Silver Knight

  Later I put on one of my two evening dresses—I had a limited wardrobe due to my many travels—choosing the creamy satin that was trimmed with chiffon and lace and had a black cummerbund of silk velvet. It draped with the remembrance of an ancient Roman goddess and was my favorite.

  I went to the first class dining salon, often referred to as the Jacobean Room. Columns in the middle of the room were embellished with Flemish scrolls, and the walls contained ornately carved panels, giving the room a decidedly formal atmosphere.

  As I entered through the double doors leading from D deck, I saw twenty, linen dressed, rather substantial, round tables in the room. All the chairs looked stiff with split spindles and carved feet. A steward came forward to show me to a table with only one remaining seat near to the captain’s table, and I wished I felt more surprised to find Alexander already there. He smiled an engaging, handsome grin as I approached.

  “Diana, good evening,” he greeted me as he stood to hold my chair out for me. Ever the gentleman until he rammed a knife in my gut, I thought somewhat bitterly.

  “Oh y’all have already met,” an older, dark haired woman sitting to his other side said.

  “Yes, we met earlier today on deck,” he answered her with a warning look at me. He made the introductions all around the table. Molly Brown sat to his left, and continuing around the circle, Harry and Lucinda Winston, and George Titan.

  “Well, where ya from dearie?” Molly asked. “I hail from Texas, and we’re big and loud there so don’t mind me none.”

  “I’m most recently from Ireland. I have family in Queenstown, and since that was Titanic’s last port of call before heading to America, I thought I would enjoy a trip on such a new and magnificent ship.”

  “Ireland? I’ve just been taking care of business in Belfast,” George said.

  “What kind of business are you in Mr. Titan?” I asked him.

  “The shipbuilding kind, but please call me George,” he smiled suggestively at me. Because I travel alone, men often think I am a certain kind of woman. I sighed. I hoped he wouldn't become a bother.

  “Well, I think because we’re on this tiny boat there’s no room for pomp, so I only call people by their first names,” Molly put in with a loud laugh. Some people from other tables looked our way, and I saw Lucinda Winston cringe slightly at what she obviously considered poor table etiquette.

  “Shipbuilding? Did you have anything to do with this lovely ship?” Lucinda Winston asked of George.

  “Yes, my company assisted in finishing many of the areas of the ship. The captain will be taking a group on a tour tomorrow if any of you are interested in joining us.”

  “I say, that sounds fascinating if it will include the bridge,” Harry put in.

  “But of course the bridge will be included.”

  As the men continued to talk about the ship and the bridge in particular, it gave me time to think about Alexander. Details were percolating up in my mind about him. The last I remembered of him, he’d burned me at the stake. We had been in England sometime in the late 1500’s. We were married, I’m not sure for how long, not more than a couple of years surely, but I knew that we’d had a child, a girl. I wondered what had become of her. Had he killed her too?

  I wasn’t afraid while we were at dinner. I mean, what could he do right there unless he tried to slip some poison in my water. I placed my glass on the opposite side from him. I could enjoy the company and conversation without fear of dying. And I did. We all agreed to go on the tour with George as we finished dinner. Alexander stood and helped me with my chair as we rose to leave and put his hand under my elbow to guide me out the door to the deck.

  The night air was cool, and I shivered slightly. He removed his dinner jacket and put it around my shoulders.

  “No, thank you, I must be getting back to my cabin,” I said trying to give it back to him, but he held it to my shoulders with his hands.

  “Nonsense. You’re just afraid to be alone with me. You don’t need to be, you know.”

  I can’t explain it, but I just felt like giving up. I was too tired to struggle so instead asked him, “What happened to Gabrielle after I…died?”

  “She never took to me, you know, and your mother, at the time, requested that Gabrielle live with her. I think she was quite happy for a time, but she lost a child and became unhinged. She was present during a fight and died while trying to protect her husband.”

  “How sad.”

  We walked quietly for a time around the deck. I expected to feel some nervousness, but there was just a calmness between us, me in his jacket and his guiding hand lightly on the small of my back. He began asking me about my travels, where I’d been and what I’d thought of the places, comparing notes as usually he’d been there as well. Before I knew it, an hour had passed, and I was yawning impolitely.

  “I must retire before I fall asleep on my feet,” I laughed in surprised.

  “I’ll escort you to your cabin,” he offered.

  “No, really it’s not necessary. Here’s your jacket. Thank you for the loan of it.” Shrugging it off, I handed it to him as we paused by the doors.

  “Very well, I wish you a good night,” he said, taking my hand and gently kissing my fingers. I could still feel the press of his lips on my hand as I crawled into bed later that night.

  The next morning I wore a light yellow, deep-V neck blouse with a cream camisole peaking out and a dark red skirt ending just at my ankles. Before going into breakfast, I headed for the Reading Room, which was located on the Upper Promenade Deck. I entered the room through a large arched opening. It was bright with sunlight streaming through the floor to ceiling windows flanked by long curtains along one wall.

  The other walls were creamy white with moldings arranged in long rectangles and squares interspersed with ornate wall sconces. Various stuffed chairs were placed along the walls. Surrounding a center column under crystal enclosed lighting, there was an encircling tufted, bench seat.

  George Titan sat facing the doorway on the bench reading a newspaper. He glanced up, smiled in welcome when he saw me, and folded his paper.

  “Good morning, Diana. It is almost time for the morning meal,” he said heartily. When Lucinda and Harry Winston also joined us, I thought, So much for a peaceful morning.

  “At ten o’clock the captain is going to escort us around the ship,” George was saying as I saw Alexander appear in the doorway, handsome in his gray, cuffed trousers and pin-stripped jacket. He looked over at me and smiled in greeting, his eyes lighting up. I couldn’t help it…I smiled back.

  At the end of breakfast, we all agreed to meet George and Captain Smith at the grand staircase an hour later. George recommended that we all wear sturdy shoes to tramp around the ship.

  After being introduced to the Captain, he began the tour by telling us such mundane details as to the tonnage and how the ship was built. I didn’t listen. Alexander and I were the last in line slightly trailing the group. He had taken my hand and put it through the crook of his arm leaving one hand on mine. He then began amusing me by giving me fake details in a whisper close to my ear.

  “And here we have a hand carved deck chair that only holds one ton. Look closely and you will see the weight restriction sign stating ‘No Fatheads: George get off.’”

  “Sshhh,” I held my finger to my mouth trying to hush him but also trying to stifle my giggles. George was pretty full of himself and annoyingly condescending. “This is serious.”

  Later as we passed one of the lifeboats on the way to the bridge, Harry began asking questions about them.

  “There are twenty lifeboats situated on the ship,” the captain told him.

  “Which boat would we go to if there were an emergency?” Lucinda asked.

  “Not to worry, my dear, this ship was built so that it would not sink. In fact, we reduced the number of lifeboats from thirty to twenty because they would have uselessly cluttered up the decks.”

  “How many peop
le can actually fit in a lifeboat?” Harry asked.

  “That depends on the particular lifeboat. Some of them hold up to seventy.”

  “But even if you counted seventy per boat, that would only hold 1400 people. Aren’t there over two thousand on board?” George asked. Maybe not such a fathead, I looked at Alexander with a smirk and he lifted one shoulder in response.

  “The lifeboat capacity is actually 1,178 people,” the captain responded.

  “But that means there aren’t enough lifeboats,” Lucinda glanced worriedly at Harry.

  “Not to worry, my dear, this ship is absolutely unsinkable!” The captain reassured us as we entered the bridge.

  After that first evening and the tour, I seemed to run into Alexander wherever I went. Was it planned? He was an amusing companion, intelligent, eager to please, and if I hadn’t known better, I would have said that he was courting me. We ate every meal together, walked, danced, and talked. Oh my how we talked. And I gradually lost my fear of him. I just decided that if he killed me, so be it. I wasn’t going to worry about anything for the moment. It felt good to live without fear. It felt wonderful not to have to hide what I did. I didn’t have to lie about where I lived, my family or lack thereof. I felt comfortable. I felt like I had come home—not home to a place but to a person.

  Then late in the evening of April 14, 1912, I opened my eyes to a muted light shining from a lamp. The last thing I remembered was sitting next to Alexander on the sofa in his suite after dinner. We had sat for a time on the private promenade deck attached to his sitting room. His bedroom was entered through the door next to the fireplace across from where we were on the sofa. There was also a table and chairs that had easily accommodated our lively game of Rook earlier in the evening with Lucinda and Harry Winston. The wall next to the deck was full of large windows, hidden by lush velvet drapes at the moment, protecting us from the misty darkness.

  Now I appeared to be lying on the sofa with him, his arms around me and my head on his shoulder. As I looked up at his face, he smiled and gently pressed his lips to mine. “Have a nice nap?”

  “Yes, thank you,” I replied a little breathlessly. He lazily moved his hand up and down my arm, gently rubbing.

  “Where are you going when you get to America?” he wanted to know, as I looked back down at his shirt.

  “I’m not sure yet. I’ll decide when I get there,” I said. Depression creept around the edges of my mind, thinking that I had a demon to track as soon as we arrived.

  “I’ve bought a house in New York on Third Street,” he said. “Stay with me there.”

  “I can’t stay with you.” Completely caught off guard by his suggestion, reality reared its ugly head.

  “Why not?” Of course, I’d lived with him in the past. Married, in fact. We’d had children together. But somehow it just seemed different now. I pushed at his arms and sat up in agitation.

  “Because…because I would have to be traveling about. Look, you know what I do. Do you expect me to live with you, go off to kill your brethren, and then come back? That is, if I survive. Would you be okay with that?”

  “You never left before.”

  “I never had the chance. You always killed me.” He flinched at the harshness of my tone. I sighed. “At any rate, it’s really only been the past couple of hundred years or so that I’ve really moved about which I guess is because transportation has become more accessible. But my point is that I feel compelled to go, and I go. That’s why I’m headed to America now.”

  “I will go with you then.” He said it with such conviction I almost laughed, but it wasn’t the least bit funny.

  “You can’t.”

  “What I can’t do is lose you again.” My breath caught at his words.

  “You never lost me, Alexander, you killed me,” I said softly. I sat back down next to him, and he took my hand in both of his.

  “I can’t begin to describe what my life has been like since that last time. Such a very long time this last gap between our meetings has been. I have been searching for you—always waiting…always lonely. Think, Diana, on any one of those occasions through the couple of thousand years that we have come together, I could have taken your soul and ended this cycle. Instead, I was infuriated. I wanted to punish you for being a warrior…I never wanted to completely destroy you. I always wanted you. I wanted you to come back to me.”

  I was shocked at his blatant admission, not able to take my eyes from his face, thinking of all the pain he’d caused me but also knowing that there had been moments of sweetness.

  “I was arrogant. Selfish. I waited for your next incarnation with anticipation. It was a game to me. A challenge. Would I recognize you? Would you know me? If you didn’t, could we be together? Would you try to kill me? Would you succeed finally? But mostly I waited to see that look in your eyes when you discovered that you loved me. No one has ever looked at me like that except you. You see every bad thing about me and yet you still love me,” he paused looking at me intently. “I’ve missed you, your company, your wit and intellect, your humor but most of all, your love. I will never kill you again, Diana. I love you. I always have.”

  Before I could respond to his astounding declaration, the ship lurched severely and shuddered, knocking us from the sofa onto the floor. “We’ve struck something,” he said as he helped me up. We could hear people opening doors in the hall inquiring about what had happened. And I knew. I knew that I was not to be given any kind of a chance at a life with him this go around. He must have realized what I was thinking and said, “No.”

  “Look, Alexander, I appreciate your honesty. You know that I have loved you in the past and, quite frankly, I still do.” I smiled gently at him, putting my palm along side his cheek. “Yes, I see the good in you, not just the bad. Everyone has a balance of darkness and light in their hearts. Some scales are weighted more on one side than the other. And it has seemed to me each time we were together that the balance of your scale was shifting away from the dark. Each time you were kinder, happier, and more eager to share the world with yourself as well as others. But my lives have become very grim.” I shook my head with regret.

  “I rarely make it to my thirtieth birthday. It is not my lot to be happy I don’t think. In fact, what would you like to bet that this ship is about to sink…me with it?” I asked with, strangely enough, a faint taste of ash in my mouth and sense of dread in my heart.

  “Don’t be ridiculous. There are lifeboats.”

  “But I can’t take a place in one. I know my fate, Alexander.” I felt a little sick to my stomach. I hated dying.

  “I’ve just found you again. I’m not letting you go down with the ship, if it does go down.” His jaw clenched with determination.

  “What about you? Are you going to take a place in a lifeboat?” I was curious because I didn’t understand his survival capabilities. I knew of only one way to kill him…with silver. He’d been alive, apparently unchanging, for thousands of years. So would he drown? Would he freeze? What would actually happen to him?

  “No, I could hang on to the side of the boat you were in so that we would be together.”

  “Well, from our tour of the ship with the captain, we both know that there are more people on board than there are places in the lifeboats. I will be reborn. My life will continue another time.”

  “No,” he was shaking his head in denial. “I might not find you again for centuries. We must stay together this time.” He grabbed my shoulders and gave me a little shake. He was definitely angry thinking I was just being stubborn. He pulled me to the closet and got out the life preservers for us to put on, and then we went out into the corridors. Apparently others had the same idea, and we followed them up onto the deck to get the news.

  There wasn’t any panic initially, but as it became apparent that the ship actually was going to go down, people started fighting for the lifeboats. Finally accepting my decision to remain on board, Alexander and I went to the quiet alcove where he h
ad seen me that first day and stood quietly holding each other, my head on his shoulder.

  “I will maintain my house in New York from now on. If you don’t survive this, then when you remember, find me there.” I smiled at him and traced his face lightly with my fingertips. In this life I remembered many of my former lives but knew that it was not always so. In some of my incarnations, I didn’t remember much of anything. I think it’s so that I could have a respite from the constant bloodshed and fear. He didn’t seem to be able to take his eyes from my face, and he leaned down to kiss me once more…possibly for the last time. It was filled with need and left me with a sad yearning sensation.

  “Will you do me a favor?” I asked quietly. “I can’t…I mean I am unable to…I am really not looking forward to drowning or freezing particularly. Would you please…just one more time?”

  “No,” he groaned just barely loud enough for me to hear. He understood what I was really asking and squeezed me so tightly breathing became difficult. “I just promised you that I would never again—besides what if we’re rescued before the ship goes down?”

  “We’ll wait then until there is no doubt. But please, don’t let me suffer. Please grant me mercy. Please.” I knew it was hitting below the belt to bring up mercy but it got the job done, and he nodded with sorrow in his eyes once more.

  * * * *

  The Present

  I woke up with Maggie shaking my shoulder as we approached New York.

  “Oh my God, Mags, I actually asked him to kill me the last time!” She didn’t even ask me what I was talking about.

  “What happened?” Her eyes were huge with shock as I hurriedly told her the story. “What are you going to do?” she asked when I’d finished.

  “Ha, go home. Actually have an eighteenth birthday in a few weeks and then finish high school.” I felt kind of let down with my little list but, hey, I wasn’t crazy. Even though that scene had played out the way it had, it didn’t mean that he had really been serious. Or was really serious. Except for the fact that he’d saved my life in Rome. Twice. But still, even the times when we had been together, after a short while he’d ended up killing me.