Читать книгу Black Man on the Titanic - Serge Bile - Страница 11

April 10, 1912, was a beautiful, sunny day. A day made for traveling. For Simone, who was in raptures over everything, it felt like Christmas in April. The trip from Paris had felt like an expedition. Since the Saint-Lazare train station was only a dozen kilometers from Villejuif5, where the family lived, it took them less than an hour to get there. Simone was disappointed: the spectacle had been too short.

She was in such a hurry to climb aboard the Titanic that she rushed ahead of the group. Until a voice called to her: “Simone, rété la!” It was her father, urging her to stay with him. Whenever Joseph Laroche scolded Simone, he did so in Creole6. He raised his voice with authority, not anger. Simone did not always know what the Creole words meant, but she understood their urgency and obeyed immediately and without fear.

Louise was not scared of Joseph Laroche either. On the contrary. She melted into her mustached father’s smiles and hugs. On that day, however, she was getting impatient in the stroller. She wanted to get out. She would have loved to walk on the dock like her sister. She stomped. She twisted and turned. “Daddy! Daddy, boat! Daddy, get down! Daddy, boat!” Louise exclaimed, a typical toddler begging to explore the ship. She loved being taken around like this. She showed it with a blissful smile that disappeared as soon as the stroller ride was over. The baby carriage was Louise’s “little car,” joked her mother, who later told her what little she could remember about that time.

Three months earlier, when her father had announced his decision to return to the faraway country of his birth, his wife and children in tow, Simone had happily welcomed the news. Not that she wanted to flee France, but she was tired of the never-ending winter. She found the cold deceptive. On the first day of April, for instance, “mild weather” had been forecast. Yet, the thermometer had bottomed out; it had snowed in Paris in the wee hours of the morning and again between ten and eleven o’clock. Simone had hated it. She loved the idea of an escape: to leave Villejuif for Cherbourg, then New York, and finally the sunny Caribbean.

By April 10, 1912, however, the milder weather was back. There were sure signs of spring, and the temperature had reached 77 degrees Fahrenheit on the banks of the Seine. Simone felt revived. It might have been worth staying, but it was too late. The two Renault AG1s had reached their destination and her father was paying the fare. Now that it was time to take the plunge and leave France for good, Simone was hesitant. She thought about her grandfather, who was staying home alone. She wondered if she would ever see him again.

However, Simone’s pout disappeared when, at the center of the Cour de Rome, she spotted Monsieur Renard, a friend of her parents, who sometimes visited their home. He had come to bid them farewell, holding two beautiful balloons. At the sight of the balloon that was intended for her, Louise started kicking and clapping vigorously. She grabbed the gift and began shaking it in all directions, giggling. But, in her excitement, she let go of the string and burst into tears when the balloon flew away. Monsieur Renard comforted her and immediately went to buy her another one.

As Monsieur Renard and the Laroches entered the Saint-Lazare station, the rush of people swallowed them. The children were in awe of the crowded Café Terminus, of the bustling platforms, of the railway men in their uniforms and the porters weighed down by suitcases. Travelers hurried to get to their cars, the women in beautiful outfits and the men with elegant top hats.

“Mom, look!” Simone said, pointing at the building’s brilliant metal frame and glass roof. She took two steps forward, two more back, stopped, and then lifted her head again as a ray of sun filled the concourse, accentuating the vastness of the place.

“Simone, rété la!” her father called when Simone let go of her mother’s hand and walked away, as she did every time something intriguing or enthralling captivated her. She could not help it: the wonders of the world were like magnets. She could not resist them! To Simone, the sights at the Saint-Lazare station were even more beautiful than the view she’d admired from the Renault AG1 taxi. She watched a locomotive chug away as big smoke clouds puffed to the sky.

Two special trains had been arranged for the Titanic. The first had set forth at 7:45 for Cherbourg, carrying 103 third-class passengers. The second one, scheduled for 9:45, would transport 161 first-class and twenty-seven second-class travelers; the Laroches belonged in that train.

On the platform, Joseph and Juliette exchanged a few more words with Monsieur Renard until, at last, it was time to depart. As the family got into the car, Simone could tell their friend had a heavy heart. The adults, she was sure, pondered one question, although no one dared voice it: When would they see each other again?

The New York Express7 was a luxury train that included a restaurant and private cabins for the wealthiest, among which was the American magnate John Jacob Astor8. Head of a financial empire and a luxury hotel chain, he was traveling with his new spouse Madeleine. In September of the year before, their marriage had shocked America. At seventeen, the young woman was a minor; her husband was forty-eight. In order to escape the scandal, the couple had left for Egypt, and later Europe, along with a valet, a housemaid, a nurse, and a dog. Now that Madeleine was ready to give birth, however, they were back in the United States. In comparison, twenty-three-year-old Joseph and twenty-two-year-old Juliette Laroche lived a simple, private life.

On board the train that reached ninety kilometers an hour, a reasonable speed, the Laroches allowed “Little Simone,” as her mother called her, the pleasure of admiring the view. An overly excited Louise had a hard time falling asleep, despite the monotonous turning of the wheels on the railway.

The Laroches did not take long to befriend the other occupants of the cab, Albert and Antonie Mallet9, a French couple who lived in Canada. Albert Mallet was unpretentious and jovial. He worked for the former mayor of Montreal, Hormidas Laporte10, who imported alcohol, tea, fruit, and spices from Europe, Asia, and the Caribbean. Mallet was in charge of the cognac orders and often traveled to Paris. He took advantage of the opportunity to bring along his wife and little boy.