Read Online Titanic: April 1912 by Kathleen Duey - Free Book Online Page B

trunk someone had left behind. “Wait for me, please,” she said, and ran back the way they had come.
    Gavin stood, staring as she slid to stop in front of cabin eighty-nine. She began beating on the door, calling out for someone named Emily. When the door opened, her voice quieted, and he couldn’t understand what she was saying.
    â€œThat’s our trunk,” a sharp-toned woman’s voice startled him from above. He faced the stairs. Without another word, two women positioned themselves and began dragging the trunk upward.
    â€œI have to wait for someone,” Gavin said apologetically, “or I’d help you.” Neither of them acknowledged him. It wasn’t until they were nearly out of sight that he realized one of them had taken Karolina’s life belts. He shouted, but it did no good.
    Gavin saw Karolina hurrying toward him.
    She banged on every door she passed. “The ship is sinking!” she yelled, over and over. People stepped out into the corridor in their nightclothes, blinking, half-awake. Gavin saw a man he recognized as a pantry­man going from one family to the next, talking earnestly. Gavin picked up Karolina’s case and followed her up the stairs.
    If they were lucky, they would get to the boat deck in time. He could get Karolina and her aunt into one of the lifeboats. Then he would have to find a life belt for himself. He refused to think further than that.
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    Karolina wanted to run up the stairs, but she couldn’t. The case was too heavy. Gavin reached to help her. “Two women took your life belts before I could stop them,” he said. Karolina blinked, feeling her stomach tighten. “I know where they are kept,” Gavin assured her. “I can get more.”
    â€œKarolina!”
    She turned back and saw Emily blinking in the bright corridor lights below. Her hair was loose, her nightgown hastily covered with a robe. She held the front of it closed so tightly that her knuckles were white.
    â€œKarolina? Did you see where Davey went?”
    Karolina shook her head helplessly. “Wasn’t he in the stateroom just now?”
    Emily pushed her hair back out of her face, glancing around, her eyes wide with anxiety. “Yes, but you know how he is. Oh, God. I have to find him.” She spun back around.
    Gavin leaned closer. “Who’s Davey? Her son?”
    â€œHe’s only four,” Karolina told Gavin. “He loves to run off.”
    â€œWhere could he have gone so quickly?” Emily wailed.
    Karolina looked at Gavin. “I should go help her look for him.”
    Gavin nodded. “I’ll watch your things. But hurry. I don’t know how much time we have.”
    Karolina set down her case and ran back down the half flight of stairs. Emily was almost all the way back to her stateroom before Karolina caught up.
    â€œHe couldn’t have gone very far,” Karolina said as Emily pulled the door open. Little Rebecca was still asleep on her berth.
    â€œOh, why does he have to do this?” Emily said in a tight, frightened voice.
    Karolina took her hand. “We’ll find him, don’t worry.”
    Emily turned back into the corridor, closing the door carefully. Her eyes flickered to one side, then the other. “I can’t believe he got past me. I was just so sleepy—and then all of a sudden I realized he was gone.”
    â€œYou go that way,” Karolina said, pointing. “I’ll take the other way.” Emily nodded and checked the door to make sure it was solidly closed. Then she started off, turning left down the main passage.
    Karolina walked quickly in the other direction, then almost immediately slowed as she passed stateroom sixty-one’s open door. “Davey?” She peered inside. “Hello,” she said to the couple standing beside their berth. “I was just—”
    â€œWhat do you want?” the man