IT HAS TO BE YOU
Chapter Six
Rose paced around
the tiny servant’s room for hours, until she finally collapsed on the narrow
bed, exhausted. No one had come to let her out, or to bring her any news of
what was happening outside. She didn’t even have any food, and her stomach
growled hungrily.
Finally, early in
the evening, a stewardess opened the door with a tray. Eagerly, Rose jumped up
and rushed forward, but the stewardess quickly set the tray just inside the
door and slipped back out, closing it behind her.
"Wait!"
Rose called. "Let me out! Please!"
"I’m sorry,
Miss, but I can’t do that. Your fiancé and your mother explained that you’d
suffered a nervous breakdown because of the trauma of the sinking, and you
aren’t to be let out until we dock." The stewardess’s voice was fearful,
as though Rose would burst through the locked door and attack her.
"They’re
lying! I have not suffered a nervous breakdown! I’m just fine! Now, please, let
me out!" Rose’s voice was growing hysterical, which did nothing to
convince the stewardess of her sanity.
"No, Miss.
This is for your own safety."
A moment later,
Rose heard footsteps walking away. Frustrated, she stomped back to the bed,
ignoring the tray on the floor.
"Damn you,
Cal! How dare you do this to me? Is this your punishment for my wanting to be
with Jack? To not only lock me in a small room, but also to ruin my
reputation?"
Rose rolled over,
staring at the floor. The scent of food from the tray tempted her, reminding
her of how hungry she was, but she wouldn’t put it past Cal to have had the
food drugged in order to keep her under control.
Resolutely, she
turned away, ignoring the tray and its contents, and closed her eyes. Maybe
sleep would take the edge off her hunger.
*****
Jack tossed and
turned restlessly in the infirmary, alternately coughing hard and mumbling
Rose’s name. A nurse looked at him with concern and went to find the doctor.
A moment later, the
doctor returned, examining him and shaking his head. "Pneumonia," he
told the nurse. "I’m afraid it’s going to take a few more people before
this is over."
Jack tried to take
a deep breath, then moaned in pain and clutched his chest. Breathing was
becoming difficult.
"What
treatment should he be given?" the nurse asked, looking at Jack as he
coughed again, calling for Rose.
"Aspirin for
the fever, and codeine cough syrup, both for the cough and to help him rest. In
addition, don’t let him cover himself up with blankets, and sponge his forehead
with cold water to reduce the fever. Also, put hot compresses on his chest once
the fever is down, to help with congestion."
"Yes,
Doctor." The nurse retrieved the necessary supplies and took two blankets
away from Jack, ignoring his complaints that he was cold.
"You have a
temperature of a hundred and four," she told him. "You are not
cold."
Jack just looked at
her blankly. She sighed and poured a glass of water. Helping him to sit up, she
gave him two aspirin and the glass of water.
Jack looked at the
aspirin suspiciously, not quite aware of what was going on around him. He
coughed violently, until he was light-headed, and then handed the aspirin back,
shaking his head. The fever was making him delirious.
"No, Mr.
Dawson, you have to take them. It’s just aspirin. It isn’t going to hurt
you."
"I have to go
find Rose," he mumbled. "Cal has her."
The nurse had no
idea who Rose or Cal were, but she wasn’t about to let Jack get up and wander
off. "Oh, no you don’t. You’re staying here if I have to restrain you.
Now, are you going to take those aspirin yourself, or am I going to have to
force them down your throat?"
Jack sighed, one
hand on his chest as though that would relieve the pain, and took the aspirin.
"Now, cough
syrup."
"No."
Jack shook his head violently, then commenced coughing again, a memory of his
mother giving him cough syrup surfacing in his mind. The medicine had made him
feel drugged and sleepy—something he couldn’t afford to feel if he was going to
search for Rose.
"Yes. Open
up." The nurse wasn’t listening to his protests.
"No!"
Jack struggled, sending the measuring spoon flying.
The nurse retrieved
it, cleaned it, and approached him again. Jack tried to get out of bed, but
succeeded only in falling on the floor. As he struggled to get up, a steward
approached, and with the help of the nurse, got him back into bed.
Jack still refused
to take the cough syrup, turning his head to the side and clamping his mouth
shut. Finally, the steward held him down, while the nurse pinched his nose to
get him to open his mouth. She poured the cough syrup down his throat, while
Jack struggled and choked, trying to spit it back out.
When he had finally
swallowed the prescribed dose, the nurse let him go. "You’re worse than a
child," she told him crossly, standing close to ensure that he didn’t try
to get away again.
After about twenty
minutes, the cough syrup began to take effect. The nurse nodded to the steward,
dismissing him, and began to sponge down Jack’s forehead.
"Please,"
he whispered. "I gotta go find Rose. There’s no telling what he’s gonna do
to her."
The nurse regarded
him compassionately, wondering if the Rose he was referring to had been one of
the victims of the Titanic sinking.
Shaking her head,
she told him, "I’m sure Rose will be fine. You’re in no condition to go
looking for her."
Jack barely heard
her, slipping into a doze, both from his exhaustion and illness and from the
effects of the codeine.
"Rose,"
he murmured. "Rose, please be all right."
*****
Rose awoke, her
heart pounding wildly and her whole body drenched in sweat. "Jack!"
she cried, before remembering where she was.
Slipping from the
bed, she went to the door and tried to open, forgetting for a moment that she
had been locked in.
"Jack,"
she whispered, leaning against the door. Where was he? Was he still in the
infirmary? She could have sworn that he was calling out to her, but that was
impossible. He was in steerage, she was in first class. He couldn’t have gotten
up to where she was—not with Cal on the lookout for him.
Still, she couldn’t
shake the feeling that Jack was calling to her, that he was in trouble somehow.
Fear rising within her, she stumbled over the tray of congealed food, sending
it flying across the room.
Where was Jack?
What was wrong with him? Why did she sense that he was calling out to her?
"Jack,"
she whispered, stumbling back to the bed and sitting down, drawing her knees
up. "Where are you?"