A/N 2/15/2020: Hey guys, I thought I'd go back over this story and check for spelling issues and whatnot as I added another chapter. I don't usually do that, but I was also having date issues with the original time line, so I went back through and did a bit of research for dates and altered them a bit. I hope you still like the story, and like it even more with the subtle differences I made to it. Thank you for being so patient with me. Much love ~Angel
Brock and Lewis waited until the helicopter, now carrying the recently deceased Rose Calvert, was completely out of sight before they turned to go back inside to catalog what they had already brought topside and give orders for everything to be packed up. Brock was dejected at the knowledge the diamond was well and truly lost now. There was just no way he could find it alone, separated from the hip at the bottom of the ocean after Rose had dropped it the previous night.
"Mr. Lovett?" came the voice of a young man. Lewis and Bock turned to see said young man dressed smartly in light gray dress pants, a crisply pressed white shirt, and black shined shoes, and carrying an old leather bound book. The ensemble was set off rather nicely by his jet black hair, brown eyes, and a confident but kind smile.
But it was the bright blue diamond, set in a simple thick wedding band on his right ring finger that drew Brock's eye. The entire ensemble itself screamed money, but Brock, who studied jewelry relentlessly over the past 5 years to find the Heart of the Ocean, knew that that particular design was from around the 1920's give or take. Which spoke of old money.
"Yes? I'm sorry, I didn't realize anyone came with the chopper, Mr.-?" he trailed off as he stepped forward and offered his hand.
"Hockley. Caledon Hockley. I was named for my grandfather; and I believe you are searching for something that once belonged to my family?" the young man asked, still smiling, but with a mischievous look in his eye.
Brock shook his head. "Not any more, Mr. Hockley. If that is really who you are," he said, not entirely believing the boy was who he said he was, though shocked that he knew the name. "I'm afraid that the diamond is now at the bottom of the Atlantic, dropped by the now dead crazy old bat that just left the ship." Bock gestured towards the direction the helicopter left in.
The young man began laughing. Full belly, doubled over laughter. "She- she dropped it into the-," he managed to get out before his laughter redoubled. It took him quite a few minutes for him to regain his composure as Brock and Lewis stood there with bewildered looks on their faces.
Still snickering, young Hockley straightened himself, before finally speaking again. "Did the aforementioned crazy old bat tell you her story of woe?"
"She did. I was quite the story," Brock said. "Your ancestor was not painted in a favorable light, if you are indeed related."
Young Hockley's smile faded a bit, his eyes softening, and he shook his head. "I would advise, that you listen to both sides of the story before making a final decision," he said before holding up the book he was holding.
Brock stepped forward and took the book. He opened it to see that it was a journal. Turning to a marked page, he saw that it was dated the morning of April 10th, 1912.
"What is this?" he asked.
"This-," Hockley said with a sigh, "Is my grandfather's journal. Caledon Hockley, son of Nathan Hockley." Brock flipped through the rest of the book and saw something that puzzled him. There were entries from the 1930's. The last was even dated in June of 1932.
"This book has entries from the '30's. But Rose said that your grandfather committed suicide in 1929, after the Crash," he said, looking up from the journal.
"Remember, you have to hear both sides to make an informed decision," Hockley said as he took the book back. "I'm surprised at you, Mr. Lovett. A scientist taking the word of a woman without checking his facts? A Hockley did shoot himself in 1929, but it was my great-grandfather Nathan. He didn't invest his fortune wisely and immediately felt the impact of the Depression. My grandfather, however, at the behest of my grandmother, invested some of his funds in the movie industry. And when the government turned to those who owned a large amount of land to help employ those out of work, and bring up the lacking agricultural market, my grandfather stepped in and took a stipend from the government to allow some of his fields to be cultivated with trees to help with the erosion caused by over farming."
"This man sounds like a completely different man compared to the dick Rose spoke about," Lewis put in eloquently. Hockley chuckled at his brashness.
"Grand-dad does mention Rose had a flare for the dramatic. It was probably why she did so well on the silver screen. Would you like to hear the story from his point of view. It may offer you more answers to questions you didn't even know you had."
Brock and Lewis looked at each other before Brock nodded and motioned for the young man to follow them to the artifacts room. Hockley looked over everything they had gathered, stopping for a while at the drawing of Rose. Before he sighed and turned towards the seat framed by the screens, showing the shots from the submersibles. He quietly opened the journal to the page he had previously marked, and looked up.
"You must understand that while the story of those that died and lost loved ones to the sinking is tragic, this is my favorite story. It's my favorite, because it tells how my grandparents met. And they went through hell to be together." He looked down at the book and began reading.
Early Morning, April 10, 1912
It is both fallacy and folly to believe that the predominate emotion a man can feel is possessiveness. It is a sad truth of this modern society that men hold the upper hand in all things, but to be snubbed for even just trying to understand your intended, after seeing and heeding all hints to do so, stirs one part anger, one part failure, and one part resignation within me. I give in to her every whim hoping that she would at least try to make this imminent union work, but she seems content to watch me dance her fool's dance for nothing more than her amusement.
Today, we set sail on the Titanic. Another whim I paid an outrageous sum for. She wanted first class ticket. This I have no problem with, I am personally about to afford such a ticket for myself, Rose, and her mother, without my father's aide. What vexes me, is that she insisted on the most expensive cabins. A set of suites with a private promenade deck shared with the neighboring suite, which was booked by the well known Cardeza family. I reserved one of those for Rose and her mother, since it only has the two rooms, and a simple first class berth for myself plus the cost of meals and the like.
It is known as the Ship of Dreams. I occasionally hear from Rose that it is nothing more than a slave ship. I wonder if she has had to work a day in her life to actually appreciate what she has. The wealth that she is taking for granted. Of course such views weren't stated until Mr. Lovejoy joined our voyage. Given his history in law enforcement, she is adamant that he is there to ensure I don't stray too far into the seedy night life. In truth, I asked my father, to whom Mr. Lovejoy has been a valet for these past 10 years, if he could be spared to ensure it was she, who didn't stray. In all honesty, I hope she does so that I have an excuse to end this farce of a union my father has foisted upon me. We are wealthy, to be sure, but the DeWitt Bukater's have the long standing name to get Hockley Steele in with some of the wealthiest business men on the European continent.
Imagine, one day, being told you must find a wife, to ensure the continuation of the Hockley name, and then not long after, told by your father that it was he that had found and secured a proper match for you. In truth, I had been looking for a wife, and was well on my way to asking the young woman I had been courting to marry me. I did love her.
My beautiful Isobel. Her father is a lumber magnate out west, and she had been in Philadelphia with him on business. We had run into each other at a baseball game, of all things. It seems, being raised by a single father had influenced her tastes a bit too much for her governess's liking. Oh how my dear Isobel loved tormenting Miss. Platt and vexing her old world ways.
Isobel values honesty above all things. So I told her the truth. How I had been working up the nerve to ask both her and her father for her hand, and how my own had railroaded me into marrying a girl I did not know, and was more likely to suit his tastes than mine. She cried, obviously. I had broken her heart. She asked why I didn't just go against my father, and I had to admit, that while the thought was appealing, Nathan Hockley is still my father. I asked her how easily she herself could give up her own and that was the end of it, for we both knew that she loved her father too much to do such a thing.
We parted on good terms, but more and more lately, I have been thinking about where I would be now had I actually turned my back on my father and family to marry the woman I loved. We might be set up comfortably in Washington with a child. A daughter with her eyes and bright smile. A son with my hair and love of business. Of course I would never force any child of mine into a career they want, but what parent doesn't think of their child's possible future. No sense on dreaming of such things now, though, is there. I am lock into an overly prolonged engagement with a viper, and by this point, Isobel is in all probability married. Possibly to that young Jacob chap she had said was a good friend, or the son of the new doctor in her town.
Rose says that the Titanic is a slave ship, and on this point, I can't help but agree with her. I wonder though, who is the slave. Her? Or me?
o0o o0o o0o
The pier was in chaos as passengers and their loved ones either boarded the Titanic or were saying their farewells. Young Isobel and her father, Charles, had been on holiday in London, when they had heard of the new grand luxury ship that was to set sail on her maiden voyage to New York. Charles, who had brought his daughter overseas to help mend her heart after having it twice shattered, the first by Caledon Hockley, whose hand had been forced by his father, and the second time by that little shit, if you'll pardon the vulgar language, of a doctor's son Edward. Who had decided to keep his family wealth in the family by marrying his cousin Tanya. For God's sake, the boy was a doctor's son! Surely he knew the dangers of inbreeding. Tanya was, after all, his first cousin.
So it was, nearly two years since Caledon had broken ties with dignity, and six months on the heels of that shit, pardon the vulgarity, Edwin? Edmund? Edgar? had publicly humiliated his little girl, Charles had thought it a capital idea to start the first leg of their journey home in comfort. They had met many influential people. Among them, Sigmund Freud, who had been on holiday and gathering information on his new theory. Isobel and Charles had a lot of fun giving their points of view on the matter. And the wonderful Lady Duff-Gordon, who had informed the two of the voyage, and who herself would travel aboard with her husband. The wonderful lady had designed many a gown just for Isobel, stating that the young girl was the perfect combination of beauty and brains. They spent a week in each other's constant company designing the gowns and choosing colors.
Charles had obtained two first-class berthings for himself and his daughter just days before, it was a small miracle he was able to. He was dressed smartly in s black three piece business suit, his shoes gleaming brightly as they were freshly polished, while she was wearing a modest lavender ankle length skirt with a matching long jacket with stripped cuffs over a black blouse that just came up to her collar bones. With this she was wearing a pair of traveling gloves and a straw hat as modestly decorated as the rest of her ensemble.
Charles sighed at the colors she had chosen. It had taken a good long while to get her to wear anything but mourning black. After all, she had only known the Cullen boy for maybe seven months. When he pressed her about it, she said she wasn't mourning his loss so much as the loss of her belief in love. After all, twice now had the man she loved left her for another. Even if one was unwilling to do so.
Isobel gasped at her first sight of the ship. It was indeed magnificent and beautiful. A true feat of human ingenuity. Charles heard the incessant sound of a horn blowing, and turned to see three Model-T's pushing their way through the crowd. He rolled his eyes at the entitlement of some of, those people with means and turned his attention once again to his daughter as she marveled the ship that would take them home to the States.
"What do you think? Will it do to carry us home?" he asked with a gleam in his eye.
"Will it do? Dad this is a floating palace!" she said brightly.
Charles laughed. "Then what do you say to boarding this palace home?" he asked before turning to his valet and her lady's maid. "Please, see that our things are taken to suites C-17 and 18."
Isobel smiled at her father. He was the kindest and most giving man she had ever known. He always said that it was just good business to treat your employees right if you want to get good service out of them, but she knew that he truly cared what happed to those who worked for them. He even paid for them to have second class berthings.
Charles turned back to Isobel and offered his arm, as they boarded the great unsinkable ship on her very first voyage.
o0o o0o o0o
Those three Model-T's that had so ostentatiously pushed their way through the crowd, turned out to be carrying Caledon Hockley, his fiancé, Rose DeWitt Bukater, and her Mother Ruth as they made their late entrance to the port. Caledon was in a mood, since both women insisted on dressing just right for the voyage. When he asked Lovejoy why they didn't just wake up earlier to accommodate as any other person in the world, the valet just shrugged his shoulders.
However, once Cal got his first look at the ship that would be taking him most of the journey home, he was in awe. And he had another one of those moments where he wondered what his dearest Isobel would have thought of the ship.
"I don't see what all the fuss is about," Rose said with a superior tone, turning to Cal as she ensured her overly large purple hat with an equally large outrageous stripped bow, didn't get in the way of her speaking. "It doesn't look any bigger than the Mauritania."
"You can be blasé about some things, Rose, but not about Titanic. It's over 100 feet longer than Mauritania," he admonished her with a half excited half frustrated tone. "And far more luxurious. Your daughter is far too difficult to impress, Ruth."
Ruth laughs softly as he helps her out of the car. The feathers in her had as distracting as the bow in her daughter's. He wanted to add in her deficiencies of character in that statement as well, but held his tongue.
"So this is the ship they say is unsinkable," Ruth mused as she walked to join her daughter.
"Sir. Sir- Sir!" said a porter for the ship over Cal's affirmations to Ruth.
"It is unsinkable. God Himself could not sing this ship- What?" Cal asked, impatient.
"You have to check your baggage through the main terminal. It's round that way, sir," he said importantly as Cal nodded and dug into his pocked for a 20 pound note.
"I put my faith in you good sir. Now kindly see my man," he said, gesturing to Lovejoy.
"Oh, yes sir! My pleasure, sir! If I can do anything at all-," but the overly thankful porter was distracted by Lovejoy, who gently pulled him by the shoulder.
"Yes, right," Lovejoy said, leading the man. "All the trunks from that car there. The twelve from here. And the safe, to the parlour suite rooms B-52,54,56," he said, double checking the ticket.
Caledon checked his pocket watch for the time and turned to the women. "Ladies, we better hurry. Come along," he ordered as the maid, Trudy, grabbed the rest of their carry ons.
"My coat?" Rose asked Trudy in worry.
"I have it, miss," the able bodied maid answered.
They passed the line for the third class health inspections and followed Ruth, who lead the way up the passenger loading ramp, like a queen leading her entourage. As they entered, Ruth broke off to ensure their names were counted among those aboard as Cal and Rose passed her. As he boarded, Cal could have sworn he had caught faint traces of a long missed, never forgotten scent. The scent of orange-blossoms. He shook his head and focused once more on finding their rooms. There was no way his Beloved would be here in England. She loved her home and the towering trees more than anything and wouldn't leave unless absolutely necessary. Certainly not to travel on a ship. Poor Isobel got seasick.