21
SANFORD FRIEDMAN
Clara greeted them with a barrage of communiques. "Miz Wolfe!
Miz Wolfe! Disaster! Catastrophe! Worst ever! Five hundred drown–
ed: women 'n children. Right down here, here in our own back–
yard, right off Seaside! Ocean liner, comin' home from Trinidad:
burnin' and drownin'-flames a hundred foot high-"
"The
Conte di Savoia?"
Mommy exclaimed, clapping her hand
to her breathless bosom.
"Now, Hattie, don't get hysterical. Your father isn't due back
from Europe for another week. Anyway, she said it was coming
from Trinidad, not Naples." Daddy turned back to Clarry. "What's
its name?"
"Name, Mr. Wolfe?"
"The name of the ship."
"I think the radio man say it called
Tomorrow's Castle."
... I knew it! Stephen thought.
Tomorrow's Castle
struck by
lightning in the night and burning on the beach. Flames a hundred
feet high, burning women and children, burning the wall marked
WOMEN with children inside: bur.ning-but not the MEN . . .
Tomorrow's Castle
battered by the waves, wearing-it-away waves,
washing-it-away waves--all of my constructions drowning and burn–
ing in the waves of MEN with children inside . . . "I knew it!"
Stephen exclaimed intensely.
"You don't know anything, stupid!" Roggie said in his most
superior manner.
"As
usual, Clara's got it wrong. The name of
the ship is the
Morro Castle,
capital M-o-r-r-o, not t-o-m-o-r-r-"
"That's my little professor," Daddy said proudly.
"Oh, I've heard of that! It goes on Caribbean cruises. Thank
God it's not the
Savoia,"
Mommy sighed.
"The number of dead
is
estimated at two hundred-fifty, not
five hundred," Roggie continued. "It was coming back from Havana,
not Trinidad, and it's anchored off a place called Shark River
Inlet, not Seaside. May I have my eggs now?"
"How do you happen to know all that, Roger dear?" Mommy
asked, as a deflated Clarry slunk from the room.
"I heard it on the radio before the rest of you were up. Did
you think I was telepathetic?" Roggie's insolence made Daddy chuckle.
"Don't
be
fresh, Roger! And don't you encourage him Saul."
