Only when the john-crew was organized and out did Colonel Warrant turn to his other priorities, assessing the ship and planning food delivery. He spoke to the other ship’s crew and military men and women after a brief discussion with the Festival’s last Second Officer.
“We will need to break up into teams. Because of the ship’s size and decentralization of food and key equipment, we will split by area. We are going to do this fast, but we are going to do this thoroughly and get it right. We’ll need information on damage, fires, communications equipment, power, remaining lifeboat capacity, other passengers onboard, and of course, food.”
He scanned the quiet group. “First of all, who here has the faintest goddamn idea about ships’ engines?”
Nobody answered.
“Alright. Who thinks they can figure it out?”
“We have scuba gear,” one of the Festival’s officers said. “Maybe someone could check out the propellers and get an idea how bad the hull is.”
“The bridge is gone,” another man said. “How could we sail even if we had power and propellers?”
“You can control the ship from the power room,” the Second Officer said. “You just can’t see.”
“Alright,” Colonel Warrant said to the officer who had mentioned the scuba gear. “Do you dive? Well, find four divers, and if you need men to lower them, take men for that too. Check the propellers, what the hell, take your time and check the whole goddamn ship. For God’s sake, make sure you’ve got a way back onboard. Good luck. Okay, what’s next? Right, who thinks they can figure out if the power room is salvageable?”
His assessment teams under way, the Colonel finally turned to food. Fortunately, there were a number of galley crew there: the Executive Chef, the saucier, the roast cook, the assistant butcher, several waiters and busboys, beverage managers, bartenders and stewards.
It wouldn’t be easy, the Colonel was told: they had half their staff to prepare food, with no power, for double the crowd. So Hesse recruited more cooks, servers and dishwashers and Colonel Warrant sent another team off to work.
After his morphine round, Travis set up the blood clinic, calling for donors from the O-negatives. Occasionally, as the assessment teams left, the Colonel or some other among them would call for volunteers. One time he asked for helpers to bring food down. A few dozen lined up to give blood. It was then still before 8:30, but Travis was conscious of his own hunger as he heard that complaint repeated around the room. He looked towards his son and Corrina occasionally and was happy to see Claude Bettman had stayed near them.
After this, Travis worked with the doctors. He joined up with the sad man. His face now showed some relief in the distraction of broken bodies, his stock in trade. But he needed help. He had to amputate a foot.
The doctor’s name was Joel Conrad. He was also a New York refugee. A cardiac surgeon from King’s County Hospital, he and Travis began their acquaintance by naming mutual friends from New York hospitals. After a few minutes, that talk tailed off as they each realized they might be talking of dead men and women. He was a good doctor, Travis could see that as they worked. Now he could see his face, not hidden in a women’s lap, not disfigured with emotion. Conrad was a handsome man, with fine grey hair still somehow holding its part after all they’d been through. His face was tan, like some of the tourists on the Festival, which had initially sailed from Florida.
After the amputation, blood spattered on their shirt sleeves, they treated a burn victim. The patient’s husband cleared his throat and kneeled down so that his face was level with Travis and Conrad’s.
“Doctor. Do you think we’ll survive?”
Travis looked to Conrad as if to offer whatever support he could, but Conrad answered calmly, looking up at the man after his first few words.
“Why shouldn’t we?” Dr. Conrad said. “We have everything we need here. Surely we can live with some diminished electricity long enough to be rescued.”
The man seemed to be looking for more than an answer to the question he’d asked. He waited a moment after Conrad spoke and then continued.
“What if no one knows about us? What if it takes…”
“Then we’ll have to wait. Days or weeks,” Conrad said. “Remember that whatever we have suffered here, we are still alive. We still have this freshly stocked luxury ship to support us, and each other to get us through. I can assure you that there are many, perhaps hundreds of thousands, who are worse off than us. We escaped the flood.”
Travis saw Conrad grimace as he said those last words, but he let the impression go.
There was an injured girl. She had her family there, and the mother and brother were crying. The injury was less serious than it looked. Her clothes were bloodstained, but the loss of blood was not substantial, and Travis felt pride at seeing her hooked up to one of the newly donated bags of blood. He was distracted, so that only when they finished with the patient did he get a good look at Conrad’s face again. The doctor stood looking away, taking a momentary breather. The ugliness contorting his face had returned, and Travis thought: it’s guilt.
Sometime after noon, assessment teams began returning, conferring with John Hesse and Colonel Warrant. Then one team came, triumphantly, with food. Seven men and women came in with six-foot carts, carrying stacks of covered trays. Quickly the proud looks of those bringing the food turned. They were swarmed before they could penetrate the room.
Hesse jumped up onto the bar.
“Everybody! Please listen! There is plenty of food for everybody! But not all at once. The team getting the food will return to the galleys and prepare more cartloads, but there is not nearly enough here right at this moment for everyone – so why don’t we have the kids eat first, and anyone who absolutely feels sick?”
“Why don’t we just go down to the kitchen and get food ourselves?” someone called.
“The galley can’t operate with hundreds of us pouring in there. Please, give these people a chance to bring the food in.”
There was a lot of screaming.
“Who are you to tell us we can’t go up and get food ourselves?”
Hesse waited for quiet. In standing there above the others, his own patience was so visible it made the crowd quiet because they wanted to hear his response.
“Please!” a new voice screamed, a woman’s.
Travis saw. It was the mother of the girl on deck yesterday.
“This man saved my girl,” she said. “Please listen to him.”
Hesse cut in quickly to the space that followed her words.
“Guys, we are in a tough situation here and we all know it. Until we get all the assessment teams back, we really won’t know what kind of shape we’re in at all. But I can tell you one thing – if we choose to act now through chaos it will certainly be a lot worse. We have survived two disasters right now, but if we give in to fear and panic we will create a disaster of our own that we may not survive. Please. Back away from the food carts. We’ll call for kids first in a moment when they’re ready. We’ll have more food down here within an hour, and hopefully they’ll get power to the stoves. We have right now lots of bread, cold cuts, cheeses and fruits. Our cooks will get more sophisticated as we go. We may not even have enough food here on the next round, but be assured, we will feed you. No one’s ever gone hungry on a cruise ship.”
One of the men who had led an assessment team came right up to Hesse and tugged at the hem of his jeans. Hesse came down to him. The tension in the crowd dissipated; the food servers were left to set up, though many stood close by watching and watching the others doing the same.
“There are others,” the man said to Hesse.
“I know,” Hesse said. “Some of the groups have found families hiding out or locked in their rooms. They’ve been telling them to come down here. If anyone needs medical attention where they are, tell the doctor.”