Page 21 - Titanic: The Untold Tale of Gay Passengers and Crew

Titanic 7

Edward was evening the score for my teasing him. “You
already know her, but her name this time is Michael.” He
pointed at me.
“Then, Michael,” Molly said, “I add you to the list of
royalty of my recent acquaintance.”
“Queen Michael,” Edward said, working his vengeance
on me for laughing at Molly’s dubbing him “Eddy Weddy.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” I said. “No man should ever be
called a queen.”
“Some men should,” Edward said.
Molly pealed with laughter. I’d have punched her, but she
was a suffragette and I heard they punched back.
“May this then,” Edward said, raising his glass in a cham-
pagne toast, “be the start of a great tradition.” He grinned.
“To Queen Michael!”
“I’ll drink to that,” Molly said. “To Queen Michael.”
Decorum overcame my anger at the feminine suggestion.
In America, I had worked since boyhood to make my gestures
and voice as masculine as my body, and found in England
less pressure for a comfortable compromise. “Ha!” I said,
“Ah-ha!” I lifted my own glass. No better way to squelch a
joke than to join it. “To Queen Michael,” I said, “and don’t
you, my subjects, forget it.” I snatched Molly’s diamond tiara
from her head and crowned myself. They all laughed.
“Keep it,” Molly said. “That glass looks better on you
than it does on me.” “That glass” was twen ty-two 10-carat
Hapsburg dia monds. “Sooner or later everyone needs a tiara,
my dear. You may need it someday.” She put her hand on
mine. “My sweet young man, let Molly bring you luck.”
The second night out, promptly at 11, Felix led us down
five flights of backstairs to the hold. The noise of the engines,
only a purr in our stateroom, drowned out the sound way