The platform descends at a walking pace past a room with benches and tables filled with passengers—third class, by the looks of them. Some stare at me dropping from the ceiling, still clinging to the car seat. Nearby, a uniformed crewman chats with a woman, his back to me. Can’t get off here. I hold my breath and wait for the platform to pass from view.

At the next level, the shaft becomes enclosed once again. I step up onto the seat, then grab the center chain. Clenching my boots around the chain, I use my legs to propel myself up, trying to climb faster than my stage is falling. The crane brakes, giving me a few precious seconds to scale higher, the chain digging into my hands. Then on it goes, rumbling to life again. I inch up, cursing my skirt for impeding my progress. Sweat blinds me. My limbs scream in anguish. I pass the large room. If anyone notices me, no one protests.

At last, the ladder appears and I hoist myself high enough to place my foot on a rung. Grabbing the ladder, my skirt tears, but at least I’m no longer headed down. I rest, catching my breath.

Then I climb, rung by rung, until sunlight kisses my face.

I peek over the framed opening. Forty feet away by the base of the crane, the sweaty crewman who had admired the Renault has pulled back his navy beret and is looking up at a seagull. No one else is on the well deck. I imagine myself as invisible as the breeze, then hook a leg over the edge. As quietly as possible, I roll onto the pine deck.

With a loud caw, the seagull swoops in my direction, and the crewman wheels about.

Sod off, you screechy tattletale.

The crewman places a hand on the crane base to steady himself, then draws closer, his bloodshot eyes nearly pouring from their sockets. “Wh-where did you come from?”

I scramble to my feet, feeling a breeze through the tear in my skirt. The sleeve of my jacket collects around my elbow. I must look a fright.

Behind the crewman, the superstructure stacks up like the layers of a cake, at the top of which stands a man with a white beard and a proud bearing, the gold braids on his navy sleeves gleaming like bracelets. Even from fifty feet away, I recognize the face in all the brochures: Captain Smith, the king of this floating palace. He spreads his fingers against the rail and bends his gaze in our direction.

I squeeze a toe down on my panic, which, like a tissue-thin handkerchief in a strong wind, is in danger of cutting loose.

The crewman’s nostrils put me in mind of the double barrel of a gun. “I said, where did you come from?”