What did he see as he stood there, alone, rapt? We who know the man and
his record can believe that before him was home and all the loved ones
there, wife and child, father and mother, brothers and sister,
relatives, friends--that picture and all it meant to him then and there;
and besides, just for a moment maybe, and as background to all that,
swift realisation of the awful tragedy ending his life, ending his ship.
But whatever he saw, in that quiet lonely minute, it did not hold or
unman him. Work--work--he must work to the bitter end.
Some saw him for the last time, down in the Engine-room, with Chief
engineer Bell and Archie Frost and the other heroes, all toiling like
men to keep the lights going and the pumps at work.
Others saw him, a few minutes before the end, on the Boat deck, our
final and grandest sight of him, throwing deck chairs overboard to the
unfortunates struggling in the water below.
Then, with a slow long slanting dive, the _Titanic_ went down, giving to
the sea her short-spanned life and with it the life of Thomas Andrews.
So died this noble man. We may hope that he lies, as indeed he might be
proud to lie, in the great ship he had helped to fashion.