Chasing Helga Bittle
 

Chapter 1

There was no mistaking Helga Bittle. Of the almost 3,000 guests aboard Royal Caribbean’s Explorer of the Seas, Helga was the passenger who stood out the most to Frances Colburn.

The moment Frances exited the Holiday Inn shuttle bus, she was greeted by a rush of porters at the Port of Miami, where the hulking cruise ship stood behind like an inviting giant. They were three white-shirted, black men wearing hard hats that were barely sweating despite the near 90 degree temperatures common to South Florida during September. They approached Frances en masse—anxious to fetch her stuffed black Fendi suitcase and add it to the nearby stack—which, at first, caught Frances by surprise. She had spent a fitful night just hours prior—wondering if the decision to vacation alone had been the right one—and wasn’t prepared for the porters’ brusqueness in the initial moments of what was meant to be a restful Caribbean cruise vacation. 

 

But it was Helga Bittle who ultimately garnered Frances’s attention—for her own blunt behavior as a steady stream of passengers filed their way from taxis, shuttle buses, and other vehicles through the maze of the Port to set foot aboard Explorer. Helga was fighting with a taxi driver, who’s broken English competed with Helga’s peculiar New England accent, as the two rehashed the details of the ride. When Helga spoke, people often wondered where she came from. She did not have the accent typical of residents in central New Hampshire, or any other region in New England for that matter. It was a sound she had fashioned all her own—part rural librarian, part English mistress. It was nothing like the accents she heard on television or in movies, when actors and actresses who didn’t hail from the region tried to mimic Bostonian articulation. They all made the mistake of trying to sound like President Kennedy. “But nobody sounds like the Kennedys except the Kennedys!” she’d yell. “When you’re that rich, you can make up your own accent!” Read More...