CHAPTER TWENTY   THE PLANE

At the end of the first week when there was still no hope of rescue, nor any sight of land, their water had to be reduced to one portion a day. Only by the notches Olan Meyer cut on the stem seat, could they tell how much time had passed. After the first few sunrises, days and nights seemed a muddled succession without hope of ending.

Once they saw a smudge of smoke on the horizon, but it vanished swiftly. Another time Nancy thought she heard the drone of a plane, but no moving speck appeared in all the cloudless, blazing blue overhead. She wondered if her mind was weakening and she was beginning to hear sounds, as a wanderer in the desert sees mirages.

On their second day afloat Nancy had had another chill, then to her amazement, after the fever had burned itself out, the attacks did not come back. Her illness made her think of the small golden vitamins Major Reed had given her. She found them still in her musette bag. By dealing them out one a day to each person there would be enough to last them two weeks.

A sail had been hoisted after their conference the first morning, and Olan Meyer steered toward what he believed was their original destination. But the wind soon died down, the sail fell slack, and it was only useful as shade from the blazing sun.

The day after her fever cleared Nancy was sitting beside Olan as he studied the Pacific map, which had been placed in the lifeboat along with a book of navigation instructions.

“Where is Koshu Island on this map?” she asked.

After a brief search he pointed it out with a grimy finger.

“Do you know of any coral-surrounded islands northeast of it?” she asked.

“Plenty. Why?”

“There was one—about a day by water from Koshu, where they tell me my brother’s plane went down,” Nancy explained. “His gunner was made a prisoner by the Japs. He turned up at our hospital back there on Koshu. Soon as he’s able he’s going to guide a plane back to the island.”

“Got any more details?” asked Olan.

“Nothing, except that the island was covered with a jungle. As far as Vernon knew there were no native villages there.”

“And it was surrounded by coral reefs?”

“Entirely, so that no big boats could go close. But he said there were passages where small boats could enter the lagoons.”

“Twelve hours journey north of Koshu,” repeated Olan, while making some mental calculations. “We must have been somewhere in that neighborhood when we were struck.”

“Oh, are we?” asked Nancy eagerly.

“We were,” he corrected. “Lord knows where we’re at now. A fair wind for forty-eight hours took us in the opposite direction.”

He pointed out where he surmised they had been sunk, and indicated the approximate direction in which the wind had taken them.

“I figure the group of reefs and islands you’re talking about is somewhere back here.”

“And northeast of Koshu,” she observed. “Wouldn’t it be safer to try to go back in that direction?”

“You’re optimistic, lady. Distances in a tub like this take a hundred times longer to cover than on our transport.”

“I know that. But we may as well be going somewhere definitely as drifting like this. We might even be able to locate the island where Tommy was marooned.”

“Any land, no matter what—a jungle would be a thousand times better than this,” said Hilda Newton.

It was two days later, however, before another breath of wind came to stiffen their sail. The heat was almost unbearable by day while the cold penetrated to their marrow at night. Nancy thanked her lucky stars that she had been wearing her overcoat at the time they were struck, and that Mabel had brought hers along. Hilda had not been so fortunate.

When the breeze stirred at last Nancy sat beside Olan, watching how he set the sail into the course he desired. It made little difference to any of the others what direction they took, so long as it brought an end to their misery. The very fact that they were moving boosted their morale.

But the fair wind was only a brief hope. It fell away after a few hours, and the horrible pall of inaction closed down on them again. Sometimes for an hour or so they would recite poetry, tell jokes or ask riddles—anything to keep their minds off reality. In this way the first week dragged by. Not once during that time was there a drop of rain to renew their diminishing water supply. So far they had used only from the lifeboat’s supply, saving the individual canteens for a reserve.

The corporal, Ned Owens, showed little improvement in disposition, even after his mind cleared. He kept aloof from the others and seldom took part in the nurses’ attempts to brighten their situation. The first few days a fever kept him on fire with thirst, and he was violently seasick. Knowing something of what he must be enduring Nancy offered him her portion of water at the end of an unusually hot day.

“You take it and I’ll knock your block off!” Olan flared, when Ned hesitated at the offer.

Rather than precipitate a fight Nancy finally drank the water herself. By the end of the first week the feud between the two men, which started with selfishness on one side and firmness on the other, had grown to alarming proportions. Every time Olan dealt out the water Ned accused him of giving him less than his portion.

One evening after they had sat through the worst heat they had yet endured, Ned demanded that Olan give him his entire allotment of water and let him drink it as he pleased.

“I won’t do it! You haven’t got the grit to restrain yourself,” Olan stated.

Nancy had been surprised to find just before their evening ritual of food and drink that Ned had moved next to Olan on the boat seat.

Suddenly just as Olan was measuring out a portion of water, Ned’s arm swung round and struck him in the pit of his stomach. Caught unawares the keg slipped from Olan’s hand to the bottom of the boat, and the precious fluid gurgled out into the bilge water. While the two men went into a grip, Nancy grabbed the keg from under their feet, but she was not quick enough to save more than half of the remaining water.

She dragged the keg with her toward the prow as the raging men grappled. Jim Benton and Hilda were sitting in the prow, and the slack sail had at first cut off their view of what was happening. The men were already at each other’s throats before Jim realized there was a row, and rushed to separate them.

Terrified, the women feared the struggle would capsize the boat. They huddled together in the prow to keep a balance. The corporal was a much larger man than the bluejacket, and soon had him down on the seat, his hands clawing at his throat. Jim could not break their grip with his bare hands. Hilda had snatched up one of the oars, as if to help. Suddenly he seized it from her and cracked it down over Ned Owens’s head. The corporal crumpled into the bottom of the boat like a crushed egg.

The moment his hands relaxed their grip on Olan’s throat, the half-conscious man rolled into the water with a list of the boat. Without a moment’s hesitation Jim Benton went in after him, shoes and all. The shock of the cold water revived Olan’s faculties sufficiently for him to get a death grip on Jim. In spite of all the soldier could do to break the hold, Olan pulled him down under the waves with him. The horrified women stared, helpless to save either one.

Nancy was making a motion to get out of her shoes, when Mabel held her back by main force. “You’re insane!” she screamed. “You haven’t strength to do anything for them.”

But it was already too late. Even while Mabel held Nancy back the two men went down again, and they saw them no more. Too stunned for speech they could only stand and stare, hoping against hope that they might come up again.

Then Hilda, the little blue-eyed girl, wavered, and Mabel gently eased her to the bottom of the boat as consciousness slipped from her. After bathing her face with sea water Mabel and Nancy dragged her up to the boat seat, and Nancy held her head in her lap. For a long time they were too stunned for speech.

Mabel was the first to say anything as she stared with fixed eyes at the bottom of the boat. “Now we’re left to the mercy of that thing!” she moaned, pointing to the corporal.

“It would be better if we were all dead,” said Nancy in a hollow voice.

Mabel finally prodded Ned Owens with her foot, turning him over. Blood flowed from the gash on the back of his head made by the oar. Even though she dreaded to see him regain consciousness, the instincts of her profession would not be denied. She finally squatted in the bilge water to do what she could for his injuries. She cleaned the wound after a fashion and dusted it with some sulfa drug from her first-aid kit, then drew the edges together with some sticking plaster. They feared he would roll into the sea if they dragged him to the seat, so they pulled him into the prow where only his feet were in the water.

When Hilda stirred again she sat up, her fixed eyes turned across the waves that had swallowed the men. She was like one under the influence of dope and made no complaint, only sat there hour after hour as if the life had gone from her, too.

Mabel took a last look at Ned in the twilight and saw he was still breathing, though he showed no signs of regaining consciousness. “If he’ll only stay that way till morning,” she said. “I’ll feel much safer.”

For once Mabel’s wish was fulfilled. The first rays of daylight revealed the corporal lying where she had left him. She bent over him almost eagerly. Her shaking fingers, that pressed his wrist, found no pulse.

“God is good,” she said fervently, looking up from her knees at the other two. “No telling what we’ve been spared.”

His passing was such a relief to them all, that even Hilda found interest enough to help them heave the body over into the sea.

When the lapping green water had swallowed him up Nancy said, “Let’s recite the Twenty-third Psalm for all our dead.”

She emphasized the all, for in spite of their relief at this last death, she felt that none should be excluded from their simple burial ritual.

With the knowledge of navigation that she had picked up from Olan, Nancy steered a southeast course with every fair wind that blew. Though their number was now only half the original, she dared not increase their water supply, as so much had been lost when their keg overturned. By careful economy they would have food and water for a few more days.

After the death of the three men they rarely spoke. There seemed nothing left to say, and speech was such an effort with rasping vocal chords and cracked lips.

Once they sighted a smudge of smoke that promised to be a boat on the horizon. Though there was always the possibility it might be a Japanese boat, even captivity seemed preferable to their present condition. Nancy tacked to catch a bit of wind taking her in that direction. But a nearer approach showed them it was merely mist from spray breaking on a reef. But the island was barren, with not a single palm to pierce the burning sky.

Before night closed them in they saw other reefs, but all were barren. They decided to lower their sail and drop anchor for the night to keep the current from sweeping them against some hidden reef.

Twice during that day Nancy had thought she heard the drone of a distant plane. If any had passed they had been hidden by fleecy clouds.

In mid-morning the following day they were becalmed again under a cloudless sky. By crouching in the bottom of the boat during the hottest hours they could shade their heads under the boat seat, making the heat slightly more endurable.

Nancy was lying there almost in a coma, when there came the sound of a plane, clear and not too far away. For a moment she did not stir, believing it the sound she had imagined a score of times before. Then suddenly Mabel called out, “Nancy it is a plane! I can see it!”

“Coming this way,” Hilda added.

“Hoist the sail! They can see us easier with the sail up!” cried Mabel, her last reserve of strength pouring out into action.

The three of them tugged at the sail a moment, then Mabel stopped to bend over her musette bag. “I’m going to try flashing a mirror at them!” she explained. She opened her compact, containing a mirror almost as large as her palm. “I’ve heard of people catching the sun’s rays in a mirror and attracting planes that way.”

They had discussed this as one device for getting the attention of fliers in the early days of their shipwreck. Nancy and Hilda got the limp sail up, while Mabel set the mirror to catch the sun’s rays and reflect them toward the approaching plane. Then they realized that the silver speck was not coming straight over, but would pass well to the south.

“Oh, dear God, make it come on!” prayed Mabel.

Both the other nurses were praying, too, in a frenzy of hope and despair. Mabel tried the mirror trick she had practiced several times. Three long flashes from the sun-touched mirror, then three short, then three longs—SOS. Again and again she repeated the signal, but the plane kept steadily on its course.

Nancy felt she couldn’t endure to see it go entirely out of sight. Moaning she pressed her face into the slack sail, and leaned against their mast, certain this was their last hope.