Either the self-test was lying or there were no planes above the horizon. Considering what the rest of this business had been like, Gilligan didn’t think the transponder was broken.
He pulled out his compass. He didn’t expect it to work this far north and he wasn’t disappointed.
There was one very non-standard item in Major Michael Francis Xavier Gilligan’s survival kit. A 9mm Beretta automatic with three fourteen-round magazines and a black nylon Bianchi shoulder holster to match. He inspected the pistol, slammed one of the magazines home and jacked back the slide. Then he struggled into the shoulder holster’s harness.
Then he felt a lot better.
Back at the base the people were feeling worse as the minutes ticked by.
The general wasn’t happy, Ozzie Sharp wasn’t happy, the squadron commander wasn’t happy and unhappiest of all was the young captain who ran the base’s rescue operation.
"We got on his last known position quickly and flew an expanding spiral search," the captain explained. "Then we did it again with a different aircraft and crew. We have had aircraft on top almost constantly. There is no voice communication and no transponder signal."
"What about the Russians?"
"They say they haven’t seen any sign of him."
"And you believe them?"
"It’s credible," Ozzie Sharp said. "The Russians returned to their base with all their missiles still on their wings." No one bothered to ask how he knew.
The general grunted. Then his head snapped up and he transfixed the young captain with a steely-eyed stare.
"Why the bloody hell can’t you even find the area where he went down?"
"Sir, this is a very unusual situation. He had sent his wingman back, so we don’t have as much information as we normally do." The captain thought about explaining how well they were doing to have gotten this far in the few hours since the missing pilot’s wingman had broken out of the dead zone. Then he caught the general’s eye again and decided not to.
"Have your crews found anything unusual?" Sharp asked. "Any unusual readings or problems with your instruments?"
"None, sir. As far as we can tell, there’s nothing in that fog but more fog."
The expression on Sharp’s face made the general seem mild by comparison.
"We’re going over the area again," the captain offered quickly. "But so far there’s no sign of Major Gilligan or his plane."
"Nothing on the transponder?" the general asked.
"Nossir," the officer said.
"Captain, I thought this sort of thing wasn’t supposed to happen."
"It isn’t, sir."
It’s as if he dropped off the face of the earth, the captain thought. But it was bad form to say something like that.
Major Gilligan drifted through the fog and tried to figure out what the hell had happened to him. He didn’t have the faintest idea where he was, but increasingly he doubted it was anywhere near Alaska. There was still fog all around him, but when the sun broke through it was bright, warm and too high in the sky, totally unlike anything he had experienced in Alaska.
He could hear the sound of surf off to his left. Surf usually meant land of some kind, so that was as good a direction as any. Besides, the fog seemed to be marginally thinner that way.
Major Michael Francis Xavier Gilligan began paddling grimly toward the sound of the waves.
Twenty-six: GILLIGAN’S ISLAND
Gilligan saw the land almost as soon as he broke out of the fog bank. One minute he was paddling along surrounded by whiteness and the next he was out under sunny skies with only an occasional puff of fleecy white clouds. Behind him the fog looked like a wall.
Ahead of him he could see a shore fringed with trees, and hills behind. Between him and that shore waves beat on a reef, making the noise that had drawn him here.
Gilligan studied the situation as best he could sitting in his raft. Fortunately the current wasn’t strong here and the tide was high. He thought about trying to find a channel, but he decided that would cost him more energy than he could afford. So he picked the best-looking spot and paddled toward it.
It took perhaps an hour for Gilligan to negotiate the reef and another forty-five minutes or so to cross the lagoon behind it. As he crossed the lagoon, Gilligan had a chance to admire "his" island. It was worth admiring, he had to admit. The black sand beach was smooth and unmarred. The trees behind it were tall and tropic green. The place looked like a travel poster.
A travel poster for a deserted island, he thought. There was no sign of footprints, tire tracks, roads or trails. The detritus along the tide line included not one beer can, plastic jug or bottle.
Reflexively he scanned the sky for contrails. There were very few places in the world where you could not see jet tracks in the sky, but apparently this was one of them. Except for the clouds and the fog on the water behind him there was nothing in the sky but the bright tropical sun.
Wherever I am, with scenery like this there’s sure to be a Club Med or something close by.
After pulling his raft up on the beach above the tide line, Gilligan stripped off his life vest, arctic survival suit and G-suit, stowed his gear, checked his radios again and started off down the beach. Either this place was as deserted as it looked or it wasn’t and he stood a better chance of finding either people or food if he stayed on the beach.
After almost an hour of walking he found nothing to show that the place was or ever had been inhabited. He had stopped twice to empty the sand out of his boots. Finally he tied the laces together and slung them around his neck so he could walk barefoot through the fine black sand.
Crabs skittered across the beach, gulls wheeled over the water and an occasional brightly colored bird flashed through the trees. But there was not a single sign of human life.
Damn it, he thought, scanning the sky again. Places like this just don’t exist anymore. He looked down the long, pristine stretch of beach. And if they do, I want to retire here!
He had been walking perhaps half a mile barefoot when he found a place where a boat had pulled up. Not a boat, he corrected, an amphibious tractor. The signs were clear enough. The place where it had come out of the water had been washed away by the tide, but he could clearly see where it had pulled up above the tide line and then the tread marks where it had churned over the soft sand and in among the trees between the tread marks was a furrow as if the vehicle had not retracted its rudder. Following the line he could even see where several branches had been broken off in its passage.
Gilligan paused and considered. An amphtrack implied military. Even in backwaters like this civilians didn’t own them. That meant there was an element of risk in meeting the tractor and its crew. On the other hand, there was also the possibility of rescue.
He studied the marks carefully. Although he was no expert, he knew that the amphibious tractors of the U.S. Marines drove through the water on special treads with extra-deep cleats. Soviet equipment used regular treads and either propellers or water jets. But the sand was much too fine and soft to give him any clue. He could only see that something big and not wheeled had come this way.