AE on Norwich Island Part 17

Amelia Earhart on Norwich Island

Part 17

July 27^th, 1937

She was sick in the night.  Violently sick.

After retching till her empty stomach was in knots, she lay back in her hammock and listened to her heart beat.  Pounding, and not very regular.  The crabs were all over what she had thrown up.  The walls of Fort Putnam had burned down and cooled.

Had she eaten something bad?  The ship’s biscuits had seemed all right, and she’d had a fish, and finished off with a can of peaches.  Had they gone bad?  Maybe. Or was it possible that her vegetable tonic was getting rancid? There was so little of it left.

“Well, whatever it was, it’s out now.” 

But her heart kept fluttering, her head pounded, and she was sweating profusely. 

Then she slept, and the ghost came again.  Standing over her looking sad.

“What do you want of me?  Can’t you see I’m sick?  Why don’t you fly off someplace and get someone to come find me?”

The ghost shook her head and went through a long soliloquy, with many graceful upward gestures.  Then faded – or did it turn into a tree….?

She woke feeling weak and shaky, but determined to look around farther south.  If she couldn’t trust the food in the cans, maybe staying here wasn’t such a good idea after all.  And she had not fully explored the south part of the island – she had just walked through, then run heedlessly, chasing the search planes.  It only made sense to give it closer inspection.

After a sparing breakfast of ship’s biscuit, she made another attempt to project her mind out of her body, communicate with someone somewhere else.  As usual, she didn’t feel that she had succeeded.  Too many crabs, too much bird noise, the ground too hard and rough – or something wrong with her? 

“Or maybe I’m getting through and just don’t know it.” 

She got up, brushed herself off.  Set off down the beach.  Past the place where she had run out of the bush when the planes passed over – the holes and slides her feet had made in the scree could still be seen.  On down to the shallow passage, without discovering anything of interest.  She followed the passage to the lagoon shore, but couldn’t get far along it; the brush came right out to the water’s edge, overhanging it.

Back along the passage to where it opened onto the reef. Tired and weak, she sat under a bush and scanned the sea. Empty, empty.

“Always empty.”

“You were expecting?”

She was not surprised, did not turn to look

“Expecting nothing. Go away.”

The crab was off to her left, under a log. Delicately moving its pincers.

“You know, you wouldn’t be here if you’d listened to Paul.”

“You just know everything, don’t you?”

“Only what you know, Sweet-chops. And you know that.”

She did, of course. But it was all so long ago…

“You’d be safe back in California now. Or on the lecture circuit. Or curled up finishing your book.”

True, all true.

“So…?”

“So why did I skip out on him? And his lessons?”

“Let him fly off to St. Louie, Louie, thinking he’d have lots of time…”

“…to lecture me about throttle settings and RDF and…”

“…getting prepped to fly around the world, but nope, Amelia Earhart doesn’t need preparation, does she? She’s not like other people.”

“All right! So I fouled up! I was – thoughtless! I thought I was – invincible. I thought – Oh, damn it, it’s done, done!”

“No telling what you could have done, if you’d made it.”

“Bushwa. This was my last big flight.”

“Well, it is now.”

“We’ll see.”

“Make up your mind, Meelie. But think about it. Lots of things to do with your life besides flying. After flying.“

“Go away.”

“But now you’re not going to have…”

“We’ll see about that, but you’re not going to!”

She got to her feet – god, she was weak! Looked for a big rock, but by the time she found one the crab was gone.

“As though he’d never been here.”

Slowly, shakily, she made her way back to camp. By the time she had the fire started she was too tired to catch anything to eat, and too wary of the cans to open one.  She nibbled a biscuit and fell into her hammock, instantly asleep.

August 4^th, 1937

She was staring at something made of criss-crossed....  threads?  Yes, threads were what they were called.  The stuff was some kind of -- fabric, yes.   Woven; the image of a loom floated across her mind.  This stuff had a name – it was – canvas.   Yes, canvas.  A name.  What was a name?  Why was a name?

With only the mildest alarm, she realized how little she knew.  Where was she?  Who was she?  WHAT was she?

"Human being."

Yes, not canvas.  Human being; the canvas was outside her, in front of her eyes.  Beyond the canvas – what did “beyond” mean? – spindly dark things against the sky. 

“Trees.”

She was not a tree. No, not a tree. 

“Human being.”

But she had some identity beyond human being, didn't she?  She wasn't the only human being -- at least, she didn't think so, though she wasn't sure why she didn't.  Other humans?  Did she know other humans?

"Mommie. S-Sam….  G.....  GP?  P…P…Pidge?"  

And the -- woman, yes, that was the word, woman – who took care of her, with the long beautiful hair and sad face.  Yes, she must be a human being too!

She opened her eyes wider.  Light was spreading across the fabric in front of her eyes, and there were sounds.....   Birds!  Yes, birds made those sounds, and....

Something large and heavy, a flurry of clacking claws, landed with a thump on her midriff, and the hammock spun around, dumping her on the ground.  Reality -- this reality, her reality -- clicked into place.  The crab was trying to eat her!  Grabbing at her belly with his great nasty claws!  But falling out of the hammock had broken his grip, and she wasn't about to let him regain it.  She scooted away, rose wobbily to her feet, kicked the crab as hard as she could.

It scuttled into the brush, chuckling.

She leaned against a tree, taking stock.

"I am Amelia Earhart.  Human.  I fly airplanes.  I landed my...  my Electra .... on this island.  Norwich Island.  My ... Fred, my navigator.. has died."  She paused; there was something profound about the word "died," or about what it meant.  Something she had recently learned.  Something the beautiful woman had taught her.  But it flittered away from her consciousness like the woman's filmy hair.

"I am awaiting ... rescue, by other ... people.  They will come on a ship.” 

What was a “ship?” She flew in a ship, but there were other ships that went on the ocean….. 

“I have been staying...."

Here, this place, this camp.  How long had she been here?  She looked around.  There were opened cans, empty biscuit tins, a fireplace and burned log walls that still smoldered.  She must have been living here for some time.  Days?  Weeks?  What were days?  Oh yes, the time it takes the sun to go around -- or really for the earth to rotate...  Information organized itself across her brain, but didn't tell her how long she had been here.  Her body told her, though, that she was desperately hungry, and her mouth felt foul. 

And something was missing – some part of her.  She considered, groped around, finally realized – her knife sheath was empty!  Her lovely Javanese knife was gone!

Shakily, she searched the campsite with no result.  Finally gave up for the time being and set about putting her life back together.  Gathered firewood, got a fire going.  Set the still to bubbling.  Wrung a booby’s neck, and – with some difficulty using the bone-handled folding knife – skinned it, cut it up, put its parts on the baking sheet.  Plunged into a tide pool, stripped, washed herself and her clothes.  Brushed her teeth with sand and what little tooth powder she could shake out of her Vince can. Where was her knife?

Time had certainly passed.  There was much less firewood than she remembered, and many more opened cans.  Crumpled pieces of screen that someone must have used to catch fish in the tide pool, and that someone must have been she.  Someone must have built the walls of the fort, kindled the fire.  Her shirt was thinner than she remembered it being – or thought she remembered, and torn.  Her slacks – Fred’s slacks – were ripped down one leg, though still usable.  But she had no memory of it at all.

“Dehydrated.”

Yes, she simply had to get more fluid. The brain couldn’t work if it didn’t have enough moisture. She watched the still, pulling it off the fire to cool as soon as its top stopped bouncing, letting it cool, drinking the first two cups of water, while they were still hot; decanting the next three.

As she went through the day, the feeling grew that she had to move on, find a new campsite.  The firewood was running out, and the crabs were getting bolder – the big one must have climbed into the tree above her hammock and literally leaped down on her.  Did crabs do that?

“These do.”

She glanced around.

But what had happened in the time – several days, anyway – that had escaped her memory?  Something important, something to do with the ghost.  The ghost she now thought of, with respect and some sort of awe, as “The Lady.”   She had learned something, been given something, very profound, but what had it been?

“Something to do with the island. And the trees.  And death and life and……”

It hovered just outside her consciousness, teasing her.

But what if a ship had come while she had been out of her mind?  She leaped up, ran down to the shore, scanned the horizon. 

No ship.  Had it come and gone?

“No, no, they’d come ashore; they’d search.  They’d blow their whistle.”

Maybe.

“Anyway… it’s time for another change of scenery.”

She found two fairly straight, stout poles and a couple to use as cross-braces, tied them together with vines in a sort of double-crossed “A” shape.  Tied her canvas floor-mat to the cross-pieces, and loaded her gear on it.  A clumsy but serviceable travois.   In the morning…..

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Notes

“…you wouldn’t be here if you’d listened to Paul.” For a concise account of how AE duped Paul Mantz about her departure date, cutting short his efforts to help her prepare, see Sound of Wings pp. 245-5.