Free Calico Pennants by David A. Ross Page A

suggestions, Freddy, I’m listening.”
    “How much time do we have?”
    “Thirty to forty minutes—that’s all.”
    “What about the Itasca?”
    “It’s supposed to be in the vicinity. I’ve been in contact, but reception is patchy at best. I’ll try to raise them again.”
    The pilot began another transmission: “ITASCA, WE ARE ABOUT 100 MILES OUT/ PLEASE TAKE BEARING ON US AND REPORT.”
    The response was garbled and full of static: “CANNOT TAKE BEARING ON 3105/ PLEASE SEND ON 500, OR DO YOU WISH TO TAKE BEARING ON US/GO AHEAD PLEASE.”
    “Which frequency are you signaling on?” the navigator questioned.
    “I switched from 6210 kcs. to 3105 kcs.”
    “Without a trailing wire our range is limited,” he grumbled. “But that shouldn’t be a problem this close in. Still, you’ve gotta stay with the pre-arranged frequency!”
    Unable to completely understand Itasca’s instructions, the pilot radioed once again: “KHAQQ CALLING ITASCA/ WE MUST BE ON YOU BUT CANNOT SEE YOU/ GAS IS RUNNING LOW.”
    “WE HEAR YOU ON 3105/ MESSAGE OKAY/ SENDING AAA’s ON...”
    “What are they saying? Can you make it out?” she asked the navigator.
    “Too much static,” he said. “Keep trying.”
    “ITASCA WE ARE CIRCLING BUT CANNOT HEAR YOU/ GO AHEAD ON 7500.”
    “AAAAAAAAAAAA/GO AHEAD ON 3105.”
    “KHAQQ CALLING ITASCA/ WE RECEIVED YOUR SIGNALS BUT UNABLE TO GET A MINIMUM/ PLEASE TAKE BEARING ON US AND ANSWER 3105.”
    “YOUR SIGNALS RECEIVED OKAY... IMPRACTICAL TO TAKE BEARING ON 3105 ON YOUR VOICE.”
    Like impossible legends, the towering clouds were reflected in Amelia’s flight goggles. Fatigue and frustration showed on her face. Pressing chapped lips and closing her burning eyes for a moment, she hoped that once she opened them again she might see not the everlasting image of sky and ocean, but the newly constructed landing strip at Howland. And having lived her life on the cusp of expectation, desire, belief, and luck, there was at this point little choice but to acknowledge, for pilot and navigator alike, that the future remained suspended on something so intangible as currents of air.
    “I’m sending a series of long dashes over five seconds,” she said to Freddy.
    “Look,” he reasoned, “I’ve done my best. After all the detours last night, it’s amazing that we’re as close as we are. And we have a sun line! So there’s no reason we should be lost. I know Howland is down there!”
    Three weeks prior to departure Noonan had implored her to install a trailing wire, warning her over and over again about the danger of becoming lost and disoriented over the Pacific. But she’d obstinately resisted the inclusion of a simple device that might have enabled them to broaden the band of short wave reception. “In all my years of flying,” she’d persisted, “I’ve never used my radio, except to break the boredom with a little music!”
    Amelia busied herself with a perfunctory check of the Electra’s instruments. They were flying at an altitude of only seven hundred feet, due Northeast, at an air speed of one hundred forty miles per hour. Oil pressure was one hundred ninety-five pounds per square inch starboard, one hundred ninety per square ince port, and the internal temperature of each engine was within acceptable limits. It was the fuel gauge that threatened an insoluble problem.
    Focusing upon the barely discernible horizon (gradients of light upon the water sometimes made it difficult to distinguish a land mass from a bank of clouds), the pilot continued to search for the landing site. Above the drone of the 500 horsepower ‘Wasp’ engines she could hear the short wave set hiss and crackle and make that curious tuning sound that seemed utterly nebulous one minute, and full of promise the next. She watched in silence as Freddy compared readings from each of his three compasses: one magnetic; one aperiodic; and the third a directional gyro. Concentrating intensely, he recorded readings