We’ve been searching since the storm, Pumpkin,” Dad told me, stroking my face as our sad party made its way home. They wouldn’t accept that I had perished, Mom said. No one realized that there was a problem for a couple of days, because there had been a terrible incident at the base. One of our F-52 bombers had crash-landed during the hurricane, and the only runway was out of action. The bomber had crashed into other planes.
“There was extensive loss of personnel as well as machines,” Dad said.
(He meant that lots of people had died. I’d almost forgotten that Dad spoke like that.)
“Then we went in search of the boatman, of course,” Mom explained. “But the conditions were dreadful, and his village was flattened in the tropical storm. Eventually, with the help of a translator, we got hold of his son and one of his brothers—they were about to make a search for him. They weren’t even aware that he’d taken you to the island.” Mom kept swallowing hard. There had been three helicopters and a small reconnaissance plane sent out from the base to search for us as soon as they realized that something was wrong, but because there had been some heavy fighting they couldn’t be spared more than once.
“It was like a nightmare,” Mom said. Again and again, Dad had asked permission to take leave so that he could coordinate the search, but all leave had been canceled.
The boatman’s family had to make repairs to their boats, which had suffered severe damage in the storm. They guessed that the boatman’s engine had probably broken down—it wasn’t the first time, apparently—and that he may have drifted. Eventually they began their search.
“On one occasion they thought they saw the flash of a mirror….”
“That would be May’s,” I explained.
“But they didn’t think too much of it, it was so brief,” Mom said. “And they didn’t believe you could be so far from where you were supposed to be.”
Then our fathers were finally given leave of absence and they demanded that the boatmen take them farther out, to the more distant islands. As far as Koh Tabu. They were just giving up hope when Jas’s dad saw through his binoculars the kite soaring high on the same mountain where the boatmen had earlier seen the flash. There was also a whisper of smoke, and then the sudden leaping blue flames. As they got closer to the reef they saw a huge SOS written on the sand, and girls waving.
AUGUST 1974, THAILAND
Following a brief hearing at a coroner’s court in Bangkok, the three deaths were deemed to have been by misadventure. There was a funeral for Natalie at the Catholic church in Utapao, and funerals without bodies for Sandy and Hope. In Sandy’s coffin were her teddy and her neckerchief, and in Hope’s coffin her silver crucifix and chain. We all attended the funeral of the boatman. His family wanted to know everything he had said to us, everything he had done on the fateful voyage. Layla told them he had courageously navigated the boat to an island with freshwater and had helped us with our camp even though the island was taboo. He had probably lost his life trying to save us. That is what she said. We placed jasmine garlands in the spirit house of his family and gave rice to the local temple monks.
My dad paid to have the outboard motor repaired and gave it to the boatman’s family.