The Unquiet Heart
Page 16
From 20,000 feet the ocean looked benign, but the closer she got to the water the more menacing it appeared. The moderate winds that had skimmed lightly across the surface of the water had increased considerably during the last hour. The swells were higher; and their color, a deeper, sinister blue gray, reflected a lowering sky.
Libby’s attention was momentarily diverted from the inhospitable ocean to the awesome sight of the doomed F-16, engulfed in flames, spiraling into the water. A cloud of steam erupted on impact but by the time it dissipated, the airplane had vanished. Hot tears stung her eyes and she had to will herself not to cry. But she didn’t have time to get sentimental over the loss of an airplane if she was going to survive the ordeal that lay ahead.
Four or five hundred feet to her left, she could see the reassuring presence of Charlie swinging back and forth in his parachute harness. Just knowing he was nearby helped restore Libby’s confidence and dispel the paralyzing fear as she prepared for impact. She tugged on the pouch under her right hip, releasing the inflatable orange dingy. It dangled beneath her at the end of a fifteen-foot lanyard. Once she was in the water, all she had to do was reel in the line and climb aboard. Libby had practiced the maneuver dozens of time before, but floundering around in an Olympic-sized swimming pool was not quite the same thing as punching out in the Pacific Ocean. Water survival had been fun. The frigid water awaiting below looked like anything but.
Libby swiveled around in her harness searching for Charlie; but he had drifted farther away. Not only that, he had failed to release the dingy. She was too low to steer much closer to him and he was too far to hear, when she shouted his name, but something was obviously wrong with the parachute or … .
It wasn’t the parachute, it was his right arm. She had been too busy to notice before, too preoccupied with her own problems to worry about Charlie. But she could see his arm now, hanging uselessly at his side. He must have been injured when he ejected and the injury had prevented him from steering the chute and releasing the dingy.
“Charlie!” She shouted again. And then she was in the water, sucked down in a swirling green vortex. She held her breath and squeezed her eyes shut as she sank and then the parachute automatically released, the horse-collar around her neck inflated, and she bobbed up to the surface and could breathe. She unsnapped the latch on her helmet and tossed it aside.
The water was fifty degrees and, despite the protective poopy suit, Libby was shivering from the intense cold. She had to get into the dingy as quickly as possible.
But first she had to locate Charlie.
Libby was a strong swimmer but being buffeted like a rag doll by the powerful current was debilitating and she had to focus all her energy and attention on the search. He couldn’t be too far away, she reasoned, but wherever he was, he needed help — to release the dingy and climb aboard.
If only the swells weren’t so high and the wind so shrill. He would never hear her above the din.
“Charlie!” Shouting his name, was a waste of precious energy. She had to concentrate. Concentrate.
Libby spotted the bright orange parachute fifty yards or so away. It should have detached as soon as he hit the water but it apparently had failed to do so, and had deflated on top of Charlie. She could see him flailing around in the water in an attempt to free himself from the tangle of lines and smothering nylon chute. The horse-collar was keeping him afloat but if she didn’t reach him, he was in imminent danger of drowning.
“I’m coming. Hang on,” she yelled, as much to inspire herself, as to reassure her friend. He couldn’t possibly hear her voice.
It took longer to reach Charlie than she anticipated. Every time she just about closed the gap separating them, she would be tossed back by a wave and have to start all over again. Her persistence eventually paid off but by the time she got her hands on him he was thrashing so wildly she was in peril of getting tangled in the lines herself.
“Stop it. Stop it. I’m not going to let you drown,” she shouted. But there was no way to free him without diving under the parachute and cutting the lines with her survival knife.
“Charlie,” she pleaded, but he was too panic-stricken to follow instructions and kept lashing out whenever she got near enough to sever the cords.
Libby took a deep breath, dived underwater and tackled him around the waist. Wielding the hooked blade, in gloves, under water, with hands that were starting to lose feeling from the cold, tested both her strength and her patience but after several dives, she managed to cut the parachute loose and yank it off his head. The helmet was next. She locked her legs around his hips to anchor their bodies together, unfastened the latch, and lifted the helmet off his head.
Charlie was deathly pale from the frightening ordeal, in excruciating pain with what appeared to be a fractured arm, and nauseated from having ingested so much salt water. There was a bruise on the side of his face, and his blonde hair was singed from the fire.
“Oh, Libby,” he gasped, before proceeding to vomit up his lunch, along with a half a gallon of ocean.
Overhead, Mike Phipps, who had been orbiting the crash scene and keeping an eye on his friends and their struggles in the water, was about to head for home before he ran out of fuel. He circled lower, tipped his wings in salute and streaked out of sight. Libby watched the F-16 until it disappeared in a bank of clouds and then turned her attention back to Charlie and attempted to inflate his raft.
“Hold still, Charlie,” she panted, as she fumbled underwater for the pouch. She tugged and nothing happened.
“Damn it.” Her fingers were numb. Libby grasped the pouch and jerked it as hard as she could. Nothing. “Damn it, damn it, damn it.”
“What’s wrong, Libby?” Charlie mumbled.
Tears welled up in her eyes, of frustration and fear. One raft would never accommodate two strapping pilots, that was for sure, and it was imperative to get Charlie into the dingy before he started suffering from hypothermia.
“Nothing’s wrong,” she stammered. Her teeth were chattering so hard, her jaw was beginning to ache. “We just have to g-g-get you out of the water before you turn completely bl-blue.”
“What about you?”
“Don’t worry about m-m-me. I’ll manage. It won’t be l-l-long before they pick us up. You know how ef-efficient the J-J-Japanese are,” she added.
Charlie, unaware of their new predicament, closed his eyes.
“Do you still love, what’s his name? Yoshi … , Yoshi … , the pilot? From the Samurai Squadron?” His words were slurred. It sounded, to Libby’s untrained ear, like he was about to pass out. “Do you, Libby?”
“No.”
Libby’s dingy was still attached at the end of the lanyard; she could see it bobbing up and down on top of the swells like a child’s bright yellow inner tube. She reeled it in and endeavored to hold it steady while Charlie scrambled aboard. Every time he got an arm over the side and tried to hoist himself up he slipped.
Libby was no weakling but trying to shove 230 pounds of solid muscle into a raft the size of a bathtub was exhausting and she had to keep stopping to rest between attempts.
“You’ll have to help me, Charlie,” she scolded. But she wasn’t sure he heard. He kept passing in and out of consciousness. Once he opened his eyes, looked directly at her and asked her if she loved him.
“Yes, Charlie, I love you. I’ll love you even more if you’ll just put your leg up over the side. I can get you in, if you can do that much. Please, Charlie,” she begged.
Getting the rest of him into the raft was relatively easy once he contrived to get his leg on board. Libby got underneath his torso and shoved with all her strength until he toppled head first into the dingy. He must have landed on his shoulder, as he let out an agonizing scream when he landed, but there was nothing she could do about that, she had done the best she could. He was safely out o
f the water.
All that remained was for her to do was cover him with the hood, cling to the handle on the raft. And wait.
“Charlie?” She tried to talk to him. Even if he wasn’t making much sense it was comforting to have a conscious companion alongside her, but when he didn’t respond, she gave up. She was physically and emotionally depleted, too tired to even wonder how Charlie fared, bobbing up and down in the raft, or feel regret at the loss of the airplane, or gratitude at having survived. The extraordinary energy that had sustained her throughout the last hour was gone. Libby’s body felt weak and insensible to everything but the punishing cold as she was dragged through the water, in the wake of the raft. She tried to kick her legs to keep the blood circulating but they felt like they had turned to stone. Her hands were frozen around the handle, a throbbing pain seared the muscles in her arms. Salt water plastered her hair to her scalp and abraded her skin.
“Damn it! Why don’t they come?” She shouted into the wind. It would be dark soon. Charlie might survive a night in the raft but there wasn’t a chance in a million that she would last more than a few hours submerged up to her neck in the ocean. “Please, God, please let them come,” Libby prayed.
The Japanese Navy Rescue Helicopter from Hachinohe arrived shortly after dusk. Above the roar of the wind, Libby could hear the propeller blades beating a loud tattoo as the helicopter strutted 300 feet in the air, in the direction of the crash site. Blinding search lights swept back and forth across the water as the pilot homed his craft in on the signal from the life raft.
Libby, galvanized into action by the sight of the chopper, pried a hand loose from the handle of the raft and began waving frantically. “Charlie! Charlie!” She shouted. “They’ve spotted us!”
Charlie groaned as a cone of light focused down on the dingy. The prop wash roiled the water, rocking the raft. Libby, buffeted by the downdraft, squinted up at the helicopter hovering overhead, through the bright haze. She could see the rotor spinning like a whirligig, the tail light winking on and off and then the figure of a man, short and slight of build, being lowered into the water a few yards away. He swam to the side of the raft, greeted Libby in Japanese, and then signaled the winch operator to lower the harness.
He had a difficult time trying to get a man the size of Charlie into the harness, but eventually, with Libby’s help, they managed to hook the chest strap securely under Charlie’s arms and he was hoisted up in the sling and into the helicopter.
By the time it was Libby’s turn to be plucked out of the water, she could barely move her limbs she was so immobilized by the piercing cold. The diver had to lift her arms, one at a time, slide the strap into place and hook it across her chest. Then he severed the lanyard still connecting her to the raft, shoved her into the sling, and the winch operator started reeling her in and up, toward the trio of tanned faces staring worriedly from the open door of the chopper. The cable, caught in the turbulent backwash from the prop osculated wildly from side to side and began whirling Libby around and around in a dizzying spin. She squeezed her eyes shut willing herself not to cry out in terror. When she opened them, she was dangling in mid-air outside the door. Then an arm reached out, grabbed her by the collar and yanked her into the helicopter.
Approximately four hours after taking off from Misawa Air Base in the F-16, Libby and Charlie returned together in the helicopter. On hand to meet them on the flight line was a reception committee of base VIPs, and hospital personnel waiting to transfer them into an ambulance.
A dazed and injured Captain McKay was hustled immediately into the ambulance, followed by an exhausted Libby. The Wing Commander shook her hand and Colonel Long gave her a warm, heartfelt embrace. “Welcome home, Captain Comerford.”
Major Yoshida was in his office on base when he heard the news that an F-16 had gone down. No details were available at the time, so despite his initial alarm, he continued with his work, after advising one of the clerks to keep him informed of any new developments. He had a difficult time concentrating. It was unlikely that Libby was in the airplane, he assured himself. But just to assuage his anxiety, he suggested to General Sato that he call and try to find out more details. The general told him that he had already been in touch with Colonel Long to offer assistance, but had not been given the identity of the pilots. Names were generally not released until their status and condition could be ascertained and the family informed — especially in the case of a fatality.
By the time Major Yoshida called the squadron, Colonel Long had received word from Major Phipps that both pilots had punched out and were in the water and, after some initial problems, appeared to be okay. So he saw no reason to withhold the information.
“We had two pilots in the airplane. They got out and are, as we speak, being picked up by your people in Hachinohe. Captain Charles McKay was piloting the aircraft and Captain Libby Comerford was in the backseat.”
“Libby?” Major Yoshida exclaimed in disbelief. There had to be some mistake. Perhaps he had misunderstood the Colonel’s southern drawl.
“Captain Libby Comerford,” Colonel Long repeated. “I’m sure General Sato remembers her. Captain Comerford and I flew with your squadron last summer.”
“I remember,” Kojiro said. And, after a long silence: “Thank you.”
“It was Libby, ah, Captain Comerford,” he told the general after he hung up. “And Charlie McKay.”
General Sato looked a little bewildered by his aide’s reaction. Since when was the major on a first name basis with the American pilots, he wondered. Major Yoshida was always so formal and reserved. He never disclosed his feelings, never gave any hint as to what might be going on in his mind. But news of the accident had visibly upset him. Perhaps it was just wedding nerves, the general mused.
“Ah, the beautiful American captain. Is she okay? What about the other fellow?”
“They got out of the airplane. Air Rescue is picking them up. Perhaps I should … We should,” he corrected himself, “go and see if, if they’re all right.”
The general glanced at his watch. “Why don’t you take the rest of the afternoon off. Order some flowers sent to the hospital from the Samurai Squadron and then go home to bed. You look like you’re coming down with the flu. You can’t have that, with your wedding just a week away!”
Kojiro did not go home to bed. After ordering flowers, a modest sized bouquet for Charlie and an extravagant arrangement for Libby, he drove to the Air Force hospital and hung around the waiting room in the ER, hoping for a glimpse of her when she arrived in the ambulance. He advised the sergeant on duty at the desk, in his most officious manner, that he was there on behalf of General Sato. But he was unsuccessful in both his request for information and his attempt to see her.
After a while, he wandered to the main lobby in hopes of overhearing someone discussing the accident, but everyone was going about his business as if it were just another routine day. He inquired as to Libby’s room number, but was informed in no uncertain terms that Captain Comerford could not have any visitors. Perhaps he could speak to one of the doctors? “I have to know if Captain Comerford is all right. General Sato is very concerned about her.”
Finally, because they got tired of being pestered by Kojiro, they summoned one of the flight surgeons who was overseeing her care. “Tell General Sato that the captain is resting comfortably. We gave her something to help her sleep — she was pretty cold and exhausted when we brought her in. She spent a lot of time in the water helping Captain McKay. He has some injuries — nothing too serious. They were both very lucky.”
“Hai.” Kojiro bowed. “Please give Captain Comerford the, the general’s regards. And Captain McKay,” he added, as an afterthought.
“I’ll do that, Major.”
Libby was alive and well — resting comfortably was what the doctor had said. Exhausted and cold, that was all, after having ejected out of a
burning airplane and parachuting into the Pacific Ocean. Resting comfortably — no broken bones, or burns, or hypothermia … . He should go home now and try and put her out of his mind. The sooner he stopped thinking about her, the better.
After all, Libby was a fighter pilot; she knew the hazards involved in flying a high-performance airplane. Every time she climbed into the cockpit she was risking her life, gambling that it wouldn’t happen to her. Next week, or the week after, she would get back into an F-16 and gamble that it wouldn’t happen again.
But if something had happened to her … . The thought was so appalling Kojiro felt physically ill. What would he have done? How could he have carried on? He was getting married next week. How could he have possibly gone through with the ceremony, sat through the long, tedious reception, spent a honeymoon in Australia, knowing Libby was lost?
But Libby wasn’t his to lose, Kojiro thought in despair, as much as he loved her. He had lost her for good the day in Osorezan when he told her he was getting married. As far as his future was concerned, Libby might as well be dead. He would never see her again — or if he did, it would be by chance — never talk to her, or hear her laughter, or make love to her … . His body ached for her. Awake, he was tormented with memories of Libby, in the hotel in Sapporo, at the hot springs in the mountains. Asleep, haunted by vivid images of them on the brink of making love. Hurry, hurry, hurry, she whispered to him in his dreams.
How could he endure a lifetime married to someone else? And yet Kojiro could see no way out of his dilemma. Too many people would be hurt and angry if he failed to go through with the marriage. Motoko would be humiliated. He thought of how she had looked sitting on the edge of the bed in the hotel room. She wasn’t as naïve or as innocent as she let on, but she would undoubtedly be a faithful and devoted wife. Kojiro didn’t stop to consider what kind of a husband he would be when he was in love with another woman. It was better not to think about those things, better just to do what everyone expected.