East of Darwin, I had a friend who owned six hundred square kilometers of land. It was grazing land and eucalyptus forest that fronted the Timor Sea. My friend was reluctant—didn't think it was hospitable—but he finally agreed to chopper me out to the most desolate stretch of beach on his property, and leave me there. I told him I wanted to spend a few weeks living off the land, collecting specimens from the mud flats. My friend told me that I was bloody nuts, unloaded my gear, and flew off.
That is where I decided to return to Dinkin's Bay. But here is how and why: I had built a sapling hut that was close enough to the sea so that I could feel the rumbling surf, but far enough away from the beach so that the giant estuarine crocodiles wouldn't crawl up and eat me in the night. I had covered the hut with a tight palm-frond thatching to keep out the monsoon rains, and I had constructed what I thought was a very ingenious all-weather fire pit. Made myself a nice little jungle camp, complete with everything but a sign outside that read: Beware the Big Dumb Shit.
For food, there were plenty of mud crabs, plus the occasional snare-dumb feral hog. I also caught barramundi—a fish which looks and behaves remarkably like a snook. For water, I had the monsoons, as well as a Pur hand-pump water filter. It was a good life. I loved the solitude of it... all the potential that the sea and that wild country offered. Some days, just for the hell of it, I'd pull out the little mirror in my toilet kit and take a look at myself: long tangle of salt-bleached hair ... red beard . . . sea-gray eyes that gradually, very gradually and over several weeks, lost the predator's gleam.
I told myself I was a hermit. I told myself that I had become the captive of my own wild instincts. But we are all creatures of habit, and soon I had carved out a new routine that was very similar to my old routine. I ran along the beach each morning, collected specimens and took notes during the day; then I'd lie in my palm shack at night, listening to my shortwave radio.
It was something I heard on the shortwave that caused me to finally return to Florida. I was lying by the fire, using what remained of my clothes as a pillow. I had the radio's antenna extended as far as it would go, and I was tinkering with the slide tuner. I was trying to pick up something— anything—in Spanish, when I happened to come across a medical talk program on Voice of America. There was a lot of static, a lot of whiny electronic garble, but I listened because there seemed to be something very familiar about the voice of the woman being interviewed.
Heard her say: ". . . always considered myself to be a logical woman who is well grounded in the sciences, but I have no explanation for . . ."
Static.
I stood naked beside the fire and held the radio up in the air, turning slowly, trying to vector in on the signal.
Heard the woman's voice say, ". . . lightning strike, perhaps . . . filled the room with a brilliant white light. . . . May explain it, although . . . yes, there were a number of wires still attached . . ."
Static.
"... still talks about an alien presence in space, which he insists . . . never dead, only traveling . . . The man still describes his body as a spaceship. . . ."
Static.
Pulled the radio down to my ear because I was certain that I recognized the woman's voice. Heard Dr. Maria Corales say, "... only one other known case of such a recovery. Even so, for my own peace of mind as a surgeon . . . for my own spiritual peace of mind . . . doing more tests . . . Odd thing is? He believes, and I'm beginning to believe too. . . . Yes . . . God . . . I'm talking about God. . . ."
It took me all the next day to hike out to a dirt road, where I caught a lift into Darwin. The following morning—it was March 24, a Friday—I caught a Qantas flight home to see my friend Tomlinson.
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Captiva df-4 Page 27