“Wake up!” she yelled in his ear, but she couldn’t even hear herself. Still, the jostling woke him. Sam took the stick back and shook his head a little. Irene sat back in her chair and hunted for the Thermos of coffee, but it was empty. There was only one Thermos remaining. Irene opened it and poured some coffee into Sam’s cup, although it wasn’t that hot anymore, just warm. She nudged it into his hand and he drank. His eyes were wide and staring. Sandy wandered up, having completed a routine patrol of the premises, and sniffed at the box of sandwiches. Irene unwrapped one and fed the cat a few delicate bites of chicken. She poured some water into a coffee mug so that Sandy could drink.

When the cat was satisfied, Irene put her headset back on and turned the volume as high as it would go. Faintly the pings of the radio beacon came to her, just a hair off. Irene wrote a note to Sam: Adjust bearing two degrees south.

Sam nodded. The ship banked slightly and righted itself.

Irene calculated their position. They were now only three hundred and seventeen miles from Honolulu, or should be. She wrote another note.

Two and half hours left.

Then, You OK?

Sam handed back the empty coffee cup and read both notes. Sandy was back on his shoulders now, grooming her long fur in preparation for another nap, cleaning Sam’s leather cap. He glanced back to Irene and lifted his left fist, thumb pointed upward.

They raised Oahu with staggering precision, at a quarter past six in the morning. Sam saw it first. He nudged a nodding Irene in the shoulder and pointed out the cockpit window. Irene saw a smear on the horizon and rubbed her eyes. When she looked again, it was still there, surrounded by the salmon-pink reflection of the sunrise behind them.

Together they stared at this miracle, this mountain rising out of the ocean. Of course, Irene could not yet confirm that this was Oahu itself, instead of one of the neighboring islands—Kauai to the north, or Molokai or even Maui to the south—but that didn’t matter. They had plenty of fuel left. They had found Hawai’i like a speck of dust on the great Pacific. When at last the distinctive shape of Diamond Head grew clear from the window, she wrote a final note to Sam: Diamond Head sighted to south-southeast. Begin approach to Rodgers Field.

Hanalei, Hawai’i

October 1947

Well, I’m alive after all. Coughing and sputtering, drenched and tumbled, on my hands and knees where the foam washes up, surfboard missing, swimsuit almost torn from my body, but I guess that counts as living, since I’m aware of it. Cogito ergo sum, as the philosopher said.

My stomach heaves, and out comes about a quart of the Pacific Ocean.