Poul Anderson: The Year of the Ransom

“Excellent loneliness.” Yes, Kipling could say it. I remember how those lines of his rolled up and down my spine when first I heard them, Uncle Steve reading aloud to me. Though that must have been a dozen years ago, they still do. The poem’s about the sea and the mountains, of course; but so are the Galapagos, the Enchanted Islands.

Today I need just a little of their loneliness. The tourists were mostly bright, decent people. Still, a season of herding them along the trails, answering the same questions over and over, does begin to wear on a person. Now they’ve become fewer, my summer job has ended, soon I’ll be home Stateside, commencing grad school. Here is my last chance.

“Wanda, dear!” The word Roberto used is querida , which could mean quite a lot. Not necessarily. I wonder about it for a flicker or two while he: “Please, at least let me come along.”

Headshake. “I’m sorry, my friend.” No, not exactly; amigo doesn’t translate one-on-one into English, either. “I’m not sulking or anything. Far from it. All I want is a few hours by myself. Haven’t you ever?”

I’m being honest. My fellow guides are fine. I wish the friendships I’ve made among them will keep. Surely they will if we can get back together. But that’s uncertain. I may or may not be able to return next year. Eventually I may or may not make my dream of joining the research staff at Darwin Station. It can’t take many scientists; or another dream could come along meanwhile and take me. This trip, where half a dozen of us are knocking around the archipelago with a boat and a camping permit, may well be the end of what we’ve called el compañerismo, the Fellowship. Oh, I suppose a Christmas card or two.

“You need protection.” Roberto has put on his dramatic style. “That strange man we heard of, asking around Puerto Ayora about the blonde young North American woman.”

Let Roberto escort me? Temptation. He’s handsome, lively, and a gentleman. We haven’t exactly carried on a romance, these past months, but we’ve gotten pretty close. While he’s never told me in words, I know how much he’s hoped we’d get closer yet. It hasn’t been easy resisting.

Must be done, for his sake more than mine. Not because of his nationality. I think Ecuador is the Latin American country most yanquis feel most at home in. By our standards, things work right there. Quito is charming, and even Guayaquil—ugly, smog-choked, exploding with energy—reminds me of Los Angeles. However, Ecuador is not the USA, and from its standpoint I’ve got a lot wrong with me, starting with the fact that I’m not sure when I’ll be ready to settle down, if ever.

Therefore, laughing, “Oh, yes, Señor Fuentes in the post office told me. Poor dear, how worried he was. The stranger’s funny clothes and accent and everything. Hasn’t he learned what can crawl off the cruise ships? And how many blondes do the Islands see, these days? Five hundred a year?”

“How would Wanda’s secret admirer follow her, anyway?” Jennifer adds. “Swim?” We happen to know that none of the ships has touched at Bartolomé since we left Santa Cruz; no yachts are nearby; and everybody would have recognized a local fisherman.

Roberto goes red under the tan we share. With pity, I pat his hand while telling the group, “Go ahead, folks, snorkel or whatever else you feel like. I’ll be back in time for my share of supper chores.”

Quickly, then, striding from the bight. I really do need some solitude in this weird, harsh, beautiful nature.

I could merge myself in it skin-diving. The water’s glass-clear, silky around me; now and then I see a penguin, not so much swimming as flying through it; fish dance like fireworks, seaweeds do a stately hula; I can get friendly with the sea lions. But other swimmers, never mind how dear they are, will talk. What I want is to commune with the land. In company I couldn’t admit that. It’d sound too pompous, as though I were from Greenpeace or the People’s Republic of Berkeley.

Now I’ve laid white-shell sand and mangroves behind me, I seem to have utter desolation underfoot. Bartolomé is volcanic, like its sisters, but bears hardly any soil. It’s already hot beneath the morning sun, and never a cloud to soften the glare. Here and there sprawl gaunt shrubs or tussocks of grass, but they become few as I walk toward Pinnacle Rock. My Adidases whisper on dark lava, in simmering silence.

However . . . among boulders and tide pools, Sally Lightfoot crabs scuttle, brilliant orange—and-blue. Bound inland, I spy a lizard of a kind unique to this place. I’m within a yard of a blue-footed booby; she could flap off, but simply watches me, the naïve creature. A finch flitting across my vision; it was the Galapagos finches that helped Darwin understand how life works through time. An albatross wheeling white. Higher cruises a frigate bird. Unship the binoculars hung at my neck and catch the arrogance of his wings in the spilling sunlight, the split tail like a buccaneer’s twin swords.

Here are none of the paths I’ve generally required my tourists to stay on. Ecuadorian government strict about that. Given its all too limited resources, it’s doing a great job, trying to protect and restore the environment. Care where I put my feet, as becomes a biologist.

I’ll circle around to the eastern end of the islet and there take the trail and stairs leading to the central peak. The view from it, across to Santiago Island and widely over the ocean, is stunning; and today I’ll have it to myself. Probably that’s where I’ll eat the lunch I’ve packed along. May later go down to the cove, peel off shirt and jeans, enjoy a private dip before turning westward.

Careful about that, kid! You’re a bare twenty klicks below the Equator. This sun wants respect. Tilt my hat brim against it and stop for a drink from my canteen.

Catch a breath, take a look around. I’ve gained some altitude, which I must give back before reaching the trail head. Beach and camp are out of sight. Instead, I see a sweep and tumble of stone down to Sullivan Bay, fiery-blue water, Point Martinez lifting grayish on the big island. Is that a hawk there? Reach for the binoculars.

A flash in the sky. Light off metal. An airplane? No, can’t be. It’s gone.

Puzzled, I lower the glasses. I’ve heard enough about flying saucers, or UFOs to give them the more respectable name. Never taken them seriously. Dad gave his children a healthy inoculation of skepticism. Well, he’s an electronics engineer. Uncle Steve, the archaeologist, has knocked around a lot more in the world, and claims it’s full of things we don’t understand. I suppose I’ll simply never know what it was I glimpsed. Let’s push on.

Out of nowhere, a moment’s gust. The air thuds softly. A shadow falls over me. I turn my face upward.

Can’t be!

An outsize motorcycle, except every last detail is different, and it has no wheels, and it hangs there, ten feet up, unsupported, silent. A man in the front saddle grips what might be handlebars. I see him with knife sharpness. Each second takes forever. Terror has me, like nothing since I was seventeen, driving along the cliff tops near Big Sur in a rainstorm, and the car went into a skid.

I pulled out of that one. This doesn’t stop.

He’s about five feet nine, rawboned but broad-shouldered, brown-skinned, pockmarked, hook-nosed, black hair falling past his ears, black beard and mustache trimmed to points though getting shaggy. His outfit is what’s absolutely wrong, on top of such a machine. Floppy boots, saggy brown hose poking out of short puffed breeches, long-sleeved loose shirt that might be saffron below its grime-steel breastplate, helmet, red cloak, sword scabbarded at left hip—