"Woods, Stuart - White Cargo" - читать интересную книгу автора (Woods Stuart)

still secured in its hidden cupboard behind the clever flap that
concealed it. He'd had that done in Fort Lauderdale, and he felt better
knowing they had some sort of protection aboard in this part of the
world. He'd heard the horror stories, and he meant to be careful. He
climbed into the cockpit and started planning his passage to the Canal.

Ordinarily, he would have done it at the chart table, but now he wanted
to be where he could see who came and went.

Four hours later he looked at his watch and then at Katie. They had all
showered and had lunch. He had done his passage planning and a couple of
odd jobs on the boat.

The kid, Denny, was nowhere to be seen.

"Well, I guess I did the wrong thing," he said.

"Cat, let's get out of here," Katie said.

"This place gives me the willies."

Cat nodded; he didn't like it much, either.

"There's probably enough juice left in the engine battery, but I want to
save it for when we get to Panama, and I don't think I want to try to
sail her out of here," he said, glancing around the area.

"Too confined. We'll inflate the dinghy and tow us out with the
outboard. When we get to the Canal, we can radio for a tow. I can make a
radiotelephone call to the builders on the way, and we can probably have
a new alternator and spinnaker pole waiting for us in Panama."

"That seems like the sensible thing," Jinx chimed in.

"I'm really surprised about Denny, though; I liked him."

"So did I, until now," Cat replied.

"Let's get moving.

I'll get the anchor back in the well; you two get the dinghy out of the
aft locker and connect it to the pump. We'll be gone in five minutes."

As they spilled into the cockpit, there was a shout from above.

"Hey, give me a hand, will you?"

They looked up to find Denny standing on the key, a cardboard box under
one arm and Catbird's spinnaker pole under the other.