Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
I decided to tell him about my prank, and he was very shocked that I would do something
like that.
“You're a damn fool; what would have happened if he caught you in the act? That kind of
scumbag would probably shoot you. I sincerely hope he doesn't find out that you did that.”
He scolded me, looking over at Mary's boat. He leaned over and took out the binoculars
from their case on the bulkhead and put them up to his eyes. He adjusted them and a smile
crept across his face. “God, I wouldn't have dared to do that; you are a bloody fool!”
“Well, he was a fool to stick a knife at my throat!” I retorted. “I know it was stupid, but it's
too late now. I'm pretty sure no one saw me any way.”
I took my coffee out into the cockpit and lit my first cigarette. I inhaled deeply and looked
about the bay. It was a beautiful morning, very few clouds around, just a few white, puffy
ones, signaling, “all's well with today's weather.” It promised to be another hot one in para-
dise. Gavin came out presently, bringing his coffee and a cushion to sit on.
“Can I have a smoke? I ran out last night.”
“Go ahead. I would like to try and quit again. I notice that Liz doesn't smoke, and she is
very against it. She says she can't stand the smell of it, can't say I blame her.”
Just then we heard a commotion, and someone was whistling and waving his arms about.
It was Armchair Steve, waving at one of his cronies rowing past, beckoning him over. As
we watched, the dinghy changed direction and headed towards the stranded thug. It looked
like Jeweler Ray, from Westward Ho, going to his rescue. Ray was an aging playboy with
an old and once grand, wooden sailboat. They had both fallen on bad times now, and it
would seem that she would end her glory days here in this anchorage with her nefarious
owner. He was a jeweler by trade but quite obviously dabbled in the underworld as well.
There was a lot of animated chatter and pointing towards Mother Mary's boat. “Oh dear!
Help me master!” I joked.
Pretty soon we saw Steve clamber down into his crony's dinghy, and they took off in Moth-
er Mary's direction. I trained the binoculars onto them and watched the little drama with
satisfaction. I could see Steve's scoundrel face, black as thunder; evidently he wasn't en-
joying this too much whilst his friend Ray had a big grin across his handsome mug. I smiled
and handed Gavin the glasses, “That will learn the scumbugsies.”
We had learned a new word, Gavin and I. Variations of scumbag, scumbucket, scumbug-
sies, scumbolian and scumbums. It was this rat bag place that was having an effect on
us. We were to learn years later that this really was the armpit of Hawaii. At that stage,
however, we had no idea how bad it was. How were we to know? In retrospect though, I
wouldn't have changed my experiences there at all, though I eventually crept out of Keehi
