Chapter 8: George Town

By the time we arrived Lionel had talked to a banker at the 1^st Royal Bank in George Town. This man understood our problem and had a solution. He was waiting on the dock as we pulled in with an armored truck and four guards! Two men put the bales in bank bags then carried them to the truck. The old metal box was emptied into a couple of bank bags then put in the truck, then we all piled into the banker’s limo.

At the bank the money was counted then deposited into an account in all four of our names. The banker advised us to leave the coins in a safe deposit box until we decided to sell them. That day he issued us debit cards on the account and we headed to a hotel. We all wanted a hot shower and to sleep in a bed that was not rocking!

The next morning we were all four sitting in the hotel restaurant looking a little worse for the wear after a night of celebrating. Mirana and I were holding hands and staring into each other’s eyes when Mr. Lewis and his daughter, Ann, walked up to our table. Mirana jumped to her feet. Ann grabbed her and they kissed.

On the mouth!

Passionately!

Since Mirana and I had been saying ‘I love you’ to each other for almost a week now, I was more than a little shocked!

Ann had tears in her eyes!

“I’ve missed you so much. I’m sorry about everything. I love you.”

Now Ann was bawling her eyes out. Mirana hugged her and said, “I love you, too!” They kissed again as I watched.

“What about the first mate?” asked Mirana.

“That did not last.”

Then there was another kiss!

Mr. Lewis finally spoke, “The diamonds?”

“In the safe in my room,” said Lionel as he started to take the Rolex off his wrist.

“This watch was also in the safe. It is still working.”

“Keep it. Let’s see those diamonds!”

We all got up from the table except Mirana.

“Ann and I will be up in a few minutes. We need to talk.”

She turned and kissed me as passionately as she had kissed Ann!

It was Ann’s turn to be shocked!

The rest of us took the elevator up to Lionels’ room where Mr. Lewis examined the diamonds then wrote Lionel a check for $50,000! When Lionel asked about the sonar equipment we had bought on his credit card, he told us to keep it. As we were finishing up our business, he asked why we were in George Town.

“We were afraid of trying to get the diamonds thru customs, you never can tell about those people, besides we wanted a little vacation and what better spot than here in the Caymans.”

Will you guys be heading back to Tarpon soon?”

“We’re thinking about doing a little treasure hunting. The ‘Santa Maria’, was an old Spanish ship that went down somewhere in these waters. She was full of Inca gold.” I think Mr. Lewis knew Lionel was bullshitting him.

“Good luck with that. Ann and I are heading back this afternoon. I need to get these diamonds back to ... errr, my client.”