Chapter 26

I confess to a minor miracle ... every single jeep part was available at Advanced and they delivered. Brakes shoes, master cylinder, tie-rod ends, all fluids. slave cylinders ... and they were all OEM ... original equipment manufacturer. They even loaned us a grease gun. There must be a lot of jeeps in New Zealand.

Jimbo towed the Hobart and all the pieces home. His dad taught us how to weld ... the 3.7 fit. We sold it to the dock master ... someone saw it ... we sold another ... by the weekend we had used every handcart wheel in town and had orders for three more.

“You got this, Jim?”

“I do.”

“Great ... build me one.”

10 years later Jim was building boat trailers, big ones, little ones, retrieval trailers.

Another rescue.

“Mr. Howard,” I wandered into the bar.

“Yes, Miss?”

“May I use the radio phone?”

“Yes.”

So ... I called Mr. Rychert in Hobsonville.

“Mr. Rychert, please.” I asked the receptionist.

“Miss Flintkote.”

“You remembered me.”

“Your name is often spoken in the shop.”

“Mike?”

“Mike.”

“Not happy?”

“Nope.” She said. “Hold on.”

Pretty quick, Mr. Rychert was bubbling at me. When he finally calmed down, I asked him to see about a crew for the Sailbait.

“I’m fairly established here. My sister is sailing the Cat. I’d like a boat for the dull moments. Could you see about sending it down?”

“You’re in luck. There’s a boat in Dunedin I have to fetch ... I’ll send the crew down in yours and they can bring the other back.”

“How soon?”

“Provisioning and topping up ... leave Friday?”

“Suits.”

“Keep it quiet, please. It’s a repossession. The defaulter won’t suspect a water-side grab.”

“One of your 11.5 cats?”

“Yes.”

“I know where it is.”

“You do?”

“I’m looking at it.”

“Where?”

“Port Chalmers BSP fuel dock.” I said. “It’s a regular in and out. The dock is a perfect place to prevent a shore side grab. What your boys have going for them is the shore to tie up is a hundred meters and almost twice that far to her slip.”

“Not on a buoy?”

“Nope ... floater dock with a few pilings.”

“Can you get away for a few days?”

“Why?” I responded. “But yes.”

“School?”

“There’s supposed to be three of us, they won’t let me start alone. ‘Unfair advantage,’ the school said.”

“Good, my repo crew is the girls.”

“The Quints? Holy Shit! Talk about a disguise.”

Olivia, Charlotte, Harper, Sophie and Emily Rychert, Polish immigrants and a year older. Beauties in their own right, disappeared with their father when a commissar decided to bring ‘em up right. He claimed it was the State ... he was another Beria.

They escaped to England and England shipped them to New Zealand.

Poland conveniently declared them drowned when their fishing boat never returned to port after a North Sea storm.

“What do you want me to do?”

“The best thing would be to fly up here and bring your boat to Otago. But ... if you could meet them...”

“I’ll fly,” I said, “I have been leading a singularly boring life. This sounds like fun.”

“We’ll meet you at the airport.

“Surprise? Bring that suit. Part of the disguise.”

“It’s on the boat, Bye.”

“Bye.”

Disconnect.

“Mr. Howard,” I called. He was attending to the pub crowd.

“Yes, Miss.” Which drew a massive laugh from the pub. Mr. Howard was no longer sole proprietor.

“I’m going to Auckland to fetch my other boat. Mattie isn’t talking to me. I’ll need to organize a ride to the airport.”

“You lot heard the woman. Who’s going to drive?”

A voice from the crowd rang out. “Let me call me wife. She’s picking up her mother today.”

And that brought condolences from all the men and half the women. Evidently his mother in law was well known.