To prevent a mutiny, Robert made it clear to the “greaseballs” that if he ever caught more than two of them together, he’d blow up the ship and everyone on it.

This kind of talk naturally made the crew a bit edgy, except for High Pockets, Jim and me. We’d long been stoic about the possibility of a Robert-induced sudden death.

Our mechanical problems started about four hours out. The big electrical generator, hooked up to a GM-671, broke its coupling and nearly decapitated Julio with flying parts. Over the next few hours Julio, who I suspect had some kind of unnatural and possibly perverse relationship with the machinery on the ship, began acting more and more unbalanced.

Soon after the generator packed up, the steering quadrant jammed with the helm hard to starboard, causing the ship to describe huge circles and roll horrendously. As soon as that was put right, the fresh-water cooling pump for the big diesel malfunctioned and pumped all our freshwater into the bilge. Luckily we had plenty of rum and several hundred cases of Heineken for drinking and showers.

Around dawn of the second day the backup generator seized for no apparent reason, leaving us with no electrical power except for a small, gas-driven Honda generator, which we used to keep the batteries charged. By this time Julio had developed a nervous tic in his face and had started sipping rum on the sly.

Just before lunch of that same day, a propane leak caused an explosion that destroyed half the galley, and Jim’s drug stash along with it. Naturally, Robert took this out on the crew, Julio included.

Julio countered by removing all the crucifixes from the engine room and locking himself in his cabin, where he mumbled Rosaries and Hail Marys incessantly. I took this desertion of his beloved engine room to be a bad omen indeed.

“Not to worry,” Robert said. He’d take care of the machinery himself. So, armed with a hand grenade and a sledgehammer, he descended into the heat and din of Julio’s former domain. The sledgehammer was for delicate adjustments, he said; the grenade for serious malfunctions.

Naturally, the radio and Eduardo’s $100,000 satellite navigational system had ceased working soon after we’d left Panama, so the only warning I had of the approaching hurricane was a sudden falling of the barometer and a backing of the wind from northeast to due north.

I checked out our safety equipment: two World War II-VINTAGE inflatable life rafts and a wooden dory slung on davits on the upper deck.

I very casually began to stock the dory with beer and rum.

“What are you doing?”

I turned quickly. It was Jim. ‘Just stashin’ some stuff,” I reptied, avoiding his eyes.

Jim took a healthy belt of Mount Gay. “You know something the rest of us don’t?”

“Weather might kick up a little, is all.”

Jim paused, absorbing my statement. “This tub’s gonna sink,” he said, “and we’re all gonna die.” He took another slug of rum. “Right?”

“Most likely.”

“Robert’s gonna get mad when he finds out.”

Before I could respond, the ship rocked from a violent explosion somewhere belowdecks.

“Jesus Christ,” I said.

“Fucking Robert.” Jim shook his head.

We dashed down to the lower deck. Smoke was billowing out of the engine-room door. The ship was listing slightly to port.

Excited Spanish voices issued from the bridge, foredeck, galley and dining salon.

Robert emerged from the engine room coughing and waving away smoke. His eyes were tearing, his face was blackened and he looked about as disheveled as I’d ever seen him. He had the sledgehammer in one hand, a bottle of rum in the other. His hand grenade was conspicuously absent.

“It was an accident,” he said.

About twenty minutes later the old Don Juan rolled belly-up and sank. All nine of us were crowded into the one raft that could still hold air. The booze-laden dory wallowed a few yards behind, connected to us by a twelve-foot painter.

As the Don Juan’s bow slid under, Julio let out a joyous whoop. A horrendous weight had been lifted from his shoulders.

A minute or so later the water around us boiled with bubbles. Between two and three thousand marijuana bales popped to the surface, the main cargo hatch having ruptured from air pressure. Hundreds of swimming rats climbed aboard them and commenced to shake dry their fur. This drove High Pockets nuts, but I calmed him down with a handful of Milk Bone Flavor Snacks for Large Dogs.

“Well,” Jim said, “at least we didn’t lose the load.” He passed me the Mount Gay.

It was around sundown when we got picked up. The eastern horizon was black and the wind was rising fast. We had seen the vessel the day before. It was out of Barranquilla on a three-week commercial fishing trip. Luckily they had us on board before they realized that over twenty million dollars’ worth of merchandise was floating all around. But darkness closed in and the wind rose quickly to force ten. With tears. in his eyes, the skipper turned the ship to the southwest and ran us back to Barranquilla.

Jim had bought several gallons of rum for the ride, so we were all completely blasted when we fell out of the bus and staggered over to Eduardo’s favorite Bandito Watering Hole in Riohacha. With the sinking of the Don Juan, Julio had lost his religious zeal and was as drunk and rowdy as any of us. He and Robert were getting along famously.

Needless to say, Eduardo wasn’t exactly thrilled to see us, but he recovered quickly after Jim spiked his drink with the usual prescription of coke and quaaludes.

“We get a-nother sheep and do eet again!” Eduardo announced. ³³ He then invited us to stay in Riohacha for a week or so of relaxation.

Jim and Robert figured they’d start out where they’d left off before we departed Riohacha three days previously, at least as far as drug consumption was concerned. I was seriously considering abstaining altogether, but I was under intense social pressure so I finally gave in ...