Santos nodded. "You no care how big?"
"There are four of us to handle it."
"Plenty," Santos said. "No more help needed for my Swift Arrow. See over there?"
Rick's quick eyes caught the lines of the craft first. He exclaimed, "Well, I'll be a galloping grampus! It's a torpedo boat!"
"Yes," Santos confirmed, beaming. "Motor torpedo boat. I convert her myself. Come see."
Chahda asked, "Rick, what is torpedo boat?"
"It's a very fast, light boat, designed to launch torpedoes at bigger ships. It depends on speed for safety. This one must be left over from World War Two."
"Plenty old," Chahda said doubtfully.
Scotty chuckled. "Age doesn't mean anything to a boat if it's well built and well taken care of. The MTB's were light, but very well built. You'll see."
Zircon was well acquainted with boats and Rick and Scotty were not novices. They went over the Swift Arrow from stem to stern, missing nothing. The armament had been removed and the original gasoline engines were gone. Instead, it was operated by a pair of marine diesels. Santos claimed that the engines were in excellent shape and that the boat could make a speed of twenty knots even in rough water, with a top speed of nearly thirty knots in calm seas.