“I’m ready,” Sandy said. “I’m going to be handing you some parts, Jerry. I want you to put them in your shirt. We can’t leave them in here, and if we threw them overboard, the splash would surely be heard. Just be sure they don’t clank around!”
Working noiselessly, Sandy ran his hands over the engine, starting from the top of the block. He touched and counted the spark plugs—four of them. His own experience with assorted jalopies would come in handy here, he thought. Carefully, he slipped the wires off the tops of the spark plugs. Following the wires to their source, he came to the distributor cap. Two clips held it in place. These were easily removed. Following the wire that came from the center of the distributor cap, he came to its end at the spark coil. A small pull removed it. Then he handed the whole thing, which felt like a mechanical octopus, to Jerry, who slipped it into his shirt.
A little more probing brought out two more parts from the distributor, both quite small. One was the rotor, the other the condenser. “With any one of these things gone,” Sandy whispered, “they won’t be able to run this boat!”
“Great!” Jerry breathed. “Now let’s get going!”
“Not yet,” Sandy said. “We still have some more to do. I don’t want to make it too easy for them!”
The next thing to go was the fuel pump, as Sandy unscrewed from it the glass bowl through which the gasoline had to pass. This was followed by a small collection of springs from the choke, the accelerator and the carburetor.
“I think that ought to do it,” Sandy said. “Now let’s put this engine lid back on, so they can’t tell right away that somebody’s been in here!”
It took even more care to replace the lid than it had to take it off. It was a tight fit, and really needed a blow on the top to make it fit properly on the casing, but this could not be done without making far too much noise. Finally, they decided to leave it unhooked, rather than run the risk of giving away their presence in the lifeboat.
Getting out and dropping soundlessly to the deck was not easy either, especially for Jerry, with the hardware stored in his bulging shirt front. Sandy, who had gone first, helped him down, and Jerry landed beside him with a muted clinking of metal and hard plastic. The slight noise brought no warning whistle from Turk’s lookout.
A glance at the deck below showed them why. Their eyes, grown accustomed to complete darkness, were now able to see quite clearly about the freighter’s deck. Up forward, near where they had hidden below the windlass, stood Jones and the white-uniformed little Captain, together with Turk, Bull, and several other sailors.