Murder Sets Sail

by Paul Stam

Chris doesn’t know when he charters his sail boat, the AHWANAH, to George Harris for a three-month cruise to Tahiti and other South Pacific islands that George plans to high-jack his boat. George needs the boat to rendezvous with a sailboat out of Hong Kong carrying a hundred kilos of China White. One week out of Honolulu George commandeers the boat and heads West to rendezvous with the other boat. After the heroin is transferred at the rendezvous and two accomplices come aboard from the other boat, George shoots one of them for having tried to double cross him while they were still in Honolulu. The Hong Kong boat is scuttled and it is obvious that the owner of that boat was killed before they ever got to the rendezvous. George makes it clear that the only reason Chris is still alive is in case the Coast Guard approaches them as they get back into Hawaiian waters. It would not do for the Coast Guard to find a boat without its owner aboard. George warns Chris that if he tries to notify the Coast Guard in any way about what's going on aboard the boat, Myra will be killed. Chris is certain that George intends to kill both Myra and him and sink the AHWANAH as soon as they transfer to a powerboat they are to meet when they are in Hawaiian waters. In a daring move, Chris works on a plan for Myra and him to slip over the side undetected and hopefully be able to make it to land.

222 pages, Kindle Edition

First published July 4, 2014

About the author

At age 13 Paul was hunting big game in Africa with his father, not as a sport but to provide food for the station. With his father he's hunted rogue leopard's that were stealing livestock from a village. He's had a leopard's face six inches from his own in the middle of the night where the only thing protecting him was the mosquito net.

Paul J. Stam was born of missionary parents in the northeast corner of the Belgian Congo, which was about as far into Africa as you could go. He grew up listening to the accounts of the old timers, some of who were the first whites in that part of Africa. From them he heard the tribal traditions that they had heard from the "Story Keepers."

Just before the end of World War II, when he was 15, he came with his parents to the United States.

After graduating from high school he enlisted in the U.S. Navy, serving aboard a destroyer during the Korean War. His tour of duty completed, Paul attend the University of Minnesota and later joined the staff. While on the staff the University of Minnesota sent Paul to the Hawaiian Islands to attend a conference.

Paul immediately fell in love with the Islands. When he returned to Minnesota he turned in his resignation and headed back to the Islands.

Within two months of arriving in Hawaii, Paul was crewing on a sailboat. After a year of sailing the pacific on other people's boats, Paul decided it was time to get a boat of his own. Together with his wife Terry and their ten-year-old son Steven, they built their dreamboat, which they launched in 1978. He signed the contract for his first book aboard their newly launched "Waiola."

After eight years of sailing between Hawaii and French Polynesia they sold the boat and started living a normal life so Steven could attend college.

Among other things, pretty much in this order, Paul has been a construction worker (while going to college), university teacher and administrator before and after the sailing days and a sailboat skipper.

Paul is now retired and lives in Hawaii where he spends a lot of time on the potter's wheel making bowls and mugs and at the computer writing.