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"Pray they don'tcold water on Pitt's confidence

"We'll know shortly Get ready to grab the harness when it's dropped"

"Take too long for it to haul us up one at a tioodbye to the lighthouse together"

Pitt nodded "I'm with you"

They stepped out onto a narrow balcony that ran around the top of the lighthouse Pitt recognized the helicopter as a Bell 430 with twin Rolls-Royce engines It was painted yellow and red, with Managua airways lettered across the sides He watched intently as the pilot took a no-nonsense approach once around the lighthouse, while a crew a harness attached by a cable to a winch out the open side door

Taller by aled the harness on the first pass as it swung in circles under the rotor wash He looped it around Giordino's shoulders

"You're built tougher than I am You take the strain and I'll hold on to you"

Giordino looped his hands through the opening and clutched thehtly around the waist The crewman, unable to be heard above the exhaust whine of the turbines, waved frantically, trying to signal them that he could lift only one man at a time

His warning caed off the balcony of the lighthouse and dangled a hundred feet above the water as a gust of wind struck the copter The pilot was surprised as the aircraft suddenly tilted to starboard froht of both men He quickly corrected and hovered on an even keel as his creatched the overloaded winch strain to pull both men aboard

Fortune prevailed and the pursuing boat did not fire uns an a staccato burst Fortunately, the boat was still too far away, and with the keel bouncing over the water, the gunner's aim was fifty yards wide

The pilot, horrified at seeing hiot about the men he had come to rescue and threw the helicopter on its side away from the boat and beat a hasty retreat toward the safety of the shore With twenty feet to go, Pitt and Giordino were crazily wind beneath the craft Giordino felt as if his ar no pain, could do little but clutch Giordino in a death grip and shout at the crewman to speed up the lift

Pitt could see the strain of the agony on Giordino's face For perhaps two est minutes he had ever experienced, he was alo and fall, but one look at the water now nearly five hundred feet below his dangling feet quickly changed his mind

Then he was looking into the dazed eyes of the crewman only five feet away The crewman turned and shouted to the pilot, who deftly banked the copter just enough for Pitt and Giordino to fall inside the cargo section The side door was rapidly slammed closed and locked

The still-shocked crewman stared at the two runted with a heavy Spanish accent "Lift only forone hundred pounds"

"He speaks English," Giordino observed