deserted. A missionary, who earlier Allie had driven away, had returned and persuaded most of the Creoles to leave with him. Soon afterwards, the three 'slaves' from Olancho arrive with guns and threaten Allie's domain. He tricks them and locks them in 'Fat Boy' intending to freeze them to death, but their gunfire causes an explosion which kills the three gunmen, destroys Jeronimo and pollutes the river. Part Three: Brewer's Lagoon Escaping the explosion, Allie leads his family and Mr. Haddy through the jungle to Sico River, determined to move even further from civilization, and become less dependent on technology. They borrow a boat from a Miskito and float down to Brewers Lagoon where Mr. Haddy's mother lives in a nearby village. Mr. Haddy gave directions to the Laguna Miskita, 'it so small, when you gets there you ain't believe you there', which sounds ideal to Allie. On arrival they convert an abandoned dugout into a hut, beachcombing for materials (including an outboard motor which Allie repairs) and planting crops on the shore, achieving total self-sufficiency. Then the rainy season starts, and a storm surge from a tropical cyclone washes away all their work. Mr. Haddy arrives under cover of night and gives Charlie a drum of gasoline and spark plugs, which he knows Allie would not accept; Charlie hides them on the shore. Allie finds them and determines to use the supplies to sail upstream, against the flow "that Mosquito Coast is a dead loss...there's death down there...Everything broken, rotten and dead is on that stream and being pulled down to the coast... I've been fighting the current all along". Charlie and his brother Jerry want to return to the United States, but Allie tells them that it has been destroyed. Part Four: Up the Patuca The family heads up the Patuca River, passing several abandoned villages destroyed by the recent tropical storm. Allie bullies his family into agreeing to his plans to head farther away from civilization, and they hear about a village called Guampo far up the river. When they arrive, it's the Spellgoods' mission settlement complete with harbor, landing strip and church. That night, Charlie and his brother Jerry swim ashore and contact Emily. They arrange to borrow the Spellgoods' jeep and escape back to the coast after learning that the United States has not been destroyed. On returning to the boat they try to persuade