We heed no instincts but our own.
Jessica's whiskey sour with a twist of lime had arrived alongside Parry's gin and tonic, and she was taking in the incredible expanse of the turquoise Pacific, about to taste her drink there in the lounge atop the Aloha Tower, when Jim Parry lifted his glass in a salute, pointed to Diamond Head in the distance and said, “Okole maluna.”
She accepted the toast, touching her glass to his, asking, “And what does that mean?”
“ Bottoms up, in this instance.”
“ What do you mean in this instance? It has a double meaning?”
“ A vulgar one.”
She was intrigued. “Really? I love vulgar-what?”
“ I'd just as soon-”
“ No, please, what else does it mean?”
“ Well, the literal translation means 'stick your bottom up toward the moon,' kind of moon the moon, a practice which most Honolulu cops let pass unless the drunk gets completely out of hand.”
She shook her head and frowned, “Luna, like the Italian moon.”
“ Suck 'em up.” He made it sound like sock 'urn op, as he downed the rest of his drink. “That's another island expression, generally to do with alcoholic beverages, but this could also be taken as a cry of need, an invitation… depends upon the speaker and… circumstances.”
“ As circumstances warrant? It sounds as if the Hawaiian people are a flexible lot, if you go by their language.” She felt a bit uneasy with the innuendo, looked around and asked aloud about the time.
He laughed lightly and said, “It's Hawaiian Time.”
“ Meaning?”
“ A bit late. Anywhere from several hours to several days late, that is.”
She smiled again, relaxing. “You know the island people well, don't you?”
“ No haole ever completely knows them, and when you speak of the island people, well, that includes a lot of varied nationalities. What with all the imported labor for the sugarcane and pineapple fields over the years-Chinese, Portuguese, Japanese. Did you know there were one hundred sixty thousand Japanese on the islands at the time Pearl Harbor was attacked?”
She realized of course that he was right; she'd heard nine languages being spoken in the space of time it took for her to gather her bags at the airport in Maui and get to her hotel- Chinese, English, Filipino, Hawaiian, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese, Samoan, and a smattering of Spanish.
“ The diversity,” she told him, “simply adds to the romance of the islands.”
“ For the visitor, sure. For the working law-enforcement official, it can cause a lot of problems. For instance, the big Samoans, many of them huge monsters, keep an annual holiday which when translated is 'Kill a Haole Day.'“
“ Kill a White Day,” she repeated. “I see.”
“ Still, English has been the spoken language of Hawaii since the 1850s and it's taught in all island schools.”
“ I've heard a pidgin English among the bellhops, cabbies and others.”
“ Mo betta leave da kine talk 'lone.”
She laughed at his charming accent.
“ Hawaiians liberally lace their language with pidgin; kind of a tapestry of Hawaiian words, English words and something in between. Tony, me, others working the law here have had to learn it as a matter of survival.”
She knew that the Hawaiian alphabet was the shortest in the world, using five vowels-a, e, i, o, u-and only seven consonants-h, k, 1, m, n, p and w. All vowels were pronounced and there was a vowel at the end of each syllable, and a vowel always between consonants. An eighth consonant was a glottal stop, pronounced the way the breathy pause in “oh-oh” was created. The w after an i or e made the sound of a v as in Ewa.
“ And I should warn you about asking a Hawaiian about directions,” he added.
“ Oh, and why's that?”
“ You've got two main directions here: mauka-towards the mountains-and makai-towards the sea. Even on their maps you'll be hard pressed to know north from south, east from west. A kamaaina refers to landmarks rather than to points on a compass.”
“ Give me an example.”
“ All right, to reach Iolani Palace from here, 'da kine trip, you go mauka four blocks, then waikiki three blocks, li' dat. Now geev um, brah-go for it, friend!”
Jessica's full, warm laughter filled the cocktail lounge. She stared out at the unending sea and back to Diamond Head. Parry watched her gleaming eyes.
He said almost in whisper, “Leahi.”
Her eyes returned to him, her lips parting, asking him to explain himself with a mere look, almost certain he was paying her some sort of Hawaiian compliment.
“ Wreath of Fire.”
“ What?”
“ Leahi-that's what the Hawaiians called it-Diamond Head. They called it Wreath of Fire because long ago signal beacons were lit up there, or possibly because in Hawaiian mythology, Hi'iaka, Pele's little sister, compared the crater's shape to the brow-lae-of an 'ahi fish, the yellowfin tuna.”
“ Then how'd it become Diamond Head?”
“ It was first called Diamond Head by British seamen who mistook the calcite crystals they found there for diamonds. At night sometimes, when the light is right, the calcite crystals resemble-at least for the Hawaiian romantics-the tears of Pele, goddess of the crater. Her tears were formed into diamonds, so to speak, by the force of the lava. Anyway, makes for great copy for the island promos.”
“ It is beautiful,” she said, “and so are the legends, wherever they come from.”
“ Sometimes hard to distinguish fact from fiction here,” he replied, lifting his empty glass at the waitress. “People think that grass skirts and ukuleles were invented here, but not so.”
“ It still sounds to me as though you love the islands, Jim.”
He smiled at the use of his name. “I do. It's become home for me now. I've gotten accustomed to their ways.”
“ Guess I feel the same about my place in Quantico. We certainly grow attached to our surroundings-people in general, I mean.”
“ People in our line of work in particular,” he added. “You try to build a safe wall of protection, a place to finally get away from what your normal day-if you can call it that-brings you. I don't have to tell you.”
She shook her head. “Sometimes I wonder why I stay in the FBI.”
“ So do I, but then I get up in the morning and go straight back in. Some of the cases I've worked have been so brutalizing, dehumanizing, awful-for me, I mean. Guess… guess from what you've said, you're not wanting in that department.”
She shifted uncomfortably in her chair, thinking of the nearly nine months of intensive psychological trashing she had taken at the hands of her therapist. “Guess it's in my blood,” she replied, telling him about her father instead, a man who had been an M.E. for the Navy for most of his life. She didn't want to admit to any failures or scars, either physical or psychological. She didn't want Parry to think her less than perfect, for despite the cane, he seemed, at the moment, to think highly of her.
Parry now ordered an island daiquiri, explaining that the locals made the drink two and three times as potent as normal. “I earned it,” he proclaimed. “I'll need it for the trip back to the Kahalas'. Time to inform the parents…”
“ I'll go with you,” she offered, extending her hand, her jaw set firmly, eyes fixed onto him. “I've dealt with grieving parents before.”
“ I'm sure you have.”
“ Having a female along might help.”
“ It might at that, but you've had enough for one day.”
“ Worried about my stamina or Paul Zanek?” Instead of answering her, he pulled out a small, tattered-looking book of poems which might have come from an ancient pawnshop. “Found this in Linda Kahala's room several days ago.” He handed it over.
The title read Shakespeare's Sonnets. He-indicated the highlighted lines, flipping through to Sonnet 73, where Jessica scanned the morbid lines underlined in red, made more curious by the circumstances of Linda's death:
In me thou see'st the twilight of such day
As after sunset fadeth in the west;
Which by and by black night doth take away,
Death's second self that seals up all the rest.
In me thou see'st the glowing of such fire,
That on the ashes of his youth doth lie,
As the deathbed whereon it must expire,
Consumed with that which it was nourished by.
“ I've checked with the university and she was involved in a Shakespeare class,” said Parry. “Most of her grades were pretty mediocre, except for the English, with the exception again of the Shakespeare course. So thought I'd take a pass at her instructor. See what shakes out there.”
“ Not a bad idea. She certainly seemed melancholy, but that's true of most teens. It's the age when they groove on Edgar Allan Poe and H.P. Love craft, too, so maybe you ought not to take these red marks too seriously.”
“ Just a hunch, a feeling.”
“ I still think you ought to get some divers as close to that Blow Hole as possible; see what may have flushed out from the bottom,” she suggested.
“ Didn't suppose you'd let that go. But it'll be dangerous, even for the most experienced men. Still, I guess we'll have to go hunting down there now for sure.”
“ I'm not interested in a media show, just forensic evidence. If this bastard's ever caught, we're going to need all we can get on him.”
“ Whether you like media circuses or not, we've got one on our hands. No way to duck it, and maybe we shouldn't. Maybe we ought to use the media to our advantage.”
“ That kind of thing can be risky. People can get hurt.”
“ I'm aware of that, Jessica. I wanted you here for good reason. You've used the press to advantage in the past.”
They sat in silence for a moment while she tried to decode what he was getting at. Failing this, she repeated herself. “I meant what I said about the Kahalas. If you'd like me to, I'll go with you as moral support.”
He almost took her up on her offer, but shaking his head, he replied. “You've been through enough today. I'll take you home and maybe you can sample Waikiki Beach.”
“ If you're sure.”
“ Tony's meeting me later. We'll manage.” He got to his feet and she followed suit.
“ Well, thanks for the drink and the foreign-language lesson.”
“ My pleasure, really. Thanks for… for sharing, earlier.”
She forced a marginal smile, recalling all that she'd told him about the Mad Matisak vampire case and the case of the Claw. Quickly reverting back to the lighter subject, she said, “Going to have to get a dictionary if I stay much longer. I think I love the language and this place.”
“ Good, maybe we'll make an islander of you yet.”
She smiled genuinely now, accepting his hand on her arm. Parry gently guided her toward the exit. It'd been a long time since a man assumed she might like such treatment, not that she couldn't find her way solo from the table to the door.
They left the lounge unaware that they were being discreetly followed by a native man in casual Hawaiian shirt and shorts, keeping at cautious distance. The man was darkly tanned, his skin the color of red earth, his clothing loose and fluid. He took a separate elevator and at ground level, when he saw the two FBI agents get into Parry's car, he rushed to his cab and got on his C.B. radio and announced that Parry and Dr. Coran were leaving the I Aloha Tower going south toward Waikiki, most likely the Rainbow Tower, where she was staying.
A voice returned on the C.B. radio, saying, “Aloha, Toma. Excellent work. I'll take it from here.”
“ You got it, aikane.”
“ Hele on outta deah, and say hello to Nola.”
“ Shaka, brah.”
“ And no talk story, eh?”
“ Garans, brah!”
The C.B. went dead.
Parry balled his fist up and allowed his pinky and thumb to stand upright, and twirling this peculiar fist at her, he said, “Shaka, shaka, brah. It means everything's cool, friend!”
“ See you later,” she called out.
Parry left her at the entrance circle by the Rainbow Tower where cabs scurried in and out, tour buses trundled past and people lolled about, mostly tourists whose steps told others that they had all the time in the world. It was what Parry called the “tourist gait.” In the crowd there were a number of Japanese women, and one, with a little skin toning, might for all the world be another Linda Kahaia, her long trailing hair near her hips, the bone structure fine and petite, the twist at the edge of the mouth, the dark eyes. This young woman, traveling in the company of her parents, it appeared, looked like the ideal target for the killer.
Something inside Jessica made her want to rush up to these strangers and warn them, but she was too practical for such a step. They would think her mad, and they most likely would understand nothing she had to say, given the language barrier and the morbid nature of her message. Warnings were seldom heeded anyway, and if a warning were to be of any use, it might perhaps be done better via the media as Jim was thinking. The investigation into the Cane Cutter case was leading in that direction. There was no artist rendition of the killer, but there most certainly were enough faces and evidence to make a rendition of the typical victim. A Linda Kahala-type pencil drawing could be flashed over the TV channels throughout the island and presented in the press. It might be the right thing to do at this point, but Jim Parry had said that it was too soon, that with her coming in on the case, he didn't want to have the killer suddenly fleeing the jurisdiction, vanishing as most serial killers did.
From the corner of her eye, she saw someone watching her, a lone figure who stopped suddenly short, turned and was pretending to hail a cab. When she turned back and started for the hotel, he quickly pursued. He was a short, stocky Hawaiian whose step was lively and quick. She was about to lift her cane and strike when from the doorway stepped Joseph Kaniola, the newspaperman and father of the slain cop. She recognized him from their brief encounter at the airport.
Kaniola shooed the other, younger man off before saying to her, “I have come for some answers.”
She stared into his unwavering, dark Hawaiian eyes at a smoldering light there. 'There's really not much I can help you with, Mr. Kaniola.”
“ As a father? Off the record,” he pleaded. “I've got to know what's being done.”
His anguish clearly undeniable, she suggested they go inside.
They entered the open, airy lobby of the hotel, where the trade winds were allowed to dust everything in the place, going straight through to the seaside exit, where they found a table. Birds flew so close she might reach out and touch one. A waitress asked them if they'd like to order something to drink. She asked for iced tea and Mr. Kaniola asked for a beer.
“ There's truly not much I can tell you,” she began.
“ That's not good enough,” he challenged.
“ All right, but this is in strictest confidence, sir.”
“ Accepted.”
“ It cannot go beyond this table.”
“ Accepted.”
“ Your son's murderer is the same man who has been killing young island women.”
He sat in silence, the news sinking in. 'To finally hear it from someone in authority… that Alan's death… that he didn't die for nothing, shot by some stoned drug-head… that he was so close to solving the Trade Winds killings… I knew it… felt it here.” He finished by beating his chest with his fist.
“ We believe your son stumbled onto the Trade Winds Killer.”
“ Stumbled? That's not exactly right. He followed the case closely. He knew every detail about the victims. He was on the bastard's trail.”
“ Perhaps… at any rate, the killer surprised him; got the upper hand.”
“ There's more you're not saying.”
“ I can't tell you any more. I've already overstepped my bounds just by talking to you.”
“ Did Parry tell you that you could not speak to me?”
“ No, to the press in general.”
“ I tell you I am here as a father.”
She cast out a long breath of air as if this might return some investment. He continued to stare, his eyes glistening over with the loss he had suffered. He reached for a napkin, dabbed his eyes which were red and swollen.
“ His mother and I… his wife and children… we have all suffered a great deal. We have to know all that we can learn. We have to know that his killer will be brought to justice.”
“ He will,” she said, knowing she could make no such promise.
He continued to bore through her from a purely Hawaiian visage with the eyes of a man seeking truth. She wondered momentarily about his ancestry.
“ You must promise that nothing I say will find its way into your newspaper.”
“ I swear on the graves of my ancestors that nothing revealed here, from you alone, will be made newsprint.”
'That's an old newsman's trick, Mr. Kaniola. Take what I tell you, run it by another source and then claim it came from the secondary source whom you fooled into nodding yes or no. I guess Parry was right about my not talking to you.” She got up as if to leave, but he stopped her with a firm hand on her wrist. Nearby, she saw the Hawaiian man who'd earlier been following her, and she saw the glint of metal where a shoulder holster bulged beneath the Hawaiian shirt. She sat back down.
“ Please, I must know, as a father.”
She sighed heavily and sat back down. She told him about the profile of the victims, hoping this would suffice. She also confirmed that Linda Kahala was the first of the missing women to be identified and that this came as a result of a limb spewed forth by the Blow Hole. It was information that was generally circulating anyway, she rationalized. “God, that could've been one of my grandchildren.” He was horrified, his eyes wandering far from the table now. “Please, anything else about my son?”
She then added, “At some time your son was in close proximity to the killer, it appears because-”
“ I knew it.”
“- because-and this for certain you don't want to get around, Mr. Kaniola-your son's hands made contact with Linda Kahala's blood, either from the body or clothing.”
His small eyes pinched at this. “What're you saying?”
“ I'm not saying that I think he had anything to do with the Kahala girl's killing. He put his hands on some item that was covered in her blood. Most likely her clothing.”
He thought about this, how close his son had come to being the hero in this story without heroes.
“ News like that could be twisted,” he said.
“ I'm well aware of that, and so are my lab people.”
“ But they're not your lab people, are they? They're Parry's people. How can you trust strangers?”
She gazed questioningly at him. “You knew the exact time when I landed at the airport, and now you've learned where I'm staying. Mr. Kaniola, maybe I should be frightened of you.”
“ You have nothing to fear from me. I want only that my son be honored, and his killer brought to justice.”
“ In the meantime, what're you paying Mr. Lau for information?” She'd taken a calculated shot. His reaction was bull's-eye, not in words but in body language.
“ I pay Lau nothing.” He clenched his teeth as if insulted.
“ Not even in beer?”
“ Lau is my sister's son.”
“ Your nephew?” She dropped her gaze and drained her tea, which had turned to water. “I think I've said enough.”
“ But you've told me nothing. How soon will you and Parry find this madman?”
“ What's really going on here, Mr. Kaniola? Island vigilantes at work?”
“ You shock me!”
“ You find the name of the killer, and then you and your pals can work a little island justice? Is that it?”
“ I have a right to know what is being done about this matter!” His shout startled people all around them. She got up to leave, ignoring his repeated apologies and his bodyguard. As she walked away, he said firmly, “I will see vengeance done. I have a right to see it done. I am an American, too, Dr. Coran.”
She rushed toward the elevator and her room, strangers on all sides of her now taking on a sinister form. How many of them were working as Kaniola's eyes? How many people were watching her? She had thought someone back at the Aloha Tower was watching her, but she had cast off the notion as preposterous. Now this.
She wondered how deeply Joseph Kaniola's frustration and anger ran. Just how far might he go if he learned who the killer was before she and Parry did?
When she got to her room and locked the door behind her, she wondered if perhaps she hadn't overreacted. Yet something in Kaniola's eyes, his manner, told her otherwise. She wondered if she should not tell Parry about the incident.
She undressed and showered, the tension draining from her, leaving her pleasantly empty; empty of thoughts of homicide, autopsies and Kaniola, of Lau's obvious deceit, and other pestering, thorny problems she'd have to face tomorrow. For now she'd get the sleep she had missed the night before, wake refreshed and be prepared for the next day far better than she had been equipped for this one.
God, why'd I say anything to Kaniola? she chastised herself. “Might've known better.” He was, after all, a newsman, and no matter his race, the story was more important than food, water and truth. Sure, he professed a father's concern, and no doubt he was absolutely sincere in this instance, but he still remained a newspaperman.
She half expected and feared that tomorrow's Ala Ohana newspaper would run a story telling everyone of the FBI suspicions she had shared with Kaniola. ParTy would have her head. It was too soon to release such information, and it might backfire on all of them, including Joseph Kaniola.
She toyed with the idea of trying to reach Jim Parry, to tell him of her encounter with Kaniola and what she had foolishly revealed to him. She thought about it but decided doing nothing was, for the moment, best.
It was early yet, 6 P.M., but she was exhausted, and the single drink she'd shared with Parry, at island proof, had left her mellow, perhaps why she'd been such easy pickings for Kaniola. She wondered now how worried she should be. Either way, she'd locate the pool, do some laps, come back up and sleep on it.