[Lady Justice 03] - Lady Justice Gets Lei'd

by Robert Thornhill

  I looked at Maggie and Harry.

  Maggie spoke first. “Hey, if all it takes is a lock of hair and a pint of blood to get our friends back, I’m in.”

  Harry was more reluctant. “I don’t like making deals with criminals, especially with zealots. There’s got to be more to it than this. They’re not telling us everything.”

  “You will be in control all the way,” Daniel said. “We both get what we want. We shall fulfill our destiny, and you will get your friends back.”

  Harry grudgingly acquiesced. “Okay, but we do it my way. I’ll order a chopper that will fly us to the crater rim. We’ll access the cave from a rope ladder and wait while you perform your ceremony; then it’s back to jail for the both of you. Understand?”

  “Agreed.”

  Harry arranged for the chopper, and Maggie had blood drawn by an EMT.

  There was only enough room in the chopper for four passengers and the pilot, so Maggie stayed behind at the precinct. The Kalakoas, cuffed and shackled, carrying their blood offering, boarded the chopper with Harry and me, and we lifted off to climb to the summit of the great volcano.

  Fortunately, it was a clear day. The clouds that so often hid Haleakala’s summit were absent, and our destination was clearly visible ten thousand feet above the valley floor.

  I had only seen the cave opening from the floor of the crater and had no idea how to locate it from the crater’s rim, but Buddy directed the pilot, and soon we were hovering outside the cave opening in the sheer cliff wall.

  Looking at the gaping hole brought back vivid memories of the ordeal Maggie and I had endured, and as I looked at the rocky cliff face we had climbed down, I silently uttered a prayer of thanks.

  I recognized the cave immediately, but something in my mind registered as not being quite right. I couldn’t put my finger on it.

  It was impossible to get the whirring blades close enough to the wall to access the opening directly, so the chopper lifted the thirty feet to the crater’s rim. We dropped a rope ladder to the cave mouth below.

  Thankfully, the thirty-five-mile-an-hour winds that often buffeted the summit were calm. Dangling from a thirty-foot rope ladder wildly swaying in the breeze was not my idea of a good time.

  Harry descended first so that he could help our shackled prisoners off the ladder, and I was last, carrying the blood and lock of hair in a bag slung over my shoulder. When we were all safely inside, I handed the bag to Daniel.

  The artifacts were located at the back of the cave, maybe fifty feet from the opening, to protect them from the elements. I had told Harry that to my knowledge the opening in the cliff wall was the only way in and out, so we waited by the mouth while the Kalakoas made their way into the depths of the cave.

  While we waited, the uneasy feeling that I had continued to plague me.

  Then it came to me. I knew what was wrong.

  When Maggie and I climbed down to the ledge, the vine rope was attached to a bamboo pole wedged between the walls of the cave opening.

  The pole and rope were missing. Someone had been to the cave after we escaped.

  I whispered to Harry, “This is all wrong. Someone’s been here. They could have left guns or anything back in that cave. I think we’ve walked into a trap.”

  “Oh crap! Are you sure?”

  “Absolutely!”

  Harry pulled his service revolver just as the Kalakoas emerged from the darkness. But they were not carrying guns as I feared. They were carrying two packages, each about the size of a brick, wrapped in duct tape.

  Harry pointed his weapon. “Okay, whatever you’ve got there, just put it on the ground.”

  “I don’t think so, Harry,” Daniel said, “and I wouldn’t think about shooting, because if I release my grip on this trigger, this C-4 will blow you all to hell.”

  Harry holstered his gun. “Okay, take it easy. So what now? You don’t think you’re going to get on the chopper with that stuff, do you?”

  “Absolutely not. We came to fulfill our destiny, and that’s what we’re going to do. After today, the bones of our forefathers will never be disturbed again. They will rest in peace, and Pele will be appeased. Our work will be finished.”

  “What about our friends?” I said. “Where are Willie and Mary?”

  “I’m sure my comrades will find a way to make good use of them. They are merely a tool, a means to an end, as you might say.”

  “But we had a deal!”

  “Your friend Harry was right. You should never make deals with ‘criminals’ or ‘zealots.’” Daniel placed a package of the explosive against the wall on each side of the cave entrance. “You have about ten seconds to make your exit. Farewell.”

  Daniel and Buddy turned and walked back into the dark reaches of the cave.

  “Walt, run!” Harry shouted. “Let’s get the hell out of here.”

  I didn’t need a second invitation.

  The rope ladder was still dangling just outside the cave entrance, suspended from the hovering chopper. I grabbed the ladder and began scrambling up, hand over fist. Harry was right behind me. The minute he was on the ladder, he shouted to the pilot, “Up! Get us up! Fast!”

  The pilot gunned the engine, and we were lifted skyward hanging from the end of the swinging rope ladder.

  “Hang on tight, Walt! We’re gonna get hit!”

  The C-4 exploded with all the fury of Pele herself.

  My first sensation was the deafening roar that assaulted my eardrums, causing me to cringe in pain.

  Following close on the heels of the thunder came the concussion wave from the explosion.

  In movies, I had seen people fleeing from a blast that were lifted off their feet and thrown through the air, and I always wondered if that was real or just Hollywood.

  It was real.

  The wave hit us with a force that took my breath away. The chopper was battered like a gnat in a stiff wind, and our rope ladder, which had been hanging vertically, was lifted ninety degrees to a horizontal position. It was all we could do hang on in the turbulent air.

  Next came the rocks and debris that were propelled from the blast site like double-aught buckshot from a twelve gauge. We did our best to protect our eyes and face, but our bodies took the brunt of the bruising rocks.

  It was over as quickly as it had come.

  As soon as the chopper leveled out and the rope ladder stabilized, we climbed to safety.

  The pilot made a pass by the spot where the cave opening used to be. All that remained was a mound of rubble belching plumes of dust.

  Daniel and Buddy Kalakoa had fulfilled their destiny and sealed their own fate by sealing off from the world the remains of their beloved ancestors.

  Their comrades would hold them up as martyrs, their death breathing new life into the sovereignty movement.

  But also dying with them was any hope of finding my friends alive.

  CHAPTER 21

  As the chopper swooped down from the summit, I saw a huge black mushroom cloud rising hundreds of feet into the air from the base of the mountain just below Pukalani.

  I turned to Harry and pointed to the cloud. “I thought you said this volcano was dormant. If that’s not an eruption, then Japan must be bombing us again.”

  Harry just smiled. “It’s nothing quite as dramatic as all that. It’s just a sugarcane burn. When the cane is ready to harvest, they burn the fields to eliminate the weeds and the leaves from the stalk.”

  “But doesn’t that burn the cane stalks too?”

  “No, the cane stalk is eighty-five percent liquid, and the field burns so fast that the stalk is left intact. A forty-acre field, like the one you see below, will completely burn in fifteen to twenty minutes. They use dozers to clear a twenty-foot area around the field so that the fire is contained.”

  From our vantage point high above the field, I saw the billowing black smoke rise high into the air, and as it drifted west in the prevailing trade winds, the black turned into a dirty gray.
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br />   “That’s our ‘Maui snow,’” Harry said. “It drifts into

  Kihei and settles on the lanais and cars and really pisses off the haoles who paid a half million for their condo in paradise.”

  “We all have our crosses to bear,” I said.

  Harry just smiled.

  On the ride from the heliport to the station, I kept playing the events of the past few days over in my mind, and something just didn’t add up.

  We found Maggie waiting anxiously in the conference room at the precinct. She was visibly shaken after hearing of our harrowing escape and the death of the Kalakoas. And worst of all, we were no closer to finding our missing friends.

  “I’ve been thinking about how all of this played out,” I said, “and something smells really fishy. Help me think this through.

  “We were on the road to Hana, and I said something like, ‘I’d like to explore the jungle,’ and Liho dropped us off at the East Maui Irrigation Trail. We hadn’t been on the trail more than fifteen or twenty minutes when those guys nabbed us. How did they know we were there? We must have passed a dozen trails leading from the highway into the forest. Why did he pick that one?”

  “Unless it was prearranged,” Harry said. “Even if you hadn’t said anything, he may have stopped there anyway. Your statement just made the stop seem more reasonable.”

  “Now think about this,” I continued. “Who knew we had escaped from the cave? If I understood correctly, Nathan called you to tell you we were safe at his place. When you arrived, you told us that after we went missing, Willie and Mary returned to the hotel, and you asked Liho to keep an eye on them. Is that right?”

  “Right on, so far.”

  “Then you told us that as soon as you heard we were safe, you relayed the information to Willie and Mary so they wouldn’t worry. Who did you call?”

  “Liho!”

  “By the time we returned to the hotel, they had been kidnapped, so someone who knew we had escaped tipped off the Kalakoas, who nabbed our friends to use as bargaining chips to get us all back to the cave. So who knew that we had escaped and the location of Willie and Mary?”

  “Liho!”

  Then a terrible thought occurred to me. They don’t need them for bargaining chips anymore. They are expendable.

  “I think it’s time we paid a visit to your old friend and guide, Liho,” Harry said.

  “He dances at the hotel every evening,” I said. “He’ll probably be there by the time we drive across the island.”

  “Then let’s get moving.”

  We stopped at the front desk and asked the concierge if she had seen Liho. She told us that he was in the dressing room behind the stage by the tiki bar.

  The dressing room was small, maybe six feet wide and twelve feet long, and the walls were lined with costumes, gourds, and drums. Liho was in the process of selecting his wardrobe for the evening’s performance when we entered.

  Harry didn’t waste any time.

  “Liho, we need to talk, and I think you know why.”

  Liho looked at each of us and hung his head. I saw his shoulders slump, and his huge body quivered with emotion as he fought back the tears.

  “I … I … I didn’t want to do it,” he stammered. “I’m not a part of their movement. But they brought me this.” He pulled a photograph of a woman and small boy from his pocket.

  “This is my sister and her son, my nephew. They live on Oahu. Buddy Kalakoa told me that if I didn’t cooperate, his ‘friends’ from Waimanolo would pay her a visit and it wouldn’t be pleasant.”

  “Why didn’t you come to us for help?” Harry asked.

  “How do you know who to trust these days? Anyone could be part of their movement—even you or one of your men. And if they find out I have talked, my sister will pay the price.” He turned to Maggie and me. “I’m so sorry. I know you trusted me, and I let you down, but I just didn’t know what else to do.”

  “I understand, Liho,” I said. “We’ve all been caught up in this thing, but we’ve got another problem right now. I suppose you know that they took Willie and Mary.”

  “Yes, the men came to their room and knocked, and they opened right away hoping it was the two of you returning. They took them at gunpoint. I saw them being shoved in a van, and they drove away.”

  “Do you have any idea where they might have taken them?” Harry asked.

  “I recognized one of the men. He has a place out by Kahakuloa. That would be my guess.”

  “Kahaku—what?” I asked. “Where’s that?”

  “Kahakuloa,” Harry replied. He pointed toward the mountains behind us. “It’s on the coast on the other side of these mountains.”

  “Then let’s get rolling,” I said.

  “Not a chance. First, it’s not a place you want to go. After you pass Honokohou Bay, the road narrows to one lane. There are sheer cliffs on the mountain side and vertical drops to the rocky coast below on the ocean side. There is only room for one car, and if you meet someone coming from the other direction, one of you has to drive backwards to a wide spot cut into the mountain. Second, you two have been through enough. You need to get some rest. This is your honeymoon, after all.”

  “But they’re our friends and—”

  “And nothing. Let us do our job. We’ll find your friends.”

  “And what about me?” Liho said. “Am I under arrest?”

  Harry looked at Maggie and me. “Do you want to press charges?”

  “I expect that if I was in Liho’s shoes and it was Maggie they were threatening, I would have done the same thing. I think we’ll pass on the charges.”

  Liho grabbed my hand and thanked me, but I thought it odd that he wouldn’t look me in the eye.

  As we turned to leave, Noelani entered the dressing room. Seeing us about to leave, she stepped back to give us room to exit the tiny space.

  As I passed by her, I felt her slip a piece of paper into my hand. I started to speak, but a quick shake of her head and the look in her eye told me to keep moving.

  Back in the privacy of our room, I unfolded the note.

  It read, “Meet me by the scuba shack after our performance. Your friends are in danger.”

  We showered, put on fresh clothing, and headed back to the tiki bar for supper. We ordered fish sandwiches and fries and enjoyed our supper while Liho, Noelani, and the trio onstage performed their evening hula show.

  At the conclusion of the show, the dancers retreated to the dressing room to change out of their costumes.

  Liho left first, and a few minutes later we saw Noelani leave and walk in the direction of the beach. We waited a few minutes so that anyone watching would not suspect that we were following her.

  The beach was pretty much deserted at that time of the evening. As we approached the shack, Noelani called to us from the shadows. “I’m here.”

  “What’s this all about? Why the secrecy?”

  “I was behind the dressing room when you were talking to Liho. It was none of my business, but the walls are very thin, and I heard your conversation. The police aren’t going to find your friends at Kahakuloa.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “Because I saw two men talking to Liho earlier, before you and the policeman arrived. I sort of heard some of that conversation too.”

  “You seem to have a knack for that. What did you hear?”

  “They told Liho that the Kalakoas were dead and that it would be just a matter of time until you put two and two together and figured out that he was part of the plan. They knew you would be coming to confront Liho, so they told him to send the cops to Kahakuloa to throw them off.”

  “So all that was just a wild goose chase?”

  “I’m afraid so.”

  “So Liho double-crossed us again?”

  “Not really. He truly wants no part of this, but they threatened his sister again. He felt he had no choice.”

  “No wonder he wouldn’t look me in the eye.”

  “Liho�
��s a good man, but he’s caught between a rock and a hard place.”

  “So Willie and Mary are not at Kahakuloa. Do you have any idea where they might be holding them?”

  “I don’t know for certain, but I did recognize one of the men. He is a watchman at the Kaheawa wind farm.”

  “The what?”

  “Do you remember seeing the huge windmills on the mountain above McGregor Point?”

  “Yes.”

  “That’s the wind farm. It’s very isolated, and there’s a maintenance shed on site. It would be a perfect place to stash your friends.”

  “So how do we get there?”

  “There’s a service road right by McGregor Point that goes directly to the wind farm, but they keep the gate locked, and sometimes there’s a guard there. There are two other ways to the farm. Just past the tunnel through the mountain on the way to Lahaina is the entrance to the Lahaina Pali Trail. Before the highway was built, the only way to get to Lahaina from Kahului was across the mountain by foot or on horseback. That trail crosses the wind farm service road. There are signs there that warn hikers to stay off the service road, but lots of curious tourists wander up there. That could be your diversion.”

  “Diversion from what?”

  “From you coming up to the wind farm from the backside. Where the Pali Trail comes down the mountain by Maalaea, there is another trail that goes directly up the mountain. It is actually a service road for the power lines that bring electric service to west Maui. Not many people know about it, and few would want to hike it if they did know.”

  “Why is that?”

  “While the Pali Trail has a few steep spots, it’s fairly easy to hike because the rise is gradual. The power line trail is straight up the mountain, and it’s a three-thousand-foot climb to the back of the wind farm.”

  “So what you’re suggesting is that Maggie hike the

  Pali Trail and distract the guard while I slip into the maintenance shed from the backside?”

  “Something like that.”

  “I don’t suppose you would have a weapon of some kind?”

  “Do Hawaiian girls dance the hula?” She grinned.