He wondered why anyone would opt to not be immortal, then shrugged—which reminded him unpleasantly of his back. But, somehow it already seemed to be feeling better—in anticipation of a rejuvenation without surgery. The thought made him again wonder why anyone would reject immortality. He finally decided it took all kinds.
THE ROAD TO HILO
“Why not?” He tried to keep his annoyance from showing. “Who could do it better than you?”
“Well, practical jokes really aren’t the same thing as acting. Besides, I don’t know the first thing about voodoo goddesses or whatever this Madam Pele is supposed to be.” Jessie’s voice was almost drowned out by the noise in the background. Craig’s phone call had caught her immediately following the traveling troupe’s early afternoon rehearsal, and the cast was either celebrating a successful performance or commiserating loudly over a bad one.
“Look! You aren’t going to do anyone any harm. You’ll just be teaching them a lesson. I’m fed up to the ears with listening to the warehouse crew go on and on with drivel. And Keola and Emily are the worst of the lot.”
“They’re both native Hawaiians?”
“Yeah. She’s only about a quarter, but you ought to hear her. She keeps talking about how her grandma was a kahuna, and how the old woman kept a lava flow away from Uncle Stanley’s store, and about sacred places, and about how you can feel the spirits when you go there. Every day is Halloween at the warehouse, especially when Keola shows up and throws more fuel on the fire.”
“I don’t know.” Craig could feel the doubt reverberating in the earpiece. He did his best to control his exasperation.
Jessie had been a friend for years. More than a friend, for a brief period before she left Hawai’i and went off to acting school on the Mainland. But they had gone their separate ways. Jessie to bit parts on and off Broadway and road shows back and forth across the US and Canada, Craig to a partnership in a small but successful coffee processing business south of Kailua town on the Kona side of the Big Island.
Jessie had two failed marriages behind her. Craig, one-and-a-half. His current wife had come back briefly, which had only induced him to spend much more time at his office in the warehouse. No great hardship. He was a workaholic anyway, and the gloomy old warehouse sitting a mile back from the main road, always filled with the rich smell of freshly roasted coffee, was more a home to him than the modern apartment facing out over Kealakekua Bay and the Pacific.
“Think of it as a one-night stand. You drive down from Kailua and meet them around seven. You can do your stuff in less than half-an-hour and be back to your hotel by nine at the latest.”
Craig figured she owed him one, and was hoping she was getting the unspoken message. On the off chance she wasn’t, he decided to dangle a reward in front of her. “And I’ll treat you to a fancy dinner at the restaurant of your choice. How’s that?”
The answer was an amused, “I expected at least a dinner.”
“So you’ll do it?”
“Well…“ The doubt was still there, though far less evident. “Go over it again. Tell me exactly what you want me to do.”
Craig was sure the hook was now firmly in place. “It’s simple. Keola and Emily are scheduled to run a load over to Hilo tomorrow night. I’ll make sure they leave here at exactly seven. I’ll think up some good excuse. A sack of special dark roast has to be loaded at the last minute. I’ll tell Keola he has to drop it off at Jimmy Miyamoto’s Supermarket in Naalehu on the way over. Something like that. They’ll be driving Keola’s old gray minivan.”
“How will I recognize it?”
“It should be no problem. Some ape crumpled the right front fender, and the old wreck is wall-eyed. The light shines way off to the right. Anyway, it should still be light enough out for you to spot the logo on the front. You’ve seen it. The coffee can on its side with the beans spilling out.”
“But how do I know when they’ll show up?”
“That’s no problem either. It’s five minutes from here to the 99-mile marker if Keola obeys the speed limit. And he will. I’ve drilled it into him. I’m willing to bet they’ll pass the marker right at seven-o-five. And the traffic rush is over by then.”
“What’ll I do with my car?”
“You borrow trouble, Jessie. Just leave it in the 7-11 parking lot. The store’s only fifty feet or so away from the marker. Keola’ll stop when he sees you standing there looking like you need a ride. He’s the kind who picks up anybody and everybody. The old van is usually packed like a Tokyo subway car by the time he gets to Hilo. So after you get in, wait about fifteen minutes or so, feed them whatever mumbo-jumbo line you want, then get him to come back to town.”
“Any suggestions?”
“You’re the one who’s got thirty years of acting behind you. I leave to your imagination.”
“My imagination freezes up when it comes to Hawaiian voodoo.”
“Hell! Tell them they’ll get into a wreck if they keep going.”
“Hmm.”
Craig ignored the noncommittal response. “Once you get back to where you hitched the ride in the first place, just wander off until they drive away. Then back to your car. Job done. They’ll come roaring up here the minute they drop you off to tell me all about their encounter with Madame Pele.”
“What makes you think he’ll turn back on my say so?”
“Look. That’s the point. They’ll for sure be convinced you’re the lady, herself. You tell Keola to drive over a cliff and he’ll do it. And Emily will egg him on.”
“I suppose you want me to dress like Madam Pele?” Humor was creeping into Julie’s voice. “Long white robe? Do I need to breathe fire?”
Now the scenario was virtually agreed upon, Craig could afford to laugh. “Emily describes her as a woman with long blonde hair. She’s even shown me some of Pele’s Hair, those bunches of yellow threads of something the volcano spews out. That’s what made me think of you. Beyond that, the dress is optional.”
“Just what does Madame Pele do when people give her a ride?”
“Oh, the usual claptrap. She tells people some relative over on Oahu has just died, or cousin Kimo is going to recover from his motorbike accident—stuff like that. And then the first thing they know, they turn around and look in the back seat and she’s gone.”
“Don’t go expecting me to vanish. I flubbed the disappearing stunt in Topper. And I had a ton of props to help me do it right.”
Craig guffawed. “Nope. This contract doesn’t call for anything any more supernatural than what I’ve already told you.”
“So all you really want me to do is to get them to come back to town?”
“Right. I’ll hang around late at the warehouse, and when they come in, wild-eyed and bushy-tailed, to tell me Madame P. herself honored them with a visit, I’ll beat them to the punch. I’ll tell them then how they were set up. It should finally put a stop to all these menehunes, and Maui rising from the deep to grab fishing lines, and all the rest of those spook stories.”
“OK. I’ll do it. Might be fun. I need a change of pace from Arsenic and Old Lace. Do you know Friday night’s performance will be my eightieth one in the role?”
The stage was set. Talk drifted back to the old days, to common acquaintances, to how much Hawai’i, and especially the Big Island, had changed during Jessie’s many years away, and then back to firming up plans for the following night, plus some background on Keola and Emily to help Jessie confound them.
***
The following evening turned strange.
An unusual and unexpected storm blew in, and Craig considered it a mixed blessing. As the minivan pulled away, the first large drops foretelling a tropical downpour began to fall. The sheet lightning hovering along the horizon during the afternoon moved in shore and overhead to give a rare performance along the lower slopes of Hualalai
Half aloud, Craig said, “Perfect setting.” On the other hand, he hoped Madame Pele had thought to take along an umbrella.
Glancing at his watch, he settled down to bills of lading, a catalog of new roasting equipment, and a search for a missing receipt the bookkeeper had been hounding him about for the past week. Reaching over, he flipped on the radio to his favorite AM jazz station, but the raucous static made him quickly turn down the volume.
Half debating with himself as to whether he should shut it off until the storm passed over, he forgot it and kept on rummaging through his desk.
Seven thirty. Seven forty-five. Early yet, but they’d be coming back soon. The deafening noise of the rain on the metal roof was abating. Time between lightning flashes and the following peals of thunder lengthened. The static leveled off. He was just turning up the volume when he heard the distinctive sound of Keola’s van pulling up to the loading dock. Craig grinned in amusement and prepared himself.
It all pretty much happened at once. Keola came in first, but Emily was only half a step behind. Keola’s face had the curious shade which can only occur in dark-skinned persons when the blood drains from their faces. Emily was frankly terrified. Dark eyes open wide. Words rushing from her mouth. “Craig! She was with us.”
Keola broke in, “She nevah get wet at all.”
Emily’s words expressed pure awe. “She rode with us!”
The phone rang. Craig held up his hand to stem the flow and reached for the portable. It was Jessie.
Craig smiled. “Great job, Jessie. They just came in.”
“What? I’m sorry about that, Craig. It wasn’t my fault.”
“What are you talking about?”
The radio crackled with a news item. Keola and Emily were talking excitedly to each other. A final rumble of thunder crashed in the distance.
Jessie’s voice kept fading in and out. “About the plan…was all this old lady’s fault. She fell down almost in front of my car, and I felt obliged…drive her home. It was someplace way back there above Holualoa. You know…maze of roads. I tried to leave as soon as I could, then I got lost back in there, and I knew…never make it in time. I would have called you sooner, but…cell phone stopped working for no good reason at all.”
The Honolulu announcer was droning on, showing little interest in the local news he was reading. “Police report hundred foot fountains of fire crossing the highway just north of Naalehu and have closed the road to all traffic. Scientists at the Volcano observatory say they noticed the first seismic indications of magma movement yesterday afternoon, but admit tonight’s eruption caught them by surprise. The last volcanic activity in the area occurred over one hundred years ago.”
Then Emily’s voice rose. The wonder in it was unmistakable. “She warned us. We’d be there now, right in the middle, if she hadn’t told us to turn back. She knew. She knew.”
Jessie’s voice sounded far, far away.
“Really, Craig…I’m awfully sorry.”
Craig returned the phone to its cradle without answering.
THE ROLLS
This was the week Freddy Wade had been working toward for the past five years, ever since he had become Charlesport’s exclusive dealer for BMW-Rolls Royce. The dealership hadn’t come easy. He had had to do some stretching with his background. He hadn’t actually held down an assistant managership at Crazy Harry’s Car Emporium in Atlanta. But senior salesman was pretty close. And there had been some days early on when he wondered if he was going to make it at Wade’s Motors. But business picked up as the town grew. Getting the unions off the docks had made the port a favored East Coast spot for shippers.
At first, he’d eked out a livelihood selling only low-end automobiles, and few of them at that, but now he was actually making luxury-end sales. Best of all, he’d sold a Rolls. The white beauty had been sitting on the floor for months. It was top of the line, and he had committed himself to it for display purposes only. He had the assurance from the regional dealer he could send it back, along with a small return fee, any time he felt it was no longer enticing customers into his showroom.
And it had enticed customers—along with hordes of gawkers. The sleek, customized automobile had come loaded with every conceivable option, from bullet-proof glass, to the inevitable champagne bar, and an amazing computerized shock and suspension system, sensitive to and correcting for every lump or pebble in the road and guaranteeing a smoother ride than an ocean liner on a calm sea. The fabulous creation also included a price tag of well over four hundred thousand dollars. Freddy had already figured out his commission three times on his pocket calculator. He decided he’d come a long way from the days of rolling back odometers. Then he became aware the more mundane business of the establishment required his attention.
Checking his watch, he realized he would just barely have time for his luncheon engagement with a buyer who was not in the class of the Rolls purchaser. But he was about to shell out the tidy sum of sixty-five-thousand-plus for one of the fancier BMW’s, just as soon as he returned from a brief trip to Savannah the following week. Never one to forget the importance of showing Southern hospitality to even moderately wealthy customers, he had invited Lawson Wagner to what Freddy called “the best seafood restaurant this side of the Atlantic.” Freddy had told Lawson he didn’t believe the old saying you would eventually meet everyone you knew in New York’s Times Square, but he guaranteed you’d meet everyone from Charlesport—at least everyone worth meeting—at Fisherman’s Pride.
Freddy was particularly expansive as they chatted over their pre-luncheon drinks, while occupying a window seat with a truly magnificent view of Charlesport harbor. Even though there was no question the week’s successful sale of the Rolls was the major source of Freddy’s euphoria, he had also taken a liking to the slender, distinguished-looking Lawson—and the feeling appeared to be reciprocated. Freddy had been especially fascinated by Lawson’s occupation. So much so that, unlike his usual practice, he allowed his companion to do most of the talking.
“Marine insurance is more of an art than a science,” Lawson was saying, between brief samplings of his drink. “You can figure everything down to the penny, and one ocean wave can toss all of your calculations out the window. Even worse is human greed and dishonesty. I never cease to be amazed at man’s ingenuity when it comes to deceiving his fellow humans.”
Freddy nodded sagely.
Another appreciative sip followed before Lawson continued, a smile momentarily lighting up a face was usually thoughtful and serious. “I suppose I shouldn’t complain. I’m really like the minister preaching against sin who should be aware his profession depends on the continuing work of the devil. And sometimes the greedy do receive their just desserts right here on earth. I can remember one instance in particular.” The serious expression came back. “I hope I’m not boring you with my philosophizing.”
Freddy insisted, truthfully, that that was not the case and tried to order another round. When Lawson insisted one was quite enough for him, Freddy settled for a second drink for himself. He urged Lawson to describe the “one instance in particular.”
“It involved a Panamanian freighter. I was the agent who handled the insurance. Now, you must know I have a suspicious nature, and I had considerable reservations about this particular captain. Unfortunately, all the calculations came out fine so, over my protests—which I could give no concrete basis for—the front office ordered me to sign the contract.
“My worst fears were realized. The second night out, the captain radioed his ship was on fire and he and his crew were abandoning the vessel. Fortunately for us, and unfortunately for him, a Coast Guard search the next morning found the abandoned ship listing badly, but still afloat, with a few wisps of smoke as the only signs of fire. After it had been towed to port, it was discovered the crew had engaged in a rather inept act of arson and then had simply opened all the sea valves. What the captain had forgotten was his cargo—kiln-dried lumber—provided more than enough buoyancy for the crippled vessel, and the in-rushing water put out the fire.”
The fleeting smile once more lit up Lawso
n’s face. “And then…”
But the reminiscences were interrupted by the approach of a tall, florid man accompanied by a slender, expensively dressed woman. Freddy almost knocked over his drink in his rush to welcome the newcomers.
“Lawson, I’d like you to meet Jimmy Dale Sutherland and Marie Sutherland. Lawson Wagner. The handshakes all around were followed by Jimmy Dale’s comment, “You were right, Freddy. Everybody in Charlesport shows up at Fisherman’s Pride sooner or later, and I can see why. I don’t believe I’ve ever had better salmon then I had here yesterday.
Marie joined in. “The brandade de morue was superb. I highly recommend it to you Mr. Larson, if you haven’t tried it already.”
Lawson apparently didn’t feel it worth the effort to correct the error in his name, merely mumbling something about not having decided on his order yet.
In the midst of Freddy’s invitation for the newcomers to join them and their ready acceptance, he became half-aware Lawson hadn’t taken too well to the Sutherlands. Was he annoyed at the interruption? Or did he feel somehow upstaged. Freddy dismissed any misgivings with the conviction the Sutherlands, who were the proud purchasers of the Rolls, deserved red-carpet treatment despite the pique of a mere BMW buyer.
Jimmy Dale dominated the conversation from the moment he sat down at the table. Lawson said virtually nothing, but simply eyed the voluble luncheon companion. Marie mostly sat, listened without comment to her husband, worked away at her bouillabaisse, and managed to look attractive during the process.
Freddy provided the occasional nods and brief comments which probably weren’t really needed to fuel the monologue. “Yup, Freddy, your Rolls has grown on me. I wasn’t much caught up with it at first, but the little lady here fell in love with it the minute she saw it.” He looked over affectionately at Marie who was busy exploring a clam in her dish. She took time out to flash him a smile. Lawson merely looked grim.
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