by Janet Dailey
It never came. Instead she was released as abruptly as she had been seized. While she stumbled backward, Ruel walked out of the room, slamming the door behind him. Waves of disappointment rushed through her. She was faced with the humiliating possibility that she had goaded him deliberately, expecting the retaliation of an embrace. She slumped into the desk chair and buried her face in her hands. The tea was lukewarm before she got around to drinking it.
After dinner that evening, Julie sat in the living room with Emily, painfully conscious of Ruel's presence. It was a strain to concentrate on what Emily was saying and appear interested, but she tried.
"You look pale, Julie," the woman observed. "Are you feeling all right?"
"Fine," she insisted with a tense smile. The narrowed glance of skepticism she received made her add, "I have a slight headache, that's all."
"Ruel mentioned to Malia that you were caught in the shower this afternoon. Maybe you're coming down with something," Emily suggested.
"I don't think so," Julie denied. "It's just a common headache, not the common cold."
"Perhaps some fresh air will help it," said Ruel. He stood beside the French doors that led onto the ground floor lanai. "It isn't raining anymore. Why not take a short stroll outside?"
"Yes, I think that's a good idea," she agreed eagerly, glad to escape the stifling atmosphere of the house.
Rising from the sofa, she crossed the room to the double doors Ruel held open for her. It wasn't until she had stepped onto the veranda mat she realized he intended to accompany her, and she glanced back into the room at Emily. There was nothing in the woman's expression to indicate that she found anything wrong with the situation.
As soon as they were out of earshot, Julie said, "I want to apologize for what I said and the way I behaved today. You didn't deserve it, and I'm sorry."
"Apology accepted," he acknowledged simply and with an air of diffidence. "Although it doesn't solve our problem, does it?"
Her gaze skittered away, not quite able to meet his look sideways. "Problem? I don't know what you mean."
"Don't you?" The rejoinder was aloofly amused.
"No, I'm afraid I don't know," Julie insisted, continuing to walk straight ahead. She was glad of the darkness and its concealing shadows.
The touch of Ruel's hand on her waist halted her. Applying slight pressure, he turned her to face him. She forced herself to breathe evenly and not pay any attention to the fluttering of her pulse. As long as his touch remained impersonal, she wasn't going to make a fool of herself by resisting.
"Pretending hasn't made it go away, Kulie," he said.
His hands lightly spanned her waist without making any attempt to lessen the distance between them. Julie felt herself becoming putty in his hands and pivoted away from him while she still had some backbone. Ruel let her turn away, but he didn't release her.
"I don't know what you're talking about," she repeated. "What was that you called me?"
"Kulie. That's your name in Hawaiian," Ruel answered.
"How fascinating." There was a faint tremor in her voice as she attempted to change the subject. "What is yours?"
"It's an old family name. Ruel doesn't have an equivalent in Hawaiian." Patience seemed to dominate his answer.
"I see," she murmured.
"We're going to have to come up with another solution for our problem," Ruel reverted to his earlier discussion.
An odd weakness attacked her knees. "As far as I'm concerned, we don't have a problem, Mr. Chandler." She took a quick step forward, moving out of his unresisting hold. Warily she stayed out of his reach. "If you'll excuse me, I have some letters to write." She started toward the outside set of stairs that led to the upper lanai and her bedroom. "Good night."
"Running isn't the answer, Julie." His voice carried quietly to her, but he didn't try to stop her. "You'll have to face it sooner or later."
Julie infinitely preferred later. Tonight she couldn't cope with the potency of his attraction. She certainly couldn't be as calm and reasonable about it as Ruel sounded.
The French doors to her bedroom were unlocked. She opened them and paused. Glancing over her shoulder, she saw Ruel standing near the chaise lounge by the pool. The red glow of a cigarette was in his hand. In an abrupt movement that suggested anger, he crushed out the cigarette beneath his heel. Jamming his fists into the pockets of his slacks, he turned away from the house.
Julie could only guess at the cause for his action. This physical thing between them didn't please him anymore than it pleased her. He was probably irritated with himself for even mentioning it. As for a solution. . . . She went into her bedroom and closed the doors. An affair was the obvious answer. But if it burned itself out before Debbie was better, how would she be able to stay here in the same house with him?
Chapter Eight
RUEL WAS SELDOM at the house during the week that followed. On the one evening he did spend at home, he made no attempt to speak to Julie or draw her aside. She kept telling herself she was relieved that he had decided not to pursue the matter. If she weren't totally convinced she didn't admit it.
On Saturday morning she joined Emily for breakfast at nine o'clock on the lanai. The sun was warming the cobblestoned floor and the air was fragrant with the scents of many tropical flowers blooming in the garden. Julie helped herself to the slices of fresh pineapple on the table and sat in a rattan chair next to Emily.
"It's a gorgeous day, isn't it?" Julie remarked.
"It couldn't be better," the woman agreed. "What are your plans for today?"
"I thought I'd go into Honolulu. I haven't been there yet, and—" she lifted her shoulders in an expressive shrug and laughed "—what would I say to my friends if they asked me whether I'd been to Waikiki or not?"
"I suppose that's true. But personally I don't think you're missing anything." Emily's opinion of the commercially developed area hadn't changed.
"Besides, there are several other places of interest I want to see in Honolulu," Julie defended her decision.
"Yes, there are a few," Emily conceded. "You're welcome to use the car."
"No, I'll take the bus. I'm not familiar with the streets. Trying to find my way in traffic is not my idea of fun anyway. And there's always the problem of finding a place to park." The disadvantages outweighed the other considerations in Julie's opinion.
"It's quite a long bus ride," the woman cautioned.
"I don't mind," she insisted. "It will give me time to look at the countryside."
"What will?" Ruel walked onto the lanai.
"Good morning, Ruel." Emily offered him a cheek, which he dutifully bent to kiss before helping himself to the coffee.
Dressed in a loose-fitting Hawaiian shirt of white cotton and light blue slacks, Ruel walked behind Julie to sit in a chair beside her. Setting his cup on the table, he buttered a slice of sweet bread.
"What will give you time to look at the country?" he repeated his question without glancing at her.
"Julie is taking the bus into Honolulu this morning," his aunt explained. "I was just warning her that it would be a long ride, what with all the stops it has to make along the way."
"I'm going downtown this morning. You're welcome to ride with me," he offered indifferently.
Julie hesitated, a polite refusal forming on her lips, but Emily was speaking before she had the chance to respond. "How thoughtful of you, Ruel!" she exclaimed. "It's the perfect answer."
"I wouldn't want to put you to any trouble. I know you have business to attend to and—" Julie tried delicately to get out of accepting.
"It wouldn't be any trouble," Ruel assured her blandly, a glint of challenge in his blue eyes. "I have to drive to Honolulu anyway. I can drop you wherever you like."
"Of course he can," Emily inserted. "It would certainly be more comfortable than riding on a crowded bus. And you'll still be able to see the country."
She was left with little option but to accept his offer. "In that case, I'
ll ride with you," she agreed.
After breakfast, Julie went upstairs to collect her purse while Ruel brought the car around to the front. Emily waved goodbye to them from the house. It was an hour's drive into the city and she tried to think of what they could talk about for all that length of time.
"You make this drive almost every day. It must get tiresome."
"Sometimes," he agreed, "especially if the traffic is heavy. It also gives me time to think—to sort out various projects and problems. Views like that—" he indicated the one ahead of them "—keep it from becoming too monotonous."
They had just started down the switchback road that led to the highway, and their height provided a panoramic view of the coastline. The ocean was a pale blue near the shore where the reefs were and a deep, rich blue beyond—the color of lapis lazuli. White strips of beach were broken by clumps of rusty black lava rock rising from the golden sands. The vivid green of the abundant tropical growth on the land provided a brilliant contrast. Jutting out to sea was the headland of the Waianae range of mountains.
"It is spectacular," Julie agreed. Even that seemed an understatement. Before she could take it all in, the car had made the last curve and the road was leveling out toward the highway.
At the intersection, Ruel waited for a lull in the traffic before turning onto the road. Not wanting to distract him, Julie kept silent. As they drove along the coast a few minutes later, she couldn't think of anything to say again. They passed a small beach with surfers bobbing in the waves.
"What happened to your friend?" Ruel slid her a lazy, inquiring look.
"Frank? He's around." Her answer was carefully nonspecific.
"Don't you see him anymore?"
"Yes." Which was true. She had simply avoided going out with Frank—mainly because she knew his affection was more serious than hers. She liked him, but she didn't want it to go any further than that.
"You haven't gone out with him lately," Ruel commented.
"He works nights," she said as if that was the explanation. "I usually see him sometime during the weekend—usually Sunday."
"Are you meeting him in town today?" Ruel circled the rotary to the Honolulu turnoff.
"No," Julie looked out of the window. Short stands of grass punctuated a field of ploughed earth in a semblance of rows. "Is that sugar cane?"
"Yes, a new field. As it grows, it will spread out and bush until it's as thick as this next one." He indicated the one just ahead, towering thick and green close to the road, tassels waving over the top. "When you see tassels in a field, the cane stalks are usually sweet. This particular field is about ready to be fired."
"I enjoy seeing that the day we rode out to your field," she said without thinking, a look of pleasure lighting her eyes.
She remembered the interlude vividly—the two of them riding across the meadow toward the smoke, pausing on the knoll to watch the red wall of fire creep through the field. There had been an easiness between them that Julie wished she could recapture. "Have you been riding lately?" Ruel asked.
"On horseback? No, I haven't." She shook her head.
"You're welcome to ride the gray whenever you like, take him down for a run on the beach sometime. Tell Malia and she'll have Al saddle him for you," he explained.
"Thank you, I might do that some weekend." Although she silently thought it might be a bit lonely riding without him. She quickly pushes that thought out of her mind.
Abruptly, it seemed, the cane field was behind them. Now, on either side of the road grew low, spiky plants. It took Julie a second to recognize them as pineapple. The fields were geometrically designed with rounded corners and straight rows.
Ruel noticed her rapt expression as she gazed out of the window. "You haven't seen pineapple growing before?"
"No," she admitted.
The car began perceptibly to slow its fast pace. Julie thought it was to give her a better view, but instead Ruel pulled onto the shoulder and stopped the car. In the row of plants paralleling the highway, she could see the conical fruit of the pineapple, growing as an offshoot of the plant.
"They're harvesting over there." Ruel pointed to a machine farther down the field straddling the rows with a conveyor belt, complete with lights for nighttime picking, stuck out from its side like a long arm. The field hands walked behind the arm, dropping the pineapple on the belt where it rode to the machine.
"You'll notice the pickers are wearing a lot of clothes—long-sleeved shirts and jackets, pants, and boots and gloves. Pineapple plants are wickedly sharp, so the pickers need a lot of protection from the spiky leaves."
Julie watched the process for several minutes before guiltily realizing that this was all very old to Ruel, who had seen it a thousand times or more before. She cast him a rueful look.
"I'm sorry. You should have said something rather than let me hold you up like this," she protested.
"It was my idea to stop in the first place." His mouth slanted into a brief smile. "If I weren't willing to be delayed, I wouldn't have done that. We'll leave when you've seen all you want."
"I have," Julie insisted.
"Besides—" Ruel paused to check the oncoming traffic; drove back onto the highway and then continued his sentence "—I couldn't let my sister's teacher be in ignorance about pineapples."
"That would be bad, wouldn't it?" she smiled.
"I gain something from it, too," he said.
"What?" She was curious.
"Looking through the field through your eyes, it becomes something new for me. I stop taking it for granted," explained Ruel.
The traffic became heavier as they passed Schofield Barracks and the town of Wahiawa. The pineapple fields were left behind and the terrain became rolling and wooded. There was a predominance of trees with canopied, umbrellalike limbs that Julie recognized as the monkeypod. From this tree came the many wooden bowls and dishes that were the standard souvenir of Hawaii. Just as suddenly, it seemed, the open country gave way to a mass of towns running together. Highway signs pointed to Pearl Harbor, Honolulu and Waikiki.
"Where would you like me to take you?" Ruel asked.
"Wherever it would be most convenient." Julie had no specific destination in mind. She had the whole day to sightsee the downtown area.
"Will the yacht harbor be all right? It isn't far from the center of Waikiki," he told her.
"That will be perfect."
Seconds later, he was stopping the car on a side street near the curb. The tall masts of sailing boats rose in the distance, crowded together in a confusing mixture. For a ride that had begun with so many misgivings on Julie's part, she was sorry to have it end.
"Thanks for bringing me," she said.
"Enjoy your day," was his parting remark with no mention of seeing her later, or possibly giving her a ride back.
She stepped onto the sidewalk and waved as Ruel drove away. She had a decidedly let down feeling as she started down the street alone. Resolutely, she told herself it was the way she wanted it.
After more than an hour of wandering through the tourist shops, she picked up some literature on places to see in Honolulu. From the luxury hotels, along the beach, she journeyed to the Punchbowl—an extinct crater that had become the cemetery of the Pacific. From there, she traveled to downtown Honolulu and walked through Chinatown, then on to the State Capitol building and Iolani Palace where the ruling Hawaiian monarchs had lived. The Palace was now a museum. A visitor at the Palace suggested to Julie that she would enjoy the Bishop Museum, where there were several exhibits regarding the Polynesian cultures and their contribution to Hawaii.
It was afternoon when Julie arrived at the Bishop Museum on the mountainside of Honolulu. With her admission paid, she went to the snack bar in the center of the courtyard before touring the exhibits.
The old, massive stone building had been a summer palace of the Hawaiian monarchy years ago. Its beauty was evident in the beautifully carved wood panels lining the stairway and the banisters and woo
dwork. Most impressive was the main room with its ceiling rising several floors high.
Hanging from the ceiling was the skeleton of a whale, one side exposed and the other sculpted out of papier-mâché to show the bulk of the monolith of the ocean. On each floor were exhibits of various cultures and eras. From the wrought iron railings around each floor could be seen the whale and the typical Hawaiian hut built on the main floor.
On display in the museum was a magnificent collection of feathered cloaks once worn by Hawaiian royalty. The rich yellow and red and black designs were created by taking single feathers from exotic birds and weaving them into a solid fabric. It had taken years to make one robe, but the colors had not faded with the passage of time.
Julie worked her way to the main floor. As she started down the last staircase, she happened to glance up from the steps. Waiting at the base was Ruel, a hand resting on the curved banister, a half-smile curving his mouth. Her heart skipped a beat and exploded like a rocket.
"How—How did you know I was here?" she stammered.
"I asked myself 'Where would a history teacher go if she were sightseeing?' The only logical answer was a museum. I simply had to go around until I found the right one," he answered smoothly.
"You haven't been to every museum?" Julie protested.
"Only the three obvious choices—Iolani Palace, the mission house, and here." He glanced around the main floor. "Have you seen it all?"
"Yes," she nodded, still stunned to find him waiting for her.
"Would you like a ride home?" Ruel asked, studying her with a sideways tilt to his mahogany dark head.
For the first time Julie glanced at her watch, surprised to find she had spent more than three hours at the museum. It was a few minutes before four o'clock.
"Yes, I would." It seemed an unnecessary answer to an unnecessary question.
