Hawaiian Crosswinds
Page 3
Thaddeus Hunnewell was pacing again, his leather oxfords squeaking on the polished floor. His son Oliver was late tonight, the truculent son who was accused of too little interest in Hawaiian politics.
“Liliuokalani is an obstinate woman,” the lawyer named Withers said, shaking his head. “She’ll continue sending the Legislature lists of men for confirmation who support overthrowing the ’87 Constitution.”
Hunnewell turned his sober countenance on the lawyer. “If she wins, our rights will be dissolved. We’re not Polynesians, true; which is the main protest of the native Hawaiians, but we were born in these Islands. Never forget that, gentlemen! What more can the present generation of natives say of themselves than that? They haven’t been here any longer than we have. The haole ethnicity of our fathers doesn’t change the fact that we are true Hawaiians. Why, some of us here tonight are third generation, the Derringtons and Rafe Easton over here.” He gestured. “Are we to simply stand by and see the homes and businesses we built and sweated over surrendered to the whim of a gilded throne?”
“No!” came the unison of voices. Some of the men who’d been seated stood.
“Then we’ll keep voting down her list of cabinet ministers,” Hunnewell said. “One thing’s on her mind by choosing these men. Annul the ’87 Constitution, and with that, our rights as Hawaiians.”
“We lack the needed votes, gentlemen,” Ainsworth said, always the more serious and realistic of the leaders. “We may not be able to vote down the men she sends us next time.”
“I tell you we can prevail if we gain a few men from the Liberal party.”
Ainsworth pursed his lips. “A challenge. Is it possible?”
Hunnewell’s smile was thin. “Wilcox and Roxbury can be won over.” His eyes glinted. “I know Wilcox through and through. For a purpose that benefits his ambitions he’ll join the Reform legislators. He can bring a few others with him too.”
Rafe wasn’t sure why, but something shifted his attention across the oval room toward the bamboo curtain.
From somewhere past the dusky perimeter of the room, out on the lanai, a lone lamp burned dimly on a Victorian style table, allowing shadowed corners to deepen as the sun approached the horizon. A curtain screened a landing with a flight of steps down to a cove. He glanced at his watch. It was still low tide, the cove accessible. He’d gone down those steps earlier that afternoon when Hunnewell had his house servants bringing refreshments near the beach.
Rafe fixed his gaze, seeking … for what, he wasn’t sure. Something there. On the lanai behind the bamboo curtain? A stealthy movement. Or just the wind moving the bamboo?
The others, talking forcefully among themselves, their emotions now in a roil as only Thaddeus Hunnewell could stir them, did not notice anything awry. Just as an eavesdropper would hope, Rafe thought with cynicism. Like actors on a stage consumed with playing their roles, they stood beneath the circle of light, sometimes too self-assured, while an audience of one inconspicuously listened beyond the room’s dark perimeter.
Again … a faint clacking of bamboo, a gush of air entering the wider spaces of the room.
Rafe moved unnoticed onto the lanai, and then to the screened landing toward the back stairs. Wayward wind or a spy, he intended to find out.
When Keno arrived at the Hunnewell beachfront house at Waikiki, the ornate iron gates that guarded the drive were shut against him. A glimmer of the sun’s rays still illuminated Diamond Head, while the quick tropic darkness descended toward the waves washing onto Waikiki from the coral reef. Lurking shadows from coconut palms deepened.
He stood for a moment, gazing at the grand place, mingled with frustration and sadness. He seldom felt tested by jealousy, but it raised its ugly head as he thought of Candace.
If I was an esteemed somebody with a family name, I could have married her. What heiress wants to throw away everything to marry a hapa-haole with little in his bank account?
Jealousy was quickly followed by the hound of self-pity.
No wonder Ainsworth wanted his sweet Candace to marry old man Hunnewell’s son. Why, look at what Candace will inherit. Money, handsome houses, land to grow even more sugarcane to maintain the Hunnewell assets. And me, Keno? I have a hut on Hanalei and a trunk load of clothes, Bible books, and hopes! Not enough of the fine “stuff” in this life to impress anyone, let alone Mr. Ainsworth Derrington.
Self-pity snarled into anger. Anger toward the Derrington patriarch for insisting the righteous Candace marry for loot and esteem from the circle of the elite. Yes, “loot”! Bags of it. Heaped up in the bank and drawing much interest.
Anger also gave a low growl at Candace for choosing to follow her grandfather’s wishes when she’d told Keno on several occasions that she was more willing to go barefoot in the sand with him, “her handsome hapa-haole,” than any son of Mr. Hunnewell.
He shook his head, still standing before the imposing gate of no admittance. He grasped hold of the cold, black wrought iron and rattled it in protest.
Wait … what was that? Was there someone there? He squinted into the shadows near the garden’s inner wall, right inside the iron gate … just a shadow of a tree moving in the wind. …
It wasn’t like Candace to behave this way. He couldn’t understand her decision, so cold and pragmatic, so indifferent to him now when once she had loved him. Yes, she had loved him. He was certain of it. Now, she wouldn’t even speak to him. On her return from Tamarind House, he’d waited for her to go out in her buggy that he might ride his horse and catch up with her, but instead of granting him even this small opportunity she rode everywhere with Oliver.
Yes, she loved him, Keno. Yet the lovely woman he’d thought so high and noble, so devout in her heart to the will of God, had turned her back to him for wealth and prestige. She had said so in the letter she’d written him, almost two months ago.
“I have freely made the decision to live up to the responsibility I have as a Derrington. I choose to do as my grandfather asks of me and marry Oliver. The engagement is upcoming. I know you will eventually understand this is the best decision for us both. …”
On and on the redundant explanation had journeyed down a spiraling path of empty words into a deep, dark well. Just standing before the Hunnewell gate heightened his frustration.
He doubled his strong fist and gently touched it against his other palm. His old sin nature would like to smash Oliver. Yes, smash him hard. Spoiled and selfish, having everything easy, everything he wanted—why, if it hadn’t been for his rich father, little junior would have nothing—stop it, Keno!
His fist was not his own. He had surrendered it to his Savior—like Rafe had when confronted by his bully stepfather, Townsend Derrington.
Keno shook his head wearily. Only the grace and the power of the Holy Spirit could control his runaway emotions. He frowned to himself. Sometimes I think my emotions are worse than everyone else’s.
Maybe I shouldn’t have come here tonight. Lord! Help me!
How easy to forget thankfulness. Why, even the Lord had not a place to rest His head when He came to earth. “The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests; but the Son of man hath not where to lay his head.” Awesome thought. And I complain?
He narrowed his gaze, hands on hips, lost in a stance he had so often seen of soul-brother Rafe when frustrated.
But then … despite the volcanic explosion that had crushed his dreams, Keno told himself to remember what he could not forget. The One through whom all things consisted and were held together also controlled the spiritual upheavals of those who belonged to Him. “He that openeth, and no man shutteth; and shutteth, and no man openeth.”
There is a different Gate, an all-important Gate, and that one stands wide open to me.
Ambrose’s words came ringing in his ears. “God is not indifferent to the loss and pain you feel. Discipleship means yielding to whatever His purposes might be. In the end, even when we can’t understand, it will come out right, if not in thi
s life, in eternity.”
Keno bowed his head and, yet again, yielded himself anew to Jesus Christ.
A short time later he opened the gate and passed through it, and walked the paved path that circled the side of the house to one of the back entrances, telling himself that in his position—or rather, his lack of position—he would be expected to come by the servant’s route.
My personal struggles are only for a brief time, but one day I will enter the Father’s mansions and walk on golden streets. “And I won’t be coming through the back door,” he quipped aloud.
He heard no other sounds in the windy evening. He began to whistle, hands shoved in his trouser pockets. He walked toward the back pathway. Movement from the yellow hibiscus bushes a few feet to the side halted him. What was that?
“Say! What are you doing here?”
That voice. He knew it. To his grief, it identified Oliver P. Hunnewell himself. Oh no … Lord, help.
Keno narrowed his gaze, making certain he hadn’t imagined the voice he was growing to despise. The shadows were heavy here. He might not have noticed Oliver standing by the bushes if he hadn’t spoken out.
Oliver Hunnewell came straight toward Keno. If this were Spain, I’d suspect he was a bull with flashing red eyes, Keno thought wearily.
Oliver was usually garbed in an expensive white jacket, trousers, watered-silk vest, a diamond stickpin in his lapel, and an expensive derby hat.
Tonight he wore dark clothing. He was tall, strong-shouldered, and his coloring fit his name, “Hunnewell,” as he had honey-colored everything: hair, eyes, and mustache. It was one of those pencil mustaches that looked as if he’d spent an hour each morning artfully waxing it. He surged forward briskly, crunching fallen leaves scattered in his path.
Keno stood still. Just my fortune, he thought. Here was the rich prince, just returned to his father’s castle to claim the woman Keno loved. Keno was bent on carrying her off to his castle, but the bride-to-be wasn’t putting up a tizzy over being shanghaied.
Too bad the days of chivalry are no more. I would have challenged him to a duel to win her back. Life is so unfair.
Oliver stopped a few feet in front of him, sizing him up. Keno met his gaze evenly. Go ahead, pal, he thought, try it. Then a quick ache of guilt came with his next heartbeat. Didn’t you just pray and yield yourself to God? Remember who you are.
Keno drew in a breath and cleared his throat. He tried to smile. “Why, it’s Oliver! Hello,” he said inadequately, the syllables nearly sticking in his throat.
Oliver’s eyes fixed on him like a hawk on a sparrow. “It’s Mister” he said, his voice striking the tone for a well-aimed insult. “But to you, it’s Makua Hunnewell.”
Keno clenched his jaw. That’s what you think, rich boy.
“What are you doing on Hunnewell property?” Oliver demanded, lifting his rounded chin.
That chin. What a perfect target. Keno shoved his right hand back safely into his pocket.
Hunnewell property, is it? My mother’s side of the family was walking here long before yours ever showed up. Keno swallowed the words before he unwisely trumpeted them into the wind. Every generation had to establish its own rite of passage. Responsibility was the key issue, not mere ethnicity.
“Look, I don’t want any trouble. It’s important I speak to Rafe. Is he still here? Pastor Ambrose Easton, his uncle, sent me to find him.”
Oliver’s mouth twisted. His cold gaze accused.
“Don’t give me that rubbish. You’re looking for Miss Derrington.”
Keno gritted his teeth, his temper on the rise. “If I was here to speak to Candace,” and he used her first name deliberately, “I’d come out in the open about it. I didn’t think she was here, I’ve come to see Rafe. This is an all-male club meeting, isn’t it?”
“That’s none of your affair. You come out in the open? Rubbish. You sneak about peering into windows—”
“Now wait a minute. Don’t make that kind of crack at me!”
“Now you listen to me,” Oliver shot back. “Don’t think I don’t know how you’ve been openly making a fool of yourself with those letters you’ve been writing her. You’ve also been chasing after her horse ‘n’ buggy every time you see her go into Honolulu. Wouldn’t surprise me if you weren’t hiding in the bushes watching for her to go somewhere. She says you trouble and embarrass her.”
Had she told him this? For a moment he almost believed him, then shook it off. Candace wouldn’t flaunt another man’s love for her. She wasn’t like that.
“If I find you’ve been pestering her again,” Oliver warned, “I’ll have Marshal Harper haul you in on charges of harassment. Don’t think I won’t. I have a certain amount of influence here in Honolulu and in San Francisco,” he boasted. “You’d be less of a fool to remember that.”
Oliver turned on his well-made heel, striding toward the steps, his arms swinging at his sides.
Keno felt the blood pounding in his temples.
“What you should say is that your father has influence. You merely have family conveniences.”
Oliver stopped. He swung round and faced him again. Even in the dim light of the Chinese lanterns his angular face said it all. He stormed back toward Keno, his open jacket swaying at his sides.
Then Keno remembered his last prayer. His lack of self-control sent a wave of frustration over his soul. I’ve made a hash of it. He drew in a breath and deliberately stepped back as Oliver stormed up. Keno held up his palm. “Now wait a minute. I didn’t mean to speak out of line—”
Oliver smiled with scorn. His eyes seemed to shout that he was enjoying the moment. “Get out of here.” He gestured toward the front road. “Before I forget I’m a gentleman and throw you over the gate. And stay away from Candace. She doesn’t want anything more to do with the likes of you. I don’t want to see you within a block of her, understood? If I do, I’ll see you wincing for your impudent presumption.”
Keno’s injured pride clashed as a titan with restraint. A surge of anger filled the gap, causing his heart to thud like a war drum.
Oliver’s mouth jutted downward in a satisfied smirk. “Go among your own people.”
Among your own people! “Unfortunately, I’m with one of them now.”
Oliver smiled coolly. “The sooner a dog learns he is one, the happier he’ll be.”
“Then, from one dog to another, it’s time you learned that where mere Hunnewell blood’s concerned, we share and share alike. Don’t play squire of the manor with me.”
The unfriendly smile had frozen on Oliver’s astonished face. He stared, taken aback. “You’re lying.”
“I’m the biological son of your uncle Philip Pepperidge Hunnewell of Burlington, England.”
“You’re a lying hapa-haole.”
“But your uncle Pepperidge didn’t stay in the Islands long—he returned to his ‘civilized’ England when he found out he’d gotten my mother pregnant. I hear he’s dead. But a Hunnewell I am, pal. Just call me Keno P. Hunnewell.”
Oliver’s face thawed as his emotions came to a boil again. A ruddy color emerged.
“You brazen dog. You won’t impress Candace with such a blatant fabrication. She’ll see right through you. That’s what this is about, isn’t it! A scheme to pilfer an upstanding name for yourself. What could you even give her in marriage? If you cared what’s best for her, you wouldn’t want her to go off barefoot and live in a hut. But Hunnewell you’ll not steal, no, not by a long shot.” Still gripping his white gloves he whipped them across Keno’s face.
Keno blinked and turned his head aside, startled by the unexpected action.
The Victorian age gesture, though foppish to Keno, was understood to be disgracefully demeaning. A slap across the face with the dress glove of a lordly foe was as disrespectful a gesture as having your challenger spit in your face in a ballroom with nobles and ladies looking on. Keno would have preferred a fist.
Keno wrenched the gloves from Hunnewell’s hand.
Ambrose’s welcoming bungalow waited ahead, and yet Keno felt he couldn’t go there now. How could he bring his sin and failure with him? How could he disappoint Ambrose? Disappoint Ambrose, yes, and what about his Lord?
Keno groaned. He fumbled in his steps. Guilt was a heavy shroud draping over his soul. I have grieved the Holy Spirit.
The sky was now a black canopy without a flicker of light. Just like me. You miserable bloke. Why did you do it, why? You knew better, you knew you shouldn’t have gone there, you knew your own sinful impulses—
Fool, he rebuked himself again, lashing his soul. You’ve given others ammunition to be scornful of Christians. Oliver may be a believer, as the Derringtons insist, but he’s lukewarm. Now Oliver can find another excuse to justify his disinterest in Bible study.
The wrath of man works not the righteousness of God. Even his hand hurt, so Keno told himself. The same hand that held his Bible when he taught a class.
And Candace will hear the worst details from Oliver. He’ll be sure to make me into the instigator of this whole raw debacle. He’ll exaggerate everything. And me? I’ve no audience with her to check his accusations. And what could I say if I did? That my action was justified because he insulted me?
You proved nothing except that you’re a fool, a taunting voice seemed to say, as it floated along beside him. It’s the prince who has the land, the money, and the woman. And you? Hah! Even your reputation will be in shreds by the time you’re out of this.
You failed Him again. You’re a miserable discard, Keno. You? An assistant pastor to Ambrose? Wrap yourself in shame. You’ll never recover from this one … never.