“As you may know, we recently gave the Kaua‘i Museum items recovered from the shipwrecked Royal Hawaiian Yacht Ha‘aheo o Hawaii, also known as Cleopatra’s Barge, in the 1995-2006 dredging of Hanalei Bay.”
“So you wanna take the curse to the mainland?” Dane shouted.
“Let him,” a woman in the crowd suggested.
“Surely in this day and age you don’t honestly believe in curses,” Bleumenthal said.
The crowd remained silent. No one nodded in agreement.
A young man in his late teens raised his hand. When Bleumenthal acknowledged him, the young man stood.
He waved the information sheet. “It says here you got almost one hundred and forty million artifacts. Why you need ours?”
Applause broke out around the room.
When it was finally quiet again, Bleumenthal said, “Thank you all for listening. We’re sure that you’ll do what’s best for the future generations of Kaua‘i.”
Louie was in the middle of fantasizing about digging up the captain’s duffle when he realized the Smithsonian representative wanted to turn over the mic. Two minutes ago he had almost made up his mind to give the tiki to the Naupakas, if there was a tiki in the bag. But, what if the curse was legitimate? He was an author of legends himself. He had embellished his own life experiences for years while working on his Booze Bible recipes. There was always a grain of truth behind each of his tales. What if there was some truth to the legend of the lost tiki?
Representatives from the Quintana Corporation were signaling from the back of the room. They had finished setting up a PowerPoint presentation.
Louie announced, “Our next speaker is a representative from the Quintana Corporation, which just purchased property near Princeville for a new hotel development.”
A round of boos went up.
“Remember folks, aloha,” Louie said.
He handed the mic to an Asian American dressed in a Reyn Spooner shirt, khaki pants and Topsider shoes. Suddenly, a watercolor rendering of an upscale resort filled a screen set up on the wall behind the stage. A collective gasp filled the room. Expressions of shock and anger were on most of the faces of those in the audience.
The speaker went on as if he hadn’t heard or noticed.
“This is an artist’s rendering of Indah, the planned hotel and resort just north of Princeville. The name Indah means beautiful in Indonesian. As you can see, the main building is done in Balinese style. The hotel cottages are the pod structures on paths that trail out and away from the main building like raindrops on a spider’s web.”
The picture changed to another showing an open-air wooden structure with a vaulted ceiling.
“This is the main building, the lobby where guests will register. As you can see, there is a reflecting pool in the center of the lobby. There is a pedestal in the center of the pool which is where we plan to display the Legendary Lost Tiki of Kaua‘i for all the world to see and admire.”
An old man in the back stood and called out, “You mean you’ll put it on display for all the hotel guests who can afford to stay at your hotel to see.”
A man beside him appeared to be related. He stood up. “What about the maids and the gardeners and the other workers? They gonna be allowed in the lobby? They gonna get to see it?”
Hoots of encouragement filled the bar and started a free-for-all.
“You got the land,” a woman yelled. “Now you want our ancestors’ gods too?”
“Go back to the mainland.”
“I was born in Honolulu,” the Quintana rep replied.
One of Dane’s cohorts hollered, “Go back and tell ’em enough hotels up here already. No more.”
Louie saw the Smithsonian representatives scurry out the door. The Quintana rep was visibly shaken. He handed the mic back to Louie.
Louie had no fear of the community members in the bar. He commanded the stage with ease. He’d been around long enough to know that given enough time, island upheavals worked themselves out more often than not.
Dane Naupaka signaled that he had one more thing to say. Before Louie handed over the mic, he whispered to Dane, “Folks are hot and tired. Not too long, eh?”
Dane nodded. “Okay, so you guys heard everybody now. You know what’s pono. You know where I live. If you don’t, ask somebody. We’ll take the tiki no questions asked, and put it back into the land, into its rightful place on our ‘āina.”
Louie thanked everyone for coming, including Roland and the men from KPD. The room soon cleared of old folks and youngsters. The regulars hung out and ordered drinks when the bar opened. Within a quarter hour, it was business as usual.
Just before closing, Em asked Louie if it was all right for her to drive Kiki home.
“Kimo’s still got things to do in the kitchen, and Kiki didn’t drive her own car,” Em said.
“Sure. Sophie and I can handle things and close up.” Kiki and Kimo lived just up the road. He figured Em would be there and back in twenty minutes or less.
Two hours later, he was worried sick, wondering where Em was. He’d tried calling but she didn’t answer her cell phone. He knew there were dead spots on the highway where cell service was spotty at best, but Kiki wasn't answering her home phone. He waited another ten minutes and then called Roland.
“Em’s missing.” Louie tried to keep the panic out of his voice and failed miserably.
“What do you mean missing?”
“She left over two hours ago to take Kiki home, and she’s not back yet. I can’t reach her by cell, and Kiki’s not answering her phone either. Kimo left and same thing. No communication.”
“I just heard cell phone calls aren’t going through to the North Shore. I’m outside of Anahola. I’ll head back. You sit tight in case she gets back. You can let me know.”
Louie agreed. He paced the bar, sick with worry. Sophie refused to leave. The television in the corner was tuned to a local news channel now broadcasting twenty-four-hour storm information. Enrique was bearing down on Kaua‘i with a slim to none chance it would pass them by.
Running his hands through his hair, Louie thought about the hurricane, Em’s disappearance, the upheaval in the community, Captain Jack and Chuckie’s deaths.
“Here.” Sophie put a gin and tonic on the bar in front of him. “She’ll be okay, Uncle.”
“You sure?”
“I have to be. You do, too.”
“Right.” He swallowed the shot.
“Another?”
“No thanks. This is no time to get plastered.”
They waited for what seemed like eons for the phone to ring. It was pouring rain when a car pulled into the deserted driveway, and both of them ran out onto the lānai.
Louie recognized Roland’s undercover KPD cruiser. When he spotted Em in the passenger’s seat, his legs nearly gave way with relief. He leaned against the railing for support.
The detective and Em got out of the car. Roland hurried her up the steps with his hand riding at her waist. Em hugged Louie and then Sophie.
“I’m so sorry you had to worry,” she said.
Louie noticed her upper lip was swollen. “What happened?”
Sophie pulled out a chair for her. “Want to sit?”
Em shook her head. “I was driving home and thought I saw a dog right in the middle of the road. It walked straight toward me, so I swerved to miss it. I ended up in a deep ditch. It nearly swallowed up my car. The airbag went off, and I guess I passed out. When I woke up, I tried to call 911, but my cell wouldn’t work. I tried to call you, too.”
“It’s nuts, but cell and phone lines both seem to be out up here,” Roland added. “I tried to call you when I found her car. The car lights were off, and I nearly drove right past her in the dark.”
“Good thing you didn’t drive off the makai side and end up in the ocean,�
� Sophie hugged Em again.
Em shivered. “I hope my car is all right overnight.”
“I’ll have a tow truck bring it to you tomorrow so it’s here before the storm hits.”
“Sheesh. I forgot about the hurricane.” Em glanced at the television screen mounted in the corner. “Is it still headed this way?”
“We have time to pack things up and get ready,” Sophie said.
Louie couldn’t stop staring at Em. If anything had happened to her because of the promise he’d made Captain Jack, he would never forgive himself.
He was the one who’d accepted the bag, the one who buried it in the yard. He was the one who was going to have to do the right thing to save Kaua‘i and everyone on the island.
Louie made sure Em was comfortable and tucked in before he went back into the main room. He planned to stay dressed and sit up all night if he had to in order to carry out his plan in the wee hours of the morning.
He woke up with a kink in his neck from sleeping on the sofa. The clock on the microwave in the kitchen read five a.m. Walking past Letterman’s cage on the way to the front door, he touched the Hawaiian print cover over the cage and whispered, “Don’t drink yourself to death, little buddy.”
The first thing he did when he left the house was pull an old, one-man outrigger canoe from beneath the house. It was still rigged, and the paddle lay in the bottom of the canoe he hadn’t used for years. For all he knew the canoe might be full of holes, but right now his only concern was making it to Hanalei Bay.
He wasn’t going to worry about getting back. If he was meant to survive, he would.
A full moon cast milky moonlight upon the sand. The crests of the small waves along the shore were a frothy blue-white as he pulled the boat across the beach toward the high tide line. It was a small craft, old style made of wood, but still not too heavy for him to move alone.
Once the boat was at the waterline he went back to the shed behind the house, got out his shovel and then dug up Captain Jack’s duffle. He pulled it out of the plastic trash bag and stored the bag and shovel in the shed.
Without looking inside, he hung the straps of the bag over his shoulder and headed back to the canoe. Once there, he gently laid the bag inside, lifted the canoe over the worn coral shelf at the edge of the water, and set it in the water. Louie stepped into the canoe, lowered himself onto the single seat, and got his balance. Then, he picked up the paddle and headed away from shore.
He paddled carefully, using muscles he hadn’t used in years as he traveled along the coast south toward Hanalei, guided by the lights of the St. Lexus Hotel at Princeville. He was outside the huge crescent bay when dawn lit the sky. Odd streaks of high cirrus clouds seemed to quickly turn from gray to pink to red.
Red sky at morning, sailors take warning.
Louie put some more muscle into his paddling and was moving along at a smooth pace when he felt something bump the bottom of the canoe. He automatically leaned toward the ama for balance and looked down into the water.
He thought he’d hit something, but something had hit the canoe. In the dim light, he could just make out a six-foot tiger shark slowly circling the boat. It nudged him again and again.
Slowly, carefully, Louie set the paddle down in the bottom of the boat and picked up the duffle. His hand shook as he unzipped it. The bag opened to reveal an old beach towel, faded and ragged. It had been wrapped around a two-foot long object.
From the shape and feel of it, Louie knew what he’d find beneath the towel.
Sure enough, it was a stone idol. The image of the tiki had been carved so long ago, its features were nearly worn smooth. As he stared down at the ancient god, he wished it could tell him where it had come from and why it was so angry.
Reverently Louie lifted it out of the bag and cradled it on his knees. The shark still slowly circled the boat.
“So, old man. Here we are. I don’t know if this is where you want to be, but it’s where I intend to be at the end of my own life. It’s peaceful down there on the bottom. Maybe that’s where you were when Jack found you. Legend has it this was your last resting place, somewhere here in the bay, so I’m putting you back. I hope that will make you happy. If not, I guess I’ll know soon enough.”
Louie gently lifted the idol with both hands and held it over the side of the canoe. The shark had moved a few feet away but was still circling, watching, and waiting.
Louie closed his eyes. Before he let the tiki go, he whispered, “Aloha. A hui hou.”
The idol sank out of sight in less than a heartbeat.
When Louie finally picked up his paddle, the sun appeared over the mountains that hugged the Hanalei Valley. The shark swam beneath and beside him all the way back up the coast until Louie turned toward shore and slipped through an opening in the reef. That’s when his deadly escort finally disappeared.
Dead tired emotionally and physically, Louie pulled the old canoe up onto the beach. He didn’t breathe a sigh of relief until both feet were firmly on the sand. He left the canoe on the shore and carried the paddle up to the house.
He opened the front door, intending to creep in and not wake Em until he heard the television in the main room.
Em was lying on the sofa with a cup of coffee in her hand. Letterman’s cage was uncovered. The parrot started squawking as soon as Louie walked in.
“Yo, ho, ho. Brrreakfast.”
Em waved Louie over to the sitting area. “I woke up worried about the storm and came out to hear the latest update. You won’t believe it. About forty minutes ago, the hurricane suddenly veered away from the island.”
Forty minutes ago he’d let the tiki slip back into the waters of Hanalei Bay.
“Whew! It looks like we’re safe.” Em’s smile was radiant with relief.
Louie nodded and smiled back. “It sure looks that way. I guess time will tell.”
Jill Marie Landis
Jill Marie Landis lives on the North Shore of Kauai where she has just completed book #5 of her hilarious Tiki Goddess Mystery Series. Mai Tai One On, Two to Mango, Three to Get Lei’d and Too Hot Four Hula are published by Bell Bridge Books and available in book and all ebook formats.
Her thirty novels have earned distinguished awards and slots on such national bestseller lists as the USA TODAY Top 50 and the New York Times Best Sellers Plus. She is a seven-time finalist for Romance Writers of America’s RITA Award for Historical and Contemporary Romance as well as a RITA Award winner.
You can learn more about her on her website: www.jillmarielandis.com.
Ke Ahi Pio‘ole: The Fire That Never Burns Out
A. J. Llewellyn
Though the weather outside my storefront Waikīkī office was frightful that hot, humid August Wednesday, the fire inside wasn’t damned delightful.
Some hotel guest at the Holiday Inn next door had been smoking in the laundry room, which was forbidden, and I seemed to be the first one to detect it.
Rushing through the maze of glitzy stores and restaurants that fronted what used to be the old Waikīkī Beachcomber Hotel, I followed the stench of acrid fumes, then discovered the fire in a trash bin. He’d made a futile effort to stamp it out with a towel, only to make the flames spread. I doused them with my own mini extinguisher, but scorched my shoes, and even managed to singe my socks in the process.
The guy who started the fire wasn’t happy either. I recognized him as a homeless man who hung out around the beach. So he wasn’t a guest, but everybody has to do their laundry someplace.
“Don’t call the cops, man,” he begged. “I have a job interview and I didn’t hurt anybody.”
I realized my shoes didn’t count. Neither did my socks. Somehow, he’d managed to get hold of tokens for the washer, but they were stuck in the slots. Most of his clothing, which had been sitting on top of the washer, had caught fire except what he was wear
ing: saggy Y-fronts and a woman’s pink bikini halter top.
I felt bad for him, slipped him ten bucks, and told him to try the thrift shop around the corner. Two fire trucks took up a lot of space out front as I stomped back to my office and tried to ignore the sky full of moisture-laden ominous, grey clouds. Something feels off. I’m a former cop and sometimes I get a little paranoid thinking everything’s suspicious, but was surprised to see a woman standing on my side of the desk. I didn’t panic, but I didn’t get excited either. I hadn’t landed a single case since I’d moved back to Waikīkī four weeks ago.
So far, every single person who’s come in here is either trying to book a scuba trip, or a luau because they think my office still sells discounted tickets. I hadn’t counted on the free holiday magazine ads still floating around out there. Often people stopped and wanted to know where the club Don Ho used to perform in before his passing was located. More strangely, I’ve had people ask me where they can find Don Ho’s Zom Zom Boutique.
They’ve also asked me, “By the way, what is a zom zom?”
I had no idea but have since discovered zom zoms are fictitious foods. And as far as I know, the online listing for this restaurant is a complete hoax.
“Mr. Morales?” the reed-slim Asian beauty asked me.
I stuffed the extinguisher in its box and made a mental note to order a new one as fire-retardant foam kept oozing out of the nozzle. The woman watching me was stunning. Her shoulder-length black hair, sweet face with just a touch of makeup, and what looked like a vintage white and lemon sleeveless pantsuit gave her the appearance of a China doll from another era. Without even looking, I knew she’d be wearing dainty, feminine shoes. Not sneakers or running shoes.
“Yes,” I said. “I’m him. He is me. I mean, I am he.” Could I possibly sound a little more stupid? She moved to the “client” side of the desk.
Paradise, Passion, Murder Page 22
