by Rob Swigart
None of Barrone’s ramblings seemed to require acknowledgement, so Chazz changed the subject. “You can’t think of any reason why someone would want to kill Queneau?”
“Don’t make any sense a’tall. I guess he made enemies along the way, of course. I mean he was the judge. Two or three people might resent him, on accounta’ he sent them to jail for a while. Mostly drunks, though, overnight. They liked him, too, see. They knew he was fair. Unusual in a Frenchman, huh? He was considerate to everyone. Mostly though, just fair. So no, I can’t think of anyone, less it was someone he had a run-in with wasn’t from the island. There was a guy before that boat left.”
“Ocean Mother?”
“That’s right. Some fellow from the crew got into it with Queneau. Don’t know what it was about, but then he left, so it couldn’t have been him anyway. Sorry, I don’t know why I brought it up.”
“No, no, that’s interesting. What do you know about the woman, the one who is supposed to have killed Queneau?”
The little man shook his head. “Sorry. I don’t know anything much about her, ‘cept she’s from down south, other end of the island. I got these farms up here, see, around the west side. Seaweed does better over there, sheltered from the trades, oysters like it too, a little sheltered bay.”
He was about to get started again. “We could talk about that tomorrow, I suppose,” Chazz suggested. “I should get back. Like I said, the lieutenant isn’t used to going to discos. Kauai’s a small island. Discos only for tourists. He can go now he’s a tourist.”
“Oh, well, sure.” Barrone was disappointed, but he brightened immediately. “Hell, I’ll join you. You might need an interpreter or something. I told you my wife’s Tahitian, didn’t I? I do speak the lingo pretty well.”
“Fine.” They turned around and walked back. More motorbikes were arriving. Things were picking up. It was nearly ten o’clock.
The music was a wall of noise and popping lights, the small room crowded. A few couples squirmed on the tiny dance floor. The sound of conversation was almost equal to the amplified music. Bottles of Hinano passed overhead in a constant tangle of traffic.
Cobb Takamura was at the far end of the bar, pressed against the wall. A neon beer ad with a faulty transformer sizzled and spat above his head, its message illegible, red and blue light spilled onto his porkpie hat in random spurts. If anything the hat appeared even more hideous than usual. Thick smoke filled the top half of the room. Chazz pushed his way through the crowd like an oil tanker in heavy seas. His bulk was impressive enough to move even the most reluctant. The crowd moved aside cheerfully.
The four French soldiers were lined up, backs to the bar, waving beer bottles at a heavyset Tahitian woman wiggling her tight skirt at them. They shouted something incoherent and spilled from the bottles. Sticky beer splashed on the floor.
“Excuse me,” Chazz said, pushing in front of them toward Takamura.
“Hien?” The man with the scar on his neck put out his hand and blocked Chazz. He said something in rapid-fire French. Chazz smiled and pushed past the hand. The other three moved forward, away from the bar.
“Your friend?” the scarred man asked, jerking his thumb toward Takamura. “Little Nip?”
Chazz stopped. “What?”
“Your friend, the yellow man?”
Chazz frowned. “You don’t have Japanese tourists here?”
The four men found this question hilarious and slapped each other on the shoulder and back. Cobb was busy watching the dancers. “Sure, sure,” the first one said. “They bring much money, hien? But he is not tourist.” His words were slurred, and Chazz could barely make out what he was saying over the blare of the loudspeakers.
Chazz smiled and pointed to his ear, I can’t hear. He pressed ahead again, and the hand that was blocking him pushed back. Again Chazz stopped. “I wouldn’t like to have any trouble here,” he said. He could feel the old anger stirring.
“Sorry,” the Frenchman said. The one now behind Chazz suddenly jabbed him in the kidney.
“Ooh, ooh, so sorry, M’sieur. Someone pushed me.” He was grinning. It was an unpleasant expression, full of venom.
The space was cramped. No one had room to swing. Punches would be useless, but if they had knives, the closeness would give them an advantage.
Chazz turned left, facing them. “What do you want?” he asked mildly, but the anger was uncoiling like a snake in his stomach. Someone might get hurt. Chazz hoped it would not be him.
“We heard you and your Nip friend were interested in the boat.” The second soldier, a wiry man with dark hair who might have been Algerian, spoke better English and the insult came through clearly.
“So?” Chazz asked. Takamura was still leaning against the wall watching the dancing and did not appear to have noticed the scene unfolding to his own left.
“Ha-ha.” The soldier laughed thickly. “Everyone dead, yes? Very funny.”
He lashed out with his foot at that instant and caught Chazz painfully on the side of the calf. The soldier next to him punched toward his face and Chazz, off balance from the kick, flinched back. For some reason, his own foot flew up and caught the second soldier under the ribs. The soldier bent over just as Chazz straightened, which allowed the man behind him to punch empty air as Chazz said, “Oh my gosh, are you all right. I slipped.” He pivoted then in the small space and found an arm extended in front of his eyes. He held his own hand edge out and as he turned, slid his hand down to the hand at the end of this arm, cupped the fist there in his own palm and bent the wrist back on itself. The soldier gave a yelp of surprise as Chazz folded the man’s arm into a Z, caught the back of the hand with his thumb, and twisted the wrist down against the inside of his forearm. The soldier, a thick-necked blond, dropped to the floor with a shout of pain.
“Oh, gosh,” Chazz bent as if to help him up and fourth soldier, a prematurely balding man with a wrestler’s body, who was uncoiling behind Chazz to seize him in a choke hold, found himself falling forward with nothing to hold. He flew over Chazz’s shoulder and landed on one of the tiny round tables. Everyone at the table leaped back, and the table toppled as Chazz turned again and gave the soldier a small push to assist his fall.
Intense pain shot up his leg as the third soldier kicked him again; the kicks were extraordinary, lightning fast and very accurate. Chazz shook his head. “You shouldn’t have done that,” he murmured. He caught a glimpse of Cobb Takamura still leaning against the wall. He appeared to be humming along with the music.
The space was too crowded. The man with the damaged wrist was climbing to his feet, holding on to a smiling Tahitian man. He turned quickly and lashed at Chazz with his elbow. Chazz swayed to the side, the elbow grazed his cheek, and he came in under the man’s armpit with stiffened fingers. “I really hate to hurt people,” he said, but the anger had uncoiled fully, and he had released it and the sarcasm with it. He stomped heavily on the instep of the soldier behind him, and allowed his own right elbow to go back low. He caught the man on the chin as he doubled over the pain in his foot.
“Damn,” Chazz said, rubbing his elbow.
The remaining two men closed in from both sides, pinning him between them, Chazz dropped his weight and slipped away from one, who immediately began punching him with quick short jabs to the kidneys. Chazz spun in the small space, carrying the one holding him in a half circle, so he caught a punch himself before the first stopped. But by then all four of them were all over him.
He dropped suddenly to the floor, then pushed up in a smooth surge, and the four men fell away. One caught his lower back painfully against the edge of the bar. Someone had picked up the small table, and the wiry Algerian hit it again, sending the beer bottles and glasses on it flying. Everyone in the room seemed to be cheering now.
One of the soldiers wiped the back of his hand against his mouth and looked at the blood there. Suddenly he grinned at Chazz. “Formidable,” he said, clapping him on the shoulder. He waved at the bartender,
and before he knew it, Chazz had a bottle of Hinano in his hand, and the four French soldiers were singing the Marseillaise, nearly inaudible over the disco music. They were suddenly very drunk. “Was he not formidable, Jean-Marie?”
Jean-Marie, the man with the scar on his neck, nodded, drinking hard.
“Most impressive,” Cobb said in his ear. He still had his porkpie hat on.
“My leg hurts like hell.”
“They like a man who can fight in a bar.”
“They’re a bunch of racist swine,” Chazz said, finishing the beer.
Cobb shrugged. “Someone sent them after us.”
“You think so?”
Freddie Barrone appeared. “Wow,” he said. “That was something.”
“Where the hell did you disappear to?” Chazz asked gruffly. “You were supposed to interpret.”
“Looked like you were doing fine. It’s not really in my line, the rough stuff. I’m a botanist.”
“Yeah. And I’m a biochemist.”
One of the soldiers asked him what it was he did back then, in the fight. “Aikido,” he said shortly. “Sort of. Not supposed to hurt.”
“Oh, is all right,” the soldier said “Fat lip, as you say, hien?”
“Fat lip, okay. Who sent you?”
His innocence was vast as the universe and false as Monopoly money. “Sent?”
“Never mind. You know, Freddie?”
Freddie shook his head on a scrawny neck. “French soldiers come to Raïatéa on R and R,” he said. “New ones all the time. Usually they stay over on the other side. I don’t know these guys.”
“No harm,” one of them said. He signaled for another round.
“I suppose not. Did you guys kill the crew of the Ocean Mother?”
“Very funny man.”
The soldiers were hilarious. Then they grew sad. They sang a song. It sounded like they were alone, unknown, lost. They had no address. The song was in French, and it was very bleak. Finally they left.
The noise in the disco grew, if anything, louder. Chazz developed a headache. Fighting was not fun. It was never fun, even when it was in fun. And he did not believe this one had been in fun. He believed it was a warning.
He and Cobb went up to the lobby. Cobb went off to his room while Chazz tried Patria again, back in Kauai. The phone rang on and on in an empty house. Finally, the operator came on and suggested he try again later, no one was answering. The music pounded through the floor of his room. His leg ached.
FIFTEEN
ZOMBIE
It was no better in the morning. Sun splashed through the large square windows into his eyes. He groaned as he put his feet on the bare floor. The bruise on his calf was black and yellow. His head hurt.
Takamura was humming in the next room. Chazz found this irritating. He put his hands over his ears and stared at his toes. The nails were getting yellow. Age, he thought. I’m almost forty, I have a child. Yellow toenails. Too old to be jealous of my wife.
He cleared his throat and let the events of last evening filter through his mind. Freddie Barrone. Four French soldiers. Duvalois. The woman at the hospital. The judge, slaughtered.
“Takamura,” he shouted. He banged his fist against the wall.
“Good morning, Dr. Koenig.” Cobb Takamura was in a cheerful mood. Chazz pulled his pants on and opened the door to his room.
“What time is it?” he asked the policeman standing in the doorway. Behind him the sun was luminous, almost surreal. At the opposite end of the short hall was the reception desk. It was deserted.
“Six-thirty,” Cobb said cheerfully. “Time to get up. The sun is up and so should we be. ‘Early bird…’”
“No, please, no Charlie Chan.”
Cobb shrugged. “We could get some coffee, take a little stroll around town. We don’t have much time down here, but we are making progress.”
“Are we?”
“Oh, yes. There was an eighth member of the crew. That eighth member is missing. He was a man of medium stature who wore glasses, and his name was Calabrese. He was Italian.”
“Was he?”
“Well,” Cobb smiled. “So my informant thought.”
“Someone at the disco?” Chazz was back in his room, fishing under the bed for his shoes. Cobb, already dressed, lounged in his door, turning the rim of his hat in his hands.
“Indeed. A young Chinese man. Who, although his first name was Charlie, had unfortunately never heard of Detective Chan of the Honolulu police. A bit too young for the movies and not a reader, I’m afraid. Still an observant young man who has interesting things to say about how the local population feels about atomic testing in Moruroa, which is, he will grant you, six hundred and fifty miles from here, but sometimes the trade winds swing around that way, and they think radiation may blow this way. Did you know it is illegal to own a Geiger counter in Tahiti? No? Well, it is. Interesting. Ocean Mother had several. And no, his last name was not Chan. It was Song.”
“No.” Chazz found his second shoe and put it on. “Ouch,” he said, wiggling his foot. The bruise ached. He stood up and danced a few steps experimentally. “Okay,” he said, smiling at Takamura. “Let’s go get them.”
The street was empty, the stores closed. There was no coffee to be found anywhere, so they strolled once again along the harbor. Gulls circled overhead. They could hear the distant surf thumping against the reef. The air was warm. They approached the hospital. No one was visible on the balconies. There was a small market nearby, a square made up of small stalls, food, and trinkets. The stalls were closed, but as they walked past two or three people arrived to open up.
Uturoa was waking up.
“When did the music stop last night?” Chazz asked idly.
Cobb looked at the sky and pursed his lips. “Around an hour ago, I believe.”
“No! Bunch of party animals here.”
“Like your four friends. We have not seen the last of them, I think,” Cobb said as they turned back. Half the fishing boats were gone from the harbor, leaving empty slots against the pier. A freighter was just coming in through the pass in the reef. It sounded its horn, a mournful echo on the silent buildings. Behind the town the television tower looked over the harbor, an odd sight in this antique setting.
Shops were opening up. The sun was higher. A line of clouds sat over the horizon like the last line of defense. Inside the clouds, the island of Huahine humped up, a darker gray. Overhead the sky was clear and blue.
“What makes you say we haven’t seen the last of them?” Chazz asked. He started doing some wrist stretches as they walked, trying to unkink his body. The bed had been narrow and hard and the hours of sleep too short. The music had gone on too long.
“Because they were taking your measure. Because they wanted to get at me, but you know I am a peaceable man and don’t like violence.”
“I’m not wild about it myself.”
“Ah, but you’re an artist, aren’t you? Advanced belts in aikido and iaido.”
“It’s only because I need to move. I need a channel for anger. Shinawa says I have to learn what my intent is. He says that violence is easy, basic. Anyone can learn to maim or kill. What’s difficult is not maiming or killing.”
“They survived you. But I think they are basic people. I think they will be back.”
“We have two choices then,” Chazz said. They stopped in front of Hotel Le Motu. Across the street, the Chinese grocery was opening up. “We can avoid conflict by finishing our business here and leaving. Or we can let them know we are not so easy to dispose of.”
“Ah.”
“I favor the first option.”
“Ah.”
“So where do we stand. You met Charlie. Song, was it? And we know there was an eighth crewman. Who was he? Do we know that? Because if we do, we can go back home and find out what our wives were up to last night.”
Cobb nodded. “Sure. Medium height, medium weight, medium brown hair, glasses. Calabrese, an antinuke activist
in Bologna a decade or so back when there were protests against a nuclear power plant. The protests died down, and he moved on. What happened to him, I don’t know. I think he fell overboard.”
“No. You don’t think that. Come on, I need coffee.”
The restaurant had coffee. It also had croissants, which were surprisingly good, even better than the ones in Papeete. Town life was picking up.
“All right,” Chazz said. “You have some ideas. They are about this woman here and about what happened to the crew. There is a connection.”
Cobb looked at his friend in astonishment. “Whatever makes you think that?”
“You think that because I think that. Someone did something to that woman, something that involves a poison of some kind. She was driven psychotic. She may have been set up to do something to Queneau after the Ocean Mother had left. Freddie said Queneau had a run-in with the eighth crewman. We know he was a man. We know he went with the Ocean Mother when she left Polynesia. We know he was not aboard when she arrived and a lifeboat was missing.”
“Oh, I can’t keep any secrets from you, can I?” Takamura finished his coffee. “Come on, we have an appointment.”
They walked back to the hospital. The freighter was at the pier, the Temehani II. She was not a boat the tourists would be taking. The decks were already crowded with passengers lying on blankets and straw mats. A crane was lifting a tiny Renault to the deck. Forklift trucks were running back and forth to the warehouse by the pier, bringing pallets of food crates and huge tubs of crushed coral to wait their turn on the crane. The smell of fish was strong.
Duvalois was waiting for them outside the hospital. “Well?” Cobb asked.
“Calabrese, you said. I’m afraid there was no record. We get many Italian tourists in Tahiti, but none of that name came through. We have something else… A hint, as it were, another name: Jean Prévert, a salesman in pharmaceuticals. Came to Tahiti from Central America about three months ago. Spent six weeks in Papeete, hanging out on the waterfront, among the yachties. He wore an ascot, one of those scarves? Very… sophisticated. A common enough character in the South Seas, one supposes. One day he disappears, you know, poof, not there. But soon he is here. Came on a yacht, we assume. Asking questions. Living at Le Motu, like you. Room four.”
