by James R Benn
“I can’t be certain about Daniel yet,” I said. “There’s something about Jack’s state of mind that makes him volatile. He can take offense easily, and I don’t know what may have passed between Daniel and him if they met on that beach.”
“What about the Chinaman? Chang. Do you suspect Kennedy of his death?”
“No, Captain, I don’t. Jack might have a sudden fit of temper, but he wouldn’t strangle a man in a hospital bed.”
“It sounds to me, Lieutenant,” Ritchie said, taking another sip and smacking his lips, “that you’re hanging onto the slightest pretext to suspect Kennedy of being involved in Tamana’s death. Should I suspect you’re prejudiced against him?”
“I know him pretty well, Captain,” I said. “Which means I know his faults as well as his strengths.”
“Fair enough,” Ritchie said. “I want you to think all this through very thoroughly. Then tomorrow, unless you come up with any evidence to the contrary, I want an official report by the end of the day, exonerating Kennedy of any suspicion in regard to these killings.” With that, he crunched ice between his teeth.
“Regardless of the facts, Captain?” Now it was my turn to drain the glass.
“You don’t have facts, Boyle. You have suspicion and maybe jealousy, I don’t know. And I don’t care. What I do know is that back in the States you wouldn’t have enough evidence to arrest Kennedy, would you?”
“No. But he’d still be a suspect in any decent investigation,” I said.
“That’s in a perfect world, Boyle. Perhaps you haven’t noticed, but we’re in the Solomon Islands and at war. Hardly perfect. Now listen and listen good,” Ritchie said, leaning forward, his elbows resting on his knees. “The navy has decided Jack Kennedy is a hero. Not too long ago, there was talk of a court-martial, but that’s changed. You can guess why.”
“He doesn’t consider himself a hero, Captain.”
“Do you imagine what that little runt thinks matters a whit? The navy needs a hero, so now that’s his job. He’s getting a new command and everyone is going to look sharp about it. No lingering suspicions. Understood?”
“Yeah, I get it, Captain. Joe Senior pulled the strings in Boston and I end up with iced bourbon on Tulagi for my troubles.” To my surprise, Ritchie laughed and poured me another. I’d half expected to be arrested for insubordination.
“You might not be far off the mark, Boyle,” he said. “I’ve learned not to question the origin of orders like these. It was a strong recommendation, actually. Nothing in writing, of course. Merely a comment that it would be in the best interests of the service.”
Maybe it was the bourbon, or the ice, but I did feel for Ritchie. He was in a tight spot.
“Sali!” he yelled. “Play the piano, willya?”
“Yes, boss,” Sali answered, and soon we were serenaded by a tune that sounded familiar, on a piano that was almost in tune.
“You do have all the comforts of home,” I said. “Is that ‘I’ll String Along With You’ he’s playing?”
“A reasonable facsimile,” Ritchie said. “Sali actually knows classical stuff, too. He learned at the mission school. Let me tell you a story about that piano. You know this was the Japanese commander’s place after the Brits bugged out in early ’42?”
“Best house on the island,” I said.
“Of course. Well, when I arrived, not long after the marines secured the island, the place was all shot up. There’d been fighting along this road, and the Japs didn’t give up easily. For some reason, that piano had been moved outside. Maybe the Jap commander thought it would be safer, I don’t know. Anyway, I come walking up the path, scouting out the housing, and I find a marine playing that piano. One leg was splintered and the whole thing was at an angle, but he was playing the same song. Better than Sali is. There were dead Japs all around, shell craters and weapons lying everywhere. But that marine was lost in the song.”
“Something about not being an angel, right?” I said.
“Yeah. Because angels are so few. I’m a lot like that piano, Boyle. Left out to rot on Tulagi. But I can still play a tune. String along with me, Boyle. You’re no angel, but you’ll do.”
I sat back and drank the bourbon, savoring the ice as it sloshed into my mouth. I didn’t like being told what to do. By anyone, much less a navy captain who was following orders originating from half a world away in Hyannisport. But I had to admit, the facts didn’t amount to much of a case against Jack. I knew I was close to digging in my heels on this one simply because Ritchie was Ritchie and Jack was a Kennedy.
“If I write this report, Captain, what happens then?”
“As far as I’m concerned, Boyle, you can go back to where you came from.”
“How about I stick around? Find out who really killed those three?”
“I get my report? Full exoneration for Kennedy?”
“First thing in the morning,” I said.
“Sali! More ice!”
Chapter Twenty-One
The next morning, Yeoman Howe kept my coffee cup filled as I pecked away at a typewriter outside Captain Ritchie’s office. Which was fortunate, since the bourbon and ice had gone down smoothly last night. I needed the java to counteract a headache and to withstand Ritchie’s prompting to get on with it and type faster. He was definitely the type of officer best experienced through a haze of alcohol.
I worked it like a police report. Short sentences and to the point. I kept the statement focused on Jack and Daniel Tamana, no mention of the other murders. Jack had recently met the deceased. He found the body of the deceased on his morning walk from the hospital grounds. No evidence of any connection between the two other than a brief conversation the day before. Lieutenant Kennedy had been cooperative in all respects. Well, that was laying it on a bit thick, but thick was what Ritchie wanted.
I dated and signed it, and handed it over to Yeoman Howe, who brought it into Ritchie’s office. I helped myself to more coffee with a heaping teaspoon of sugar. One thing about the navy; they had all these ships, and besides fighting, they carried tons of supplies all over the world. Cold beer, ice, sugar, the kinds of things in short supply in North Africa and Sicily—on army bases, at least.
“Very good, Lieutenant Boyle,” Ritchie said, waving the report in my direction as Howe returned to his desk. “See Yeoman Howe if you need anything, and keep me posted.” He shut his door and I could hear him whistling a tune. “I’ll String Along With You,” of course.
“I’m at your service, Lieutenant,” Howe said. “The captain’s a happy man this morning.”
“I live to make captains happy,” I said. “Can you find out if Lieutenant Kazimierz is coming back from Brisbane today?”
“I’ll send a radio message. They’ll have a manifest for the PBY flight and I can find out if he’s on it.”
“Okay. I’m heading over to Sesapi. I’ll call or swing back here later this morning.”
I drove the now familiar route to the PT base at Sesapi, wondering what the payoff would be for Ritchie. A promotion? A job after the war with the Kennedy business empire? Maybe politics? Well, good luck to him, whatever it was. He’d find out soon enough there was always a price to be paid, even when you thought you were square with the Kennedy clan.
I parked the jeep and walked around the fuel dump this time, the odor of gas heavy in the humid air. The tepid harbor water did little to cool the oppressive air. Men were already stripped to the waist, glistening with sweat as they carried supplies aboard PT boats, cleaned machine guns, or worked on engines in what shade they could find. Speed was their best defense, and lives depended on those engines being in top shape. Jack had been idling on only one engine when he’d been hit, and I’d heard him harshly criticized, since it had given him no time to get out of the way of the destroyer. But what else could he have done? If all the engines had been running at more than idle, the
phosphorescence from the churning water would have highlighted his position to any Kawanishi in the night sky. Jack had played the odds, but sometimes fate has a way of dealing a losing hand even when you’re holding aces.
A clanking rumble jolted me out of my musings as cries of warning echoed from above. I looked in time to see two steel drums careening down the hill, straight at me, each full of high-octane aviation gas. I dropped and rolled toward the embankment, hoping to evade the avalanche. One drum hit a rock and bounced over it with a metallic clang, crashing into the dock a few feet from my head. The other rolled straight down and into the water, missing me by inches.
A gaggle of sailors ran to me, yammering a bunch of excuses and apologies. No one knew how it could have happened; all the drums were supposed to be secured on pallets; thank God I wasn’t hurt; was I okay?
“Don’t worry, boys, accidents happen,” I told them as I picked myself up. But I doubted this was an accident. I scanned the gathering crowd and the wharf for a familiar face. A suspect. I didn’t see any of the cast of characters running through my mind. But who would hang around? The place was a warren of paths and rickety wooden stairs. The stairs through the fuel dump had a couple of switchbacks; it would have been a simple matter to shoulder a couple of steel drums from their resting place while no one was looking.
I moved on, eager to see whoever I might run into. I spotted Silas Porter and John Kari, disembarking from PT-157. An officer in bleached khakis was following them to the shade provided by camouflage netting draped from the bow of the boat to poles set along the dock.
“Billy,” Kari said, waving me over. “Come meet Lieutenant Liebenow. He’s in command of the 157.” He was all innocent smiles. Porter looked nonchalant, even bored.
“Call me Bud,” Leibenow said. “I hear you’re coming along for the ride to Rendova.” None of them made any mention of the accident, not that it would have rated headlines. Sesapi was a busy place, thick with weapons and machinery, accidents waiting to happen.
“I might wait for my partner to get back from Brisbane,” I said, studying their eyes. No telltale flickers of guilt. “If he makes it in later today, we’ll hitch a ride with Gordie and Archer tomorrow, if that’s okay.”
“Your choice,” Bud said. “If you’re not here at sixteen hundred hours, I’m sure Phil Cotter won’t mind one more on the 169.”
“I’m a friend of Jack Kennedy, from back in Boston,” I said, stretching the truth a bit to see Bud’s reaction. “Think Cotter will mind me tagging along? There seems to be bad blood between them.”
“Hey, I’m a pal of Jack’s, and this is the boat that picked him and his crew up on that island,” Bud said, indicating the 157 with his thumb. “Know what he said when he first saw me? ‘Where the hell have you been?’ He wasn’t kidding around, either. Jack can be pretty hard on his friends, but we’ve gotten used to it.”
“Has Cotter?”
“Well, that’s a special case. Jack thinks Cotter abandoned him,” Bud said.
“What’s your opinion?” I asked.
“Hard to know,” he said, puffing out his cheeks in exasperation. “We fired all our torpedoes at what we thought were landing barges, but they turned out to be destroyers. Then we returned to base, which is standard operating procedure. We were long gone when Jack lost his boat. I don’t have the facts to call Cotter a liar, but it is hard to believe he didn’t see the flames.”
“Cotter seemed pretty sore at Jack, who basically did call him a liar,” I said.
“At the Coastwatchers party?” Bud asked. Porter and Kari nodded. “I heard about that. I hope neither of them has to depend on the other again. It won’t be pretty. I have a few last-minute details to check on, so I’ll see you later. Or on Rendova.”
“Bud’s a good sort,” Porter said, taking a seat on a crate of Spam under the dappled shade. “So Billy, what is your Polish pal doing off in Brisbane?”
“Talking to Dickie Miller,” I said. “Daniel Tamana’s partner.”
“You think he may know something of what got Daniel killed?” Kari asked.
“It’s possible,” I said. “It was right after Daniel saw him off on Henderson Field that he began acting strangely; lying about having to visit a sick relative, and looking for Sam Chang. Perhaps he told Dickie about whatever was bothering him.” I moved a wooden crate of K rations into the shade and sat next to Porter.
“Right, you mentioned that at the party, didn’t you? I hope Dickie came through all right,” Porter said. “I heard it was a serious case of dysentery.”
“Do you know him? Either of you?”
“Not personally, no,” Kari said.
“Same here,” Porter said. “All we knew was the call sign for the Choiseul coastwatching station. But I never met the guy.”
“You never were much for socializing,” Kari said to Porter with an easy laugh. “On Pavau they called him Silas the hermit, Billy. Never stepped foot off his plantation.”
“Well, there was nowhere to go, was there?” Porter said. “But I admit, that’s why I bought the place. Far from civilization, that’s what I thought, until the Japs showed up. Goes to show, you can’t escape from the world.”
“What happened exactly?” I asked.
“We saw their boats in the distance,” Porter said, casting his gaze out to the horizon. “When two destroyers headed straight for us, I told my assistant manager, bloke by the name of Peter Fraser, to round up the workers. They were all from Choiseul or Malaita. We’d known it was likely the Japs would come, but I did harbor a hope that the war would pass us by. It’s a small island of no military value—hardly a decent harbor to be had, and no airstrip.”
“You weren’t a Coastwatcher then, were you?” I asked.
“No, I didn’t have a radio, and didn’t really care to be part of the government. I’d come out here to be on my own, but that’s another story. Anyway, as Fraser was gathering the workers, I went down to the dock and moved my boat. It was a forty-foot launch with twin diesel engines. An old tub but seaworthy. She could make eleven knots, which would serve to get us to Choiseul and then to Vella Lavella if need be.”
“Why did you move it?” I asked, as I wiped the sweat from my forehead.
“I figured the first thing the Japs would do is shell the dock or send an aircraft to shoot up any shipping. I took her to a protected cove and hid her as best I could. Fraser was to have brought everyone there, but when they didn’t show, I went looking, heard a shot in the distance. I ran along the track until I got within view of the plantation. I could see the Jap soldiers shooting, and then the house began to burn. There was nothing I could do. They killed everyone, or most everyone, far as I can tell. There was rumor that someone had fired on the Japs as they marched towards the plantation. Maybe it was Fraser, maybe one of the workers. Or the Japs were simply out for blood.”
“So you were alone,” I said.
“Alone, yes. Ironic, isn’t it? I bought that place on Pavau to enjoy being on my own. But when I finally came to be truly alone, it was the most horrible moment of my life. It’ll never be the hermit’s existence for me again, I tell you.” Porter laughed, the gruff growl of a man who had learned a hard lesson too late.
“Did you join the Coastwatchers to get your revenge?” I asked.
“It seemed the only thing to do,” Porter said, rubbing his face with his hands as if washing away a memory. “I know I’m not the type for the army, to go marching around and saluting. I figured this suited me best. I wouldn’t mind a bit of revenge though, I don’t mind saying.” He rested his hand on the hilt of the stiletto at his belt, his fingers flexing around it. I didn’t doubt he had his own personal reasons for the war he fought.
“What about you, John?” I asked. “You worked on Pavau, right? How did you get away?”
“I worked for Lever Brothers,” Kari said. “At the small harbor on
the south side of the island. It was where the other plantations brought their copra. Lever ships first went to Silas’s place, then to the main docks for the rest of the shipment. I kept track of copra deliveries and worked the sale of supplies the ships brought in. Lever did a good business selling supplies to the planters. Whiskey especially.”
“Did you escape on one of their ships?” I asked.
“No, Lever canceled the last run when the Japanese took Rabaul in the Bismarcks. It was every man for himself when we heard the Japs had landed on the north side. I got on a small boat and worked my way south to Tulagi. That’s where I met Silas and Hugh Sexton and joined the Coastwatchers.”
“Why?” I asked.
“These are my islands, Billy,” Kari said. “I’m from Bougainville. I wanted to do my fighting here.”
“I can understand that,” I said. “Daniel Tamana must have felt the same way. Did either of you know him on Pavau?”
“He didn’t work for me,” Porter said. “I never heard of Daniel except when his name was mentioned around headquarters. John, did you ever cross paths with him?”
“No, but I’d only been on Pavau for three months. I was glad to get a job that didn’t involve drying copra in those kilns or harvesting it in the fields. Really hot work. But so is this,” Kari said, giving Porter a meaningful look.
Porter rose and hoisted a rope from the water, tied to a burlap bag, from which he extricated three bottles of Ballantine’s Beer. It wasn’t exactly cold, but it hit the spot.
“That’s what I heard about Daniel,” I said, returning to the subject after a long gulp. “It must be hard for a well-educated native to find a decent position.”
“It’s not so hard,” Kari said, passing the bottle opener back to Porter. “The trick is to get them to pay you a decent wage. Lever didn’t mind saving a bit of money on salary, knowing people like me were looking for a step up.” He drank, shrugged, and stared at the horizon, trying to disguise his bitterness with nonchalance.
