Primal Instinct

by Robert W. Walker

  They sat in silence for a moment while she tried to decode what he was getting at. Failing this, she repeated herself. “I meant what I said about the Kahalas. If you'd like me to, I'll go with you as moral support.”

  He almost took her up on her offer, but shaking his head, he replied. “You've been through enough today. I'll take you home and maybe you can sample Waikiki Beach.”

  “If you're sure.”

  “Tony's meeting me later. We'll manage.” He got to his feet and she followed suit.

  “Well, thanks for the drink and the foreign-language lesson.”

  “My pleasure, really. Thanks for... for sharing, earlier.”

  She forced a marginal smile, recalling all that she'd told him about the Mad Matisak vampire case and the case of the Claw. Quickly reverting back to the lighter subject, she said, “Going to have to get a dictionary if I stay much longer. I think I love the language and this place.”

  “Good, maybe we'll make an islander of you yet.”

  She smiled genuinely now, accepting his hand on her arm. Parry gently guided her toward the exit. It'd been a long time since a man assumed she might like such treatment, not that she couldn't find her way solo from the table to the door.

  They left the lounge unaware that they were being discreetly followed by a native man in casual Hawaiian shirt and shorts, keeping at cautious distance. The man was darkly tanned, his skin the color of red earth, his clothing loose and fluid. He took a separate elevator and at ground level, when he saw the two FBI agents get into Parry's car, he rushed to his cab and got on his C.B. radio and announced that Parry and Dr. Coran were leaving the I Aloha Tower going south toward Waikiki, most likely the Rainbow Tower, where she was staying.

  A voice returned on the C.B. radio, saying, “Aloha, Toma. Excellent work. I'll take it from here.”

  “You got it, aikane.”

  “Hele on outta deah, and say hello to Nola.”

  “Shaka, brah.”

  “And no talk story, eh?”

  “Garans, brah!”

  The C.B. went dead.

  Parry balled his fist up and allowed his pinky and thumb to stand upright, and twirling this peculiar fist at her, he said, “Shaka, shaka, brah. It means everything's cool, friend!”

  “See you later,” she called out.

  Parry left her at the entrance circle by the Rainbow Tower where cabs scurried in and out, tour buses trundled past and people lolled about, mostly tourists whose steps told others that they had all the time in the world. It was what Parry called the “tourist gait.” In the crowd there were a number of Japanese women, and one, with a little skin toning, might for all the world be another Linda Kahaia, her long trailing hair near her hips, the bone structure fine and petite, the twist at the edge of the mouth, the dark eyes. This young woman, traveling in the company of her parents, it appeared, looked like the ideal target for the killer.

  Something inside Jessica made her want to rush up to these strangers and warn them, but she was too practical for such a step. They would think her mad, and they most likely would understand nothing she had to say, given the language barrier and the morbid nature of her message. Warnings were seldom heeded anyway, and if a warning were to be of any use, it might perhaps be done better via the media as Jim was thinking. The investigation into the Cane Cutter case was leading in that direction. There was no artist rendition of the killer, but there most certainly were enough faces and evidence to make a rendition of the typical victim. A Linda Kahala-type pencil drawing could be flashed over the TV channels throughout the island and presented in the press. It might be the right thing to do at this point, but Jim Parry had said that it was too soon, that with her coming in on the case, he didn't want to have the killer suddenly fleeing the jurisdiction, vanishing as most serial killers did.

  From the corner of her eye, she saw someone watching her, a lone figure who stopped suddenly short, turned and was pretending to hail a cab. When she turned back and started for the hotel, he quickly pursued. He was a short, stocky Hawaiian whose step was lively and quick. She was about to lift her cane and strike when from the doorway stepped Joseph Kaniola, the newspaperman and father of the slain cop. She recognized him from their brief encounter at the airport.

  Kaniola shooed the other, younger man off before saying to her, “I have come for some answers.”

  She stared into his unwavering, dark Hawaiian eyes at a smoldering light there. 'There's really not much I can help you with, Mr. Kaniola.”

  “As a father? Off the record,” he pleaded. “I've got to know what's being done.”

  His anguish clearly undeniable, she suggested they go inside.

  They entered the open, airy lobby of the hotel, where the trade winds were allowed to dust everything in the place, going straight through to the seaside exit, where they found a table. Birds flew so close she might reach out and touch one. A waitress asked them if they'd like to order something to drink. She asked for iced tea and Mr. Kaniola asked for a beer.

  “There's truly not much I can tell you,” she began.

  “That's not good enough,” he challenged.

  “All right, but this is in strictest confidence, sir.”

  “Accepted.”

  “It cannot go beyond this table.”

  “Accepted.”

  “Your son's murderer is the same man who has been killing young island women.”

  He sat in silence, the news sinking in. 'To finally hear it from someone in authority... that Alan's death... that he didn't die for nothing, shot by some stoned drug-head... that he was so close to solving the Trade Winds killings... I knew it... felt it here.” He finished by beating his chest with his fist.

  “We believe your son stumbled onto the Trade Winds Killer.”

  “Stumbled? That's not exactly right. He followed the case closely. He knew every detail about the victims. He was on the bastard's trail.”

  “Perhaps... at any rate, the killer surprised him; got the upper hand.”

  “There's more you're not saying.”

  “I can't tell you any more. I've already overstepped my bounds just by talking to you.”

  “Did Parry tell you that you could not speak to me?”

  “No, to the press in general.”

  “I tell you I am here as a father.”

  She cast out a long breath of air as if this might return some investment. He continued to stare, his eyes glistening over with the loss he had suffered. He reached for a napkin, dabbed his eyes which were red and swollen.

  “His mother and I... his wife and children... we have all suffered a great deal. We have to know all that we can learn. We have to know that his killer will be brought to justice.”

  “He will,” she said, knowing she could make no such promise.

  He continued to bore through her from a purely Hawaiian visage with the eyes of a man seeking truth. She wondered momentarily about his ancestry.

  “You must promise that nothing I say will find its way into your newspaper.”

  “I swear on the graves of my ancestors that nothing revealed here, from you alone, will be made newsprint.”

  'That's an old newsman's trick, Mr. Kaniola. Take what I tell you, run it by another source and then claim it came from the secondary source whom you fooled into nodding yes or no. I guess Parry was right about my not talking to you.” She got up as if to leave, but he stopped her with a firm hand on her wrist. Nearby, she saw the Hawaiian man who'd earlier been following her, and she saw the glint of metal where a shoulder holster bulged beneath the Hawaiian shirt. She sat back down.

  “Please, I must know, as a father.”

  She sighed heavily and sat back down. She told him about the profile of the victims, hoping this would suffice. She also confirmed that Linda Kahala was the first of the missing women to be identified and that this came as a result of a limb spewed forth by the Blow Hole. It was information that was generally circulating anyway, she rationalized. “God, that could've been o
ne of my grandchildren.” He was horrified, his eyes wandering far from the table now. “Please, anything else about my son?”

  She then added, “At some time your son was in close proximity to the killer, it appears because—”

  “I knew it.”

  “—because—and this for certain you don't want to get around, Mr. Kaniola—your son's hands made contact with Linda Kahala's blood, either from the body or clothing.”

  His small eyes pinched at this. “What're you saying?”

  “I'm not saying that I think he had anything to do with the Kahala girl's killing. He put his hands on some item that was covered in her blood. Most likely her clothing.”

  He thought about this, how close his son had come to being the hero in this story without heroes.

  “News like that could be twisted,” he said.

  “I'm well aware of that, and so are my lab people.”

  “But they're not your lab people, are they? They're Parry's people. How can you trust strangers?”

  She gazed questioningly at him. “You knew the exact time when I landed at the airport, and now you've learned where I'm staying. Mr. Kaniola, maybe I should be frightened of you.”

  “You have nothing to fear from me. I want only that my son be honored, and his killer brought to justice.”

  “In the meantime, what're you paying Mr. Lau for information?” She'd taken a calculated shot. His reaction was bull's-eye, not in words but in body language.

  “I pay Lau nothing.” He clenched his teeth as if insulted.

  “Not even in beer?”

  “Lau is my sister's son.”

  “Your nephew?” She dropped her gaze and drained her tea, which had turned to water. “I think I've said enough.”

  “But you've told me nothing. How soon will you and Parry find this madman?”

  “What's really going on here, Mr. Kaniola? Island vigilantes at work?”

  “You shock me!”

  “You find the name of the killer, and then you and your pals can work a little island justice? Is that it?”

  “I have a right to know what is being done about this matter!” His shout startled people all around them. She got up to leave, ignoring his repeated apologies and his bodyguard. As she walked away, he said firmly, “I will see vengeance done. I have a right to see it done. I am an American, too, Dr. Coran.”

  She rushed toward the elevator and her room, strangers on all sides of her now taking on a sinister form. How many of them were working as Kaniola's eyes? How many people were watching her? She had thought someone back at the Aloha Tower was watching her, but she had cast off the notion as preposterous. Now this.

  She wondered how deeply Joseph Kaniola's frustration and anger ran. Just how far might he go if he learned who the killer was before she and Parry did?

  When she got to her room and locked the door behind her, she wondered if perhaps she hadn't overreacted. Yet something in Kaniola's eyes, his manner, told her otherwise. She wondered if she should not tell Parry about the incident.

  She undressed and showered, the tension draining from her, leaving her pleasantly empty; empty of thoughts of homicide, autopsies and Kaniola, of Lau's obvious deceit, and other pestering, thorny problems she'd have to face tomorrow. For now she'd get the sleep she had missed the night before, wake refreshed and be prepared for the next day far better than she had been equipped for this one.

  God, why'd I say anything to Kaniola? she chastised herself. “Might've known better.” He was, after all, a newsman, and no matter his race, the story was more important than food, water and truth. Sure, he professed a father's concern, and no doubt he was absolutely sincere in this instance, but he still remained a newspaperman.

  She half expected and feared that tomorrow's Ala Ohana newspaper would run a story telling everyone of the FBI suspicions she had shared with Kaniola. ParTy would have her head. It was too soon to release such information, and it might backfire on all of them, including Joseph Kaniola.

  She toyed with the idea of trying to reach Jim Parry, to tell him of her encounter with Kaniola and what she had foolishly revealed to him. She thought about it but decided doing nothing was, for the moment, best.

  It was early yet, 6 P.M., but she was exhausted, and the single drink she'd shared with Parry, at island proof, had left her mellow, perhaps why she'd been such easy pickings for Kaniola. She wondered now how worried she should be. Either way, she'd locate the pool, do some laps, come back up and sleep on it.

  8

  There is in God. some say,

  A deep but dazzling darkness.

  Henry Vaughan

  After dropping Dr. Coran at the Rainbow, Chief Parry met Tony Gagliano a block from the Kahala residence, where they sat for a moment in Tony's unit. Tony was wearing a freshly cleaned, midnight-blue flowered Hawaiian shirt, his usual attire, along with loose-fitting dungarees.

  “So what's new?” Tony asked. “Anything developing I ought to know about? Anything at all? Like are you or are you not seeing Dr. Coran on other than work-related business, Boss?”

  “No, no and no,” Parry replied. He changed the subject to the victim's boyfriend. “How'd you fare with the background check on George Oniiwah?”

  “The kid's squeaky clean, Jim?”

  'Too clean or just clean?”

  “Well, as clean as it gets, let's say. He's liapa Japa, as they say.”

  “What's his being half Japanese got to do with anything?”

  “Jim, when's the last time you arrested a Jap?”

  “What?”

  “Think about it, seriously.”

  Parry gave it a moment's thought. “Can't say that I ever have.”

  “That's what I realized after talking to this kid. I bet the HPD wouldn't Find many arrests of Japs on their books either. It's not that they don't do crime like everybody else, but when they're good, they're very good, if you know what I mean.”

  “If they're into crime, they cover their behinds, I know, but what about the other half of this guy?”

  Gagliano pulled his wallet out, absently checked how much cash he had on him and put it away. “Any rate, Georgie's clean. I mean he may be into smoking weed, doing a hit once in a while, maybe selling burn bags out of his dorm room, maybe; but he doesn't come over as any sort of maniac or hard-assed killer.”

  “Christ, Tony, neither did Jeffrey Dahmer to the cops who interviewed him just before he killed and fried up parts of his last meal.”

  “Hey, you maybe have to trust me on this one, Boss.”

  “You like this, don't you?”

  “What?”

  “Yankin' my chain, damn you.”

  “Come on, Jimbo. All I'm sayin' is that this guy don't shine like a hardcase. Japan's home for his father's parents, but the kid was bom here, an American, the good ol' U.S. of A. Mother is Hawaiian, some sort of social worker; father's big in the computer programming business, makes a bundle for—get this—General Fucking Electric.”

  “And so the kid's well off and attends the university, the big campus?”

  “Right, and get this: He not only knew Linda but also another of the victims, Kia Wailea.”

  “She was also attending classes.”

  “Right, and according to the kid, it was Kia who led Linda into the part-time-prostitution business down on the strip. Linda got off work at nine. So what's she doing on Ala Wai at midnight the night she disappeared? It's pretty sure she was tooting, Boss.” Tony had called it “tooting” for years. “According to Georgie boy, Kia told Linda that hooking was her ticket to get through school, all that. George says when he learned about what she was doing that he went a little crazy. They had a big fight. He slapped her around some... she scratched hell out of him.”

  “Any fresh marks on him that you saw?”

  “No, but they split some time ago. Says he broke it off and hasn't seen her since. That was three months ago, he said, but he lied. It was less than a month ago he last saw her, according to the girl's p
arents.”

  “Gag, if the punk's lying about that, what else's he hiding, huh? Is he half clean or half dirty?”

  “I think he's hiding plenty about his relationship with the girl, but I think it's small potatoes.”

  “Then why's he lying to you?”

  “It's not small-time shit to him; to him it's important shit.”

  “Well, if it's important to him, and he's the only thread we got, then it's important to me, so out with it. What is it he doesn't want to get around?”

  “For one, he's worried shitless that the girl's relatives are going to come after him, you know, the way we have, and if they do, they're not likely to be so gentle.”

  “What else?”

  “Just a lot of crap, Jim.”

  Tony's guessing games sometimes annoyed Parry, who stared hard across at his subordinate now.

  Gagliano finally said, “His pride.”

  “His pride? What the hell do we give a shit about this punk's pride?”

  “Nothing, just that you know... he goes to bed with her again—”

  “Again?”

  “After he'd learned she was tooting, after he'd had time to cool off.”

  “You don't think he's angry enough over this to kill her?”

  “Getting ahead of yourself, Jimbo. No, now he's had time to think, and he's asking himself how he really feels, down and deep, you see. Maybe it'd be kinky and fun to sleep with a dirtied, soiled dove, and Linda's a perfect way for him to find out. She takes on a whole new dimension since she's become a prostitute, more rounded, more complex, more interesting to his hapa Japa brain. Know what I mean?” Parry followed Tony's reasoning. “It's risky. She's taking risks with AIDS and all, and now he's taking risks.”

  “He gets a hard-on he didn't expect, a rush to jog his safe, little world.”

  “I see.”

  “Only, he doesn't want anyone to know that he's got back together with her, not on the outside, anyway. Still, her parents aren't completely blind, and it seems every kid at the college knows who's on and who's off who, just the same as they know who's on drugs, who's selling, and who's tooting whatever down at Waikiki.”