The Black Thumb

by Frankie Bow

  I felt my phone humming inside my purse.

  “Mrs. Masterman, I’m so sorry. This is my lawyer. I should probably get this.”

  “Of course. Come out and join me in the great room when you’re finished. And please, call me Fontanne.” She shut the door gently behind her to give me privacy.

  I hoped she didn’t think I was being rude, taking a call in the middle of her home tour. Like those guys I used to see back on the mainland, shouting important-sounding phrases like “value proposition” into their phones while the people around them were trying to enjoy dinner. In my defense, I wasn’t going to be much use as a homebuyer if I ended up serving a life sentence for murder.

  If I lived here, I probably wouldn’t want to sleep in the master bedroom. It was right there on the balcony that Melanie, poor Flora Brewster and Flora’s little sister Constance had all spent their last moments. Not that I was superstitious or anything, but being reminded of all those deaths might be depressing in the long run. Also, heights made me nervous.

  I pulled the French doors shut and backed away from the magnificent view.

  “Okay, first,” Honey said, “good news. I got your arraignment delayed again.”

  “Why do we want another delay? The arraignment is where I just plead not guilty, right?”

  “I’m trying to avoid escalation of commitment by the DA. We learned about escalation of commitment in your class, remember?”

  “Of course. ‘Knee-Deep in the Big Muddy’ by Barry Staw.”

  What if I sleepwalked right out through the French doors and toppled over into the garden? It was possible.

  “I figure the less far along they get on your prosecution, the easier it’ll be for them to turn around and save face,” Honey continued. “It’s more of a psychological strategy than a legal one.”

  “You know best.”

  I wasn’t a habitual sleepwalker, but there had been one incident, in grad school. I was staying over at Melanie’s apartment. She had let me have her loft bed, and she was in a sleeping bag on the floor below. It had been generous of her, come to think of it. Anyway, I dreamed I got up to use the bathroom, and next thing I knew I was being woken up by angry yelling. Who, I’d wondered hazily, was shouting in the middle of the night like this? So inconsiderate!

  “I finally got Melanie’s browser history sent over,” Honey said. “And they promised I’d have her phone records by tomorrow.”

  The midnight yeller had turned out to be Melanie. I had woken her up by falling out of bed right on top of her. Fortunately there had been no permanent injuries.

  “Her browser history. Wonderful, thank you. Was there anything that stood out to you?”

  “She did searches on people at the university. You, the people in the English department, some of the administrators.”

  “She was trying to get the goods on everyone. The same way she found everyone’s publications and ran them through the plagiarism checker.”

  “Maybe. Or maybe she was just trying to learn about her new coworkers.”

  “Was there anything else?”

  “Lotta shopping, looks like.”

  “No surprise there.”

  “Also canoe paddling blogs, real estate sites, social networks, some activity on what I guess you call specialty dating sites, all consistent with what you told me about her. There was one thing kinda stood out to me, though. She was an English professor, right?”

  “She was hoping to be.”

  “She seemed to be doing research on rules for financial transactions. Seems more like something a finance or accounting professor would be interested in.”

  “It does seem un-Melanie like. Oh, wait. That must have been Iker Legazpi’s research.”

  “Professor Legazpi from accounting?”

  “Iker told me Melanie had been asking him about his research. I think she was trying to get close to him. She wanted to become better friends with him than I was.”

  “She must’ve really wanted to impress him,” Honey said. “She kept coming back to this topic over a period of several days.”

  “You don’t suspect Iker Legazpi, do you?”

  “Nah, nah. He has no motive. And he was sitting there with you and the other garden club members at the time of the incident, wasn’t he?”

  “He was. Anyway, Iker Legazpi would never kill anyone.”

  “Nah, I can’t see Professor Legazpi as a murderer,” Honey agreed.

  “You know, it would be really nice to hear someone say that about me.”

  Honey laughed, as if I had meant to be funny.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

  “HONEY, LISTEN. SPEAKING of Iker Legazpi, I just had an idea.”

  “Okay. I’m listening.”

  “I was just talking about this with Betty Jackson. We’re writing a paper together, and we’re trying to make sense of the data. She said when you get stuck for an explanation, try reversing the causal arrow. If it looks like the rooster crowing caused the sun to rise, consider it might be the other way around.”

  “And then?”

  “So maybe Melanie wasn’t looking this information up to have something to talk about with Iker Legazpi. Maybe she was asking Dr. Legazpi about it because she was already interested in the topic for some other reason.”

  “Like what other reason?” Honey asked.

  “I don’t know. But this thing with Melanie researching financial regulations, and talking to Iker about it, she would never make such a monumental mental effort unless she had a really good reason. So, I don’t know. Maybe she was involved in a scam that went bad?”

  “I could hire someone to look at her financials. Not sure it would tell us who killed her or how.”

  “No, let’s hold off on hiring anyone.”

  I wasn’t sure how I was going to pay Honey’s fees, let alone any extras. Donnie had no reason to pitch in for my legal defense now.

  “Maybe it was just part of Melanie’s mission to one-up me. Canoe paddling with my best friend, flirting with my fiancé, and it looks like she even wanted to buy the Brewster House. Maybe she was trying to learn about business and get a job in the College of Commerce?”

  “I don’t know,” Honey sounded unimpressed with my theory. “Professors cannot just move from one field to the other. The training’s too specialized, ah?”

  “And yet, here I am. With my Ph.D. in literature and creative writing. I should be the one teaching the Jane Austen elective. Except if it were up to me, it would be a Kafka elective.”

  “Nah, lucky you ended up in the College of Commerce, Professor. It was good to have a female role model. Not a lotta wahine in the College of Commerce. You know my parents didn’t want me to leave the island, not even to go to law school. But I told ‘em about you, not from here, no family here or nothing, and you were making it work.”

  “But now you’re back in Mahina,” I said.

  “Yeah, I didn’t want to be away from my parents for too long. They’re getting older.”

  Honey’s parents were probably my age.

  I found Fontanne Masterman sitting in her great room, gazing out at the view of the Hanakoa River gorge. I joined her on the rattan couch.

  “It’s a shame about you and Donnie, dear. When Doc passed away, I didn’t know how I would go on. But I did. And you will too. In fact, I hear you have a new suitor.”

  “Nothing terribly serious. I’ve gone for coffee with a colleague from IT. That’s all.”

  “And as far as the financial aspect,” Mrs. Masterman continued, “I believe you’ll be able to...”

  Her voice was drowned out by a moaning sound beneath us. The sound swelled, so deep and intense it made my internal organs vibrate. Mrs. Masterman sighed in a resigned way and waited.

  “What is that noise?” I asked when it had died away. I heard a quaver in my voice, and realized my hands were shaking. I must still be feeling a little on edge from standing out on the balcony, I thought.

  “Oh, it’s nothing to fret abou
t. It doesn’t happen very often. As I was saying, I believe you can afford this house without Donnie.”

  “I can? How do you know?”

  “I’ve seen your salary information.”

  “You have?”

  “Of course. All state employee salary information is available to the taxpayers.”

  “It is? I had no idea—”

  The wailing rose up again, more terrible than before. Outside, across the gulch, trees lashed back and forth in the wind.

  Fontanne Masterman was used to this, apparently. She was like someone accustomed to living next to an airport, halting her conversation for the unearthly cries the way someone might pause as a noisy plane passed overhead.

  I made a mental note to call Leilani Zelenko. I was ready to look at other options. The Brewster House was beautiful and historic and everything, but really, it was far too big. Who needed all those rooms anyway?

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  ATTICUS AND I WERE lunching in Chang’s Pizza Pagoda Express (the new one on campus, not to be confused with the original Chang’s Pizza Pagoda in the Pōmaika‘i Arcade). The pepperoni-and-olive topping was lukewarm and the dough was gummy, but I was hungry enough to enjoy it.

  “So what did you do this morning?” I asked.

  “Oh, the usual.”

  “Anything interesting going on?”

  “Not really. Mm, this pizza’s not bad.”

  I tried to imagine Atticus as the father of my future children, but found myself staring at a tomato crumb caught in the corner of his mouth. Then again, I couldn’t really picture myself as a mother either.

  “Hang on,” he said. “I’m gonna go up and get some pepper flakes. You want anything?”

  “No. Thank you.”

  My phone hummed in my bag. The caller ID flashed Donnie’s picture. I swiped to send the call to voicemail. Atticus took a long time at the counter, long enough for Donnie to leave a recorded message. I got curious, and listened.

  Hi Molly, I’m just wondering how you’re doing. Uh, the Business Boosters volunteer dinner is this weekend, and we never worked out how we were going to handle it. I still have your ticket, but I understand if you have other plans.

  Donnie probably knew I’d been spending time with Atticus. Everyone in Mahina seemed to know my business. I had no idea how Sherry was managing to stay off of Donnie’s radar, but who knew how long that would last?

  Anyway, if you’re busy, I understand. Please let me know so I can give it to someone else. Jennifer said she’d take the ticket if it was available.

  “Jennifer” must have been Jennifer Yamazaki, sole proprietor of Yamazaki Sports Massage, one of the newest (and youngest, and prettiest) members of Business Boosters. Well, Jennifer Yamazaki wasn’t my problem, was she? I had moved on, and it was only fair to let Donnie do the same.

  I didn’t want to be like Melanie, whose relationship philosophy was that you couldn’t expect any one person to fulfill all of your needs. At one point in grad school she was simultaneously dating her Pilates instructor, a married history professor, the bagboy from Whole Foods, and the captain of the softball team. (That was the same semester Melanie went around proclaiming how tired she was of people’s “drama,” which in her lexicon meant people holding her accountable for her behavior.)

  I quickly texted Donnie back.

  Thank you for your message. Good idea to let Jennifer have the ticket. Have fun.

  Atticus returned with a silver-topped shaker jar full of pepper flakes, and shook liberal quantities of it onto his pizza.

  “So what’s new with IT?” I asked.

  “Nothing. Same ole, same ole.”

  “I got some work done on my conference paper this morning,” I said.

  “Cool. Where is it again?”

  “Just over in Honolulu.”

  “Honolulu’s cool. Good bus system.”

  Maybe I had been getting ahead of myself, thinking of Atticus as The One. Today, in the daylight, the Brewster House seemed more appealing; Atticus, less so. What would it be like to live there with him?

  This house is great! He’d say. Totally retro! And then we’d hold hands silently and gaze out at the terrifying panorama with the roiling river below, as little Constance Brewster shook the foundations with her unearthly wailing.

  At least I could have a conversation with Donnie. He wasn’t really into politics or current events, but he was passionate about the restaurant business. Not only was he on top of industry trends, he could explain exactly how oil breaks down in a fryer and how temperature fluctuates in a deep freezer. Donnie even asked me about my work now and then.

  On the other hand, Pat seemed to like Atticus, and Pat had never liked anyone I’d been involved with. What did Pat see in Atticus that I didn’t?

  A dead end, that’s what he saw. Pat didn’t want me to run off and get married. Pat wanted me to remain his misanthropic, celibate friend.

  Atticus finished up his pizza and wiped his mouth, removing the tomato crumb. Finally.

  “Molly. I have to talk to you about something.”

  “You do? Okay.”

  “You’re so great. I’ve loved getting to know you. You’re awesome.”

  He took my hands in his.

  “But I haven’t been fair to you.”

  “You haven’t?”

  “I’m not over her.”

  This was hard for him. He looked tense, and a little sad.

  “Atticus, I know what it feels like, not being over someone. Believe me, I understand.”

  He squeezed my hands and released them, glowing with relief.

  I would have to call Donnie back right away. I couldn’t let him go to the Business Boosters Volunteer Dinner with Jennifer Yamazaki.

  “And the thing is,” Atticus continued, “I mean, in some ways you’re not anything like her, but in some ways, like the first time I walked into your office? You just reminded me of her so much.”

  “She must be must be very beautiful, then.”

  Atticus laughed at my joke, which was sweet of him.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

  “SO DOES SHE KNOW?” I asked.

  “Yeah. After all these years, we’re getting married. Finally.”

  “Wow, there’s a plot twist. Congratulations.”

  “Her new boyfriend turned out to be a total washout.”

  “Well, it sounds like it was a rebound relationship. I understand those don’t usually work out.”

  “Molly, I know this sounds kinda weak, but I’d still like to be friends.”

  “Of course. If your girlfriend—fiancée—doesn’t mind. Are you going to invite me to your wedding?”

  “Sure,” he grinned.

  “I’m picturing some indie band from Portland, playing a folk-inflected version of Mendelssohn's Wedding March on genuine 19th century string instruments.”

  He laughed. “It sounds kinda cool, actually. I like it.”

  “Are you moving back to the mainland?”

  “Yeah. There’s not much here for either of us, career-wise.”

  My phone hummed in my bag.

  “Go ahead and get your call,” he said.

  “I’ll just check and make sure it isn’t my lawyer—oh no, it is my lawyer. I’m so sorry. What awkward timing.”

  “No, it’s okay.”

  “I got Melanie’s phone records,” Honey said. “Are you on campus?”

  “I’m at the pizza place. Chang’s Pizza Pagoda Express.”

  “I’ll be there in five.”

  Atticus was at the soda machine getting a refill when Honey showed up with an armload of printouts. She dropped two thick stacks of paper on the table in front of me.

  “Here’s her phone records, Professor. And here’s printouts of the websites she was visiting frequently. The phone records show texts between Melanie and Leilani Zelenko, your real estate agent. So there’s more evidence for what we were thinking about Melanie wanting the Brewster House.”

  “Okay
, we’ve confirmed Melanie was after the Brewster House. Anything else?”

  Honey pulled up a chair and sat down next to me.

  “There’s some phone calls to and from the university, but the university has a central switchboard so it’s impossible to tell who those were to.”

  “I wonder if any of these calls were to Scott Nixon. Threatening to expose his plagiarism.”

  “Maybe,” Honey said. “But even if we could show she called Scott Nixon, it wouldn’t be unusual. He was her new department chair. Anyway. How long will it take you to look through all of these?”

  “All of them?” I asked.

  “Yes. You’re the only one who can tell me if they mean anything.”

  “I don’t know. This is a lot of paper—”

  “How about this weekend?”

  “This weekend? It’s already Tuesday.”

  “It’s Wednesday.”

  “See, it’s already Wednesday. I always lose track of the days in the summer. I don’t have my class schedule to keep me oriented.”

  “We can’t waste any more time,” Honey said. “If you find something worth following up on, I’ll have to get our investigator on it.”

  “We have an investigator?”

  “Haven’t had to use her yet. I was thinking of having her look for Scott Nixon, but I thought I’d wait for the police to do their job.”

  “Any progress there?”

  “Nah. Nothing on Scott, or the student he supposedly ran off with. I bug Medeiros about it at least once a day. He’s starting to duck around corners when he sees me.”

  “Thanks.” The Medeiros-pestering was certainly going on her billable hours. I tried not to think about what my legal expenses were going to look like.

  “Oh, Atticus, this is Honey Akiona, my capable lawyer and one of our outstanding alums. Honey, this is Atticus Marx, from our IT department.”

  “Nice to meet you.” Atticus put down his soda and offered his hand. Honey clasped his hand tightly and stared at him.