4 Kaua'i Me a River (15 page)

I
would’ve chuckled at her use of the word ‘slather’ for ‘slander’ but I was
taking her threat seriously.

She lurched
out onto the porch. She appeared even more inebriated than when she’d first
come in. Before she got to the steps, she turned. “You know, your mother’s
death wasn’t hush-hush. It was all anybody talked about for weeks.”

She staggered
down the steps and I slammed the door. I winced at the thought that she’d be drunk
driving. I hoped she lived nearby.

I
headed into Phil’s den. If my mom’s death had been the gist of local gossip, maybe
I’d be able to find something on the computer. I hoped Phil hadn’t been so
obsessed with peace and quiet that he hadn’t had an Internet connection
installed.  

The
computer booted up and thankfully, Phil hadn’t set it up with a password. W
ith
just a few keystrokes I found the link to the archives of
The Garden Island
,
the local Kaua'i newspaper. I went to the search box and typed in ‘Hanalei
murder 1981.’ I gripped my shaking hands into fists while the computer took a
second to search. But when the results came up, nothing it listed was over five
years old. I tried other keywords but still nothing.

The next day was Sunday, so I’d
have to stop by the newspaper office on Monday after probate court. I’d also drop
by the police station and see if I could bluff my way into getting my hands on
the police report. I’d try invoking the Freedom of Information Act. I wasn’t
exactly sure what the FIA covered or who could use it to get what, but I
thought it sounded good.

I logged off the computer and
started rummaging through the furniture in the den. The big mahogany desk was
first. There were three drawers on each side with a pencil drawer in the
middle. The files in the bottom drawers were mostly copies of paid bills and bank
statements. I didn’t care about any of that. I already knew my dad was rich. I
wanted to see if he’d kept any mementos from his days at Taylor Camp. 

In a far corner of the pencil
drawer I found a tattered envelope so worn it felt more like fabric than paper.
Inside was an old black and white photograph; the kind with the date printed in
the margin of the white scalloped edge. The date was August 15, 1976—two months
after I’d been born. The image was a little blurry but it still made me shiver.
It showed three people, a woman in the middle and two men on either side.
Looking at the woman’s face was like looking in a mirror. It had to be my mother.
I’d seen photos in Auntie Mana’s scrapbooks, but I’d never noticed before how
much I resembled her.

The men on either side seemed to be
about the same age or maybe a few years apart. One had a full beard and a big
smile; the other guy squinted at the camera as if he’d rather be somewhere
else. The squinter looked vaguely familiar. High forehead, prominent nose. Perhaps
it was Phil in earlier times? It was hard to tell.

I continued rifling through drawers
and shelves but didn’t find anything else that intrigued me. I went back to the
photo. Who was the other guy? Probably a Taylor Camp friend.

I was dead tired, but I didn’t want
to go into the bedroom and lie down on Phil’s bed. I wondered how good it would
feel to totally trash this fancy house of my father’s. The man who’d abandoned
the mother of his child. The guy who’d left my mother to fend for herself among
a tribe of weed smokers and dopers. When one of those dopers, most probably A J
Chesterton, got hopped up one night and viciously attacked her, where was
Philip J. Wilkerson the Third? Nowhere to be found. From where I was sitting,
my father was as guilty of my mother’s murder as if he’d killed her himself.

I was sick, exhausted, and dizzy. I
went into the living room and dived onto the sofa.  

***

I was
pretty sure my cell phone was ringing. I opened one eye, then the other. Light
streamed through the living room windows. I went through the whole
Where am
I?
What day is this?
routine before I was awake enough to answer it.

“Pali,
how’s it going?” It was Farrah.

“Not
one of my better mornings,” I said with a voice that sounded like I’d survived a
near-strangulation.

She
laughed. “Sorry to hassle you, but I wanted to see how you were doing. You
missed a real groovy party last night. Did you hear? Hatch was up for Rookie of
the Year and he won! Far out, right? He’s been strutting around here like a Chinese
peacock.”

I
heard Hatch’s laugh in the background.

“Where
are you?” I said.

“We’re
up here at the house. I promised him a big breakfast for taking me last night.”

I
wasn’t even going to ask for clarification on
that
one.

“Farrah,
I’m sorry but I’m feeling kind of sick. Can I call you back in a little while?”

“Don’t
you want to talk to Hatch?”

“Sure,
put him on.”

“Hey,”
he said.

“Hey,”
I said. “Congratulations on being Rookie of the Year.”

“Yeah,
mahalo
. The dinner turned out to be pretty great. So what’s going on
with you?”

“It’s
been crazy. My dad’s ex-wife told me my mother hadn’t died of natural causes. She
said my mom was murdered. And now I’ve found a picture of her here at Phil’s
house.”

“Whoa.
Do you believe her? Uh-oh, sorry, but I gotta run. I just got handed a huge
plate of French toast with my name on it.”

In the
background I heard Farrah say. “Which name would that be? ‘Hatch Decker’? or
‘Maui Fire Rookie of the Year’?” 

They
both laughed and Hatch hurriedly said his good-byes and hung up.

I
snapped the phone shut. A flash of anger shot through me. Why couldn’t I get
anyone else to care about this as much as I did? And then it hit me. There were
only two people on this earth who’d ever care as much, and I was one of them.

I
thought of my little brother running down the beach calling for his mom. Someone
had gotten away with her murder and left us orphans. I picked up the black and
white photo and scrutinized my mother’s face. It’d been thirty years but the
killer still had a debt to pay.

And if
it took thirty more, I wouldn’t rest until I’d collected on that debt.

CHAPTER 18

Sunny
called a few minutes later and invited me to breakfast. My stomach was still
roiling, but I needed to eat something. As I made my way over to the main house
I noticed Peggy had ‘gone off the rails’ when she left the night before. There
were deep tire ruts in the lawn where she’d failed to stay on the road.

Sunny
met me at the door with a glass of guava juice. I love guava and started to
drink it but stopped after one gulp. It tasted so sweet it nearly gagged me. I
carried the glass with me to the kitchen and set it on the counter.

“How’d
you sleep?” she asked.

“Well,
after Peggy left—”

“Oh
no, did Peggy come over and bother you? I told her Joanie was just being a
bitch. But I thought Peggy should know what she’d told you. It’s best to have stuff
like that out in the open, don’t you think?”

“She acted
drunk. Was Peggy drunk when she talked to you?”

“Oh, Phil
told me Peggy always had a drinking problem. That’s why he finally called it
quits. They were married for a long time, but enough’s enough. She claims she’s
sober now, but it doesn’t look like it.”  

Sunny
had laid out a huge fruit plate with pineapple, mango, papaya, and bananas all
artfully arranged. It looked like something I’d order for a bridal brunch
party. There was also a plate of muffins and a pitcher of the guava juice. I
steered clear of the juice but helped myself to a muffin and a large portion of
fruit.

I
pulled the photo from my purse and showed it to Sunny. She smiled when she recognized
who was in it. “That’s Phil,” she said pointing to the scowling man.

“And
who’s the other guy?”

“Um, I’m
pretty sure that’s his brother, Robert.”

“The
one who killed himself?”

“Yeah.”
She turned away.

“What
is it?”

“Oh, nothing,”
she said. “Where’d you get that picture?”

I told
her about finding it in his desk. She got up and scraped the leftover fruit
into the garbage. If I’d had leftover fruit I would’ve put it in a plastic
container in the refrigerator.

She
sighed and sat down. “I guess I should tell you. With Joanie mouthing off and
Peggy falling off the wagon, it’s bound to come out sooner or later. Let’s go
sit on the
lanai
. It’s nicer out there.”

We
went outside.

“This
is not a happy story, Pali. But you deserve to know the whole story.”

She’d
known all along? Oh well, better late than never.

 “Phil
told me what happened was an accident. A really sad accident.”

I felt
a tightness in my neck and had to roll my shoulders to get the kinks out. I
still felt somewhat sick to my stomach so I hoped Sunny’s story wouldn’t send
me fleeing to the bathroom again. 

“Your
father didn’t just up and leave your mother. He cared about her a lot, but he’d
run out of money. He asked his parents for help, but instead they demanded he
come home to Oregon and go to college. He said he promised himself he’d come
back to Kaua'i one day, but he didn’t think it was fair to ask your mom to wait
for him.”

She
looked at me as if checking if I was buying what she was selling. I did my best
to keep a neutral face.

“Anyway,
he said a few years after he was out of the picture Peggy’s brother, AJ, tried
to put the moves on your mom. She was already hooking up with another guy, but
AJ was used to getting his way and wouldn’t take ‘no’ for an answer. After all,
his dad was the chief of police and all.”

“Oh
that’s right. Peggy’s dad was the police chief before he became mayor.”

“Yeah,
so anyway, one night AJ went all crazy and came after your mom’s new lover with
a bat. From what Phil told me, your mom tried to break it up. She got between
the two guys. Nobody was exactly sure what happened, but she got hit on the
head and she later died. So you see, it wasn’t murder; it was just a horrible
accident.” Sunny stopped and took a deep breath as if recalling a tragic scene
she’d rather not revisit.

“But didn’t
the police investigate? I mean, AJ and this other guy were fighting and my
mother got
killed
.”

“Think
about it. AJ was the police chief’s son. And besides that, according to Phil,
back then there was no love lost between the cops and the hippies. Phil said even
if the police had tried to investigate, nobody would’ve talked to them.”

 “So how
did Phil hear all this?”

“He said
he’d kept in touch with some people he’d known at Taylor Camp.”

 “So who
was the other guy?”

“What
other guy?”

“The
guy my mom
died
trying to protect.”

“Oh
him,” said Sunny. “Phil said he and your mom had a baby together. So I guess
that would make him your half-brother’s father.”

“Uncle
Robby.”

“Did
you know him?” she said.

“I
vaguely remember him. I was five when my mom died. And now that I think about
it, I never saw Uncle Robby again after Auntie Mana moved us to Maui.”

 I
paused a moment. “But then after my dad graduated, he came back to Kaua'i and married
Peggy Chesterton?”

“Yeah.
Seems kind of weird, doesn’t it? But he said one of the things he and Peggy had
in common was they shared that tragic secret.” She shook her head. “Peggy’s
brother and your mom. I’m sorry I was the one who had to tell you.”

“I
appreciate it. It answers a lot of questions.”

We sat
there a moment and Sunny’s home phone started ringing.

“I’ll
let you get that,” I said.

I went
over to the
ohana
to use the bathroom one more time. My stomach was
still doing flip-flops and Sunny’s story hadn’t helped.  I hoped whatever it
was that had made me sick would be out of my system before I had to go to court
on Monday morning.

As I was
walking back to the main house, my cell phone rang.  

“Pali?
It’s Valentine. I’m afraid I have some bad news. Peggy Chesterton died this morning.
It seems she was in a terrible car accident last night.”

CHAPTER 19

I started
jogging toward the main house. “What? Peggy’s dead? I just saw her last night.”

I was taking
the stairs to the
lanai
two at a time when Valentine said, “Yes, and Sunny
told me she’d been to see you right before the accident.”

I
stopped mid-stride. “What?”

“I
just spoke with Sunny and she said Peggy had come over to see you last night.
She said Peggy seemed very upset about some allegations you’d made about her brother.”