Lana'i of the Tiger (The Islands of Aloha Mystery Series) (21 page)

I was deep in thought when a
silver Corolla pulled up. Kate rolled down her window and waved. I made a dash
from the safety of the porch to the passenger side door and jumped inside.

“You ever been to Maui?” she
said.

“A few times.”

“You know your way around
there?”

“Pretty much.”

“Well good, because all I’ve got
is an address in a town I’ve never heard of,” she said. “I looked it up on the
Internet and it’s somewhere in central Maui. We’ll probably have to rent a car.”

“What’s the name of the town?”

“I can’t remember. Here’s the
address.” She pulled a piece of paper from the console and handed it to me. The
town where Marta was hiding—Pukalani—was only a few miles north of my house in
Hali’imaile.

Did I know my way around? Heck,
I could’ve found the place blindfolded.

CHAPTER
26

We bought our round-trip tickets
and had only a short wait before the ferry came churning into view. Even though
it was the first trip of the day it looked like the ferry would be filled to
capacity. But then, it was the last Saturday before Christmas. The gift-buying
procrastinators and people stocking up for a big Christmas Day dinner were
already lined up.   

As I looked at their faces, everyone
seemed to be trying awfully hard to appear jolly. But I’d been in the wedding
business long enough to spot the facial expression that appears to say,
isn’t
this fun?
but really means
I can hardly wait ‘til this is over
. The
holidays are like that. Lots of expectations, lots of anxiety, and a whole lot
of thinking that other people are enjoying it way more than we are.

We approached the gangway and
the same ponytail guy was checking off the embarking passengers against the
manifest.

“Not you again,” he said as he looked
up from his clipboard. “You gonna actually go this time?”

“Yeah, I’m really sorry about
yesterday.”

“Is your auntie doing better?”

“
Mahalo
, she’s much
better today.”

Kate shot me a quizzical look
and I told her I’d fill her in later. We headed for the stairs to the top deck.

“You okay with sitting outside?”
Kate said.

“Best ride on the boat.”

The crossing was a bit rough,
with sea spray crashing over the bridge and getting everyone sitting outside
wet, but no one made a move to go inside. The sun was shining against a perfect
cobalt-blue sky and the smell of the ocean was invigorating. I thought about
Ono and our sail around Lana’i two days earlier. I felt a stab when I
remembered him telling me about Farrah and Hatch living together. As eager as I
was to be home, I wasn’t at all eager to face that mess.

When Lahaina Harbor finally came
into view it was all I could do to keep myself from bawling like a baby. Shops
and boats and people—lots of people—could be seen out along the waterfront and
along Front Street.  The West Maui Mountains rose in the distance like immense
green sentinels welcoming me home.

We pulled up to the dock and
waited for the gangway to be lowered and locked in place. I looked over at the
marina hoping to spot Ono’s catamaran, the
Maui Happy Returns
. It was
there, at the far reaches of the harbor, gleaming bright white in the morning
sunshine.

We disembarked. The ferry
passengers made a beeline toward the line of waiting taxis and shuttle busses
parked along Harbor Street. Kate started walking quickly to join them, but I
put a hand on her arm.

“Come with me,” I said. “I know
someone here at the harbor. We may not need to rent a car after all.”

We trotted over to the furthest
area of boat slips where the
Maui Happy Returns
was docked. Ono wasn’t
visible on deck, but Chico, a young guy who sometimes crewed for him, was
scrubbing the “trampoline,” the netting at the front of the catamaran.

“Hey, Chico,” I called. I felt a
little alarmed at how politically incorrect that sounded, but hey, it was the
guy’s name.

“Hey, Pali,” he called back. It
took me a second to realize he’d called me my real name.  Kate’s expression
registered confusion.

“Uh, some friends from way back
know me by my school nickname,” I said. I turned back to Chico. “Is Ono
around?”

“Nah. He’s gone to the other
side,” he said. “Probably be back in a while.”

“You got his cell number handy?”

“Sure. You ready?”

“Uh, hang on a second. I don’t
have my phone with me,” I said.

“I have mine,” Kate chimed in.
She pulled a sleek black smart-phone from her bag and handed it to me.

Chico rattled off Ono’s number
and I punched it in. It rang until it went to voicemail and I left a message.

Kate and I left the dock and
went to sit on a bench in Banyan Tree Park. Kate said she needed to use the
restroom and she got up and started toward the public toilets by the dock.

 “There’s a better ladies’ room
on the second floor in there.” I said. I pointed to the old courthouse building
that houses a visitor’s center and art gallery. “It’s open to the public.”

“Looks like you really know your
way around here. I thought you’d only been to Maui a few times.”

“My auntie used to bring us over
here when we were kids,” I said. “Lahaina’s stayed pretty much the same.”

She nodded but looked
unconvinced.

While Kate was in the restroom I
looked around at the familiar sights and sounds of Maui. I was finally home.
Even though I was on the opposite side of the island from my house, everything
about the place felt normal to me in a way no other place on earth ever would.

Kate walked back to where I was
sitting; talking on her cell as she walked. She didn’t look happy as she hung
up and stashed the phone in her bag.

“I just talked to Marta’s
sister,” she said. “We’ve got to get going. Marta’s leaving for Manila at
twelve-twenty.”

I scanned the harbor looking for
Ono. Still no sign of him. We sat down and I outlined my plan for Kate. If Ono
didn’t show up in half an hour we’d call for a cab. We’d take the cab to the
airport and rent a car. From the airport, it was only a fifteen minute drive to
Pukalani.

“How do you know all this? I
mean, if you were a kid when you were here, how would you know how long it
takes to get to Pukalani from the airport?”

“I guess I was a precocious.”

Less than twenty minutes later I
spotted Ono’s red and white VW bus making its way down Front Street. My heart
leapt as I watched the little hippie van inch its way toward us in the early
morning traffic.

“That’s him,” I said getting up.
I trotted over to Front Street to flag him down.

***

Ono pulled to the side of the
road. “Hey, what are you doing over here?” He looked up and down the street as
if half-expecting a hail of gunfire.

“
Aloha
, Ono. This is my
friend Kate. We’ve come over from Lana’i to talk to someone here. Any chance
you could give us a ride to Pukalani?” I stuck to the facts since I didn’t want
to have to explain any more than necessary to either Ono or Kate.

“Sorry, but I’ve got a big group
going out this afternoon. Bunch of insurance agents. We’ll be gone until six.
Can you wait until then?”

“No, we need to go right away.
The woman we’re meeting with is leaving for the Philippines in a few hours.”

He shot me a look that had a
million questions behind it but I didn’t bite.

“Could we borrow the bus?” I
said.

Ono looked pained. I’d ridden
with him before in his classic 1964 Volkswagen van. When it was cruisin’ flat
out, the thing barely got up to forty-five. But Ono was as proud of his vintage
ride as Willie was of his Shelby.

“I promise to be gentle,” I
said. “No gunning the engine and no muddy feet.”

“Nah, it’s fine,” he said. He
looked over at Kate. “I’m not a jerk. I let people drive the love bus all the
time.”

I leaned in the window,
sniffing.

“What’re you doing?” he said.

“Checking for smoke. I’m waiting
for your pants to catch on fire.”

He got out and ceremoniously
handed me the keys. I kissed him on the cheek.

“We’ll be back by one o’clock,”
I said.

“Take your time. I’ll be gone by
then anyway. Park it over there, in the lot by the school. You can leave the
keys in the dock box.” He started walking away.

“Aye, aye, Captain,” I said. “
Mahalo.
 I’ll gas it up before I bring it back.”

“She takes premium,” he said
over his shoulder.

“Of course she does.”

***

Kate and I didn’t talk much on
the ride up to Pukalani. Besides, it was hard to hear over the roar of the tiny
VW engine reverberating through the chassis. I took the Honoapi’ilani Highway
to the Kuihelani Highway into Kahului. Then I turned at the Hana Highway and
then again at the road to Haleakala. It was weird to be driving the same roads
I used to drive every day. And it was beyond weird to be only a few miles from
my house and not go there. When I saw the sign announcing we were entering the
town of Pukalani, I turned to Kate and asked for directions to the house.

“I’m not sure how to get there,”
she said. “Let me call Marta’s sister.”

She called. It turned out we
were only a few blocks away. We made a couple of turns and parked in front of a
small brown house.

The place looked deserted. The
shades were drawn and the driveway was empty. Usually in family neighborhoods you
see bikes or kids’ toys scattered around, but at that house the yard was completely
bare. “Are you sure this is the right address?” I said.

She checked her paper. “This is
it.”

We went to the front door and Kate
knocked. I noticed there were no flip-flops or shoes on the porch—very unusual
for a Hawaiian home.

We waited. And waited. Kate dug around
in her bag and pulled out her phone. But before she could punch in a number,
the front door opened a crack and a tiny brown face peered out.

CHAPTER
27

 The woman behind the door was
less than five feet tall. Kate spoke to her in Spanish and the woman opened the
door just wide enough to allow us to slip inside. Once we’d come in, she pushed
the door shut and locked it with a deadbolt.

Kate introduced me and I managed
to recall enough of my high school Spanish to say I was pleased to make her
acquaintance. Kate started talking in rapid-fire Spanish. I assumed she was
telling her I didn’t speak fluent Spanish so Kate would be translating. A few
moments later a second woman appeared in the hallway. To my untrained eye, the
two women looked like mirror images.

The first woman gestured for us
to sit in the living room and, once we’d sat down, she began speaking in
English. She said her name was Maria and she’d married an American ten years
ago and had moved from the Philippines to Hawaii. Her twin sister Marta stayed
behind to care for their elderly parents but now the parents were dead. Marta
had come to the U.S. four months ago to join her sister. She said Marta was
thrilled to find the housekeeping job at the Four Seasons Hotel on Lana’i even
though it meant sleeping in a workers’ crash pad during the work week and only coming
back to see her sister on her days off. Maria said Marta had hoped to stay in
the United States and become a citizen, but she’d overstayed her visa and now
she had to return to Manila.

Maria said nothing about Marta witnessing
a murder victim or being sought by the police, even though the Lana’i murders
had been front and center on the Maui news for the past three days.

Marta and Maria sat on chairs
opposite us and it was like looking cross-eyed and seeing double. They even
wore matching clothes—black pants and loud floral-print blouses. I looked at
Kate and she looked at me. Seemed we were thinking the same thing.

I asked Kate to ask Marta what
happened that night. Marta bit her lip and began talking in a voice so soft I
was amazed Kate could keep up. After a couple of minutes, Kate held up her hand
in a “stop” gesture and turned to me with the translation.

“She says she and Stella were
going from room to room on the second floor doing turn-down service. They’d
been at it for about half an hour. They’d park their cart in front of each room
and knock. If someone answered, they’d go in when the guest opened the door. If
no one answered, Stella would use her pass key. Stella always entered first. When
they got to the ‘dead lady’s’ suite Stella told Marta to tidy up the sitting
area while she turned down the bed. Marta crossed the sitting room to pick up a
towel on the floor and when she looked up, she saw a man.”

“Inside or outside?” I said.

She asked Marta and Marta
mumbled a couple of sentences.

“Outside. She said she could see
him through the window. He was outside on the balcony—the lanai.”

“She’s
positive
she saw a
man?” I said.

Kate asked and Marta answered.

“Yes, she said she’s absolutely
positive because the man looked startled to see her.”

Kate asked Marta to continue.
After a few more minutes of back-and-forth whispered Spanish, Kate translated
again.

“About the time Marta noticed the
man, she heard Stella scream. At the sound of the scream, the man tossed
something off the lanai. I asked her if she saw what he’d thrown and she said
she couldn’t tell, but it was small, like a wad of paper. Then the guy climbed up
on the railing. She said she left to see why Stella had screamed so she didn’t
see what the man did after that.”

“So while he was up on the
railing she went into the bedroom?” I said.

“I think so, but let me check.”

She asked Marta and Marta
nodded. Her face looked crestfallen as if she blamed herself for not talking
the guy down off the ledge. Of course, it would have been pretty difficult to
talk him down unless the guy knew Spanish—or Tagalog.