Damned in Paradise

She walked me to the limo, where the Navy driver was helping Darrow back in. The breeze was wafting her lovely haze of blond hair. Her arm in mine, she pulled me down, leaned in, her lips almost touching my ear.

“I can’t decide whether you’re wonderful or terrible,” she whispered.

“No one can,” I whispered back. “That’s my charm.”

In the limousine, I said, “Where to now, C.D.?”

“Pearl Harbor,” he said, “to meet our clients.”

“Might I make a suggestion?”

Darrow looked toward Leisure, who was sitting beside me in the roomy back of the limo. “You’ve probably noticed, George, this boy is not shy about making his thoughts known.”

Leisure gave me a sideways smile. “I’ve noticed that. And I respect it. We three have a considerable challenge ahead, and I don’t believe we should hold anything back.”

“Agreed,” Darrow said. “What’s your suggestion, Nate?”

“Let’s make a slight detour. Mrs. Fortescue’s rented bungalow is only a few blocks from here. We probably won’t be able to get in, but let’s at least have a look at the outside of it.”

Less than three blocks away, just one house off the East Manoa Road intersection, on Kolowalu Street, was a nondescript, even dingy little white frame number, a charmless cottage set back amid some scroungy trees with untended hedges along the side. With its intersecting pitched roofs, it was like a parody of the Massies’ little dream house. The yard was slightly overgrown, making it a mild eyesore in this modestly residential section.

No question about it: if you had to pick a house on this street where a murder might have happened, this was the place.

The Navy driver parked the limo across the way, and we got out, crossed the quiet street, and had a look around.

Darrow, hands on hips, was studying the bungalow like a doctor looks at an X-ray. He stood ankle-deep in the gently riffling grass, like an oversize lawn ornament.

“Wonder if it’s been rented out yet,” Leisure said.

“Sure doesn’t look like it,” I said. “Unless Bela Lugosi moved in…. But I’ll find a neighbor to ask.”

The haole housewife next door stopped her vacuuming to come to the door. She was an attractive brunette in a blue housedress, hair pinned up under an island-print kerchief; she thought I was cute, too. She wiped some perspiration from her upper lip and answered my questions.

No, it hadn’t been rented, the place was still empty. The real estate agent was starting to show it, though. They’d left a key with her, if I was interested….

I came back grinning, my prize dangling from a key chain.

Soon we were inside the little place, and it was little: only four rooms and bath— living room, kitchen, two small bedrooms. More rental furniture, but of a lower quality than at the Massies’; not a framed picture on the walls, not a knickknack in sight. No radio, no phonograph. Dusty as hell, and only the crusty dried remains of two fried eggs in a skillet on the stove, and a place setting for two at the kitchen table, indicated anyone had ever lived here at all.

The rust-colored outline of bloodstains in the master bedroom indicated somebody had died here, however. Odd-shaped stains on the wooden floor, like maps of unchartered islands…

The bathroom was spotless—including the tub where the body of Joseph Kahahawai had been dumped for cleaning and wrapping purposes.

“Mrs. Fortescue didn’t live here,” Leisure said from the bathroom doorway as I studied the gleaming bathtub.

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“She just stayed here. Like you stay in a hotel room. I don’t think there’s anything for us to learn in this place.”

“Do you see anything useful, son?” Darrow asked me, from the cramped hall.

“No. But I smell something.”

Darrow’s brow furrowed in curiosity. Leisure was studying me, too.

“Death,” I said, answering the question in their eyes. “A man was murdered here.”

“Let’s not use that word, son—‘murder.’”

“Executed, then. Hey, I’m all for getting our clients off. But, gentlemen—let’s never forget the smell of this place. How it makes your goddamn skin crawl.”

“Nate’s right,” Leisure said. “This is no vacation. A man died, here.”

“Point well taken,” Darrow said, his voice hushed, somber.

The seven-mile stretch that separated Honolulu from the naval base at Pearl Harbor was a well-paved boulevard bordered by walls of deep red sugarcane stalks on either side. The breeze rustled the cane field, making shimmering music.

“I like Thalia,” Darrow said, after a long interval of silence. “She’s a clever, attractive, unassuming young woman.”

“She’s awfully unemotional,” Leisure said.

“She’s still in a state of shock,” Darrow said dismissively.