Damned in Paradise

I put a hand on his shoulder. “He took off for the mainland, didn’t he, Phil?”

“I don’t like that name. Call me Tahiti, ya mind? That’s what I like my friends to call me.”

Hand still on his shoulder, I nodded toward his glass. “What you got there, Tahiti?”

“Little Coke. Little oke.”

“Try this on.” I removed my hand from his shoulder and took my flask from my pocket and filled his glass almost to the brim. “Take a sip.”

He did. His eyes widened. He half-smiled. “Hey! Smooth stuff.”

“Bacardi. Genuine article.”

“Nice. Look—fellas…gentlemen…Detective Apana, we ain’t met but I see you around. All I know about Sammy I told you already.”

“No,” Chang said, and he grabbed Tahiti’s wrist, the one attached to the hand holding a cigarette. Chang tightened and Tahiti’s fingers sprang open and the cigarette went tumbling, spitting orange ashes in the darkness.

“It got too hot for Sammy,” I said, “didn’t it? And he took a run-out powder to the City of Angels.”

Chang let go of the wrist.

Tahiti, breathing hard, his eyes damp, nodded.

“So we agree on that much,” I said. “But what I need to know is, what made the Islands too hot for Sammy?”

“He was afraid,” Tahiti said. “We were…talking in a hotel room, back on Maui…this was in January…he had a gun, a revolver. He was afraid this friend of his would hurt him.”

“Hurt him?” I asked.

“Kill him.”

“What friend?”

“I can’t say. I’m afraid, too.”

“Lyman,” Chang said.

Tahiti’s eyes popped again. “You know?”

“What did Sammy tell you?” I asked. “What did Sammy know about Daniel Lyman?”

Tahiti covered his face with a hand. “Lyman’s a nasty one. He’d kill me, too. I can’t tell you.”

“We can talk at headquarters,” Chang said.

The dark eyes flashed. “Right, with billy clubs and blacksnakes! Look, I’ll tell you what Sammy told me…but don’t ask me where Lyman is. I won’t tell you. No matter what you do.”

I glanced at Chang and Chang glanced back: interesting choice of words on Tahiti’s part—he seemed to be saying he knew where Lyman was….

“Fine,” I said. “What did Sammy tell you?”

“It’s something…big.”

“We know.”

The pretty eyes narrowed, lashes fluttering. “You know who was peeling Sammy’s banana?”

I nodded. “Thalia Massie.”

“You do know…”

“Yes. And Sammy was here at the Ala Wai the night Thalia Massie was supposedly attacked.”

And the sensual mouth twitched. “No supposedly about it.”

He seemed to want prompting, so I gave it to him: “Tell us, Tahiti.”

“Sammy said she was a little drunk, tipsy. She came up to him, he was standing up by the door, and she said she was gonna get some air, you know, take a little walk in the moonlight. She told Sammy he could join her, but he should wait a little while, be discreet, you know. They were gonna go to one of those rent-by-the-hour rooms down by Fort De Russey that the soldiers use to bang their Island sweeties. Well, Sammy was waiting, being discreet, only first he saw this Navy officer that used to be Thalia’s back-door man…I don’t know whether she threw him over or he threw her over…but anyway, Sammy knew this officer had a history with her, and when the guy took off after her, Sammy got, well, jealous, I guess.”

“Did Sammy have any words with the officer?” I asked. “Try to stop him or—”

“Naw. Sammy was too smart, or too cowardly or too something, to do that. He kinda followed along after the officer a good ways, till the officer caught up with Thalia, only he didn’t exactly catch up. The officer sorta trailed behind her; they were arguing, lovers’ quarrel kinda thing. So Sammy figures maybe he’ll just say hell with it and butt out when he sees a ragtop cruise by with some guys in it, some guys Sammy knows, or thinks he knows.”

“Did he know them or didn’t he?”

“He knew ’em, but he thought it must be somebody else till he got a close look and, sure enough, it was his buddies, two wild guys who was supposed to be in prison.”