1 Murder on Moloka'i (3 page)

four

The Kaluapapa trail began like a stroll in the park, wide and gently sloping. But soon the path narrowed, descending over rain-slick boulders, potholes dug by mule hoofs, and red mud.

At the first opportunity, I peeked over the
pali
and gazed down again nearly two thousand feet to Kalaupapa. Wild seas from the north pounded its craggy shore. Wind-whipped mists drove slantwise across the salt-bitten land, gathering like gauze against the towering sea cliffs. Their rocky faces rose like prison walls from the boiling surf.

Awesome beauty. Stark desolation. Fierce, unforgiving nature. No wonder this forbidding peninsula had once been called a living tomb. No wonder I suddenly felt bleak again about my long shot case.

We passed a gate posted with a more severe warning than the first
Kapu
signs: Hawai‘i Law Forbids Entry Beyond This Point Without Written Permission.

Kaluna explained that access to the colony had been strictly controlled before sulfone drugs rendered leprosy, known today as Hansen’s disease, non-contagious. The
pali
trail first opened in 1889, the year the colony’s most celebrated savior, Father Damien, died. For many years after, the three miles and twenty-six switchbacks were traversed mostly by pack mules ferrying supplies to the victims below. The savvy mules could pick their own way down the sixteen-hundred-foot cliff without a human guide, and likewise return. So it was nothing for mules in modern times to carry tourists safely on thousands of trips. That is, until Sara Ridgely-Parke’s fall.

Why had Sara come here? Was her trip connected in some way to her ecological passion, or her desire to evade her ex-husband’s constant hounding? Did she perhaps feel affinity for the sufferers of Kalaupapa–victims of rape and sodomy and murder, not to mention starvation?

‘A‘ole kānā wai ma kēia wahi
had been the cry of leprosy victims. “In this place there is no law.”

The first official switchback in the trail–marked by a big red “1”–brought a cool, shady corner canopied by trees. No slippery rocks. No outrageous drop. Not even a view. Therefore, not likely the turn where Sara had fallen.

Before reaching the second switchback we passed yet another warning: Stop! Go Back Unless You Have Written Permit. We hiked on.

The red numeral announcing switchback three brought a dramatic view of Kalaupapa, and a difficult section of trail. Kaluna picked up the pace. I kept my eyes glued to my feet.

Halfway down the
pali,
at switchback thirteen, we heard the first faint rumblings of surf. Beyond this hairpin turn, boulders lay in the trail above a sheer drop. Kaluna stopped suddenly and glanced up.

“Wish I had da money Chancellor Trust gonna make on dat development.” He pointed to a ridge towering over us.

“Development?” I said. “But dis national park land, yeah?”

“‘Ae,
jus’ to da
pali,
but Chancellor own da conservation lan’ beyond dat.” Kaluna scratched his silver-flecked mustache. “Dey own da lan’ and da politicians too!”

“What Chancellor going to build up there?”

“‘Kalaupapa Cliffs’–hotel, condos, spas. All dat kine stuffs.”

“Now I remembah.” I linked the development to yesterday’s
Star-Bulletin
.

“When da last leprosy patient pass on, Kalaupapa be one busy kine national park. Da tourist flock hea …” Kaluna paused. “Chancellor make plenny
kālā–
plenny money.”

“Good fo’ your business? More mule riders?”

“Maybe, but I no like condos up on da cliff.”

I nodded in agreement.

“Anyway, jus’ ‘round da next bend where da
wahine
fall.”

We turned a sharp left at switchback fifteen and gazed down the pocked, boulder-strewn track–a treacherous-looking patch. The wicked combination of jagged boulders and pitched steps was apparently the best the trailblazers who chiseled this rocky path could do. My knees involuntarily trembled as I listened to the waves lapping the shore a thousand feet below. We could see the beach clearly now: milk-chocolate sand, ultramarine swells, sparkling white foam. No guard rails obstructed the view.

If a four-hoofed animal were prone to stumble anywhere on the trail, this would be the place. Kaluna must have read my mind.

“Da
wahine
ride Coco up da trail toward da bend.” He pointed to the red “15.” “I take da lead and she ride near da back.” Kaluna paused. “Den hear Coco bray and da
wahine
scream. Dat’s all. I no can see her fall.”

“You spot her down below? Or hear more screams?”

“Nah.” Kaluna shook his head, a tortured look on his face. “No can do nut’ing. I call to her. Da oddahs do too. But no use.”

“What happen’ den?”

“Since no can do nut’ing, I took da oddahs to da top and call da police. They wen’ send one helicopter. Meantime, I take my rifle back down to Coco. He still lying dere on da path, peaceful kine. Look at me wit’ big brown eyes and I say, ‘You been one good mule, Coco.’ Den I do what I gotta do.”

“Sorry, bruddah.”

“T’anks. Den da helicopter pick da
wahine
off da
pali,
fly her to O’ahu. But too late.”

“About dis Parke guy.” I tried to make a connection. “He ‘round here da day of da accident?”

“I no remembah seeing him.” The mule guide shrugged.

I took some photos, then searched around the site for evidence but found nothing. During the month since Sara’s death the trail had been washed by rains, blown by gusty trade winds, and scorched by the sun. The winds alone would have carried away anything not bolted down.

If Parke was behind Sara’s fall, he had left no evidence here. But that probably wasn’t going to change my client’s mind. Adrienne seemed hell-bent on her murder theory and might never stop believing it–unless my investigation proved otherwise.

five

Just before switchback sixteen, a sharp jackknife turn, I noticed a flat-topped boulder beside the trail. On top of it stood a makeshift shrine of religious figurines–Madonna, baby Jesus, turbaned wise men–encircled by a dried
maile lei
and rosary beads. A wilted red rose lay beside this somber, huddled group. And a fresh rose lay next to it. The roses struck me as odd amidst these rugged surroundings.

Had some adoring admirer fondly remembered Sara Ridgely-Parke on this remote stretch of trail? Someone who was feeling pain at her loss? Red roses, I imagined, were not that easy to come by in this remote part of Moloka‘i. Who cared that much for Sara?

As we passed, Kaluna quickly crossed himself, making me wonder how long the shrine had been here. Before I could ask, the old
paniolo
abruptly launched into a homespun speech about Kalaupapa, sounding like he’d given it hundreds of times before.

The peninsula, he began in a tour guide voice, was first settled by Hawaiians in about 1000 AD. The small spit of land had been a fishing and agricultural village until 1868, when King Kamehameha V sent the first boatload of leprosy patients to be quarantined there.

Leprosy at the time was misunderstood and greatly feared, much as AIDS is today. Boat captains tossed helpless victims overboard to swim ashore. Those who drowned were the lucky ones. Those who didn’t had to fend for themselves on the isolated peninsula. Their average survival rate was about two years.

Kaluna explained that there was little to support patients here: no dependable food supply, shelter, clothing, or medicine. Helpers called
kōkua
were permitted at first, but soon forbidden. Victims remained utterly alone, without family or friends. Kalaupapa became known as “the place where one is buried alive.” No wonder people dreaded being diagnosed and sent here.

I wasn’t surprised that Father Damien, now a candidate for sainthood, was not uniformly appreciated during his life, especially by the State Board of Health. He took under his care seven to eight hundred leprosy patients, whose number eventually grew to as many as thirteen hundred. Now, Kaluna said, only about fifty residents remained–of their own free will– and most were growing old. He said they stayed for various reasons, some from their attachment to the only home they have ever known.

At nine that morning we finally reached sea level. The quiet village of Kalaupapa lay another quarter mile to the east. The path to the village wove above the deserted beach we had seen from the cliffs, a gorgeous, wide beach lined with stately ironwoods whose needles padded the trail. No one swam. No one surfed. No one beach walked. It seemed a shame. As we drew nearer, we saw the expected warning: Stop! Entry Pass Violators Subject to Citation.

In the village, a young woman in a park service uniform introduced herself as our official guide. Haunani offered us a tour in her Jeep, and I began to wonder what I was looking for here as we passed Kalaupapa’s simple amenities: a one-pump gas station, a small general store, a souvenir shop in a converted Buddhist temple, a carpenter’s shop, a government motor pool, an invitation-only guest house dubbed the “Kalaupapa Sheraton,” a pier for the biannual barges that ferried heavy supplies, three churches, and seven thousand graves. Mostly unmarked.

If Kaunakakai was a slow town, Kalaupapa was frozen in time. I watched as a half dozen axis deer roamed the village like pets, grazing on cottage lawns. The cottages looked empty, but Haunani explained that residents seldom showed themselves among strangers. There was a deafening silence to Kalauapapa. The only sound beyond the surf was the whispering fronds of lonely palms.

Haunani said she remembered Sara’s striking appearance from her visit to the colony. And when I showed our guide the photo of Parke, she recognized him as well. After a full month she still recalled his grim, determined face, so unlike other visitors’ expressions of curiosity and wonder. What had Parke had on his mind?

The return hike up the
pali
to “topside” Moloka‘i took about an hour and a quarter. We didn’t push. Kaluna let me lead. I’m fairly sure I slowed him down. But he patiently stayed behind me, step for step. Despite my conditioning from surfing, my chest heaved and my heart drummed. Sweat stung my eyes. My thighs burned. At least the steady climb allowed me to comb the trail again for clues to Sara’s mysterious death. But no clues did I find.

We finally reached the top at half past eleven. As I drove back to the ‘Ukulele Inn, I reluctantly admitted to myself that Adrienne’s hunch about Parke might have some basis in fact. His mere presence at Kalaupapa near the time of Sara’s death seemed more than a coincidence. I itched to interview Parke immediately upon return to Honolulu. But those were my emotions talking, not my head. I knew the best course would be to gather information about him first, since he might not consent to see me more than once, if at all.

I collected my things from the beach cottage and checked out at quarter to one–nearly an hour late, but still in time to catch my flight. Before long another Twin-Otter was winging me back to O‘ahu. I was too preoccupied with questions about the case to pay much attention to the bumpy ride.

My trip to Moloka’i had served more to increase the mystery surrounding Sara’s death rather than to solve it.

six

The flower
lei
shop beneath my office is the perfect buffer between me and the pungent aromas of Chinatown below. And it offers my clients a degree of anonymity. They can linger among the perfumy
lei
, then slip unnoticed up the orange shag stairs. Even if detected, they can pretend to be patronizing one of the four other tenants of Mrs. Fujiyama’s building, a decaying pre-war specimen ornamented with two-headed dragons, serpents, wild boars, and Chinese characters in red.

Inside the flower shop today, Mrs. Fujiyama was ringing up a customer with a ginger
lei
. The ginger’s sweet, pungent odor raised the hair on the back of my neck.

“Good morning, Mrs. Fujiyama.” I said as the customer departed.

Mrs. Fujiyama peered up at me knowingly over her half-glasses. “Ah, Mr. Cooke. One pretty young lady come see you. Bought tuberose and orchid
lei
.”

“Adrienne?”

“Upstairs now.
Haole
lady. Very pretty!”

“Thanks for the tip.” I smiled.

“Nice young lady for Mr. Cooke.” Mrs. Fujiyama bowed graciously.

I climbed the stairs to the musty second floor and peered down the hallway toward the surfer airbrushed on my office door. Adrienne Ridgely stood by him statuesquely, clutching a
lei.
She looked transformed. The tropic sun had deepened the color in her cheeks and highlighted the reds and golds in her chestnut hair.

As I approached, Adrienne stretched her arms toward me and placed the
lei
around my neck. Her perfume, mixed with the intoxicating odor of the tuberose, drew me nearer. We touched. She abruptly stepped back. The blush heightened in her cheeks.

“Ah, what a surprise,” I said, searching for more intelligent words. “Why the
lei
?”

“For taking my case.” She quickly regained her composure. “My sister is finally going to get the justice she deserves.”

“I’m not sure we have a case yet,” I admitted. “Although I did discover something on Moloka‘i yesterday.”

I unlocked the two dead bolts and swung open the thick mahogany door. The tuberose
lei
instantly revived the stale air in my office. I opened my window and couldn’t help but notice how gracefully Adrienne slid into my client chair. She glanced atop my filing cabinet at the tarnished trophy teetering there– Classic Longboard–Mākaha–Third Place–then turned her cool gaze back to me.

“So the big news is,” I started, “your former brother-in-law rode to Kalaupapa the day before Sara died.”

“He
did?”
Adrienne’s eyes widened. She seemed even more surprised than I had been.

“The guide doesn’t remember seeing Parke on the day of the accident, but said he acted preoccupied when he took the tour the previous day. His mind was apparently elsewhere.”

“I know where it was,” Adrienne said almost to herself, her expressive brow working again.

“It’s going to take more than his mule ride to build a case against him,” I said, trying to give her a sense of the magnitude of evidence needed to convict a man of murder. “We have a long way to go. But, fortunately, there were four witnesses besides the guide, Kaluna. I plan to interview each in person before confronting Parke. Their testimonies may give us more leverage against him.”

“When will you start?” She looked at me hopefully.

“Today,” I said. “The first witness is a doctor named Benjamin Goto who practices here in Honolulu. I lined up an interview for eleven o’clock. It should require little time and expense.”

“Whatever it takes.”

“Interviewing the other three may be more challenging. One lives on Maui, another on the rural Hāmākua Coast of the Big Island, and the last in a Los Angeles suburb. If you want to cut costs, I can try phone interviews, though I don’t think they’re nearly as effective.”

“No,” Adrienne agreed. “Interview each in person.”

“Your retainer should still cover the trip to Maui. But I’ll need another two thousand for travel to the Big Island and Los Angeles.”

“Why don’t I just write you a check now?” Adrienne reached into her calfskin purse. She was determined.

I took the crisp Boston check and tucked it into my top desk drawer. “I’ll call you after the interview with Dr. Goto then.”

Adrienne rose. The highlights in her hair caught the sunlight filtering through my window. “If anyone can undercover my sister’s murder, I trust it’s you.”

“Thanks for the vote of confidence,” I said, the intoxicating scent of the tuberose mixed with her fruity perfume starting to make me dizzy. “And for the
lei
.”

She nodded and turned to go. I took the opportunity to escort her down the orange shag stairs. Mrs. Fujiyama smiled when she saw us together.

Outside the flower shop, Adrienne climbed into her waiting cab. The yellow sedan swept down Maunakea, past the lurid neon signs that glow day and night on Hotel Street.