“You’ll do as I say, or I’ll break your disobedient neck!”
Rafe’s heart thudded like the cadence of a military drumbeat. Instantly Rafe was over the rail, his feet landing softly on the wet wooden deck.
As Rafe quietly opened the cabin door, Townsend swung round, shock carved on his sweating face.
“You,” he said, his eyes cold and hard. “You’ve ruined my life.”
“You’ve ruined your own. Eden is safe. Hanalei is safe. The rain put the fire out.”
“I’ll kill you.”
“I was hoping you’d try,” Rafe challenged.
Zach’s right arm was in a sling from his father’s earlier rage. But the brave young man still grabbed a bookend and hurled it at Townsend’s head—it missed.
Townsend barely noticed. His weathered face with its high cheekbones and steely silvery eyes leered at Refe. “I’ll do more than ‘try.’ I’ll beat you. Then I’ll tie you up and dump you at sea.”
“Think so? Not this time. I’m going to kick your face in. I’ll give you a licking you’ll long remember, while you sit in your prison cell awaiting execution for my father’s death.”
For a moment Townsend showed surprise, even uncertainty, but then charged Rafe.
Rafe smashed his fist into Townsend’s face.
Townsend gasped as he flew backward, thudding against the cabin wall. He grunted, and slipped down the wall, landing on his seat, legs stretched out before him. He shook his head as if something were out of place.
Zachary laughed hysterically as he held his injured arm.
“Too easy, Townsend.” Rafe shook his head sadly. “Where’s the bluster you tormented Eden with—and my mother? You’ve had this coming for a long time. Get up.”
Zachary sobered. He wiped his palm on his shirt, glancing from Rafe to Townsend. “Caution, Rafe. Take it easy, now.”
“That first blow was for my father and to begin to pay for your pushing him off that cliff and leaving him to die,” Rafe said coldly. “I have a few more to go to pay for the way you tricked my mother into marrying you and then abused her. And for the way you tried to kill the woman I love—your own niece. Say goodbye to your teeth, Townsend, because when I’m through, you’ll have to eat mush while you wait for a hangman to drop a rope around your neck.”
Townsend spat blood and wiped his mouth on the back of his sleeve. He rose to his feet and rushed at Rafe, striking out with his fist. His swing was wild but it caught Rafe on the side of the head. Townsend smashed his fist a second time on the back of Rafe’s neck as Rafe staggered. Townsend’s horrible laughter filled the cabin.
Townsend viciously kicked. But Rafe rolled aside and jumped to his feet. His fist sent Townsend again stumbling back against the wall. Townsend reached into his belt and came at Rafe, knife in his hand.
Rafe heard Townsend’s breath and saw the light gleam along the blade. Rafe stopped, poised for attack. Townsend lunged but Rafe sidestepped, extending his leg and catching Townsend’s toe, tripping him as Rafe swung upward.
The blow caught Townsend off guard, but Rafe felt the knife rip his sleeve. Townsend came back up and ran toward Rafe again, jabbing. Rafe caught Townsend’s wrist and twisted fiercely, causing Townsend to lose his grip on the knife. He threw his weight into Rafe. The force pushed Rafe backward, but his forearm caught Townsend’s chin. Rafe landed on his back and Townsend tumbled over him. They both panted fiercely.
From the deck footsteps pounded and someone yelled.
Keno burst through the cabin doorway and stood there, looking from Rafe to Townsend.
“Back off!” Keno warned. “Both of you!”
Rafe’s head was buzzing. “Stay back, Keno,” he warned, eyes on Townsend. Townsend was up again and Rafe struck with his left fist. Townsend stepped back and Rafe stepped in, his thrust low and hard.
He grabbed Townsend and slammed him back against the bulkhead as the cabin rumbled.
Rafe picked up the blade and threw it across the cabin. Zach hobbled forward and snatched it. Rafe grabbed Townsend’s blond head and began smacking it against the cabin wall.
“Stop! It’s enough, Rafe! You’ll kill him!” Keno demanded.
Rafe continued the merciless attack.
Keno threw himself against Rafe’s back, grabbing his arms and wrestling him away from Townsend, his voice fierce. “Rafe stop!”
Zach lunged as Townsend grabbed the heavy brass bookend on the floor. Townsend pushed himself to his feet, shoving Zach aside.
Rafe broke Keno’s hold, shoving him backward.
“Rafe! Watch it!” Zach threw himself against his father, but went down easily as Townsend kicked him.
Rafe turned and saw Townsend behind him, arms raised, teeth bared, his face bloodied, the brass bookend in his hands. Townsend brought the bookend down with a grunting blow that smashed Rafe’s forehead.
Rafe’s brain filled with sparks, and his ears roared. He reached for something to grasp and found nothing as he spun into searing blackness. He heard shouting voices as he felt something warm running into his eyes, and then tasted blood.
Tiny flames appeared in his vision. He ran a hand across his eyes. Nothing. He imagined a voice cackling with demonic laughter. His head throbbed. Sweat stung the abrasions on his face, and his knuckles were stiff and swollen.
Rafe’s vision grew as dark as rolling clouds. He closed his eyes tightly, trying to refocus, to think…. He half-consciously realized that Keno was shouting madly.
Thud!
Rafe had fallen to the floor unable to move.
Ambrose Easton clambered aboard the Lilly of the Stars a short time later with Liho just behind. Ambrose burst through the cabin doorway and gasped at seeing Rafe unconscious. He dropped to his nephew’s side.
“I was afraid of this.” He bowed his head as his groans of dismay and prayers blended together.
Keno gazed at Rafe’s blood-splattered face. “It’s my fault. I distracted him.”
Zachary, pale and in pain hobbled to the cabin door. He ranted at Liho: “Why are you just standing there! Go! Go for a doctor! Hurry—!”
Liho rushed into the windy night.
Zachary glanced uneasily at his father, Townsend, crumpled on the floor amid broken furniture. His eyes opened slowly, like a lizard’s, then closed again.
Zachary stepped toward Ambrose and Keno and looked down at Rafe with anguish.
“This wouldn’t have happened if I hadn’t distracted him,” Keno tried to explain. “Rafe turned toward me—and Townsend took advantage—” Keno picked up the bronze bookend and stared at it. “He smashed him in the forehead. Rafe must have a concussion.”
“Then don’t lift his head!” Zach shouted as Keno moved a hand toward Rafe.
Keno stifled a sob.
“You were right to try to stop him,” Ambrose murmured, putting his strong, steadying hand on Keno’s shoulder. “Rafe might have killed Townsend and what then? He crossed the line tonight. Eden and the burning of Hanalei were as much as Rafe could take without exploding, and Satan knew it would be so. If Rafe had killed Townsend his future would end in rubble!”
“But look at him now. Is it any better for him? Rafe’s dying.”
“The Almighty will decide that. Remember who is in ultimate control. Both of you lads, steady yourselves.”
Rain began to splatter on the deck of the Lilly of the Stars.
Zachary opened the cabin door and stepped onto the deck. He strode to the side of the boat and looked toward the darkened quay, clutching his arm against his chest. “Why doesn’t that miserable doctor get here!”
Thump!
Zachary whipped around to face his father steadying himself with both hands on the frame of the cabin doorway.
Zachary lunged toward him. Townsend thrust out his arm, shoving Zachary out of his path.
Zachary’s knee buckled and he grabbed the rail. Townsend rushed past him and jumped over the side of the boat with a splash.
“Stop him!” Za
chary shouted, as he stared into the dark water.
Keno came from the cabin door.
“He leaped over the side. He’s out there. Somewhere in the water,” Zachary explained.
Keno ripped off his shirt and dove over the side with another splash.
Zachary fumbled down the gangplank to the wooden wharf, and limped into the night.
Chapter Two
Ashes to Ashes
The long uncertain hours of the night provided Eden with little sleep. She was dressed with the dawning of the eastern sky over Hanalei. She strained her ears to hear any distant horse hoofs galloping up the road. She cheered herself by imagining the arrival of good news: “All is well, darling,” Rafe would say, embracing her joyfully. “Townsend yielded without any trouble.” “Yes, and he’s repented,” Keno would add. “We left him kneeling in prayer with Ambrose.”
Sobering, Eden paced across the lovely pale blue carpet to the lanai. Then she walked back again, and heard the ominous clock ticking. With each minute her belief that something had gone dreadfully awry took command of the struggle she fought to keep her mind free of chains.
God is on the throne. Whatever may have happened, He is in control.
And, still … Rafe should have returned by now, or sent me a message. And Ambrose—where is he?
She went to the lanai again, and again looked toward the road—nothing.
She would at least have expected Liho to come back. She had intended to ask him to deliver her letter to Candace. But by now, Noelani and Candace must also be wearing out the carpet at Kea Lani as she was here at Hanalei.
The clock in the hall struck noon. She drew in a breath and turned at the sound of Ling rapping on the door and entering with fresh fruit and broiled chicken. “You mebbe eat something, or you faint. Here—you eat this.”
“Ling,” she said firmly, “I know something must have gone horribly wrong or one of them would have returned by now.”
“You right.” He set the tray down. “Police don’t catch Mr. Townsend quick, I think. Pardon, we both know he very evil man. Very bad fellow, that one. Burn down my house, this house! Try to kill people.”
“At least this house wasn’t totally ruined,” she said, though the rooms in the front were devastated. Feeling as if she needed to be optimistic, she added: “Rafe can rebuild better than ever.”
He nodded. “He can. But no rest for tired hands. Always work.”
“Well, God’s mercy did provide rain just when we needed it to put out the fire. And no one can convince me it wasn’t the gracious Lord who answered many prayers. Ambrose agrees.”
“I agree. Great God can do anything He want to do.”
She tried to smile.
“Rafe been after me,” he admitted. “Keno, too. Always telling me I need Son of God, Jesus. After all I hear, I become humble fellow. I believe. Soon, be baptized to tell all my people.” He smiled at her.
Her heart lightened. “Ling, now we’re all in the same family, all members of God’s family.”
He patted his thin chest beneath the white tunic.
Christ’s words when He was about to be betrayed came to her mind. “In the world you will have tribulation, but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.”
It was 2:30 in the afternoon.
As time slipped by, Eden’s emotions raced. Lord, I believe—help me to trust You—I’m so afraid. She couldn’t endure not knowing any longer.
“Ling!” she called toward the kitchen. “I’m taking a horse from the stables and riding to the wharf. I’ll be back when I’ve learned something.”
He rushed out of the kitchen with his hands dusted with flour, crying out words of warning in Chinese. But Eden was already out the door, not caring if it was improper or dangerous for a woman to go to the wharf alone. She called to Koko to saddle the mare, and hurry: “Wiki!”
When she arrived at the beach and the small quay the wind had begun to gain strength. She looked all around for the Lilly of the Stars, Zachary’s boat, or Liho’s Princess Kaiulani.
Her heart sank. Neither vessel was docked, nor was either anchored farther in the harbor.
She curled her fist. Too late. I should have acted as soon as it was light!
She saw some Hawaiian fishermen on the landing wharf tying down their boats. She asked if they knew what had happened to the two boats and their passengers.
“Both boats left last night, miss.”
“Was there trouble last night?”
“Ho! Much trouble. Very bloody fighting.”
Her heart beat so fast she was breathless. “Who was hurt, do you know?”
“Several haole men were hurt.”
Several!
“Did the police take anyone away?”
The talker pursed his lips and shook his head. “Don’t know.”
Another fisherman said, “There was talk of a missing man, no, two missing men.”
Two! Eden shaded her eyes and looked at the rough blue-gray waters. She might be able to hire a boat to take her to Honolulu. She mentioned this to the fishermen but they shook their dark heads apologetically. They knew of no boatmen willing to risk the choppy sea. An older Hawaiian pointed. “New storm coming. Rain—and strong wind.”
Eden turned her horse around and started back to Hanalei. If a storm was brewing she probably wouldn’t get to go to Honolulu until tomorrow, or even the following day.
Two missing men? What did it mean?
Her mind trembled to explore the idea, afraid of where it might lead.
Ling opened the front door and Ambrose entered, drenched with rain. He handed his dripping dark coat and hat to Ling with an apology.
Ambrose was a tall and solid man of sixty, with piercing deep-set eyes beneath a swath of silver-gray hair that in some places remained dark. His suntanned jaw was square and his stance resolute. He had always been there for her, Rafe, Keno, Zachary, and even her cousin Candace, so he seemed to never need anything.
Even in his wearied condition, Ambrose’s presence brought a feeling of security into the room. Eden rushed toward Ambrose and grasped his arm.
“Ambrose, I rode to the wharf earlier. One of the fishermen told me two men were missing last night after a terrible brawl. Where is Rafe, and Keno?”
Ambrose was somber. “Keno is safe. So is Zachary. There is distressing news, though. We need to talk about it, lass.”
She met his sympathetic gaze. She was seized with an uncomfortable notion that “something more” had entered the door behind Ambrose. Something spiritual trailing after his steps. Some dark, slippery “thing” she couldn’t see, but sensed, tracking in slime, and then backing into a shadowy corner, searching for an opportunity to strike.
Eden must have paled because Ambrose laid a firm hand on her shoulder. “Now lass you must be strong. Let’s find a place to sit so we can talk sensibly.”
“Not in there,” she said as he started for the parlor, “the room is in rubble.”
Like everything, she wanted to add.
She took him to the luncheon room. When they were seated at the square, wood table, Eden looked straight at Ambrose.
“Is he … is … Rafe dead?”
Ambrose reached across the table and patted her hand. “He was alive when I left him. He’s in Honolulu, at the medical ward, seriously injured. Your father is the physician and is in touch with Dr. Bolton and others. Dr. Bolton is now a declared leper, unable to enter the ward where Rafe is being watched. Jerome tells me Rafe will be unconscious for at least 24 hours, and perhaps days.” His sober gaze fixed on her. “Being a nurse, Eden, you would understand comas.”
Eden frowned as she recalled what she knew about comas from her work at Kalihi hospital.
“Townsend shot him, is that it? And my father isn’t sure Rafe will survive.”
“Rafe wasn’t shot. There was a fight. Rafe was caught off guard, and Townsend struck him on the forehead with a brass bookend.”
She closed her eyes, as if that woul
d make everything painful fade away. Her heart reached out to God in prayer.
She considered Ambrose’s words, “Alive when I left him.”
The news that Rafe was in a coma turned her hands cold, and she knew this was not his first. He might not awaken from a second concussion. Although Rafe had never given the details, he did tell her a year ago that he’d suffered a head injury on a voyage he’d made to French Guiana. As a result, he had frequent headaches.
Ambrose looked at her kindly. “I see you understand. We know, as does Keno, that Rafe is not a man to live in a chair or on his back. And yet, what if life demands it? Can we not say this outcome, too, is in God’s hand? We must rest in God’s character, in His wisdom, and sovereign purposes.”
The penetrating question what if life demands it? echoed in her mind. The answer Ambrose hoped she would see was clear: many chosen Christians had these demands placed upon their lives, or on the lives of loved ones.
“This is bitter,” she choked, swallowing the urge to weep. “Whether Rafe lives or dies, the outcome may bring little but the promise of tears … for all of us.”
“And bitter situations often bring no instant blessing to be seen within our earthly eyes. We are such people of clay that if we cannot soon know the purpose of our trials we quickly believe there is no meaningful reason for them. Most likely our understanding may not come until when we are in His presence. Even so, our Redeemer is merciful. So we will pray, and hope.”
Would she ever be Rafe’s wife now?
When Ling brought in the coffee and fruit, he paused. “May ask question?”
“Certainly, Ling,” Ambrose said.
Ling looked from Ambrose to Eden then back. “What of Makua Townsend? Evil man escape?”
Eden turned to Ambrose. “Yes, what about Townsend?”
Frowning, Ambrose admitted he had not been seen since he’d jumped overboard. Keno had gone after him, but Townsend had eluded him. Zachary, too, had searched the wharf, but then Zachary, too, had disappeared.
“Keno admits he didn’t search long for Townsend,” Ambrose said. “Rafe’s condition was on all our minds. It was urgent to get him to a doctor. Thankfully, by the time Keno returned to the boat, Liho arrived with a doctor from the village.”
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