5 The Elemental Detective

by Kirsten Weiss

  “Because of Townsend’s stewardship?” he asked.

  “Well, that and the bequest from Townsend’s wife. Before, we were all about education and advocacy. Now we’re much more directly involved in protection, and not just of the seals. Many aquatic creatures are endangered by overfishing, habitat loss and pollution. And illegal shell trade, consumption of eggs, and beach recreation have all made sea turtles vulnerable. Though people consider this a paradise, in many ways, ours is an island in peril.”

  “We ask because it was Dennis who initially got us interested in the Society,” Riga said.

  Carol’s eyes lit. “You knew him? Wonderful man. I mostly saw him at Society and Chamber of Commerce meetings, but he was such a caring, charming man. He will be missed.”

  “Who might have killed him?” Riga asked.

  “Obviously, whoever is killing those seals.” Carol stood, and paced. “It’s a short step from murdering an animal to killing a human. Isn’t that what they say about serial killers? They start as children, killing pets? There is no one – no one – who would want to kill Dennis. He was absolutely dedicated to the environment. Everyone respected him. Everyone.”

  “Were there any conflicts on the board?” Riga asked.

  “Of course not! Townsend manages the Society wonderfully.”

  Someone knocked at the door, and Carol leapt from her seat. “That must be the Wiederhausers.”

  Riga and Donovan rose, followed her to the door.

  “Thank you for your time, Ms. Harding,” Donovan said.

  They squeezed past the Wiederhausers on the front porch and walked back to the Ferrari.

  “How much do you know about non-profit board operations?” Donovan asked.

  “Not much,” she said. “I’ve never served on one.”

  He slid into the car. “Boards are managed by the president, and the board has authority over the executive director – Townsend. But sometimes, especially with small organizations and all-volunteer boards, the executive director ends up actually running the show.”

  “You think that’s what’s happening with the Aquatic Protection Society?”

  He started the car. “The way Carol talked, it sounded like Townsend was responsible for changing the strategy of the organization. But even if Townsend is running the board from behind the scenes, it’s no motive for murder.”

  She filed away that nugget to turn over later. “Do you mind if we stop at the Society’s office? There’s something I’d like to check out.”

  Donovan turned toward central Hanalei, and soon they were pulling into the mini-mall parking lot.

  In the office, Jay stood at the copy machine, stacks of printed paper piled high on the table. He shifted the memorial with the two glittering dolphins to the side and added another pile to the mess.

  “Hello,” Riga said.

  He looked up and scratched at his wispy beard. “Hey. I heard you’re making a donation. That’s awesome. Thanks.”

  Riga nodded toward the table. “That’s a lot of paper.”

  The young man stiffened. “It’s recycled.”

  “I just meant it looked like a lot of work,” she said.

  His shoulders relaxed. “Yeah. I’ve been at it all morning. We’ve got a big board meeting coming up, and a fundraiser. But what can I do for you?”

  “What time did you leave work yesterday?” Riga asked.

  “Why? I mean, uh… Seven o’clock, I think. Why?”

  “Did Townsend leave at the same time?”

  “No,” he said, “I left him to close up. I don’t know when he left. Why?”

  “Just checking something,” Riga said. “It’s a shame you weren’t able to find someone to watch that seal two nights ago.”

  “What? No, I mean, right.”

  “What do you mean?” Riga asked.

  “Nothing. Yeah, it was a bummer we couldn’t find anyone. So, do you need our tax I.D. number or anything for that donation?”

  “My assistant, Ellen, will be in touch,” Donovan said.

  They turned to leave.

  Something crashed behind them. Riga jerked, spun around.

  Jay stood, papers clutched in his hands, staring down at the fragments of glass dolphin. “I didn’t… It wasn’t… It was an accident!” he said shrilly. He dropped the papers and stooped, tried to fit two of the pieces together.

  Riga just shook her head. She knew a lost cause when she saw one.

  They left the Society and drove east on the winding highway. Ocean sparkled on Donovan’s left. Green, conical mountains rose on Riga’s right.

  “You missed the hotel,” Riga said as they sped past.

  Donovan’s teeth flashed. “That’s because we’re not going to the hotel.”

  “Then where, pray tell, are we going? To harass Kimo some more?”

  “No, although that’s not a bad idea.”

  The car slowed as the highway passed through a village of cinderblock buildings and chain link fences. A chicken pecked idly at the side of the road. Donovan turned on the narrow street to the lighthouse.

  “Another question for Grover?” Riga asked.

  “Nope.”

  “Then I give up,” Riga said. “All our other suspects are behind us.”

  “I thought it would be helpful to take a step back from the situation, get more of a bird’s eye view.”

  “Bird’s eye…” She twisted to look at him, her shoulder pressed against the car door. “No. You didn’t.”

  He grinned. “I’ve booked us a helicopter ride. That’s the other reason Sarah called me from the hotel – to confirm our seats. You don’t mind, do you? The tour only takes an hour.”

  Riga rummaged in her purse for a motion sickness pill. “Will we fly over Waimea Canyon?”

  “Yes.”

  “What about the Na Pali coast?”

  “That too.”

  “I wonder if the pilot can get us to that colony Townsend mentioned?”

  “We can ask.”

  Riga chewed thoughtfully on the pill. It tasted like bitter children’s medicine.

  The fact was, she was dying to fly around the island, had never been in a helicopter. She’d intended to return to the hotel and organize her case notes, plot next steps. But Donovan’s plan held appeal, and it was only for an hour. Though she hadn’t taken seriously Townsend’s suggestion that someone at the colony might know about the seal killing, if there was a chance…

  “You’re brilliant,” she said.

  “True.”

  They drove to a small landing strip not far from the lighthouse, where a red and black and orange helicopter waited. The pilot, a tanned woman with long, blond hair tied in a ponytail, and eyes hidden behind aviator sunglasses, settled them in the helicopter and soon they were zooming low over the water. Any thoughts of the case evaporated in the spray of waterfalls, cascading down the tall folds of emerald and burnt-orange mountains.

  Riga leaned closer to the window, lips parted, one hand pressed to her chest. No wonder magic had flourished here, she thought. It was an elemental place of lush canyons and pinnacled cliffs dashing headlong to the multi-blued Pacific.

  Wordlessly, Donovan grasped her hand. The helicopter lowered beside an arch cut in a cliff next to a sandy beach, then shot along the spines of mountains rippling outward from the mist-shrouded Waialeale Crater.

  The pilot grimaced when they asked about landing near the colony. “Sorry. It’s not worth my job to do it.”

  “It was a long shot,” Riga said to him. It was hard to feel disappointment in the face of Kauai’s heart-stopping landscape.

  “Whatever happened to follow every thread?”

  “Well that thread is going to the back of the line. I’ll ask Brigitte to check it out. She’s been looking for a quest.”

  “She’s not going to like it.”

  “What’s not to like? The chance to play covert op, do some surveillance…”

  “We’ll see.” He flipped a switch so they coul
d communicate through the headphones privately. “Let’s talk about the case.”

  “I keep thinking of something a cop once told me: there’s no such thing as hard evidence, only evidence. But there isn’t a whole lot here we can take to the police. At first I thought Dennis had been killed because he was Dennis. Now it’s clear the seals were the target. We won’t be able to use the magical evidence in court, but if we can nail down means, opportunity and motive – even an occult motive – the police might go for it.”

  He nodded. “I’ve been thinking the same thing. So who are we left with? Kimo could have killed the seals – he certainly spends a lot of time roaming the island. And he’s connected with Mana. He might have had an inkling that Mana was going to talk to us.”

  “But Mana said he was friends with Kimo,” Riga said. “It didn’t sound like he was going to rat him out.”

  “Unless he thought he was doing it for Kimo’s own good.”

  “Maybe,” she said. “Both Paul and Deidre had opportunity for the first seal killing. We know they were close to the beach. And they could have gotten into our bungalow. As the owner and manager, Paul’s got a master key to the entire hotel. Conceivably, Deidre could have gotten hold of one.”

  “And then there’s the Aquatic Protection Society.”

  “Someone may be using it to find out where the seals are, where to strike.”

  “Townsend?”

  “Maybe. The opportunities are there.” The fact was, she didn’t like Townsend, and knew it was coloring her perception. “Mana’s death is the key.”

  “It’s also the only death we’ll never be able to prove was murder.”

  Tour over, they set down on the landing pad, and Donovan handed her out of the chopper.

  “Shall we go back to the hotel?” he asked as they got into the car.

  She sighed. “I do need to organize my case notes.”

  “Finally, I get to watch the process in action.”

  “It involves a lot of mumbling and paper shuffling and staring out the window.” Riga laughed. “It’s not that impressive.”

  They roared off, and when they reached the hotel, Donovan paused the car at the edge of its circular drive. It was filled with emergency vehicles, their lights flashing.

  A hotel valet hurried down the drive. “I’ll park it from here,” he said, terse.

  “What’s happened?” Donovan stepped out of the Ferrari and dropped the keys in the valet’s outstretched hand.

  The valet looked down at his shoes. “There’s been an accident.” He jumped in the car and slowly drove away.

  Riga took in the scene: five police cars, an ambulance, a fire truck. “There are an awful lot of police here.”

  Donovan nodded. “Let’s find out what’s going on.”

  The lobby was filled with chattering guests. They approached an older woman in a baggy safari shirt and shorts. “What’s happened?” Riga asked.

  “A woman drowned in the fish pond,” she said, her voice hushed.

  Riga’s heart sank. “Do you know who…?”

  Two EMTs pushed through the crowd carrying a stretcher, the slim body of the woman upon it hidden beneath a sheet.

  “Come on,” Donovan said. “Let’s find Paul.”

  The office reception area was empty. Riga went to his name-plated door, knocked lightly.

  After a moment, a strained voice called, “Come in.”

  Riga opened the door. Paul sat bowed over his desk, head in hands. He looked up, his eyes dull and wet.

  “Paul, are you all right?” Donovan asked. “What’s happened?”

  “It’s Sarah. She’s dead.”

  Donovan sucked in his breath. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t know her well, but I liked her. And I know she was close to you and your brother.”

  “She was like a kid sister,” Paul said. “They said she must have slipped, hit her head.”

  “Where did it happen?” Donovan asked.

  “Are you worried about liability?” His voice was high, reedy.

  “No,” Donovan said. “But we couldn’t help noticing all the police cars in the drive. Are they treating this as a possible murder?”

  “Murder? She hit her head and drowned in the fucking fish pond. It was an accident!”

  “I hope you’re right,” Riga said. “If there’s anything we can do, please let us know.”

  Donovan followed her out of the office, closing the door behind him.

  “We need to take a look at that fish pond,” she said.

  “There are three at the hotel.”

  They hurried through the hotel grounds, along wandering paths lined with ginger plants and birds of paradise, and were turned back by the police from a trail that led to a secluded pond in the shade of banana trees.

  In their bungalow, Riga tossed her bag on the coffee table.

  “We’ll check the pond out after the police have left,” Donovan said, shoving open the tall glass doors that lined the living area.

  “Yes.” Riga rummaged through a desk drawer and found a watercolor map of the hotel complex. “Sarah had her accident at the most isolated pond on the grounds.”

  “Making it a good place for a private meeting,” he said.

  “Or a murder.” She spread the map on the table, pointed to the pond. “It’s secluded, and there are two paths leading to that fishpond, leaving two good potential exits for a killer.”

  “You’re right. If someone’s coming down one path, he or she can escape down the other. But it’s not completely private. There are bungalows near that pond.”

  “This map isn’t detailed enough to tell if any of the bungalows have views of it. We’ll have to see the pond for ourselves. At least in this case time of death shouldn’t be difficult to narrow down.”

  “Especially since I spoke with Sarah this morning.”

  “What time was that, exactly?”

  He checked his phone. “Ten thirty-seven. If it was another murder by our necromancer, it’s not part of the magical pattern. And killers generally keep to the same M.O. Or so I’ve read.”

  “I won’t know if magic was involved until I get down there. And if he’s trying to make the deaths look random or accidental, he’d change the pattern.” She put her hands on her hips. “But maybe he is repeating his M.O. Didn’t Sarah tell you that the other woman who drowned here also hit her head and went into the water?”

  “That was over three years ago.”

  “Yes, but the ghost is appearing to us now. Often a ghost will manifest due to a trigger event. Perhaps her killer has become active again, and that’s why she’s returned.” Riga went to the desk and booted up her laptop. “We need to get that ghost’s name, find out more about her.”

  But an hour of Internet searching turned up nothing. Riga found newspaper articles about the death, but the victim’s name was withheld at the family’s request. She tossed her pencil across the table. “There’s got to be someone who’ll talk about that drowning.”

  “Paul must know her name,” Donovan said. “She was a guest at this hotel. I’ll get it.”

  “Sarah couldn’t get it. I wonder who she talked to about it?”

  Donovan quirked an eyebrow. “You think she was killed because she was asking about that drowning?”

  “A more obvious explanation is that she died because she knew something about Dennis’s murder. Sarah worked closely with him. She was distraught over his death.”

  “And her death might have just been an accident,” Donovan said.

  But she didn’t believe that. Not for a minute.

  Chapter 23

  Riga walked into the bungalow’s living area, her silk pajamas swishing about her ankles, and worked at unlatching the clasp of her charm bracelet one-handed. The windows were a black mirror at night, reflecting the cheerful cushions, the low table, the wrinkled tarot cards stacked upon it. Riga did a double-take. Hadn’t she thrown those away?

  Three of the cards had fallen to the floor a
nd lay face down on the sisal carpet. She knelt and turned the first card over. The two of pentacles: a fool on a beach juggling two large coins. A ship labored in the high waves behind him. It was usually a card of finding balance in the midst of turmoil, but Riga knew who the fool on the beach was.

  She turned over the next card. A man hung upside down by his heels, coins falling from his pockets. In Renaissance times it was the card of the traitor. Today, it could mean a time of stillness, or sacrifice. She thought of the ghostly figure hanging from the tower at the snow goddess’s heiau, and a chill rippled up her spine.

  Riga flipped the third card. A king and queen plummeted, head first, from a lightning-struck tower.

  She blew out her breath. “Well, that’s not good.”

  Bare-chested, Donovan walked into the room. “What’s not good?”

  She swept up the cards and dropped them on the table. “These tarot cards. I thought I threw them away. Did you salvage them?”

  “Not me.”

  Brigitte soared through the open glass doors and landed on the carpet. She skidded and the carpet accordioned, rumpling beneath her talons. “What has happened since I have been away?”

  “Brigitte, did you pull these cards from the wastebasket?” Riga asked.

  The gargoyle stiffened. “I do not dig through ze trash, like a common vulture or… or… crow.”

  “Sorry. As to what’s been happening…” Riga told her about their interviews at the lighthouse, the B&B, of Sarah’s death.

  “Another death, and so soon on ze heels of ze poor Mana! This necromancer, he must be growing desperate to kill with such speed.”

  “Right. I’m afraid whatever he’s working up to will happen soon,” Riga said.

  “As do I. It is logical, is it not? But this necromancer is a cunning one. First he killed Monsieur Dennis Glasgow and ze mermaid, and makes one murder ze cover for ze other. Brilliant. And then ze poor Mana, to die so terribly, so obviously by magic – so obvious, that no one will believe it! And now ze hotelier’s assistant – her death appears to be an accident, which means it must be murder.”

  Riga raised her brows. The gargoyle’s logic was straight out of a mystery novel.