Silversword

by Phyllis A. Whitney

  She spoke without rancor, simply standing back with an objectivity she had learned over the years. Nevertheless, a glimpse of the old pain came through. My father seemed to have hurt everyone.

  I told her about the scene in the garden at Ahinahina as I remembered it. “Were you the woman who sang to my parents’ guests that night?”

  “Yes.” There was regret in the single word. “I didn’t intend what happened. I was terribly in love—with your father. Thought at least I was realistic enough to know that he would never leave your mother for me. Or for any other woman. Though toward the end he was angry with her, and even talking about divorce. I wonder if your mother ever understood that she was his safe haven. Perhaps she was too angry herself to recognize that. The old Hawaiians had a saying, ‘Anger is the thing that gives no life.’”

  “But what woman wants to be just a safe haven?” I objected. “Were there many other loves for him?”

  “I suppose not, really. I was nursing a very young broken heart, and it seemed that way to me.”

  I felt achingly sorry for my mother. When I’d grown up I too had run after the will-o’-the-wisp of a charming man who had thought for a time that he was in love with me.

  “Why won’t anyone at Manaolana talk to me about my parents as they were in those days?” I asked.

  “It’s a sore subject, and they probably don’t want to hurt you. Or hurt themselves by dredging everything up.”

  “Joanna said Marla was in love with him too.”

  “I’m afraid she was.”

  “But there’s more to their remembering, or not being able to remember, isn’t there? Marla believes that Noelle wanted to kill my father that day when they rode up the mountain. Perhaps Joanna believes this too, and it’s why they all want Noelle to stay as she is.”

  Ailina accepted this quietly. “I’ve often wondered what really happened. In a way, it’s convenient that no one could tell the story afterward. Just the same, Caroline, I think you should accept the fact you don’t really know the truth. I wonder if anyone does, or ever will.”

  “Perhaps my mother knows, if she ever dares to face it. But then what would happen?”

  It wasn’t a question anyone could answer, and Ailina didn’t try. I’d stirred up unhappy thoughts, and sometimes she seemed to go far away, so there were long silences.

  “Is it possible for you to leave everything as it is?” she asked after one of those trips away into her own thoughts.

  “That’s what they all want me to do. They’re trying to protect Noelle from whatever happened up there in the crater.”

  “Perhaps they’re trying to protect you as well.”

  “I don’t want that! Maybe they think that if I’m frightened into believing that my mother killed my father I’ll stop asking questions.”

  “Will you stop?”

  “Do you think I should? No—never mind. I’m the one who has to decide. As I told you, when David took me up to the crater yesterday I saw my shadow on the clouds in that rainbow circle of light, and I felt strong and determined and sure. Then I came back to being helpless and confused. Just the same, I still think the direction I took up on the mountain is the right one.”

  Ailina nodded gravely. “Sometimes we have to believe in the course that’s been revealed to us. I saw that vision once myself when I was young and frightened—because I’d fallen in love with a man I couldn’t have. What I saw made me strong enough to give him up.”

  She’d had more strength than I did, even when she was young, and I said so.

  “But you are strong,” she told me. “I can see it. You’re not always sure, but you can carry through on what you decide to do.”

  “I hope you’re right. It hasn’t seemed that way. It’s been more like a restless search. I suppose the first thing I must do is give up all those old memories of my father, since none of them was real.”

  “No!” Ailina reached her hand across the table and covered my own firmly, briefly. “He was also all the things you remember. Perhaps he loved you most of all. So keep that.”

  I was grateful, but not entirely comforted. “Sometimes I feel as though my mother is being used as a scapegoat at Manaolana.”

  “That might be true. But if she doesn’t realize it, does it matter?”

  “It matters to me.”

  “That’s something you have to deal with in your own way. But just for now, Caroline, can we put all those things aside and think about you in another way? What do you want for yourself?”

  “I don’t know. I’ve never really found out. Ailina, how did you get over your feeling for my father?”

  “I was lucky. I met Carlos Olivero at the right moment. He had just come here from Manila, and he was already a successful lawyer. I expect the contrast—with Keith, I mean—of his being solid and dependable counted with me. Though he could be an exciting man too. The thing that mattered most was that he didn’t want anyone else. We were married nearly twenty-five years. When he died six years ago I thought my life was over. Of course it wasn’t. I have plenty to do. Since I don’t have to worry about money, I can take all the volunteer work I want. Koma has helped me enormously and we both care about our islands.”

  “David introduced me to your son.”

  “Yes, I heard. Koma carries around a lot of passion and sometimes he doesn’t use it wisely. He’s bitter about what he feels the haoles have done and he doesn’t want their greedy encroachment to continue on Maui. I agree with his principle but not always with his methods. For a long time here our very history was put down, and even our language was forbidden to be taught in some schools. All that’s changed now, so that there’s a renaissance for what’s old. We’re learning to be proud of our unique history and we want to keep it alive. But no one can go on forever being unforgiving because of the past, no matter what the injustices were. We do need to remember, but not to be so bitter about what can’t be helped. Those who did all the wicked things we resent are dead, and none of that can be changed. If we hadn’t been annexed by America, some other nation would have gobbled us up those were the days of colonization, you know. Japan, perhaps, would have taken us over. Or Russia.

  “However, Koma doesn’t want to look at any side except the narrow one he focuses on. I’m afraid he enjoys his anger. He hates not being a pure-blooded Hawaiian, and blames me for that—though I’m not pure-blooded either. Very few really native Hawaiians are left.”

  She had talked for a long while, and I’d listened, absorbed, sensing wisdom and compassion that she must have come by through all those difficult years.

  When we finished our coffee and were on our way again, back to Lahaina, she spoke about our trip to Honolulu tomorrow. She had already made a reservation for both of us on the small island-hopping plane.

  “We’re going to Iolani Palace, since I have an errand there. After Carlos died I lived in Honolulu for a while, and I was able to help a bit in the restoration of the palace. So I’m permitted to take a visitor through now and then. You’re Hawaiian-born, Caroline, and you need to experience what is your history too. David Reed’s mother is in Honolulu now on a visit, and I phoned her this afternoon and asked her to meet us at the palace. She knew all those people at Manaolana and Ahinahina when you were little. Way back in time there was a royal lady on Helena Reed’s family tree, and she’s been able to trace the line back, even though that particular princess lies buried in New England.”

  “I’ll be eager to meet her. Thank you.”

  “She told me that David is driving you to Hana soon, but she liked the idea of seeing you alone ahead of time.”

  I wondered why, and felt a little uneasy again.

  First, however, before tomorrow arrived, there was to be an entirely different and much more unsettling meeting ahead of me. Something for which I was totally unprepared.

  11

  The generous home that Carlos and Ailina had built years before was tucked into a fold of the mountain near Lahaina. Trees sheltered it on
three sides, leaving the front open for the tremendous view.

  She took me to her upstairs sitting room that opened onto a wide lanai, where we sat down in bamboo chairs to enjoy the dramatic sweep of light along the Kaanapali coast. The islands of Molokai and Lanai floated as dark patches on a moonlit sea, and the land’s edge, with its winding indentations of bays, made a long, sparkling line against the water beyond.

  For a little while I could feel relaxed and almost content—able to put troublesome thoughts away. I was grateful to Ailina for making this possible. Then the fragile moments of peace were shattered when Koma’s voice reached us from the terrace garden below. Koma never seemed to bring serenity with him.

  “Do you mind if I come up?” he called.

  Ailina told him to come and then glanced at me apologetically. “This may not be pleasant. My son is a fervent young man, and I’m afraid he resents your coming to Maui.”

  “Because I’m my father’s daughter? But that’s hardly fair.”

  “Since when does ‘fair’ have much to do with anything?”

  We returned to Ailina’s pleasant sitting room, aglow now in lamplight with warm sun colors and cool greens. A splendid framed photograph of the crater of Haleakala occupied a central wall. David’s work, Ailina said.

  When Koma came in he greeted me with no enthusiasm, and his mother caught his look at once.

  “Relax,” she told her son. “Caroline has a Hawaiian heart that she’s just beginning to learn about.”

  Koma sat down, and I could sense his restlessness. He would look right in a malo, I thought—the loincloth from early years. Maybe with a spear in his hand.

  “We need your help,” he said directly to his mother.

  “Another demonstration against the bombing of Kahoolawe?”

  “Right. And your name counts. You’re not a crazy fanatic like me, and people listen.”

  “I suppose demonstrations help bleed off some of the rage,” Ailina said, “though I’m not sure how much attention the Navy pays to them.”

  He almost smiled. “We won’t ask you to get arrested.” He looked at me. “David’s coming with us. We can count on his support. At least we could until lately. Do you realize how many people you’ve managed to upset since you came here, Caroline Kirby?”

  “I’m only trying to help my mother, who doesn’t even recognize me,” I told him.

  “You’ve upset Joanna. And she’s had enough to bear. She’d lend us some help on the Kahoolawe effort, but she’s not feeling well, and Marla says that’s your doing.”

  Ailina shook her head at her son. “Let Caroline alone. You have to do your thing, and she must do hers. Tomorrow I’m taking her to Honolulu—Iolani Palace. A good place to recover some of what’s old and must not be lost.”

  Mention of the palace seemed to add to Koma’s unhappiness, and he got up. “I just wanted to make sure you’d speak for us,” he said to his mother.

  “All right. You’ll give me the details when everything’s set?”

  “Sure. Probably in a couple of weeks. I’ll see you.”

  For just a moment he stared at me—a mocking look that I didn’t understand. Then he went off, taking with him some of the heat that his presence had brought into the room. When he’d gone, Ailina, clearly upset, couldn’t indulge in ordinary conversation anymore. She showed me to my room and brought me pajamas and a few other items.

  “I still have a little work to do tonight—paperwork,” she told me. “Do you mind?”

  When she went off to her own room, I stepped out on the lanai again, to sit in darkness, enjoying jeweled lights that followed the coastline. I wasn’t at all sleepy, and I needed to let everything grow quiet inside me.

  I hadn’t been there five minutes, however, before a whisper came up to me from the terrace below. “Come down here, Caroline. We need to talk. Don’t tell my mother I’m still here.”

  That sounded ominous. I didn’t want to talk with Koma, but there seemed nothing else to do. Stairs led down from the lanai, and I went to the lower level, where a flowering hedge offered privacy.

  “I hoped you’d come outside again,” he said. “Visitors usually do—for the view. I’ve decided that there’s something you’d better know, though my mother would probably kill me for telling you this.”

  He began to prowl the terrace, his restlessness worn like a garment. Perhaps it kept others from coming close, since he was always moving away.

  “What do you want to tell me?” I asked.

  He stopped in deep shadow, close to the house, so I couldn’t see his face. “It’s time you knew that you and I have the same father, Caroline Kirby.”

  I could only stare in his direction, trying to find him in the dim light. He laughed softly.

  “That takes the wind out of your sails, doesn’t it? I know a lot about your dashing father, though I never knew him personally, since he died before I was born. Thank God!”

  “Did Ailina tell you this?” I managed.

  “She knows that I know, though she didn’t tell me. She wanted me to be Carlos’s son. As I wanted to be. And still feel that I am. It was Marla who told me a few years ago when she was angry with me about something. So I talked to Joanna—who knew everything, since my mother went to her when she knew she was pregnant.”

  I hadn’t grasped this fully yet—there were too many ramifications. I didn’t even know why he was telling me.

  “Did Carlos know?” I asked.

  “Yes. My mother told me about that when I asked her. She was honest with him from the first—before they married. He loved her and he wanted me born as his son. Now it doesn’t matter—not a whole lot. He will always be my real father. I never liked what I heard about Keith Kirby, even before Marla told me the truth.”

  “Why are you telling me this now?”

  “Maybe because I think you bring pilikia wherever you go. Trouble. Bad luck. To David, especially. But to Joanna too, and probably to your mother. There’s a lot of your father in you, and I think you ought to know what he was like. Then maybe you can just cut off and go home.”

  “If you’re so great on fairness and justice, then you shouldn’t be deciding about me. You don’t know anything about me—any more than I do about you. All we know is that we don’t like each other.”

  He stepped out into the terrace light and I could see his grin. “Agreed!”

  “I’ve already learned about my father and Ailina. It doesn’t matter, and your existence doesn’t change anything for me. It’s my mother I want to help.”

  “A lost cause. Go home!”

  “You forget—I’m Joanna’s granddaughter. That gives me a stubborn streak. You’re making it stronger.”

  It was then that something so incongruous struck me that I began to laugh. Koma came at once to stand before me.

  “What’s so funny?”

  I was closer now to crying, and I told him, “I was thinking about how interesting it would be if my Grandmother Elizabeth in San Francisco could meet her grandson.”

  “I can imagine. What’s she like?”

  “She’s elegant and very proper. Narrow in her views. Intolerant of anyone outside her own circle. She doesn’t like Hawaii or Hawaiians.”

  “Maybe I’d be good for her.”

  I stood up to go inside. “Maybe you like pilikia yourself. Maybe that’s really why you told me. You like to upset people.”

  “And you are upset, aren’t you, Caroline? To have me for a brother!”

  “I’d have picked someone I might like better.”

  His smile flashed in the darkness. “So long, haole sister,” he said, and slipped away into the night.

  I went inside and returned to my room. My thoughts wouldn’t be quiet now. All my life I had loved and admired my father as the hero Grandmother Elizabeth had created for me—and as I remembered. Ailina had said I must hold on to the memory of his affection for me. But I could only feel more sorry than ever for my mother because of what she’d had to endur
e at his hands. Probably she’d never known about Ailina’s pregnancy—at least she’d been spared that.

  It was not a good night for sleeping, and I spent it with a good deal of tossing. I was glad when daylight came and I could get up early for our trip to Honolulu.

  After breakfast we drove the short distance to the airport at Kaanapali and boarded a small plane for Oahu. Ailina arranged for me to sit beside the pilot, where I would have the best all-around view. I was glad for the complete distraction of this trip, which would leave me no time to think about anything back on Maui.

  I watched the red earth of the airstrip slip away beneath one wing as he headed out over a sea that looked navy blue this morning. We island-hopped, flying almost level with the steep cliffs of Molokai, in one place looking up a green valley slashed between precipitous sides.

  Oahu was only twenty-four miles and after the short flight we came in behind Honolulu through the gap at the top of Nuuanu Valley. There great cliffs plunged down the mountain in the historic Pali—where Oahu warriors leapt to their death far below, rather than be captured by Kamehameha’s men. We could look into the small crater of Punchbowl, now a military cemetery occupied by rows of white crosses in a place where there had once been human sacrifice. Bloody history came down from the ancient past to the present—because men had always played war games. Only in our present, desperate times did it appear that ordinary people everywhere were beginning to cry, “Enough! Give us peace!”

  The modern city of Honolulu, with its tall buildings crowding seaward, lay spread below us. Diamond Head rose at the city’s far limits, thrusting into sea and sky just as I’d see it in a hundred pictures. Surf rolled in along the strip of white sand that was Waikiki, where giant hotels welcomed tourists, dwarfing the Royal Hawaiian and the Moana—once the big hotels on the beach.