“And this was—”
“Nineteen ninety-nine. Around the time of the ten-year anniversary of Lino’s death. We had had a dinner with some of his closest friends.”
“Sperry brothers included?”
“Yes, they were there. This was about a year before Joe was beaten up. Warren Ross was there too. He had flown in from Japan.” Minerva took a quick sip of her coffee, just to wet her lips, it seemed. “I cornered him, asked him about the tape he had given Lino. He told me he had another tape, a more valuable one. Said he had it on reel-to-reel. It was recordings of Lino singing his own songs. He told me that he had recorded Lino in the studio. Herblach wouldn’t have allowed this, but he was off-island, so—”
“Did Lino play ‘Ku‘u Leialoha Pikake’?”
“Not only did he play the song, he talked about what inspired it. His daughter. He also mentioned Barney Isaacs being present, which confirmed what Barney had told me.”
“And other songs?”
“Oh, there was some beautiful music there. Warren promised he’d send me a copy, and he did. After I listened to it—oh, it was hard to take—anyway, I had copies made and put the cassette Warren had sent me in a safe deposit box. Funny thing—no, unfunny thing—shortly before Stan died, I contacted Warren about obtaining the master tapes from him, thinking I should be the one holding on to them. I was willing to pay him whatever he wanted. It was then that Warren told me that the tapes were missing.”
“But you still have recordings—”
“Yeah, on cassette. Not that good quality; still, it’s something. And it’s corroboration for any claim that we may make on Lino’s behalf.”
“Caroline have any role in this?”
“I think when this was going on she was pretty oblivious. She had her own issues to sort out. She was only eight when her father was killed, and we became very close. We moved to Minnesota for a while. I just thought she needed to be with family. My sister’s there, and her children. They’re about the same age as Caroline. She liked Minnesota for a while, but I think we both knew that Hawai‘i was home. And so we returned….”
Minerva took a long sip of her caffè americano, and seemed lost in thought for a solid minute.
“When she hit puberty, boy she was hard to handle. This was around the mid-nineties and I had begun seeing Stan. Two really rough years. Her screaming at me, which was actually better than her periods of moodiness, which I don’t know how I handled. I threatened to send her back to Minnesota and she said she’d run away. And then one day, she was suddenly an angel again. Sweet, accommodating. She focused on her studies, got into Kamehameha. She had always been a good student, but now she excelled. During her sophomore year she became more social and really blossomed. She partied, hung out with friends. It was all good. During her sophomore year, she was homecoming princess….” Minerva sighed, then continued, in a more hesitant voice: “Then all that Bishop Estate crap began. It had been simmering for years, but it really exploded right during her sophomore year. She and her fellow students were caught in the middle of all that controversy. What a way to spend your high school years.”
“Quite a wake-up call.”
“A frightening one at that. Caroline became disillusioned, in a way that was palpable. Here was one pissed-off girl. And meanwhile, the scandal dragged on and on. She just got fed up. She didn’t even want to be at Kamehameha anymore, so I let her transfer to Kalani. She kinda recovered there, got the grades she needed to get into Stanford. And off she went…. In retrospect, I think that was a good move for her. Only thing is, all things to do with Lino went by the wayside. Stan and I had been living together; I wasn’t ready to make it ‘legal,’ but it became more and more obvious that Stan wanted to get married for my protection. You know, so I’d get his social security if something happened to him, his pension. It was like he knew he wouldn’t last long, and he wanted me secure. So after holding him off for a few years I gratefully accepted his offer of marriage. Then got really busy helping run the store. No time to even spend the money I now had, so a lot of it went toward Caroline’s tuition. We lived a decent life, me and Stan, and whenever Caroline came home he made it plain that he adored her. It was hard on both of us when he died. That’s when Caroline decided to return to Hawai‘i for good.”
“Anything else happen in the last few years, I mean to do with Lino?”
“Mmmm. Good question. Well, after Stan died, we moved into the place where I live now, a much smaller place, so we had to get rid of a lot of stuff. When we had tons of room, no problem, but to downsize…. Well, I let Caroline take charge of Stan’s library, which also housed Lino’s songbooks and other music paraphernalia. Caroline insisted we keep only what we couldn’t let go of, and dump the rest. So I told her, go ahead, I’ll trust your discretion….” Minerva stopped.
I took her hand.
“It’s hard reliving all this….”
I pointed to her cup. She drank. I drank my coffee too, a long swallow.
“… That’s how she stumbled upon her dad’s notebooks. They were filled with song drafts. Lino wrote some beautiful, tender songs, so it was good to be reminded that he wrote some silly stuff and some pretty awful stuff as well. He had songs with titles like ‘Keiki Need It Too,’ ‘Kalamai World.’ He was so kolohe.” Minerva chuckled, then teared up again, dabbed her eye with her Starbucks napkin.
“I don’t know if it was Matthew’s influence, but when she returned to Hawai‘i, she would corner me, asking all kinds of questions about her dad and his music. She knew that he had received songwriting credit for one song, ‘Islands on Notice.’”
“I know it. It’s a good song.”
“It was recorded by Johnny Lopes, an ex-con. He was one of the winners in that Homegrown contest they used to have. Johnny recorded it and gave Lino the composer credit—’cause he knew him.” Minerva took one more swallow of her americano, then placed the cup down and leaned a little forward.
“When Caroline was six or seven, she took piano lessons. So she knew how to read music.”
“I saw a piano at the North Shore home. In her and Matt’s room.”
“That’s the same piano, that old Baldwin Acrosonic. Anyway, as time passed, she played less and less, but then, every now and then she’d pull out a songbook and she’d work on her sight-reading skills. So around twenty-o-four, when she returned, she got into playing the piano again. Then one day, she pulls out this ratty songbook, one that was falling apart, and a folded sheet of paper fell out. She brought it to me. It was a draft of what was to become ‘Ku‘u Leialoha Pikake.’ There were lines crossed out. Chords and notes written over the words. Obviously her father’s handwriting…. When I told her he had written the song for her, she went ballistic. I felt so guilty for having kept that information from her all those years. I just didn’t want any trouble.”
“And this happened about three years ago?”
“Yeah. Shortly after Stan died.”
I put my pen down, rested my chin on both palms as I looked at some of the phrases I had scratched onto the page:
Mom:
—Suspicious of JH. Protective of daughter.
—Non-confrontational
Daughter:
—Saw father murdered. Further traumatized by BE scandal.
—Confrontational
It was clear to me that Caroline had made it to adulthood quite intact, but as she witnessed large-scale corruption, saw women exploited every which way by the powers that be, saw her father’s legacy destroyed….
You don’t want trouble, Minerva? Problem is, your daughter sees the world for what it is and, unlike most of us, is trying to do something about it. You don’t want trouble, but your daughter runs straight into it whenever it rears its ugly face.
“Did she ever seek out Jerry Herblach?”
“Not to my knowledge.”
“Do you think he had a hand in Lino’s murder?”
“If he did I have no proof. The cops couldn’t find an
ything. Or didn’t want to. The thing is, it could have been anyone, for any stupid reason. While I do think Herblach was behind that strange burglary, I don’t see him sanctioning a murder. He’s just not the type. Still, it pisses me off that he’s the one who gets rewarded. I mean, where’s the karma here? He’s the one that gets to be filthy rich. I’m sure his battles with Lino are ancient history for him. He’s moved on; made new enemies, no doubt. ’Cause that’s his style. If he’s got anything to worry about, it’s the people he screwed most recently. And if my daughter tried to take him on, what could she do? This is a guy who can buy off judges. You can’t fight that kind of power.”
“Unless—”
“Unless what?”
“I’m just—”
“Unless what?” She was adamant.
“I’m just thinking, why would she approach one of the Sperry brothers?”
“Which one?”
Curtis, I was thinking. What came out of my mouth was, “Wish I knew.”
“Those guys have been doing their routine forever. When cops would arrest Joe, he’d tell ’em he’s Curtis. And vice versa. They’ve thrived on causing confusion. I can tell them apart in a second.”
“How?”
“How? Jesus, for one, they’re miles apart in demeanor. Two, Joe’s got those hand tremors now. Three, their tattoos are different.”
“Is Warren Ross still around?”
Minerva shrugged. “Haven’t seen or heard from him in several years.”
“Do you know that there’s a recent photo of your daughter in Midweek?”
“No…. In Midweek? Jeez, I stopped reading that tabloid ages ago. It’s mostly crap.”
“It’s a group photo, taken in Vegas on Cinco de Mayo. The night of the Mayweather–De La Hoya fight….” I put my hand on one of her hands. “Caroline and Matt are in the photo. So’s Josiah Kamana, Genaro Blankenship….” She didn’t react, so I added, “and Jerry Herblach.”
She gripped my hand, and again shut her eyes. Had she just been given another puzzle piece?
When she opened her eyes, she looked down at the tabletop. Then she covered her mouth with her folded hands.
“Apparently,” I continued, “Herblach is involved in your daughter’s life. There’s a couple possibilities here. One, they just ran into each other, totally innocent, and somebody saw the opportunity for a photo-op; two, he might be one of the backers for the film. Three….”
I did not have to say what three was.
When she looked at me, she was transformed. Hard, stubborn, resilient. Nothing was going to faze her.
“Maybe I should have hired an assassin,” she muttered through her hands.
“Wouldn’t have solved anything.”
“I know. But sometimes you gotta do something.”
She now sounded like her daughter.
“True.” If I sounded resigned to her, it was because I knew that sentiment all too well.
“The lei,” she said. “Maybe it wasn’t her.”
“There were footprints. Well, shoeprints. Really large ones, between the roadway and Lino’s grave.”
She shut her eyes again. When she reopened her eyes, she uttered a word I had only heard once before, not so much a word as a name, one that forced me to reevaluate much of what I thought I knew.
“Declan.”
My pen flew into the air. I didn’t try to catch it. I just watched it land on the notebook with a plop.
Minerva excused herself to go to the restroom, leaving me to weigh the implications of that two-syllable declaration.
When she came back, wearing shades, she simply shook my hand and said, “Thanks so much for meeting with me. Shall I write you a check?”
“Let’s wait on that.”
“I have to go.” She grabbed her nearly empty coffee cup and dumped it in the trash. I got up and said I’d walk her to her car.
“By Declan, you mean Curtis and Joe’s nephew?” We were exiting the mall. I could barely keep up with her.
“Yes, and I think he’s the one putting leis on Lino’s grave.”
“Why him?”
She stopped and faced me. “They grew up together,” she said, as if that explained everything, and continued her brisk walk.
When we reached the parking garage she pulled out her keys and clicked the unlock button on her fob.
She got into her car, a Lexus IS200 with a few years on it.
“They were really close,” she said as the window rolled down. “He used to follow her around. Believe it or not, she used to be bigger than him. He’s a year younger, and had a very late growth spurt. When he got big, he got really big, and he fancied himself her protector.” She looked ahead, fired up the engine. “They were at Kalani together, after she transferred.”
“You going to see him?”
“I don’t know. Really. I’ll be in touch.”
“You know that Curtis is a known associate of Josiah Kamana,” I said as she began to back up.
She braked. Kept looking straight ahead. “He hates the guy.”
“But keeps him close?”
She looked at me. “As far as what Curtis is up to, only Curtis knows. That’s how he plays it. Don’t underestimate the Sperry boys. They’re far smarter than people think.”
“So smart that they can play dumb really well?”
“They own the patent on that one.”
Fuck.
37
INTERVIEW WITH A WHISTLE-BLOWER
My watch said 9:30. Instead of heading back to the harbor, I drove to the Waikiki Zoo and parked there so I wouldn’t have to walk far to see Smokin’ Joe.
“Da Mac is back,” he said when he saw me.
“Missing girl went to school with your nephew. Missing girl was seen with either you or your braddah. What’s up?”
Joe scrutinized me. Then his stare went blank and he seemed lost in thought.
“Sal told me you could be useful,” I added.
He looked out toward the ocean. “How?”
“Useful in terms of finding the girl, especially since she was tight with Declan.”
A tourist couple arrived at the concession. Joe gave them a glare that sent them moving on, maybe all the way back to the airport.
“An’ Auntie Agnes sends her regards.”
“Auntie….” Joe’s eyes went soft. “Look, brah …,” he said to me with surprising sincerity. “We no like cops. We no trust ’em, period. An’ PIs? Well, dey kinda like cops, eh? But listen, braddah, listen real good. Kamana an’ his undahlings, dey da fricken worst. Bottom of the barrel. Somet’ing wrong wit’ dose guys. I mean, off-da-scale wrong. ’Ass why da Sperry ‘ohana wen’ become, uh, independent contractahs.”
“So what, then?”
“Sal, he square wit’ us. An’ Auntie, if she say help you, so be it.”
“One mo’ question, Joe.”
“Shoots.”
“Why would your braddah and your nephew chase me away when I was spying on Kamana’s house?” I explained the locale, the situation, mentioned Mia.
He chuckled. “You guys was prob’ly in da way of deah spying. Eh braddah, dey looking fo’ Ku‘ulei too.”
He knew her as Ku‘ulei.
“No worries, brah. We gon’ fine her. Guarans. No charge. Dis what you call pro bono. An’ when we fine her, if she all right, all is good. If somet’ing wrong, if she hurt, o’ dead, some people gon’ fricken pay. Gon’ be one proportional response.”
Didn’t see that phrase coming. “So we on the same side.”
“Fo’ dis one, yeah. Cannot guarantee da next one. As I said, we independent contractahs.”
“An’ we sharing information?”
“About da girl?”
“Yeah. About da girl.”
In reply he offered his hand. I closed mine. He closed his and we bumped fists. Way less damage that way.
I headed back to my car, found myself low on cash and gas so I headed for the nearest ATM. Just when I reached the Te
soro station on Kapahulu my phone went off.
It was Orse, so I answered. I told him what had transpired with Smokin’ Joe. He said something like whew and told me to be careful. Then he said he called because he had found the guy who had blown the whistle on the incident over on Tinian. He told me that this mystery man had quite a story to tell, one that had to do with a secret arm of hibiscus, known to its members as abbacus. Spelled with two b’s. And while Orse couldn’t give me this guy’s phone number, he said with my OK he could pass on mine.
Minutes after I had finished gassing up I got another call. The caller spoke with an accent that I couldn’t quite locate, and related his involvement with abbacus. He said anyone who inquired about abbacus, as some curious reporters had done, was told it was an investment arm, that abbacus stood for Affiliated Builders, Businessmen, and Contractors, U.S., but according to this whistle-blower abbacus was really a clean-up squad known for doing the real dirty shit, some of its members having had mercenary and/or intelligence backgrounds. Within the hibiscus membership, he said, abbacus stood for the Alliance of Ballbusters, Brainbeaters, and Crackdealers, Unharnessed and Surreptitious.
What was Orse thinking, putting me in touch with this guy?
I was ready to cut him off when he added that he used to work for Bishop Estate at their Kawaiahao Plaza headquarters. This was shortly after the scandal years. Early this year, soon after that incident in Tinian, he moved on to The Law Offices of Derego, Dubin, & Matsumura—just before they added Jameson to their door sign. He said he worked in public relations. He said he knew about all their bullshit schemes. Told me that he was willing to talk to me after Orse had mentioned my own run-ins with newspaper brass a few years ago and that he felt some degree of kinship. But he was quick to add that although he had called me he wasn’t about to discuss what he knew over the phone.
For a Song Page 30