Shimura Trouble

13

THE WAIKIKI YACHT Club was situated on the fringe of Ala Moana Park, the beach known as Honolulu’s safest place for children to swim. I puttered along the parking driveway that edged the beach park, looking in vain for a spot large enough for my vehicle. As I drove, I couldn’t help noticing how many of the mothers holding children’s hands shot untrusting glances toward my Odyssey, as if the vehicle’s rust, dirt and pure ugliness indicated a thug was at the wheel.

I gave up on finding a parking spot near the water, and as I returned to Ala Moana Boulevard, I decided to leave the minivan in the large parking garage attached to the Ala Moana Center. I backed easily into a generous space near Macy’s, locked up and emerged from the shadowy garage into bright sun, and waited for the light to change so I could walk across the busy boulevard to the yacht club.

Entering the low white stucco building made me slightly anxious, as entering members-only places sometimes did. When I’d called Georgina back for more information on the timing of the boat’s arrival, I’d thought about asking her what I should wear, but decided against it for fear of being gauche. Now I wish I had. The halter back of my clingy orange and turquoise striped silk sundress, and my high-heeled turquoise-studded sandals seemed too feminine against the backdrop of club members wearing either polo shirts and shorts or bright cotton shift dresses. But that wasn’t the biggest difference between the club members and me; as Edwin would have said, it was a haole place. I was the only Asian, hapa or otherwise.

I walked around the pleasant, teak-ceilinged rooms decorated with hundreds of nautical flags, choosing to linger in the trophy room, where there were almost a century’s worth of cups, statues and plaques celebrating feats of sailing and surfing. I did a double take at a series of trophies engraved with the name of Duke Kahanamoku, the world’s fastest swimmer and most famous surfer during the first part of the twentieth century.

If Duke, who was indisputably Hawaiian, was a member of this club in the old days, that was a good sign. And then I saw another name that made my skin prickle: Pierce. Someone called Lindsay Pierce, a big handsome blond man photographed in 1968 holding a mammoth trophy. If Lindsay was in his thirties in 1968, the date of the picture, he’d have been too young to remember real-estate transactions taking place in the thirties. But the sight of him reminded me of how badly I wanted to talk to someone in the Pierce family. Now I’d found a connection.

I asked around until I was directed to Georgina Dobbs, the woman who’d telephoned me about the boat’s arrival. She turned out to be a graceful woman with a mahogany tan and helmet of silver hair. Her trim figure was flattered by her slim-fitting floral cotton sheath dress, just like the others but somehow more Hawaiian in appearance.

“Why, hello, Rei!” she said warmly when I greeted her. “Funny, I thought you’d be Japanese, because of your cousin who answered the phone-what good English he speaks!”

I eyed her more cautiously. “I’m half-Japanese.”

“Oh, hapa-haole, just like my grandkids. My daughter married a Hawaiian, so the children, good Lord, are they gorgeous! Now I’m so glad that you’re here, because the gal I’d been counting on to help me carry mai tais had to take the shuttle over to the Honolulu Yacht Club for some reason or other…”

“Any update of when Four Guys on the Edge is arriving?” I asked.

“Maybe an hour or two away. Can’t tell for sure, but don’t leave.” She smiled at me. “You could kill the time with a few drinks in the bar. Our mai tais are infamous.”

The characters in Juanita Sheridan novels were always sipping mai tais, but I couldn’t risk getting tipsy when I had to drive back to Kainani and serve dinner to nine people. “Maybe later. By the way, I noticed a picture in the trophy room-a man called Lindsay Pierce. Is he involved with Pierce Holdings?”

“Hmmm. Lindsay is the younger son, and he left fifteen or twenty years ago for California. As far as I know, he’s retired. Pierce Holdings isn’t actively run by the family anymore, just its corporate people.”

“Is there an older son?”

“Yes, Josiah Pierce, or JP Junior, as people used to call him in my parents’ day, when his father was still living. He retired back in the 1970s, but I believe he lives up on Tantalus at the old family house.”

“Well, that’s convenient,” I said. “There’s a little real-estate deal I’m looking into, with a Pierce connection. I’d love to talk to him directly.”

Georgina raised her eyebrows, as if measuring me in a new way. “Like I said, JP’s still in Tantalus, but I’m sure he’s unlisted. And…I really shouldn’t do this, but…there’s got to be an old club directory lying around somewhere.” She said a few words to the bartender, who produced one from under the counter.

“Let me mark this down for you,” Georgina said, writing on the back of a bill.

“Thank you.” I chatted a while longer with Georgina, and when she was called away to the telephone, I took advantage of the break to step outside of the building toward the water and tried the number she’d given me. It rang almost ten times, an unusual occurrence in a world now filled with answering machines, but at last an aged-sounding male voice answered.

“My name is Rei Shimura,” I said, after I’d ascertained I was speaking with Josiah Pierce the Second. “Actually, I’m a friend of a friend-Georgina Dobbs.”

“Oh, from the yacht club. You’re calling to try to get me to contribute to a fundraiser?” His voice sounded dismissive.

“No. I’m trying to put together an accurate historical record. I hope to interview you about something relating to the plantation.”

“You shouldn’t disturb me at home about that kind of thing. It’s all handled out of our offices in Kapolei.”

“I’m afraid the officers of Pierce Holdings may be too young to help me. They weren’t around sixty-some years ago.”

He paused. “Who did you say you were? And what’s your company-or is it a magazine?”

“My name is Rei Shimura,” I repeated. “And I’m actually just visiting from the mainland. I know it sounds forward, but I would very much like to talk to you, face to face.”

“Well, then.” He paused, as if making a decision. “Can you come to me?”

“I’d be very happy to do that.”

“How about tomorrow, say one o’clock?”

“Yes, thank you.”

“My house is close to the top of the road in the last stretch of houses before the parkland at the top.”

“Is there a number?”

“Yes, twenty-seven. But you’ll know it because of the roses.”

MORE THAN AN hour passed, during which I consumed two virgin mai tais and kept consulting my watch, wondering how late I could get away with leaving Honolulu for the Leeward side. But my patience was rewarded as, finally, a ripple went through the yacht club’s bar. Four Guys on the Edge had passed Diamond Head and would be at the dock within a half-hour.

“You must be happy to see your friend,” Georgina said as we left the building and walked along the dock, where most of the slips were filled with yachts, large and small, that belonged to the local crowd. “And it looks like his boat will be finishing first in its class. Has that happened before?”

“He’s never sailed this race, although the man who owns the boat is pretty seasoned. But Michael said something about there being a staggered start, which would put the boat’s finishing rank into question still, wouldn’t it?”

“That’s right. The boats leaving Newport Beach don’t all depart at the same time; there are so many of them, it could cause accidents. Instead, the boats follow a staggered schedule, and we record their total elapsed time, and subtract or add their handicap. The goal is for all the boats to get here around the same time, so we can celebrate together at the awards dinner-you’ll be going, I assume?”

“I’m not sure. Hey, is that the boat coming in?”

“No, dear, that’s just the shuttle taking people back and forth between the yacht clubs. But out on the horizon, I think I see something.”

The speck of something dark in the water became larger, and indeed it was a sailboat-a handsome, sleek hull. Four men were aboard, busily rolling down sails and guiding the boat into place. They all wore navy-blue polo shirts and ball caps obstructing their bearded faces. Michael hadn’t had a beard before, so I was having trouble recognizing him. I bided my time, making guesses. Michael might have been the wiry man pulling down the front sail…or was he the one at the wheel?

Even after Four Guys on the Edge had docked, I couldn’t discern Michael from the others. Then I noticed that one of the men had a bit of silver hair showing from under a Naval Academy cap, and was waving frantically at me. We made eye contact, and my stomach made the funny little skip that it had been doing for the last few months.

“Welcome to Hawaii,” I called out to Michael, whose eyes were bluer than I remembered, set against the deep tan he’d developed. The sea life clearly had agreed with him, I thought as he took off his cap and ran his fingers through his closely cropped, salt-and-pepper hair. He was making no effort to disembark after the boat was tied up and, as if sensing my disappointment, Georgina explained that they couldn’t set foot on Hawaiian soil until the customs agent had thoroughly inspected the boat for contraband.

The crowd around us was growing-after all, these were the first to arrive in the fifty-foot class, which was worthy of a big celebration. Georgina and I handed up the drinks, and each man took one and also bent his head to receive a lei made of yellow and white flowers and kukui nuts, the fruit from Hawaii’s state tree. But when it was Michael’s turn to take the lei, his arms were suddenly around me and, before I realized it, I’d been pulled up the rigging and on to the boat.

“I missed you too much to wait a moment longer,” Michael said as he embraced me in a classic friendly hug, perfect for public observation. This close, I smelled something slightly astringent about him-the seawater, and something else.

“What am I smelling on you-cologne?” I teased as we separated.

“No. It’s joy.”

What a romantic. “I’m happy too, but I smell something-a kind of citrus aroma.”

“No, it’s Joy. You know, the dishwashing soap? We mix it with seawater to clean ourselves.” Michael laughed. “Speaking of cleaning up, I can’t wait to get off this boat and get a real shower, not to mention shave this thing off.” Michael rubbed at his chin.

“Sure,” I said rashly, since the family dinner was still two and a half hours away. “I’d be happy to drive all of you to the hotel.”

That opened the floodgates for me with his three crewmates, all of whom had been quietly watching and smiling. I could understand the interest: their good friend had been without female companionship for years, so the appearance of a real woman was a curiosity. Michael introduced me to the Afghanistan and Iraq returnee, Kurt Schaefer, a deeply tanned, muscular man with white-blond hair cut military-short like Michael’s, and green eyes that looked as if they’d seen too much. It was easier for me to connect with the softer-faced crew captain, Parker Drummond, who was a real-estate investor in Southern California. Finally, I met the fourth man in the group: Eric Levine, an engineer at Goddard Space Center, who had terrible-looking sunburn. He didn’t say more than a quick hello, because he was on his cell phone trying to help his wife, who was lost somewhere in Los Angeles trying to meet Parker’s wife, Karen, for the next flight to Honolulu.

The customs inspector arrived and Michael and Parker followed him as he went below deck looking for contraband. Kurt lounged on the side of the boat, giving interviews to sports reporters. When Michael emerged from the cabin a few minutes later, he steered me around to the side of the boat that wasn’t facing the harbor, so that we could talk.

“Don’t count on taking the guys back to the hotel; they already said they plan to stay around the yacht club for a few hours to get their land legs back,” Michael said. “Frankly, I think they don’t mind being showered with free drinks and adulation.”

“A little adulation is in order for the fastest finishers in your class.”

“We don’t know yet if we’re the fastest-and I don’t really care, to tell the truth.”

“Come on.”

“I’m just glad I did the race, and it got me out here, with you. I have to say, though, that I’m more than ready to be on land and get a full night’s sleep.”

Michael didn’t just need sleep, he needed help walking. After the customs official finally cleared the boat, Michael hopped off, then nearly collapsed on the deck. Two men from the yacht club steadied him until I’d made my own precarious, high-heeled way off the boat and could walk him up to the yacht club, where I left him with his bags while I walked back to the mall for the car. I decided I didn’t want to risk Michael collapsing as he crossed Ala Moana Boulevard.

“Once again, you’re taking care of me,” Michael said as we continued by car from Ala Moana toward the Waikiki district. “Though I can’t say this vehicle has the Rei Shimura style to which I’m accustomed.”

“Yes, I know it. But what can I do? My Hawaiian uncle chose it for us,” I said, more aware than ever of the shiny new vehicles around me, the tour buses, convertibles, and luxury sedans streaming with us toward Waikiki.

“No offense meant, but I’ll see about renting my own car tomorrow. So, tell me about your newfound relatives. You were so nervous before you left.”

“Most of them are pleasant. But there’s a complicated agenda-just like I expected.” I began telling the story in a more or less chronological fashion, with Michael listening quietly. It was complicated enough that by the time we’d parked in the garage around the corner from the Hale Koa hotel, I was only halfway through Uncle Yoshitsune’s story, at the point where he’d been interned.

“I wonder if it’s true about his tampering with military mail,” Michael said as we stepped up a curving stairway and then entered a large, breezy open-air lobby, where ceiling fans whirred and a military population lounged on rattan furniture with crisply striped cushions.

“Apparently he was suspected, but never formally charged, which makes it seem quite unfair.”

Michael paused by the check-in desk, waving a family with four small children to go ahead of him. “We’ll have to pick up on this conversation later, but should I look for corroborating records at the Pearl Harbor archives? You could probably get in yourself with the Freedom of Information act, but it’d take longer.”

“That would be great.” I shouldn’t have been so happily surprised by his interest, but I was, especially since he must have been exhausted. “And another thing-I hope to see Harue and Yoshitsune’s old cottage, which can be reached by a road that runs through the old Barbers Point naval air station. If I give you the address, can you look up the route to get there?”

“Sure, and once I get a military access sticker, we can drive there together.” Michael leaned on the counter, and I wondered if he was suffering a balance problem again, or just exhaustion. Probably both. Now I was thinking I’d requested too much.

“That’s awfully generous of you, and I don’t expect you to do a bit more, honestly. It’s your week off, and you have Kurt, Parker and Eric to gad about with, and sailing honors to accept-”

“Twelve days and eleven nights are about all I can take of that crew.” Michael reached over with his free hand and squeezed mine with it. “Come on, Rei, let me help you with your family research. It’ll give us more time together.”