Hotel Honolulu

48 The Happiest Man in Hawaii

Once, after an excellent bottle of wine in the hotel, Royce Lionberg fixed his lawyer's lie-detector eyes on me and said, "I know you're going to write about me." I had first met him at the "service" for Buddy's wife Stella, the happy funeral. Apart from Leon Edel, he was the only person in Hawaii I had met who had read my books. He expressed genuine shock that I now managed a hotel. The statement about using him in my writing was intended to take me by surprise. I told him what was in my heart, "Never," and he believed me.

I did not tell him the reason I said it. I would not have attempted to deceive him. He lived on the North Shore, up the hill from Buddy, a mansion on a cliff. He visited the hotel once or twice a month and indulged himself in a Buddy Burger (Peewee spiked the ground beef with vermouth) and a bottle of Merlot. He had retired early because of his brilliant instincts and his sense of timing. He was a man without any regrets. He also used to say, "People come into my house and think, What can he do for me? What can I get out of him?" He smiled when he said it, knowing that he was way ahead of these people.

But I wanted nothing from him — that was why we became friends. I said "never" because he was impossible to write about, though I could not explain this without offending him.

I could have told him, as I had once tried to tell Sweetie about Stephen King, that it takes only a modest talent to write about misery — and misery is a more congenial subject than happiness. Most of us have known some suffering and can understand and respond by filling in the gaps. But great happiness is almost incomprehensible, and conveying it in print requires genius. The thankless result for such luminous prose is a character so happy he can seem undeserving, like those skillful boardroom portraits of smug company presidents that make you want to spew. Gloom finds kindred spirits, but write about pleasure and readers feel mocked and excluded. Happiness is almost repellent in black and white — even in life: apart from Buddy, Lionberg had few close friends. He was the happiest man I had ever met.

Craving anonymity, Lionberg gave his mansion a street number but no name. He lived alone, on the highest part of the bluff, facing west over Sharks Cove. A dense, blossomy hibiscus hedge around his property camouflaged a thick steel fence and security cameras. Visitors to the North Shore sometimes detoured to look at the high gates, but not because of Lionberg. He was a recluse, whose justified paranoia was summed up in his attributed question "What can he do for me?" A rumor that Elvis had lived briefly in Lionberg's mansion in 1968, when he was here making Blue Hawaii, brought out the gawkers.

"If I had known about that Elvis connection, I wouldn't have bought the place," Lionberg said.

Yet he was so happy that he hardly left the property. At first I had taken Lionberg to be one of those Hawaiian millionaires who was secretly snooty, always measuring himself against his competitors. His dismissiveness about Elvis seemed like the proof. A rich recluse is usually someone who craves the right company, an intensely social but fussy snob. But after I got to know him better I understood that when Lionberg said he wanted to be left alone, and not written about, he meant it.

Buddy Hamstra had introduced us with the usual "He wrote a book!"

Lionberg said he knew my work. I recognized him as a conventional American millionaire in being mean with his money and rather a know-it- all, a terrible listener, somewhat defensive in his manner, especially in his never discussing the source of his wealth. I took this to indicate that he was superstitious and self-conscious about it, but hearing that he had been a lawyer, I also had the impression he was a little ashamed of how he had made his money. Buddy, a gossip, mentioned that it was a huge settlement Lionberg had won — "The largest sum ever awarded in a personal injury suit in". . was it California? Lionberg had one of those California accents that always shows the speaker's fine California teeth.

"I'm a knucklehead," Buddy said. "He's real smart." Buddy believed Lionberg and I were kindred souls.

"I'm surprised I know your work," Lionberg said. "I don't read many books." He was unapologetic.

"Books upset me," he said. "They take hold of my mind. When I'm reading one I can't think of anything else."

I said that seemed to me a sign that he was perhaps a more dedicated reader than he realized.

"That I take books too seriously?" he said. "But it's such a commitment reading a novel. I'm not one of these people who read for enjoyment or to pass the time. Books tend to possess me. They get into my head. So I avoid them."

The act of writing was to him rather obscure — mingled with magic, touched with power. He was not used to associating with people who had more power than he. Anyway, few people did, and none of them was on the North Shore.

Lionberg never said to me, as others often did, "I wish I could write." He had everything, and he knew it. He even had me.

Instead of my tedious and unwelcome description of Lionberg's happiness, or my portrait of his beautiful house (whenever I hear, "They've got a lovely house," I think, Why should I care?), I would prefer to sort through some more telling incidents. They relate to Lionberg's being a do- it-yourselfer and a beekeeper. Though he had a handyman, Kekua,

Lionberg did most of the chores on his property. He was so wealthy he could afford the time to carry out these menial jobs. He did them well, though his staff, Kekua especially, tended to applaud a bit too strenuously

and nervously overpraised him. They knew he was dabbling and, worse, that he was trespassing on their turf. So Buddy said.

He was painting some beehives one day while I stood by; he was talking more than listening. He had a bucket of white paint — they were new hives, boxes that were put together by Kekua — and in the middle of a sentence, something about one of his visitors (someone with a "What can he do for me?" attitude), Lionberg spat into the bucket. He had been smoking a big cigar, and his spittle was dark brown, and it looped like caramel on the glossy white surface of the paint. He stirred this gob into the paint — three twists of the mixing stick — and there was no trace of it. He went on applying the pure white paint with his brush.

He smiled at me. This for him was like a whole signifying speech, and yet he had not said a word. If this was a reply to something I had said, I could not remember what had provoked it.

I knew what I had been thinking, though — that in the middle of my life I found myself alone, and so I latched on to people, thinking they were strong; but they were alone too, or else they wouldn't have let me. Whatever inconsequential thing I had said — for it was relaxing to be with Lionberg — that thought was going through my mind. I was drifting and clinging like everyone else, except him.

Being happy, he did not draw off my energy, and I always left his house feeling revitalized. His calmness calmed me. He had no envy, none of the needy attention-seeking that could be so tiring. And his happiness did not mean high spirits and hilarity. Quite the opposite. It made him

meditative and thoughtful. He was serene, fulfilled, the real thing, the person no one wants to hear about, a happy man.

Somewhere in his past there was a wife — wives, maybe — and children. He mentioned them as you might allude to old friends, without any rancor, always with generosity and affection.

"I was talking to Didi yesterday," he said. "She grows orchids. Doing very well with them."

"Was that the woman I saw in the garden?"

"No. Didi's in Mexico," he said. "My first wife. We were married thirty years ago. She was just a kid in her mid-twenties."

Working the paint into the grooves of the beehive, he went on talking.

"That woman in the garden is a psychic. She's a funny person. She was a truck driver somewhere on the mainland. She realized she had a gift and has been doing it full time. She's very colorful. For a while she was a prostitute. She predicted a change in my life."

"How do you feel about that?"

"Frankly, I'm happy with the way things are," he said. "Like a lot of prostitutes, she is also a lesbian. She came highly recommended by Buddy, who swears by her."

Lionberg might have been in his sixties, but he looked forty-five. He was a small man and had the appearance some small men have — perfectly proportioned, very fit but quietly so. You never saw him exercising; perhaps the chores kept him in shape. I believed him when he said that books upset him, yet he had an extensive library. He also had a collection of telescopes and chronometers, ships' compasses and clocks. He was a cultured soul. He saw films and listened to music. He was a patron of the Honolulu Symphony, the Hawaii Film Festival, and various charities. He was generous and undemanding; everything he attempted seemed to succeed. His flowers bloomed, his mango trees were heavy with fruit, his hives were full of honey. He experimented with coffee bushes on one slope — he had twenty acres altogether — and I knew they would flourish. I assumed that his whole life had been like that. It was how he had become wealthy — quietly, without fuss. He took no special credit. "Ram a broomstick in this soil and it will grow. Everything grows here."

I am giving the impression that he was aloof, and I suppose he was where most people were concerned. But preoccupied would be a truer word. He had a passionate interest in details — the life cycle of the bee, the medicinal properties of shrubs on his land, the traditional uses for blossoms, the hallmarks of antique silvei the accuracy of certain timepieces. He had time for everything, and in that respect he was rich. He said, "Time is wealth."

Buddy Hamstra was in most respects Lionberg's opposite, but he was useful for comparison. Like other disturbed and excitable people, Buddy was unhealthy and accident-prone. Lionberg was an example of someone whose health and contentment seemed like radiant consequences of his clear mental state.

He lived, embowered, behind hedges, in the fragrance of his bushes and flowers and his buzzing bees, bathed in the light of the Pacific, facing west. Now and then, people came to consult him as though he were an oracle. They had problems and they were convinced — his house and his life were the proof — that he had solutions. His reluctance to encourage anyone to believe in him made people more credulous and persistent. He also knew how, smilingly, to turn them away.

It was hard to imagine anyone so serene and satisfied that he looked at the world and, possessing such experience of immense pleasure, saw nothing he wanted. It was like achieving an ideal state of being, for there was something godlike in having conquered all desire.

He had a few eccentricities. One was his general refusal to eat anything but his own food. He did make exceptions (the Buddy Burger was one), but his fastidiousness kept him from going to dinner parties — not that he was interested. It also kept him from traveling. He said he didn't mind: "I've done my traveling." Another oddity of his was his thoroughness in removing the brand names from everything he owned. His car, his microwave, his toaster, his oven, his telescopes. Even from something as insignificant as a watch dial he effaced the brand name. He hated logos. "I detest advertising. It makes the thing look as though it's on loan."

Besides the bees, the painting, the carpentry, and his accomplishments as a handyman — he made birdhouses, he kept tropical fish — he had a great assortment of simple weapons: air guns, slingshots, crossbows, throwing knives. And much more: a suit of armor, a blunderbuss, a working cannon, shields, spears, a collection of war clubs from various Pacific islands. In the room that served as his arsenal, he also had a wind-up phonograph and a jukebox.

"What do you want to hear?"

"What have you got?"

Pressing buttons, he said, "Here's a favorite of mine."

It was Frank Sinatra singing "Blue Moon."

"That was very popular when I was at school."

That was how I got an idea of his age.

"Did you grow up with guns like this?"

"Oh, no," he said. "My mother hated guns." He paused, smiling at the music or a memory. "Hated rock-and-roll too." He looked around the room and said with pleasure, "This would have appalled her."

I understood him better then. These were things he had always wanted, that he had finally attained. It was really very simple. He didn't yearn for "Rosebud" — he possessed it and had all the time in the world to enjoy it.

I never saw him angry or drunk or depressed. He had the patience of a Buddhist monk. He was modest; I never heard him boast. He was compassionate and kind, and he yearned for nothing. His staff loved him. I

liked being with him — and, as I say, I always felt better afterward. He gave me confidence and energy. I saw him as one of the lucky few.

But he confounded me. A happy man cannot be the subject of a story. You never saw his sort in a story. Happiness is hardly a subject — Tolstoy said as much in the opening sentence of his hybolic masterpiece. It amazes me that I have written this much about Lionberg, the happiest man in Hawaii.