Primal Instinct

24

The Wailea Sun Resort Hotel provided a place to catch one's breath, clean up and relax until nightfall, before they would attempt the dangerous landing on Kahoolawe. Jim had showered and rushed out before she was even settled, saying he had to coordinate things with the local authorities, see to it they were doing everything in their means to locate and apprehend Kowona, and seek out an underworld figure here who would see to it they had passage to Kahoolawe.

The time alone, waiting for Jim to return, was passed with her own showering and freshening up, and a brief nap after a call to room service for a cheese and wine tray to be sent up. She'd gone out on the balcony, put her feet up and after a few glasses of wine, had dozed against a pillow. When she awoke, native birds had roosted on the table and were sampling the cheese and crackers while the sky all around had softened into a cloud of lavenders and purples.

Night was descending rapidly now and she feared Jim had left her, believing she'd be safer left behind, the thought infuriating her. She lashed out at the birds, shooing them off. Then she quickly dressed in jeans and a pullover, and was about to storm out the door when the phone rang.

She grabbed for it.

“ Jess, it's me.”

“ Where are you, Jim9”

“ Take a cab and meet me at Nuekuela Point Wailea harbor. We've got passage.”

“ I thought you'd left me.”

“ Don't think I didn't give it serious thought. You realize if we're taken into custody by the local tribesmen, well, it'll be hell to get off the island, much less fax for help from Washington. You sure you don't want to reconsider, Jess?”

“ I've stopped thinking about it, Jim. Let's just do it. I've got to know where this Jack the Ripper is, and if there's a chance in hell we can bring him to justice, then I say we go for it.”

“ We won't have a scuba in from the boat either.”

“ Really?”

“ We're rafting in, inflatable.”

“ Terrific.”

“ And we'll have a guide.”

“ A guide? This is sounding better and better.”He remained cautionary. “It's not like any guided tour you've had of the much-visited islands, kiddo, so don't think it's like the little choo-choo ride through the plantation.”

“ Don't worry about me.”

“ Still, it's someone who knows the island.”

“ Sounds like one hell of a plus to me,” she replied with enthusiasm.

“ Name is Ben Awai. He trades with the locals, knows the village on Molokai where Lopaka grew up. How's that for a turn of good fortune?”

“ Has he been able to confirm your suspicions?”

“ Some, not all. Says Lopaka's people did move out to Kahoolawe, but doesn't know if our killer's out there or not.”

A glint of suspicion like the sliver of shadow and light that runs the gamut of a knife blade flashed along her consciousness before it faded. But she didn't allow her suspicious nature to sway her this time. Jim had wanted her to be less suspicious, more trusting of him.

“ I'm on my way, Jim, and don't you dare embark without me, you hear?”

11 P.M., Wailea Harbor, Maui

At the harbor where the cab let her off, she saw Jim coming toward her in the dark. The harbor lights were dim and pretty, reflecting off the water, more show than functional, creating paths for lovers to walk, not light for boatmen to work by. Still the harbor was thick with fishing boats and men unloading large caches of fish, carving them up over a worn, gray boardwalk long before stained and discolored with blood.

Jim hailed her and casually said, “Ready for that moonlight boat ride, honey?”

“ I can hardly wait, dear,” she replied, not missing her cue, realizing Jim feared one or both of them might be recognized and that their trip must remain clandestine.

He guided her down the pier, the calm Pacific lapping at the boats in the harbor, rocking them gently against their moorings. Ropes and lines swayed with the masts here and metal clinked so gently against metal that the effect was of a hundred crystal wine glasses chiming together.

A crescent moon blinked over the scene, the sea a watery blend of turquoise, jade and azure, like an unfinished oil painting, its colors running, except that this seascape was real. She carefully boarded the small craft that Jim had arranged for, nodding to Ben Awai, a thick-necked, barrel-chested Hawaiian with the familiar knatty, red-burnished hair and grinning eyes of his race. Ship's master here, Awai welcomed Jessica aboard with the economy of words she'd come to expect from his race, saying, “He mea 'ole.”

“ He says welcome aboard,” Jim translated.

The ship's master mumbled something in Hawaiian to the two crew members, also Hawaiian. The other two laughed and began casting off, wasting no time.

Jessica felt the comforting weight of her ankle holster and gun, knowing that Jim's own weapon was safely tucked into the small of his back below the dark green U of H sweatshirt he wore. “How well do you know these characters, Jim?” she whispered as the boat began its slow departure from port.

“ Enough. Don't worry.”

“ What're you saying? Situation normal, all fucked up, or have you simply gone beyond worry stage? Exit left or no exit left?”

“ Awai will do right by us. I've had assurances from friends on the island that he's okay, that he's a man of his word.”

“ Friends?”

“ In law enforcement.”

This didn't quell her fears, especially when she saw one of the other crewmen glaring unashamedly at her. This was followed by more mumbling between the crewmen and more icy stares.

“ What're they saying?” she asked Jim.

“ Can't make it out. Something about how pretty you are, I think.”

She gritted her teeth. “I don't feel entirely right about sticking our necks out so far, Jim.”

“ Hey, come on, you don't want a blind crew, do you? And they'd have to be blind if they didn't see how beautiful you are. As for sticking our necks out, I tried, if you remember, to leave you behind.”

She frowned, paced the small deck of the fishing charter and wrapped her hands around one of the thick ropes of hemp. “Yeah, you did warn me of the risks. But now we're actually out here, sailing away from all contact with the outside world… I mean, anything could happen out there on Kahoolawe. We have no jurisdiction, our badges are worthless. What if we have to fall back on our weapons, Jim? You and me, we could end up on the wrong side of the law very easily.”

“ Kahoolawe law, yeah, quite easily.”

“ Just how much do you know about the people on the island? Are they as feudal as they sound?”

“ They're made up of people who chose to return to a completely traditional way of life, all of them cultists in a sense-”

“ Great, sounds more and more like we're stepping into a David Koresh situation without backup.”

“ Cultists in the sense they embrace the old ways. They've come to Kahoolawe only recently, actually, appearing from all over the other islands, Molokai, Maui, even Oahu and the big island of Hawaii itself. They're not much different from the American Indians who're trying desperately to hold onto their culture in the States, and they enjoy the same kind of immunity from governmental pressures as do the American Indians. Sure, we could storm the reservation, but the political repercussions would cause a ripple effect that would be felt all the way back to D.C.”

“ And the already widening rift between the peoples of the island would be opened wider?” she added. Old scars, she thought, ripped to bleed as never before, something neither side wanted.

He put an arm around her and squeezed her shoulder firmly as the boat slipped its moorings and backed out under the power of its relatively quiet motor. “We just have to play this one by ear.”

'Tell me everything you know about Kahoolawe.”

“ I already have!”

“ Everything, Jim.”

“ Hmmmm, well, there's no way your prophet on the mountain, Lomelea, could be right about the so-called legend of Lopaka Kowona's having seen his brother killed.”

“ Why do you say so?”

“ If it happened, it happened on Molokai, but records there indicate that there was no brother, that Lopaka in fact is and always has been the only son conceived by Chief Kowona, and this with a white wife who died of cholera when Lopaka was quite young. She was pregnant with a second child at the time, but no brother was bom. That is according to a rough census taken.”

“ The old chief could've lied.”

“ Perhaps… perhaps not. I don't know a hell of a lot about psychology but I do know that killers lie, and very often they lie to themselves, to rationalize that which cannot be explained away in any other manner, if you get my drift.”

“ That would only prove Lomelea wrong factually; symbolically, for the killer, he did have a brother who was destroyed by his father, even if that brother was his alter ego.”

“ Yeah, well, that's best left to the shrinks.”

“ If it ever comes to that.”

“ Anyway, it was only in the early nineties that the U.S. Government returned Kahoolawe to the Ohana.”

“ The Ohanal Isn't that Kaniola's newspaper?”

“ No, no, the PKO-Protect Kahoolawe Ohana. Ohana means family, but the PKO, which came into existence in '76, has turned Kahoolawe into the principal symbol of native Hawaiian consciousness. Native Hawaiians made it clear they wanted Kahoolawe back.”

“ But you said there's nothing there, no resources or riches.”

“ Still, it's been the most hotly contested piece of real estate in the islands, primarily because land is so limited and scarce in the islands-any land, even land with hundreds of unexploded U.S. Navy shells lying about.”

“ There're live shells all over the island?” she asked. “That's a real comfort, Jim.”

“ Any rate, the PKO's become a powerful political group in the islands. Hell, unless I miss my guess they were behind Ewelo's kidnapping of Oniiwah, and Kaniola's Ohana newspaper makes the perfect mouthpiece for them.”

“ Now I understand better your attitude toward him.”

“ Their big push on is to restore as much island land and sacred temples and burial grounds as possible, and there are some prime archaeological sites on Kahoolawe that they have their eyes on, which fortunately escaped as targets of the U.S. military over the years.”

“ I can see their point of view,” she said, staring out toward the black mound of the island in the distance. “They've been so disenfranchised by us over the years.”

“ If we were to go over the island in Lee's chopper, Jess, you'd see just how desolate the place is, how awful the results of the years of bombings have been, not to mention the goats.”

“ Goats? Yeah, you mentioned something before about goats.”

“ The only thriving creatures on the island since the bombings, save for lizards, insects and maybe some mongoose.”

“ Mongoose in Hawaii?” she asked.

“ Imported but thriving and remarkably prolific, and the goats too have been allowed to roam free and wild, and have overpopu- lated and devastated the topsoil on the slopes over much of the island. There needs to be a serious effort to decrease their numbers, but the PKO and the U.S. Government can't seem to agree on how it should be done; consequently, nothing's been done.”

“ Sounds sadly typical and political.”

“ You got that right. Anyway, from overhead, in the air, Kahoolawe is a uniquely Hawaiian anomaly.”

“ What?” she asked, turning to look into his eyes.

“ An ugly, undesirable piece of property. Not supposed to be any such thing in Hawaii. Seven miles off the coast of East Maui, we come across a barren, windswept island inhabited by goats and cultists.”

“ Maybe you're being harsh to call them cultists, Jim. Maybe they're just what they say they are, native Hawaiians who want to live as their forefathers lived.”

“ Yeah, maybe I've got my prejudices, sure. Some people in the islands just see them as fools. There's barely enough vegetation on the island for shade much less raising livestock, and streams around the island dry up in the summer. Mt. Haleakala on the bigger island just about squeezes all the rain from the clouds before they reach here. The only thing Maui sends over are the dry, cold Makaniloa winds off the slopes of Halekala. Kahool- awe's hot and humid during the day, and cold at night. Much of the red-soil landscape is lunar in nature.”

“ Add to that fifty years of poundings by naval artillery and airforce bombers,” she inteijected. “Maybe it's become such a symbol for native unity because it most represents what Kaniola would call blatant haole disregard for his homeland? I can sympathize with the desire to see the land returned to civilian control.”

“ In an island state, land of any kind is valuable, Jess. All that the PKO knows is that one day Kahoolawe will be worth a fortune, and if they can squat on it… well, squatters' rights, you know. Hell, Jess, as a practice bombing site for the Navy and Airforce, it was perfect.”

“ Perfect, huh?”

“ It's only one hundred ten miles from Pearl, the U.S. headquarters for operations in the Pacific.”

“ And you think that makes it okay?”

“ In the best tradition of might makes right and given the context of the times, I don't know. Since the fifties the natives have been given visitation rights several months of each year to the island and limited fishing rights year round. It was never contested until the PKO came into prominence.”

She thought Jim Parry was sounding political now, perhaps even racist, but then who could live day in and day out here without taking sides? she wondered.

“ In '76 the PKO occupied the island against the orders of the Navy. It got ugly.”

“ There were riots?”

“ More like there were arrests. It was the first of many battles fought in the name of their sacred island, and since then the PKO has scored some impressive victories. They backed their own man for Congress and he's won every year since. In 1990, Congress passed a two-year moratorium on the bombing while a federal and state commission studied the cost of clearing the island of shells and debris, its future use, and who would eventually have jurisdiction over the place.”

“ So what was the outcome?”

“ You're looking at it,” he said, pointing ahead to the dense growth in the fast approaching bay along this stretch of the island. “A return to the past.”

She thought for a moment of all that Jim's phrase implied, the multifaceted levels of connotation in his words. Was going back to the past a personal affront to the white race? Did it imply that Christianity was dealt a blow, that the American way of life, Western civilization, was a poor substitute for a simple agrarian lifestyle? That democracy and the Puritan work ethic of the whites were all a fraud perpetrated on humanity by a rigid mind-set, no less treacherous in its way than that of a conqueror of another kind?

“ A sacred island, they call it?” she asked. “Is it sacred, or is it like the Seven Sacred Pools, a slogan written by an ad man?”

He raised his shoulders. “I guess Kahoolawe is sacred in the native mind.” But Jim wanted to talk of things associated with the island other than its sacredness to the Hawaiians. “The Ohana, with some big guns in Congress now, won their argument to have the island set aside for cultural and educational purposes. Had the island declared a national freaking historic monument. Can you believe that?” He held his voice down, obviously not wishing Awai or the crewmen to hear him on this.

“ Why do they regard the island as sacred? And if it was sacred, how did they ever lose control of it in the first place?”

“ They were herded off the island when the military declared it theirs. They hadn't any choice in the matter, and they weren't exactly prepared to take on the U.S., either through force or through the courts, believe me.”

She repeated her question. “What makes it sacred to them?”

“ Usual crap.”

“ Jim, why're you sounding so… so unlike yourself over this? Why're you sounding like a racist?”

He took a deep breath and blew it out toward the island, which was taking on more formidable size before them. “Because now this sacred place, this native Hawaiian jurisdiction, is a sanctuary, a natural haven for fugitives like Lopaka Kowona. That's why. And it frustrates and infuriates me that they hide behind a wall of sacred cows when in fact this place is no better policed than Indian Territory in the American West of the 1800s. Just pisses me off, and it hasn't got squat to do with race or sacredness.”

“ You still haven't answered my question.”

'They think it sacred because in ancient times it was known as Kanaloa, after one of the four major Hawaiian gods. It's mentioned all the time in their chants and the legends passed down through the generations. At one time all travelers to Tahiti stopped on the island to perform rituals before journeying on, and in 1874, King David Kalakaua was personally brought here by his kahuna — “

“ His kahuna? His priest?”

“ Yeah, his priest… to purge himself before ascending to the throne. There are ancient shrines and fishing temples all over the island, and since the Navy imposed isolation, these shrines are in excellent condition, so the Ohana, naturally-”

“ I see; understood. Then maybe the Ohana were right, their intentions good.”

“ The road to hell is paved with good intentions,” he countered. “I don't know. I'm just a cop when it comes down to it, way out of navigable waters here. The PKO did force the Navy to make a comprehensive study of the environmental impact of the shelling and bombing, and a thorough survey of the archaeological sites and conditions of each. Amazingly, the shrines survived all the hits. The Ohana also managed in '81 to gain the historic site status which made the Navy's continued policy of obliterating the place appear downright un-American.”

“ Not to mention stupid.” She laughed lightly at this. “Cunning move for the kanakas, heh, Joe? Chalk one up.”

“ Right, the beginning of the checkmate, if you ask me, because next the Ohana won the right for natives to visit the island four days a month for ten months each year. While at the same time the U.S. military stubbornly held onto its bombing schedule, at least in the abstract, since they seldom fired again on the island after this.”

“ Damned fools had to know that if some fool scheduled a bomb run on a day when natives were visiting shrines, well, all hell would've broken loose,” she said, laughing. He smiled at the image before continuing. “The northeast shore, where we're landing, a place called Ule Point, is where most of the visitors over the years have made pilgrimages to shrines. It's the area that gets most rainfall and has best survived the U.S. Navy assaults. Nowadays, Polynesians the islands over gather here to 'go native,' to dress in ancient clothing, celebrate ancient ritual and legends, to talk story, their phrase for oral histories. Some of the celebrations have been filmed and can be seen at the Bishop Museum by haoles, but none are invited here.”

“ So the Ohana won in the end.”

“ I don't believe that even the Ohana could've foreseen the actual return of a permanent population to the island.”

“ I see.”

“ It just happened. Pockets of pilgrims who came for the celebrations started slowly to trickle back to stay, most of them booking passage on boats like this one, refugees out of time, you might say, living anachronisms, like this Chief Kowona.”

She sensed a confusion in Parry, a sense of profound sadness for these people he spoke of in such analytical terms. She asked, “Before the Navy controlled the island, it held a permanent population?”

“ Yes, the diehards who from the first contact with the white man resisted becoming assimilated, and before World War II there were some flourishing ranches on the island, owned by whites who'd come in the 1870s. For a time before the cattle ranchers, King Kamehameha III had turned the island into a penal colony, which failed miserably. After the attack on Pearl Harbor, Kahoolawe fell into the control of the military, the ranchers on the island suddenly finding themselves as disenfranchised as the natives.”

“ Can the island support a permanent population now?”

“ Doubtful, really…”

“ Oh? Why?” The breeze lifted her auburn hair, tying it in knots.

“ The island's been used traditionally as a fishing base.”

“ The soil no good for agriculture?” she asked.

'The soil has been determined to be excellent for modem agriculture, but for hoe and rake subsistence farming, who knows.” Jim stretched, yawning, obviously tired. “Most Hawaiians are, or have been, unable to cope with Kahoolawe's changing weather, you know, cold nights and treacherous summers, so they've naturally opted for the larger, more fertile islands.”

“ The other native islanders still use Kahoolawe as a fishing base, then,” she remarked.

Frowning now, he added, “It's going to be hell reclaiming the fragile ground cover destroyed by the wild goats and the scraff- ings. Soil erosion's on an enormous scale here. And without the U.S. military's help and proper management of water resources, the island's just going to continue to be parched. Much of it is a no-man's-land, like I said.”

“ Sounds to me like it took some courage to return here,” she told him.

“ No doubt of it,” he nearly shouted, his voice traveling over the waters of the channel. Toning himself down, he continued. “Meanwhile, Maui County would like to control and manage the island.”

“ Maui County covers the island of Maui?”

“ And neighboring Lanai, there in the distance.” He pointed out the dark, sleeping giant in the northern sky. “Maui County also wants to return the island to human habitation; has for years, and many Hawaiians working within the system have fought for county control. They want a major reforestation effort, irrigation canals built, but-”

“ But the Ohana wants control in the hands of the people.”

“ Exactly. They don't trust any governmental intrusion, and they've amassed a lot of native clout to push their beliefs on the rest of the Hawaiian population.”

“ Well, Jim, realistically speaking, if the PKO hadn't forced the issue, do you think anyone could have wrested the island from military control?”

Parry frowned, considering this, and without a word spoken she knew he had to agree.

“ So, we're dealing with what, a feudal system, a native law and a local chieftain?”

“ They've got their own way of doing things, now that the government has relinquished all claims to the land, setting it up as protectorate in a sense, like Puerto Rico, like the Indian Nation of Oklahoma Territory before the Civil War. The U.S. will only intervene in their affairs at the request of their elected officials.”

“ Is the chief elected?”

“ Not on your life.”

“ Power by family name, Kowona?”

“ Exactly, and we might assume that he doles out his own kind of justice as freely as a Hell's Angels biker king.”

“ Hmmmmm, I see.” She considered this. “And given that Lopaka is the son of the chief, it follows that-”

“ I wouldn't look for too much in the way of justice. They don't give a damn about our ways or our laws; in fact, they pretty much despise our way of life, and like I've said, they've harbored fugitives in the past.”

“ Really?”

“ No one quite of Lopaka Kowona's caliber, I grant you. Thieves, crooks, scoundrels of various stripe, the occasional tax dodger, pickpocket and the like. No one's ever quite sure, because no one seeking asylum on Kahoolawe has ever been extradited or returned of his own accord, or so they say.”

“ They just don't play by our rules. So if Kowona has gone home, he knows this.”

“ Exactly.”

“ And if we can't return him to Maui County, we'll never see justice done. He can never be tried for his grisly crimes,” she said, finishing his thoughts.

“ Any wonder Ivers pointed me to Awai when I called him?”

“ Ivers? How'd-”

“ The ol' fool wanted us to wait for him to fly over. He's still in hospital, half blind, but he's going to fly over. I convinced him we could get the job done.”

“ How'd you know Ivers would have such contacts here?”

“ Ivers used to be a Maui cop for many years before going to the HPD, and he frequently visits the island both for pleasure and on manhunt. He does bail bondsman's work on the side.”

The boat now moved swiftly ahead of the current in the open waters of the Alalakeiki Channel, the depths here shallow and glassy. The ship's master at the wheel wore a grim look now, the smiling eyes flat, straight-lined, revealing nothing. Jessica got the sensation of a trap being laid, a web being spun by the Jolly Roger of Hawaii and his leering crew, but maybe she was just jumpy, she told herself.

“ Jim, just how well does Ivers know these guys?” she asked, her eyes going once again from crew member to crew member.

“ It doesn't matter, Jess.”

“ It matters to me.”

He deeply breathed in the Hawaiian night. “Okay, if you must know. Ivers actually suggested a boat captain named Kaupau, but his boat's in for repairs and his crew was nowhere to be found. Kaupau put me onto Ben Awai.”

She sighed in sad resignation, and under her breath she cursed. “So you don't know a damned thing about Awai and his pirates?” For some reason now the filth of the boat deck bothered her far more than before, and the crowded deck also seemed to be closing in, too small for five people.

Awai's boat took on odors she hadn't noticed before. Fishing nets reeked of ancient kills, coiled as they were in all areas where she stepped, some looking in need of repair. Overhead a winch and derrick used for lifting large caches of fish tapped out an eerie requiem in the trade winds. Jim was right, the island they neared was cold. She felt a chill embrace her, nipping at her neck and tingling her most deeply embedded bones.

“ I'm no longer comfortable about Captain Awai and his boys, Jim.”

“ They don't get paid in full until we return, and they know it. Relax, will you? Will you quit worrying?”

Another glance in Ben Awai's direction evoked a smile from the man, but she thought it forced, his yellow teeth glinting dully in the moonlight.

Ahead of them loomed Kahoolawe, out of shadow now, bathed in a blue light.

“ How do we know we won't be seen, coming straight on this way? she asked.

“ Ben Awai's boat trades routinely with the natives.”

“ By night?”

“ No, by day, but if we're spotted, Awai assures me he can find a safe harbor. There're no wharves or ports, so we'll anchor and raft in, just the three of us.”

“ Does he know where Kowona's people are?”

“ He says he does, yes.”

“ How far from shore's the village?”

“ Not very, he says. A few miles inland, but it's a dense jungle. If you want to remain behind-”

“ Not with those two, no way.”

“ Hold it down,” he cautioned. “You never know how much English they understand.”

“ You're not leaving me behind!”

“ Okole nani,” said one of the crewmen as he passed by to get to some rigging.

“ What'd he say?” she asked Jim.

“ He… it's meant as a compliment in these parts, Jess.”

“ What the hell'd he say?”

“ He either said you behind is beautiful or that it's in the way.”

“ My behind is what?”

“ He heard you say the word 'behind,' and must've thought-”

She gritted her teeth and spoke through them. “I'm not staying behind.”

“ All right, all right. You've come this far.”

She nodded authoritatively, effectively ending the conversation.

Midnight, July 21. the Island of Kahoolawe

They were skirting the island now, coming about into a snug bay the captain called Kanapou, an area made up of several small bays. Noticeably, with this side of the island facing Maui and the channel, away from the ocean, there were no crashing waves here. Rather, the channel waters ruled here with a tranquil peace. They put in as close to shore as Awai dared, fearful of grounding his boat, and there they came to anchor.

“ Well, we're here, and so far I've not seen any spears whizz by,” said Jim, lowering the inflatable over the side.

Captain Ben Awai, inspecting Jim's work, insisted that Jim try the raft first. Once it held Jim, he crooked his neck, tilted his head and gave an approving look, his smile returning. He then climbed down the rickety ladder of his own boat to the inflatable. Jessica followed, finding a seat opposite Jim, who was already pulling on the oars.

“ Ben Awai gets the raft as partial payment for his help,” Parry informed her.

“ Aha, the plot thickens,” she replied.

Ben Awai patted the sides of the fat inflatable approvingly and sputtered, “Ko'u… mine. It is soon mine.” He sounded like a child just given the biggest gift from below the Christmas tree, she thought, but then it was a state-of-the-art piece of Army issue. She wondered how the raft had materialized, how Parry had performed this nifty trick… but there was too much on her mind to pursue it. Ben Awai spoke as they neared the shore. “There, there,” he pointed. “Best place to hide raft. Beyond is path. I take you.”

The raft silendy glided in over the top of the turquoise sea which lazily lapped at the desolate island, much of which was barren wasteland as a target for bombing runs over the years, but this beach head looked as lush as Hana, or nearly so. The island was a relative latecomer in the chain of islands here, nowhere near as large as Maui's 729 square miles, which was over twenty times Kahoolawe's size.

There was also a conspicuous absence of construction. No condos here, no resorts, no paved roads. It was the antithesis of Honolulu, the primal, waidng jungle alone greeting them like stone vegetation, creating its own gaping maw where a foot-path showed the way. Until Ben Awai pointed out the near- inconsequential footpath, she could see no way to penetrate the dense wall of bougainvillea, kedwe trees and palms.

The raft, which Parry and Awai had pulled carefully to shore, was now quickly camouflaged.

“ We go dis way,” said Awai, leading them into the forest that hugged the bay. Behind them a small, warm light marked the boat at anchor, looking like a harbor buoy now. Soon, even this light was extinguished by the thick forest through which they trekked. A quick glance at the luminous dial of her watch told Jessica it was nearing 2 A.M. Her ankles already throbbing, she wondered how long she might hold out. It had been a strenuous thirty-six hours: first the search for Lopaka on Oahu, then the helicopter ride to Hana on Maui, followed by the dive and the bone find, and now this. She almost wished she had her cane back, just to lean on.

She felt herself beginning to limp, the old pain returning. Jim, from moment to moment, looked over his shoulder from where he followed on Awai's heels. Each man had taken turns at the lead, each chopping away at the clinging vegetation on either side of the footpath.

“ Seeing would be nice,” she said to herself.

“ What's that?” he asked.

“ Nothing, never mind,” she said.

“ You okay, Jess?”

“ Yes, damnit!” She sounded more angry than she was.

Awai just kept working at the vines ahead of him, expertly chopping away, the results visible as the foliage opened for them. Awai paid Jim and her no mind after a while, until he suddenly pulled up short, gasping for air, his hand covering his pounding heart. Parry went forward, asking in hushed tones about what had startled the big Hawaiian.

Awai pointed to a heiau, a religious temple with a totem carved out of the rock here. The devilish eyes of the god stared back at the party, an angry scowl forming features somewhat between those of an evil beast and a man. The temple, restored somewhat, or at least reclaimed from the dense vegetation growing up around it and clinging to it, showed just how effectively the ancient Hawaiians had used their meager island resources of stone and wood.

“ How far to the village?” asked Parry.

“ That way,” replied Awai as if he did not understand. “I stay here.”

“ Whataya mean, you stay here?”

“ I stay back. I no like make trouble with the chief of these people.”

“ Don't do this to me, Ben.”

“ It's not far.” The big man continued to gasp. “Go north annuder fifteen, twenty minutes maybe, Joe. Stay on path.”

“ You're going to take us there, Awai. We made a deal. We may need an interpreter, and we certainly need a guide, for which you're being paid well.”

“ I got you here. I' no interpreter.”

“ We need you,” Jessica said, adding her plea.

“ No need me. No need interpreter. Many in village speak English.”

“ You damned fool,” Parry said, tugging at the big man. “We don't want a luau with the villagers. We don't want them to even know we're here! We just may need you in the event we're spotted.”

“ We might get more cooperation if you're with us,” Jessica told the man.

He obstinately shook his head. He turned to find a log to sit on, and after he'd comfortably arranged his bulk there like a sitting bull, he looked up into the muzzle of Jim's. 38 revolver. The metal bore he stared down needed no further explanation, end of argument.

“ Get up and get ahead of us, Awai. You're being paid to guide us, so get to it.”

Awai's feelings looked quite bruised, his dark, meaty face blanched and pinched. “You haoles and your guns. Damn you, you no heah so good? Dey no like me over heah.” He indicated the general direction of the village. “Usually trade at the shore. No like dem old ways and magic. Dem people spook me, and… and some I owe goods to.”

“ Just get us there,” Parry said with bitter authority.

Awai returned to striking at the canopy of vines ahead of them. “You hard man, Mr. Parry, no menemene.”

“ No sympathy,” Jim told her.

The big man was perspiring in the cold night. She worried he could turn on Jim with the cane cutter.

“ Be careful of that machete, Jim,” she whispered, but it was a useless warning when all around them the rain forest itself came to sudden life, painted limbs reaching out to them, dark faces and eyes following, brandishing native weapons and machetes. They took hold of Jim and her before Jim could get off a shot, and before she could reach for the gun at her ankle.

Jim was knocked down, a huge spear pinning him at the spine to the earth. Awai was likewise manhandled. All other eyes, straining from behind war paint, were on Jessica.

“ Oh, Jesus,” she moaned.

They were prisoners of the island, prisoners of Chief Kowona.

Awai was cursing in his native tongue, glaring at Parry and Jessica as he was being led away by the village warriors.

They were neither tied nor abused, but Jim's weapon was taken and the native men, spears in hand, forced them onward toward the village they sought.

“ No chance we'll lose our way now,” she joked, displaying more nerve than she felt.

“ Damn me,” Parry moaned. “I should've forced you to remain in Maui. I should've left you at the hotel.”

“ I'd hate you for a long time if you had.”

“ And what, you don't hate me for this? Getting you involved in what's bound to become a very sticky international incident if we're lucky enough to ever get off this island with all our parts intact?”

“ We're not dealing with cannibals, Jim. Are we?”

“ No, but I can imagine what the old chief's going to do with us.”

“ What?”

“ Bind us over-literally-to U.S. authorities. Don't know 'bout you, but there goes my pension.”

“ Shut up, haole ilioV shouted one of the men in paint with frightening force and venom. Jessica was told by Jim that the stocky Hawaiian had just called the Chief of FBI's Hawaii Bureau a white dog with a loose tongue.

Jessica swallowed her fear and shouted back, stunning the painted warriors. “Hey, you just tell your chief that this man you call a dog is also an important chief.”

“ Jess,” Parry cautioned.

“ No, no… they have a right to know who their dealing with. Chief.”

“ Everybody knows who Parry is,” said the native coldly.

“ What? How'd you know his name?”

Parry's eyes had already fixed on Captain Ben Awai.

“ You bastard.”

“ I knew this was a setup,” shouted Jessica, pulling her arm free of a native who ushered her along.

“ This whole thing was engineered, wasn't it?” asked Parry of Awai. “When? When did you know who we were?”

“ News travels fast around the islands, especially on the Hawaiian hot line, Chief Parry. You've been watched since leaving Oahu, and we know of your desecration of the burial site at the Spout.”

“ You're PKO?” asked Jessica.

“ Every Hawaiian is PKO. Some of them just don't know it yet,” replied Awai sternly.

“ Then you do know the chief here.”

“ That's right.”

“ And you wanted your cover protected, so you wanted to wait at the shrine, or were you simply going to turn back for your boat and disappear?”

“ All of the above, but it appears the chief wants to see me as well.”

“ I see your English has improved since we came ashore, too,” said Parry, his teeth now set in anger at the man. “You just better pray, white man.”

Jessica exploded at Awai even as she fought to keep on her feet, what with being shoved forward. “You harm an agent of the FBI and your little island paradise here'll be swarming with U.S. marshals and G-men. It'll make Waco, Texas, look like a backyard barbecue! Is that what you want, you… you native son of a-?”

“ You don't have no juice here, and your haole threats fall empty on Hawaiian soil, so shut up, white bitch.”

“ Do as he says, Jess. Hold onto your temper. We'll have to use our wits here, negotiate an agreement, some sort of amicable settlement so we can extradite Lopaka Kowona. That's all we're here for.”

“ I can just imagine what they'd like for a settlement. Especially Lopaka Kowona,” Jess replied in defeat.

“ Settlement, agreement, you haoles,” said Awai, shaking his head sadly. “You're trying to write up one treaty while you're trampling another.”

She countered, “You know why we're here! What kind of an animal we're tracking!”

“ The island is off-limits to U.S. military personnel, and the entire Caucasian race. That's what was granted us, this scrap of native land. You desecrate it without a thought, and you look for leniency from our chief?”

They were forced onward to march to the village. Parry leaned into her and said, “Don't worry, Jess. They're not so stupid as to harm us.”

“ Who even knows we're here, Jim? Anyone?”

Parry gritted his teeth and air seeped through them in a hiss. “Only Ivers, but Tony's smart. He'll figure it out.” Just then they smelled wood fires and the lingering cooking odors of the village, and in a moment flickering fireflies shown among the wall of green darkness before them, campfires.

Ben Awai brandished the cane cutter and Parry's. 38 over his head as he welcomed himself into camp ahead of the others, calling out his name repeatedly, “Awai, Awai!”

Ben was greeted by several of the children who'd come awake and wandered to the noise. Women, too, hung on Ben Awai until he shooed them off with their children in tow.

Jim and Jessica were pushed ahead, out of the dense foliage where they might have found safe hiding, a point from which to observe the village at a safe distance, spying to determine if Lopaka were actually there or not. But all those plans were dashed now, and they were forced to their knees in a neady carved clearing where traditional huts stood about the circle of a communal campfire.

Jessica felt her stomach chum, fearing the worst lay ahead of them, getting extremely annoyed at the same time with the short creep that kept poking her ribs with a war club.

She wondered if these people were f6r real or if they were like the survivalists she'd encountered on tf^e mainland, who were more obsessed with a lifestyle than committed to a way of life. The native population was crowded around them, obscuring her view, but she could hear the collective gasp that followed in the wake of Chief Kowona, who parted an Army-issue tarp acting as an entryway cover and came towards them, wearing a thick feathered headdress.

She felt Jim's hand grasp hers and tightly squeeze. “Let me do the talking. If you talk, he'll see it as a sign of weakness.”

“ Whose weakness?”

“ Mine.”