The Paradise Affair

Quincannon

If he had had his way, they would have booked passage on the next available steamship bound for San Francisco. A desire to report to R. W. Anderson and return the stock certificates and bearer bonds was one reason, the bad taste left by the deaths of Vereen and Nagle and his misadventures on the Big Island another. But the primary reason was that he missed the city and its familiar haunts, and Carpenter and Quincannon, Professional Detective Services. The old bromide that absence makes the heart grow fonder was never truer than when your home and business were seven days and almost three thousand miles distant.

Sabina, however, was less eager to leave. Now that the weather had improved, the attractions of Waikiki and Honolulu, combined with the well-meaning blandishments of Margaret Pritchard, had her yearning to prolong the vacation aspects of their visit. The matter was settled at dinner with the Pritchards that evening, when Lyman offered to arrange for their first-class passage on an Oceanic steamer from Australia scheduled to depart Honolulu on Tuesday. The prospect of three more days on the island put a sparkle in Sabina’s eyes that Quincannon could not bring himself to dim. Only an unfeeling dolt — he was many things, but that was not one of them — would deny his bride, his partner, and his best friend a simple pleasure. A well-earned one, too, for Philip Oakes had paid the bill she gave him promptly and without complaint.

As it turned out, the delay in their departure was not without benefit for Quincannon, too. On Saturday, Lyman and Margaret took them on a picnic in lush Manoa Valley, and on Sunday to a native luau replete with traditional Polynesian music and dancing, and succulent roast pig. He found these outings almost as enjoyable as how he and Sabina spent their last day on Waikiki, which was to do nothing more than swim in the ocean and lie indolently in the shade of coconut palms.

Both Lyman and Margaret accompanied them to the harbor on Tuesday afternoon. Sabina and Margaret had become staunch friends, a bond strengthened by Sabina’s sterling efforts in the Pettibone matter; they promised to write regularly and to arrange a get-together when the Pritchards made their annual trip to San Francisco the following year, and Margaret issued an open invitation for another island visit. The get-together, if not the invitation, suited Quincannon. His small coterie of social acquaintances did not normally include corporation executives, but Lyman was more congenial by far than any he’d dealt with in California.

When the Oceanic steamer sailed out of Honolulu Harbor, he stood with Sabina at the rail for his last glimpse of Hawaii’s tropical lushness. Now that he was departing, he had to admit that his feelings toward the Islands had mellowed. They had a certain amount of allure, to be sure. Although another visit was unlikely given the demands of their profession, he supposed he might not be averse to it someday to please Sabina.

The mellowness lasted until the steamer was two days from the Golden Gate. That was when a sudden storm as fierce as those on the westbound crossing set the sea a-churn, the ship to pitching and rolling, and Quincannon lurching to their stateroom.

He lay abed, green-gilled and groaning despite Sabina’s tender ministrations, and silently vowed that he would shoot himself before he took another ocean voyage. As for paradise, he thought morosely, one man’s version was another man’s aversion. Travel to such a place was all in the eye — and the stomach — of the beholder.