Twenty blue devils

Chapter 9

But there is no such thing as a reasonable hour at which to arrive in Papeete. By balsa raft, maybe, but not if you're coming by scheduled airline service. International flights over the South Pacific are overnight affairs, geared to arrive on the far side of the ocean-in Auckland, or Los Angeles, or Santiago-at a decent hour of the morning, which means they touch down in Tahiti at midnight if you're lucky, or 3 A.M. if you're not.

John and Gideon weren't. They arrived at Papeete's Faaa Airport at 2:45 A.M. Gideon was not at his best. When he traveled he generally tried to follow the rules laid down by his old professor, Abe Goldstein, in his field anthropology course. Rule One was: never arrive in a strange place at night on an empty stomach. “In the dark and with a low blood sugar level,” Abe had warned with somber emphasis, “new places don't look so hot."

Well, there was nothing wrong with his blood sugar level. The breakfast of eggs Benedict served just before landing had been wonderful, and he had amazed himself by eating all of it a bare three hours after dinner, but with less than two hours of sleep in between he was queasy and unsettled. And that second cognac, which had seemed like a good idea at the time, didn't seem like one now. In addition, there was the surreal jet-age shock that came from having stepped into an upholstered canister in funky, familiar L.A., relaxing for the duration of a couple of good meals, and then stepping out of it into a place where everything was abruptly exotic: the snatches of conversation in liquid French and soft, rhythmic Tahitian, the smells, the noises, the way people walked and gestured, the moist, tropical air as thick as cream.

They walked through the marble-walled, open-air lobby, past groups consisting mostly of excited, handsome, bronze-skinned Tahitians, many of the women with flowers in their hair and flower leis in their hands, waiting to greet returnees. At the curbside in front, where Nick had promised to have someone on hand to pick them up, hotel and travel agency vans were lined up with open doors. Beside them, staff members, mostly French or American, were marking off their clipboard checklists in the light of the street lamps, greeting their travel-dazed charges with only slightly forced smiles, and loading them efficiently into the vans, docile and subdued, each with a lei now draped over his or her slumping shoulders.

John looked on with narrowed eyes. “If anybody tries to put a lei around my neck,” he told Gideon, “they're dead meat. I'm telling you.” John had had three cognacs after dinner, not two, and he was clearly regretting it.

"It looks as if you don't have anything to worry about,” Gideon said, scanning the names on the vans. Tahiti Nui Travel, Sofitel Maeva Beach, Tahitian Odyssey Adventure, la Orana Tours, Aroma Travel…" There's nothing here from the Shangri-La."

"There's gotta be. If Nick said he arranged-"

"Johnny! Over here!"

Shambling toward them from the lobby was a large, loose-limbed man in his sixties, wearing shorts, tank top, and thongs. Even from forty feet away, Gideon could see the fuzzy mat of light hair that covered his shoulders and arms.

John brightened. “Nick! What are you doing here? It's the middle of the night."

"Well, hell, I thought I'd take one more crack at convincing you to bunk at my place. There's all kinds of room. You too, Dr. Oliver.” He stuck out his hand. “Nick Druett. Nick."

Gideon shook the offered hand. “Gideon."

"What do you say, John?"

John shook his head. “Wouldn't work, Unc. I already explained why."

"Explain it again, would you? I didn't quite get it the first time."

"Because,” John said, “when you're coming to look into a fishy death in the family, the last place you want to stay is the family homestead. It cramps your style."

"But why? We wouldn't get in your way, you know that."

"That's not the point, Nick,” John said patiently.

"Well, what is the point?” Angrily, Nick pushed shaggy, thinning hair somewhere between blond and white from his forehead. “You can't actually think that anyone in the family had anything to do with it, can you?"

John looked uncomfortable. “It's been known to happen."

Gideon was surprised. Not once had John mentioned the possibility of his family's involvement in Brian's death. That was like him, though; he would have felt disloyal bringing up family suspicions to an outsider, even to Gideon. But he was a good cop too; he wouldn't have discounted them either.

Nick made a grumbling noise. “Well, that's a hell of a note, is all I can say. Tell me, who do you suspect? Celine? Therese?” He stuck out his chin. “The twins, maybe?"

"Come on, Nick,” John said. “I'm just trying to do it right.” He appealed to Gideon. “Am I right, Doc?"

"Yeah,” Nick demanded, “is he right, Doc?"

Gideon hunted for the right words. He wasn't happy about being in the middle of a family dispute before he even got out of the airport. “Well, it's not so much a question of suspecting any particular person, Nick,” he said carefully, “it's just that, um, the investigative process can be compromised if it's not carried out in an environment of strict impartiality and disinterest."

John vigorously nodded his agreement. “That's what I said."

Nick's laugh was much like John's, a sudden, sunny burble that lit up his face. “You wish that was what you said.” His smile took in Gideon too. “I always did like professors."

He reached over and ruffled John's hair, something Gideon had never seen the big FBI agent submit to before, and placed his other hand easily on Gideon's shoulder. “Okay, you win. Come on, guys, I'll drive you over to the Shangri-La."

On the way to the car, he said: “So, should I be calling you ‘Doc'? Is that what people call you?"

"Only one,” Gideon said with a nod in John's direction. “In all the known world."

John shrugged. “Hey, can I help it? To me he looks like a ‘Doc.’ “

"He sure talks like one,” Nick said.

"What kind of car do you drive, Gideon?” Nick asked as they pulled away from the airport onto Highway 5, which like Highways 1, 2, 3, and 4 was something of a euphemism. There was only one “highway” in Tahiti, the coastal road that almost but not quite encircled the island, simply (and inexplicably) changing its name every now and then. The Shangri-La was fifteen miles south of the airport along this road, about a half-mile before Nick's house at Papara.

"Not an Infiniti,” John answered for Gideon. “He works for the government too. Did they exhume Brian's body yet, Nick?"

"Uh, no, not exactly,” Nick said.

John's and Gideon's eyes met briefly in the rearview mirror. Not exactly? How did you not exactly exhume a body?

"When, then?” John asked.

"Oh, there are some details,” Nick said airily. “Not to worry. I'll get it all straightened out."

Gideon leaned forward from the back seat. “I only have a few days, Nick."

"Right, don't worry about it. I'm taking care of it.” He gestured out the window at the darkened streets. “Sorry it's so late or I'd point out the sights to you, Gideon. It's a pretty interesting place."

"I know,” Gideon said. “I was here on vacation with my wife three or four years ago."

"Like it?” Nick asked.

"Very much. Well, I did, anyway. Julie's a native Washingtonian. Three days in a row without rain and she gets restless."

"Is that right?" Nick said as if it was the most fascinating thing he'd heard all week. He was certainly working overtime to avoid any talk about the purpose of their coming.

John too had picked up his reluctance. “Something wrong, Nick? Is there a problem with the exhumation?"

"Problem? No, what kind of problem? I filed the papers as soon as I got back. It just takes time to process them, that's all. We have red tape in Tahiti too, you know. But don't get exercised, there's plenty of time. Hell, the memorial service isn't until next week."

"I'll need to be back home before next week,” Gideon said.

"Fine, no sweat. Look, I'll fill you in tomorrow-I'll fill you both in. But first I want you guys to sleep in as long as you feel like in the morning, have a swim, lay around in the sun, and then come on over whenever you want to in the afternoon. I'll give you the grand tour of the plantation-"

"I've had the grand tour, Unc,” John said. “Twice."

"Well, what about your buddy? Don't you want to see a real, live coffee plantation, Gideon? We'll even throw in a free tasting."

"Sure,” Gideon said.

"Good, and then you're both coming to dinner-I have the whole clan over every Monday, you know, and they're all looking forward to-” He threw a narrowed glance at John. “Now you better not start giving me a hard time about this too, pal.” The glance flicked around to take in Gideon as well. “The investigative process isn't going to get compromised because you guys sit down for a friendly meal with the family, is it?"

Gideon smiled. “I guess we can take a chance."

"Good, I'm glad to hear it. I'm putting on a real Polynesian feast. Wait'll you see the Twin Terrors, John. Do you realize you haven't seen those little monsters since they were two?"

"I guess that's right, isn't it? How old are they now, four? Can you tell ‘em apart yet?"

The two of them lapsed into family talk while Gideon lay back against the soft leather, not sure if something was really off-tone in the atmosphere, or if it was just the early-morning eggs Benedict catching up somewhere in his system with those late-night brandies.

"This is Dean Parks,” Nick said, introducing the scraggy, elderly man in Western shirt, jeans, and silver-buckled belt behind the Shangri-La's reception desk. “The Texas Kid. He owns the place."

"The whole shebang,” Parks agreed in what was indeed a measured, mournful, East Texas twang. “Mortgage and all."

"Don't let him kid you,” Nick said, “this guy's richer than I am.” He looked at him fondly. “Dino and I go back a long way."

"Unfortunately, I go back longer,” Parks said. “Not, of course, that you'd know it to look at us,"

He was wrong about that. His tanned face was as seamed and dried out as a discarded boot, his throat puckered, his shoulders narrowed with the years, his thin belly sunken. Only his hair was youthful: lank, long, and ferociously black.

"It's clean living as does it,” he explained to Gideon and John.

"That and spending half his disposable income on Grecian Formula,” Nick said.

Parks grinned. “Don't you believe a word of it. Well, welcome to Tahiti, gents. Or as we say here, Ia ora na."

Nick laughed. “Yeah,” he said, “ask him how many other words he knows."

"More than you, anyway,” Parks said. ‘That's for dang sure."

"You're probably right at that,” Nick said agreeably.

The two of them had been friends a long time, he had explained in the car. Private First-Class Nick Druett and Corporal Dean Parks had met during the war, when both of them were in the same platoon, first in the Solomons and then on Bora Bora. Afterward, they had returned individually to French Polynesia to seek their fortunes and had run into each other again. They had talked about going into the hotel business together, but decided to try their luck on their own instead and had enjoyed a friendly competition of sorts ever since.

Nick had put all his money into a large copra plantation on Tahiti. ("The truth is, I didn't even know what the damn stuff was. I didn't know if you farmed it, or grew it on trees, or raised it on the hoof.") He'd done well with it too, but sold off most of the land a few years later and used the money to buy property on the outer islands, where he'd eventually opened a chain of four small hotels that he still owned. The remainder of the old copra plantation was now the Paradise Coffee farm, and although Nick still talked longingly about building more hotels-in particular a huge golf course resort on Bora Bora-his energies had gone increasingly into the coffee business.

Dean, more single-minded, had gone about it differently, sticking to his first project for almost fifty years now. He'd bought a decrepit old hotel on a near-worthless strip of beach between Papara and Paea, torn it down, put up a sprawling collection of ocean-front bungalows-he'd hammered nails right alongside the Tahitian carpenters-and christened the place the Shangri-La. Luck had been on his side. When the new international airport at Faaa eventually opened, turning Tahiti from a remote beachcomber's haven to a jet-set destination, there was only one decent American-style hotel on the island, and the Shangri-La was it.

According to Nick, that's the way it had remained for almost five years, and Parks had raked in the cash. More recently, the hotel chains-the giant Sofitel, the twelve-story Hyatt built into a mountainside-had siphoned off the more lucrative of the American tour groups, but the Shangri-La still had arrangements with several foreign airlines and was holding its own with a steady flow of groups from Chile and Hong Kong. And Dean was a great guy who took care of them in style. Not to worry.

"I'm going to take off now,” Nick said. He smiled at his old friend. “I really appreciate your waiting up for them, Dean."

"No problem. At what I'm charging you, I can afford to give personal service. Shoot, their keys are in the office. I'll be right back."

Nick waited for him to leave. “Um, by the way,” he said, looking just a little sheepish, Gideon thought, “tomorrow, at dinner? Could we not say anything about-well, you know.” He mimed digging with a shovel. “I haven't gotten around to telling them why you're here yet."

Gideon and John looked at each other. There was something funny in the air, all right.

"Nick,” John said, “that doesn't make any sense. They already know why we're here. They were right there when we talked about it at my house, remember? Nelson, Rudy, Maggie-"

"Yes, but they don't necessarily know that's why you're here now. They think you're just coming for the memorial service."

"And me?” Gideon said.

"So? John brought a friend along."

Gideon shook his head. “But I'll be gone by then. Besides, I don't like to-"

"Look, guys, could we do it my way, please? Can't we at least have a nice, friendly family get-together first, without spoiling it with…Look, I promise I'll straighten everything out the next morning. I just hate…ah, what the hell.” His face sagged with exhaustion; the exchange, along with the hour, had taken the starch out of him. For the first time he looked his years. His tired eyes appealed to them. “Just humor me, okay? Just trust me.” He smiled crookedly. “Hell, I guess you must think I'm being pretty funny about this."

Yes, Gideon thought he was being pretty funny, but Parks returned before he could say anything, and Nick made his goodbyes.

"See you next week, Dean?” He dealt imaginary cards. “Old Geezers’ Monthly?"

"Seems like a reasonable assumption,” Parks said, “seeing as how I haven't missed but one game in twenty-two years now and that was when I had my gallbladder out."

"Good, I'm planning to get some of my money back."

"Whup your ass,” Parks replied.

Nick laughed. “And keep it quiet around here in the morning, will you? See that these two get a good night's sleep. Oh, and book ‘em a rental car. On my account. A good Renault.” And with that he was gone.

Parks rang for a husky, sleep-puffed Tahitian porter in a lavalava to take their bags, then led them back himself through the dimly lit reception lobby, moving on lean, long, stiff-jointed legs. The Western look made it only down to his calves. No boots. He was wearing jogging shoes, the kind meant for comfort, not jogging; old men's shoes, purple and gray and stubby, with Velcro straps instead of laces.

"Kind of quiet here right now,” he told them. “You should see it when those crazy Chileans come here. You talk about party animals."

The lobby was built Polynesian-style, without outer walls or doors, more a large breezeway than a room, with rattan chairs and tables arranged in casual groupings on a dully gleaming tiled floor. They went past the empty bar and restaurant, the darkened gift shop, and the travel agent's desk, and finally out to the slate terrace in back, where Parks switched on a flashlight. Then across a lawn of close-cropped grass and onto the moonlit beach. Teacup-sized, pale gray land crabs scuttled sideways out of their path and disappeared into the scores of holes they'd bored in the sand.

Parks stopped at the first of a row of thatch-roofed, bamboo-walled cottages that lined the rear of the narrow beach and handed them keys. “This place's yours, Gideon. You're next door, John. Either of you boys stayed in a thatch-roofed place before?"

Gideon shook his head.

"Not since I was a kid,” John said.

"Well, let me show you the way you best go in at night. First you put a light on.” He climbed the three wooden steps to the door and flicked a switch. A light came on somewhere inside, but the main room stayed dark. “Now you wait,” he said “Give it a minute or so to let the mosquitoes and things go into the bathroom, where the lights at. Then you run in real quick and spray in there-there's a can right near the front door. Then you put on the rest of the lights, see?"

"What do you mean, mosquitoes and things?" John asked. “What else you got in there?"

Parks laughed. “Oh, that's about it. Actually, they shouldn't be much of a problem. Been a dry year. But nobody's used these cottages for a couple weeks, so you never know. Oh, yeah, one more thing: when you spray, always spray down. Don't never aim it at the ceiling."

John glowered suspiciously at him. “Why not?"

"Because whatever's up there living in the thatch, you'd best just leave it alone, that's for dang sure."

After a brief pause John spoke. “Say, Dean, you wouldn't have any rooms with regular walls, would you? And a regular ceiling? I mean, this is real nice and everything-"

"Hell, don't worry about it. It's nothing but lizards. The worst they do is fall off, kerplunk, once in a while, but they just pick theirselves up and scoot back up the walls. Besides, they eat the bugs."

"Oh, lizards,” John said, relieved. “We had lizards in Hilo when I was a kid. Lizards I can live with."

Gideon wasn't so sure he could, but there didn't seem to be much choice, and he was too tired to worry about it. There was only an hour or two left until daylight and he was aching to lie down. If he didn't sleep on his back with his mouth open, which he usually didn't, how much of a problem could falling lizards be?

"Nighty-night, then,” Parks said. “I'll see you fellas tomorrow."

They waited until he was out of earshot, John spoke first. “What's this about Nick's not getting around to telling them what we're doing here?"

"What's this about Nick's not getting around to getting the body exhumed yet?” Gideon answered. “I should have been able to get going tomorrow, John. The body could have been back in the ground long before the memorial service. You'd think he'd want that, wouldn't you?"

John nodded. “Something weird's going on, don't you think?"

Gideon slowly climbed the steps, turning around before he opened the door.

"That's for dang sure,” he said.