Rafferty and Ginny approached Ginny's vehicle in the Pikake Lounge parking lot. Ginny drove a bright white ambulance with "Ilima Chapel" stenciled on the doors.

Ginny unlocked the doors. "I'm still following in my father's footsteps."

Rafferty said, "How is he, anyway?"

Ginny hesitated. "He died six years ago. Mom, too."

They climbed into the ambulance.

Ginny said, "Mom and Dad were flying back from Kauai. He had a heart attack and the plane fell into the sea. No survivors."

"Ginny, I'm so very sorry for you."

Ginny started the car. "I gave them a lovely funeral."

As the ambulance left the parking lot, Ginny said, "What are you doing these days?"

Rafferty said, "Have you seen those newspaper stories that start out ‘Senate Investigators alleged that—?’ That's my beat. Washington, D.C."

"You’re a Senate investigator?" She was impressed.

Rafferty wouldn’t threaten a cover story.

The white ambulance drove uphill on a mainly deserted Hawaiian highway.

Ginny said, "What are you here for? Or can't you tell me?"

"Just here to see some people who live up in the hills. Seeing if the baby-sitter needs anything."

Ginny said, "Don't go prancing around in the hills too much. At least not alone, okay?" Seeing Rafferty puzzled, she said, "You could get shot, or—"

Rafferty joked, "Or worse?"

"Terry, this is harvest time. People forget everything else at harvest. They're got to get their crops in. And you don't just drop in on people. Even old friends."

"Marijuana, you mean? Is that stuff still going on?"

"Did you think it ever went away?"

"Ginny, you’re making me nostalgic. How much is it going for these days?"

Ginny was cold. "About three thousand dollars a pound."

Rafferty said, "That much!"

Ginny said, "Right now the paranoia is incredible. The growers are afraid to lose what they've worked so hard for. All it takes is a tourist from Japan, some backpacker from the Mainland—" She looked at Rafferty. "Some Washington, D.C., investigator wandering through the woods ... " She gestured out at the night. "These growers mauka, they'll shoot you right where you stand. And this haole is never heard from again."

"Mauka?"

"Mauka is a direction. It means towards the mountains. Makai means towards the sea. In Hawaii, you're either going mauka or makai."

"You make it sound like some voodoo curse in the movies," Rafferty said. In a stage voice he said, "If you go mauka, maybe you never come back."

Ginny said, "Maybe you not come back."

Rafferty and Ginny had tropical drinks in a side booth at Suszie’s Sugar Shack, a touristy nightclub whose trademark was a giant neon sign framed by palm trees. The club featured lanai seating, bamboo walls, flaming torches around a live fish pond, tourists and locals, and a good floor show.

Ginny raised her drink. "To old friends."

Rafferty raised his drink. "To old friends."

They clinked glasses and drank.

Deputy Sheriff Eddie Ka’aina, a big, burly Hawaiian in uniform, saw Rafferty and Ginny and joined them, sliding in beside Ginny. "Ginny?"

Ginny told Rafferty, "Terry, meet Eddie Ka’aina, my fiancee." Then she told Eddie, "And this is Terry Rafferty, an old friend from San Francisco."

Putting out his hand, Rafferty said, "I'm pleased to meet you."

Eddie ignored the hand and told Rafferty, with jealousy, "What are you doing here?"

Ginny said, "Eddie!"

The sudden tension could be cut with a knife.

"A business trip," Rafferty said. "I'm only here for a few days."

Eddie told Ginny, "I recognize him from the old photos."

Ginny asked, "How's tonight going?"

Eddie threatened Rafferty, "Stay away from Ginny. We're getting married."

A noisier row across the room broke the tension.

An angry, half-drunk Lester Rahler, beer bottle in hand, stood near a round table, at which five young women were sitting, several who wore nurse's uniforms. Cheryl Park, one of the nurses, a pretty young Korean woman, was the bone of contention, and the other women were encircling her, protecting her. A large plate glass window was behind their table.

A very thin, blonde and beautiful woman stood between the circle of women and Lester. She wore an aloha shirt identical to the one Tomo Oteas had been wearing earlier, again the white bird of paradise against a flaming sunset.

Lester Rahler told Nora, "I want to talk with her outside."

Nora stood up to him. "She doesn't want to. You better leave, Lester."

Lester said, "Nora, she can tell me herself outside."

As Eddie left their booth, Ginny told Rafferty, "That's Lester Rahler. He's poison. The blonde is Nora Buchanan. She's the Sheriff's sister-in-law."

A beer bottle crashed at Nora's feet, startling everyone.

Lester stood in the aisle, empty-handed, glaring at Nora.

Nora was livid. "You stupid shit!"

Lester punched Nora in the nose. She fell to the floor.

Nora sat on the floor, blood coming from her nose, and a glazed look in her eye.

Eddie grabbed Lester's shoulder to spin him around.

Lester went berserk. He barreled at the deputy, carried the deputy, and using their combined momentum, threw them both against the plate glass window. The window shattered, and the deputy's head and shoulders crashed against the large hole that appeared.

People cried, screamed, hollered and cursed. Chairs were toppled, tipped over. A pitcher of margaritas crashed to the floor.

Lester had the deputy sprawled on his back, his neck hanging over the edge of the broken glass window. Lester pushed down on the deputy, trying to saw off the deputy's neck with what was left of the window. The deputy choked, flailed his arms, and his neck splattered blood.

Rafferty and Ginny, on their feet, shoved their way through the onlookers, Ginny falling behind.

Lester was on a rampage, trying to choke the deputy, slice his throat, to kill him with a broken window. But the deputy's shirt collar was up, it covered most of his neck, protected it from most of the glass. Still, blood in great gobs was splashed around.

Lester planted a knee on the deputy's chest, then tried hopping on his chest, jumping up and down, screaming, "Die, fucker, die!"

Broken glass cracked beneath the deputy’s collar.

Rafferty grabbed a pitcher of margaritas and with a roundhouse swing smacked Lester in the head. The glass cracked apart, and Lester ricocheted away from the bleeding deputy. Rafferty went after Lester with the broken pitcher, Lester backed off, threw a chair in Rafferty's path, then took off through the hole in the window.

Rafferty followed Lester through the broken window. Rafferty saw Lester leaping onto a parked car. Lester kept moving, across the parked car, then he jumped onto the roof of a station wagon coming down the street. Then he was across the street and running away.

Rafferty was left standing on the sidewalk.

Lester Rahler ran like a deer through the streets and the night. His head was back, his nostrils flaring, the adrenaline coursing through him. After moments, he slowed, then stopped. His chest heaved from the effort. Aching, in pain, he leaned up against a telephone pole to catch his wind. Most of his clothes were splattered with blood and booze.

Lester's eyes were crazed. After a moment, he started laughing hysterically, from the sheer joy that came when trouble explodes around him, but then his laughter died off. Then, grimly determined, he looked back at where he came.

Rafferty brought the ambulance up by the front door of Suszie’s Sugar Shack, got out and opened the rear hatch, just as Nora, Ginny and Cheryl Park were helped outside with a folding-chair-used-as-a-stretcher carrying Eddie.