Micro

“They’re not going to make Tantalus anyway. They took a tumble, poor souls.”

Chapter 35

Kalikimaki Industrial Park 31 October, 10:30 a.m.

Lieutenant Dan Watanabe parked his brown Ford in the single, lone parking space marked VISITORS. The painted metal building stood next to the skeleton of a half-finished warehouse on one side and an empty lot on the other side dotted with thickets of underbrush. By the warehouse, he noticed an area covered with gravel. He walked over to it and picked up a few pieces. Crushed limestone. Interesting. It looked like the same stuff trapped in the PI Rodriguez’s tires. He dropped a few pieces in his shirt pocket, for Dorothy Girt to have a look at.

The parking lot around Nanigen’s building was full of cars.

“How’s business?” he said to the receptionist.

“They don’t tell me much.”

A coffeemaker on a table diffused the sour smell of coffee that had been heating for hours.

“Would you like me to make some coffee?” the receptionist asked.

“I think you already did.”

The company’s security chief walked in. Don Makele was a heavyset man packed with muscle. Makele said, “Any news on the missing students?”

“Could we talk in your office?”

As they entered the main part of the building, they passed doors that were shut. Windows looked into rooms, but the windows were covered with black blinds on the inside. Why were the blinds all drawn? Why were they black? As he walked along, Dan Watanabe felt the presence of a hum, a vibration coming up through the floor. That hum meant there was a lot of AC electrical current running in the building. For what?

Makele ushered Watanabe into his office. Windowless. Watanabe noticed a photograph of a woman, must be the guy’s wife. Two children, just keiki s. He noticed a plaque on the wall. U.S. Marine Corps.

Watanabe sat on a chair. “Nice kids.”

“I love ’em to death,” Makele said.

“You served in the Marines?”

“Intel.”

“That’s cool.” Chitchat never hurts, and you can pick up things. “We found your vice president, Alyson Bender-” he began.

“We know. She was very depressed.”

“What got her depressed?”

“She’d lost her boyfriend, Eric Jansen. Who drowned.”

“So Ms. Bender and Mr. Jansen were romantically connected, I take it,” Watanabe said. He could feel the uneasiness of the man under the surface. Cop instinct. He went on: “It’s actually pretty hard for seven people to vanish in these islands. I’ve called around to see if the students showed up anywhere. Like Molokai. Everybody on Molokai knows everybody else on Molokai. If seven kids from Massachusetts showed up there, the Molokai folks would be talking about it.”

“Don’t I know. I was born on Moloka‘i,” Makele said.

Watanabe noticed that he pronounced the name of the island in the old way. Moloka‘i. With the glottal stop. It made him wonder if Makele spoke any Hawaiian. People born on Molokai sometimes did speak Hawaiian; they learned it from their grandparents or from “uncles”-traditional teachers. “Molokai is a beautiful place,” Watanabe remarked.

“It’s the old Hawai‘i. What’s left of it.”

Watanabe changed the subject. “Do you know a gentleman named Marcos Rodriguez?”

Makele looked blank. “No.”

“How about Willy Fong. A lawyer up north of the freeway.” Watanabe did not mention they were dead.

Makele picked it up anyway. “Sure-” He squinted, looked puzzled. “The guys who got stabbed, right?”

“Yes, in Fong’s office. Fong, Rodriguez, and another man, still unidentified.”

Makele seemed confused. He spread his hands out and said, “What am I missing, lieutenant?”

“I don’t know.” Watanabe watched Makele to see his reaction to that.

Makele seemed surprised and irritated, but he stayed calm. Watanabe was pleased to see that the security chief fidgeted in his chair. He’s nervous, Watanabe thought.

“What I know about those murders,” Don Makele went on, “is what I saw on the news.”

“What makes you think they were murders?”

“It’s what they said on the news.” Makele paused.

“Actually they said it was suicide,” Watanabe said. “Did you think it was murder?”

Makele didn’t take it casually. “Lieutenant, is there some reason why you want to talk to me about this-?”

“Fong or Rodriguez weren’t doing any work for Nanigen, were they?”

“Are you kidding? Nanigen would never hire losers like that,” Makele answered.