“Here,” James said, a block away from the station. The driver stopped. “What do I do with the real flag?”
“You’ll know.” Vicky kissed him on the cheek. “A hui hou, James.”
THE STATION HOUSE buzzed with activity. His partner, Kam, was writing down the names of the patrons at Bolo’s, who were now slouched against the wall or on the floor. Kam signaled James to leave, but it was too late. Wong, his superior, blocked his path. “Someone killed Bolo.”
James made his voice all innocent. “Who?”
Wong studied James. He looked down at his newly oiled boots, up at his combed hair, his fresh clothes, shined badge, belt, holster, and gun. “No good witnesses yet.” He pursed his lips. “I thought you were up in Ewa.”
“I was,” James said. He couldn’t think of any plausible reason why he had come back to Honolulu except the truth, which he certainly wasn’t going to tell Wong.
“Where’s your brother?”
“Still in Ewa.”
“Yeah? Where’s your sister?”
“Who knows?” James shrugged. “I’m not my family’s keeper.”
Kam’s voice was loud. “Can I get some help over here?”
“Stick around,” Wong said.
JAMES HELPED KAM write down names. Still doped up, no one recognized James except for the paradise-is-free woman, who mumbled something. Kam whispered in her ear, and she shut her mouth.
Wong came out of his office, carrying a lantern and a flask. “No one saw anything?”
“These guys saw something.” There was a commotion at the door. Saito and Beppu, Japanese officers, dragged in two handcuffed sailors, the Filipinos from Hotel Street. They had new cuts, and their eyes were puffed and bruised.
“You recognize anyone, boy?” Wong prodded one of them with his foot.
The sailor looked at James. “Was a guy on a yellow horse,” he said. “Small guy. Chinese, I think.”
Saito kicked him. “You said Hawaiian.”
“Not Hawaiian,” the other sailor said. “Maybe Japanese. Short, like you. Japanese.”
Beppu and Saito punched them until Wong told the officers to get the Filipinos out of there. Beppu pointed a gun at their heads and laughed when they ran. Saito and Beppu left for the bar across the street. The third shift arrived, and Wong took his lantern and flask and went to the outhouse.
James told Kam everything. Kam insisted that he go with James to see his natural father. James said no, but Kam said he was his partner, and what were partners for? Neither could think of a way to switch the flags.
Wong returned, smelling of outhouse. He carried an oil-paper package, which he unwrapped. It was Auntie’s mango knife, crusted in blood. “Ever seen this before?”
“No,” James said. In the name of God, how would he keep track of all the lies?
“I think you’ve seen it,” Wong said, “because I think you were there when your brother killed Bolo.”
James made his voice lower than Wong’s. “Bolo said he paid you plenty.”
Wong flushed. “The only one who can prove that is Bolo.”
“Good he’s dead then,” Kam said.
There was a long silence. Wong raised his voice and slapped James on the back. “Now that you’re here, boy, you may as well work tomorrow.” He grinned with spite. “Someone with Hawaiian blood should be there when your flag comes down.”
Kam winked at James and shouted at Wong, “You can’t ask him to do that!”
James took the cue. “I won’t,” he said.
“In fact, you take down the flag and give it to the governor. Kind of on behalf of all Hawaiians.”
“No,” James said.
Kam shook his head sadly. “You gotta do what he says, James. He’s the boss.”
“That’s right, boy,” Wong said. “You be here at noon. And when they raise the Stars and Stripes, maybe you should think about which side of the bread your butter is on. Now get out of here.”
KAM SADDLED HIS own pony, and James helped himself to Wong’s horse. They trotted toward Diamond Head. The moon was low in the sky; there was little time before the Celtic put out to sea, and now it was imperative that Mary and Richard be on that ship.
The ornate Victorian house of Jameson P. Huntington was smaller than James remembered. He knocked politely. Nothing happened.
Kam pounded and shouted, “Honolulu police! Open up.”
Huntington answered the door. He had thrown a silk jacket over striped pajamas. He looked at James and Kam, then motioned for them to follow.
James looked at the back of his father’s head — the thick white hair, the pink ears — and hatred welled up in him. He wished he could stick the mango knife into that silk-covered back. He tasted bile. Why him? Why did he have to ask his father for help? Why was it all on his shoulders? Oaths, ohana, and everything?
James looked around the study, with its rich rugs and polished table. Sailing timetables were spread on the table, along with a handwritten note. James could see the signature: Jefferson Blackwell. He and Huntington ran the Committee of Safety, a clandestine group of businessmen who had plotted for more than a decade to seize Hawaii and bring it under American law.
When the queen had drafted a new constitution that gave more rights to native Hawaiians, they saw their control slipping and intensified their drive for annexation. The queen went to Washington and convinced the president that annexation was wrong. But his successor, McKinley, believed in Manifest Destiny. Besides, he wanted the harbor for his ships, now fighting the Spanish-American War in Manila. There was fear that Japan would claim the harbor; military interests coincided with financial interests. In July, the ship that sailed into the harbor spelled out the bad news in black flags: annexation. The Committee of Safety had finally prevailed. The monarchy was gone. And James Huntington had been the driving force behind the committee.
“You look like your mother, James,” he said.
A pale, bleached woman in a pink dressing gown opened the door. “Jameson, is everything okay?”
“Go back to bed.” Huntington was curt. The woman closed the door.
James stared at his father. How could he ask anything of this man who had killed his mother as sure as if he had poured the kerosene down her throat? James could think of nothing to say.
Kam jumped in. “Mary and Richard are in trouble. Mary has . . . given of herself to support her addiction,” he said. “Your son just murdered the man who gave her opium.”
“Their weakness of character is not my concern.” Huntington’s face turned red. “Did you come here to tell me the sordid details of my bastard children?”
James grabbed the front of the silk gown and punched his father, one-two, straight into his soft belly. See how it feels? Huntington fell to his knees, and James slapped the sides of his head with open palms, one-two, until Kam pulled him away.
“I did plenty for my children,” Huntington said. He touched his ear and looked surprised to see that his hand came away bloody. “They lived well in this house.” He looked at James. “Your mother understood that I never intended to marry her.”
“Did she?” James’s voice was thick with anger.
“I did plenty for you. I got you a loan for your house. I got you your job on the Force.”
James heard drumming in his ears. “I got my job on my own,” he said.
Huntington laughed. “I would have done the same for your brother and sister, if they had even tried to better themselves.”
“How could they begin to better themselves, after what you did?”
“Because they’re half white,” Huntington said. “My haole blood runs in your veins.”
James turned away so his father would not see his tears. Oh, the shame of crying, James thought, crying in front of the man you hate.
Once again, his partner came to his rescue. “Mary needs a clinic, and Richard needs to leave Honolulu. They need to be on the Celtic, and they need your help in San Francisco.”
H
untington said nothing. What had Vicky said? Don’t ask him, tell him.
James faced his father. “I was there. I saw Richard kill Bolo,” he said. “I’ll tell what I saw. I don’t care to keep the job you got for me. I don’t care to keep the house you got for me. I don’t care if I’m arrested. But I think you care that today, everyone will be talking about your son, James Huntington Lopaka, accomplice to murder.”
HUNTINGTON USED HIS telephone to call his shipping office on the pier. He had his agent deliver a message to the Celtic’s captain. He had a sleepy stablehand harness up the trap. James and Kam tied their horses to the back and drove the trap at high speed to the bungalow, where Mary had not moved and where Richard was asleep on the floor.
They carried Mary outside and woke Richard. He refused to go. “I’d rather hang for murder than take help from him.”
“You keep your pride while our ohana goes down? So selfish.” James pushed Richard toward the door. “We’re going to move along, little brother.”
James squeezed into the trap next to Richard and Mary. Kam rode his horse and led Wong’s. They trotted, then cantered, toward the pier, aware of the sun rising behind them, over the Koolaus.
On the dock, the Celtic was ready to go. The captain and shipping agent stood next to one lowered gangplank. The captain looked at Mary and called for help. Two sailors carried her up the gangplank. Vicky’s blue ribbon fell from her braid, which started to unravel. The last James saw of Mary was her long black hair, fanning.
Kam handed the trap to Huntington’s agent. James picked up the ribbon from the dock and walked with Richard to the gangplank.
“Take care of the roan,” Richard said. His voice was unsteady.
“Take care of your little sister.” James put the ribbon in his pocket.
EXCITEMENT CHARGED THE air inside the station. James and Kam walked in together, and everyone fell silent.
“You have ten minutes to get dressed,” Wong said. He arranged his epaulets. “We’re marching to the palace together.” He lowered his voice. “Where the hell’s my horse?”
“In back,” James said.
They donned the dress uniforms reserved for ceremonies. The blue pants matched the jacket with the motto on the pocket: the life of the land is perpetuated in righteousness.
James picked up the folded flag. How was he going to carry it without being seen? The belt, he thought. The belt. He tucked the flag smooth against his belly and buckled his belt, still on the last notch but tighter with the flag inside.
ALONG KING STREET, clusters of haoles waved American flags. There were no Hawaiians. They were inside shuttered windows, hung with black crepe.
The stand on the grounds of Iolani Palace was decorated with red, white, and blue bunting. Spectators took their seats. How was he going to switch flags with everyone looking on? Wong pushed James to the front, next to the flagpole. His face burned with shame. The only other Hawaiians besides himself were in the Royal Hawaiian Band, which began to play “Hawaii Ponoi.”
Wong nudged him. James stepped forward and pulled the ropes. The Hawaiian flag began to lower. A squall of rain wet the flag. The band played. Kam stepped forward to help James fold the flag, and then it was in his hand.
The Royal Hawaiian Band stopped playing. The audience gasped as they threw their instruments on the ground and walked away.
An American soldier stepped forward, clipped the American flag to the pole, and ran it up. Guns from the USS Philadelphia boomed in the harbor as the Stars and Stripes flew high above Iolani Palace.
All eyes were on the American flag. Kam nudged him and yanked the new flag out from James’s belt. James shoved the real flag inside. The guns fell silent, and James walked slowly toward the new governor, carrying the new flag, feeling the dampness of the real one against his skin.
His natural father, Huntington, stood next to the governor. He smiled at James as if to mock James’s Hawaiian blood, having to take down the Hawaiian flag. It was a smirk, really. James met his father’s eyes coldly, without emotion, as he handed the new governor the new flag.
It was done.
THEY FOUGHT THEIR way through the drunken officers in the station. An elderly Hawaiian man, standing by the door, stepped in front of James.
“Take the flag to your auntie,” he said, and walked away.
“A hui hou,” Kam said, and also started to walk away.
“You might as well see it to the end,” James said.
James reborrowed Wong’s horse while Kam resaddled his own mare. They rode toward the great Ewa Plain and did not stop until they reached the foot of Auntie’s road.
Kam reined up his horse. He reached inside his own belt and pulled out the oil-paper packet. He handed it to James, who opened it. Inside was the bloody mango knife, which they buried under a pandanus tree.
CHICKENS CLUCKED AND scattered as they rode into the yard. Auntie came running and embraced them both, tears in her eyes.
“They’re on the Celtic,” James said.
“I know,” Auntie said. “We talk later.”
Three very old kupunas sat on the outside bench, next to the row of shoes. James handed the flag to the oldest. They nodded their farewell and set off walking toward the black caves above the Ewa Plain.
“They already ate,” Auntie said, herding James and Kam into the pili-grass house.
Inside, they ate laulaus and sweet potatoes. James unbuckled his belt (Oh, what a wonderful feeling) and then took it off altogether. He tried to be discreet, but nothing slipped past Auntie’s eye.
She rose to her feet, whisked away their empty calabashes, and refilled them with poi. “You’re too thin, boys,” she said. She waggled a finger. “A skinny Chinaman? A skinny hapa? Officers like that don’t get respect.”
She brought out four more squares of coconut pudding, then placed a new mango knife next to the plate of fruit. “Will you slice the mangoes, James?”
And he did.
The Price of Love
By Peter Robinson
Tommy found the badge on the third day of his summer holiday at Blackpool, the first holiday without his father. The sun had come out that morning, and he was playing on the crowded beach with his mother, who sat in her striped deck chair, smoking Consulate, reading Nova magazine, and keeping an eye on him. Not that he needed an eye kept on him. Tommy was thirteen now and quite capable of going off alone to amuse himself. But his mother had a thing about water, so she never let him near the sea alone. Uncle Arthur had gone to the amusements on the North Pier, where he liked to play the one-armed bandits.
The breeze from the gray Irish Sea was chilly, but Tommy bravely wore his new swimming trunks. He even dipped his toes in the water before running back, squealing, to warm them in the sand. It was then that he felt something sharp prick his big toe. Treasure? He scooped away the sand carefully with his hands while no one was looking. Slowly he pulled out the object by its edge and dusted off the sand with his free hand. It was shaped like a silver shield with a flat top and seven points. At its center was a circle, with METROPOLITAN POLICE curved around the top and bottom of the initials er. On its top were a crown and a tiny cross. The silver glinted in the sunlight.
Tommy’s breath caught in his throat. This was exactly the sign he had been waiting for ever since his father died. It was the same type of badge he had worn on his uniform. Tommy remembered how proud his dad had sounded when he spoke of it. He even let Tommy touch it and told him what er meant: Elizabeth Regina. It was Latin, his father had explained, for the queen. “That’s our queen, Tommy,” he had said proudly. And the cross on top, he went on, symbolized the Church of England. When Tommy held the warm badge there on the beach, he could feel his father’s presence in it.
Tommy decided not to tell anyone. They might make him hand it in somewhere, or just take it off him. Uncle Arthur was always doing that. When Tommy found an old tennis ball in the street, Uncle Arthur said it might have been chewed by a dog and have germs on it, so he
threw it in the fire. Then there was the toy cap gun with the broken hammer he found on the recreation ground — “It’s no good if it’s broken, is it?” Uncle Arthur said, and out it went. But this time Uncle Arthur wasn’t going to get his hands on Tommy’s treasure. While his mother was reading her magazine, Tommy went over to his small pile of clothes and slipped the badge in his trouser pocket.
“What are you doing, Tommy?”
He started. It was his mother. “Just looking for my handkerchief,” he said, the first thing he could think of.
“What do you want a handkerchief for?”
“The water was cold,” Tommy said. “I’m sniffling.” He managed to fake a sniffle to prove it.
But his mother’s attention had already returned to her magazine. She never did talk to him for very long these days, didn’t seem much interested in how he was doing at school (badly) or how he was feeling in general (awful). Sometimes it was a blessing, because it made it easier for Tommy to live undisturbed in his own elaborate secret world, but sometimes he felt he would like it if she just smiled at him, touched his arm, and asked him how he was doing. He’d say he was fine. He wouldn’t even tell her the truth because she would get bored if she had to listen to his catalog of woes. His mother had always got bored easily.
This time her lack of interest was a blessing. He managed to get the badge in his pocket without her or anyone else seeing it. He felt official now. No longer was he just playing at being a special agent. Now that he had his badge, he had serious standards to uphold, like his father had always said. And he would start his new role by keeping a close eye on Uncle Arthur.
UNCLE ARTHUR WASN’T his real uncle. Tommy’s mother was an only child, like Tommy himself. It was three months after his father’s funeral when she had first introduced them. She said that Uncle Arthur was an old friend she had known many years ago, and they had just met again by chance on Kensington High Street. Wasn’t that a wonderful coincidence? She had been so lonely since his father had died. Uncle Arthur was fun and made her laugh again. She was sure that Tommy would like him. But Tommy didn’t. And he was certain he had seen Uncle Arthur before, while his father was still alive, but he didn’t say anything.