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Chapter 1
And need not that any should
"Are you cold?" she asked him.
"No, are you?”
“No. Want to go swimming, then?”
"Are you nuts? Things come out at night to feed around here." He pretended to shiver and clasped her close again.
"Okay, I know just the place where there's nothing to eat you. There's nothing to be scared of. I'll take care of you," she giggled. She pulled him off the blanket, trailed it behind her and ran laughing toward a stuccoed structure with large arched openings.
"Wow, it's huge. Like an Olympic sized pool! What is this?" he asked when he saw the giant structure.
"It's the Natatorium. It's a memorial they built after World War 1. It's the largest salt water swimming pool in the world or something. They used to have swimming meets and stuff here way back then. It was open to the public, too. It hasn't been used in years, though. They can't decide if they should tear it down or build it back up. "Help me up", she commanded. He boosted her onto the four foot wall surrounding the cement deck. On the parking lot side, concrete bleachers blocked out the stars. The other three sides were open to the night.
"If it hasn't been used in years, why is there water in it?" he asked, jumping down to the deck.
"It's open to the ocean somehow, and water comes and goes with the tides. Only it must be kind of blocked - it smells pretty gross.”
"It doesn't look too healthy in there either. Let's not swim. Let's go back to the hau tree." He smiled and reached for her hand, but she pointed to the middle of the pool. "What's that?"
"What?" He strained to see.
"It looks like a dead fish or something."
A shiny white object floated a third of the way down the pool. Suddenly it shifted, and an entire human arm became visible in the moonlight.
"Ohmygod!" the girl shrieked and ran to the wall, leaping the barrier that had required a boost from her muscular young man only moments before. He followed, clearing the wall by a foot. They ran to the Hau Tree Lanai restaurant and sailed over that seawall too. The restaurant was closed, but the adjacent hotel wasn't. They bounded up the steps, startled a small group of Japanese tourists, and reached the front desk.
Gasping and crying the girl said "Ohmygod" and draped herself over the registration book. The alarmed desk clerk turned his attention to the boy who said, 'There's a body! A dead body! An arm of a body...in the pool!"
The clerk dialed housekeeping while asking, "What, our pool? Is it a guest?"
"No. Not hotel pool. Nata...,nata...," he panted.
"Natatorium!" the girl finished for him.
The clerk hung up on housekeeping, which squawked, "Yes? What? Moshi moshi?" He dialed 911.
Chapter 2
"I'm sorry sir, as I've said before, without a case number, I really can't help you," K.O. repeated for the third time.
The Records Division office at Honolulu Police Department was stifling, even with the A\C because civilians opened and shut the door so many times coming to get case information. "Perhaps sir, if you have the names of the plaintiff or defendant I could--"
"The what?"
K.O. sighed. "The names of the people involved and the dates concerned, sir." She smiled weakly at the long, hot, impatient line of people behind the whiner. If this counter weren't so wide, I could just reach over and strangle him, she mused silently as her customer screwed up his face in concentration.
"Uh, it was a couple years ago, eh?" He grinned at her. "The last name was, uh, Portagee, I tink." The man's pidgin accent became thicker and more difficult to understand as the temperature rose and fuses shortened.
"Sir, do you mean the last name was Portagee, or that the name was of Portuguese extraction?" K.O.'s navy blue, wool blend uniform began to adhere to her. Her red hair, cut in a shoulder length bob with bangs, was pulled into a small bun. Escaping tendrils stuck to her neck, her bangs glued themselves into spikes on her forehead. "Perhaps you should come back later, when you have more information," she said to him and the twelve people behind him. A collective sigh went up. And before I kill you where you stand, she finished to herself.
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Excerpt from K.O.’d in Honolulu |
