Fires of Eden Page 8

  SEVEN

  When you’re feelin’ blue, here’s what you gotta do,

  Don’t let ’em fool ya’, just wiggle to the hula,

  To the hula, giggle to the hula, to the hula,

  To the hula, to the good ol’ hula blues!

  —Popular song of the 1930s

  The morning dawned brisk and clear over the Mauna Pele Resort, sunlight crept around the south end of the volcano and threw thousands of palm fronds into green relief, while moderate winds moved the ash cloud far to the south and turned the sky over the resort into a bowl of perfect blue; the sea was calm, the surf seemed hardly more than a gentle curl onto the white-sand beach. Byron Trumbo didn’t give a damn about any of it.

  The Japanese had gotten in on time the night before, the airport opening again just long enough to land their jet an hour after Trumbo’s, and the limo ride and brief reception at the Mauna Pele had gone according to plan. Mr. Hiroshe Sato and his entourage had been housed in the Big Hale Royal Suite, the penthouse complex only slightly less lavish than Trumbo’s own Presidential Suite. Everyone in Sato’s group had turned in shortly after arrival, claiming jet lag despite the fact that this was rarely a problem on the east-west leg of a trip. Because of the late hour, the resort had seemed normally quiet rather than unusually empty. Trumbo had set his security people three deep around the Royal Suite. When morning came, manager Stephen Ridell Carter reported that the three New Jersey car dealers had not been found, but at least no one else seemed to have disappeared overnight.

  Byron Trumbo was still pissed.

  “What’s today’s schedule?” he asked Will Bryant. “Our first meeting is over breakfast?”

  “Check,” said Bryant. “Our people meet their people on their breakfast terrace. You and Mr. Sato exchange pleasantries and gifts. You give the Tour. Then our people and their people work on the preliminary figures while you and Mr. Sato play golf.”

  Trumbo frowned over his coffee. “My people?” Everyone knew that Byron Trumbo did his own negotiating beyond the opening-bid stage. He and Sato had passed that weeks ago.

  “I’m your people,” said Will Bryant with a smile. He was wearing a gray, tropical-weight Perry Ellis suit. His long hair—Bryant’s one affectation—was neatly tied back in a queue.

  “We need to wrap this up in a day or so,” said Trumbo, ignoring Will’s comment. Trumbo was wearing what he always wore at the Mauna Pele—a bright Hawaiian shirt, faded shorts, and sneakers. He knew that young Sato would also be casual—golf clothes—while his seven or eight male aides would be sweating in gray suits. In this sort of situation, informality equaled power.

  Will Bryant shook his head. “The negotiations are very sensitive…”

  “They’ll be a fucking sight more sensitive if one of Sato’s people gets killed while we’re talking,” interrupted Trumbo. “We’ve got to wrap this up in a day or so, let Sato get his gutful of golf, and get them out of here while the ink’s still wet on the paper. Capisce?”

  “Si,” said Bryant. He shuffled papers, stacked them neatly, slid them into a folder, and set the folder in his calfskin briefcase. “Ready for the games to begin?”

  Byron Trumbo grunted and got to his feet.

  Eleanor awoke to a riot of birdsong. She sat up in a moment of confusion, then noticed the rich light through the shutters—light reflected off a thousand palm fronds—felt the thick, warm air against her skin, smelled the blossoms, and heard the soft murmur of the surf. “Mauna Pele,” she whispered.

  She remembered the screaming outside her window in the middle of the night. She had seen nothing through the shutters, so when the inhuman screams began again, she had looked around for something heavy—found only a complimentary umbrella in the closet near the door—taken a firm grip on that and unlocked the door. The screaming had been coming from the foliage along the path to her hale. Eleanor had waited almost a full minute before the peacock stepped onto the path, setting its feet as if they were sore, its feathers ruffling out and then folding again. It screamed a final time and waddled down the path out of sight.

  “Welcome to paradise,” Eleanor had said to herself. She had been around peacocks before—once camping in a field full of them in India—but their cries always demanded attention. She had never heard one calling at night.

  Eleanor rose, showered—enjoying the scent of the shell-shaped soap—perfunctorily blow-dried her short hair, dressed in navy shorts, sandals, and a sleeveless white blouse, picked up the resort welcoming brochure and map from the nightstand, tossed it into her straw bag with Aunt Kidder’s diary, and went out into the day.

  The riot of flowering plants and soft sea breezes acted on her as such tropical places always did—making her wonder why she lived and worked in a part of the world where winter and darkness claimed so much of the year. The asphalt path meandered through a carefully tended jungle, hales rising on wooden stilts into the rustling palm fronds on either side of the path, while birds of bright plumage leapt and flew through the overhead canopy. Eleanor consulted the small resort map, checking her way as she encountered other paths, lagoons, wooden bridges, stone walkways, and well-tended dirt trails heading off into the artificial jungle. To her right, she caught glimpses of the lava fields that stretched for miles to the highway. The shield of Mauna Loa was visible to the northeast through the dancing fronds, its ash cloud only a watercolor slash of gray along the steep horizon line. To Eleanor’s left, the ocean was a presence for all senses except sight: the sibilant wash of the surf, the scent of seawater and aquatic vegetation, the caress of the ocean breeze against her forehead and bare arms, and the faint taste of salt on her lips.

  Eleanor turned left on the next path—a series of volcanic stepping stones winding through an explosion of flowers and palm trees—and walked past an empty pool onto the edge of the Mauna Pele beach. White sand curved away for half a mile to a rocky headland to her left and a long spit of sand and low lava to her right She could see some of the more expensive hales rising near the water in both directions—large, Samoan-looking structures of polished redwood—and the seven-story Big Hale was visible through the cluster of palms along the main stretch of beach. Eleanor saw serious waves out beyond the entrance to the bay, their white curls smashing against rock and sand in geysers of spray, but within the protected curve of the lagoon the wave action became broad and slow, uncoiling onto the beach with an almost indolent sound.

  There was no one on this perfect crescent of beach except two workers raking sand, one Hawaiian-shirted bartender in the open-sided grass hut bar near the pool, and Cordie Stumpf lying in the only beach chair, just short of the wash of lazy waves. Eleanor smiled. The other woman’s swimsuit was a one-piece, flower-splashed thing that looked as if it had been purchased in the 1950s and worn for the first time today. Cordie’s heavy arms and thighs were masses of white dough, and the woman’s round face was already florid and sweaty from the morning sun. She wore no sunglasses and her small eyes squinted up as Eleanor approached across sand not quite hot enough to make her step lightly.

  “Good morning,” said Eleanor, smiling a greeting at Cordie and then looking out to where the smooth lagoon met the heavy breakers. “Beautiful day, isn’t it?”

  Cordie Stumpf grunted and shielded her eyes. “Do you believe that this place doesn’t serve breakfast until six-thirty in the A.M.? How’s a body to get a head start on a vacation day if you can’t eat until six-thirty?”

  “Mmmm,” agreed Eleanor. She had left her watch in the hale, but it was not quite 7:30 when she started her walk. Eleanor rose early when she had early classes and on summer trips, but she was not really a morning person. Left to set her own schedule, she would work and write and read until two or three in the morning and sleep until nine. “Where did you finally find breakfast?”

  Cordie gestured toward the Big Hale without turning to look at the rooftops rising above the palms. “They got an outside eating place there.” She shielded her eyes and looked up at Eleanor. “You
know, either everybody at this rich people’s resort sleeps real late, or there ain’t many people here.”

  Eleanor nodded. The sunlight and wave action filled her with a sense of buoyancy. She could not imagine anything terrible happening in such a place. Unconsciously, she shifted the strap of the straw bag on her shoulder, feeling Kidder’s diary against her side. “I guess I’ll head off to eat. Perhaps we’ll see each other later.”

  “Yeah,” said Cordie, her gaze on the lagoon once more.

  Eleanor was just passing the thatched hut bar—the Shipwreck Bar she saw it was called, and then noticed the small sailing ship set on its side in the sand among the trees beyond the pool—when Cordie called out to her. “Hey, you didn’t happen to hear nothing in the night, did you?”

  Eleanor smiled. She imagined that Cordie Stumpf had never heard the cry of peacocks. She explained what she had heard and seen.

  Cordie only nodded. “Yeah, but I didn’t mean the birds. Something farther away.” The woman hesitated a moment, hand raised over her squinting eyes, her neck creased into multiple folds. “Did you happen to see a dog?”

  “A dog? No.” Eleanor stood waiting. The bartender leaned on the polished counter of the bar and also waited.

  “Okey-dokey,” said Cordie Stumpf, and lay back on the reclined beach chair, closing her eyes again.

  Eleanor waited a second more, glanced at the bartender, the two exchanged mental shrugs, and Eleanor went off in search of breakfast.

  The breakfast meeting had gone about as planned on the Private Lanai overlooking the Sea Meadow, and after the meal Byron Trumbo took his guests on the Tour. The procession of golf carts rolled out of the private garage eight stories beneath the Presidential Suite, its order determined by protocol: Byron Trumbo and Hiroshe Sato rode alone in the first cart with Trumbo driving; the second cart was driven by Will Bryant with the elderly Masayoshi Matsukawa, young Mr. Sato’s principal adviser, alongside him in the front seat; in the rear seat of the second cart were Bobby Tanaka—Trumbo’s Tokyo man—and young Inazo Ono, Sato’s drinking pal and chief negotiator. The third golf cart was driven by Mauna Pele’s manager, Stephen Ridell Carter—dressed as conservatively as the Japanese aides—with Dr. Tatsuro, Sato’s personal physician, and Sato aides Seizaburo Sakurabayashi and Tsuneo “Sunny” Takahashi as passengers. The next three carts were filled with lawyers and golf cronies of the two principals. Following at a discreet distance were three more carts filled with Trumbo’s and Sato’s security details.

  The golf carts rolled down the smooth asphalt path past the Whale Watching Lanai and through the Sea Meadow—a gradually sloping yard, putting-green smooth, bordered by flower beds and exotic plants. An artificial stream ran through the meadow, tumbled over lava rocks into pools and waterfalls, and ended in a grotto-bedecked lagoon that separated the beach area from the Big Hale area. Passing through a shield of coconut palms, they came out onto the Beach Walk Path.

  “We pump more than twenty-two million gallons of seawater through these ponds and streams every day,” Trumbo was saying. “Another fifteen million gallons to keep the lagoons fresh.”

  “It is recyclable?” inquired Hiroshe Sato.

  Trumbo hesitated a second. He had heard—It ii lecycraber? Sato could speak almost unaccented English when he tried, but he rarely tried during negotiations.

  “Sure it’s recyclable,” he said. “The hard part isn’t the seawater ponds and streams, it’s with the pools and koi ponds. We have three main pools for the guests, plus the swimming lagoon, plus the twenty-six private pools for the Luxury Hale guests on the Samoan Peninsula. And the carp ponds require the same quality water as the pools. All in all, it adds up to more than two million gallons of fresh water a day.”

  “Ahhhh,” said young Mr. Sato, and smiled. And then, cryptically, “Koi. Hai.”

  Trumbo swung the cart to the right, heading north along the Beach Walk, away from the Shipwreck Bar. “These are the manta pools. We have two-thousand-watt halogen floods underwater here. At night you can stand on that rock and reach out and touch the mantas we draw into the light.”

  Sato grunted.

  “This beach is now the finest one on the South Kona Coast,” said Trumbo. “Probably on the entire west coast of the Big Island. It ought to be—we brought in more than eight thousand tons of white sand. The lagoon was original.”

  Sato nodded, his chin deep in the folds in his neck. The young man’s face was impassive; his black hair gleamed in the fierce sunlight.

  The procession of carts hummed past dining pavilions, gardens, and lagoons into another line of coconut palms. Tall, stately hales rose on heavy legs. “This is the beginning of the Samoan Peninsula,” said Trumbo. The carts passed down lanes of perfectly manicured tropical blooms, over wide bridges, and between lava boulders. “You see these are the largest of the two hundred some hales on the property. Ten people can sleep comfortably in each of these. The ones out here near the end of the peninsula each have their own pool and butler.”

  “How much?” said Sato.

  “Excuse me?”

  “How much per night?”

  “Three thousand eight hundred per night for the Royal Samoan Bungalow,” said Trumbo. “That doesn’t include tips or meals.”

  Sato smiled and Trumbo caught the impression that the Tokyo billionaire thought that this was a bargain.

  Leaving the peninsula, the procession of carts hummed into a forest of palms and sea pines. “This is the closest of the three tennis centers. Each one has six Flexi-Pave courts. You can see the Sailing and Scuba Center off through the trees there—you can rent everything from kayaks and outrigger canoes to one of the Mauna Pele Classic Motor Launches—we have six—each one cost us three hundred and eighty thousand dollars. The Dive Center offers scuba lessons and excursions along the coast. In addition, we have parasailing, sailing, windsurfing, jet-boating—down the coast since the goddamn environmental regulations keep us from doing that in our own lagoon—sunset dinner excursions, surfing…all the usual shit.”

  “Arr usuer shit,” agreed Sato. The billionaire looked as if he were on the verge of dozing off behind his sunglasses.

  Trumbo led the procession back past the Big Hale toward the lagoon.

  “How big is the resort?” said Sato.

  “Thirty-seven hundred acres,” said Trumbo. He knew that Sato had all of the facts memorized from the prospectus. “That’s counting the fourteen-acre petroglyph field.” The golf carts meandered through the main hale section, around rock-lined lagoons where golden carp rose gaping to the surface. The carts encountered few pedestrians. Circling the beached schooner behind the Shipwreck Bar, they passed a twenty-meter pool where only a single family splashed and then wound through gardens of orchids. Trumbo noticed that Sato did not inquire why there were only a dozen or so people lounging on the beach or in the grassy shade under the hundred-foot coconut palms. Trumbo glanced at his watch; it was still early.

  “How many rooms?” said Sato.

  “Ahhh…two hundred twenty-six hales—bungalows—and another three hundred twenty-four rooms in the Big Hale. Some of our guests like to rough it. We get lots of movie stars and celebrities who just disappear into the hales for a week or two—Madonna was here last month. Norman Mailer and Ted Kennedy are regulars, as is Senator Harlen. They like the Samoan Bungalows and to be left alone. There’s a painted coconut at each bungalow and if you set it on the steps, no one bothers you—not even to deliver mail. Others like room service and cable TV and direct dial phones and the in-room fax machines. We try to accommodate everyone’s tastes.”

  Sato’s lips were pursed as if he had swallowed something bitter. “Under six hundred rooms,” he said softly. “Two golf courses. Eighteen tennis courts. Three main pools.” Three mine poors.

  Trumbo waited, but Sato said nothing else. Guessing at the opinion being expressed, Trumbo said, “Yeah, we’re heavy on space and guest services for the number of rooms. We’re not trying to compete with the Hyatt
Regency for population—I think they’ve got twelve hundred some rooms—or the Kona Village for quiet, or the Mauna Kea for old money—we’re reaching all those target clients. Our concierge service is more efficient, our recreation more tailored to celebrity status than family fun, and our shopping more along Tokyo or Beverly Hills expectations. Our restaurants are better—we have five on the grounds, you know, plus room service in the Big Hale and catering to the Royal Samoan Bungalows—our courts are emptier and our golf courses are better designed.”

  “Golf,” said Sato, pronouncing the l perfectly. His tone was almost wistful.

  “Next stop after this,” said Trumbo, and aimed the golf cart toward a boulder. Pulling a remote control device from his shirt pocket, he aimed it at the lava rock and thumbed the only button on it. A panel the size of a garage door slid up on the rock and the procession hummed down the asphalt path into a brightly lighted tunnel.

  From her breakfast table on the Whale Watching Lanai, a large second-story dining area jutting out over the grass and gardens below like the bow of some oceanbound ship, Eleanor had watched the convoy of golf carts go by. All of the faces she glimpsed were Japanese and having seen such tour groups in most of the odd places in the world where she had wandered, Eleanor wondered if Japanese tourists were as cohesive in super-luxury resorts as they were among the more middle-class strata.

  The lanai was large and pleasant; its windows were accordioned open and the scent of blossoms wafted in on every breeze. The floor was a dark, polished eucalyptus, the tables a light wood, the chairs expensive bamboo and wicker. Napkins were red linen and the water glasses were crystal. There was room for a couple of hundred people on the expansive deck, but Eleanor saw only a dozen or so there besides herself. All of the waitpersons were women, all Hawaiian, all of them moving gracefully in flowered muumuus. A light strain of classical music came from hidden speakers, but the real music was the susurration of palm fronds and the distant sound of surf.