About halfway up, the trail switches back and climbs the ocean side of the ridge toward the summit. It’s clear enough today to see Moloka‘i’s West End across the channel the doctor crossed that night—though he’s still not admitting it.
Soon we get our first glimpse of the historic lighthouse, whitewashed and red-roofed, on the cliff’s edge. The doctor stops and turns toward us. His face is flushed and glazed with sweat.
“We leave the main trail here.” He points to a steep path that angles down toward the lighthouse.
Kula’s tongue is already dragging in this heat, so I say, “Just a minute.” I pull out my bottle and pour water into my cupped hand. Kula laps up the water that doesn’t slip between my fingers onto the ground.
The doctor puts his hands on his hips, looking impatient.
“Stay behind me,” I tell Marie. “And keep your eyes on your feet. You should be okay.”
“I can handle myself,” she insists.
As we step off the trail, the view of Moloka‘i across the channel grows crisper.
Dr. Grimes hobbles down the slope—the dark sea far below—heading toward the lighthouse. Kula pulls on the leash. He’s still excited. I turn back and see Marie shaking her head.
“I don’t believe this,” she says again, loud enough for the doctor to overhear.
“Let’s wait and see,” I whisper back.
Dr. Grimes seems to know where he’s going. We follow him at a distance.
As we edge down the cliff, getting closer to the lighthouse, another mongoose darts across the path ahead. Kula doesn’t see it. Good thing. The dog could pull me off my feet. And down the cliff I’d go.
We pass beneath the lighthouse. The cliff gets steeper. One false step and any one of us could tumble.
Dr. Grimes struggles on. He’s a slow and unsteady hiker. After another twenty yards of twists and turns, he steps off the path. There is barely enough room for the three of us to stand, and an ominous view of the ocean far below.
He gestures to a small clearing. “This is the spot.”
“Where’s the shrine?” Marie scans the trail. Then to me, “I told you he was lying.”
On the upslope side of the trail he removes what looks like a camouflage net. Under it, sure enough, is what looks like a makeshift shrine. It’s been several years since Mrs. Ho died and the shrine is looking weathered and beaten. But some artifacts remain.
“This is where she kept vigil,” the doctor says. “And this is where she probably jumped.”
Marie and I step forward, Kula leading the way, to get a closer look. The shrine is the roadside variety with a dusty photo of an adolescent boy in a waterproof frame, some dead flowers and plastic flowers, a miniature toy surfboard, and a few other knickknacks that look like they might have been meaningful to Marie’s mother.
Kula sniffs the shrine. Marie stoops down and picks up something small and faintly gleaming. “That’s my brother’s high school ring,” she says. “And a photo of him with my mom. And another with his girlfriend.”
“I told you so,” her stepfather says.
Marie approaches him angrily. “You killed her!”
I stand between the two of them. “Keep your distance,” I tell Marie and peer down. The drop must be four hundred feet, easy.
Gazing at this craggy cliff from which Beatrice Ho may have plunged sends chills up my spine.
I turn to the doctor. “If you didn’t kill your wife, why did you lie to HPD about coming to O‘ahu that night?”
“I did bring my boat to O‘ahu,” he finally admits. “And I did borrow Kitagawa’s car. But not to harm my wife in any way. I didn’t even see her that night.”
I hear rustling in the kiawe brush. Another mongoose? Kula snaps to attention.
“Then why didn’t you tell Fernandez?”
If I told him the real reason I came, he would have suspected me even more.”
“Another lie,” Marie says angrily. “You killed her.”
“I came to see someone else,” he says.
“Who?” I ask.
Before he can answer Kula takes off after a flash across the trail. I grab for the golden’s leash but it’s already beyond my reach. I make quick eye contact with Marie who’s standing close to Dr. Grimes. She gives me a nod that she’s okay.
I rush after Kula. He finally stops and sniffs the spot where a mongoose was apparently last seen. I catch up to him and grab his leash.
“C’mon, boy,” I say. “Maybe next time.”
Before I can turn and hike back to the cliff-side shrine, Dr. Grimes lets out a shriek behind me and then I hear a little avalanche of pebbles and shards rolling down the cliff. When I pick my way with Kula back to the shrine, Marie is standing alone. She’s shaking. The doctor is nowhere in sight.
“Where’s your stepfather?” I ask her.
She points, her hand trembling, down the steep slope to the ocean. I gaze far below. At first I don’t see him. Then I do. He’s a mere speck in the rolling surf. He’s floating. Face down.
“What happened?”
“He fell,” she says
You mean he just tumbled down?”
“Not exactly. When your back was turned he came for me. I knew not to trust him.”
“And?”
“I gave him an elbow to the side of his head. He keeled over and lost his balance.”
“And then he fell?”
“Yes, that’s how it happened.” Then she says, “I know I promised you, but it was either him or me. And it wasn’t going to be me this time.”
I stand there not knowing what to think, much less what to say.
She reaches her trembling hand into her purse, pulls out a cigarette and lights it. “God, if I ever needed a smoke, it’s now.”
I gaze at her, speechless.
Then she says, “He killed my mother. He killed Pierre. And he molested me. He would have spent the rest of his life in prison. So maybe this isn’t the worst thing that could have happened to him.”
“Maybe,” I say. And wish I felt more convinced.