Aaron Elkins: Where there's a will

“Call from Inge,” he told them when he’d hung up and they were in the checkout line. “We’re invited to a memorial reception for Dagmar. Casual dress. Just family and close friends.”

“I doubt if Julie and I qualify as close friends,” Gideon said.

“No, she made a point of saying they’d like to have you. She sounded like she meant it. I guess they really don’t want there to be any hard feelings.”

“I don’t think so,” Gideon said doubtfully. “I’ve stirred up a lot of trouble for those people.” He swiped his credit card through the machine on the counter.

“I think we ought to go,” John said.

“When is it?” Julie asked.

“Two o’clock, at the community center in Waimea. We’ll be a little late, but we can make it. I think it’d be a nice thing if we showed up. For a few minutes, anyway.”

“I think so, too,” Julie said. “To pay our respects.”

“Yes, but-”

“Good, it’s settled,” John said. “Let’s get going.” Gideon gave up with a sigh. “Okay, I’ll go along.” He signed the $57 receipt and tucked a copy in his wallet.

“I still think we should have gotten him the monkey head,” he muttered as they left, just to prove he did have a mind of his own.

Hedwig, Inge, Axel, and Felix, forming a ragged reception line, seemed genuinely grateful when John, Julie, and Gideon made their appearance. Hedwig, reeking of jasmine and splendidly draped in a shimmering silk muu-muu of royal blue threaded with gold, hugged them all to her soft bosom. A teary-eyed Inge energetically pumped their hands. Axel, also showing emotion, hugged John and Gideon, but shyly shook hands with Julie. Felix went the other way, throwing wide his arms and bear-hugging a startled Julie-it was the first time they’d met-but cordially shaking hands with John and Gideon. Malani and Keoni beside their respective spouses, politely nodded and murmured appreciation for their coming. All very hospitable and sincere and gratifying.

And yet, thought Gideon, there was something surreal about it all. If Fukida was right-and he, Julie, and John agreed with him-then one of these people, these warm, nice, decent people (if you made a few allowances for fraud, theft, and one or two other little transgressions) was the murderer of the woman they were all there to memorialize.

Not that there were so very many. The Torkelssons, it appeared, did not have many friends. In addition to the four siblings and the two spouses, there were perhaps a dozen people who looked as if they were probably ranchers and their wives, and about ten Hawaiian and Asian men, some old, some young, but all with a compact, athletic grace that marked them as current or retired paniolos. Gideon recognized Willie Akau and a couple of the others he’d seen around the Little Hoaloha. The paniolos, some of whom still had range dust on their work clothes, were gathered in two clumps near the refreshment table, most of them clutching tiny paper cups of pink lemonade and looking thoroughly ill at ease.

The refreshments were ample-punch, lemonade, coffee, trays of cookies and fruit breads-but the room would comfortably have held a hundred-a plain, linoleum-tiled, echoing space, far too large for the two dozen or so people in it, so that the affair had a forlorn quality, with guests whispering rather than talking, to keep from making too much noise.

Until Felix took over. “I think we’re all here now,” he honked from the middle of the room. “On behalf of my family, I want to thank you for coming. My aunt would have really appreciated knowing you were here.”

“She does know,” Hedwig said with a wise smile.

Felix looked pained. “You all know my sister Hedwig, who is now going to lead us in a… in a what, Hedwig?”

“In a Circle of Karmic Energy.”

With a theatrical half-bow, Felix stepped aside and turned the floor over to Hedwig. “Whatever,” Gideon heard him mutter out of the side of his mouth.

Hedwig spread her massive arms, bringing silence. In the full, gorgeous, blue-and-gold muu-muu she looked immense, the Mother Goddess herself.

“It must be hard to get that big being a vegetarian,” Gideon mused.

“Be good,” Julie warned him, but she was smiling.

Hedwig lowered her head and waggled her outstretched fingers. “We will hold hands and form a circle.”

A circle was duly formed. John held Julie’s left hand, Gideon her right. On Gideon’s other side, he grasped the callused hand of a wiry old paniolo, making both of them uncomfortable.

Hedwig looked up to see that all was proper and again lowered her cropped blonde head and began to intone.

“Let those who form this circle be here in peace and love, and may it be a protection against any negative energy that may come to do us harm. We are here to honor a beloved person who has moved to another plane. By the formation of this circle we make thinner the veil between the worlds, so that we can call to those who have gone on before us and they will hear us…”

Although his head was bowed, Gideon managed to throw a pointed look across Julie and at John. This is your fault, pal, and don’t think I’m going to let you forget it.

“I ask you now,” Hedwig went on, “to sense the presence of the entity we knew as Dagmar Torkelsson among us, and to allow the energy and love she brings us to build and grow. Visualize the energy circling round, gathering strength.” She paused for the space of three long breaths, visualizing. “And now I want you to bask in this energy a moment longer, and then divide yourselves into groups of three or four, and to share with each other your memories and reflections. In that way, we release this positive energy back into the universe.. .”

Gideon, his mind wandering, found himself looking into the community kitchen at one end of the room. Something there-something important, he thought-had fleetingly engaged his attention, but whatever it was, he’d lost it as suddenly as it had come. He scanned the stainless-steel sinks, the counter, the two big stainless-steel refrigerators, the electric coffee percolators, the open shelves of dishes and utensils. His eyes went back and focused on the refrigerators, both of which were covered with little notes attached by a colorful multitude of refrigerator magnets. There were surfboards, pigs and penguins in grass skirts, hula dancers, palm trees, martini glasses with olives He froze. “ John! ” The exclamation popped out on its own. Fortunately, the circle was now breaking up into its smaller groups, so he didn’t disrupt the visualization in progress.

John looked curiously at him. “What?”

He began to point into the kitchen, then said: “Come on, you two. I want to show you something.”

“My goodness,” Julie said as he grabbed her wrist, “what’s all the excitement about?”

Once in the kitchen, he pointed at one of the magnet-laden refrigerators. “Take a look at that.”

“Look at what?” a puzzled John asked. “What’s so-”

When he realized which one Gideon was pointing to, it stopped him in his tracks. “I’ll be damned,” he whispered and plucked it from the metal surface. “Holy cow, am I nuts, or is this the same…”

“I think it’s exactly the same.”

“I think so, too.”

“John, do you realize what this means? It must-”

“I know,” John said, running his hand over the irregular surface. “It’s almost too fantastic, but-”

“I know.”

“I can’t tell you what a thrill it is to observe great minds in action,” Julie said dryly, “but if one of you could manage a coherent sentence, I would be endlessly grateful.”

“This thing is a ceramic map of the Big Island,” John said, offering it for her inspection.

“Ah. Well, as a matter of fact, I did manage to grasp that much on my own.”