Ha-Ha-Ha-Ha

Chapter 2

CHAPTER TWO

Linda turned to Faith. “Remember the Woman in Black and Jocko, the linebacker-looking guy?”

Faith nodded. “He actually is one.”

“Both spoke to Howdy—I mean, Quist. For a few minutes. Both seemed to make him happy,” I offered casually.

“Happier than he already was?” Hammill.

“Happier than he was tipsy, yes.”

The detective looked from me to Faith. “Tell me about the Woman in Black first, maybe starting with her name.”

“I’ve heard her called ‘sugah’, ‘honey’, ‘love’, and ‘sweetness’. Pick one or all four.” She smiled amiably and waved to Felicity, motioning her empty cup.

Felicity strolled forward with a steaming pot and refilled it, her gaze riveted on Hammill.

“The Woman in Black will occasionally smoke black cigarette on the patio. Keeps them in a gold-and-rhinestone case. They’re English, so she probably has them specially ordered. She creates a very dramatic effect, dressed in upmarket vintage clothes—almost always black—and very high-heeled shoes. Long flashy black fingernails with sparkles add to the look.” Meeting his keen scrutiny, she again smiled prettily. Faith wasn’t easily rattled. There’d been too many dramas in her life to allow one arrogant detective to fluster her. “The few times I’ve seen her on my watch she’d set her sights on attractive, model-type men. Lets them buy her a couple of drinks, but rarely leaves with one.”

“What made her chat with the likes of Quist?”

“I heard that she’d told him he reminded her of someone, and that got them to talking. It wasn’t until that night that I learned she worked as a scout or agent for some production house… Or maybe it was an advertising firm? Anyway, she’s not one to chat with staff. Only attractive men.”

Hammill appeared bemused. “She wanted Quist for a commercial or something?” His eyebrows shot up so fast I thought they might leave that finely lined forehead altogether.

“Apparently. She gave him a business card and he got so excited, he had to share. He flashed it before me as I passed a drink.” She smiled sadly. “He couldn’t believe someone found him ad material.”

“Neither can I,” Hammill acknowledged with a frown. “But maybe she—they—wanted a certain look for a cookie-and-milk ad, or a front man for a new cartoon or comedy act. How long were Quist and this woman together?”

“Maybe ten minutes. She let him buy her a b****y Mary, extra spicy. Then, off she went. That was around nine.”

“You saw the card, Faith. Did you see a name?” I prodded.

Faith closed her eyes to replay the moment Howdy-Doody-Quist had displayed the card. “It was a unique black business card … real fancy … with raised red lettering. I see it, sort of. Zelde. Zee. Priz—uh.” She sighed softly and reopened her eyes. “Nope, can’t recall it. But there definitely was a ‘z’.”

“You’re very observant,” Hammill stated with a curt nod. “Now, what about this Jocko person?”

“When he overheard Howdy-Doody was studying medicine, he engaged him in conversation.”

Hammill wiggled long fingers in a give-me-more gesture.

“Jocko seemed very interested in forensics. They were debating which of the CSI shows had been best.”

“Anything else?”

“Other than the fact I’d thought it strange that Jocko was interested in the world of

medicine, no. His buddies had often joked about his mind being as vacant as his ‘mug’.”

“Is he?”

“Vacant?”

“Uh-huh.”

Faith shook her head. “No. Although I rarely talk to him or his friends about anything but sports or the cute redhead or lovely blonde at the end of the bar, he seems articulate.”

When she ceased speaking, he turned to us. “Is there anything you’d like to add?”

The three of us eyed one another and shook our heads.

“So, you’re private eyes, huh?” The brow arched again, this time in amusement. “You save runaway Rottweilers and spy on disobedient husbands?”

Yes. But we’d never admit it. “We are private investigators and we’re pretty good at it,” I said bluntly.

Hammill rose and took a couple of steps towards us, then gazed around the lounge with a furrowed brow. I could smell cologne that had been subtly applied—Egoïste if I wasn’t mistaken. A former weather-station colleague, Edgar, had worn it since its inception, up until the day he’d been felled by a giant shamrock during a Saint Paddy’s Day parade.

“We have an agency,” I stated evenly. “And we’re b****y damn proud of it. And ourselves.”

“I’ll b****y damn bet you are.”

“Don’t patronize,” Linda said brusquely, standing.

“Look, maybe you three are good at locating little old ladies’ missing pension checks and runaway Pomeranians. Murder’s another thing. It’s not like Murder She Wrote or Poirot or Nero Wolfe. It’s dangerous. It’s ugly. And it’s f*****g real.”

“We’ve had a few ‘real’ encounters and solved a few ‘real’ murders,” Rey declared briskly. “Successfully. Maybe you should ask around the precinct. Start with Detective Hives.”

“Ives,” I corrected automatically.

Hammill stared at Rey, then turned to Linda and me. “If you remember anything, your bartending friend has my contact info.” With a brisk nod to Faith, he sauntered over to Felicity.

Belgian. That was it. Out of the blue, it came to me—that whisper of an accent. It hailed from Belgium.

“Where to now?” Rey asked as the four of us stepped up to the Jeep.

Linda held up a hand to shield her eyes against the bright sun as she scanned the long one-way street. “How about lunch, maybe somewhere Kailua way?”

“That’d make for a nice drive,” I agreed, hopping into the driver’s seat.

“I’m in,” Rey said, swinging into the rear.

Faith leaped in alongside her and Linda slipped into the front passenger’s seat. “Man, was he a piece of work, or what?”

“Kinda like Sallo,” Rey frowned, adjusting the seatbelt. “At least this dude’s easy on the eyes.”

Faith laughed and slapped Rey’s thigh. “Is that why yours were twinkling?”

My cousin’s response was to stick out her tongue and offer a raspberry, which prompted the rest of us to laugh.

“So, what do you think about Quist’s murder?” I asked as I pulled onto H1-61.

“You mean, not-yet-officially-confirmed murder,” Linda stated drily.

“The poor kid was in the wrong place at the wrong time,” Faith said quietly.

“You don’t think he had anything to do with drugs, do you?” Linda.

“No, I definitely don’t. He enjoyed bending his elbow, but drugs?” She shook her head. “I don’t buy it.”

Recalling that face, I had to agree. There was something off and it wasn’t with Howdy-Doody Quist. As Faith had said, he’d been in the wrong place at the wrong time.

“Well, it’s not our case, so we’ll have to leave it to Hammill et al to solve,” Linda advised, watching the passing scenery.

“What about your case?” Faith asked.

“It’s not our case,” Linda responded. “GRP merely used us as some bizarre starting point.”

“GRP?”

“GrimReaperPeeper.”

Faith offered a flat chuckle. “You don’t believe GRP will contact you again?”

Linda turned to eye the former waitress. “He hasn’t contacted us since we called the police about the bodies we found by the Canal. If it was a game, like he’d stated in the email, you’d think he’d continue taunting and teasing.”

Faith tilted her head one way and then the other as she considered it. “Maybe you’re right.”

“We should still try to find out who he—or she—is,” Rey declared, opening a bottle of tepid water and taking a long swig.

“We don’t have any leads and our IT expert-s***h-pal had no luck tracing the URL,” I pointed out.

“Some expert,” Rey muttered.

“He’s pretty good at what he does,” Linda said in Rocky’s defense. “And Ald and his team didn’t do much better.”

“Maybe one of Gail’s IT buddies could check out things when she’s back from Japan.”

Gail Murdock was an HPD Administrative Specialist and good friend. Right now, she was on a three-week tour of Japan after breaking up with a fellow officer she’d been dating.

“We could text her now—”

“Let the woman enjoy her much-deserved vacation. She’ll be back soon enough,” Linda interrupted her BFF. “The poor thing hasn’t had a decent break in three years. She needs the down time.”

“No thanks to that jerk.” Rey snorted softly and gazed out the window.

Lunch at a small café in the heart of Kailua had been delicious, pleasant, and just what was needed: respite from reality.

On a lark during the drive back, we stopped at a bustling souvenir shop and bought some un-needed things: salt-water taffy, mac nuts, and cute touristy T-shirts. After promises to get together again soon, we dropped Faith at her small Makiki apartment and drove back to the house that was in dire need of repair—from painting to refurnishing and some remodeling thrown in between. With time. After purchasing it for nearly 1.5 million, it would take time to earn the wherewithal to finance major house projects.

It was 4:15 when we stepped into the foyer and changed from sandals to slippers. Our agency’s part-time cleaner/gofer/assistant, Eddy Galazie—“Red-Head” as we sometimes fondly called him, due to an amazing head of r****h-red curls—hastened from the rear with Button and Piggaletto scampering behind.

The former was a young rescue mutt of Havanese, Schnoodle and Chacy Ranoir origins, the latter Linda’s pot-bellied pig. Not far behind bounded Bonzo, Rey’s Checkered Giant rabbit, rescued when its young owner had been murdered during the Can You Hula Like Hilo Hattie caper. Oddly enough, my cousin had requested—demanded, implored, and pressured as only Reynalda Fonne-Werde could—that the rabbit be placed in her “custody” when she’d heard he’d be removed to an animal shelter. She’d never been much of an animal/pet person previously and what had changed her mind, and heart, I’d never know. But God bless her. Home to Oahu the rabbit came.

We greeted the kids with hugs while acknowledging Eddy. Linda gave him a playful slap to the back while Rey brushed her lips across his low, flat forehead. We’d grown quite fond of the young animal lover.

“Did the kids behave?” I asked, leading the way into the spacious, cupboard-heavy kitchen.

“For the most part.”

“Oh-oh.”

“Only one broken vase,” he grinned, sitting at the blue-veined granite counter and watching me remove four cartons of coconut water from a large wheezing fridge (appliances were on the to-buy list, too). “You had a call.”

“Anyone important?” Rey smiled, dumping the contents of the souvenir shop before her and ripping open one of three mammoth packages of Diamondhead Taffy. She tossed one to each of us.

“Strawberry-guava,” Eddy said excitedly. He unwrapped it and popped it into his mouth before you could say taffy twice. The amiable fellow had suffered a head injury when he was eight, which left him challenged; his uncle, a former mob-type menace with a good heart had employed him until his unexpected demise during the Coco’s Nuts case.

“Who was the call from?” Linda asked, squeezing his hand and pulling one of four adjustable-height swivel chairs alongside his.

“Some guy with a weird voice.” Ash-gray eyes glanced earnestly from one face to the next. “It was like he had marbles or pebbles in his mouth. Said to tell you he was wondering what was happening with the game.”

We stared, stunned. Linda found her voice first. “Did he say who he was? What the game was or what should be happening?”

“He didn’t give a name and didn’t say what the game was,” he answered, eyeing the bag of taffy by Rey’s slender hand.

She passed it over. “What else did he say?”

Eddy removed six candies. “Something about … yeah … it was time for the players to stop snoozing.” He grinned and crammed two coconut-flavored ones between small, thin lips. “Was he talking about you?”

Rey and I exchanged concerned glances, then she casually said, “He sounds like the guy we met at the Center a couple of weeks back, when we were looking at board games.”

Eddy chewed blissfully as he watched Button race past, Piggaletto at her heels.

“Maybe he’ll call back,” Linda said dismissively. “Would you like to stay for dinner? JJ’s barbecuing.”

“I am?” I asked flatly.

“Yeah, you love it,” she grinned. “Why else would Rey have bought that six-burner backyard grill?”

“Because she was hoping to learn to cook the easy way?” I asked wryly.

“I can stay and help. Just tell me what to do,” Eddy said cheerfully. “By the way, the guy said he’d try and contact you again sometime soon.”

Rey, Linda and I exchanged anxious side-glances. Evidently, GRP was back.