Taking Care Of Business

Detective Fiction by James Clar

Honolulu, 1948

My chair creaked as I lit a cigarette and leaned back to make myself comfortable. I had some foot-dangling to catch up on. I was out of practice. The overhead fan in my office above a pawn shop on Hotel Street did little to blunt the odors from the noodle joint down the block. It wasn’t doing much for the late morning heat either. Damn thing wobbled and shimmied like a drunk trying to make his way down a crowded sidewalk in Waikiki. Honolulu was sweating through a September heatwave and the streets around Chinatown smelled of diesel, grease, garlic, and bad decisions. And not always in equal measure.

The knock on my door was polite, too polite in fact. In my experience, it was the kind of knock that came with cuff links and billable hours.

“Come in,” I said, as I sat up straight and tried to look professional or, at the very least, what passed for professional in my line.

He waltzed in, dressed like his clothes had been pressed with a steamroller. He wore a white linen suit, white trousers, maroon tie and wire rimmed glasses. His hair was brown with just the right amount of gray. It wasn’t just cut, it was manicured, coiffed in fact.

“Mr. O’Brien,” he began without preamble, “My name is Arthur Kapono.” He paused, as though his name meant something to me. It didn’t, but I nodded my head as though it did. Even on such short acquaintance, I could tell he was a guy who liked his ego stroked.

He set a manila folder on my desk like he was handing me the key to the city. “I’m an attorney representing Harlan Franks of California. The Harlan Franks … of Continental Shipping. I presume you’ve heard of him?”

“This may surprise you, Mr. Kapono, but I do occasionally read the papers.” Franks was a well-known name in the islands. What wasn’t hauled here by Matson was brought in by Franks. I’d heard he’d branched out, too, into steel and banking as well.

Kapono’s smile was as thin as a razor and about as inviting. “His son, Dennis, left Stanford and came here. Mr. Franks sends him an incredibly generous allowance. He indulges the boy, if you ask me, but that’s hardly my concern. The boy no longer writes home except for a perfunctory note every few weeks. The Franks have been unable to reach him by telephone or radio telegraph.”

I stubbed out my cigarette and lit another. Arthur Kapono watched the smoke rise and do battle with the ceiling fan. It was early in the bout but, for now, the smoke was winning.

“And this concerns me … how?”

Kapono looked at me with the expression of a not-so-patient teacher attempting to explain the operation of gravity to a particularly dim-witted student.

“Well, obviously, the Franks are concerned about their son. They’d like you to verify his welfare. You will, of course, be compensated handsomely. Twice what I’ve been told is your usual rate.”

This was post-war Honolulu. The ‘wild West’. A young haole kid on his own and with money to burn. ‘Welfare’ was hardly the word I would have used, but twice my usual rate was strong inducement. For once, I refrained from the snappy comeback and took the case.

After Kapono left, I walked around the corner to Smitty’s and had a couple of stale beers as a hedge against the heat. After that, it didn’t take me too long to pick up the trail. Folks in all the wrong places remembered a haole kid throwing money at dice like he was tossing flower petals at the tourists disembarking from the SS Lurline down at Pier 39. Funny thing, no one seemed to know his name. I showed them the picture Franks’ attorney had given me. Heads nodded in recognition nonetheless.

I wore out some more shoe leather, bought a few more rounds of drinks. Spent a little more of Franks’ money. He could spare it. By the time I was done, I had traced the boy to a flop house in Iwilei. 

The manager was an elderly Asian guy who looked like he had come with the décor when the place was built. He wore an Aloha shirt that was so dirty – or so faded – that it was impossible to tell what the original color or pattern might have been.

“So that was his name,” he declared as he looked down at the picture of Dennis Franks. The manager took off his glasses and wiped them with a handkerchief that had been clean when Roosevelt was president. Teddy, that is.

“He registered here under the name of ‘Smith’. What do I care, hey? As long as they pay up on time it’s no business of mine.”

“Your compassion, not to mention your civic pride, is commendable.”

The manager didn’t get my subtle brand of humor, or he just wasn’t biting that day.

“Kid had a taste for the ladies … and for some other things too.” The manger thumped a dirty index finger once or twice against his nose. I got his drift. Who says it never ‘snows’ in Hawaii!

“What happened to him? Know where he is now?”

The manager laughed. It was a laugh without warmth, nothing but the cold, cynical echo of decay.

“What usually happens, brother? You look like you know your way around. Boy OD’d. It happened six months or so ago. He didn’t have a wallet or papers.” I didn’t bother asking if he had them before the manager found the kid.

“I called the cops. They came out and took him away in a meat wagon. Snooped around asking questions for a couple of days. End of story. That’s how the story always ends.”

“Ever see the kid with anyone in particular?” I asked.

“Just his ‘girlfriends’.” The manager paused for a moment, looking thoughtful. I was patient. I figured that, for him, being thoughtful was a bit of a strain.

“There was a dapper little guy in a white linen suit and horn-rimmed glasses. He came ‘round once or twice. Never knew what his connection was. Didn’t ask. Never pays, especially in this neighborhood, to ask too many questions. Know what I mean?” The manager winked.

The next day, the temperature had dropped and the trade winds had returned. Apart from a few mauka showers, it was a picture-postcard-perfect day. The kind the Chamber of Commerce would order up year ‘round if they could. Blue skies, puffy white clouds and, off toward Manoa, the usual profusion of rainbows. The rainbows didn’t do much to help me forget a dead kid all alone in a seedy rooming house.

I took a drive up Nu’uanu to the morgue at the corner of School Street. I found pretty much what I figured I’d find. It was a file marked John Doe from 198 days ago. Male Caucasian, approx. 23. Cause of Death: narcotics overdose. Personal Effects: none. The appended description matched Dennis Franks to T. Just another victim of the hollow promise of paradise.

I went back to the office and opened a window. Figured I’d give the ceiling fan an assist. A light breezed jostled the blinds. They made a noise that sounded like surf lapping rhythmically against the shore. Mid-afternoon sunlight cut the room into thin strips. I leaned back in my chair and had a drink from the office bottle. I picked up the folder on Dennis Franks and practiced some more foot dangling while I studied it for an hour or so. I had found the kid, case closed … but a few things weren’t adding up. The more I read, the more two plus two kept coming out five. But then again, Math was never my strong suit.

I assumed the manager of Dennis Frank’s rooming house had nicked the kid’s wallet and ID. What if he hadn’t? Also, I had copies of a couple of the most recent letters the Franks had received from their son. They were written in a sloppy scrawl and were general enough in tone that they could have been drafted by and addressed to just about anyone. Buried deep in the file I found a note that young Franks had written much earlier to Kapono about transferring a portion of his monthly allowance into another bank account. It was neat and precise. Could the difference in penmanship be chalked up to the boy’s addiction and deteriorating condition? Probably, but I wasn’t convinced. Things like that make me itch and, when I itch, I scratch.

I walked over to the Bishop National Bank on Merchant Street and arranged to have dinner later that evening with a teller I knew by the name of Millie. No reason not to mix business with pleasure. Especially when the client was footing the bill.

We met at the Moana and, after dinner and drinks under the banyan tree, we took a stroll along the beach to watch the sunset. By next morning, Millie had quite enthusiastically confirmed some of my suspicions. Her description of the woman who had been cashing Dennis Franks’ checks the past few months was intriguing to say the least. My itch was better but I wasn’t done scratching yet.

I called Arthur Kapono’s office and made an appointment for later that afternoon. Getting access to the gold in Fort Knox would probably been easier than getting through Kapono’s secretary.

On the way, I dropped by the Advertiser and had a chat with Mitch Shiga, the society columnist. He had a file photo of the attorney and his wife at some charity event back in July. Shiga told me that Kapono’s reputation and income had taken a nosedive of late. Lucky for all of us, it was Mitch’s job to keep the world safe for democracy by tracking momentous news like that.

“A series of bad investments,” the newspaperman explained. “Plus, there are rumors that he’s tried to cash in on some ‘privileged information’ given to him by more than a few of his high-profile clients.”

Shiga paused, took of his classes and tossed them on his desk where they disappeared beneath a pile of copy and a growing mountain of cigarette ash.

“You know what it’s like here, O’Brien. Honolulu is still basically a small, insular town at heart. Word like that gets around in those circles and you’re sunk.”

I thanked Mitch and flashed him the gunfighter’s salute as I turned to leave. My itch was extinguished, apparently, like Arthur Kapono’s reputation.

Kapono’s office was in the Alexander and Baldwin building on Bishop Street. Under other circumstances I’d stop and admire the structure’s terra cotta exterior, the double-pitched tile roof with overhanging eaves and lavish fretwork on the bronze doors and second-story windows. The whole shebang was done up in a style those in-the-know referred to as ‘Hawaiian Regionalist’. This time, I wasn’t interested. I had other fish to fry.

Kapono’s secretary was even more intimidating in person than she had been on the telephone. She was an elderly battle-axe with steel-gray hair and a chin you could split coconuts with … that’s if you had any coconuts that needed splitting. She showed me into the attorney’s inner sanctum with a snort that sounded like a tugboat’s’ horn as it was maneuvering into port. She closed the door behind her. I think she even left a wake.

“I assume you have some news for me, Mr. O’Brien,” Kapono began as he stood up regally from behind a desk that was the size of an battleship.

“Dennis Franks is dead.” I tossed the morgue file and a sanitized copy of my case notes on his desk. “Kid OD’d six months ago. He was found in a cheap rooming joint in Iwilei. No ID. Authorities picked him up. He was buried as a John Doe.”

I paused. I was waiting for a reaction. Kapono was cool, I’ll give him that, but he couldn’t hide the briefest trace of relief that crossed his face as he took his glasses of and polished them with his tie.

“There’s information in there,” I continued pointing to my notes, “about how Franks can identify and claim his son’s body. Do I inform Franks or will you?”

“Thank you, Mr. O’Brien, you’ve fulfilled your charge admirably. I’ll convey the tragic – but not entirely unexpected news – to the boy’s parents.”

Kapono reached into his desk drawer and handed me a check. As promised, it had enough zeroes in front of the decimal point to keep me afloat for the rest of the year.

I left without offering to shake his hand. He didn’t seem to mind. I gave his secretary a saucy wink as I left the office. I couldn’t wait to get outside into the fresh air.

The next morning, I sent a cable to Mr. Harlan Franks and followed up with a letter containing carbon copies of my case notes … the whole kit-and-kaboodle this time. I could of – probably should of – gone to the police with what I knew. If I was right, I figured that a man like Franks would have the resources and the guts to deal with things far more efficiently and effectively than the cops.

Whether Kapono had anything to do with Dennis Franks’ death was an open question. I’d bet the farm on it, though. Either way, he and his wife benefited from his demise. Kapono forged the notes home to the parents. Larceny with a fountain pen. His wife cashed the sizeable checks that kept coming in even after the kid was dead. Fraud.

Kapono was in a bind. He had to hire someone, or Franks might have gotten suspicious. If I had failed to find the kid, great. The scam could maybe continue. If I happened to track the boy down, well, who knows what Kapono intended to tell the family? I’d get paid and that would be the end of it. I’d have no reason to pursue things any further. That’s if I hadn’t developed that nasty itch.

About two weeks later, I got a call from Mitch Shiga.

“Hey, O’Brien,” he said. “It hasn’t made the funnies yet but figured you might want to know. That attorney, Arthur Kapono, and his wife? They found them dead. Packard went off the Nu’uanu Pali Drive last night. A bad scene. Crashed at the bottom and burst into flames. Looks like the brakes failed or something.”

I thanked Mitch and hung up. I wasn’t surprised, not exactly. But I did marvel at how quickly it had happened.

Ten days after that, Harlan Franks showed up at my office. He was fresh off the Pan Am Clipper. Tall, distinguished, wearing a double-breasted suit despite the tropical heat. He was the kind of guy who never sweated, at least not in public. He was in town to see to the details about his son’s remains. Taking him back to the mainland for a “proper” burial.

“I Wanted to take a moment to thank you in person, Mr. O’Brien. In some ways, you’re responsible for giving our son back to us … and for allowing ‘justice’ to take its course. I also wanted to make certain that you had actually been compensated as promised.”

I nodded in the affirmative. I didn’t want any more of Harlan Franks’ money.

As he was about to leave, Franks turned back toward me. Despite the heat, something cold had moved into his eyes.

“Kapono and his wife turned Dennis’ death into a get rich quick scheme, a shady business deal. What would you have done?”

I reached into the bottom drawer and poured myself a belt from the office bottle. I didn’t bother offering him one. I couldn’t tell if he was looking for absolution or confirmation.

“I’d have taken care of business.”

“That’s what I thought.” He closed the door behind him.

I leaned back in my chair and looked up at the ceiling fan. It was making a low but steady “woof, woof” sound as the blades revolved in their elliptical and erratic orbit. Damn thing sounded like an old, asthmatic dog. I thought about what Franks had said, about justice. Had I done the right thing? Who knows!  But I did know one thing for sure. Justice drags her feet. She’s blind, deaf and, more often than not, late to the party. Karma, on the other hand, settles things in full and on time. She takes care of business. Occasionally, though, she needs someone to remind her of who really owes. As long as that was true, in my racket, business would always be steady.

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Bio: James C. Clar is a writer and retired teacher who divides his time between the wilds of Upstate NY and the mean streets of Honolulu, Hawaii. Most recently his work as appeared in Sudden Flash, The Magazine of Literary Fantasy, MetaStellar Magazine, The Blotter Magazine, Bright Flash Literary Review and Freedom Fiction Journal.

Cover photo by the Author

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