My Kind of Town
>> State Library On a whim
Lily Ah Sun glanced at her watch. Researching references to the Ah Sun family in both Honolulu dailies during 1981 had taken just minutes. The whole year! Lily needed to be at her home in Hawaii Kai in an hour to meet the decorator about giving her bedroom a new look after last night's shootings (and blood-letting). But she was also fascinated by her family research. Who was this Clarence Ah Sun she'd never before heard about? And what could he have to do with the feud between her father and uncle? She was anxious to look up the three references to Clarence, as well as one to her Uncle Mits.
But just on a whim, she pulled down the volume for 1974, the year before she and Quinn were born. Whim? Later, she would come to believe it was nothing less than divine inspiration.
But for right now, all it said was: Ah Sun, Clarence -- SB B-4 4-17. Meaning a story about the mysterious Clarence appeared in the Star-Bulletin, page 4 of the B section, on April 17. Old Clarence was getting newsier and newsier.
And then a reference to her father: Ah Sun, Shitsuro --SB A9 4-17, A A-10 4-18.
Both papers covered a story about him, both in the A section, but the Bulletin beat the Advertiser by a day.
And that was all the Ah Sun news of 1974.
Lily glanced at her watch again. She had to hurry, but her research was going fast. Replacing the golden-brown bound volume for 1974, Lily took down the volume for 1975, the year she and Quinn were born.
>> State Capitol
Retrieving his car from the parking garage, Machiavelli Yang experienced a rare moment of self-reflection. Usually he was too busy managing other people's lives to think about his own. But analyzing the task ahead with the lovely Donna Gomes, Machiavelli considered the science of bending people to his will while allowing them to think they're really in charge. He knew all the tricks, of course. But for Machiavelli it was really an art -- creative, based on feel, instincts and experience.
Machiavelli didn't know his travel agent well, but did know that at 32 Donna was still single and likely to remain so because she spent too much time with her small agency, Uku Miles Travel. She might welcome the opportunity to meet Sen. Donovan Matsuda-Yee-Dela Cruz-Bishop-Kamaka, get to know him. Certainly his contacts would be good for her business. And, as always happened, his inherent charm would soon have her hooked. Unless she learned about his demons. But part of Machiavelli's job was masking them.
Don Chapman is editor of MidWeek.
His serialized novel runs daily in the Star-Bulletin
with weekly summaries on Sunday.
He can be emailed at dchapman@midweek.com