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My Kind of Town Don Chapman |
Speargun Sonya
>> Off the Big Island
While her fiancee Daren Guy showered, Sonya Chan quickly pulled on an itsy-bitsy yellow bikini and hurried up to the deck of the yacht now called Wet Spot. And just as he'd said, there in the chest behind the wheel lay two spearguns. One she knew as Daren's, and recalled not being able to find it the night all his friends came to offer condolences and propositions. So this is where it was. The other speargun was newer, obviously came with the boat.
She sighed in relief, feeling safer and more secure about her future, leaned down, picked up Daren's gun. And shivered, relief suddenly overcome by the realization that these were the instruments with which Daren killed Paul, the skipper when this was Pet Shop, and his crewman. And that she might also have to use these spears to shoot something other than fish.
"You always were good with a speargun." Daren's voice startled her. She jumped, saw him coming up from the cabin in red board shorts, pulling on a navy "Eh!" T-shirt. "That's one of the things that made me fall for you."
She smiled, hoisted the newer speargun out of the chest, now held both, and Daren had a flashback: The last time one person held all the guns on this deck, two people died.
"I feel better now."
"I'm glad. Hey, there it is!"
Dead ahead, Tuna Maru awaited their rendezvous.
"You really don't know what this is all about?"
"I told you, babe, all I know is that your friend Paul made some kind of deal with this Sushi to pick up some girls and deliver 'em to the Big Island. Which I couldn't care less about, except that Sushi said there was cash involved, which I could use until the insurance thing gets settled."
"Right." The insurance thing. She would make it a policy to have one of these spearguns with her at all times until they reached land safely.
This time it all happened smoothly. No other vessels appeared out of nowhere. The sea was calm. Working the wheel and the electric motor, Daren kept the yacht positioned at the bottom of a ladder made of nylon rope and wooden slats reaching from the deck of the Tuna Maru down seven stories to the water.
One by the dozen brown-skinned girls climbed down, terrified of the height and the fear of falling into sea, but they kept moving, in a hurry to reach the safety of the yacht.
Keeping both spearguns close by, Sonya helped the girls aboard, noting that they were Filipinas and looked barely legal -- age-wise, anyway. As Sushi Leclaire came down the ladder wearing a chartreuse aloha shirt with a large briefcase strapped to his chest, Sonya reached for a speargun.
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Don Chapman is editor of MidWeek. His serialized novel runs daily in the Star-Bulletin. He can be e-mailed at dchapman@midweek.com
