Koa thought of his brother lying in a hospital bed with a brain tumor and wondered if he’d ever see Ikaika again. He suddenly recalled his baby brother, maybe an eighteen-month-old, playing on the lānai of his family home. Ikaika had been such an inquisitive and fearless baby, venturing down the steps and crawling off into the yard. Koa’s mental image morphed into an ugly picture of his brother drunk after a bar fight. Ikaika had lashed out at him so often and caused so much pain, their connection had atrophied. But now Koa couldn’t bear to lose his brother. Funny how a moment of tragedy pulled estranged brothers together. “What are his chances?”
“Actually, pretty good. These types of tumors are well contained and good candidates for surgical resection. Based on the MRI scans we’ve done, we should be able to remove it. The extent of surgical resection is the best indicator of long-term survival.”
“Resection?” Koa asked.
“In simple terms, if we can cut out the entire tumor, then your brother will have excellent odds for long-term survival.”
Good long-term news, but the short term concerned Koa more. “And the survival rate for this kind of surgery?”
“We’ve made lots of advances in the last few years. With advanced imaging and computer-guided surgery, patients come through the surgery amazingly well.”
Koa had a lot to absorb all at once. “And this needs to be done right away?”
“Yes. Any brain tumor increases intracranial pressure and can damage other parts of the brain. That’s why your brother blacked out.”
“What’s the recovery time?”
“Typically, about eight to twelve weeks, but it varies depending on the person and the surgery.”
Koa knew the state paid for routine medical care of prison inmates but wasn’t sure about complex surgery. “I’ve one last question, Dr. Carlton. I’ll bet there’s a hefty price tag on this kind of surgery.”
“Oh, don’t worry about the cost. The Supreme Court interprets the Eighth Amendment to require the same level of medical treatment for prisoners as other citizens receive. The state of Hawai‘i will pay for your brother’s care.”
After putting down the phone, Koa walked to the window. Rain splattered against the glass, and gray clouds hung low over Hilo Bay. Was it ever, he wondered, going to stop raining in sunny Hawai‘i? His brother in a coma with a brain tumor, a tumor he’d had since childhood. Scenes flickered through Koa’s mind like comic-book pictures: his brother’s angry face, his shouting irrational taunts, his sudden bouts of violence. He thought of Ikaika’s schoolyard fights, his first car theft, his first stint in prison. The pain in his mother’s face as clear as if it all happened yesterday. He flashed back on all the times he’d tried to get through to his brother. The visits to his prison, helping Ikaika get jobs, bailing him out when he got in fights, the excuses. And Ikaika always blaming Koa.
One particular scene stuck in Koa’s mind. Ikaika must have been seven or eight. Koa had found him in the forest preparing to butcher the neighbor’s cat. When Koa challenged him to stop, Ikaika had turned on him. He’d seen a demented light in Ikaika’s eyes, and his brother had stepped forward swinging his knife at Koa. Only at the last second had Ikaika halted. “I hate you,” Ikaika said. “Hate … You understand, big brother.” An hour later, Ikaika had strolled through the house, announced he was going fishing, and left as if nothing untoward had happened.
Koa had thought of Ikaika as a bad seed, like eight-year-old Rhoda Penmark in Maxwell Anderson’s movie. He’d viewed Ikaika as evil to the core, but he now saw the glimmer of a different cause. Maybe Ikaika had been sick. Maybe his violent acts had a medical explanation. Koa wondered if any of the doctors he knew could shed light on that possibility.
Brain surgery! They were going to cut open his brother’s head. Would Ikaika be the same person? Then Koa caught himself. Ikaika’s future wasn’t the question. If he didn’t survive the doctor’s knives, he’d have no future.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
KOA, RESPONDING TO Piki’s urgent call, reached Reed’s Island, one of Hilo’s toniest areas, at 6:30 a.m. Small mansions occupied large lots on the tree-lined street. Driveways harbored Mercedes, BMWs, Lexus sedans, and a Tesla or two. Neighborhood children went to private schools like HPA—Hawai‘i Preparatory Academy—in Waimea or Punahou in Honolulu. Hilo’s one percent.
Koa parked behind two other police vehicles, lights flashing, outside 7 Ka‘iulani Place. The front door of the white clapboard-style house stood wide open. The elegant setting made the bloodied body of Arthur T. Witherspoon, the architect who’d designed the KonaWili school, all the more startling.
Koa knelt beside the body. Witherspoon, dressed in linen slacks, a silk shirt, and expensive loafers, had been shot twice in the chest at close range. One bullet was still lodged in his body, but the other had gone through, splattering the man’s blood over the foyer.
Witherspoon had fallen backward and lay with his eyes open seemingly fixed on the crystal chandelier above. Koa took note of the man’s gold chain, wedding band, and platinum Rolex watch. Inside Witherspoon’s pants pocket Koa found several keys on a sterling silver ring and a leather wallet with several $20 bills. Plainly, not a robbery. A Hawai‘i driver’s license confirmed the man’s identity. He checked around the body for shell casings but found none. Koa tried to imagine what the architect saw just before the bullets ripped into him. Most likely the eyes of an assassin. The killing had the earmarks of a professional hit.
Koa experienced a wave of guilt. After the Boyle killing, he should have warned Witherspoon or put him under police protection. Koa had become a cop to assuage his guilt over killing Hazzard and his part in the death of Jerry, his Army buddy, who’d died from a bullet meant for Koa. Yet he couldn’t escape guilt. When cops screwed up, people died. Witherspoon might have been partly responsible for the KonaWili disaster, but his death still weighed on Koa. He sighed. ‘O ka mea ua hala, ua hala ia, what is gone is gone. His guilt never solved a homicide.
Turning to look out the front door, Koa peered down the concrete path from the stoop to the roadway and noticed a puddle halfway between the house and the street. Walking back over the lawn to avoid disturbing evidence, he found two places where wet footprints hadn’t dried, leaving impressions—heavy thick treads—on the concrete. Hiking boots? Not the kind of shoes worn by cops. Knowing the prints would dry up before the police photographer arrived, he knelt and snapped cell phone shots of each print.
Koa returned to the house where Piki advised him that Mrs. Witherspoon had gone upstairs to change out of her nightclothes. While he waited, Koa examined the living room and the adjoining dining room. He wanted to know more about Arthur Witherspoon. Seeing how a person lived—what things occupied special places—often yielded insights into personality. If you couldn’t get inside a dead man’s mind, you could still study his man-cave.
The house had a warm, lived-in feeling. Tasteful and expensively furnished, the rooms appeared orderly, but not obsessively neat. Architectural photographs and drawings of churches decorated the dining room walls. One in particular, a color photograph of a cathedral with two massive, but different, spires rising to enormous heights caught Koa’s attention. Another picture showed the front of a church with a giant circular window between two towering spires. As he studied the spires in the two photos, he realized they belonged to the same church.