The Fire Thief Page 4

  That night was humid. She slept fitfully, not falling into a deep slumber until it was nearly morning. At first, the pounding on the front porch door seemed no more than part of the dream she was having, in which huge bones were spewing from the mouth of a fiery volcano. In the dream, she stood at a safe distance, watching as the bones hit the ground and broke apart. Each time a chunk hit the ground, it made a crashing noise. She sat up, fully awake, realizing with a great deal of regret that it was morning, and that this was not a strange dream, but the very real banging of a fist on her front door.

  “Kali! I know you’re home, because Hilo’s out here. Open the door!”

  She recognized the voice, but without pleasure. It was Birta Elinsdottir, who lived in the house on the next piece of land. As usual, she sounded thoroughly aggravated about something. It was Saturday, and Kali wasn’t in the mood to deal with excitement. She was in the mood to sleep for another hour.

  “Yes, hold on. I’m coming,” she mumbled, and to her annoyance, she heard the door swing open in response. Hilo bounded inside and jumped onto the sofa, then stared down at Kali.

  “Isn’t it time you were up?” Birta asked, clearly rhetorically.

  She plunked herself down into one of the two large easy chairs in the room and regarded Kali with a calculating look. In her lap, she held a covered plate.

  “You don’t even have any coffee made. For crying out loud, Kali, it’s almost eight-thirty. Elvar’s already been working on the forge for a couple of hours, and I made muffins. I brought some with me, but I’m not sure you’ve earned anything delicious. And why are you sleeping on the sofa again?”

  Muffins. This sounded mildly interesting and would relieve her of the task of preparing her own breakfast. And there was always the remote possibility that Birta was actually crisis free today and just wanted to have breakfast with someone other than herself. Or that she simply hoped to escape the sound of clanging hammers coming from the covered terrace where her brother, Elvar, had set up the forge he used in his custom knife-making business.

  Her mind flickered over an image of the tall, muscled Elvar, with his shy blue eyes, swinging his hammer, shirtless beneath his leather forging apron. Something in her stirred softly at the image, and she pushed it away. She rose from the sofa and wandered toward the kitchen counter to start a pot of coffee, yawning as she pulled two mugs from the dish rack, where they’d been left to dry.

  “Coffee on the way. What kind of muffins?”

  “Banana and macadamia nut, and I didn’t just come for a chat. I need help with a theft.”

  Her heart sank. Work, after all. The muffins were nothing but a warm, fragrant bribe.

  “One of Elvar’s knives or swords?”

  “No. Someone’s been stealing our solar panels.”

  Kali paused with the coffeepot suspended over the mugs. “You sure?”

  “Of course I’m sure.” Birta scowled, watching as Kali filled the mugs. “Looks like someone’s pried two out of the array up on the roof. One a few weeks ago, and one more last night. We found out this morning.”

  “That someone took one a few weeks ago?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous. Of course not. I noticed that then, and I noticed this now.” Birta snatched one of the mugs off the counter, spilling coffee in the process. She seemed oblivious to the trickle running toward the edge of the counter, and was already pushing open the screen door to the front porch.

  Hiding a smile, Kali wiped up the puddle of coffee and walked toward the porch with her own mug in hand, reflecting that her Icelandic neighbors couldn’t possibly be more unlike one another. In his late thirties, Elvar was calm and friendly. Birta was the elder of the two. Bossy, sensible, and demanding, she’d moved to Hawaii to teach sixth and seventh grade at the local middle school—a task she approached with a zeal and intensity that kept most of the local kids in a state of perpetual terror. Kali wondered idly if her overpowering need for order and control was some deep psychological response to the crowds of tourists and the largely unstructured life she’d found in Hawaii, which was no doubt a huge contrast to the smaller population and stark orderliness of Iceland.

  Followed by Hilo, she joined Birta on the lanai, settling into her seat next to the other woman. A small wooden table separated them, and Birta had placed the plate of muffins on its surface. Hilo found a space on the wooden boards, curling himself up as close as possible to the legs of the table. Kali reached for a muffin, waiting for Birta to elaborate. Looking out across the yard, she realized with some surprise that it had rained heavily during the night. She was just thinking that she must have slept pretty soundly when Birta’s voice interrupted.

  “So what are you going to do about it?” she demanded.

  “I’m not clear why you’re telling me about the theft. You need to file a report and then contact your insurance agency. What exactly is it that you’d like me to do?”

  Birta’s eyes narrowed. She didn’t smile. “Aren’t you a detective? Do you know that each one of those damned panels cost us more than a thousand bucks?”

  “Yes, I know. My grandmother paid the same for hers.”

  “And it wasn’t an ordinary thief. It was some kind of spirit. That’s why I came to you, as a neighbor. The police will just laugh.”

  Kali said nothing. She looked at Birta’s no-nonsense face, at the unblinking gaze challenging her to say she had imagined it. Then she spoke slowly. “A spirit?”

  “Yes.” Birta crossed her arms over her chest, defiant.

  Kali kept her voice neutral as she responded. “What exactly did you see? Can you give me any kind of description?”

  For a long moment, Birta said nothing. Finally, she nodded, a sharp downward movement of her head. “It was something, not someone.” She lingered again before continuing. “What I mean is that whatever it was, it didn’t have a face.”

  The air grew still. Against the window screens, flies buzzed, their movements slowed by the heat already gathering. The brilliant sunshine belied the image of a faceless intruder making its way across Birta’s sturdy roof. Kali studied the other woman carefully.

  “Are you saying you saw a noppera-b or a mujina?” Kali asked, then watched for Birta’s reaction.

  The older woman’s pale eyes remained steady, and the only indication that she’d heard Kali’s question was an added layer of defiance appearing in her tightly drawn lips.

  Kali waited, patient.

  When Birta spoke, her voice was matter-of-fact. “I am saying no such thing. We have plenty of folklore in Iceland, too much for me to be dismissive, but Hawaii’s spiritual nonsense is your department. I’m reporting a factual observation. Whatever it was that was climbing on my roof did not have a face.”

  Kali frowned. Legends of supernatural events in the islands were not uncommon, but encounters with the faceless noppera-b, which Hawaiians of Japanese heritage at times referred to and which they occasionally called mujina, were the subject of rare, frightening stories whispered in the dark. She spoke thoughtfully. “You have to admit that it’s a highly unusual statement.”

  Birta waved a dismissive hand in the air. “You should be taking this a little more seriously, shouldn’t you?”

  Kali split the last muffin in half and offered a section to Hilo.

  “Well, I don’t completely understand. Why didn’t you file a report when the first panel went missing? Did you see something then, too?”

  Birta shrugged, then glared at Hilo and the muffin crumbs gathering around the dog’s front feet. “Stop feeding that wretched animal. He’s already enormous.” She looked up. “When the first panel was stolen, Elvar and I were on the Big Island for a knife show. When we got back, the power didn’t seem up to snuff. I called the maintenance people, and they found that a panel was missing. I couldn’t be sure if it had happened the week we were away, or if maybe it had been longer ago than that. I felt silly calling the police when I couldn’t even be sure of when the actual theft occurred. Reporting it t
o the insurance company would have simply raised the rates.”

  Kali nodded. “And the second panel?”

  “As I said, it was last night.”

  “And you still didn’t report it?”

  “Why do you think? I’m reporting it now, to you, because I know you. The last thing I need is to have the local police force regarding me as a crazy old woman who makes things up. But it absolutely must have happened sometime last night.”

  “How can you be sure?”

  “We drove down to Hana for dinner, and when we came home, Elvar went straight to bed.” She paused. “I was in the kitchen, getting a glass of water, and that’s when I saw the ghost. I hadn’t bothered to turn on the lights, and there was moonlight coming through the window over the sink. There was something like a shadow moving in front of the window outside, blocking out the moon. It separated itself from the darkness and turned toward me. Instead of eyes and a mouth, there was nothing. Just a blank space. As though it wanted me to see.”

  She shuddered. “Then it was gone. It wasn’t until this morning that we realized the power wouldn’t come up all the way. We got out the ladder, and Elvar climbed up to the roof, and sure enough, there’s another panel missing.”

  Kali shook her head. “Well, there’s very little I can do until you make an official report.”

  Kali stood up and went inside, returning with her phone. She called Walter, and explained about the theft. Her brow wrinkled as she listened to Walter’s reply. The conversation was brief. She turned back to Birta, her face serious.

  “Walter’s just a few minutes away. He said we should meet him over at your place.” She saw the impatience in Birta’s eyes. She spoke slowly, choosing her words carefully. “It seems we’ve had reports of similar thefts from other areas of the island.”

  Birta nodded. “All right, then.”

  Kali headed down the porch steps. Birta picked up her now-empty muffin plate and followed Kali slowly down the porch steps and across the wide lawn in silence. Hilo trotted along contentedly behind them, the three of them reaching a path that led through thick shrubs and palms to Birta’s property.

  In less than three minutes, they were next door. Elvar was standing under the overhang of his makeshift workshop in a small building in the garden, attaching a carved-bone handle to a newly finished knife. He turned when he heard them approach, then smiled warmly at Kali.

  He was bare-chested and sweaty from the heat of the forge, a heavy leather forging apron protecting his skin and his long golden hair tied back to keep it from interfering with his work. Kali’s heart gave a small, involuntary lurch as the muscles across his back rippled beneath his skin.

  “Aloha,” he said politely, then turned to his sister. “The solar company people are sending someone over with a couple of replacement panels, and I know you’re not going to be thrilled, but I also phoned the insurance company.” He grinned. “I’ll warn you that no one seems to be in much of a hurry, though. I’m guessing they’re on island time.”

  “Naturally,” said Birta, her disapproval evident. “Anyway, it turns out we’re not the only ones to have had panels stolen.”

  Elvar looked at her inquisitively. “What do you mean?”

  Birta glanced at Kali, who hesitated.

  “It seems there’s been a sudden rash of thefts,” said Kali. “It’s anyone’s guess where they’re all disappearing to, but it seems unlikely that someone’s driving them across the state border.”

  Elvar’s laughter was interrupted by the sound of a car slowing on the main road. Walter’s cruiser pulled into the driveway and rolled to a stop. They watched as he climbed out of the car. He greeted Birta and Elvar and listened as Birta relayed her tale of the faceless intruder, his expression neutral. He frowned and looked inquiringly at Kali, gesturing for her to step away from the others. He spoke quietly, just out of earshot of Birta and Elvar.

  “Noppera-b stealing solar panels?”

  She shrugged. “Who’s to say? Give me the details about what was going on when I called you.”

  “Theft with violent assault during the night on an elderly woman living near the airport at center island, in the Khei area. Grace Sawyer. She’d been on Kaua‘i for several weeks, visiting her daughter, and came home a few days early. Her daughter phoned nine-one-one after getting an incoherent call from her mother that there was some kind of noise on the roof. Apparently, she went outside to see what was going on, and was attacked. We know part of the story because we got it from the daughter. The responding officer found the woman unconscious. Eighty-one years old, and someone smashed her over the head. But . . .” he said, then took a breath, “according to the emergency room staff, she drifted to for a few moments, mumbling something about monsters. Hasn’t woken back up since.”

  Kali looked back to where Birta waited. “Could have been social commentary. Comparing thieves to monsters isn’t necessarily a stretch.”

  “Could be. Or it could be something far more literal.”

  “And I’m guessing the theft involved solar panels?”

  “Yup. Two. He, she, or they left the woman on the ground, unconscious and bleeding heavily from a head wound, and carried on with the theft.”

  Unaware, Birta crossed the lawn and took up a position at the foot of the ladder that had been left leaning against the roof of the house. She glared at Walter, her arms crossed tightly, and called out to him. “I saw what I saw. Now do your job and take a look at my roof. I left the ladder waiting.”

  Walter suppressed a smile and gestured to Kali to help him. Together, they walked to where Birta waited. Walter stood for a moment at the foot of the ladder, looking up, then directed his gaze at the thick lawn as he walked around slowly.

  Kali walked with him, peering at the carefully mown lawn. They examined the area along the side of the house for some indication that another ladder had been set up the night before, but there was nothing.

  Walter moved to the side of the house where the kitchen window faced out toward the sea. The shade was deeper here, and the roofline was slightly lower. Kali followed, her eyes raking the ground. Here, the lawn was broken up with patches of bare earth that edged a garden. She knelt, and peered into the dirt where the broad, waxy leaves of a bush had protected the ground from the rain. She stopped and pointed, and Walter came to stand beside her.

  “There’s a huge jumble of prints everywhere there’s dirt,” she said. “Mostly the same shoes, by the look of it. I know Birta spends a lot of time out here puttering around and gardening, so they may mean nothing.”

  They followed what seemed to be a logical line between the prints and the driveway. The grass was short and dense, and there were no bare patches that might have revealed more markings. Birta’s Volkswagen was parked at the far end of the drive where she usually left it. Walter knelt and studied the ground beneath it, but there were no signs of anything useful. After rising, he walked the length of the driveway, but if there had ever been any tire marks, they had been washed clear by the rain.

  “Ask the scary woman and the knife guy for their shoe sizes and find out if either one of them was walking around that kitchen window in a pair of rubber-soled shoes since the last rain,” Walter said, eyeing Birta with some trepidation.

  Kali frowned uncomfortably. “I’d rather you did. This isn’t my case.”

  Kali could feel Walter’s eyes boring into her.

  “What’s the deal?” he asked.

  She shifted, looking back toward the house. “They’re my neighbors, and I’d prefer to let you handle it. I’m just a little hesitant to get involved with them on any kind of a personal level.”

  Walter smothered a laugh. “What?” He looked at her knowingly. “Wait a minute. Let me make a wild guess—you’re hoping the guy with the ponytail might ask you to the prom someday, and you think asking him questions about his shoe size is too personal?”

  “Asshole. And not true. They’re my friends. Kind of.”

  “Yeah, well, y
ou’re lucky I’m not going to send you up the ladder for being disrespectful. I’m the officer in charge. Plus, I’m your uncle. So I’m doubly offended.”

  “Noted. Not that I particularly care.”

  Walter was still grinning when they returned to where Birta waited. Kali gripped the sides of the ladder as Walter made his way up the rungs. He climbed carefully to the roof and even more carefully swung one leg up over the edge. The roof was empty, washed clean in the rain. The solar array wasn’t far away. He climbed the sloping distance until he was standing before it. He dusted the panels closest to the empty spaces for prints.

  “Nothing especially odd or out of place,” he said to Kali as he climbed back down. “Doesn’t look as though the panels were removed in a hurry. There’s no scraping or broken attachments.”

  “They were probably taken out very carefully,” said Kali. She and Walter walked to the edge of the lawn, looking back at the house. “Whether someone’s stealing them to use or to resell, they’d have to be in pristine condition.” She looked up at the edge of the roof. “The whole thing seems deliberate, right down to the thief knowing exactly when Birta and Elvar would be away from the house.” And, she thought to herself, knowing when the old woman would be off-island, on Kaua‘i, visiting her daughter.

  “Agreed. But the ghost part of the story is pretty weird.” He looked at her sideways. “And it means you’re officially on the job, regardless of the neighbor angle. Outside of the attack last night, none of the other theft victims mentioned anything unusual like that in connection with their panels going missing, but people are more likely to tell you that kind of thing, anyway. Like you understand or something.”

  “Or something. Send me the list of burglary victims,” Kali said, her voice resigned and low enough not to be overheard, “and I’ll see what I can find out. And let me know when—or if—the attack victim is able to talk.”

  They turned to walk back to Birta. Elvar had joined her, and Hilo leaned against him. Elvar reached down, scratching the big dog’s ears.

  As Kali drew near, Hilo wriggled out from beneath Elvar’s hand and ran to her, his tail wagging madly.