Surfing Detective 00 - The Making of Murder on Molokai

wondered if the Maui masseuse had served Parke in her professional capacity–a mere rub down?–or in some more personal way. That she knew him at all seemed ominous.
    Remote Hana Bay soon drifted under our wings, a tranquil azure pond bringing an end to Maui. Then nothing but sea green, a shade darker than Heather Linborg’s eyes. The plane crossed the twenty-mile ‘Alenuihaha (“great billows smashing”) Channel to the island of Hawai‘i. As I recalled from a boat passage once with my parents, this channel between Maui and its southern neighbor can get pretty wild. Today’s flight was smooth. Not a single bump.
    Soon the Big Island, twice the land area of all other Hawaiian islands combined, loomed ahead at its northern tip, the lush mountainous spine of North Kohala. The Maui masseuse slipped from my thoughts as we flew along Kohala’s windward coast.
What a view!
Over on the lee slopes, fleetingly visible through cotton white clouds, lay the rolling green pastures of Parker Ranch. Down among the coastal lava beds sprawled the oceanfront fairways and velvet greens of the Mauna Kea and Waikoloa golf resorts. And on the windward side, directly beneath us, soaring sea cliffs were pierced by more silvery cascades.
    As the jet descended south along the Hamakua Coast, where soon I would interview Milton Yu, groves of kukui stood out like lime-green swatches against the darker green cliffs. The fire-orange flowers of African tulip trees dotted the landscape like a pointillist’s canvas. Above these flamboyant trees rose Mauna Kea. I grimaced at the sight of this tallest mountain in Hawai‘i–cloud-shrouded and dominating.
    Mauna Kea, you see, took my parents’ life. Their light plane crashed into the mountain when I was only eight. I can never look at Mauna Kea without thinking of them and how my fate suddenly and irrevocably changed. The accident report blamed pilot error. I never believed it.
    The sky had been clear. My father was an experienced, careful pilot who knew every inch of Big Island terrain. Though the report exonerated the airplane’s manufacturer and the firm from whom he leased it, I suspected some of the “investigators” had ties to these two entities. In any case, I received compensation from neither. A modest life insurance policy became my only legacy.
    I had been an only child. Now I was alone. My cousin Alika’s family, the Kealoha’s of the North Shore, welcomed me into their
ohana
and treated me as their own. But since I was a shy boy raised in town and accustomed to the hallowed halls of Punahou, I had trouble adjusting to an unfamiliar public school. My grades fell. Through lengthy family negotiations I was too young to understand, it was decided that I would attend private school in California and live with the family of my father’s brother, Orson T. Cooke of Pasadena.
    I grew up with three sandy-haired cousins who looked like my brother and sisters. No one outside the family’s rambling Tudor on a hillside cul-de-sac off Orange Grove Boulevard knew I was part Hawaiian. I spoke little pidgin. I shed my “Island-style” ways. Gradually I became a Californian.
    Ironically, it was California–not Hawai‘i–that kindled my passion for surfing. Cousin Matthew Cooke and I haunted our favorite spots: Malibu, Rincon, County Line, Trestles. After graduating from preppy Ridgecrest Academy, we trekked south to California Surfside College–a liberal arts school perched on Sunset Cliffs at Point Loma–boasting four of the best breaks in San Diego. At “Cal Surf,” as students fondly dubbed our college, we clocked more hours in the water than in the classroom. I had a blast–until my father’s life insurance ran out.
    I quit the pricy beach-side school (against my Uncle Orson’s advice) and joined the Army, after a recruiter promised me duty at Fort DeRussy in Waikiki.
Shibai.
Didn’t happen. I spent my whole tour stateside. When discharged I returned to San Diego intending to complete my degree with Army money at Cal Surf. Instead I partied and rode waves. Cousin Matthew, by then a management trainee at Acme Casualty, landed me a job as a claims adjuster.
    I never did finish college. Claims work taught me volumes, however, about human nature. I witnessed more half-truths, deception, and outright fraud than I care to remember. This glimpse into the darker side prepared me–better than any classroom–for my later occupation.
    People are like waves.
Despite appearances, look