Moloka'i (43 page)

He couldn’t quite read the emotion in her face. “Oh,” she said. Then, quickly, “I told you. The damn bug’s laughing at us.”

To her surprise, Kenji reached out, touched her cheek, and said, “I love you.” A tear welled in his good eye. “I love you so much, Rachel.”

He cupped a hand around her neck, drew her to him, and showed her how much.

Chapter 19

1941–43

F

rom the beginning there were relatively few
haoles
sent to Kalaupapa: the first, an Englishman named William Williamson, arrived in 1867, having apparently contracted leprosy while working at the Honolulu receiving station. There was no counting the number of Caucasians who became infected but had the wherewithal to buy quick passage out of the islands before, or even after, their condition was discovered; but dozens of Americans and other people of Northern European stock did find their way to Moloka'i, and one of these arrived shortly after New Year’s Day, 1941.

Former Seaman First Class Gabriel Tyler Crossen came ashore in a boat with six other bedraggled newcomers: four Hawaiians, one Portuguese, and an elderly Chinese. In his Navy whites—white cap and jumper, black neck-erchief, white starched trousers—he was a peacock among sparrows. Waiting at the dock for a produce shipment, Rachel couldn’t help but notice the sailor in bright cotton twill, though at first she took him for a visitor mistakenly placed in a launch with patients. It wasn’t until he stepped onto the landing that she noticed the angry red welt on his neck only partially hidden by his crisp white collar, and realized that he was, however improbably, one of them.

As he gave his name to settlement officials Rachel detected a slight drawl to his speech, but had no clue what state he hailed from: her familiarity with mainland accents came primarily from movies, and Southern accents from
Gone With the Wind
. Now as the newcomers followed the officials into town, the young sailor looked around for the first time—taking in the maimed faces of those he would be living among for the rest of his life—and Rachel clearly read the dismay and horror in his face. She could hardly begrudge him that—they’d all felt it at first. But there was something else, noticeable in the way his shoulders began to sag and his proud bearing seemed to wilt. She remembered seeing some of it in Kenji when he first came to Kalaupapa: the shame not merely of having leprosy but of having lost one’s station in life.

Then the first cargo boat landed, and Rachel thought nothing more about the sailor until she and Kenji—and aging H
ku, sisterless since the death of Setsu—came home that evening to discover that Seaman First Class Crossen had been settled, alone, in the cottage next door. It was unusual as ever for a single person to be assigned their own home; but given that he was
haole
she supposed she shouldn’t have been surprised. The administration of the settlement was quick to make allowances for the lifestyle of what used to be called “white foreigners.”

Crossen, no longer in uniform but wearing denim pants and a short-sleeved shirt, stood on his
l
nai
, his back to Rachel and Kenji as he gazed down Kaiulani Street. As they approached Rachel called out, “
Aloha
.”

The man jumped as if someone had cried “Boo!” He pivoted around, seeing his neighbors for the first time; gave them a tight smile and a perfunctory nod; then quickly turned away and hurried into his house.

“Good meeting you, too,” Kenji said to empty air.

“It’s his first day. You remember what it was like.”

“As I recall,” Kenji said dryly, “I was friendly, gregarious, and generally of sunny disposition.”

Rachel poked him in the ribs.

“Give him a couple days to get settled,” she said.

But though they would eventually exchange brief pleasantries with their new neighbor, that was as far as it went. He came into the store often enough, to buy Wrigley’s gum or Lucky Strikes, but was always coolly unapproachable: he paid promptly for his purchases and departed quickly, never engaging in small talk with Kenji or his regular customers. Only once did he contribute even a single sentence: during a heated discussion about the settlement authorities’ recent attempts to convince patients to be voluntarily sterilized. Some patients, told they couldn’t go to Honolulu on T.R. unless they underwent the procedure, acquiesced under pressure; others flatly refused. Crossen listened in disbelief, then disgust, then snapped out, “Anyone tries that on me, I’ll return the favor.
Without
surgery.” The regulars laughed, but Crossen just turned on his heel and left the store.

He declined invitations to parties and dances, never going near the social hall but for the occasional movie. When the shades of his house were raised Rachel and Kenji could see him downing one bottle of Pabst Blue Ribbon after another, only to pass out afterward, sitting stewed in his chair like a hermit crab tucked in the cleft of a rock. Sometimes they heard those bottles shatter and caught glimpses of amber shards lying in acrid pools on the floor.

Crossen’s sole apparent friend was the only other mainland American patient, an affable Californian named Brady; and on one of Brady’s visits to the store Rachel asked him pointblank whether or not their new neighbor was
pupule
.

“Oh, he ain’t batty,” Brady told her, “just angry. He drinks to forget where the hell he is—or not care.”

“I was angry too at first,” Kenji admitted. “Maybe if I talked to him . . .”

Brady shook his head. “I wouldn’t. Gabe’s got no use for Orientals—thinks he got the
ma'i p
k
from a Chinese whore in Honolulu. He was stationed on the USS
Nevada
, and when the ship’s medico told him he had leprosy, he went on a bender—went AWOL, beat the crap out of that poor whore. The brass had him march up and down the deck carrying a full pack for six hours.”

“But I’m not Chinese,” Kenji pointed out.

“You’re close enough for him.”

“I’m surprised he’s even here,” Rachel said. “Isn’t there a leprosarium on the mainland?”

Brady nodded. “Carville, Louisiana. But it’s kinda close to his family in Baton Rouge. Didn’t want to go back and shame them. Sounds silly, I know, but there it is.”

Kenji just nodded.

It wasn’t until the annual Fourth of July celebration that Crossen allowed himself to be coaxed from his house by the gregarious Brady. The Fourth was traditionally festive at Kalaupapa, memories of those tiny flags ground into the dust in ’98 having been long forgotten. Food was abundant; there were canoe races, a baseball game, pony races, and most colorfully,
p
'u
riders—a Hawaiian princess and her six attendants astride horses, ginger wreaths around their necks, their long sweeping skirts grazing the ground as they rode. Crossen didn’t participate in any events, but he did watch them, particularly the baseball game between patients and staff physicians (the doctors lost nine-four). After this there was a motion picture in the social hall, followed by ice cream, cakes, and other desserts. For the first time since the young seaman arrived here he seemed to enjoy himself—seemed to realize that it was possible to enjoy himself here—and by the end of the evening he was even dancing with a pretty young Portuguese girl named Felicia. Kenji and Rachel joined them on the dance floor, as a blind eighteen-year-old named Sammy Kuahine—something of a musical prodigy, despite his handicap—strummed his ukulele and sang a song of his own composition.

“
The Sunset of Kalaupapa

Smiles through the evening rain;

The tradewinds of Kalaupapa

Sing like an old refrain

There’s music of romancing,

Moonlight and stars above;

Your magic charms, your dancing

Fill every night with love . . .”

Rachel’s cheek brushed against Kenji’s as they danced, as out of the corner of her eye she saw Gabe Crossen cradling Felicia in his arms, swaying to the music with a smile that somehow changed his whole face; and for these moments at least, Moloka'i truly seemed the place of romance and beauty of which Sammy sang so sweetly.

T

hat first Sunday morning in December was as drowsy and quiet in Kalaupapa, but for the crowing of settlement roosters, as it was on O'ahu. As Kenji slept in, Rachel took H
ku to Papaloa Beach. The swells were moderately high and well-shaped, perfect for surfing. There was only one other person on the beach, a man in his thirties whose face and legs were riddled with sores, his right foot amputated at the ankle; he sat on the sand, gazing out at the big waves rolling in. He turned at her approach, and Rachel nodded a hello to the surfer she’d first met here thirteen years before, the one with the hollow surfboard. The eyes in his ulcerated face reflected the same longing and frustration he must have seen in hers back in ’28. She gave him a consoling smile and walked on, playing catch with H
ku a while before heading back to town.