Chapter 7 Settling In
Settling In
Manō: shark
Early afternoon they unloaded at the boat harbor, Minnow feeling crisp and toasty and already turning pink. This time she
dropped off Nalu at his hotel, stopped for groceries and headed back to the house. With no word when Woody was coming, she
slithered onto the floor and tried to light the fridge. It took a few snaps, and then she saw the blue flame of the pilot
light flick on. Same as yesterday, a thick layer of cloud cover had materialized midafternoon, stacking up against the flanks
of Hualālai and spreading down the mountain minute by minute. Minnow ate her peanut butter and honey sandwich on the patio
in the shade of the trellis above, a tangled thicket of woody vines.
In the light of day, she could tell no one had been here in a while. Leaves and sticks and sand had piled up on the concrete
deck pad, and the grass out front toward the ocean was overgrown and strewn with coconut fronds. When she was done eating,
she did a quick tidy up of the place, then called the hospital on the ancient rotary phone. Dr. Eversole had given her Angela’s
room number and said not to ask for her by name but just to refer to her as the shark incident patient.
“North Hawai?i Community Hospital. How may I direct your call?”
“I’d like to speak to the nurses’ station for room 206, please.”
The phone rang and rang and she almost gave up, but a harried-sounding voice finally answered. “Aloha. East wing nurses’ station.”
“Hi there. I’m a shark biologist working on the recent attacks. And I’m calling to find out how and when I can speak with
the shark incident patient in room 206. My name is Dr. Gray.”
There was such a long pause that Minnow began to worry that maybe Angela hadn’t made it. “Yes, well, we can’t give out any
personal information without patient consent. And no visitors at this time.”
“I’m not a visitor. I’ve been hired to work on the case.”
“Hired by who?”
Good question. “By the university—the state.” Though she couldn’t even be sure who exactly she was working for.
“Hang on. I’ll need to go check,” the nurse said.
As she waited, she watched a fat gecko scurry down the weathered wooden post, a mongoose weave in and out of the bushes, and
a gray heron land on a rock out front. At least she wasn’t alone.
Five minutes later, the nurse came back on. “The patient is sleeping and the doctors are busy, so I don’t know what to tell
you.”
At least Angela was alive.
“Is there any family I could talk to? The man who was with her in the water? Please, I’m doing my best to figure out what’s
happening and prevent any more incidents.”
She knew she was dancing around the obvious, but she wanted to remain discreet since she had no idea how many people knew.
“Why don’t you give me your name and contact info, and I’ll pass it on,” the nurse said.
There was a yellowed sticker on the side of the phone with faded numbers, but it was illegible. “I don’t know the number where
I’m staying. I’ll call back tomorrow.”
Frustrated, she hung up. It was hard to imagine Angela Crawford lying in a hospital bed up in Waimea, possibly fighting for
her life.
Angela had burst on the scene the same year Minnow graduated from college, almost a decade ago, causing a firestorm with her appearance in the movie Hour of the Hawk, opposite Kevin Costner. Strangely, Minnow bore a resemblance to Angela, and watching her was like watching a more striking
version of herself: a mess of long dark hair, porcelain skin and a fiery spirit that came alive on the screen. It was her
passion for hawks that made Minnow take notice of her, even though she knew Angela was only playing a role. That was her gift—to
shape-shift into whatever character she played.
Since then, Angela had become America’s favorite wild card—making blockbuster after blockbuster but also occasionally starring
in low-budget indie films. It was something Minnow had admired in her, that independent streak and the desire to take on roles
for the love of the story, not for the money. But that was the weird thing about famous people—you somehow felt like you knew
them, when really, you only knew the characters they played, not their motivations and desires, hopes and fears. And despite
Angela’s fame, Minnow simply wanted to meet the woman who’d just had a devastating encounter with a massive white shark and
lived to tell about it. Something like that was bound to bring anyone down to earth.
When Minnow called Mayor Lum’s office, his secretary put her right through. Nalu had briefed her on his background. Hawai?i
County mayor, retired attorney, smart and charismatic, and a guy whose favorite pastime was going to Vegas.
“He’ll smile and make nice, but don’t trust the guy as far as you can throw him,” he’d warned.
It would’ve been nice to meet in person, but his office was in Hilo, close to two hours away, and she had serious doubts the
truck would even make it that far.
“Miss Gray, I appreciate you for flying out here so quickly,” he said. “I understand you are somewhat of an expert on great white sharks.”
Miss? She had introduced herself to the secretary as doctor.
“No problem, Harry. And yes, white sharks are my specialty.”
“Despite what people are saying, our waters are generally pretty safe. I want to remind people of that. I want you to remind people of that. So, do you have any updates for me?”
“Nope, nothing new. I’m just getting started, but tomorrow I’m going to try to interview the most recent victim. It’ll help
to take some measurements and hear her story, and I’m also determined to find Stuart’s surfboard. That would at least tell
us if it’s the same animal.”
“I’ll tell you what I told Dr. Eversole. Spring break is coming up next month, and with it the Kiawe Roughwater Swim. We’ve
got people coming from as far away as China, and our businesses count on this race to keep them going. If you don’t have this
thing figured out in two weeks, I may have to authorize a shark hunt. Open season—”
Her stomach twisted in on itself. “I strongly advise against that.”
“There’s a shark out there hunting people in my waters, so advise away. I’ll do what I need to protect our interests.”
“Mayor Lum, shark hunts have been shown to have a detrimental effect on the ocean. We need our apex predators to keep things
in check. All the shark hunts here in the past did nothing but mess things up—other big fish proliferate and eat the reef
fish, which causes microalgae to explode, and that makes the coral susceptible to bleaching. Give us the time we need and
we’ll figure this out. Plus, we believe the great white sharks head back to the mainland sometime in April.”
He blew out into the phone, and she pictured him sitting in his office with a thick head of white hair, smoking a cigarette.
“April is a long way off. Plus, it’s not like we would be taking sharks all over Hawai?i. Just along this coast.”
“I should also add that white sharks don’t hunt humans. They most often bite out of mistaken identity or curiosity.”
“Curiosity, my ass.”
“It’s true, Harry.” Conversations with men who knew it all usually never went well, but she was determined to at least keep
those two weeks—she could find out a lot in that time. “Do I at least have your word on the two weeks?”
He paused. “Sure, why not?”
“In the meantime, it would be great if you could let the press know that under no circumstances should anyone be out there
hunting sharks on their own.”
“Fine. And in the meantime, you keep me posted on any updates. I’ll let Vera know to expect to hear from you.”
“Will do.”
“I don’t take this situation lightly, Miss Gray.”
“It’s actually Dr. Gray, Mayor Lum. And neither do I. There is nothing light about any of this, and believe me, I know as
well as anyone what it’s like to lose a family member in a shark incident. Like I said, sharks are my life.”
The average person did not understand how someone could revere sharks, but she had come to terms with that long ago. People
did not love sharks. Most of them feared them in the deepest part of their brains. She was an anomaly.
He paused, blew smoke again. “Then you know what I’m dealing with.”
“Absolutely.”
Minnow lay on the wall by the water, looking up at a rose-streaked sky and keeping an eye out for the first star.
Winter sun was not supposed to be as strong, but her sunburn made her back feel hot and sticky.
She should have worn a rash guard top, but the water had lured her in with its perfect temperature.
Cool at first but lacking the icy shock of California.
And the longer she stayed in, the more her body felt right at home. No threat of hypothermia whatsoever.
Once darkness came, she went out back to turn on the generator. The shape of the coconut trees against the starlit sky caused
her to stop in her tracks and stare up for a minute. A fish plopped in the pond nearby, and a bird screeched. There was something
to be said for the barren beauty of the lava fields. It was a little bit eerie and isolated, but when she thought about it,
what did she have to worry about? There was no one for miles, and no dangerous wild animals. On land, at least.
After wolfing down two black bean quesadillas with fresh salsa, she dusted off the large daybed, pulled the Big Island relief
map off the wall and began creating her own map of where the attacks and sightings had occurred. The Kiawe was really located
at the center of it all. At no other time in history had Hawai?i had a situation like this. It nagged at Minnow that a large
white shark would remain in the area and wreak havoc like this. In her experience, unless they were at aggregation sites,
foraging or reproducing, white sharks usually traveled. She was missing something important; she could feel it in her gills.
The phone rang, splitting the silence and causing her to jump clear off the bed. No one had her number here because even she
didn’t know it.
“Hello?”
“Ah, there you are. I was beginning to wonder if you made it,” a man’s voice said with notes of pidgin.
“Woody?”
“None other. Look, I was gonna try come down tomorrow, but I’m stuck on a job, so I should be there day aftah. You good?”
“Yes, I’m great. This place is incredible. I feel so lucky to be able to stay here, thank you.”
“How about the manō—the sharks?”
“Well, I’m just getting the lay of the land, and I hope to talk to the victim in Waimea tomorrow,” she said. “Have you ever
seen any white sharks in the area?”
A loud laugh. “Girl, we got plenty to talk about when I come down there. But yeah, I seen ’um. Bumbye, you go eat at the Kiawe,
and we’ll talk story when I come.”
Funny how the voice fit so well with the photos on the wall. Deep, gruff, but with a smile behind it all.
“Sounds good, I can’t wait to finally meet you after all these years.”
“Same, girl, same.”
“Oh, and what’s the phone number here? I need to give it out to a few people I’m working with, if that’s okay.”
“It’s 882–6266. Easy to remember—882-MANō.”