Chapter 5 of Roi-Namur the Novel
Yokwe Jara,
It is time to add another installment of my novel. For those of you new to my site, I’m writing a novel and adding a chapter on the first of every month. This is your chance to see a novel in process. Thanks for coming to my site and I hope you enjoy it. Next month’s chapter features a visit to shark infested Speedball so please check back on July 1st.
Chapter 5
They call it the cocoanut telegraph. It is how word spreads on the islands and it spreads uncannily fast even without the aid of the internet. When I walked into the cafeteria for lunch the day they found Duane you could sense something was wrong. Folks were gathered in groups on tables talking quietly among themselves. The normally friendly workers behind the counter had little to say other than to ask if I wanted a burger or a hot dog. They didn’t ask the usual annoying question of if I wanted cheese despite knowing that everytime for the last several weeks I had ordered it without cheese. It confirmed my suspicion that they had been playing with me all along but today were too distracted to comment. Reggie wasn’t around so I sat with Phil and Karen. Phil was one of the radar technicians and his wife Karen was a mission coordinator. They were an interesting couple. Phil looked every bit the refuge from the 60s though I knew he could not have been that old. In his spare time he taught a yoga class and was also one of the dive instructors. Karen was an ex marine. She didn’t have Phil’s easy going way but was a dependable friend when you needed one. She wore her black hair short and favored polo shirts and kacki shorts. Virtually no one wore long pants on the island unless they needed to because of safety concerns in their work.
“Sad day” Karen commented when I sat down.
“Has anything like this ever happened before?” I queried.
“Not that I can remember, and I’ve been here 14 years this October” answered Phil.
“Do they know how he died?”
“The Army is investigating but don’t expect an answer from them.”
“Phil, you’re too suspicious of anything military” responded his wife, “they can’t say anything until they know the facts and when they do I’m sure they’ll say what they need to say”
“And not a syllable more.”
“So no one has any clues?” I asked.
“I heard from one of the Marshallese workers at Tradex that the police chief on 3rd island said it looked to him like a drowning but there were marks on his neck and shoulders as if he’d been forced underwater.”
“Who would do such a thing?”
Karen raised an eyebrow and stated “Matt, the Marshallese are a good people but they’re famous for their gossip most of which isn’t true.”
“Well it sure seems strange to have two deaths so close together when I’ve lived here for 14 years and the only death was a heart attack on Kwajalein but nothing like this.”
Phil looked genuinely worried and considering his normal disposition it seemed quite out of place. About that time Lt. Greene walked up and joined our table. “Karen, Phil, how are you?”
“A bit shaken” answered Phil.
“Matthew, I have a few questions for you. You were one of the last people to talk with Mr. Miles before his disappearance.”
“Mr. Miles?”
“Duane” answered Phil for Lt. Greene.
“Oh yes Reggie and I talked with him some here in the cafeteria.”
“What about?”
“We asked him if any of his co-workers had been off duty at the time poor Lucy met her demise”.
“Why?”
“We thought they might have seen something.”
“And who appointed you the investigating committee.”
“No one but we couldn’t help be curious besides this is our island too and we have a right to know what’s happening on it.”
“This is not your island this is the Army’s island. You’re an engineer and I’m a cop. I’ll make a deal with you, I won’t help you engineer as long as you don’t help me police this island is that clear?”
“Quite but it isn’t like I’m trying to take your job from you or anything we were just curious.”
“Well save your curiosity for logrithms or whatever it is you do at your desk and we won’t have any problems.”
With that Lt. Greene got up and left.
Karen had a sympathetic look cross her face as she said “Matt, don’t pay him a lot of mine he just doesn’t have much tact but he’s really not a bad person.”
“Karen you’re always sticking up for him and anything else official. I love you dear but I wish you would not side with authority so much.”
“Well it is authority that binds our society Phil. Without order where would we be?”
“Order is for animals. We’re thinking rational human beings. Man should be free to think for himself. If you give man the freedom he’ll gravitate to what is right.”
“Will he sweetheart? Our prisons are full of men who had the freedom to choose right from wrong and which did they choose?”
“You’re right there are bad apples. But in order for there to be a good man a person has to have the freedom to be a bad man. I’m not saying we don’t need laws or even that we don’t need neaderthals like Lt. Greene keeping the laws but by the same token you can’t put your trust in them to do be our guardians anymore than you can trust the criminals to do right or to always do wrong.”
“Phil,” I interjected, “I’m not really following your logic. First you seem to claim that we need complete freedom in order to choose what is right. Then you contradict yourself by implying that those in charge will choose wrong.”
“No, I’m not saying that at all. I’m just saying on one hand that everyone, whether criminal, police, or engineeer is capable of being either good or bad and you should not trust any one of them to be totally good or totally bad. On the other hand, if you give any one of those folks too much power over the others they’re capable of using it to abuse that power. History has shown that to be the rule rather than the exception. My wife, a sweet trusting woman, puts her faith in the Army, the Police, and the Government. My theory is, being a good person of high character she knows that if she was in their position, she would do the right thing.”
“You’re so sweet dear.”
“But what she’s ignoring is that for all of history, the fact of power corrupting has been the rule rather than the exception. That’s why I’m a libertarian Matt, the democrats want to give the government more power to abuse us and the republicans speak a good line but when the rubber meets the road they’re not that much different.”
“Phil I really wasn’t intending to launch into a political discussion it is just I’m upset that something has happened to a man I was talking to only hours before.”
“Don’t mind him Matt, my dear husband means well but he sees everything in a global context.”
By the grace of God Gary walked over to the table and asked me if I wanted to go diving the next day being that it was a Sunday our day off. I gladly took the ocassion to escape this political discussion. I answered to the affirmative.
Tune in next month for Chapter 6.