Free Collins, Max Allan - Nathan Heller 09 by Damned in Paradise (v5.0)

nationality?” I asked.
    “Hawaiians, I thought at the time. Later, I learned they were a mixed-race group.”
    According to the materials I’d read, the motley crew of young island gangsters included Joe Kahahawai and Ben Ahakuelo, pure-blooded Hawaiians; Horace Ida and David Takai, Japanese; and Henry Chang, Chinese-Hawaiian.
    “Go on, dear,” Darrow said.
    “I offered them money, I told them my husband would give them money if they would let me go. I said I had some money with me they could have. I had my purse, and I said, ‘Take my pocketbook!’ One of them in the front seat, Ahakuelo, turned around and said, ‘Take the pocketbook,’ and Chang took it from me. I got a good look at this Ben Ahakuelo—he turned around several times and grinned at me. He had a gold tooth, a big filling about here.” She opened her mouth and pointed.
    “How far did they take you?” I asked.
    “I don’t really know. I know they were driving along Ala Moana Road, heading towards town. Maybe two or three blocks. They drove the car into the underbrush on the righthand side of the road, and Kahahawai and Chang dragged me out and away from the car and into the bushes and then Chang assaulted me….”
    Thalia said all this as calmly, and detachedly, as if she were reading off a laundry list; but Isabel, next to her, was biting her fist and tears were streaming down her face, streaking her makeup.
    “I tried to get away, but I couldn’t. They hit me so many times, so hard, I was dazed. I couldn’t imagine that this was happening to me! I didn’t know people were capable of such things…. Chang hit me, and the others were hovering around, holding my arms.”
    Isabel gasped.
    Thalia didn’t seem to notice. “Then the others…did it to me. I was assaulted five or six times—Kahahawai went last. I started to pray, and that made him angry and he hit me very hard. I cried out, ‘You’ll knock my teeth out,’ and he said, ‘What do I care? Shut up!’ I asked him please not to hit me anymore.”
    Isabel, covering her mouth, got up and ran from the room.
    “There were five men,” I said. “You think you may have been assaulted as many as six times?”
    “I lost count, but I think Chang assaulted me twice. I remember he was standing near me, and he said, ‘I want to go again.’ That was all right with the others, but one of them said, ‘Hurry up, we have to go back out Kalihi way.’”
    “They spoke in English?” I asked.
    “To me, they did; sometimes they talked to each other in some foreign language. They said a lot of filthy things to me, in English, which I don’t care to repeat.”
    “Certainly, dear,” Darrow said. “But you heard them call each other by name?”
    “Yes, well, I heard the name Bull used, and I heard the name Joe. I heard another name—it might have been Billy or Benny, and I heard the name Shorty.”
    “You must have got a good look at them,” I said.
    She nodded. “Kahahawai had on a short-sleeved polo shirt, blue trousers. Ahakuelo, blue trousers, blue shirt. Horace Ida, dark trousers, leather coat. And Chang—I think Chang had on dark trousers.”
    This was the kind of witness a cop dreams of.
    “Now, dear, after they’d had their vicious way with you,” Darrow said, “what happened next?”
    “One helped me to sit up, Chang I think. He said, ‘The road’s over there,’ then they bolted for their car, got into it, and drove away. That’s when I turned around and saw the car.”
    I asked, “Which way was it facing?”
    “The back of the car was toward me. The car’s headlights, taillights, were switched on.”
    “And that’s when you saw the license plate?”
    “Yes. I noticed the number. I thought it was 58-805, but I guess I was off a digit.”
    The actual license, belonging to Horace Ida’s sister’s Ford touring car, was 58-895. Easy mistake, considering what she’d been through, confusing a 9 with a 0.
    Darrow said, “Dear, what did you do after the