She turned to him, took him by his two hands to calm him, brought him closer, and as he bowed toward her she touched her forehead to his and said softly, “All you need to do is tell me what you said in the accident report.”

“You mean what happened that night?”

“What you claimed happened that night,” Olive said. “The lies, the half-truths, everything that got you off the hook.”

He hesitated, then said in a small shallow voice, “I explained the accident.”

“Was it the truth?”

“It was what I remembered.”

Olive said, “Joe, listen. If you don’t tell me the whole truth, I’m going inside. I’ll get a copy of the report and I’ll show you that it’s full of lies.”

He stood flat-footed and solemn on the terrace, glancing at the station entrance, then turning to look outward, beyond the rock wall, to the parking lot—the lights in a nimbus of drizzle, the wet street, the night glow over Wahiawa, the air muddy and chilly, a twinkle of red lights and the stutter of a rotor, a helicopter bumping low in the sky in the distance, going lower to land at Schofield Barracks. Sharkey pretended to be interested, he fidgeted, rubbed his arms in the chill, sniffed a little, blinked and breathed hard, unsure of what to say.

Olive said, “You told them you hadn’t been drinking. Was that true?”

“No. I’ve already said that.”

“But you dictated it to the cop who was writing it down in the accident report. You saw him writing it.”

“Okay, I’d had a few drinks.”

“Three drinks. Over the limit. And the pakalolo.”

Still watching the starless and indifferent sky, Sharkey nodded.

“You were in a good mood—talking—but you were toasted.”

“Yeah.”

“Seat belt?”

Sharkey jerked his head, an unwilling negative.

“So the cop wrote another lie on the report.”

“Guess so.”

“Did you see the man on the bike?”

In a thin breathy voice Sharkey said, “I guess.”

“Former lifeguard, trained in first aid. Did you administer help to the victim?”

“Kind of,” Sharkey said, beginning to object. “Okay, you got out of the car and checked on him.”

“What did you do, Joe?”

He took a deep breath and with an effort of will that was audible said, “Nothing.”

“But in the report it says that you hurried to his side and checked his vital signs.”

“I meant that you did.”

“All those lies,” Olive said.

“The cop never asked the right questions,” Sharkey said. “He saw who I was, he mentioned his old man—I knew the guy. And here at the station the same deal. ‘You’re Joe Sharkey.’ It’s happened lots of times before—you’ve seen it. Locals respect a waterman. They know the risks I’ve taken.” He muttered a little, then said, “My rides.”