Devil-Devil (26 page)

Distracted, Hita snarled and turned to face his latest attacker, adjusting the grip on his spear to deal with the American. Kella lashed out with both feet, catching the bush warrior on the shins, causing him to stagger and lose his balance for a moment.

At the same moment Mallory's bony shoulder thudded with full force into Hita's body. The bushman staggered back several paces, waved his arms desperately in an effort to regain his balance, and then plunged screaming over the edge of the cliff. The cascading force of the waterfall enveloped Hita's body and drove it mercilessly down on to the rocks far below. The falling, broken body bounced several times on different ledges and then spiralled helplessly to the river beneath.

Awkwardly Professor Mallory teetered on the edge of the cliff. Kella forced himself to his feet and dragged the American back. Then both men collapsed panting in a heap on the grass.

Mallory was the first to recover. He climbed slowly to his feet and settled his spectacles on his nose with one trembling finger. He regarded the great waterfall with myopic awe.

‘I've never done anything brave on purpose before,' he said wonderingly.

Kella looked at the three voluptuous Sikaiana women who were hurrying towards them, audibly marvelling at the American's prowess.

‘Life must have been full of new experiences for you lately,' he observed. He wondered what had prompted the American into his unexpected display of resource and courage. Perhaps he had guessed what would have happened to him and the three women if Hita had triumphed.

Thirty or forty armed bushmen hurried agitatedly out of the trees in their direction. Kella stifled a groan. Then he caught a glimpse of Pazabosi. The paramount chief surveyed the scene. The bushman Kella had knocked unconscious was standing, tenderly feeling his swollen, broken nose. The man with the shattered tendons was being supported unsympathetically by two other bushmen. Pazabosi questioned the second man briefly before allowing him to be helped away into the trees. Then the old chief approached Kella unhurriedly.

‘I hear that Hita is dead,' he said.

‘It's a real shame,' said Kella. ‘You don't have a rival any more, but it had nothing to do with you. You're smelling of roses, old man.'

Pazabosi pretended not to hear him. ‘I think I can stop the others from attacking you for about an hour,' he said. ‘But you would all do well to get down to the coast and join the police patrol which I hear is coming this way, before any of Hita's
wantoks
start after you.'

‘We're on our way,' Kella assured him. He hesitated. There was still one aspect of the case that puzzled him. Because he had rid the old chief of the renegade Hita, Pazabosi now owed him a big favour. Perhaps he could persuade the old man to tell him what he really wanted to know.

‘Before I go, there's something I want to ask you,' he said.

36

SERVICE MESSAGE

‘Cain killed Abel because he was jealous of his brother, and he was cast out by his people,' said Sister Conchita. She glanced at her script. Through the glass window of the radio studio she could see the Melanesian programme assistant in the studio next door torpidly manipulating the control panel.

‘Cain was so jealous of his brother that he murdered him,' went on the nun reading into the microphone, ‘and as a result he was banished by his people. But perhaps Abel should have been more alert. There could be nothing worse than being betrayed and attacked by a brother. However, as Christians we should also be aware of the feelings of others. We should always ask ourselves, ‘‘Did I pay enough attention to my brother? Did I really know him? Could I have stopped him before it was too late?'' Thank you! God bless you and goodnight.'

The programme assistant gave her the thumbs-up sign. Sister Conchita stood and walked through to the solitary control room of the Solomon Islands Broadcasting Service. As she entered the room the programme assistant removed a spool of recording tape from a console and scrawled a title on it with a marking pen.

‘Will that be broadcast tomorrow night?' asked Sister Conchita.

‘Yes, sister, at 21.55, just after the record requests programme.'

‘Good.' She handed the technician a scrap of paper. ‘I would like this service message broadcast as well. Could you see that it goes out tonight and tomorrow night, please.'

The programme assistant looked at the message. ‘Is this right?' he asked, puzzled.

‘It couldn't be more right,' the sister assured him. ‘It's also very important. Will you send it out before my talk?'

‘Sure,' shrugged the islander. ‘Consider it done.'

Sister Conchita thanked him. Father Ignatius had looked suspicious when she had asked his permission to write and deliver the five-minute religious broadcast that the different churches took turns to broadcast every night. He had even insisted on reading her script in advance, but, finding nothing apparently offensive in its content, had dubiously given her the go-ahead.

The nun hoped that Ben Kella would hear the programme, and that if he did the content would start him thinking. Sister Conchita had not been able to forget her confused experience in the dream-maker's cave. She was convinced that she had been intended to pass on a warning to Kella to be aware of the actions of a brother.

She realized the risk she was taking. If the bishop were to find out that she had used a religious broadcast to pass on her experience at the hands of a pagan dream-maker, Sister Conchita knew that she would be shipped out of the Solomons and perhaps out of the Church, which was something that would break her heart.

Outside the SIBS building in the bright morning sunlight she saw Chief Superintendent Grice marching briskly past on his way to the Guadalcanal Club, presumably for one of his notorious liquid lunches. The usually reticent Kella had mentioned his periodic run-ins with his choleric superior. But Kella was far away on Malaita; it was time someone else kept the police officer on his toes.

‘Good morning, chief superintendent,' she said innocently. ‘I just want to tell you what a great job you guys are doing.'

‘Really? Thank you,' bumbled the gratified police officer.

‘Sure thing!' confirmed the young nun. ‘It's hard to select any one particular guy, but I've got to tell you, that Sergeant Kella, he's something else again. Everyone says so!'

‘Do you think so?' asked Grice, disconcerted.

‘Oh, yes, sir, no doubt about it. He's the pick of a fantastic bunch. One of Honiara's finest! Good afternoon, Chief Superintendent Grice.'

Sister Conchita sailed graciously past the bemused officer. If nothing else, she thought hopefully, she must have befuddled Kella's principal antagonist in the capital even more than usual, and softened him up for Kella's eventual return to Guadalcanal.

37

ONE SIMPLE AMBUSH

‘There's a message for you,' Inspector Lorrimer informed Kella.

Kella finished storying with the three Roviana policemen around their cooking fire and reluctantly got to his feet. It was mid-evening on the Ruvabi mission compound. The police patrol had arrived there from the mountains that morning. A truck had been waiting at the Sulufou road-head to take Professor Mallory, nine of the constables and the three Sikaiana women straight to Auki.

Lorrimer and Mallory were booked on a chartered flight to Honiara, the capital. The constables would follow by ship. Kella had arranged for Elizabeth and the two other women to wait at the Catholic mission in Auki until the next trading boat left for Sikaiana to take them home.

The truck was due back sometime in the next hour. Kella, Lorrimer and the three policemen had stayed on to clear things up. Reaction after the events on the killing ground had set in. Mallory had hardly stopped trembling, even when wrapped in blankets after encountering a relieved Lorrimer and his patrol on the bush track. Elizabeth had departed from Kella with a great deal of pouting reluctance, and even a show of tears.

‘What sort of a message?' he asked Lorrimer.

‘You're not going to believe this.'

‘Try me,' said Kella patiently.

‘There was a service message on the SIBS tonight. It was for you from Sister Conchita. She wants you to listen to her religious broadcast tonight.'

‘Are you sure?'

‘There's no doubt about it, old boy. It's due on now. I brought this across for you.'

Carefully he placed his portable radio on the ground between them and tuned it in. Slim Dusty was singing ‘A Pub With No Beer'. The final nasal strains died away and the announcer introduced Sister Conchita's talk. Lorrimer and Kella listened in silence. When the broadcast had finished Lorrimer switched the set off.

‘Wow!' he said. ‘What was that all about?'

‘Obviously she was trying to tell me something,' said Kella.

‘But what? It was just a story about two brothers.'

‘Two brothers who fell out,' Kella reminded him. ‘The sister was warning me to beware of a brother.'

‘Which one? You've got four or five, mate.'

‘Somehow I don't think she meant any of them. Perhaps she didn't know herself. She just had some sort of premonition she was trying to pass on to me.'

‘Who then?' Suddenly Lorrimer looked alarmed. ‘Oh my God!' he exclaimed. ‘What was the name of the big fellow who helped you push the truck across the ford a few days ago?'

‘Brother John,' said Kella.

The two policemen looked at one another. ‘Could it be him?' asked Lorrimer. ‘Maybe Sister Conchita heard something, or guessed it, and sent you a coded message to warn you.'

‘It won't be John,' said Kella decisively.

‘I'm not so sure,' said Lorrimer, turning away. ‘I'm going to send an emergency message to Honiara HQ over the mission transmitter. The duty officer there can start inquiries first thing tomorrow morning and find out just where Brother John has been on Malaita over the last couple of weeks.'

The inspector hurried away. Kella thought about the huge Melanesian mission man but dismissed his suspicions. He knew what he had to do, but Brother John would not be involved.

The schoolboys were eating their evening meal noisily in the mess hut as he walked across to the house of Solomon Bulko. The mission school headmaster was sitting reading a hardback copy of
The Naked and the Dead
when Kella entered. He looked up and nodded, marking his place in the book with a leaf. A country and western record was playing on a battery-operated player.

‘You know,' Bulko said, indicating the book, ‘I find it very hard to identify with the Solomon Islanders in this story, when we only ever appear in the distance as terrified extras.'

‘You should try Jack London's
The Cruise of the Snark
,' Kella told him. ‘We're all savage headhunters in that one.'

Bulko took the record off the player. ‘Charlie Pride,' he said, holding up the disc approvingly. ‘A black man who made it at Nashville. There's hope for us all. I'll get to sing at the Grand Old Opry yet.'

‘Don't hold your breath,' said Kella.

‘Maybe not. Anyway, I was wondering when you were going to get around to seeing your old mucker. I'll open a few tins and we'll have something to eat,' said Bulko, bustling around the over-furnished room. ‘Then you can watch the film in the compound with us afterwards. It's
Love Me or Leave Me
tonight. Jimmy Cagney's a bit past his sell-by date, but Doris Day's all right in it.' He looked at Kella. ‘You're very quiet. Are you all right?'

‘I know,' said Kella.

Bulko looked inquiringly at him. ‘Of course you know,' he said calmly. ‘It's your business to know. You're the bloody
aofia.
You're supposed to know everything. What particularly do you know tonight, mate?'

Kella sat down. ‘The lot,' he answered wearily. ‘You've been organizing the smuggling of custom artifacts out of the Solomons, helped by Mendana Gau. Oh yes, and you tried to kill Sister Conchita in the mangrove swamp.'

‘Oh, come on,' expostulated the headmaster, sitting down abruptly with an unconvincing laugh. ‘Are you trying to wind me up? What are you on about, Ben? This is me, remember? Your old mucker.'

‘I heard that someone from the school had been up by the treehouse where Gau stored the surplus carvings waiting to be brought down to the mission. That same person was also seen at the killing ground by the custom temple,' said Kella.

‘So? There are a lot of people at this school, sunshine. Seen one, seen 'em all, especially from a distance.'

‘Exactly,' said Kella. ‘I assumed that they meant Peter Oro, because he was killed in Kwaio country. But the teachers wear the same uniform as the students here at Ruvabi. It wasn't Peter Oro who'd been up there. It was you. Pazabosi told me so yesterday. I did him a favour by getting rid of one of his rivals. He figured he owed me one. I asked him what Peter Oro had been doing, collecting artifacts from the bush villages. That was something I hadn't been able to work out.'

‘You're slipping,' said Solomon Bulko spitefully, standing up again.

‘Pazabosi told me that the boy had nothing to do with it. It wasn't Peter Oro who was buying the carvings and who stole the
havu
from the waterfall temple. It was you. Several people saw you there. They never imagined that their
havu
would be in any danger from the school headmaster.'

‘A good reputation is worth more than gold,' said Bulko.

‘You sometimes go up into the bush area to see if there are any candidates from bush schools for a place at Ruvabi, so you weren't an uncommon sight there.'

‘If you only knew the agony I underwent climbing the side of that bloody mountain,' said Bulko unemotionally. ‘Is that all? It seems a bit flimsy on the evidence side to me, Ben.'

‘Don't worry about evidence,' Kella assured him. ‘When Mendana Gau hears that I've arrested you, he'll sing like a mynah bird to shift most of the blame in your direction.'

‘Gau,' said Bulko wryly, deflated. ‘I needed him because he had a right to come and go in the bush on trading expeditions. Believe me, he wouldn't have been my first choice for a partner.'

‘Is that why you tried to have him killed, too?' asked Kella. The headmaster looked at him inquiringly. Kella went on. ‘I don't think you told Gau that you'd stolen the
havu.
You hoped that when he went up to make the next routine collection of carvings, he would be killed by the bushmen looking for vengeance. That would have got rid of a potential witness and left you in sole charge of the racket.'

‘Bloody bushmen,' said Bulko with rancour. ‘With all the practice they've had over the years, you'd think they'd be able to organize one simple ambush.'

‘How did you expect to get away with it?' Kella asked. ‘Sooner or later the Kwaio people would have broken into the school and chopped you down, like they did Gau.'

‘I've put in for a transfer to a school on Guadalcanal,' said Bulko. ‘It's due to come through next month. I would have been safe over there, if you hadn't interfered.'

‘It was the arrival of Sister Conchita that prompted you to steal the
havu
, wasn't it?' asked Kella.

A flicker of reluctant appreciation crossed the headmaster's eyes. ‘How do you make that out?' he asked.

‘It was something the sister told me. She mentioned that she'd studied island religions in her training. Carvings are an important part of Melanesian faiths. You were afraid that she would notice that some of the artifacts in the boxes of carvings made by the students to be sold in Honiara were genuine relics.'

‘Do you reckon?'

‘Oh yes. I almost noticed it myself, and I wasn't in the mission house long. I saw that some of the carvings in the open crates looked black and ancient. I assumed that the students had used boot blacking to make them look older, but they were the real thing. Father Pierre's eyesight was too bad for him to notice such things, but you knew that Sister Conchita would discover the truth before long.'

‘I knew I didn't have much time left before she found out,' nodded the headmaster. ‘I wanted to make one last big haul before I transferred out. So I went up to the killing ground and stole the
havu.
As you said, the local people were accustomed to seeing me inspecting the handful of mission schools up there.'

‘Did you have to try to kill Sister Conchita?' asked Kella astringently.

Bulko shrugged. ‘I saw her talking to you down by the river. I didn't know what she might be telling you. I couldn't take a chance, so I shot at you and then followed you into the mangrove swamp. I should have known that I didn't stand a chance against you there.'

‘And I thought I knew you,' said Kella, shaking his head. Suddenly he understood the message that Sister Conchita had been struggling to get through to him, probably not appreciating its true significance. ‘You were like a brother to me, Sol.'

‘Who knows anybody?' asked Bulko. ‘I get paid peanuts for running this school for the mission. I'm patronized by the expats and treated as a traitor by my own people. What did I do that was so bad? I bought a few old carvings from bushmen who didn't want or appreciate them, and I sold them to collectors who did both.'

‘And you tried to kill a harmless nun. I've got to arrest you for that, Sol.'

‘Come on,' wheedled Bulko, extending his hands in a conciliatory gesture. ‘What good will that do? Let me resign and go back to my district. I promise I'll keep out of your way.'

‘Sorry, I can't do that.'

‘For God's sake why not?' exploded Bulko. ‘All I've done is cheat whitey. Who gives a shit?'

‘You're missing the point,' said Kella. ‘When you tried to murder Sister Conchita, she was under my protection. I can't let that go.'

‘So it all comes down to bloody custom again, does it?'

‘Yes,' said Kella. ‘It usually does.'

The three Roviana policemen were waiting for them outside the leaf house. Some of the staff and students had been alerted by their presence. Quite a large, silent crowd had gathered as the policemen escorted the headmaster away. Bulko stared straight ahead, not giving his school a backward look. He was suddenly unknown to Kella, as if a stranger was occupying the Western District man's substantial body.

‘The truck will be waiting at the road-head,' Kella informed the departing officers.

He watched the three uniformed men take his friend down the track beneath the trees towards the river. A deep sense of loneliness engulfed Kella. It was as if he was trying to remember a song he had once loved, but neither the words nor the music would come back into his head.

Then he picked up his pack and started to walk after the others.