Death Beyond the Limit: Fiji Islands Mysteries 3

by B. M. Allsopp

  Death Beyond the Limit

  Fiji Islands Mysteries #3

  B.M. Allsopp

  BONUS – Deleted Scenes

  Would you like to know what went into the recycling bin?

  I ended up cutting several chapters from the final draft. However, I do rather like these scenes so I’ve clipped them together in a bonus booklet for you. Get the link when you’ve read the book.

  Exclusive to Fiji Fan Club members

  One of the things I’ve learned about my readers is that they are just as fascinated by the lovely islands of Fiji as I am. If you enjoy this book, I invite you to join my Fiji Fan Club. I’ll welcome you with something new to read that you won’t find in any book store. I’ll tell you more after you’ve finished this mystery.

  Table of Contents

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  11

  12

  13

  14

  15

  16

  17

  18

  19

  20

  21

  22

  23

  24

  25

  26

  27

  28

  29

  30

  31

  32

  33

  34

  35

  36

  37

  38

  39

  40

  41

  42

  43

  44

  45

  46

  47

  48

  49

  50

  51

  52

  53

  54

  EPILOGUE

  Exclusive BONUS – Deleted Scenes

  Welcome gift for Fiji Fan Club members

  Glossary and Guide to Fijian Pronunciation

  Enjoy this book? You can make a big difference.

  Also by B.M. Allsopp

  Acknowledgements

  SUNDAY 10th September

  1

  Fireti Kaba hated returning home empty-handed. Whenever his boat chugged to the village landing stage, eager children came running. Their faces fell when they saw a box with hardly enough fish to feed his own family, let alone share or sell. A few snapper, a parrotfish and two coral trout—nice but not enough. He decided to motor further out and troll around the FAD. The bigger boats had been and gone before dawn. Fish would return now all was quiet. He would use a lot more diesel, but if he was lucky a school of tuna would swim beneath his boat.

  He made the right decision. He and his cousin Osi hauled in four of the six lines. They tossed two skipjack tuna, a yellowfin and a large wahoo onto the deck. Their scales gleamed in the dull grey light. Wordlessly, the two men killed the fish with hammers and knives. Another line jerked and ran out fast. The two men worked the line together, pulling it in then easing it out to avoid it breaking as the fish made a bid for freedom. The water erupted and they glimpsed the dorsal fin in the seething foam. Fireti and Osi hung on to the line, as determined as the shark. Eventually, they landed the beautiful tiger shark, killing it immediately before it could injure them or jump back into the sea. When that job was done, Fireti got going, setting his course for the outer reef passage. Exhausted, he thanked God for his good fortune.

  ‘Fireti, come now! Look at this!’ Osi shouted from the deck where he was gutting the fish and packing them in boxes.

  Fireti tied off the wheel and hurried astern. Osi squatted over the tiger shark’s slit abdomen, his gaze riveted on its open stomach. Staring up at him were the sightless eyes of a human head. The stench made him gag, although he ought to be used to it.

  ‘Oi lei! I thought it was a monster, but it’s a man!’ Osi spoke at last.

  The head, marbled blue and purple, nestled among unidentifiable bits and pieces and brown-green juices. It was slick as if it had shrugged off its skin like a sea snake. Maybe the skin had been unable to contain its bloated contents. The swollen tissue hid the face’s features. It didn’t look like there was a bony skull inside, although he knew there must be.

  ‘Or a woman. How could anyone tell?’ Fireti said. ‘Why did God send me this?’

  ‘What will we do, Skipper?’

  Good question. Fireti didn’t need this. He was bone-weary. He wanted to continue on home, distribute his bounty generously and send the women to market with the rest. Only then would he sleep, which was what he most wanted to do. He should say a prayer and toss the head overboard with the rest of the guts. Dear God, that’s what he wanted to do.

  But the head was part of a human, indeed the most important part. Where were the other parts? If there were any remaining, the family of the dead man or woman would certainly find comfort in burying the head as well.

  On the other hand, he did not want to get involved with the police procedures which could bring him unpredictable trouble, possibly for weeks ahead. He didn’t have the time. He had to earn a living. Above all, he needed to sleep.

  ‘Skipper?’ Osi nudged him to decide.

  ‘Put the shark’s stomach and guts into a separate fish box. There might be other bits of this poor person in there. We can’t go home yet. I’ll change course for Levuka.’

  Osi’s head jerked up. He looked at Fireti as if he was mad.

  ‘I know it’s a long way and a lot more diesel, but the closest police station is in Levuka. We’ll hand our find over to the constables. That’s the right thing to do.’

  Osi looked disappointed. ‘Io, yes.’

  When the tiger shark’s organs were packed to his satisfaction, Fireti said, ‘You can finish gutting and cleaning before we get to Levuka. We can try selling the catch there before we go home.’

  Glad to get away from the smell, he went back to the wheel and changed course. After he handed the head over, he would avoid further involvement.

  2

  ‘Sure your stomach’s up to this, mate?’ Dr Matthew Young, Fiji’s senior pathologist, liked to be provocative sometimes.

  ‘I’m sure it’s not. What about you?’ Detective Inspector Josefa Horseman sat beside Dr Young in the single-engine plane. It was only a twenty-minute flight from Suva to the island of Ovalau, ridiculous really, but it was vital. A box of shark’s guts containing a human head should not sit in temperatures above thirty degrees Celsius for very long.

  ‘I’m glad you could charter the flight, Joe. A six-hour return trip on the police launch is too long.’

  ‘I told the constable to find some refrigeration. I hope he’s done that. Can a tiger shark really bite off a human head?’ Horseman asked.

  ‘An adult sure could. Tigers and great whites too. As an Aussie, I know a bit about sharks. In the summer they’re something of a national obsession, especially for surfers and divers. The idea of being eaten alive terrifies people, including me. It doesn’t keep them away from the sea though.’

  ‘Or was the head dumped at sea and swallowed by the shark later?’ Horseman asked.

  ‘That’s possible, too.’

  ‘If the shark decapitated the body, the death could be accidental. But if the shark swallowed a disembodied head, the victim was murdered first.’

  ‘With luck, I’ll find a bullet hole. Then it’ll be murder for sure,’ Dr Young joked.

  The plane broke through the grey clouds and landed on the grass airstrip at the edge of the sea. An officer leaned against a police Land Cruiser, watching them. Beyond the road the lush green
cut off any view.

  ‘Bula, hello, you’re very welcome, sirs. I’m Sergeant Sauli Rogoyawa.’

  They all shook hands then got in the vehicle. ‘We can’t get rid of this horrible package soon enough. It’s stinking the place out even though it’s wrapped in a tarp. Still drawing a crowd of onlookers. Some people! Shut the doors and they poke their arms through the louvres! We only have a small fridge in the station and I didn’t know if we should put ice directly in the box. I didn’t want to introduce contamination to the evidence.’ There was pride in his voice, pride that he’d remembered his training.

  ‘Well done, Sergeant,’ Horseman said.

  ‘Then there’s that big shark. Too big for the fisherman’s plastic fish boxes. So, we squeezed it into a body bag and zipped it up. I phoned PAFCO, you know the tuna factory? Closed on Sunday, of course, but the security guard’s there. So I asked if we could keep the lot in a cool room there. He agreed, but there’s still a smell at the station.’

  ‘Vinaka, thank you. You couldn’t have done better,’ Horseman said.

  Dr Young patted the sergeant on the shoulder from the back seat. ‘Yes, you did exactly the right thing.’

  The sergeant visibly relaxed. ‘Been to Ovalau before, sirs?’

  Horseman was eager to answer. ‘I lived here as a boy. My father used to work for Burns Philp in Levuka way back. I loved it. I guess I ran wild a lot. After Dad died, my mother moved away, so it’s years since I was last here. What about you, Matt?’

  ‘Never, although I’ve always wanted to. I’m sorry my first visit is on such a dreadful case,’ Dr Young said.

  ‘Sirs, do you want to go straight to the remains, that’s at PAFCO, or call at the station first?’

  Horseman glanced at his friend. ‘The plane’s waiting to take Dr Young and the remains back to Suva as soon as possible. So, let’s go to PAFCO first, then you take him back to the plane. I can get a cab into Levuka.’

  ‘No need, Detective Inspector. I’ll radio for our probationer to come and pick you up. He can drive if not much else! We have two vehicles at the station now.’ His pride touched Horseman. This was a simpler place, without Suva’s ambition and pretensions.

  The Pacific Fish Company was certainly unpretentious. The corrugated iron sheds jumbled around the waterfront, where a substantial wharf projected more than a hundred metres into the sea. There were no boats tied up. A few makeshift timbers supported a caved-in corner of one shed. A couple of men were hammering buckled sheets of corrugated iron, presumably to fix a gap in a roof. What had once been a grand sign at the entrance was battered and cracked.

  ‘How is PAFCO doing these days?’ Horseman asked, trying to be diplomatic. Officers at small stations identified closely with the communities they served.

  ‘Who knows? Last year’s cyclone hit the factory bad. Management’s done temporary repairs to keep the place running while they wait for the insurance pay-out to come through. They say they’ve got plans to upgrade then. If they shut down, Ovalau will suffer. PAFCO’s the biggest employer by far on the island. Six hundred people work here, most of them ladies.’

  The air around the sheds was a bit fishy, but not rotten. The burly security guard came up and shook hands.

  ‘Josefa Horseman, I’m Pauli Leluva. So pleased to meet you again. I remember you as a boy. We never dreamed you’d play for Fiji! The whole island boasts you grew up here.’

  ‘Vinaka vakalevu, sir. I remember you were in the church choir.’

  The guard nodded, pleased. ‘My condolences on your father’s death, even though that was years ago. And your mother was a wonderful nurse. I’ll never forget her help when our youngest had chickenpox… How is she?’

  ‘She’s very well indeed. She’ll be pleased to hear I met you. She’s retired now and spends quite a bit of time in her home village. She pays extended visits to my older sisters, too.’

  ‘Please give her my best wishes. But you’re here on duty, a particularly nasty one at that. Who could imagine a shark swallowing a head? Just like Jona, eh?’

  Horseman smiled. ‘Io, Mr Leluva. I’m sure that’s what the papers and the radio will say when they hear about this.’

  ‘I won’t hold you up. Sauli, you can all go straight through to the cool room. You know where it is.’ They all shook hands again.

  ‘You’ve made his day, mate,’ Dr Young said, smiling, as they followed the sergeant to one of the smaller sheds.

  They unwrapped the blue tarpaulin to reveal the shark’s guts enfolding a monster of a head. Even the inured pathologist reeled away. But only for a moment. Dr Young then put on a head magnifier, took a shiny tool from his bag and probed, carefully lifting bits of entrails from around the head. He took a full minute to examine the mess.

  ‘Now let’s see this tiger shark.’ Together, Horseman and the constable unzipped the body bag. The sleek grey carcase was still elegant, built for speed and attack. Its midsection, striped with darker vertical lines, gave the species its name. It looked like the shark was wearing a jacket with a subtle chalk-line. No more than two metres long, Horseman estimated. He was surprised its belly could accommodate the head. He glanced at the pathologist, questioning.

  ‘D’you think it’s not big enough, Joe?’ Dr Young asked.

  ‘I was expecting it to be bigger,’ Horseman admitted, shrugging.

  ‘Me too. No problems swallowing the head, though. Look at that jaw!’

  The pathologist probed the cleaned belly, checking with the magnifying glass as he did so. ‘This fisherman’s a good surgeon—got a sharp knife too. I’ve got everything we need in the box of innards. He can have the shark back—it should fetch a good price, or feed his extended family. I’ll take some shots first.’

  Horseman waited, thinking about how the head got inside the shark.

  Dr Young looked up. ‘Now you can help me slide the innards into my plastic bag here. Sauli, can you return the box to the honest fisherman? Not everyone would’ve brought the head into the police, you know.’

  ‘True, true. Fireti seems a good man. He’s from the Viti Levu mainland but Levuka was the nearest police station. He caught the shark far, far out beyond the reef.’

  ‘Where’s Fireti now?’ Horseman asked.

  ‘Around the town, selling his catch. There are only two streets, so we’ll find him as soon as you’re ready, sir.’

  They packed the plastic bag into Dr Young’s large insulated cool box. ‘Vinaka, guys. Sergeant, I’m ready to go.’

  ‘I’ll be in touch the minute I get back to Suva, Matt.’

  ‘You’ve got Susie on board this one, I hope?’

  ‘Yep, all approved. Detective Sergeant Singh should be on the bus back to Suva soon. Thanks for your confidence in my abilities!’ He grinned.

  *

  Horseman leaned against the weatherboard front wall of the two-room police station, taking the weight off his protesting right knee. The constable had gone to find Fireti Kaba. The station fronted Beach Street, the main road skirting the foreshore. Horseman strolled across the road to the grass strip behind the beach and looked back. Most of the single row of businesses had stood for a hundred years: one-story weatherboard and iron sheds in rainbow colours. Some facades boasted pediments and fancy mouldings.

  But the ambitions of the foreign traders of the 1870s were puny specks on nature’s melodrama. Emerald walls rose not far from Beach Street to the broken crater rim of the dormant volcano. When he lowered his gaze to street level, he spotted the constable walking towards him. A tall thin man pushing a trolley loaded with fish boxes followed him.

  The constable rushed up. ‘Sai Tuwai, sir. This is Fireti Kaba.’

  Horseman held out his hand to the weather-beaten fisherman. ‘Fireti Kaba, vinaka for staying here to talk to me. You must be tired and want to go home. I’m very grateful that an honest man found this head.’

  Fireti’s hand felt like knobbly tree bark. He kept holding Horseman’s hand while he spoke, pumping it now and then. ‘
It’s an honour to meet you, Josefa Horseman. I’m a big fan. I’m sad you’re not playing anymore.’

  ‘Vinaka, Fireti.’ He tapped his knee. ‘My leg’s improving, so you never know. You might not have seen my last game yet.’

  The fisherman released Horseman’s hand. ‘That’s good news, sir.’ He looked unconvinced.

  ‘You know, God has already rewarded me for making the right decision. I just sold most of my catch to the Marist school for a good price, and now I’ve met the great Joe Horseman in person.’

  ‘I’m glad to hear it. And there’s more good news for you. Dr Young has examined the shark and doesn’t need it now. So, you’ve still got a tiger shark waiting for you in the PAFCO cool store, along with your tarp and fish box.’

  Fireti’s leathery face furrowed in a broad smile. ‘Sister Filomina at the school will probably want it. She told me it’s hard to feed two hundred boarders with good food. They would be glad of it in my village, too. Sir, when can I go home?’

  ‘I’d like to hear about your find this morning first, please. Sergeant Rogoyawa has given me your statement already. Just a few questions I’d like to ask you.’ He withdrew the succinct document from his satchel.

  ‘It’s half past two, now. Have you had lunch? I could do with some,’ he added.

  The constable butted in, flushing with embarrassment. ‘Excuse me, sir. Let’s go across to the station and I’ll get some takeaway. Fish and chips, roti or hamburgers?’

  Horseman handed some cash to Constable Tuwai. ‘Lunch is on me. The fish should be fresh, eh Fireti? It’s probably yours.’

  Fireti opted for a hamburger and chips.

  After they had eaten and Horseman had teased out the fisherman’s story, he asked, ‘Could you find your way to the exact location where you hauled in the shark?’

  Fireti was eager. ‘Oh, easy! It was around the FAD, miles north beyond the outer reef. I’ve got it saved on my GPS. There’s an orange buoy marker. I don’t usually go so far out, with diesel so expensive, but I worked all night for half a box of fish. So I was desperate.’