Death Beyond the Limit: Fiji Islands Mysteries 3

by B. M. Allsopp

‘You’ll have to explain what a FAD is, I’m afraid,’

  Confidence straightened Fireti’s back and brightened his eyes. ‘Fish Aggregation Device. The Fisheries people have installed them all over. I went to a workshop and learned how to make one myself. You need some sort of raft—can be bamboo, oil drums, anything that floats and lasts a while. You anchor that out in deep water with a good current. You attach material that small fish like to hide in—old ropes or netting, even strings of palm fronds. Small fish appear out of nowhere and make it their home. And small fish bring big fish, including sharks. The FADs that Fisheries put in are bigger and better, but the home-made ones work like a charm too.’

  Horseman thought, not for the first time, how his years of dedication to rugby had deprived him of so much other knowledge. ‘Brilliant. Why is this FAD so far out to sea?’

  ‘Ah, the Fisheries men are clever, sir.’ He tapped his grizzled head. ‘True, true. You’ll only find tuna schooling in deep water, and that spot has an upwelling current which fish like. But the main reason is that the inner and outer reefs are overfished. Get it?’

  Horseman nodded. ‘I guess it’s a way to stop you fishing the reef.’

  ‘Io, so our natural coral reefs can recover. Fisheries put a FAD in the deep water so fish swarm around one point. Anyone who fishes there will get a good haul.’

  ‘Sounds good.’ Horseman wanted to get back to his questions now, but Fireti had found his stride. It was always a mistake to interrupt a witness on a roll.

  ‘I’m lucky, I was able to fix up an abandoned boat with a small inboard engine. I’m a mechanic too. Even so, the cost of diesel means I only go to the FAD if I’m desperate. Most village fishermen only have small open boats. It’s too dangerous for them to venture so far.’

  Horseman nodded.

  ‘You know another name for FAD? Fishermen Aggregating Device!’ Fireti chuckled at his joke. ‘Sometimes, so many boats converge there, you can come away with little. And some are foreign too—small purse-seiners. They break the law, they think they can fish inside the twelve-mile limit and no one will notice. And they’re usually right.’

  Horseman was well aware only Fiji-registered vessels were permitted to fish within the territorial limit.

  ‘Have you reported these breaches to Fisheries?’

  ‘I’ve never seen it myself, but everyone knows it goes on.’

  ‘Please, Fireti, urge your colleagues to report any foreign vessels you see breaking the law like this. Either to Fisheries or the police. It’s important.’

  The fisherman looked away, evasive. Horseman wondered about the substance for his complaint. His grumbles might have been based on generalised resentment of foreigners when coastal fish stocks were in decline.

  Fireti nodded slowly.

  ‘Vinaka, Fireti. I’ve learned a lot. I’ve got a proposal for you. You don’t have to agree, but I hope you do. You’ll understand my top priority is to identify the victim you found.’

  Fireti bowed his head. ‘Io, sir.”

  ‘If we can find any other body parts, they could help us greatly. I want to hire you and your boat to go back to the FAD and troll around the area again. Maybe you’ll hook a body part. If you catch a shark, do what you did this morning. Go in daylight, and I’ll get a diver to search the submerged FAD material. You never know, some pieces of the victim might be caught there. You’ll be paid at the going rates in Suva. Are you interested?’

  Fireti was silent for a few seconds. ‘That’s a good idea, sir. My young deckhand is a licensed diver. He can do that.’

  ‘We’ll hire him but I’ll bring in a police diver as well. Too late now, but I’ll arrange it all for early tomorrow. You can pick up the diver here around nine o’clock. Why don’t you move your boat to the PAFCO wharf? Constable Tuwai will help you retrieve your shark. Then go home and get some sleep. I’m very grateful.’

  ‘Vinaka, sir. We’ll sleep on our boat to save travelling time. I should tell you, the chances of finding more of this person are small. The sea-floor is so clean because countless small creatures eat the dead very quickly. The pieces left by big fish won’t last more than a few days.’

  Horseman nodded. ‘We’ve got to try, Fireti.’

  ‘Io, sir. I’ll go and pick up my shark now.’

  3

  As the rattly old bus made its leisurely way on the four-hour journey from Lautoka to Suva, Detective Sergeant Susila Singh pondered the weekend she’d just spent with her parents. She loved them dearly, but they couldn’t understand that she’d moved a long way from the world of tenant farmers in the west of Viti Levu. The last thing she wanted was to scratch a living from the earth with the son of a neighbour, at the mercy of the weather, global sugar prices, Fijian landlords and perhaps worst of all, her husband. Yet if she complied with this future, her parents would be content.

  When she’d given up Teachers College to join the police force, her avowed ambition to become a detective, they felt betrayed, even ashamed. Her mother lamented that no boy would marry her now.

  But they did what they could, with the help of a professional matchmaker. Singh estimated this morning’s elaborate morning tea was the seventh such occasion the matchmaker had organised over the last two or three years. Even though most parents would reject a police officer as a bride for their sons, the clever matchmaker dredged up yet another prospect. Singh’s parents had agreed that the field could be widened to include respectable Hindus, far more numerous than Sikhs in Fiji’s Indian population. Singh had flatly refused to consider marriage to an unknown man in faraway India, never mind the miracle of Skype.

  She had liked a few of the previous six suitors and even dated two of them for a while. They’d liked her too. The trouble was, she would not marry a man who expected her to give up her career when the first child came along. And that meant all Indian men. But this seventh suitor, Ma told her, had made no such stipulation. He was a Suva lawyer so could easily afford a good nanny. Singh hadn’t believed her. And why would a lawyer be interested in a detective who insisted on her way? He was 38, so why wasn’t he married already?

  Singh had permitted her mother to dress her in a beautiful sari, to oil and style her hair. She greeted the guests with downcast eyes and a closed-lips smile, she was quiet and gracious to her prospective parents-in-law, the model of a well brought up daughter.

  Their son Brij surprised her. He was quite handsome really, slim, intelligent-looking, but maybe that was just the stylish wire-framed glasses he wore. She wondered if his mother had brushed his hair too. It certainly shone, and not with hideous smelly oil. He played a courteous role, sipping tea, praising her mother’s home-made sweets. At the end of the visit, the parents left the room and chatted at the front door, leaving their children alone for a few minutes.

  Brij whipped out his mobile phone. ‘May I have your number, Susila?’

  ‘Sure.’ She took her own phone from her handbag and they swapped numbers.

  ‘How about dinner on Tuesday? I’ll send you a text.’ With a quick handshake, a grin and a cheeky wink, he joined his parents at the door. She had to admit she liked him. Was he perhaps a bit too glossy?

  As the bus headed east, she smiled to herself. It wasn’t because of the sunlit sea, or the lush gardens of the resorts. She was happy to be going back to work. DI Horseman, the best boss she’d ever known, had sent her a text. A fisherman had found a human head inside a shark. Horseman was Senior Investigation Officer and Superintendent Navala had approved his request for her to join the team. If she did well on this one, Horseman might support her promotion to Detective Inspector. She couldn’t wait. Her mind sifted the possibilities for identifying a head without a body.

  MONDAY 11th September

  4

  Bindi Chopra, news editor of the Fiji Times, was waiting for Horseman at the steps of the Suva Central Police Station. Bindi was a friend from university days and she never let him forget it. A blonde Afro frizz framed her round face. It suited her.
/>   ‘Bula Bindi, are you lying in wait for me?’ They shook hands.

  ‘You know I never lie, Joe. How’ve you been? How’s that gorgeous girlfriend in the States?’

  ‘Melissa’s fine, thanks.’

  ‘I hope she’ll visit Fiji again soon. Perhaps for good?’

  Horseman tolerated Bindi’s prying about Melissa. There was no stopping Bindi anyway.

  ‘I need to go to the States for a check-up on the knee surgery in January. I’ll see her then. No further plans, Bindi.’

  Bindi rolled her eyes heavenwards. ‘Hopeless, Joe. You do know you’re hopeless with women, don’t you?’

  ‘Why have you come to see me?’ Surely she hadn’t heard already.

  ‘Can you confirm a fisherman off Levuka hooked a human head yesterday?’

  He smiled. ‘No, I can’t confirm that rumour. I’m investigating a fishing accident in the Lomaiviti district. The police will release the facts to the press when we’ve discovered exactly what happened.’

  ‘You know my standards, Joe. I never publish unfounded rumours. The upshot is that rag The Mirror scoops the hot stories. If I hold off now, can you give me the heads-up on the release?’

  He could trust her. ‘Sure, but nothing more till then.’

  *

  Horseman liked to work out plans for any investigation with his core team. The brainstorming and mashing of ideas were what he enjoyed most.

  ‘All we’ve got so far is a deformed head. The first challenge for us is identification. I’ve seen it and I can tell you this person’s own mother couldn’t recognise him or her. Even if we wanted to publish a photo it wouldn’t help. Dr Young’s already sent tissue for DNA analysis which will reveal sex and race, but even with the urgent flag flying, that will take days.’

  DC Tanielo Musudroka’s perpetual smile vanished. ‘Do you mean we can’t even tell if the victim is Fijian?’

  ‘Not yet, Tani. No skin, no hair. Dr Young completed the post mortem yesterday afternoon. He believes the shark probably inflicted the injuries. However, he’s still considering his conclusions and consulting with colleagues overseas.’

  ‘Have you got a photo, sir? I’d like to know what we’re talking about here.’

  Horseman smiled at his enthusiastic apprentice. ‘I had intended to spare you this, but okay, in the interests of your scientific training…’

  He turned to his computer and clicked open the pathologist’s shot of the bloated head with its lurid marbling.

  They stared, transfixed.

  ‘Thank God you can’t smell it,’ Horseman said.

  Singh was the first to recover. ‘Is it possible the victim was decapitated before the shark got to it?’

  ‘Dr Young hasn’t ruled it out, but he reckons it’s unlikely. You and I will go up to the morgue this afternoon and he’ll explain the evidence.’

  Ashwin Jayaraman, specialist search officer and Scene of Crime lab manager, spoke up. ‘I’ve never had a stretch of deep-sea as a crime scene before. Can anything more be done out there?’

  Horseman shook his head. ‘Time’s against us, Ash. Fireti the fisherman and Dr Young both say body parts will be gobbled up within a few days. I’ve chartered Fireti, his boat and crewman. They’ll troll their lines over the same course this morning. Luckily, the focus is a FAD. A police diver and Fireti’s deckhand will search through the FAD material.’

  After the shouted questions had died down, he said, ‘What a lot of landlubbers you are! I’ve known what a FAD is since yesterday afternoon.’

  He enjoyed enlightening them.

  Ash looked thoughtful. ‘Let’s hope for the best. Are you going to repeat the exercise? If so, I’d like to poke through the FAD myself. I’m a certified diver. I’ll start researching underwater crime scenes right away. I might get a different focus.’

  ‘Great idea, Ash. I’ll put it to the super. Ideally, I’d like Fireti to fish around there for another two days. But a separate trip for a team in the dive boat, with you on board, should be more thorough. Let’s see this morning’s results first.’

  Ash nodded and started writing notes.

  ‘Singh, I’d like you to coordinate a Missing Persons search.’

  ‘Do you want a media appeal, too?’

  ‘Not yet. We can hardly release that photo, can we? In a few days I hope we’ll get more clues from the head—at least whether it’s male or female. Why don’t you check through the Mispers records, then tell me how much help you’ll need? You’ll also need to talk to local police about anyone missing who hasn’t made it onto the central records—Lomaiviti province first, then spread out.’

  ‘Right, I’m on it.’ Like a terrier, Horseman thought. She thrives on the chase.

  5

  The hills behind Suva’s waterfront did not permit a grid layout of streets and buildings. From Horseman’s point of view, this was all to the good. The route to Colonial War Memorial Hospital was like a meandering river, overhung by spreading trees. The cab drove around the back of the hospital and dropped them at a door with the discreet sign Deliveries.

  ‘You two took your time! It’s three o’clock.’ Dr Young sounded cheerful rather than impatient.

  ‘Why are you so happy, Matt? Solved the case for us already?’

  ‘No, I’m happy to see Susie, you dolt.’ He held out his hand to Singh. ‘It’s been a while, hasn’t it? Great to welcome you to my domain again, Detective Sergeant Singh.’

  ‘Pleased to see you, Matt. Can I meet our victim?’

  ‘Atta girl! Over here, both of you.’

  The head, now disentangled from shark innards and cleaned of digestive fluid and other stomach contents, lay on a green cloth on a stainless-steel dissecting table. It was like a head sculpted from heavily veined marble. A modern sculpture where the features were lightly carved, just suggestions. The colouring was even more lurid today. Singh leaned over the head, examining it closely. Horseman was content to step back.

  ‘Have you finished the post mortem?’ Singh asked.

  Dr Young looked grim. ‘Yep. It’s quick when you’ve only got a head. I’ve fixed the top of the skull back in place.’

  ‘What can you tell us?’ Horseman asked.

  The pathologist put on gloves. ‘Let’s go through what I didn’t find first. No brain disease or abnormality, no dental decay. The size of the head suggests a male, but I can’t be sure. The teeth indicate twenty-five to forty years of age. The obvious bloating is normal a day or two after death, as is the slippage of the epidermis, together with hair. I couldn’t identify any skin or hair in the stomach contents, so I conclude that the shark’s digestive fluids and enzymes completely consumed it.’

  Singh straightened up. Horseman gulped. They stood in silence for several seconds. Horseman guessed Singh, like him, was imagining being digested by a shark.

  ‘Can we know how long the head was in the shark’s stomach?’ he asked.

  ‘Less than a day, I’d guess. I’ve been swotting up, and I’ve sent photos to a shark attack expert in South Australia. Watch this space.’

  Singh recovered her poise and leaned over the head again. ‘Any chance the shark swallowed the head after it was dropped in the water? I mean, can we be sure the shark bit the head off an intact body?’

  Dr Young pointed to a large monitor on a side bench. ‘Come and look through the microscope.’

  The large screen sprang to life and he zoomed in to the back of the mangled neck. ‘See here? No?’ He zoomed more, then indicated the neck edge with his cursor. ‘See these punctures with serrated edges? A few centimetres below the right ear. They’re the teeth marks, or rather, half of them. Obviously, the other half will be on the torso, which we don’t have.’

  As Dr Young’s cursor danced from hole to hole, the marks seemed obvious.

  ‘Rough, aren’t they? Irregular.’

  The pathologist flicked to some shots of a shark’s teeth and jaws. ‘The tiger shark’s got serrated teeth. Technically, each tooth has a prima
ry cusp with small cusplets kinda sprouting off it in different directions. The main point punctures and holds the prey, while the cusplets cut like a saw. There’s nothing they can’t eat. Tiger sharks easily tear through bone and cartilage, as you can see from this backbone.’

  Horseman reeled as the vision of thrashing shark, bloody water and headless body flooded his mind. ‘I’m still surprised that the shark we saw yesterday could do this. It wasn’t all that big.’

  ‘It measured 2.1 metres—a fair-sized young male. Joe, the tiger shark’s the rugby player of the shark world: powerful, fast and aggressive. No offence, mate.’

  Horseman hadn’t thought of himself as a shark before.

  Even unflappable Singh seemed appalled. ‘Could the victim have been dead when the shark bit the head off?’

  ‘You’re hoping he was, Susie? I think we all are. Yeah, it’s possible. But with just a head, I can’t determine that, short of a hammer blow or a bullet hole, which we don’t have here.’

  ‘If we tone down the melodrama, Matt, the most likely scenario is that someone fell off a boat accidentally, probably at night. He drowned and was decapitated by the shark, we hope in that order.’

  Singh looked dubious. ‘The crew would have reported that, surely? Tried to get help?’

  Horseman nodded, ‘If it was an accident, yes. Maybe if there was a fight… The FAD’s a long way out for someone to fish alone in a small boat, but it’s possible. In that case he’d be missed, but relatives mightn’t be too worried for a few days. If this happened on Friday or Saturday night the police may not have heard someone’s missing yet.’

  ‘I’ve already checked the most recent Mispers reports—there’ve only been a few. None fit this, sir.’

  ‘I’ll leave the detective work to you two,’ Dr Young said, as he left the lab.

  ‘Could I have a DC to start calling coastal police posts as soon as we get back?’ Singh asked.

  ‘Sure. Let’s hope the only culprit here is the shark. But in the unlikely event the victim was murdered, the police won’t get a report. Was our victim killed out at sea on a moment’s impulse and dropped there?’