Killman (15 page)

‘Do you also think that this is why the would-be new high priest might have killed two other members of the sect recently?’

‘I don’t know what to think,’ Kella confessed. ‘It’s certainly a possibility. If you ask me, at least one of the candidates for the job is a zealot who is prepared to start a religious war between Christians and pagans in the Lau area. We’ve got to stop that before it gets out of hand.’

‘How do you propose to do that?’

Kella hesitated. ‘It seems to me that the answers to a lot of the questions we’re asking are to be found on the island of Tikopia,’ he said. ‘The Blessed Ark cult has a large number of Tikopians in it.’

‘That’s just what Father Pierre thinks!’ burst out Sister Conchita before she could stop herself. She was aware of Father Kuyper’s disapproving glance and clasped her hands demurely in her lap, determined again to say no more unless she was asked.

‘There isn’t much that the father doesn’t know about Lau,’ nodded Kella. ‘He probably understands more about the sect and its members than I do. From what I can see, the Church of the Blessed Ark has a number of connections with the island. There’s Shem, for a start, and the man that Sister Conchita caught a glimpse of before she discovered Papa Noah’s body. He was a Tikopian.’

‘And Shem ran away to hide in the bush outside the mission when he saw another Tikopian,’ said Sister Conchita, unable, despite all her efforts, to adhere to her self-imposed silence for more than a minute.

‘What about Dr Maddy?’ asked Father Kuyper. ‘Where does she come into this?’

Kella shrugged. ‘She certainly seemed interested in the Church of the Blessed Ark,’ he said. ‘She was recording music at the feast and she appeared to have struck up some sort of relationship with Shem. Later, she seemed to go to a great deal of trouble to get herself to Tikopia. She was assisted in her endeavours by the group of Tikopians going home on the
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, as I found out to my cost. I’ve got to get down to that island and make sure she’s all right. At the same time I can try to find out if the events surrounding Papa Noah’s sect had their origins on Tikopia. After all, they were still having disputes there between the pagans and the Christian converts up until a few years ago.’

‘How do you intend getting there?’ asked the priest. ‘There won’t be another government ship going to the eastern islands for three months at least.’

‘I think I can handle that,’ said Kella, avoiding giving a direct answer. ‘I’ve got to find Brother John and take him with me as well. The Melanesian Mission runs the Anglican Church on the island, and they’ll need to be kept in the picture. Anyway, Brother John’s a useful guy to have around if there’s a likelihood of trouble.’

‘What puzzles me’, said Sister Conchita, who was following her own train of thought, ‘is why Brother John didn’t attend Papa Noah’s funeral himself.’

‘He certainly must have had urgent reasons not to be there,’ said Kella. ‘I think Brother John probably knows more about this affair than he’s letting on.’

‘Perhaps,’ said Father Kuyper. ‘We all have our secrets; even you, Sergeant Kella.’

‘And perhaps you, Father Kuyper.’

Suddenly there was more testosterone in the lounge than in a boxing ring, thought Sister Conchita. Rashly she tried to defuse the situation by bringing the combined wrath of both antagonists down upon her own head.

‘May I make a suggestion?’ she ventured. Father Kuyper nodded. ‘Why don’t I go down to Tikopia with Sergeant Kella?’ she asked.

‘Certainly not,’ said Kella immediately.

Bad move, thought Sister Conchita with subdued triumph. As things stood at the moment, anything meeting with the policeman’s disapproval might automatically recommend itself to the bishop’s visitor. She waited for Father Kuyper’s response. The priest raised his eyebrows.

‘Why should you do that?’ he asked.

‘If the source of the religious strife is on Tikopia, a representative of the Catholic faith ought to be there with Sergeant Kella and Brother John,’ said the nun. She thought before she went on, wondering if she was going too far. ‘There’s something else as well.’

‘Go on,’ said Father Kuyper.

‘You told me some time ago that you were worried about my presence at the mission,’ said Sister Conchita. ‘You said that you were considering sending me back to Honiara for my safety’s sake. Why not send me to Tikopia with Sergeant Kella instead? I’d be safer there than I would be at Ruvabi under the present unsettled conditions, and I might be of some use reporting back to you at first hand about what’s happening down there.’

Father Kuyper was beginning to nod judicially. Sister Conchita waited for Sergeant Kella’s detonation of protest. It came almost at once.

‘That’s out of the question,’ said the sergeant.

‘Well, if I’m not wanted . . .’ said Sister Conchita, judging that this should spur Father Kuyper into a suitably inflamed response.

She was right. The priest waved them both into silence and stood up with a briskness that brooked no interference. ‘I admit that I am sceptical about the possibility of a religious uprising,’ he said. ‘However, as I am in charge at Ruvabi during the illness of Father Pierre, I must take into account the sergeant’s advice. You may well be right in your assumption about Tikopia being the centre of all that is going wrong at the moment. We won’t know until you’ve been down there to see for yourself. But this is more than a criminal matter; it’s a religious one as well. You are, forgive me, a pagan, Sergeant. It’s important that you be accompanied by Christians on your mission. As you say, you ought to find Brother John and persuade him to represent the Anglicans. Sister Conchita, in this case you must be the bishop’s delegate.’

‘It might be dangerous,’ Kella warned desperately, although he could sense that beneath her impassive countenance the nun was thrilled at the prospect of the proposed action.

‘It is also vitally important that the Christian faith be preserved on Malaita. Sergeant Kella, I guess that you are operating on your own in this matter, as usual. Would I be correct in assuming that you have not informed your superiors of your intention of going to Tikopia?’ Kella did not answer. A grimace of satisfaction creased Father Kuyper’s face. ‘Exactly,’ he said. ‘Well, if you are not accompanied on this expedition of yours by two adherents of different Christian faiths upon whom I can depend, namely Sister Conchita and Brother John, then I shall be forced to radio Honiara and inform the police authorities of your intentions. I imagine that you will be recalled to the capital at once.’ He raised a hand. ‘Enough!’ he said sternly. ‘There is no more to be said on the matter.’

For a minute or so Sister Conchita had been aware of a disturbance in the mission compound outside the lounge window. Now the confused babble swelled to screams. The nun wondered if a few of the islanders could be engaged in some incongruous ritual. She stood up and moved towards the door of the lounge to look into the cause of the sudden disturbance. Before she could go out, she heard the outer door of the building being thrown open and then two sets of heavy footsteps thudding along the corridor towards them. The lounge door hurtled open, and two big men staggered into the room. One of them was Brother John. The missionary was supporting Shem the Tikopian, who was bruised and bleeding.

Sister Conchita hurried over to inspect the injury. Father Kuyper got to the reeling Polynesian before her and helped Brother John lower the Tikopian into a chair. Shem seemed dazed. Father Kuyper examined him quickly.

‘It doesn’t look too bad,’ he told the nun. ‘Let’s take him over to the hospital, just to be on the safe side.’

The priest and the nun supported Shem out of the lounge. Brother John made as if to lumber after them, but Kella put a restraining hand on his arm.

‘He’ll be looked after,’ he said. ‘Sit down and tell me what happened.’

‘There’s nothing much to tell,’ said the missionary, sinking into one of the armchairs. ‘I was walking along the track in the dark and I heard the sounds of a struggle ahead of me. Then I saw that Shem was fighting another Tikopian. The attacker ran off into the bush when he saw me coming. I brought Shem here to get patched up.’

‘Where was Shem going?’

‘I don’t know. If you ask me, he was probably coming to the mission under the cover of night to persuade some of the members of his cult to return to the ark.’

‘Did you recognize the attacker?’

‘No, except, like I said, that he was a Tikopian.’

‘Do you think it could have been the killman?’

‘Who knows? You know what things are like all over north Malaita. Anybody who shoves somebody else in a queue at a trading post is accused of being the murderer these days. If you ask me, this looked like a good old-fashioned knock-’em-down-and-drag-’em-out fight to me, not an attempt at an assassination.’

This was not good, thought Kella. There was no point in continuing to question Brother John. Kella was more convinced than ever that the wandering Anglican preacher knew more than he was admitting about a lot of things.

‘Let’s see how Shem is getting on,’ he said.

The two men left the mission building and crossed the compound. Word of the attack on the Tikopian had spread. Most of the islanders claiming sanctuary at the station had woken up and were standing talking agitatedly. Kella noticed how shabby and dilapidated the mission looked after only a few days. Coping with several hundred itinerant islanders had taken its toll on the fabric of the building. When he had been a student here twenty years ago, the place had shone like a polished pearl necklace.

Kella and Brother John entered the hospital building. Shem’s wounds had been treated, and the big man was looking much better.

‘Don’t tell me,’ Kella said to Shem resignedly. ‘You saw nothing and you’ve no idea who attacked you.’

‘It’s the truth,’ said the Tikopian aggrievedly. ‘Somebody jumped out of the bush and started hitting me. I fought back, but if Brother John had not come along, I would have been hurt.’

‘Of course I believe you,’ Kella told the Tikopian sceptically. The sergeant had to admit that he could not fathom Shem. Most of the time he was sure that the big man was just another happy-go-lucky Polynesian, living strictly for the day. Yet Shem had got himself involved with the Church of the Blessed Ark and might even have been implicated in the death of Papa Noah. It all seemed so out of character. Was there a darker side to the man than was obvious on the surface, or had he just suddenly found himself out of his depth?

‘Anyway, I’ve got news for the pair of you,’ Kella told Brother John and Shem. ‘I’m going down to Tikopia to make sure that Dr Maddy is all right. At the same time I want to find out if the killman is linked with Papa Noah and the Church of the Blessed Ark in some way, and why so many Tikopia are connected with the cult. I suspect that you both know far more about this connection than you’re letting on, but for some reason neither of you is telling me what you know. All right, this is what I’m going to do. I’m taking the pair of you down to Tikopia with me, so that I can keep an eye on you and find out what you’ve really been up to. Or we can all wait here while I send for a police patrol from Auki and lock you up in the cells there until I get back from the outer islands. Which is it going to be?’

Neither of the men he was addressing seemed thrilled by the alternatives put before them so bluntly. Shem shuffled his feet and looked at the ground. Brother John scowled, his habitual affability wiped away for the moment as if by a sponge.

‘What grounds have you got for arresting me?’ he asked.

‘Delivering tedious sermons at inordinate length, for starters,’ Kella said. ‘I’ll think of something better later. Well?’

Brother John hesitated, and then nodded. ‘But I’m only coming because I want to know what’s happening to our mission on Tikopia,’ he said. ‘Otherwise, you’d better double the usual size of that police patrol you’re going to send for if you hope to get me inside a cell.’

‘Whatever,’ said Kella. ‘Shem, how about you?’

Shem shuffled his enormous bare feet. ‘I have much to do at the church here on Malaita,’ he said.

‘You won’t be able to do it from Auki police station, that’s for certain,’ said Kella. ‘At the moment, that’s your only other option.’

‘In that case, I’ll come with you,’ Shem said fatalistically. ‘After all, I haven’t been home for five years.’ He stretched and yawned.

‘Keep still!’ ordered Sister Conchita. She threw a swab into a waste basket. ‘There, that’s finished. You can sit down, while I look for beds for the night for you and Brother John.’

‘Why would the killman want to attack me?’ Shem wondered aloud.

‘It was dark,’ said Kella. ‘Perhaps he was waiting for Brother John instead.’

As she hurried across the compound on her errand, the nun wondered why Father Kuyper was so keen on sending her to Tikopia with Sergeant Kella and Brother John. Was he really entrusting her with representing the Catholic faith on that faraway island, could he be concerned about her safety on Malaita, or was there some other reason for his behaviour? She also thought about Sergeant Kella. She had practically invited herself on the trip to Tikopia. How would the witch-doctor policeman react to that?

Dozens of canoes were putting out from the shore of Tikopia as the government vessel
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dropped anchor in the harbour. Islanders were already scrambling up the rope ladders dropped over the sides and swarming all over the decks, animatedly greeting those friends and relatives who were returning from work on the plantations of Malaita, Kira Kira and the Russell Islands.

Florence Maddy stood on the main deck of the passenger boat, her baggage at her feet. It had been a strange voyage. Ever since she had left Malaita, she had been the only white person on board. The Tikopians around her on the voyage had been perfectly friendly but had maintained a discreet distance as she had sat reading the long hours away in a deckchair in the bows of the ship. Even when she had tried to talk to some of the children on board, they had scampered off giggling, hiding behind their mothers’ skirts.