Gregory's brows knit and he asked sharply, `What did they do with the body?'
Joe Joe looked surprised… `Why, Master, they bury it. Just beyond garden. Here peoples must bury soon after death. If taken back to Suva, long before they arrive body would have made great stink.'
`I appreciate that,' Gregory agreed. `But I should like to see the grave. Please take us to it.'
Obediently Joe Joe led them through the palms and an orange grove to a small clearing. In the centre there was the mound of a newly made grave. There were flowers on it and from one end rose a roughly made wooden cross. Gregory leaned forward to look at the cross and saw that no name had been carved on it.
As they walked back towards the house, Joe Joe offered hospitality. It would, he said, have been Madame's wish. Gregory thanked him, but declined, saying that they would dine on board and, later that night, return to the mainland.
When they sat down to dinner James looked across at Gregory uneasily. `I can't understand this at all. It is most unlikely that two parties of Colons from Tahiti would have been out there seeking to engage divers at the same time.'
`I agree, and that Manon should have lent them her house as a headquarters is a very strange coincidence. Of course, as she had heard nothing from us for over ten weeks, she has very good reason to suppose that we are dead. I happen to know that she is extremely hard up. She is wildly extravagant by nature, and the house here cost her a small fortune. So she may have gone in with Lacost and Co. to earn a share in the gold. But there may be some other explanation.'
`Yes. She may have let the house to them through an agent, not knowing that they were Lacost's party. Anyhow, this fatal accident means that we have one enemy less:
`But which? That's what I want to know. When they are all asleep in the house I'm going to find out.'
`What!' James exclaimed, with a horrified expression. `You… you can't mean that you're going to desecrate the grave?'
`I am.' Gregory's voice was firm. `Surely you don't imagine that the dead man's spook is going to jump out and bite me? You can come with me or not, as you wish.'
James shuddered. `No, no! Forgive me, but I'll remain on board and stay up till you return.'
The following two hours seemed to creep by. As usual aboard such boats, the crew sat up on deck, strumming guitars and singing plaintively. James, after nervously flicking through the pages of a magazine for a while, gave up the attempt to read and sat listening to the nightly concert. Gregory, outwardly calm, but far from looking forward to the grim task he had set himself, downed four brandies and soda in succession while playing a game of six pack bezique with Bob Wyndhoik. When the game ended he stood up and said to Bob
`Have two of your boys man the boat, will you? I feel like going ashore for a stroll before I turn in.' With a glance at James, he added, `Well, I'll be seeing you.' Then they went out on deck.
The boat had not been hove in, so was still alongside. The concert party broke up and Gregory followed the boys down into the boat. As she headed for the shore, phosphorus gleamed brightly in the little waves churned up by the bows. Five minutes later, having told the crew to wait for him, he waded through the shallows.
It was a wonderful night. The sky was free of cloud and a splendid moon dimmed the stars but made the scene almost as bright as in daylight. In places, contrasting with its brilliant illumination, there were patches of dense black shadow thrown by the groups of palm trees and the bures. The air was balmy and, but for the gentle lapping of the tide, it was utterly silent.
No light showed from the big bure. Cautiously, he moved from one patch of shadow to another, until he had made his way round it. The smaller bures behind it were also in darkness. Skirting them, he went to a tin roofed shed. From his stay there early in February he knew that the gardener kept his implements there. Silently removing a spade from a stock of tools in one corner, he walked with almost noiseless footsteps through the orange grove to the small clearing in the jungle where the body had been buried.
Carefully removing the now wilted flowers and the wooden cross, he began to shovel the loose soil away from that end of it. As he had expected, the grave was quite shallow and the corpse covered with little more than a foot of earth.
The stillness of the night was eerie and the strong moonlight heightened the sense of tension that he felt. Sweat began to break out on his forehead but, setting his teeth, he laboured on until he had uncovered the dead man's head. Bright as the moonlight was, clots of earth still rendered the corpse's features unrecognisable. Taking a torch from his pocket, he shone its beam down on to the now mottled face. Then grasping it by the hair, he pulled it up so that he could examine the skull. At the back was a deep depression of crushed broken bone clotted with blood, from which scores of frightened ants scurried. Letting it fall, he shovelled back the earth, replaced the flowers and the cross, threw the spade away into the nearest patch of undergrowth, then walked thoughtfully back to the beach.
On the deck of the cruiser, James was waiting anxiously for him. Bob had already gone to his cabin. As soon as the two boys. who had taken Gregory ashore were out of earshot, wide eyed, the young Ratu uttered the single word:
`Well?'
`It was as I expected,' Gregory replied grimly. `De Carvalho.'
`Oh God!' James exclaimed. `And it's the full of the moon! The White Witch's curse!'
`No. His death was not an accident brought about by occult means. He wasn't killed by a falling coconut. That would have hit him on the top of the head. The back had been bashed in. He was struck down with a club, by somebody walking behind him.'
'But why?' stammered James. `Why? You… you said there was no point in their killing him until they had got up the gold.'
Gregory shrugged. `I forgot one thing. To get clean away with taking the treasure, Lacost must have a licence: Otherwise the French authorities will hunt him down. If for no other reason, because they will want their ten per cent of the value. If he had murdered de Carvalho in Tujoa, after they had got the gold, it is certain that he would have been suspected. De Carvalho's having died here in Fiji, apparently from an accident, no one is going to connect his death with what happens in Tujoa. And now the holder of the licence is dead, Lacost has a free field to apply for one himself. That is the answer. Anyway, this is a stroke of luck for you. With her husband out of the way, Olinda is now all yours.'
For a moment James was silent, then he burst out, ` Olinda! But don't you see? As de Carvalho's widow, she will inherit the licence. Before Lacost can apply for one for himself he will either have to come to terms with her or kill her. And he must be on his way to her now!'
15
Night Race to Suva
Gregory raised an eyebrow. `That could be, although I doubt it. I don't know much about Lacost, but I should think he's too clever to rush his fences. As it was while with his party that de Carvalho's death occurred, he will naturally go straight to Olinda and inform her of it. To fail to do so would be a hideous blunder. If he returned to Tujoa and left her to learn by some other means that she had become a widow she would immediately suspect that he had had a hand in it and set the police on to make enquiries. That is the one thing he dare not risk. An autopsy would disclose that de Carvalho was not killed by a falling coconut. Seeing that Lacost had motive and opportunity, he would find himself in a very nasty spot. But…'