Beat Not the Bones (2 page)

Nyall had stretched out his hand for the telephone. With the other hand he waved Jobe back in his chair. ‘Don't worry. You did quite right. But from what I can see there'll be another department concerned in this.'

‘
Another
department,' said Jobe. Even approaching one had been against his principles. Another bloody department! And they were going to fiddle around together and ring each other up and write each other letters while he hung around cooling his heels. ‘What department?'

‘The Department of Cultural Development,' said Nyall coolly. ‘It's probable that these neck ornaments have some ceremonial significance. We'll have to find that out before we can consider your claim.'

‘Cultural development!' Jobe's face turned scarlet. With a supreme effort he controlled himself. It wasn't Nyall's fault. He was only doing his job. He had to do what he was told. It was the Australian government. They'd ruined the place with their native education and tommy rot. Cultural development was the last straw. Culture was churches and music and ­theatres. Any fool knew that. And they talked about native culture! Dirty coons. Naked too, except for a bit of leaf and string. It was all very well for the Australians. They'd pushed their natives off into the middle of the desert and abandoned them, or killed them off. And now they sit back and tell us what to do. Native culture!

Nyall was asking for a man called David Warwick. ‘Can you come over straight away?' he said.

There was a pause and Jobe heard a faint voice. ‘What's it about?'

‘I think …' said Nyall ‘… not over the phone.'

‘Who's this bloke Warwick?' said Jobe when Nyall had hung up. Warwick … Warwick … the name rang uncomfortably in his head, but he couldn't place it.

‘Haven't you heard of him? He's an anthropologist.'

‘Oh,' said Jobe. He might have known. The whole trouble had started with anthropologists.

Nyall waited and Jobe soothed his outraged feelings.

About five minutes later the door opened and Warwick came in. He was a broad-shouldered, thick-set man in his forty-ninth year. He had lived in the Territory most of his life and, like many Territorians, did not look his age. The climate agreed with him. He was strong, active and clear-eyed. His name had meant nothing to Jobe, but actually he was one of the island's aristocrats. He had been born in Marapai, a distinction that not many of the older men could boast of, and here the aristocracy were not those of blue blood or noble occupations but the ones who had lived here longest. This, however, was not the end of his achievements. He had half a dozen books to his credit and a reputation for learning and practical ability. To that minute section of humanity who had any interest in this primitive island, he was a celebrity.

Even Jobe, who had not known his name, recognised him immediately. His heart sank. What rotten luck. What a piece of filthy, rotten luck.

Warwick had not looked at him. He moved into the centre of the room and stood looking at Nyall. He seemed rather ill at ease and said uncertainly, ‘Well, Trevor …'

‘This,' said Nyall, waving a hand vaguely, ‘is Mr Jobe.'

Jobe came boldly forward with an outstretched hand. It was rotten luck, all right, but there was nothing to do but brazen it out. There was just a chance that this fellow wouldn't recognise him.

Warwick looked straight at him but appeared not to see him at all. He looked vague and worried.

‘He's just come back from Kairipi,' said Nyall briskly. ‘He's been up the Bava River – hasn't told us yet exactly where. And he brought these back with him.'

Warwick took the two gold moons from his hand. The look of anxiety passed from his face. He turned the moons over and peered at them intently, then said, ‘Most interesting.'

‘Mr Jobe finds them interesting too,' Nyall said with a faint smile.

Warwick looked up and focused now on Alfred Jobe.

Jobe held his breath. He thought he saw for an instant a faint beam of recognition in Warwick's eyes. ‘I suppose he would,' he said.

‘Well, come on, Mr Jobe. Let's have your story. I'm afraid you'll have to tell us where these things come from.' Nyall spoke briskly now.

Jobe had hoped he wouldn't have to tell them but saw that this would be impossible. He squared his shoulders and went over to the map. His finger followed the coastline west from Marapai and mounted inland up the Bava River.

‘Here's the river,' he said. ‘Bava. Here's Kairipi on the coast. Patrol ends at Maiola. You can take a boat up that far. The district officer goes up every six months from Kairipi. Eola's about here, three miles west along the river.' He tapped his finger on the map.

‘Eola,' repeated Nyall.

‘Outside patrolled Territory,' said Warwick.

‘Eola,' said Jobe again impressively. ‘I was having a look around these parts. I've got a boat, been doing a bit of ­pearling up in the north. I took the boat up the Bava River and in one of the villages I came across one of these ornaments. They said they didn't make them there, and I traced it back to Eola.'

He paused. The two men were silent, their eyes turned intently to his face. He went on. ‘Eola's a river village. You know the sort of thing … twenty or thirty grass huts built on the bank of the river. Big long house in the middle of the place, for the men – no women allowed – you know. Where they do all their hocus-pocus nonsense. Pretty wild people. Only half a dozen of them had ever seen a white man before. One of them had been down to Kairipi. They get a bit of trade stuff through from Maiola. A couple of them had cotton ramis on, and they had some tins of bully beef.'

‘Were they at all hostile?' asked Warwick.

Jobe became vague. This was a subject that he did not wish to go into. These government fellows were always worrying whether the locals were hostile. Wouldn't even let you carry a gun. A man would be a fool to go into the jungle without a gun, but it might frighten the poor bloody natives.

‘Bit nervy at first, you know,' he said airily. ‘Only natural. Not used to white men. Soon got used to me, though. Got quite fond of me after a bit, you might say.'

‘And the gold?' said Nyall.

‘There's a lot in the village,' said Jobe, dropping his voice to a whisper. ‘Some of the old men wear those things round their necks, like pearl shell, you know. I'd say they was beaten out nuggets. And they've got a lot of rough stuff stuck away, and one special bit they make a fuss about that would be worth a few thousand on its own. There must be more of it round the place.'

‘Did you look when you were there?' said Warwick.

Jobe shook his head. This far he would not go.

‘Why would they value it!' said Nyall, turning to the anthropologist. ‘It couldn't have any utilitarian value, and these things are so crudely made they're nothing to look at. The pearl shell is at least ornamental.'

Warwick shrugged his shoulders. ‘There might be a hundred reasons, it's hard to say how these things begin. Take those two rocks in the middle of the harbour. They're more or less sacred, or used to be. There's a legend about them. There'd be magic behind this somewhere. Where do they keep the gold?'

‘In the long house, or whatever you call it. The big hut in the middle of the village where all the men get together, and dance and eat and howl and God knows what.'

‘In the long house!' exclaimed Warwick. ‘How on earth did you get in there? I had to wait in a village for three months once before they'd even let me look at it.'

Jobe shifted uneasily. He had not been prepared for these questions. He knew well how taboo the long houses were; in fact it was there that the trouble had started.

‘Well, when I first got to the place,' he said, ‘I saw some of the old men wearing ornaments like these, and I asked them if they had any more. There was an old bird who'd been to Kairipi and spoke a bit of police motu, and we could more or less understand each other. They was pretty cagey at first and wouldn't say anything, but I managed to break them down. I had some trade goods with me, and I handed them around to sort of sweeten them up. Then one day he took me into the long house and showed me what they had hidden away. Very secret. Very hot, it was. This one big nugget, seems to be the prize piece, was hidden under leaves and feathers.'

‘Did they explain why they kept it?' Warwick asked.

‘They seemed to think the big bit looked like a crocodile. It was quite rough. They hadn't touched it. But there was a sort of look about it.'

‘Would it be a clan totem?' asked Nyall.

‘Possibly,' said Warwick. ‘Something like that. It probably started with the crocodile. Some sorcerer may have found it and made some sort of magic with it and then gradually the material itself – the gold – would be believed to possess the same properties.' He turned back to Jobe. ‘Did you try to take any away?'

Jobe's spirits bubbled up afresh. Everything was going all right. This fellow Warwick hadn't recognised him. And they were interested, they were quite excited about it all. It paid to put your cards on the table. It wasn't such a bad show. They couldn't help it if Australia interfered all the time. ‘I tried to buy some with trade goods, but they weren't having any. The old boy sold me one of those ornaments for tobacco. But when the others found out about it they got a bit restive, and I had to hop it. One of them pitched a spear at me.'

He extended for their inspection the underside of his arm. Across the delicate, almost feminine, flesh was scrawled a shallow, red scar.

He saw immediately that he had made a mistake. Warwick looked up at him, faintly narrowed his eyes and glanced across at Nyall. There was a moment's silence in which the only sound was of Jobe's heavy breathing. Then Warwick put the two gold moons carefully on the desk. ‘We'll have to talk this over, Mr Jobe, and let you know later on. But …' he paused ‘… I don't want to hold out much hope for you.'

Nyall nodded and said nothing.

Jobe, looking from one to the other, thought he detected a faint, identical expression of satisfaction on their faces. ‘Oh. Why?' he said loudly.

Warwick did not look at him. His voice was soft and tired. ‘From what you've said, Mr Jobe, this gold is obviously of considerable value to the Eolans. The fact that they keep it secreted away in the long house means that it has ceremonial, to them almost sacred, significance. They wouldn't sell it to you, they wouldn't give it to you.' He paused and shrugged his shoulders. ‘The fact that you value it for a different reason does not give you a right to it.'

Jobe's face was crimson. Words choked in his throat. For a moment the probable loss of his gold was a secondary consideration. It was this white man talking about native rights that enraged him.

Warwick looked at him sharply. This time his eyes were curious. He's remembering, thought Jobe. It's coming back. He changed his tone, smiled and said sweetly, ‘It seems to me that we haven't always been so mighty fussy about the things that natives value.'

Warwick still stared at him. ‘That's true,' he said. ‘But you're speaking of the past. Exploitation has stopped now; at least, we're doing all in our power to stop it. But there's more to it than that. If you'd found the gold within patrolled territory, we might have had a different answer for you. But these people have no culture contact whatsoever. They don't know our law. When you take their gold, they throw spears at you. The whole enterprise might end in a welter of bloodshed.'

‘They've had trade contact,' said Jobe, still smiling. ‘They've bartered trade goods from Kairipi. They're very fond of bully beef.'

‘A few tins of bully beef could hardly be called culture contact,' Warwick said coldly.

‘I thought the policy of this government was to encourage private enterprise,' Jobe bellowed.

Nyall rose to his feet and spoke sternly. ‘The policy of this administration is also to protect the Papuans, particularly the unsophisticated people in backward areas.'

‘Protect!' said Jobe, cut by the implication of his words. ‘Protect! Now, Mr Nyall, I come to you in all good faith. Fair and above board.'

Nyall looked at his watch. ‘Come back at three this afternoon when we've had time to think it over. You never know …' he ended vaguely. ‘In the meantime I trust you won't mention this to anyone. We don't like rumours to get around.'

‘I'm not such a bloody fool,' said Jobe. He threw a baleful glance at Warwick, bowed respectfully to Nyall and left the room.

They waited till his footsteps had died away, then Warwick said, ‘You can't let him go, Trevor.'

Nyall turned away. ‘Why?'

‘Well, apart form the obvious reasons that I've been trying to explain to Mr Jobe – there's the man himself.'

‘I saw you didn't like him.'

‘He shouldn't even be here,' said Warwick. ‘He would have been deported, but war broke out and things slackened up a bit. He's been gaoled twice – in Rabaul before the war – once for nearly killing a boy, hit him over the head with an oar and nearly beat him to death, and once when he was tried for peddling spirits in a local village. Got away with that on insufficient evidence. He's a really nasty type – makes trouble in the worst way, and there are others like him. They hate the local people, exploit them and teach them bad habits. They should never be allowed near a country like Papua.'

‘You seem to know a lot about him. I thought all the Rabaul court records had gone in the war.'

‘They have, too. It was bad luck for him he happened to run into me. I gave evidence against him. Obviously he struck trouble in Eola too. He would never have come to us except as a last resort. It's my guess they chased him out and he was scared to go back. So he thought he'd try and get government protection, possibly the help of the district officer and some police boys. Why else would he come here and tie himself up in red tape?'