South Sea Gold: Chapter Twenty-six

Chapter Twenty-six

"That's the man, I'm sure of it." Maxine Edon paled as she gazed through the one-way glass at the six men in the police line-up; her grip on Sophia's wrist tightened.

Inspector Vincent Gora, Special Forces Command, made a note on his clipboard. "Miss Edon, for the record please identify the man you are choosing by his place in line."

"The second man from my right. He's one of the three who assaulted me that night, the one who followed me until I got back to the newspaper building."

"Do you remember anything more about him since that night?"

Maxine was trembling now. Sophia put a hand on her arm to calm her. "It's okay, Max. He's a prisoner in jail. He can't hurt you now."

Maxine took a deep breath. "He was horrible. After the other two left me lying in the alley, he didn't help me up. He just smirked and said that as long as I was lying there anyway, how about another. . . " She shuddered. "His breath was foul. The light was dim there in the alley, but I remember one of his front teeth was broken. I realized I had to get out of there on my own, and get out very soon . . . I could barely walk, but made it back to the office, and the watchman let me in."

"Just one more question, Miss, and then your friend can take you home. Can you remember which tooth was broken?"

"It was upper left―his left."

"Thank you. Your detailed description is very helpful. Now if each of you will sign at the bottom of my notes as witnesses, you are free to go. Ms. Waru, please stay with her for a while after you get her home. Either of you can call me if you think of anything further." Gora nodded to the lady constable, who accompanied them out.

Later that day, Gora called the prisoner to his office. "Petey, we have a witness to the rape that night, who has identified you. It's no good telling us you don't know the other three. You were part of the gang, and you were there. Who are they?"

Petey was sweating. "I can't tell you."

"Yes you can."

"I can't! Sarge would find me and kill me!" He clamped his mouth shut, suddenly realizing he might have spoken too much already.

"Who is Sarge?"

"That's all they ever call him."

"Was he in the army? The police?"

Silence. Petey's mouth stayed shut.

"He can't get at you in here, you know."

Petey panicked. He muttered something in a low voice. All Inspector Gora could make out were the words "done it before."

Finally, after another quarter-hour of frustration, he sent the prisoner back to his cell.

At a Special Forces group meeting at Headquarters that afternoon, Inspector Gora reported on progress in the government corruption case. "Still no certain ID of government officials, but perhaps we have a lead to the gang working as their enforcers. "We have a positive ID of one of the gang members, from the rape victim they released with the threat to the newspaper office taped to her arm. He's a punk kid who's afraid to talk about the others. But in a slip of the tongue this morning, he revealed that the gang leader is called 'Sarge'."

"Ex-military, do you think?" asked the senior inspector.

"Or maybe a rogue cop."

"Nobody in Port Moresby seems to know these men. Kerro, you've worked in the Highlands. Any ideas?"

"I can check the mining camps and the cities for anyone who has dismissed a sergeant with a habit of violence in the last few years."

"Do that, and we'll check the same types who may have left the military."

"Prison guards, and mining company guards, too," another member advised.

"Right then, let's move ahead."

Tom Akani felt uncertain of his next step. Sophia had told him about accompanying Maxine to the police station and her identifying one her attackers. "She was terrified, Tom. Even though she knew in her mind that he couldn't see her through the one-way glass, it's still frightening to confront an attacker after being raped at knife-point. I don't think she should still be working alone at the reception desk."

"There are always people coming in and out."

"But not always people she knows. She's changed, Tom. Hardly sleeping some nights, not eating enough. She should be working somewhere surrounded by people she knows."

"You'd better talk to the chief editor."

"And there's another thing, too, Sophia continued."In ordinary assault, the one who did it pays the expenses and a fine to the victim. But a rape victim usually gets nothing. If the attacker does pay anything in PNG, it goes to the family or the husband. That's not right!"

"That's true, but what can I do about it?"

"You're a reporter, Tom! Wake up! This is not some Arab country where a raped girl is murdered to preserve the family honor; in PNG women have rights! Or should have."

Jason Kerro and Vincent Gora had been friends ever since they had broken up a ring of foreign drug dealers and gun runners in the Western Highlands three years earlier. Gora had led his special services group, the nearest thing to a SWAT team in PNG, in a surprise helicopter attack after Kerro had located the ring's jungle headquarters. Both inspectors had a similar philosophy for keeping the peace: Do your research and planning carefully, then act swiftly and decisively.

Kerro decided it was time to take Tom further into his confidence, and did so at the Akani house rather than at Tom's office. "Tom, I want to bring you up to date in the police case about the gang who beat you up. I know you are a reporter, but you'll have to keep quiet about this, not even hints in the newspaper or to your colleagues. I believe you share my goal of finding whoever is siphoning off government funds intended for building up Papua New Guinea. The Owego Island pollution and the gang who attacked you reporters are only side issues to the police case, but now it looks like the gang could point the way to those higher up."

"Keeping the secrets of my sources is part of my regular job," said Tom. "I don't discuss such things even with Kim. What do you need to know?"

"You were still staying at the Journal office the night Maxine was attacked, and you went to the emergency room soon after she got there. Can you remember anything else about the scene?"

"Not then, but I remember talking with her a couple days later. She was calmer then, and had had time to think. I asked her about names, and she only remembered Petey's, but I thought one of them called the leader 'Joe' once, when they were beating me up."

A query didn't get results from any of the police Kerro sent it to, nor did military records produce anything useful. Tom's investigation of mining company payrolls for the combination of "Joseph" and/or "sergeant" were equally unhelpful.

"Do we know for sure that the "sarge" is a native of PNG?" Tom asked Kerro. "He could be, say, Australian, or Slav or almost anyone hired on at the mines."

"That's true, I suppose," Kerro considered. "Were there any clues in his language, that night he attacked you?"

"They didn't use Tok Pisin or Motu. They spoke English to me, and among themselves. But it didn't sound quite right. Could be that English is a second language for him."

"Not Australian then."

"Maybe not."

"I think we're expecting too much from the computer," said Tom. "It could easily break down 'Sergeant Joe' into it's two words, but it wouldn't include Joseph, or corporal, or any other possibilities he used when he was first put on the payroll."

They started over again. Private, constable, lance corporal, Joseph, Jose, Giovani. . . . .They didn't call him Giovani, Tom was positive.

"But maybe Gio for short?" said Kerro.

"Okay, try it." They added, Kyo, Chou, and any other variant they could think of, and then went through the military, constabulary, and industrial lists again. This time they got perhaps fifty names, some of whom could be winnowed out by date of birth, etc., leaving about a dozen possibilities.

"You getting any more useful information from Petey?" Tom asked.

"Not much. He's still scared spitless. We're still holding him, and he doesn't object because he's too frightened to go back out on the streets."

They sorted out the names the computer lists had produced. Three from Madang, two from Lae, one each from several lesser mining and oil areas. Kerro sat back and surveyed the data. "Tom, you know more about the Madang area than I do. I can provide letters of introduction to the commanders of police in Madang and Lae. I know both of them personally, and as far as I know both are honest cops. My work ties me up here, but you could go check both cities. I can clear the trip with your boss, without telling him all the details."

"Okay, what do you want to know about these guys?"

"The usual personal data, birth date, work history, but especially conflicts, discipline problems, anything that might cause a grudge or opportunity for graft or blackmail. Any close connections with 'Big Men' in mining or government. Use your reporter's instinct."

After making arrangements to have Kim and Morrie stay with the Kerros, Tom took the morning plane for Madang next day.

The bustling town was not the quiet scene of his boyhood, now with its oil and gas drillers, harbor expansion, and the big nickel and cobalt refinery farther down the bay. He wryly noted that this town had a slurry pipeline problem too, or rather that the inland territory did. Building the long pipeline down from the hills had problems. He was surprised to learn that the DEC had closed down the pipeline (and therefore the mine) for a time after inspecting the pipe's construction. Maybe things are going to improve, he thought.

Tom checked in with the Madang police station and presented his letter of reference from Inspector Kerro to the local police chief. The chief read it carefully. "Joe's in trouble? I'm surprised," was his comment.

"You know him?" Tom asked in surprise. This was quick, he thought to himself.

"Yeah, I know a sergeant named Joe," the chief said. "I was sorry to lose him. A good man. Kept the constables in line. He got more work out of them, when the government cut the roster down to where we just plain don't have enough cops to keep order in a town this size."

"Then why didn't he show up on the computer list of dismissals?"

"Oh, he wasn't dismissed. He transferred down to Morobe Division. He couldn't find housing for his family here in Madang. As far as I know, he's still a cop. Sergeant Joe Moran."

Tom wrote the name in his notebook. "And you don't have anyone else that might match the description?"

"Huh - If we did, you can bet we'll hang on to him. We're short-handed here in Madang. Hey, man, you want a job?"

Tom smiled. "No thanks. Already got one."

The police chief shrugged. "Doesn't hurt to ask."

But Tom didn't have any better luck in Lae, the Morobe Province capital. The police chief there knew Joe Moran, but said he wasn't there any longer. "He moved on after his wife was shot and killed, you know."

Tom looked up sharply from his pad, his pencil motionless. "What?"

"It happened only a week or so after he came to work. We have some rough neighborhoods here. She was in the wrong place at the wrong time, I guess. Moran never really got involved in his job after that. We never got to know him well; he brooded a lot, but I could see the rage building up in him. I think he blamed the police force for not protecting her."

Tom looked up at the chief again. "Was he right?"

"Maybe. That's easy for an outsider to say. But there are places in this town where it's better for even the police to stay away from. One day, about six weeks ago it was, he just didn't show up for work. We haven't seen him since."

"Is he still on the payroll?"

"Yes, I guess he is, come to think of it."

The chief spoke like the question had never occurred to him, thought Tom on the flight back to Moresby. I wonder who's collecting his pay?