The Moai Murders

5

AHU AKIVI—As it turned out, the flight to Tahiti was not an issue. The plane got in from Santiago all right, but technical difficulties delayed its onward journey by five hours, by which time Pablo Fuentes had had to rethink his attitude toward any number of things.

But that was to come later. After my visit to the cave and the excursion along the shoreline, I came up the path to find Moira standing on the cliff edge in a complete flap. "Where have you been?" she demanded. "I've been looking for you everywhere. Susie Scace said she'd seen you walking along the cliff and I was afraid something awful had happened."

"Moira!" I exclaimed. "I just went for a walk."

"You can't just go off like that without telling me," she said.

"You were asleep, Moira," I said.

"You're right," she said in a second or two. "This place must be getting to me. I'll be glad when all these people have left, and we can get on with our holiday. How's your head?"

"It's fine. Life list: I will never have a migraine again," I said. She managed to smile. "Let's go get breakfast. I'm starving, and I have to hear what happened after I left Jasper's talk."

"Not that much, really," she said, as I tucked into a rather large plate of eggs. "Two of those dancers came out pushing a glass case to center stage, followed by the rest of them, who did what I can only describe as a victory dance around that thing, whatever it was. Then Jasper invited Rory and Gordon to be the first to see the tablet, which I gather he has named the San Pedro tablet. I guess Rory's curiosity overcame his humiliation because he actually went up and looked at it. Gordon wouldn't go."

"And?"

"They behaved like perfect gentlemen, even if Gordon refused to go on stage. You have to give them credit. Rory even shook Jasper's hand and said if the tablet stood up to further study, he was to be congratulated for a significant find. Something like that, anyway. It must have pained him greatly to say it. After that, everyone was allowed to go up on the stage to have a look. I went up there, but I had no idea what I was looking at. Everyone else was pointing out some of the little figures and saying it looked just like the Santiago staff. What do I know? But we may have inadvertently stumbled into something really special at this congress. We may get to eat out on this for years. Jasper said National Geographic was interested in an article, as was Archaeology magazine. We'll be able to say we were there when Jasper made his big announcement. Not that anybody else but you will have a clue what rongorongo is."

"Has anyone seen Jasper?" Kent Clarke said in a loud voice at the dining room door. Everyone said no. "We're supposed to be filming," she said in an exasperated tone.

"Tell him I'm looking for him if he comes in here, please." She vanished just as quickly as she'd come.

"She's obviously used to being in charge," Moira said. "I hope I don't speak to my staff that way. Life list: Speak civilly to staff at all times."

"I suppose she's under some pressure," I said. "According to Mike and Daniel, this is one dog of a documentary she's making."

"I thought I was going to be seeing him. I thought we had a date," Yvonne said from the next table. "Story of my life. They all dump me for some reason. I suppose I wasn't smart enough for Jasper. I'm not dumb, you know. I just didn't get much of an education. I'm trying to learn stuff. That's why I signed up for that Internet group and came here." She rose from her chair and ran from the room sobbing.

"I'm thinking this is opportunity for me," Enrique said as he rushed past our table in her path.

"Was she talking to us or the tablecloth?" Moira said.

"I have no idea," I said. "But it seems the Jasper thing is off. So what's the drill for today? Are we going to Ahu Akivi with the rest of them? What are your plans?"

"I'm afraid to tell you," she said.

"You have a date with Jasper?" I said.

"No," she said. "It's worse."

She's going off to spend the afternoon with Rory doing the unthinkable, I thought. Will I or won't I tell Clive? I waited.

"Promise you won't scream, or anything?" she said.

I promised. It was a promise I hoped I'd be able to keep.

"I'm going to get a tattoo," she said.

"What?" I shrieked.

"You promised not to scream," she said.

"Sorry," I whispered. "A tattoo?" It wasn't the idea of the tattoo itself that surprised me; it was the idea that Moira, spa owner and seeker of skin perfection, would even consider one. This was the new Moira indeed. I looked at her carefully. I rarely saw Moira without makeup or with a single hair out of place. It had happened gradually, over the space of a few days here, but Moira had essentially transformed herself. She'd toned the makeup down to pale lipstick and some eyeliner, and her hairstyle was considerably more relaxed than usual. I decided this was a good thing.

"Haven't you noticed that almost everyone here, the people who live here, I mean, have tattoos?" she said. "Rory told me that when the Europeans first came, they found people with their entire bodies covered in tattoos. He said there are names for each of the different tattoos—you know, one name for the face, another for the tattoos on the buttocks. You get the idea."

"You're having your buttocks tattooed?" I said.

"No," she said. "Did you see that lovely little turtle Victoria Pakarati had tattooed around her navel?" I nodded. "I'm thinking of having something like that done."

"Okay," I said.

"Rory's going to take me to a parlor he knows about, a place with clean needles, et cetera. When I get there, I will, of course, cast my Meller Spa eye over the place to make sure it meets my standards of cleanliness. If it does, I'm going for it. Rory claims he has a tattoo himself, too, one I haven't seen, so I can only imagine where it is. Do you want to come with me? Get a little butterfly or something at the base of your spine?"

"Nooo," I said.

"You are such a poop, Lara," she said. "What are you going to do, then, while I'm breaking free of all the constraints that have held me captive for many years?"

"One little tattoo will do that?" I said. "Maybe I should reconsider." She laughed. "I guess I'll go to Ahu Akivi with the gang," I said. "We missed it on our island tour. Then I may go into Hanga Roa to shop for souvenirs. What I'd really like to do, if it is in any way possible, is see that tablet of Jasper's," I added. "I spent some time talking to Seth Connelly about rongorongo, and he made it all seem very exciting. It's a better story if the people of Rapa Nui invented the language virtually overnight and all by themselves, but either way, I'd like to see it. I'm sorry I missed the opportunity. I wonder where it is. I assume Jasper wouldn't just have it lying around his hotel room, would he? It's got to be priceless."

"That's a good question," she said. "Maybe the museum in town has it in safekeeping, or something."

"Another question, now that I think about it, is how did he get it here without anyone knowing about it? I sure wouldn't want to put it in my checked luggage, given the number of times airlines have lost my bags," I said. "He must have had a lot of help from somebody. When I see Jasper, though, I might ask if I could have a quick peek at it," I said. "If I suck up to him the way you did to…" I stopped. "That was tasteless of me. I was going to say Dave Maddox, of course. He seems to have just disappeared, don't you think? Even I, who found him dead, was going to joke about the way you had him wrapped around your little finger that first night."

"It seems like a very long time ago, doesn't it?" Moira said. "I think poor old Dave probably has gotten lost in the frenzy to discuss Jasper Robinson's startling discovery. Now that you mention it, I didn't hear his name much at all yesterday and certainly not at all so far today. He was kind of sad, wasn't he, the way he was so overly jolly all the time. All that stuff about coming to his session. He must have said that to me ten thousand times in the two days I knew him. I think it just put people off. I made fun of him a lot, though, and I regret it now. If it would make you feel any better, when the time came for his session, Susie, Yvonne, and Brian went for a drink and toasted his memory. You were under the influence of the sleeping pill I gave you at the time."

"I suppose that's something," I said. In fact, though, not everyone had been able to delete Dave from their memory file. Brenda Butters came up to our table only minutes later. "I have a favor to ask," she said in a voice so low I could hardly hear her. "I'm wondering, er, the hotel wants us to clear out Dave Maddox's room. He was due out today anyway. He was going to Tahiti for a week's vacation. The flight from Santiago will be in later this afternoon, and the hotel is full. They need the room. Given I'm the registrar for this event and the person who has been dealing with the hotel on all the arrangements, they've come to me."

"You'd like our help clearing his stuff out," Moira said. "I'm not sure Lara is feeling up to this. She had a terrible migraine last night. I actually had to get a doctor in to see her." She gave me a look that indicated she was trying to find us a way out of this.

"Is it okay with the carabineros?" I said.

"Yes," she replied. "The hotel called them, and that man who investigated the accident, Fuentes I think he said his name was, came over to say it was okay. I'm just not terribly comfortable doing this by myself, not because he's dead or anything, but because of valuables. I would just like a witness or two while I'm doing this."

"All right, then," I said. "I'll help. How long can it take? It's not as if it's his house or an office he's used for years. He's only been here a few days. Let's just get it done fast."

Moira looked surprised and none too pleased. I, of course, was curious to see what other surprises Dave had in store, even dead. It did not take us long to find out. Essentially, Dave had barely unpacked, just kept everything in his suitcase, which was a mess. I just put his suitcase on the bed and in the guise of repacking had a quick look through his stuff. There was nothing out of the ordinary. Moira packed up the bathroom toiletries and put them in the bag. Brenda went through the drawers.

The book with the Grisham dust cover was on the bedside table, but when I checked the contents quickly, it was indeed a book by Grisham. That meant that The Art Forger's Handbook had to be somewhere else, but I couldn't see it. The other item that was distinguished by its absence was the paper Dave was due to give the day he died. It was possible the paper had been folded up in the pocket of the clothes he'd been wearing when I found him. Needless to say, it was not something I'd thought to look for at the time. The book, however, was too big for that.

Moira caught my attention. She was holding an empty bottle of pisco. "Found it on the floor under the desk," she said, with a knowing look.

When we were done, I said I was going to do one last check and pulled open all the drawers, checked the cupboard and the bathroom, and even looked under the bed. Moira looked at me with some amusement. "Shoes and socks," I said.

Neither the paper, nor The Art Forger's Handbook were anywhere to be found. I had one last thought and checked the back of the closet. "The safe," I said. "It's locked, so there must be something in it."

"Oh dear," Brenda said. "There's a fifty dollar deposit on the keys for those things. We'd better go through his pockets to find it or the congress will be stuck with paying for it."

We unpacked the suitcase. The key was not there. The only key, in fact, was one for the suitcase itself. "I suppose it might have fallen out when, you know, he tried riding that horse," Moira said.

"I guess I'll just have to 'fess up about the key and eat the fifty dollars," Brenda said. "I'll phone and get the hotel's." But the phone in the room didn't work, so she went off to Reception to get it. I continued to look around the room.

"I don't think it's here," Moira said.

"What?" I said.

"The key. That's what you're looking for, isn't it? Or is it?"

I told her I didn't think Dave's death was an accident. I told her about my dreams about horses.

"I hate to say it, but I think that migraine has damaged some brain cells," she said. "I'm sure it's only temporary. Why would anyone kill Dave? You think that someone got ticked off because he got their name wrong for the hundredth time, lost it completely, bashed in his head, and then rode a horse over him?"

"It's true that if I killed everyone who called me Laura, the streets of most urban centers would be piled high with corpses," I said. "But something else was going on." I told her about the book.

"I wouldn't want anyone at this conference knowing I was reading a forger's textbook," she said. "Isn't it as simple as that?"

"Let's just see what's in the safe," I said, as Brenda returned, key in hand. But there was nothing. The safe was absolutely empty.

"I wonder why he bothered locking it," Brenda said. "This is very irritating about the key. And the hotel is going to charge us storage for his stuff, until his family makes some arrangements."

"He has family?" Moira said.

"A brother, apparently," Brenda said. "Who didn't sound too cut up when I called him to give him the news. I don't think they were close. He's suggesting Dave just be buried here. He said he'd send money."

"Poor Dave," Moira said. "He did seem to be something of a klutz. Maybe he locked it accidentally. The key could be on the floor of the cupboard."

But it wasn't. "Maybe the cleaning staff swept it up by accident," Brenda said.

I thought it was much more likely that someone had been in Dave's room just before or after he died, had found the key, emptied the safe, and left, locking it to slow people like me down. I went over to the sliding door and with one pull opened it. "This door is unlocked," I said.

"The police, maybe?" Moira said. Maybe, I thought.

"The rooms on this side of the hotel aren't air conditioned," Brenda said. "They're a bit cheaper. It gets pretty hot, I'm told, so he probably left the door open for some air."

"I'm sure you're right," Moira said, as I, growing more suspicious by the minute, went to take a second look at the phone that wouldn't work. It was easy to see why: The cord had been cut. I held it up for the other two to see.

"What would cause that, I wonder?" Brenda said.

I was tempted to say a knife, or scissors, but I held my tongue. Nobody was going to believe me on this one, including Moira. Even though I'd predicted she wouldn't, and even though I knew in my heart of hearts hers was the rational reaction, I was still a little hurt by it and feeling rather put upon. Then I had the most wonderful idea, one I went to implement the minute Moira headed off to get her tattoo.

"Brian!" I said to the nice young man who had unfortunately not yet snagged himself a job. "You are obviously the most technologically advanced person at this congress. I am really hoping you can help me."

"You flatter me," he said. "What seems to be the problem?"

"My partner Rob gave me this camera to bring on this trip," I said. "I thought that was really nice of him, particularly given the fact he couldn't come with me."

He looked at it. "I'll say. This is a really good camera," he said. "Five megapixels. Great resolution."

"Yes," I said. I had no idea what he was talking about. "Rob couldn't get away from his job, you know. I thought it would be nice to send him some photos I took with the camera he gave me. I read the manual, and I think it should be possible, but I don't know how to do it."

"You just have to transfer them to your computer and then attach them to an email. Did you bring your laptop?"

"I didn't," I said.

"Okay," he said. "We'll use mine. I have software on my laptop that should work. But I'd have to hook your camera up to my laptop. I don't suppose you brought a connector for the camera for a USB port."

"Would this be it?" I said, handing him a cable. I'd been so intimidated by the manual, I'd brought everything that had come in the box with the camera. This was the first time I'd needed any of it.

"That's it!" he exclaimed. "We're in business. Now, I'll get my laptop and transfer your photos to it, and you can send them through my email. I can log on in Santiago."

"I'll pay the charges," I said.

"Don't worry," he said. "One of the advantages of living in the middle of frigging nowhere is that Chile takes good care of you. Valparaiso, on the mainland, even though it's 2,500 miles away, is a local call."

"But Santiago?" I said.

"Look," he said. "You and Moira were so nice to me when no one else in the whole world would talk to me. If I can repay you in even this small way, I am grateful."

"I really thought your paper was terrific and that those other people were horrid," I said.

"I rest my case," he said. "Okay, here we go," he said when he returned with his laptop. "Now, you put in your partner's email address, say it's a message from you in the subject line, just so he doesn't think it's spam, and tell me what photos you want me to attach." I told him.

"Well, these are different," he said, looking at them. "All this dirt."

"Actually, Rob is a soil engineer," I said. "I agree with you, as would almost everyone else on the planet, but he'll be over the moon with these photos." You are a pig, Lara, I thought. Life list: I will never lie to a nice young man again.

"I think you'll have to send two or three separate emails, with all these attachments," he said. "Now here's the space for you to write your own message."

I wrote my own message all right. Over the course of three emails, I told Rob my feelings about Dave Maddox and about how nobody believed me. I said I hoped he'd take a look at the photos I'd taken and send a reply, not by replying to Brian Murphy, of course, but to me.

"Is that a dead horse?" Brian said, as he attached the last photo.

"It is," I replied. "Sad, isn't it? But so artistic, don't you think? Rob is also a farmer on the weekends. And a painter. He uses scenes like this as his subject matter. I know he'll find this interesting." / am damned, I thought. My aku-aku will torment me forever for this.

As soon as the emails were on their way, I hurried into Hanga Roa to the Internet cafe and logged on. I'd sent the emails to both Rob's home address and work, hoping he was at his desk one place or the other with the email beeping to tell him there was a message from me.

He must have been nearby, because there was already a message from him asking me what I was up to and about how I should just come home. I sent him another in which in a rather testy tone I pointed out that he'd offered to come and help me on these trips, and even though he wasn't there, I still wanted his help.

This time he was at his desk, because by the time I'd managed to reply to another inane request from Clive, Rob had replied again. This time the message said: The dead horse on the rocks did not make the prints on the dirt where the body was found. The dead horse was wild, i.e. unshod. The prints on that Tomb thing, whatever it is you keep calling it, are horseshoes.

Ha, I thought. / knew it. Then I realized I wasn't much further ahead. I had merely eliminated one horse among what had to be thousands on the island. Fuentes would just say another horse killed Dave.

Do you think Maddox was trampled by a horse? I typed.

Could be, but only if the horse considered itself, or its foal, for example, to be threatened by him, the return email read. Horseshoes are unique, made for a specific horse. You could look for distinguishing marks in the prints. I can't tell from your email. Be careful were the last two words.

So real had been my dream about Rob on horseback, that I almost emailed him to ask what else it was I'd forgotten about Dave Maddox's death. That one would have stumped him, I'm sure. I sincerely hoped I would remember whatever it was I was supposed to soon, because this feeling of unease was starting to get to me. I didn't want to think about Dave Maddox's body at all, that crushed face still very fresh in my mind.

As an afterthought I asked Rob how my kitchen was coming along. The reply was that progress was being made at a rate that was essentially imperceptible. I wanted to cry.

Back at the hotel everyone was getting ready to go to Ahu Akivi on the last field trip of the conference. The flight to Tahiti was not until late in the day, so everyone was there. I put Susie Scace's bags in our room for safekeeping until it was time for her to go to the airport.

While we waited for the others to assemble, I went over to talk to Mike and Daniel, who were sitting surrounded by their gear, in the shade. Kent Clarke was standing beside a Jeep in the hotel drive, tapping her fingernails on the hood of the vehicle and looking about with a particularly vexed expression on her face. Brittany was sitting in the passenger seat looking, well, bored. She had acquired, I noticed, another tattoo, this one of a jelly fish, that sort of climbed up her neck, somehow.

"She's going to wear her fingers out," Daniel said, nodding in Kent's direction. "And then how will she be able to count out the vast sums of money she owes us, Mike?"

"Star gone walkabout?" I said.

"He probably drank himself into a stupor somewhere last night, savoring his triumph," Mike said. "I can see him now, sprawled on the floor behind the bar of some dive, arms still wrapped around that rongorongo thing."

"You're such a cynic, Mike," Daniel said. "You have no appreciation for greatness." He couldn't keep a straight face, however, and soon we were all laughing. I rather hoped Rory and Gordon would happen along so they could join in the fun, but perhaps their sense of humor had deserted them the previous evening, or they were off by themselves licking their wounds. Rory, now that I thought about it, wouldn't be here, because he was taking Moira to a tattoo parlor in Hanga Roa, of all things.

"Speaking of that rongorongo thing," I said. "Where is it? In safekeeping I presume?"

"No effing idea," Daniel said. "I just wish it looked at bit more impressive on film."

"I was kind of hoping to see it. I had a migraine and had to leave just as it was being wheeled on to the stage."

"We'll ask on your behalf when we finally see Jasper," Mike said.

"Given you're one of the few people at this congress who will actually talk to us plebs," Daniel said.

"You're kidding," I said. "I'd have thought everyone would be interested in hearing about the documentary."

"Nope," Mike said. "You and that dead guy, Maddox, were the only ones who'd have a conversation of any duration with the likes of us. He's gone, so that leaves you. So it will be our pleasure talking to the great one on your behalf."

"Thanks! I really want to see that thing. Dave was interested in the documentary?" I asked, I hoped casually.

"Yes, indeedy," Daniel said. "Bit of a bore, though. All that 'great to see you' stuff. I suppose I shouldn't speak ill of the dead. He was helping Kent with the research. Kent asked him and paid his way to the congress apparently. That's all I know really. I have no idea what he did for the airfare. Funny choice, I'd say, but there you are."

That seemed about all he was going to say. "So did last night make for better television?" I asked.

"The dancing girls in those feathered skirts and tiny bikini tops were good," Mike said.

"Too many white girls," Daniel said. "The spots in the dance company are all being taken by Chileans. It's a shame because it's Rapa culture they're representing, and furthermore, Rapa girls are really lovely."

"You would hardly be biased or anything, would you?" Mike said. "But to take your question seriously, Lara, no, slides and a talking head at a podium do not good television make. That's why we plan to take Jasper out, should he deign to show us his lovely face before the sun goes down, to shoot some footage at a cave where rongorongo tablets could, theoretically at least, be found. When that was done, we were going to have him give you all a little talk at Ahu Akivi and film that as well."

"You don't like him, do you?" I said.

"I do not have strong feelings on the subject," Mike said. "About him, or about his big discovery, if that is what it is. He's a job, one job in a not-so-illustrious career."

"By not having strong feelings he means he hates the guy," Daniel said. When Mike started to protest, Daniel put up his hand. "Don't try to deny it. J. R. is a turd. We all know that." Mike shrugged and then laughed. "Still, Mike and I keep begging Kent to let us work on every one of J. R.'s adventures."

"Our masochistic tendencies," Mike said. "I think this will be the last time for me, though. There is only so much of J. R. I can stomach."

"My wife Eroria certainly feels strongly," Daniel said. "She was much miffed last night when I told her what Jasper had to say about South American stonemasons. He has earned the undying enmity of Eroria and every other Rapa Nui on the island, I should think. In the interests of family harmony, I agreed with her. I have no effing clue, of course, whether he's right or not."

I noticed for the first time that Daniel had a tattoo, a lizard, on his left bicep. "Does everybody here really have a tattoo?" I asked.

"A lot do," he said. "Long tradition of it, I believe. Eroria treated me to this one when we got engaged."

There was something about this tattoo business that was bothering me, and I didn't know what it was. I had no problem with Moira getting one, and I thought I'd even consider something very discreet myself, except I couldn't bring myself to do it. I wondered what that was about. I'm sure it hurt a bit, but so did having your ears pierced, which I'd done maybe twenty-five years earlier and certainly never regretted. For some reason, though, right now I was filled with revulsion at the idea of a tattoo, something I'd never noticed in myself, not that I'd thought about it much, if ever, before.

By now the buses were ready to go, and our group headed out in two of them, followed by the Kent Clarke team in their van. Kent had decided that rather than waste more time, they'd film some footage of the group at the site to use as background at some point in the documentary.

I loved Ahu Akivi the moment I saw it, and the mere sight of it put troubling thoughts about tattoos out of my mind. Unlike other ahu that invariably hugged the coast, this one was inland, an ahu with seven moai gazing across the landscape toward the sea. I don't know why I liked it better, other than to say it had a certain grace that the larger Ahu Tongariki lacked, something Brian Murphy attributed to the sensitive restoration work of his hero, Bill Mulloy.

Christian Hotus, the young man Gordon had described as his right hand, was the guide for this excursion, the only one, given Jasper had still failed to show. Edwina Rasmussen could have done it, but she would much rather stand under her umbrella, which she used constantly outdoors in the sun, and criticize someone else, which is what she did all the while Christian talked. I, however, thought he did a better than credible job as guide, and the fact that he was Rapa Nui born and bred added a great deal.

According to him, there were two stories about the ahu, one that the seven moai represented seven sailors sent out by Hotu Matu'a to find the island he had seen in his dreams. The other, perhaps more realistic, was that these moai represented seven ancestors of the clan whose village the moai guarded. There was space for one more, perhaps to honor the man who had built the moai and had the seven carved, but the clan wars and the toppling of the moai made the raising of the eighth impossible.

We stood, a group of about twenty, in front of the ahu, while Christian pointed out various features, telling us that long after the moai had been toppled, the ahu had been a burial place. "Now," he said. "Follow me around the back, and I'll show you something interesting."

It was interesting, all right. What followed was a scene right out of the Keystone Kops. Christian rounded the end of the ahu, and I was right behind him, snapping photographs. Oblivious to everything beyond what I could see through the camera lens, I walked straight into Christian, who had come to an abrupt stop. When I saw what had happened to him, I stopped dead in my tracks, too. Then Enrique, who had his guidebook up to his nose, bumped into me, and then Brian, who was rhapsodizing about the work of Bill Mulloy, ran into Enrique. We then had the pedestrian equivalent of a pileup on the freeway. One after another, those coming around the side of the ahu, all gawking at something other than where they were going, bumped into the person just ahead. Susie was almost knocked down. Over to the side, Daniel, who, like me, was oblivious to anything that could not be seen through the camera lens, kept right on filming, panning across the back of the ahu, not noticing the absolute chaos just to his left.

The cause of this uproar was the great Jasper Robinson himself. He was sitting on the ground, leaning against the stones of the ahu, legs stretched out in front of him, looking for all the world as if he'd been waiting for us forever.

"What is he doing there?" Edwina carped the minute she saw him. "We could have been hurt."

"If you didn't want to see me, you could have just said so, Jasper," Yvonne said loudly.

"For heaven's sake, Jasper," Kent Clarke said, striding purposefully up to the seated Jasper. "Do you not realize how expensive it is to have a crew on standby for hours on end?" And then she fainted dead away.