Grave Island: a compelling mystery thriller

by Andrew Smyth

  ‘So, you’re here to see the bats then?’ she said.

  ‘Bats?’ I repeated dumbly.

  ‘Yes. I assumed that’s what you came to look at.’

  ‘Of course,’ I said, thoroughly confused. ‘Amongst other things. But the bats in particular.’ I looked across at Dickson but he clearly had no idea what she was talking about either. ‘Is that what most people come to see?’ I asked her.

  ‘We’ve got quite a few different animals on the island,’ she said. ‘Some people come for the beaches on the south side but most come to see the wildlife.’ She made some notes on the computer and then indicated a flower bed where a woman was on her knees weeding. ‘That’s Ariana. She owns this place.’

  We went over and as we approached, the woman saw us and stood up. Even in her work-clothes, she was exceptionally elegant and wasn’t in the least embarrassed by being found on her knees in a flowerbed and I suspected that it would take a lot to embarrass her. Dickson had told me that she was a qualified engineer who’d built some of the roads on the island before starting up this small resort. She regarded me with a sort of amused detachment which I found rather disconcerting, but she was all business when I explained warily that we wanted to keep watch over the warehouse opposite.

  ‘Do you know anything about them?’ I asked.

  ‘Smugglers cave?’ she said. ‘There’s a lot you have to understand about Zanzibar and that includes knowing when to stop asking questions. It’s taken me years to be accepted here and they still think the idea of a woman engineer is almost impossible to believe, but then I can show them the roads I’ve built here and they can’t really argue. But when it comes to one of the island’s main industries – smuggling – it’s best not to enquire too deeply.’

  I thought I should change the subject. ‘It’s quite a place you have here.’

  ‘We work hard at it. We run it as a sort of co-operative. All the staff have other duties – growing the vegetables, for example. Some of them even make the dresses we sell in the shop.’

  ‘It seems to me to be pretty close to paradise here.’

  ‘Perhaps, but my real daydream is to sail around the world.’

  ‘What? And leave this place?’ However much I enjoyed sailing, it didn’t seem a good idea to me.

  ‘This will be here when I get back. But it’s only fantasy. Occasionally we get yachts passing through and I always make them welcome and ask about their adventures.’ She sighed again and I recognised that despite the apparent paradise she had created, few people are ever fully content. ‘I suppose that’s the nearest I’m ever going to get to my dream.’ She looked wistfully out to sea. ‘But don’t let me keep you, the bats are also at that end of the island.’

  I still didn’t understand about the bats but before I could ask, Dickson pulled at my sleeve and hefted the backpack onto his shoulder. I followed him out along the seashore towards the small beach we had seen at the tip of the island. ‘Christ!’ I said. ‘Look at that.’ I pointed towards an extraordinary animal that was moving along the shore. It must have been nearly a foot across and appeared untroubled by our presence.

  ‘Coconut crab,’ Dickson said prodding it with his boot. ‘Extraordinary, aren’t they? They climb the palm trees and snap off the coconuts, and then come down and open them up with their claws. Some of them can grow to more than six feet across.’

  ‘As long as they don’t decide to change their diet and come searching for me in the night. What other surprises does this island hold?’

  I watched the huge crab wander off and then Dickson and I headed for the end of the island. Passing a stand of about half a dozen trees near the point, I was surprised at the strength of the wind that had the leaves dancing noisily. At the point, we had a clear view across the narrow passage to the Ansaar warehouse. ‘Couldn’t be better,’ I said. ‘A front-row seat.’

  We set ourselves down on the edge of a small beach where some bushes allowed us some cover and Dickson took out a notebook and made a note of the time. I pulled out the laptop and satellite phone and set it up with some difficulty and then we settled down to wait.

  ‘Looking across to Zanzibar over there, that’s probably the real Grave Island,’ I said. ‘Their adulterated drugs kill people around the world, but that’s where their graves are being dug.’

  Dickson nodded, but continued to check the coast. ‘Look,’ he said suddenly. ‘See the boat there?’ I picked up my binoculars and we watched as a dhow headed towards the beach. ‘It’s definitely making for Ansaar,’ he said as the crew dropped the sail and poled the dhow up the sand and jumped out. They were obviously expected because the loading door slid open and two men started carrying out boxes. I watched as they loaded the boat – the dhow was deceptively spacious and it was a substantial load they put in, taking well over an hour before the crew pushed the boat out into the water and jumped in. The lateen sail was hoisted and the boat headed out north towards Pemba and the mainland of Kenya.

  ‘If only they carried registration numbers,’ Dickson said ruefully.

  ‘They’d probably be faked, like their cargo,’ I replied, equally ruefully. I pulled the laptop towards me and opened it up. ‘Anyway, I think British Intelligence can do better than that.’ I plugged in the satellite phone and checked the signal on my laptop, loaded the tracking program and zoomed in towards Grave Island until I could identify the boat that had left and then set it on automatic tracking.

  ‘Clever.’ Dickson had been watching me. ‘I’ve been issued with the same laptop, but it doesn’t have that program.’

  ‘Trouble is that it only works during the day. It’ll estimate where it might have got to during the night, but it’s useless unless it’s out at sea on a steady course and speed.’

  As the afternoon wore on there had only been one other boat – another collection, but this time the load was much smaller and the dhow headed south towards Dar es Salaam but it was the consignment towards Kenya that interested me. That was where the Bakaar distributor was.

  As the sun dropped behind the trees casting a gloom over the water, I gradually became aware of a strange squeaking noise coming from the trees behind us. I turned, but although I could see movement, I couldn’t make out what it was – was it my imagination, but were the trees moving? It seemed that they were alive and the squeaking was getting louder. I reached for the binoculars and adjusted them until the picture came into focus. The trees were indeed alive.

  I tapped Dickson on the shoulder. ‘Look at that.’ I pointed at the trees. ‘It’s the bats.’ As I said it, a single bat flew up and flapped around over us until it was joined by others and they headed across the water to the main island. Then dozens more followed them, then hundreds more. There were so many of them that the evening gloom almost turned to darkness while the sky over us was blanketed by a non-stop cloud of black bats.

  ‘Fruit bats,’ Dickson said – he was turning out to be quite a useful eco-guide. ‘Going off for breakfast. They won’t come back again until sunrise.’

  It was a truly incredible sight. They had been sleeping on the boughs of the trees – and must have been almost ten deep because they kept coming – it didn’t seem possible that so many of them could have been roosting on just a few trees. There were tens of thousands of them and it wasn’t until nearly twenty minutes later that the last one fluttered away across the water.

  ‘While they’re looking for their breakfast,’ I said to Dickson, ‘let’s go and get our dinner.’

  ‘Quite a place, this Grave Island.’ The terrace of our beach hut looked out across to the lights of Stone Town. ‘Let’s hope we don’t get attacked by bats or coconut crabs.’

  ‘Or the antelopes,’ Dickson said. ‘There’re supposed to be antelopes here as well – dwarf antelopes.’

  ‘That’s all right then. I think I could handle dwarf antelopes, it’s the thought of being suffocated by a swarm of 10,000 bats that troubles me. It’s a magnificent view, though; I’d like to come back sometim
e. Spend some time here. It’s very relaxing – if you don’t have work to do.’ I turned back to my computer and lifted the lid. I’d left the program running but the picture was now dark. I could see where the dhow had been tracked on its way north. It had sailed quite a distance off Pemba Island, and appeared to be heading either for Tanga or the Kenyan border beyond. I plugged the laptop into the resort’s rather unreliable electrical supply and checked the signal on the satellite phone and closed the lid. Hopefully, we’d know more in the morning.

  17

  We took the island’s boat back to Stone Town and in my hotel room I set up the satellite phone on the balcony. Now that daylight had arrived, I could check the dhow’s position. The program couldn’t track the boat at night, but before it got too dark it calculated the position as if it continued at the same speed and course. There were three boats in the general vicinity, but only one in almost exactly the right position. This had to be the one and it had made good progress during the night. It had passed Tanga and was clearly heading for somewhere near the Tanzania-Kenya border. We would have a better idea where in a few hours but we needed to find out more about Ansaar.

  I turned back to Dickson. ‘Somehow we’ve got to get inside their warehouse. In Mumbai, we tracked a transport company called Comar Logistics. We think the drugs being made by Bakaar Pharmaceuticals are full strength, so the fakes must be introduced into the supply line by Comar. I told you we set up this fake front complete with business cards and real addresses so I could use the same cover here.’

  ‘As you say, they’ll be very suspicious.’

  ‘Yes, but I’m hoping the mention of Comar will get me in. If my theory is right then only someone who knows about the fakes would know about Comar.’

  ‘Possibly, though it sounds risky. If you don’t pull it off they might realise they’ve been rumbled and shut down the entire operation and move it somewhere else. We might be burning our boats.’

  ‘Not necessarily. There’s always the dhow we’re tracking towards the mainland. That’s still a strong lead.’

  ‘It’s your call,’ Dickson said doubtfully.

  I thought about that. ‘Did you bring a gun?’

  ‘I suppose that means you’re not convinced either. The answer’s no, not officially.’

  ‘And unofficially?’

  ‘Rarely without one,’ Dickson said, with what I thought was a note of conceit but it was reassuring nonetheless.

  ‘I told you, Comar is our trump card, so I’ll have to play it.’

  ‘You could fold your hand.’

  ‘And then what? No, it’s got to be worth the risk – not that there’s much choice.’

  ‘But if it doesn’t work they might realise they’ve been rumbled.’

  ‘I see you always look on the bright side,’ I said. ‘Have a little faith. I’ll take the car and drop you off on the way so you can keep lookout.’

  Perhaps I had my army training to blame for being so reckless, but my adrenaline level was rising and anyway, I couldn’t see the alternative so I left Dickson keeping watch and drove back onto the main road and then turned into Ansaar’s entrance. I turned the car to face out in case I needed a quick getaway and went up and knocked on their front door. It took a while before someone opened it. At first I could barely see, the sun was so bright and he was standing back in the shadow. ‘Can I come in?’ I asked. ‘Do you speak English?’

  ‘A little. What you want?’

  ‘Can I come in and talk about it?’

  I could see the man shrug and then stand aside and I stepped inside as he shut the door behind me plunging the room into darkness. I stumbled on the uneven mud floor and could make out another man sitting at a table by a window overlooking the beach. It seemed the perfect place for smuggling. I walked over to the table which had paperwork scattered across it. ‘I was told you might be able to help me,’ I said, but the man looked up at me without expression. He was quite short and could have done with losing a few pounds, but the most noticeable thing about him was his left hand – his middle fingers were missing above the knuckles. I hoped he hadn’t noticed me staring at them and looked away.

  ‘I represent some British interests. We’re looking into new ways of distributing pharmaceuticals within Africa – if you understand what I mean. A different type of operation, one that can cut costs but still gives us a good profit.’ Despite my heavy hints there was no reaction so it was time to play my trump card. ‘I was out in Mumbai and met with Comar Logistics and they suggested that you might be able to help me.’ Was it my imagination or did I see a flicker of recognition. ‘Can you? Help me, that is?’

  No-Fingers finally held out his arm and gestured towards the chair opposite him. ‘Comar, you say?’ he said in heavily accented English.

  ‘Yes, outside Mumbai.’

  ‘And how you think we can help you?’

  ‘I was told you had access to… to… Let’s call them cut-price drugs. Pharmaceuticals,’ I corrected myself in case they thought I was talking about narcotics. ‘We want to set up a distribution network across in West Africa.’

  ‘And you thought that Ansaar could help?’

  ‘Can you? We can pay in any currency. Any country.’

  ‘What particular… drugs are you looking for?’

  ‘The whole range. Anticoagulants, antimalarials and HIV treatments including antiretrovirals.’

  ‘What sort of quantities?’

  ‘How much can you supply?’ I replied, sensing that he might be biting.

  He said nothing and I grew increasingly uncomfortable under his gaze. ‘Where are you staying?’ he asked finally.

  ‘At the Africa House. I arrived last night.’ I didn’t want to tell him that I’d spent the previous afternoon watching his warehouse.

  ‘So you came straight here?’

  ‘I told you, I came here to see you. To see if you could supply us.’

  ‘It’s possible, but you’d have to speak to my boss. He decide. Come back this afternoon. At three. Do you have a business card?’

  I took one out, it was the cover that I’d cooked up with Orion, but I hesitated. ‘That comes later,’ I said as I put it back into my wallet. ‘Let’s see if we can work together first.’

  I stopped to pick up Dickson on my way back to the hotel. ‘I think they’ve bitten,’ I told him. ‘I’m going back this afternoon. They told me the boss would be there. We might be in.’ I put the car in gear and headed back to Stone Town. ‘In the meantime, let’s find out where our boat has got to.’

  Back at the hotel, I pulled out the laptop and took it out onto the balcony and set up the program and waited for it to boot up. The track was still heading a bit north of the Tanzanian-Kenyan borders. ‘There’s a little island here,’ I said, zooming into the chart. ‘Wasini Island? About forty-five miles south of Mombasa. Ever heard of it?’

  ‘It rings a bell.’ Dickson looked over my shoulder at the computer screen and frowned. ‘Shimoni’s the village opposite on the mainland, one of the various slave holding points along the East African coast. You can see the jetty used by the ferries, but they won’t be unloading in full view of everyone in the village. They must have a place somewhere among the mangroves.’

  ‘We’re not going to be able to get there before it reaches the coast and starts unloading. We’ll have to send someone down there from your office. It’s only fifty miles – it shouldn’t take them long.’

  Dickson pulled out his mobile phone and pressed a speed dial button. It was answered quickly and he spoke in rapid Swahili of which the only words I recognised were Shimoni and Wasini. He came over to the laptop and zeroed the screen over the dhow which was now about twenty miles off the coast. He read off the co-ordinates and after a while he hung up. ‘They’re sending someone. They’ve got satellite surveillance in the office so they’ll pick her up on their system and direct him when the boat looks as though it’s unloading.’

  ‘Okay. There’s nothing much more we can do until th
is afternoon. Let’s go and try out the restaurant.’

  ‘You’d better keep watch from behind the trees,’ I said to Dickson as I dropped him off by the muddy track that we’d used that morning. ‘Wish me luck – I hope my cover holds.’

  I drove on and pulled into Ansaar’s entrance and parked again facing out, leaving the keys in the ignition in case Dickson needed to take it. The door opened before I could knock on it and the same man gestured me inside and told me to sit at the table. There was no one else in the room but I could hear talking on the other side of the wall. Presumably that’s where they kept the stock.

  After a few minutes, the door opened and a tall, dark-skinned man walked in with No-Fingers, the man I’d spoken to in the morning, following at what looked like a respectful distance. I stood up – there was no doubt that this was the boss, his bearing proclaimed a self-confident arrogance. If he’d been dressed in a dishdash and Arab headdress, he would have passed as a tribal chief, such was the way he carried himself. He was slim with deep crease lines in his face and a few days’ growth of greying beard. His eyes were dark brown and drilled into me with an alarming intensity. ‘My name is Ansaar, this is my business. Sit down.’ He took his own place opposite me. ‘I understand that you’re interested in obtaining pharmaceuticals.’ His English was excellent, with a slight American twang.

  ‘Might be interested,’ I said, not wanting to appear too keen. ‘It would depend.’

  ‘These things usually do,’ he said without irony. ‘What makes you think we can help you?’

  ‘I told him this morning.’ I gestured at No-Fingers who was still standing by the window. ‘Comar Logistics in Mumbai told me they supply you here in East Africa.’

  ‘But you want to distribute in West Africa?’

  ‘I assumed you’d got the distribution in East Africa all tied up, and it’s West Africa where we think we can have the biggest impact – particularly Nigeria.’