Free The Shark God by Charles Montgomery

Port Vila. The missionaries had insisted that their friend, John Rush, had converted the chief. “John Frum. John Rush. John Frum is John Rush!” I said. “Right?”
    â€œNo! I remember John Rush. He came and told us John Frum was inside of him, but I never believed it. John Rush is only wan man blong church. We don’t need church. We need to stay together and follow John Frum.”
    â€œSo where is John Frum?”
    â€œAway.”
    â€œThen how can you talk to him?”
    â€œHe sends others to talk with me. Spirit men. They come through the volcano. There’s a road underneath the fire, it goes all the way to ’Merica.”
    We were speeding into fantastical terrain. I certainly didn’t want to break the momentum by questioning the physics of the chief’s assertions. I encouraged him:
    â€œMaybe you have been to America…”
    â€œYes, I have!”
    â€œHow did you get there? Through the volcano? Did John Frum take you?”
    Isag Wan glared at me, eyes narrowing with irritation. Of course not, he said. A visitor to Tanna had paid for him to fly to America on a plane. How? With his Visa card, of course.
    â€œI have seen Atlanta, Dallas, and Washington,” said the chief. “I went to the White House and I spoke to President Clinton’s general secretary. He was happy to talk to me because he knew that Tanna has flown the U.S. flag for so many years. But ’Merica made me very sad. Too many trucks, too many poor people. Did you know that some men there have no land at all? I met them on the road. I gave them all the money I had in my pockets.”
    It was too mundane a story to doubt, though I wished the chief would get back to miracle talk.
    â€œI thought John Frum promised to make you all rich, like Americans.”
    â€œWe will not follow ’Merica. ’Merica should follow us. Look,” said Isag Wan, doodling in the sand with a stick. “’Merica has lost the road. They think money is Jesus. ’Merica must remember the promise of John. Remember the true path.”
    I took a deep breath and closed my eyes. I could feel the dregs of the previous night’s kava pulsing behind my temples. “The true path—”
    â€œThe life way. Don’t follow government. Don’t follow church. Don’t follow money. Follow kastom and peace. That’s what Jesus and John Frum say.”
    â€œBut you don’t have peace here. You’ve abandoned Sulphur Bay. You are fighting your old neighbors. Stanley told me you are fighting with this man—this prophet—Fred.”
    â€œFred is not a prophet. He is an evil man. He tells people he has the spirit of John Frum, but it’s a lie. I know where Fred’s power comes from. He is using the power of the black sea snake to trick us all.”
    The whole Fred business had started two years before, said Isag Wan. “Fred made bad talk. He told the old men in Sulphur Bay to kill nineteen pigs and drink nineteen shells of kava in order to wash away their sins, but look what happened instead: he broke the lake and he washed away half the village. Fred promised to turn all the old men in Sulphur Bay into children again. But the old men are still old! Fred promised that if people followed him to the top of the mountain, Jesus would come and take them all to heaven. Jesus didn’t come! He said he would stop the sun from setting, but look at the sky. Night still comes. Fred lies!” The chief paused to swipe at a dog that had poked its head through the door of his shack. Embers flew from the end of his stick. “Worst of all, Fred told people to destroy the last of the kastom stones, and now he is trying to make everyone go back to the church. That’s why we had to leave Sulphur Bay. It belongs to the church again. Namakara is the new home for John Frum.”
    â€œSo Fred lives in Sulphur Bay.”
    â€œNo! He has taken the people to live on the