Mindanao Pearl - Alan Caillou

From writer Alan Caillou, author of the Tobin's War and Cabot Cain series.

THERE IS ONLY THE PEARL

American David Calib is sent by his father to pursue a man named Smith who has stolen from his father's San Francisco business. His whereabouts is somewhere on Mindanao island in the southern part of the Philippines. It appeared to be merely a matter of finding Smith in order to have him extradited back to the U.S.. But the situation becomes more complicated when Calib finds out that Smith is on the island of Pangalau, the home of Gaston and Jules Ordue and their beautiful sister Andree.

Smith had been in partnership with the brothers in an illegal pearl-finding venture, vanished with the pearls, and was hiding somewhere on the island. When Calib arrives on Pangalau asking questions, the enraged brothers believe that he is a cohort of Smith's... After being brutally beaten and held prisoner, with Andree's help Calib escapes; and together they set off on a nightmare search for Smith in the jungles and mountains while being pursued by the brothers.

Alone and defenseless in a lawless countryside there is something far worse than the evils of men-fear of the hungry shrews of Pangalau-little animals which attack in the thousands and could strip the flesh of a man while he slept.