Bulibasha

Chapter 29

Many years have passed since I was raised in Bulibasha’s house, in those times when he ruled all our lives. His power was almost invincible. How I held out against it, I’ll never know. I have never really escaped it.

If I was to admit the truth, I would say that one of the reasons I rarely go back to Waituhi is because of Bulibasha. But life in Wellington is also very full and that is another reason why I can’t spare the time. This is why Aunt Ruth, now in her eighties, has taken it upon herself to be my messenger, regularly arriving from Gisborne and bringing me news of the iwi. Aunt Ruth comes by plane. When she gets off, in her black scarf and holding her flax kete, she always touches the ground with both hands.

‘If God had wanted me to fly he would have given me wings,’ she says. She likes to impress me with her courage. ‘I take my life into my own hands.’

Time has not mellowed the absolute nature of Aunt Ruth’s beliefs. Things are black or they are white. If it’s not yes it’s no. A man is a man and a woman is a woman and a bird is a bird.

My son showed Aunt Ruth a photograph of the Pope doing the same obeisance at an airport. For all that he was a different religion, she was pleased.

‘Ehara, he copies me! So am I a fool?’ Then she banged me with her kete as if it was all my fault. ‘How dare you tell the Pope what I do!’

Aunt Ruth has become a revered kuia and much-loved grandaunt, her face lined with the beauty of age. She has, however, never lost her temper and her withering scorn. After Uncle Albie’s gonads had dried up on him and he gave up his floozies, she made every remaining day of his life a misery.

‘No mercy, boy,’ she said. ‘No mercy.’

Yet, when Uncle died, she mourned him as only one who has loved deeply can mourn. At his tangi she reached up to claw the sky down and into the emptiness of her heart.

A man is alive or a man is dead.

Mark loves Aunt Ruth’s visits. I think, in many ways, she comes to see him rather than me. At the slightest opportunity she retells the story of my grandparents’ elopement, investing the vendetta between the Mahana and Poata families with a halting, quavering passion.

I overheard Mark with Aunt Ruth in the sitting room. My mind flipped back to 1957. When I peered in to look, it was like seeing myself with Aunt Ruth those many years ago. At first I was lulled by the memories but something wilful began to buzz inside my head. I heard Aunt Ruth ask Mark, ‘Did you know that there was a song named after your great-grandmother?’

‘Don’t listen, son,’ I said, drily. ‘That song was from a silent film of the 1920s and had nothing to do with —’

Perhaps I was jealous of the intimacy that had developed between Mark and Aunt Ruth. Whatever, Aunt Ruth caught the undertone of my voice. She gave me a look of warning and went on.

‘Well, just outside the church the band was playing the song. Your great-grandmother was about to get married to our arch enemy, Rupeni Poata. I spit on his memory and on all his seed. Suddenly, your great-grandfather came down the road on his white horse and —’

I couldn’t help it. I was unwilling to let Aunt Ruth tell that old story in her same sentimental way.

‘Yes,’ I said cynically, ‘Thrum, thrum, thrum, down the road on his trusty stallion came the mighty Bulibasha —’

Aunt Ruth stiffened. She stopped her narration. She cupped Mark’s chin in her hands and stared into his eyes.

‘Don’t you listen to your father. He’s always been whakahihi — ever since he left Waituhi, went to school and got some brains and then to university for more brains. When you get older, don’t go to school or to the university, because you see your father? That’s what happens. He thinks he’s a know-all. Well, he knows nothing.’ Aunt Ruth stood up, turned to me and shook a finger in my face. ‘Turituri to waho,’ she growled. ‘Turituri! Just because you’ve never been struck by the lightning rod of God doesn’t mean it can’t happen. The trouble with you is that your schooling made you heartless. You don’t want to believe any more. Every time I come here you make fun of me and our family. Of your grandfather and of our blood. What’s wrong with you! You’re the one who Dad acknowledged in the end. Where’s your family spirit! Where’s that killer instinct! Where’s your mana! Am I, the eldest of the women, the only one to carry on the battle?’

I went to embrace her but she pushed me away. Mark was angry at me too.

‘You’re mean, Dad,’ he said.

Aunt Ruth was still seething. ‘You just go out there right now,’ she said to me, ‘and bring me back a stick.’ She pointed to the elm tree. I stifled an impulse to laugh. But this time her anger was different. It was shaking her apart. Her words were spitting out.

‘Not just a small stick, either, nephew,’ Aunt Ruth added, tremulous. ‘A big one for your big black bum. Go on now. A big stick so I can give you a good caning with it and put some sense back into you. You don’t believe any more in the fightings. You don’t believe any more in the protecting of the mana of the house of Mahana. Those Poata family, they’re still our enemy. We still have to go to war with them.’ She was shaking apart. Tears were spilling out between the cracks. ‘You may be a big man now, but you’re not too big for me to give you a thrashing. Even when you were fifteen you were too big for your boots. I should have given you a thrashing then.’

Then she said what she had probably been wanting to say to me for years. ‘It’s all your fault. What happened is all your fault. You hear me, nephew? You’re the one to blame. You —’ She took a swing at me. I grabbed her thin elbows. She was so shockingly thin. Her eyes were spilling with tears. She collapsed into my arms.

Chapter 30

When school started I was back to being the main hand at Fort Petticoat.

‘Look after your mother and sisters,’ Dad said. ‘Another month of shearing and then I’ll be home. Be obedient to your grandfather.’

One night not long after that, I was woken from sleep by my mother.

‘Himiona,’ she whispered. ‘Wake up. Kia tere, kia tere.’ The tone of her voice alerted me. In an instant I was awake and out of bed. ‘Come on, Himiona.’

It was raining outside. I could hear Grandfather Tamihana bellowing and my aunts shouting and screaming in the main house. I shucked on my pants and shirt and followed Mum from the quarters. She was already way ahead of me and hurrying into the homestead. Lamplight flickered against the windows of the main bedroom. Shapes were chasing backwards and forwards across the curtains. There was a crack, the sound of a punch being thrown, and one of the shadows fell down with a thud.

I ran past my mother, through the drawing room and into the bedroom. Inside, my aunts Sephora, Miriam and Esther were battling with Grandfather Tamihana. He had already walloped Grandmother Ramona and was trying to get at her again. She was crumpled up against the wall trying to recover from the blow. My aunts were holding him back from throwing another punch.

‘Bitch,’ Grandfather roared. ‘That’s all your mother Ramona is. You hear me, bitch?’

Grandfather Tamihana’s rages came out of nowhere, out of some black hole in his past. They took over his entire body. His veins knotted at his neck, his eyeballs protruded and there was foam at his mouth. He was a demented animal, and most often he took out his rage on the person nearest to him — Grandmother Ramona. Whenever Grandfather was like this, it was always Dad’s job to pacify him. Now it was mine.

‘That’s enough, Grandfather,’ I said. ‘Leave Grandmother alone now. Okay?’

The words sounded absurd but they had the effect of turning Grandfather’s attention away from Grandmother and towards me. Grandfather looked at me incredulously and laughed.

‘Listen to the boy,’ he gestured. ‘Telling me what to do. Didn’t anybody ever tell you not to come between a man and his woman?’

‘Come on, Grandfather. It’s all over. Time to get back to bed.’

He started for me. I looked across his shoulder and motioned to my aunts to look after Grandmother. I backed out of the bedroom, Grandfather followed after me, jabbing at my chest.

‘I own you as much as I own her,’ Grandfather shouted. ‘Whenever I want her I will have her. That’s the law. She belongs to me. You all belong to me. So don’t you order me around.’

He reached out to grapple with me. Frightened, I chopped at his windpipe with the edge of my hand. He fell back gasping.

‘You little bastard!’

Free for a moment, I took off out through the kitchen, into the rain and across the back yard. My strategy was to get Grandfather out of the house and keep him busy until his rage had gone. But –

‘Look out, Simeon!’

Aunt Sephora’s warning came too late. Something hit me in the back. Grandfather must have thrown a brick or a heavy piece of wood. The blow made me double up in pain and I fell against the outside pump. Then Grandfather was on me and I thought, I’m for it now. Nothing to do except hold tight to the pump and try to protect my stomach and face.

‘Get up, you son of a bitch!’

Grandfather was trying to prise my fingers loose, but I held on for dear life. He began to kick me — in the side of the head, the kidneys and the back. I was gasping from the blows. My aunts were screaming. I felt like I was being murdered. The pain. He was hitting my head against the iron of the pump. I didn’t have a prayer.

‘Come on, you little bastard,’ he panted. ‘Stand up. Stand up and fight like a man!’

Finally he lifted me up and propped me against the pump. I was groggy, soaking from the rain or blood. I don’t know which. The piledriver was coming. There was nothing I could do about it. Ah well, better me than Grandmother Ramona.

Glory, where are you, sis? Play dead, Glory, please play –

Grandmother Ramona was there, standing in the rain. She had a rifle in her hand. She reversed it so that she was holding the barrel. She slammed Grandfather over the head with the butt. Grandfather swayed, not quite ready to topple. She hit him again. With a groan he fell poleaxed to the ground.

My aunts were hysterical. They knelt beside Grandfather, trying to revive him.

‘Father? Father!’

Grandmother Ramona cupped my chin in her hands.

‘I’m sorry, Grandmother,’ I said.

‘You’re going to have a beautiful black eye,’ she said. ‘A real shiner.’

I felt ashamed that I hadn’t been able to protect her. I spat blood and a broken piece of tooth.

‘You did well, Himiona,’ Grandmother said. ‘Nothing to be sorry about. Anything broken? Or are you just bruised?’

‘I don’t know,’ I said.

‘Huria?’ Grandmother Ramona called. ‘Look after your son. As for you others, leave your father there.’

‘We can’t leave him out here in the rain,’ Aunt Miriam said.

‘Just do as I say,’ Grandmother commanded.

As she was speaking, Grandfather began to revive. His rage was over and, dazed, he looked up into Grandmother’s face.

‘E kui —’

‘Picking on a boy,’ she muttered. ‘Just be careful that next time I don’t shoot you.’

She went to walk past him. He grabbed at her nightdress and pulled himself up to clasp her around the waist. She paused, her face wan, then pushed him away and continued on into the house.

After this incident I fired my first shot across Grandfather Tamihana’s bow. I chose to do it in the only way and the only place that Grandfather would understand — at church during testimony-bearing. And I scandalised the whole congregation by taking the microphone after Aunt Sarah had vacated it.

‘Brothers and sister,’ I said, ‘you know that I rarely bear my testimony, so don’t expect this to be a habit. I have a black eye —’ There was a gasp. ‘And I have bruised ribs.’

Grandfather Tamihana was staring straight ahead. Grandmother Ramona began to pull her veil across her face, then decided against it. She nodded at me.

‘I went to help a woman who was being beaten up by her husband.’

My aunts were crimsoning and Aunt Sarah was flapping her hands at me in horror.

‘Do you think I should have left her to be beaten?’ I asked the congregation.

‘Brother, no,’ came the answer. ‘You should take the lesson of the good samaritan who did not pass by but stopped to help when it was needed.’

‘Thank you for your support,’ I said. ‘The person concerned is a member of this church.’ There were more gasps.

‘I give him fair warning that if it happens again I will seek your help against him.’

After church Dad approached me and said, ‘You shouldn’t have done that, son. The family can handle it.’

I saw Grandfather Tamihana in the distance. He came over to me, paused, and nodded.

‘So, Himiona,’ he said.

Chapter 31

At the beginning of winter 1958, the family had achieved a good season. There was every chance that we’d be able to winter over without difficulty. However, no sooner had we had a chance to congratulate ourselves than my father Joshua faced two reversals.

The first announced itself when Dad was coming back from Tara, Mahana Four’s final shed of the season. He heard a clunk and the car lurched.

‘It’s not my car that should be shot,’ Pani said.

Pani looped a tow rope to the Pontiac, and towed it back to Mr Jenkins’ garage at Patutahi.

‘I’m sorry, Josh,’ Mr Jenkins said. ‘The repair is going to work out pretty expensive. Parts for cars like this are hard to come by and I’m going to have to get a new back axle —’

The Pontiac was a month in Mr Jenkins’ garage. When the car came out, the bill was enormous. Dad’s face turned white as a sheet.

‘We need the car,’ Mum said.

A car was really the only status symbol we had. Paying for the repairs wiped out our savings.

Then came a request from Uncle Matiu at the March family meeting. It was nearing its end when Grandfather Tamihana asked, ‘Kua pai?’ and Uncle Matiu coughed. He shuffled forward on his knees, his head bowed before Grandfather. He made his plaint.

‘Father,’ Uncle Matiu said, ‘I am putting this request on behalf of the pastor. As you know, a Mormon college has been established in Hamilton for our children. The church has been calling for more funds to support the college’s work, and more volunteers also. The pastor has asked whether our family might commit a tenth of our earnings to this work.’

‘On top of the tithe?’ Grandfather Tamihana asked.

‘Yes, father. The pastor realises we already substantially support the work of the church. He hopes, however, that the shearing season has been bountiful enough so that the Mahana family will be able to —’ Uncle Matiu paused.

Given Grandfather’s attitude to education, I didn’t think that our teeth-flashing pastor had a hope. I had forgotten that this was one of those matters which, if agreed to, would increase Grandfather’s public reputation and mana.

‘You may tell the pastor,’ Grandfather said, ‘that the Mahana family would be pleased to support such work. Kua pai?’

‘Kua pai.’

Oh that was just great. Now twenty per cent of Dad’s earnings was going to the church.

‘Let our light,’ Grandfather began, ‘so shine before men that they may see our good works and glorify the Lord our God who is in Heaven.’

Blah blah bloody blah. My thoughts weren’t complimentary. I looked upward. My father and our family had just been shat on from Heaven.

‘So what are we going to do?’ Dad asked Mum. They were whispering in the dark on the other side of the bedroom wall.

‘We’ll manage,’ she said. ‘We always manage.’

‘I think we can last out till August,’ Dad said. ‘Money will be tight from then though.’

‘There’ll be seasonal work,’ Mum said. ‘Perhaps we can pick up some scrubcutting. If we have to, we can always ask Miss Zelda for more credit —’

‘Only if we have to.’

‘We’ll cross that bridge when the time comes,’ Mum said.

That night I dreamed my mother was standing on a stage in front of an audience of a thousand people. She looked like Edgar Bergen’s dummy, opening and closing her mouth without being able to say a word.

‘Please Miss Zelda please Miss Zelda please —’

Next morning I was angry enough to confront Grandfather Tamihana.

‘I disagree with your decision,’ I said. ‘You should not have committed more of our income to the church.’

He was amused. ‘Why didn’t you say so at our meeting?’

‘I will next time,’ I answered. ‘What you have done is make things more difficult for all of the family.’

‘The church comes first.’

‘Charity begins at home,’ I hit back.

‘Don’t you start quoting my Bible back at me, Himiona.’

The words stung the air between us.

As if that wasn’t enough, my physical development was bringing me into conflict with grandfather too. I was starting to sprout in all directions and, yay, was now at eye level to the mirror in the bathroom.

‘That boy of yours,’ Grandfather said one day to Dad at dinner, ‘is eating us out of house and home.’

‘Didn’t you tell me once,’ I responded, ‘that I should eat what was put before me?’

My father nudged me. ‘Don’t be disrespectful to your grandfather,’ he said.

Growing up was having its positive side, though. Even Mohi The Turd Who Walks was treating me with guarded respect, and girls were starting to look at me.

‘It’s your tight pants,’ Haromi said. ‘Aunt Huria should buy you some new ones. They’re managing to cover everything, but only just.’

I blushed. Haromi, Andrew and I were at our usual place, waiting at the bus stop, doing our usual thing — slinging off at the family. I knew she was right but couldn’t bear the thought of having Mum spend our hard-pressed cash on new clothes.

To change the subject I asked, ‘Did Aunt Ruth ever tell you guys about how our grandparents met?’

‘That old story about the lightning rod of God?’ Andrew asked. ‘Sure.’

‘Huh,’ Haromi said. ‘I’m not going to be struck by no lightning rod of God or anything else. Any storm cloud comes along, or even any hint of a clap of thunder, I’m out of here.’

‘I sometimes wonder whether they really loved one another or not,’ I said, ignoring her. There, I had admitted the possibility to myself.

‘Of course Grandmother and Bulibasha loved each other,’ Haromi said. ‘Look at all the kids they had!’

Oh really? As if having fourteen children was the ultimate proof of love.

Haromi turned tragedienne. ‘Please, God,’ she screamed to the world, ‘save me from having too many kids crying at one end and shitting at the other! I’m too beautiful to have my body ruined and to end up looking like, Jesus ber-loody ker-rist, my mother!’ She threw a hail of pebbles at the little kids playing hopscotch on the road. They looked up, bewildered.

Oh, just Haromi again.

In this dangerous mood I turned fifteen. That same April the annual Maori cultural competitions were held between haka teams from all over the district. The Mahana family had the first inkling of what was to come between us and the Poata family of Hukareka.

As in past years, the venue was the Gisborne Opera House, now long demolished, a two-storeyed building with upstairs and downstairs decorated in fabulous gold and red. In its heyday, at the turn of the century, the theatre hosted overseas opera and theatre companies which performed everything from Puccini and Verdi to Shakespeare and George Bernard Shaw. During the 1920s it became more versatile, even going so far as to become a boxing venue for the great Tom Heeney, a local boy, before he went to live in America. Gisborne was on the Williamson station circuit and one of its claims to fame was that J. C. Kerridge had opened the first of the great Kerridge-Odeon theatres in the town.

By the 1950s Gisborne Opera House was more a backwater venue. Although it still hosted first-class shows and the occasional visit of the New Zealand Players — valiantly dedicated to bringing culture to the provinces — it was more likely to feature local productions. Sometimes the Gisborne amateur dramatic company put on operettas and musicals like White Horse Inn or Rose Marie; Gilbert and Sullivan’s Pirates of Penzance, HMS Pinafore, and The Mikado were also occasionally dusted off. In August the annual amateur dramatic competitions took place, and singers, tap and ballet dancers and elocutionists trod the boards of the Opera House. Little did we know in the 1950s that a bright-eyed, ringlet-covered girl with a silver voice would follow an earlier East Coast Maori singer, Princess Te Rangi Pai, and turn from being ‘Tom and Mum’s daughter’ into Dame Kiri Te Kanawa.

The haka competition was tough. Twenty-five teams were in the open section. Last year Mahana had managed to win, receiving the glittering Ngata Cup and the Hine Materoa Shield in the process, pipping Waihirere and Hauiti at the post. Our job this year was to hold off all challengers.

So far so good. We had succeeded in getting through the first round and were now among the twelve semifinalists. Again our performance was impeccable. When the curtains opened, we were already grouped to give our traditional item, ‘Po Po’. After that, our programme was fluid, moving with professional ease through action song bracket, poi, haka and exit waiata. Most of the team comprised the Mahana and Whatu families: my aunts, mother and other female in-laws all in the front row, and the Whatu women and others from Waituhi in the second and third rows. Behind them were my uncles and father, led by Uncle Ruka, and in the fifth row were the younger men including Mohi, myself and Andrew. Pani had been dragooned into joining us.

After our performance we sat upstairs in the balcony with Grandfather Tamihana and Grandmother Ramona, other teams, supporters and spectators.

‘We’ve got it in the bag,’ Granduncle Pera said, shaking our hands.

Aunt Sarah, our tutor, and Uncle Ruka thought we had done well, and of course Mohi was receiving the usual pat from He With The Gammy Leg. The women were dressed in their headbands, bodices and piupiu; the men too were in piupiu, but wearing coats or jerseys over their chests. All of us were sweating, and our grease-applied moko were smeared.

Hukareka was the final team to perform. The lights dimmed. The plush red velvet curtains swished back.

Huh? The stage was empty. Normally haka teams were already onstage in their ranks, two or three rows of women in front and two rows of men at the back.

Then, from the side of the stage, a woman’s voice called out authoritatively in the karanga.

‘Tena koutou rangatira ma, tena koutou, tena koutou, tena koutou!’

Aunt Sarah nodded her head. ‘That’s new,’ she said, approving. ‘The judges will give them points for originality.’

To whistles and cheers, Hukareka swept on to the stage, the men at an angle from one side, the women at a similar angle from the other. They were moving at double speed, making an X pattern. When they met in the middle, the scissoring effect was so dazzling that the hall raised a mighty cheer.

‘Pae kare, they’re good this year,’ Aunt Sarah repeated. She should know. She had been trained by experts.

‘Look at that!’ Even Uncle Ruka was filled with admiration.

‘A bit showy,’ Aunt Ruth sniffed.

Aunt Sarah had her eyes on the judges. Showy, yes, but there was no doubt the judges were impressed. As Hukareka continued with their programme — the ancient waiata first, then action song, poi, haka and exit — all the judges except one known for his preference for the traditional nodded their heads in agreement. Last year Hukareka hadn’t even made it to the semifinals. But this year –

That was when Aunt Sarah realised.

‘They’re planning to take us on,’ she said. Her voice was filled with awe and respect.

It was no surprise to Aunt Sarah when the judges took so long to reach a decision on the final six. They had a heck of a job, and it would be worse on the night of the finals.

To cheers of applause the compere announced, ‘The haka teams in the finals are in alphabetical order. Hauiti, Hukareka —’ Rupeni Poata and his family yelled and screamed. They were sitting in the front downstairs. ‘L.D.S. Mahia —’ My heart lurched. We hadn’t made it. ‘Mangatu, Manutuke, Waihirere, Whangara and —’ The compere smiled up at us. ‘Sorry, Bulibasha,’ he apologised. ‘My alphabet was never any good: Mahana!’

We erupted into roars of relief.

‘I’ll wring your neck!’ Aunt Sarah yelled.

The compere waved good-naturedly at her. ‘See you next month for the finals.’

The red curtains swished to a close.

Just as Hukareka were leaving, Rupeni Poata looked up at us. He inclined his head.

Chapter 32

At school the next week, not even Miss Dalrymple’s usual greeting could pour cold water over our excitement at making the finals. We were doing English — poetry appreciation, page 17 of Plain Sailing.

‘This is a Scottish tale,’ Miss Dalrymple began. ‘It is very famous throughout the English-speaking world.’ She got out a stick and tapped like a conductor on her table. When she thought we had the beat, she said, ‘Now, class, together!’

We began to read in unison. ‘ “O, young Lochinvar is come out of the west, through all the wide Border his steed was the best — ” ’

I could hardly believe my eyes. Lochinvar, a young Scottish stud, was in love with Ellen, a girl forced to marry another man. So what did Lochinvar do? He rode his horse to the wedding and snatched her up from the altar and they escaped to live happily ever after.

It was the same story as Grandmother Ramona’s abduction on her wedding day.

That night the haka team met for the first time since the semifinals. As usual, Grandfather and Grandmother joined us as we assembled at Takitimu Hall, wondering what Aunt Sarah had in store for us. The month after the finals was when Maori cultural teams practised, polished, changed their repertoire and incorporated — some would say pinched — other people’s ideas.

‘Our main challengers are Waihirere and Mahia,’ Uncle Ruka said. ‘I don’t know what happened to Hauiti this year. Waihirere are solid and Mahia have got some great men in their haka.’

Aunt Sarah made a sign of assent. I began to feel irritated. Everybody was afraid to say what they really thought because Grandfather was among us.

‘No, our greatest challenge is from Hukareka,’ I muttered.

Everybody looked from me to the Lord Of Heaven.

‘The boy’s right,’ Grandfather said, amused.

It was just what Aunt Sarah had been waiting for. She started to crack her whip. ‘Did you all see the way they came on?’ she asked. ‘Ka pai, credit where credit is due, that was original. You put our entrance up against that one and who wins? Not us. We have to change our entrance.’

Uncle Ruka thought this through and nodded. The haka team groaned. No sooner did we get it right than we had to start all over again.

‘Notice anything else?’ Aunt Sarah asked again. ‘Any of you? Come on, you’ve all got eyes.’

‘They looked different somehow?’ Frances ventured.

‘That’s right, babe,’ Aunt Sarah answered. ‘They had new piupius, bodices’ the lot. What have we got? All you girls will be busy sewing this month.’ Haromi sighed. ‘That’s another thing,’ Aunt Sarah went on. ‘You know why they looked good? They weren’t resting on their laurels like we were. Compared to them, our front row was as crooked as a dog’s hind leg. All the hems of the piupius were higgledy piggledy, especially yours, Haromi, pulled up so high. This is not a beauty contest to see who has the nicest-looking knees.’

Everybody grinned.

‘Did you notice something else?’ Aunt Sarah was really getting into it. ‘All their front row was young. Judges like seeing young girls in front. We may have to switch some of the oldies to the back.’ She began to pace up and down. ‘But we must come up with a trump card. Hukareka knows they’re on a winning streak so they’re not going to change their programme. That gives us the edge, because they think they know ours. We’ve got to come up with something that will appeal to all the judges, something traditional as well as modern. Something that will get us the Ngata Shield again —’ She stopped in mid-sentence. ‘That’s it!’ she said. Her eyes were shining. Whenever she got that look, trouble was bound to be brewing. ‘Tomorrow we change our programme. We’ll keep the poi and the haka. But we will learn a new entrance and a new action song. The action song will be our trump card.’

‘But Auntie,’ Andrew moaned. ‘Hukareka never even came anywhere last year. Why all the fuss?’

Aunt Ruth stepped forward. ‘Never underestimate Rupeni Poata,’ she said.

Aunt Sarah nodded in agreement. ‘Nobody is targeting us this year,’ she said. ‘They all know that Hukareka is the tops. We have to target them too, as sickening as that is for me to say.’

Then Andrew asked the million-dollar question. ‘And what’s our new action song?’

Aunt Sarah made my day. ‘Simeon hasn’t composed it yet, eh Himiona? You do the melody and I’ll do the words, ka tika?’

My mind boggled. Grandfather began to shake his head doubtfully.

‘Okay, Aunt,’ I said. ‘You say, me do.’

Of course it was just like Aunt Sarah to dragoon everybody, including Mum, into creating the all-new all-stereo sound and technicolor Mahana haka team. She had four weeks to do it.

‘I’ve had an idea about costuming for you girls,’ Aunt Sarah announced one night at practice. ‘Floor-length cloaks — floor length, Haromi, not knee-length, not even ankle length. Huria, can you drive me to the store to get some calico?’

‘Not Mum,’ I said quickly. ‘Get somebody else.’

Aunt Sarah looked at me quizzically. ‘You’re getting uppity, boy. Can you drive the car?’

Checkmate.

‘Why, he-llo,’ Miss Zelda said as Aunt Sarah and Mum walked into the store.

‘Good morning, Zelda,’ Aunt Sarah answered. ‘We’ve come for the best calico you’ve got in the place.’ Aunt Sarah knew how to handle Miss Zelda.

‘Of course,’ Miss Zelda said. ‘Scott? Will you bring our best quality calico in for Sarah?’

Scott came in with a roll and unfurled it over the measuring table. Aunt Sarah pursed her lips. ‘I’ll take it.’

‘The whole roll?’

‘Why, yes.’

‘Cash or charge, Sarah?’

‘Cash. Your interest rate is too high for me, Zelda.’ Aunt Sarah turned to Mum. ‘Always pay in cash if you can,’ she offered.

It was a careless, innocent enough remark, but it made Mum blush with embarrassment. As my mother started the car, she saw Miss Zelda and Miss Daisy at the window. They were like eternal watchers, watching and smiling and waiting. Winter had only just begun to bite, but they knew there would come a time, soon enough, when my mother would need to go in and get herself on the tick.

Chapter 33

As if the cultural competition wasn’t enough, the Mahana women’s hockey team found itself scheduled to play Hukareka women in the Gisborne women’s senior grade section the following Saturday afternoon. Hukareka had won the last game and both teams were neck and neck in the competition.

Aunt Ruth was the Mahana women’s coach and Aunt Sarah was team chaperone. Both were veterans of the field. However, as soon as Aunt Sarah found out who our opponents were the challenge of playing Hukareka was irresistible, varicose veins notwithstanding. At the very least she wanted to go in as goalie.

‘You can’t,’ Aunt Ruth said. ‘We already have a goalie. Auntie Molly’s our goalie.’

‘I’ll be one of the fullbacks then,’ Aunt Sarah said. ‘You need me, sister, after that hiding you fellas got from Hukareka last time. Put me in as left fullback.’

Aunt Ruth bristled. ‘A draw is not a hiding, and Sephora’s already left fullback.’

‘Move her to halfback.’ When Aunt Sarah made up her mind, she could never be budged.

‘What happens if somebody takes a crack at you?’ Aunt Ruth asked. ‘Who’ll look after our haka team?’

‘Nobody’s going to take a crack at me!’ Aunt Sarah scoffed. ‘If anybody is taking a crack it will be me, and Poppaea, The Brute, will be on the receiving end. Boy, do I owe her one.’

‘Sister, dear,’ Aunt Ruth said, ‘if you go on, who’s going to be on the sideline directing the play?’

‘You are,’ Aunt Sarah answered. ‘You’re the coach.’

‘Not for this game I’m not. I’m playing right fullback.’

The two sisters paused, made up their minds and shook hands. In unison they said, ‘Let’s both play.’

Hukareka, watch out.

The day of the match was cold and wet, and the rain had made the ground mucky underneath. Four other games were on at the same time, but word soon got around: ‘Hey! Mahana women are playing Hukareka!’ Naturally, Nani Mini Tupara, who loved hockey, was there to barrack for Mahana, even if we were Mormons.

As Andrew and I made a beeline for the pavilion I saw Mohi parking the De Soto and heard Grandfather calling to me: ‘Himiona!’

I hurried Andrew on. ‘Pretend we haven’t heard,’ I said.

Aunt Ruth was huddled with the team. She had just finished karakia, calling on God’s aid in this fight against the Infidel. Aunt Miriam was centre forward. Aunt Esther and Aunt Kate — Uncle Hone’s wife — were inner right and inner left, and the wings were the youngest — Haromi on the left and Frances on the right. Playing at halfback positions were Aunt Sephora, Aunt Dottie — Uncle Ruka’s wife — and my mother Huria, who seemed to be a different person all togged up in her hockey outfit. The backs were the heavyweights, Aunt Ruth and Aunt Sarah, an impenetrable wall of solid flesh, with Aunt Molly as goalie. There she was, looking for all the world as if she was sitting on an upsidedown basin outside her cookhouse, splaying herself from one side of the goal to the other.

‘Okay, girls?’ Aunt Ruth asked. ‘Are you all ready? Just keep to your positions.’

‘Hit the ball,’ Aunt Sarah interjected.

‘And if you can’t hit the ball —’

‘Hit the player,’ Aunt Sarah said.

Then Aunt Ruth and Aunt Sarah said in unison, ‘The Brute is ours!’

The referee called the teams on to the field. The linesmen took their places. Grandfather Tamihana came sauntering from one entrance of the field and Rupeni Poata from the other. Rupeni Poata raised his hat to Grandmother. Grandfather Tamihana flared.

Then, ‘Didn’t you hear me yelling out to you, Himiona?’

‘No.’

He wasn’t convinced. ‘I wanted you to hold the game until I got here.’

I shrugged my shoulders.

He made a motion as if to hit me. ‘You’re sailing close to the wind, boy.’

As if I cared.

The referee pushed his glasses on to the bridge of his nose. ‘Let’s have a nice clean game, ladies,’ he asked, then blew his whistle.

‘Come on the maroon,’ came the chant from the left sideline. Maroon was the colour for Mahana.

‘Come on the black,’ came the chant from the right sideline. Black was Hukareka’s colour. And boy, was their team formidable. Poppy was at centre forward until her mother, The Brute, saw she was up against the heavier Aunt Miriam.

‘Poppy!’ The Brute called. ‘Change with Auntie Anna on the right wing.’

‘No!’ Poppy answered. ‘I can beat the old bag.’

A deep rumble came from the Mahana sideline. Fighting talk and the game hadn’t even started.

‘Do as I say!’ The Brute yelled.

It was wonderful to see Poppy’s flaring temper. She stalked over to the right where, ah Heaven, Andrew and I were standing. Her opposite number was Haromi, who accidentally pushed Poppy on purpose.

‘So my auntie’s an old bag, is she?’ Haromi smiled sweetly.

Murder was in the air.

Weight for weight, the teams were evenly balanced. The Poata women were all on deck — Julia, Agnes and Helen at the back positions; Virginia, Gloria and Carla in the positions at middle field, and Poppy, Ottavia, The Brute and two other cousins of Poppy’s in the forwards. The Hukareka women were leaner and fitter. But either they had forgotten about the ruthlessness of Mahana women or else they hadn’t played sport with their brothers and men for quite a while.

‘Hockey one, hockey two, hockey three —’

The sticks blurred and Aunt Miriam, finessing Anna by not quite touching on the third click, scooped the ball past her to where Mum was waiting to push the ball past Gloria, chasing it into the clear.

‘Ref! Where’s your eyes!’ The Brute roared.

My mother took a look to see where Frances was. No, Haromi was better placed. Whang, and she hit the ball towards the right corner of the Hukareka half.

The Mahana team strategy had always been that once anybody got the ball they hit it out to the wing. The older women knew the younger girls didn’t want bruises on their beautiful legs and would therefore fly down the line, keep out of trouble and then whack the ball into the circle of the opposing team. The theory was, of course, that the older women would be there to receive the ball. Good theory.

Haromi positively streaked along the line after the ball. The Hukareka halfbacks chased after her, but not for nothing was she the last baton runner of our school track and field team.

‘Offside, ref!’ The Brute cried.

If the ref was blind, that wasn’t our fault.

Haromi picked up the ball, tapped it nicely, past the Hukareka backs. Only the goalie ahead. Now hit it into the centre where the aunties were — huh? Where were the aunties? Never mind. Haromi dashed into the circle. She pretended to hit the ball to Frances, and the Hukareka goalie turned to the left.

Gotcha!

Did I forget to tell you that Haromi had a wicked eye? Whether playing basketball, billiards — even though she wasn’t supposed to — or kicking a goal, Haromi had an inbuilt direction finder. She needed no computer to calculate the distance divided by the width of the goal minus the mass of the goalie multiplied by the probability factor to –

Up came her stick. Wham. I swear that ball caught fire, it was travelling so fast. It sizzled into the net before the goalie even knew it was there.

The Mahana side of the field roared with acclamation. The Hukareka side screamed and squabbled with the ref. ‘I told you girls,’ The Brute screamed, ‘to watch these Mahana women.’

Haromi trotted back to the centre of the field, looking at her fingernails as if she’d broken one.

‘Try that again,’ Poppy hissed.

Oh, they were magnificent, those Mahana women. They had skill, strategy and, if not speed, the experience of modern-day Amazons. They were like the army led by man-hating Amanda Blake in The Loves of Hajji Baba who rode standing up on their horses and lassooed the evil Caliph’s men. Directed from the back by Aunt Ruth and Aunt Sarah, they pulled every trick in the book to keep ahead.

Both aunties liked directing the referee too. Aunt Ruth, for instance, liked to have one fullback way up to the half-way mark when the play was in Hukareka’s half. That way she could often catch a Hukareka forward offside.

‘Offside, ref. Offside,’ she’d yell.

‘Yes, I know, Mrs Whatu.’

And if a Hukareka player was in the circle and about to aim at the goal, her favourite trick was to yell, ‘Sticks!’

You never knew your luck. The ref might agree with you.

The half-time whistle blew. Poppy was looking dazed, the realisation dawning that her mother was right about Mahana women. Mahana were ahead four goals to Hukareka’s (very lucky) one. Mahana’s tactic of hitting fast and regularly from the very start, getting as many goals as possible, had paid off.

However, the game was only just beginning. The real problem was that in the second half all the aunties got slower and slower. Having too many babies and standing so long at the shearing sheds had given all of them, not only Aunt Sarah, varicose veins. The Brute knew it.

Immediately after play resumed, Hukareka broke through the Mahana lines. Despite a valiant stopping attempt by Auntie Molly, Virginia managed to get a lucky hit.

‘Take that, you big black bitch,’ Virginia snarled. She started to trot back to her side.

Aunt Sarah accidentally put her hockey stick out. ‘Oh sorry, darling,’ she said as Virginia tripped over and ended up with a face full of mud. Aunt Sarah went to pull Virginia up. By the hair. Virginia screamed. ‘Only trying to help,’ Aunt Sarah said.

To make matters worse, it began to rain. The ref looked doubtful about continuing the game. He consulted the two captains. Call the game off? You’ve got to be kidding!

As the aunties began to run out of steam, the play moved relentlessly into Mahana’s half. The greater fitness of Hukareka began to show as the women made lightning strikes into Mahana territory.

The delectable Poppy scored a goal. ‘Take that!’ she screamed.

‘Lucky shot,’ Haromi yawned.

Mahana 4, Hukareka 3.

None of this fazed the Mahana team, for defensive play in the second half had always been part of the strategy. Although one by one my aunties were coming to a standstill, their hitting power was as damaging and as accurate as ever. The objective became to stop the ball or get it off Hukareka and keep hitting it to the younger and fitter wingers who could take the ball back up the field into the Hukareka half. It didn’t matter what Haromi or Frances did with the damn ball once they were up there, so long as they kept Hukareka busy while the aunties had a bit of a breather. The primary task was to guard the circle at all costs.

However, the rain made the field muddy and the ball wasn’t running as far as it would on a flat surface. To get the ball travelling, Mahana had to resort to greater strength –

‘Sticks!’ The Brute cried. Or ‘Raised ball!’

Each penalty against Mahana meant that Hukareka could begin the game closer and closer into the Mahana half. As Hukareka penetrated and pushed the Mahana defence further back, slowly but surely the aunties began a strategic retreat to guard the circle.

A cornered animal is always dangerous, and there was nothing more glorious to watch in hockey than Mahana women on the defensive. They were like tigers, roaring, screaming and yelling orders to each other. ‘Watch the left! Watch the right! Watch the centre! Protect the flank! Keep an eye on that young winger! Cover that gap! Keep together, girls! Only another quarter of an hour to go! Kia kaha!’ Mahana were wonderful, shifting and dissolving fluidly from one defensive pattern into another. The defenders stopped the ball and hit it out to the wingers. But Hukareka had them marked. Never mind. Defend again and hit beyond the wingers to the far corner. Defend again and hit.

Then Hukareka managed to get through the Waituhi defences and slam another goal home. The score drew at Mahana 4, Hukareka 4.

That did it. Defensive strategy descended into the arena of dubious play as the Mahana women began pulling every trick in the book — and some that weren’t in the book. If the ref didn’t see what you were doing, that was his problem. If he did, never mind.

If a Hukareka player is dribbling the ball and gets past you, don’t worry. Stop the player, either by tripping her up with your stick, tangling your stick with hers or, if necessary, pushing her off balance as she passes. The referee might blow his whistle — ‘Obstruction!’ — but at least that will stop play for a while and allow the aunties to regroup. If you are standing in the clear with the ball, don’t hit it straight away. Why waste a good shot? Wait until one or two Hukareka players are coming to attack you, then hit it. If there are two attacking players, you can get them both. Easy! You pretend to miss the ball on your first stroke, because that way you can whack the first player, Oops sorry. On your second stroke, that’s when you hit the ball at the second player. She shouldn’t have been in the road anyway.

Oh yes, sticks is okay if there’s a Hukareka player behind you who might cop your stick on your backswing. That way she might get carted off the field and, who knows, by the time you finish Hukareka might not have any reserves left. And if all else fails and you need to protect the ball, pretend to slip and sit on it. Nobody’s going to hit a poor defenceless old lady when she’s down.

You never do any of the above in the circle, though, or the referee will call — ‘Penalty!’ But if it’s really necessary, a penalty is better than Hukareka getting a goal.

The Mahana women trotted leisurely to their backline to prepare for a penalty goal attempt by Hukareka. Only four minutes to final whistle.

‘Hey, ref!’ The Brute yelled, ‘Tell Mahana to move their big bums. They’re wasting time.’

‘Wait your hurry,’ Auntie Molly responded.

‘Better a big bum than a black one,’ Haromi called.

‘Keep it clean,’ Aunt Ruth said.

My aunts lined up to protect the goal. Julia Poata was Hukareka’s hitter. The ball would be stopped by Agnes, and The Brute would take the attempt at the goal. Aunts Sarah and Ruth joined Auntie Molly in the goal. No way could a hockey ball get past them. The rest waited, taking deep breaths ready to –

The ball cracked out from the corner and across the circle. Agnes stopped it. The Brute steadied. Mahana women were charging out of the goal.

The Brute aimed at Aunt Esther and swung. The ball rose — and slammed Aunt Esther in the stomach. Aunt Esther collapsed.

There was shocked silence. Mahana could do that to the opposition, but they weren’t allowed to do it to Mahana — especially to the baby sister who had never hurt a fly.

Aunt Ruth helped Aunt Esther up. We were all wondering what she would do — take The Brute on herself or order a free-for-all. Aunt Ruth did neither. She smiled at the ref and smiled at The Brute and indicated that the game should continue. Her killer instinct, however, was aroused, and from the side of her mouth came the words, ‘Okay girls, kill.’

Oh they were angry! The ref ordered a free hit for Mahana. Aunt Sephora tapped the ball gently to Aunt Miriam. Adrenalin pumping, the Mahana women began to move like a juggernaut down the field. Even Auntie Molly left her goal, twirling her stick like a taiaha. She followed Aunt Ruth and Aunt Sarah as they moved out of the Mahana circle.

‘Fall back!’ The Brute screamed to her women. ‘Fall back!’

Mahana made an awesome sight as they came silently sweeping through the rain. They dribbled the ball amongst themselves. They were like Zulu warriors executing a pincer movement into enemy territory.

‘Watch out, girls!’ The Brute cried.

Mahana crossed over into Hukareka’s half. Never mind about being on the defensive. Mahana women were going to war. Where was the ball? The rain was falling so heavily you could hardly see it. Ah, there it was –

‘Gloria!’ The Brute commanded.

Uttering a banshee cry, Gloria Poata ran at the wall of Mahana women. Silently a gap opened, and Gloria hurled herself in. It closed behind her. When the juggernaut moved on, there was Gloria Poata, dazed, going round and round in circles without her hockey stick and wondering what had happened to it.

‘Helen!’ The Brute squawked.

Helen rushed at the Mahana women. A flurry of sticks followed and there was Helen Poata cartwheeling head over heels out of the pack.

Meantime, Aunt Sarah somehow staggered against the referee, knocked off his glasses and trod on them. Good, he was out of the way.

‘Back to the circle!’ The Brute ordered. She still couldn’t see the ball — only those huge solid Mahana legs like Burnham Wood come to Dunsinane.

Then Aunt Ruth let out the order, ‘In you go, sis!’ She flicked the ball to Aunt Sarah.

The game literally exploded.

‘Keep out of the way, girls,’ Aunt Sarah roared. She took the ball through the Hukareka defences. The referee still hadn’t found his glasses.

Wham here, slam there, and two Hukareka women were down. The rest of the Mahana women joined the attack. The rain was so heavy that nobody could see what was really happening. Slash here and slash there, and another two Hukareka women bit the dust. Boot here and boot there, and a fist as well, and three more went reeling away from the circle.

Suddenly the rain cleared and there was Aunt Sarah, hair plastered on her face like a gorgon. Wielding her hockey stick with one hand, she gave an earth-shattering cry and cracked the ball. The fact that it missed the goal by a mile was not the point. Aunt Sarah had had no intention of getting a goal. She took out The Brute, who fell, clasping her mouth with horror. She shouldn’t have been in the road anyway.

The referee found his glasses. Oh, look at the time. He blew the final whistle. In protest, somebody threw an orange at him.

Mahana 4, Hukareka 4.

A draw — but, boy, it was worth it.

Chapter 34

When I look back, I realise something was happening to me in 1958 that made me wilful and rebellious — something intangible that I couldn’t recognise in myself, though others could.

I was delivering calico for the cloaks to Aunt Ruth one day when –

‘Hey Aunt,’ I said, ‘have you ever heard a poem about a young Scottish boy who steals his girlfriend on her wedding day and —’

She pierced me with a glance. ‘Just because the Scottish have the same story doesn’t mean ours isn’t true.’

‘I wasn’t going to say that!’

‘But you were thinking it,’ she growled. ‘You’re getting too whakahihi, Simeon. Too big for your boots.’

I turned away from her. ‘Nor was that song about Ramona,’ I muttered, ‘written for Grandmother. It was written for a silent screen star, Dolores Del Rio and a film she made in 1928 when she played a Spanish girl in the Old West and —’

‘What’s that?’ Aunt Ruth asked. She was holding her sewing needle as if she was ready to skewer me with it.

‘Oh nothing,’ I answered.

Even Glory was affected by the change in me.

‘I hate it when you’re like this,’ she said one day while we were milking.

Like what?

‘You’re always so up yourself. Always in a bad mood. You never talk any more, and when you do it doesn’t come out sounding nice. At nights you’re the only one who doesn’t answer when I call g’night to everybody. I don’t care if you don’t love anyone else, but —’ She pinched me, hard. ‘Don’t you love me any more?’

I looked at her, surprised.

‘There,’ she said, ‘you’re doing it again.’

Doing what? Suddenly afraid, I hugged her close to me; we clung together as if we didn’t want anything to get in between. I knew Glory was right. I was changing, and I didn’t know how or why. Nobody was safe from me. At school I went around pushing little kids out of the way. I pushed my father Joshua and mother Huria away. The fearsome ones in my life, like Miss Dalrymple, were no longer so formidable.

‘Do speak up, Simeon,’ Miss Dalrymple said in class.

‘Quardle oodle ardle wardle doodle,’ I mumbled.

Even when Mohi tried to push me around, I pushed him back. Perhaps he put his finger on it: ‘You’re growing up, kid.’

One night the collision between new and old bordered on madness.

The family had just finished evening prayers. Grandfather was at the holy end of the room, where his throne was. Casually, Aunt Esther asked me, ‘So, Simeon, what are you studying at school these days?’

‘We’re doing biology,’ I answered. ‘The theory of evolution. Did you know that we are descended from monkeys?’

Grandfather Tamihana was in the middle of talking to Grandmother. His mouth made a big O. ‘Man is a special creation,’ he said. The Voice of Authority hath spoken.

‘There was a court case about that,’ I muttered. ‘In the 1930s. God lost.’

‘Simeon,’ my father reproved.

There was silence for a moment. I thought that was the end of it. But –

‘Get me the Bible,’ Grandfather Tamihana said.

‘I know what it says in the Bible,’ I answered.

‘So you know,’ Grandfather continued, ‘that God created Adam and Eve?’

‘I know that is what the Bible says —’

‘And is the Bible not the Word of God?’

‘No,’ I answered, ‘it’s the Word of Man.’

Mohi started to make strange choking sounds. My aunts were blushing with embarrassment.

‘I think you should leave the room,’ Mum said. She was panicking. Grandfather Tamihana was growing extremely angry.

I looked around at everyone. ‘Why is it?’ I asked, ‘that every time I say something, everybody takes sides so quickly? Doesn’t anyone here, apart from Grandfather and myself, have an opinion?’ My uncles and aunts continued looking at their laps. Ah well, I had tried.

‘I am not descended from a monkey,’ Grandfather said.

His comment would have been humorous, except that he was apoplectic with rage. I crossed my arms and stared at him. ‘Grandfather,’ I said, ‘the greatest biblical scholars in the world have agreed with you. However, some of the greatest scientists have disagreed. You are right —’ he nodded — ‘but you are also wrong.’

There was hardly a sound. Dad was on his feet ready to clip me over the ear. Grandmother restrained him.

‘Let us agree to differ.’

As soon as I said the words, I felt a rush of elation. Grandfather wasn’t too sure what I was saying. Was I agreeing with him? Or disagreeing? It was as if suddenly I had discovered a new language, a way of saying things beyond his limited comprehension. In knowledge was power, yes. But the secret was how to articulate that knowledge.

My grandfather, despite his mana, was piss ignorant. The understanding made me feel triumphant.

My father came looking for me after prayers. I was in my bedroom doing my homework when he burst in and motioned to a book on the bed.

‘Is that your biology book?’ he asked.

‘Yes.’

‘I want you to burn it.’

Burn it?

‘You can’t, Dad. It doesn’t belong to me. It’s from our class set.’ I paused. ‘Grandfather wants this done, doesn’t he?’

‘Give me the book, Simeon.’

‘Dad, this is really dumb.’

We began to tussle over the book. Laughing, I wrenched it away from Dad. He raised his fist and hit me. I couldn’t believe it. I touched my right cheek. This couldn’t be happening.

Dad took the book. I watched from the window as he handed it to Grandfather. The entire family had been ordered to watch. Grandfather doused the book with kerosene. He threw a match at it. There was a whump, and the book burst into flame.

He looked across at me where I stood at the window. He was laughing, and he looked maniacal. This was the only kind of reaction he could muster — physical or symbolic. I had discovered Grandfather Tamihana’s weakness. He feared anything that would destroy his world.

Later I had it out with Dad. When did I ever get to be so wise?

‘Dad,’ I began, ‘I don’t mind that you did what you did. But there are other books just like the one Grandfather burnt. Is he going to burn every book?’

‘Just that one,’ he answered.

‘Dad, you can’t stop progress.’

‘Progress is not always a good thing, Simeon.’

I was getting nowhere. I tried to be kind. ‘You only say that because those are Grandfather’s words. You only do what you do because Grandfather tells you to. At some point, Dad, you’re going to have to make a choice without looking to him first. All the family will have to make that choice one day. Are you always going to choose for Grandfather Tamihana?’

‘Honour thy father and thy mother, Simeon.’

‘When are you going to choose for me, Dad? For my mother and my sisters? For yourself? And when are you going to choose for what is right? Are you always going to take his side just because he’s your father? What if he’s wrong?’

My father looked at me, frightened. ‘I know he’s wrong sometimes, son,’ he said.

‘Then you’re a coward, Dad.’

He raised his hand again.

‘Don’t you hit my son,’ my mother interrupted. She had just come into the room. I thought she would take my side. Instead, she turned on me. ‘You think you’re so smart, Simeon. But you’ve never had to live the way your father and I have. Life is not easy. The choices are not so simple.’ She kissed me on the forehead. ‘We do love you, son,’ she said. ‘But just because you know more than me and your father, and can read and write, it doesn’t mean to say you know everything.’

Chapter 35

Aunt Sarah had the Mahana haka team practising right up to the hour before the finals.

‘Good,’ she would say during rehearsals, ‘but not good enough.’

Again and again she drove us through our new entrance and the new action song. She had fallen in love with the tune I’d composed for it, and she’d pulled out all the stops to create the appropriate words and actions.

‘This is a gutsy composition,’ she admonished. ‘I want you all to put some guts into it. Come on, girls! Never mind about trying to look pretty. Get into it!’

I thought we had a smash hit on our hands. By the time we arrived at the Gisborne Opera House, we were ready to go for gold.

‘We’re on last,’ Aunt Sarah announced. ‘Ka pai! And guess what? Hukareka’s on first!’ She was triumphant. Now we’d be able to watch everyone else and tailor our performance accordingly. And the judges would have forgotten Hukareka by the time we’d finished. She bustled us backstage so that we could change into our costumes and queue up for Uncle Matiu to paint moko on us. Aunt Sarah hid the cloaks so that none of our competitors would see them until we emerged, resplendent. Then we went up into the balcony to join the other performers.

The view of the stage from the balcony was gorgeous. Flowers decorated the apron and sides. The Apirana Ngata Shield and Heni Materoa Cup dazzled in silver glory. The audience was dressed up to the nines. The men were wearing suits or sports jackets; the women were elegant in black, and some were wearing fake fur. The kuia were stunning with their greenstone earrings and pendants. The older ones had chiselled moko.

The lights dimmed. The compere came out. He was dressed in a tuxedo, and the audience whistled. He went offstage and came on again for another whistle. How we all laughed! Then he whistled at us.

‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ he said, ‘from here you all look fabulous. Not a black singlet or pair of gumboots in sight. Sorry, Auntie Mary, I didn’t see you out there! Seriously folks, you look proud, beautiful and dignified. Yes, even you Auntie Mary. You all lend lustre to this occasion. For tonight we are going to witness the very best of our performing arts.’

We all started to preen.

In the distance I saw Poppy sitting with the Hukareka girls. She was vivacious in her black and white costume, her long hair curling on her shoulders. Her lips had been darkened and a moko applied to her chin. She looked like the daughter of a Renaissance prince. My heart gave a lurch –

Night. A full moon shines on a balcony in an old Italian citadel. A young girl comes out, looking around as if searching for somebody.

Girl Taku tane, taku tane, kei hea koe taku tane?

(Subtitles: Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou Romeo?)

A young boy from Waituhi, transformed so that his nose isn’t as big and he is taller, detaches himself from the shadows.

Boy Ko ahau, kei raro nei!

(Subtitles: Down here, beloved, down here.)

Did Poppy see my adoring eyes? No, for the Hukareka group was hastening down to the stage.

‘Good luck,’ I said to her as she passed my seat.

She started to smile. Then she saw I was a Mahana and her eyes widened with surprise. With a flick of her piupius she was gone.

‘But you don’t want to hear me all night,’ the compere said. ‘So let’s begin our competition with Hukareka first, followed by L.D.S. Mahia, Hauiti and Whangara. We’ll have a break for a smoke —’ The compere saw Grandfather sitting in the front row downstairs. ‘Oops, sorry, Bulibasha.’

Grandfather waved the joke aside. Beside him, Grandmother Ramona was beautiful in that serene way of hers. She wore her long dress of white Spanish lace. She was like a dove among eagles.

‘Then after the break Mangatu, Waihirere, Manutuke and Mahana. Break a leg, folks! And first on — Hukareka!’

The opera house erupted into cheers. We kept our hands under our bums. Clap for Hukareka? No fear.

The curtains opened. The stage was empty. On came Hukareka, proud and vigorous, executing that amazing scissors pattern. ‘Karangatia ra, karangatia ra —’ They moved in double time, hands outstretched and quivering, claiming the stage with assurance and authority.

‘They are good,’ Aunt Sarah nodded. ‘They’re going to be hard to beat.’

As the competition continued, Aunt Sarah revised her opinion. Everybody was going to be hard to beat.

‘Ko Ruaumoko e ngunguru nei —’ The L.D.S. Mahia men chanted. They were on one knee, gesticulating and slapping their chests red from every slap.

‘Au, au, aue ha, hiii.’

The crowd was going wild. Old men were leaping into the aisle to face the men on the stage, confronting them and encouraging them to greater heights of vigour.

After Manutuke and L.D.S. Mahia came Hauiti and Whangara, and Aunt Sarah had been right; spurred on by the excellence of Hukareka, all the finalists had targeted them and were really pulling out the stops. Not only that, but every time the curtains parted the stage was empty. Everyone was copying Hukareka.

‘Not fair, judge!’ Agnes Poata called. ‘They’re all pinching our act.’

Hauiti had even gone one better, incorporating the entire marae ceremonial of welcome into their entrance — a karanga by the women, followed by a haka pulling everyone on to the marae, then the action song itself.

‘E te hokowhitu atu kia kaha ra —’

The judges sat up in delight.

‘Hauiti is really good,’ said Nani Mini Tupara, who was sitting with us. She saw that Hauiti had changed their poi as well — a poi describing the coming of the canoes to Aotearoa. She burst into long applause.

‘E ki! E ki!’

This was a moment that the Maori heart lived for — when music, words and action blended in perfection and brought the past surging like a sea into the present. My heart caught in my throat in recognition and thankfulness that I owed my life to those intrepid vikings of the South Pacific. The women in Hauiti’s front row sat, using their short poi to mimic the motion of a canoe’s prow plunging through the water. In the second row the women also sat and used the medium-long poi to depict the spray from the prow. Behind the women, the men were standing with peruperu sticks making paddling motions through stormy waves.

‘Ka pai tena!’ everyone yelled.

Whangara had their work cut out to claim the stage for themselves –

‘Uia mai koia whakahuatia ake, ko wai te whare nei e? Ko Te Kani!’

By the time interval came, Aunt Sarah was looking sick. The foyer was buzzing. By common consent tonight was better than last year.

‘We can only do our best,’ Aunt Sarah said bravely as she exchanged mournful glances with the two tutors for Mangatu and Waihirere, who were also looking green at the gills.

Then the bells rang for the second half.

‘Ah well, ka ka kakakaka —’ Suddenly Aunt Sarah clutched her throat in horror. Halfway through saying goodbye to her friends, she had lost her voice.

Panic struck. The haka team relied on Aunt Sarah to set the note and volume for our items.

‘Karangatia ra, powhiritia ra,’ Mangatu sang –

Upstairs, Aunt Sarah was doing a dumb show. ‘Where’s a doctor?’ she mouthed. ‘Somebody get a doctor.’

‘Pa mai to reo aroha,’ Waihirere sang –

And there was Aunt Sarah, eyes bulging. ‘Take me to hospital. Maybe they can operate in half an hour, stitch me up and bring me back in time for our performance.’

‘Kapanapana,’ Manutuke sang –

‘I’m dying,’ Aunt Sarah whispered.

Then it was time for us to go downstairs. Aunt Sarah heaved herself from one row to the next, as if on her way to bear testimony. It was clear to the entire audience that something was wrong in the state of Mahana. With heavy hearts the haka team went backstage. Aunt Ruth distributed the capes. We tied them on. Aunt Ruth sighed and turned to Haromi. Was that a wink?

‘You better do the karanga for your mother,’ Aunt Ruth said.

Did I forget to tell you that, as far as Aunt Sarah was concerned, there was only one star — herself?

‘Oh no she won’t!’ she said, finding her voice. Have somebody else shine? Her own daughter? Get off the grass. She was her bossy self again.

‘Okay everybody, on stage.’

But what about our new entrance song! The one we had been practising so hard?

‘Everybody before us has done their entrance that way. Let’s be different.’

So it was that when the curtains swished regally aside, there we were, in our long cloaks, in a V position. I couldn’t see beyond the footlights, but the roar of approval was deafening.

Good old Mahana. Let the others be flashy. You could always count on Mahana to be solid!

We began our traditional chant. Not a muscle moved. Let other groups move if they wanted to — we were Mahana! Again there was a roar.

Then Aunt Sarah moved to the centre of the stage and let it rip. Everybody held on to their hats. The voice that could cut a ton of butter was made for the karanga. When revved up and covering all the notes from A to G, that same voice could circle the world.

Aunt Sarah was standing in the middle of the stage. To both sides of her, the wings of the V formation moved backward and forward, simulating the flying motion of a giant bird. Our long cloaks had been cleverly designed to look like black and white feathers. The women began to stamp their feet. No sound at all except for Aunt Sarah’s voice, climbing to the stars. The men began to slap their chests. Aunt Ruth joined Aunt Sarah, her voice trying to catch up to Aunt Sarah’s and finally intertwining with it to go higher into the heavens. Both men and women began to swing at the hips, our piupiu crackling like static electricity.

Haromi’s sweet soprano came out of nowhere, speeding like a sparrowhawk after Aunt Sarah and Aunt Ruth, carolling up and beyond the universe. The three voices took the lid off the Opera House.

We began to sing: ‘E Ngata e, titiro koe ki a matou —’

We lifted our arms heavenward, following after the three voices as they soared through the night sky. We searched for our ancestor among the stars and moons and, when we found him, we reached for him — Look at us, Apirana, your great work lives on.

This was our trump card. Our action song — a tribute to Ngata himself.

For a moment there was stunned silence. Then whistles of approval and foot tapping was heard throughout the hall.

The women sang — ‘Titiro atu koe e Ngata!’ The men sang — ‘E Ngata e!’

The women sang — ‘Titiro ki nga mahi ora!’

The men sang — ‘E Ngata e!’

We brought the house down.

It would be nice to report that we won. We didn’t. Neither did Hukareka. Hauiti got the palm.

However, both we and Hukareka were commended, and the Mahana action song was singled out for special praise. The judges said, ‘Mahana’s waiata a ringa showed both traditional and contemporary elements. Of particular note was the song’s tune which indicated that Mahana was not afraid to embrace the music of today’s young generation.’

For many years after, Aunt Sarah swore black and blue that even when we were practising the song she hadn’t known the tune was ‘See You Later Alligator’.

Chapter 36

That winter, the competition between Mahana and Hukareka escalated. Apart from the haka competitions and women’s hockey games there were great battles on the rugby field. When Mahana men’s rugby team were drawn to meet Hukareka senior men at Rugby Park, excitement was feverish.

Grandfather’s approach to training was merciless. Two weeks before the game against Hukareka he had the team running every night from Waituhi to Patutahi and back — in hobnail boots.

On the first night of the marathon runs the rest of the family watched and tried to keep the mood light as the men assembled on the road outside the homestead. They were nervous — with good reason. Those from whom the scrum would be chosen were in the front row of runners. They included Uncles Matiu, Maaka, Ruka, Aperahama, Ihaka and Albie, and the sons of Ihaka Mahana. Behind them were the potential backs: Dad, Pani and Mohi — a new inductee — and a good number of the Whatu clan. Grandfather Tamihana sat in the De Soto with Aunt Ruth in the driver’s seat.

‘Keep the speed at five miles an hour,’ Grandfather instructed her.

She started the car. ‘Move out!’ she called.

The men began to run in front of the car. The first half hour was easy as everybody chugged along at a steady mile every twelve minutes. After that, some of the men began to feel the strain. The horn of the De Soto blared. They had to regain their wind pretty fast. The option was to be run over by the De Soto.

Grandfather’s rationale was that if the team could run at normal speed with heavy footwear, they would run twice as fast when they had their lighter rugby boots on. He did not doubt the strength in the men’s upper bodies. Shearing, farming and fencing kept shoulders, chest and upper arms at optimum strength. Put a Mahana scrum down on a field and nothing could move it — the Mahana scrum could push the opposing scrum from one goal post to the other if it had to. The clan’s weakness, however, had always been in motive power. Sure, the Mahana backs were speedy, but they couldn’t keep the speed up. Thus the rugby team learned to apply the same tactics as the women’s hockey team — get out there, hit the other side with all you had in the first half and get all the tries you could while you still had the legs to do it. The infusion of men from the Whatu family, who had more leg power and stronger running skills, was another of Grandfather’s tactics. A third was to hope that some star centre or winger would turn up to work in the Mahana shearing gangs — Tobio had been one and Pani was the latest in line — or graduate like Mohi from junior football. The last hope was to pray to his American angel. Meantime, training was relentless. Sting was needed in the backline.

The night before the game against Hukareka, the family met with the team in the drawing room of the homestead. The atmosphere was strained. Mum was holding Dad’s hand. Pani was standing beside Miriam until Grandfather sent a message via Mohi from the throne that he should take a few steps back. Pani crimsoned.

Grandfather knelt to pray. ‘Oh God our eternal father,’ he began. ‘Tomorrow our rugby team has its big game. Succour our team and, if it be Thy will, bring victory to us, Amen.’

With a sigh, Grandfather stood up again. ‘Okay, boys, get a good night’s rest.’ He gave a slight smile. ‘Early to bed, no drink, no smoke and no sex.’

Later, while everybody was inside having a drink of cocoa, I went outside for air. I had found Grandfather’s prayer and the constant drawing of battle lines to include Heaven somewhat claustrophobic. Did everything have to include God?

I was watching the moon when Grandfather came across to me from the verandah. A mood of arrogance possessed me.

‘Why didn’t you pray for a saviour?’

‘Ae, we need a Jesse Owens,’ he laughed. His voice was good-humoured and relaxed.

I looked at him, incredulous. ‘Jesse Owens is black.’ In our church, black men could not hold the priesthood.

‘So?’ Grandfather asked, puzzled.

‘He bears the mark of the children of Ham. You wouldn’t want a man like that in your godly team, would you?’

Take that, you bastard.

‘E hara, grandson,’ Grandfather sighed. ‘Do you want a fight? You know I’m stronger.’

‘You might be stronger,’ I answered, ‘but that doesn’t make you always right.’

‘Right? What do you know about right and wrong? You live a little longer, and maybe you’ll get to be wiser.’

I wasn’t going to take that one lying down. ‘Why is it that older people always think that just because we’re younger we don’t know something? Your way of being right is to always say we are wrong, to keep us from knowing anything about the world outside Waituhi or to try to deny the world is changing. You can burn all the books you want, Grandfather, but that won’t stop us. Nor will we believe anything you say, for instance, about the mark of Ham, just because you say so. You don’t hold the power of life and death over us.’

Grandfather stared at me. ‘We are a family of God,’ he said, ‘and I am the leader. Whether you like it or not, Himiona, I lead according to my beliefs and my faith in God that we will prosper if we obey His commandments. There’s always got to be somebody who leads and others who follow. I’m the one who decides.’

‘And if I don’t like your decisions?’

A star fell from the sky.

‘Then one of us,’ Grandfather said, jabbing at me with a closed fist, ‘is going to lose.’

The next day Grandfather hired two buses so that everybody from Waituhi, including Maggie and old Uncle Pera, could come to the game. This was how he distributed his largesse. When the buses arrived at the field, Grandfather was there to greet everyone as they alighted. He was like an Italian godfather, his wife by his side, waiting while everyone kissed his hand or embraced him. I marvelled anew at his charisma.

‘They don’t play rugby like they did in our day,’ the old-timers said to Bulibasha as they stepped off the bus.

Grandfather was magnanimous. ‘Let’s see how the youngsters shape up anyway.’

Grandfather was so clever to have the old ones there. Whatever happened out on the field, nothing could damage Grandfather’s mana. If the team lost, the old ones would say, ‘There, didn’t we tell you? These young ones are not as good as Bulibasha was.’ If the team won, the old ones would say, ‘Aha! You see? It’s Bulibasha’s training that has won the game.’ He was the reference point by which all history was judged.

Just as the Waituhi crowd was seating themselves, the Hukareka supporters arrived. Rupeni Poata had travelled on the bus with his people and, as he stepped down, he offered his hand to Poppy. Laughing, she accepted his assistance and bowed prettily to him. At that instant I looked at Grandfather and Grandmother — and I saw Grandmother sway, as if she were a reed in the wind. A slight swaying motion, and that was all.

The Waituhi oldies pretended not to see the Hukareka oldies as they ascended the stand.

Uncle Pera started sniffing. ‘Can you smell anything?’ he asked Maggie.

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘It’s coming from that side of the stand.’

The Hukareka oldies weren’t going to take that. ‘Oh is that so!’ one of them replied. ‘How strange that the wind is blowing from your direction to ours. Somebody forgot to wipe their bum before they got here.’

Women could get away with saying such things in a way that men couldn’t, but Maggie’s feathers were ruffled. She scowled and was just about to reply when Zebediah Whatu said, ‘Don’t waste your time, Maggie. They’re not worth it.’

The grandstand soon divided into us and them, a definite space ran right between the two factions. I felt surrounded by refugees from an old people’s rest home.

‘Let’s get outta here,’ I muttered to Andrew.

He nodded and we raced down the steps as more Hukareka people came up. Immediately I barrelled into Tight Arse Junior and Saul, and we began to trade blows. Saul got a lucky punch in and I reeled away, but somebody caught my arm in a vice to stop me from falling. He was short, squat and ugly.

Shit, Rupeni Poata.

‘Hey, watch it, boy!’ he laughed.

I coloured and pushed away from him. My heart was thudding in my chest like a cannon. Before Rupeni Poata could say anything more, I was off and away.

Later I remembered that his face had a scar running diagonally across the left cheek. Yet, in the story that Aunt Ruth had told me, when Grandfather Tamihana stole Grandmother Ramona away it was Grandfather who was slashed across the face. I raised the question with Andrew.

He shrugged. ‘Maybe Grandfather’s scar has faded,’ he said.

The battle began in the dressing room under the stand. Nobody knows who started it, but somebody on one side said, ‘Hey, I didn’t know their cocks were so small.’ His friend only made it worse by saying, ‘Yeah, but their arseholes are huge, man.’

The inference to homosexuality was anathema to Maori men: the first punch-up of the day erupted. The fisticuffs were short, sharp and vicious, and Mohi ended up minus a tooth.

‘Oh shit shit shit,’ he cursed, spitting blood. He had a date that night and would have to keep his mouth closed whenever he smiled.

That was not the end of it. Everything quietened down for a second, then someone on the other side said, ‘I went out with one of their women once.’

‘Oh yeah?’ his mate said.

‘What a dog she was, man, even with a pillow over her head.’

This time, when the fists flew, it was a Hukareka man who was downed by rabbit punches to his kidneys.

‘Cut it out,’ the ref yelled, ‘or the game is off before we even start.’

The ruckus was heard in the stand above the dressing rooms. Grandfather and Rupeni Poata looked at each other, and came down to see what the problem was.

‘Tell your boys to back off each other,’ the ref said.

Rupeni Poata bowed in assent. ‘A truce for the day?’ he asked Grandfather.

‘Yes,’ Grandfather answered.

‘I want a clean game out there,’ Rupeni Poata told his team.

Clean game, ha. He was such a double-faced bastard — just like Scarpia in Tosca, who tells his lieutenant to use blanks rather than real bullets in the mock execution of the hero Cavaradossi. When the squad fires, Cavaradossi falls down dead.

When the teams came out of the dressing room, World War Three was only narrowly averted.

‘Come on the maroon!’ the Mahana oldies yelled.

‘Come on the black!’ the Hukareka oldies responded.

‘Maroon!’

‘Black!’

‘Maroon!’

‘Black!’

The ref threw a coin in the air.

‘Heads,’ Caesar Poata called. Heads it was.

The Hukareka team took the advantage by electing to play with their backs to the sun.

‘You’ll need more than the sun to help you,’ Uncle Pera yelled. He was a cocky little terrier lifting his hind leg against a fence post.

The strong, fierce Hukareka forwards were like racehorses champing at the bit. They grouped around Augie, Tight Arse Senior and Alexander Poata. Caesar Poata took the kick-off. The Hukareka supporters roared their approval.

The game began.

From the very beginning there was no doubt that Mahana was the heavier side. When the ball was kicked off, a solid wall of Mahana men was waiting underneath. The Hukareka forwards, expecting to dent that wall, bounced off like rubber balls.

‘E koe! E koe!’ the Mahana supporters yelled. They loved nothing better than a show of strength.

The ref ordered a scrum-down. Mahana to put in the ball. Mohi, at halfback, zapped the ball in quickly. The Mahana forwards gouged the ground like bulls, goring the ball back through the scrum to where Mohi was waiting. He was downed by his opposite half.

‘Offside, ref!’ the Mahana supporters screamed.

The ref agreed. Mahana got to kick the ball. My father Joshua took the kick. He found touch deep in the heart of Hukareka territory.

Good old Josh, the oldtimers nodded — almost as good as his father at kicking the ball.

Now a lineout. The throw-in was crooked. Another lineout was ordered. The whistle. Another scrum. The suspense was killing as each side tested the other, trying to probe for weaknesses.

Rupeni Poata went down to the sideline. Seeing this, Grandfather followed him down.

‘Wait for the break, boys,’ Rupeni said.

‘Settle down, boys,’ Grandfather said. ‘Settle down. There’s plenty of time. Plenty of time.’

And wasn’t that just the best advice, the Waituhi oldtimers agreed. Bulibasha was the King of Rugby all right.

Out of nowhere Hukareka made the break. A lucky possession at the lineout. Quick spinning of the ball along from first five-eighth to second five-eighth –

Look! Titus Poata at halfback had slashed around as an extra man in the backline, drawing the Mahana opposite number to him before passing the ball out to Alexander Poata at centre –

Alexander kicked ahead and over the Mahana backs and was chasing after the ball. Whu, he was fast.

But there was good old Josh streaking over to get the ball on the bounce and –

Good boy, Josh! Takes after his father all right. Kicking for touch again, way down the side and back into Hukareka territory.

Great rugby, man. Not as good as the old days, but good to see the ball moving around. Somebody better keep an eye on Alexander Poata, though. Man, he was dangerous.

The whistle blew for halftime. The score was nil-all. The frustration on the field and off was reaching fever pitch. The atmosphere was heavy, like a front before the weather changes. Grandfather kept an unperturbed exterior, but I knew he was worried. He had expected Mahana to be up by at least ten points.

‘You’re doing good,’ Grandfather said during his pep talk, ‘but not good enough. I want to see more possession. I want to see more penetration by the forwards and better handling among the backs. Watch those Hukareka backs. They’re opportunistic. They will take advantage of any breaks they can get. Ka tika?’

‘Ka tika,’ the Mahana men nodded.

Two minutes into the second half, the Hukareka backs made another break and executed a scissors movement similar to their entrance on haka night. Titus Poata made a dummy pass and suddenly changed the direction of play by running into the gap between his position and second five-eighths. He cut through the lumbering Mahana defence players as if they were a piece of cloth. Before Mahana knew it, Alexander Poata had the ball and the Hukareka players were through and streaking for a try.

‘Anei! Anei!’ the Hukareka supporters yelled. Some of the women began a hula of delight, their ample bums wobbling like jelly. The stand started to sway with them. There were a lot of heavyweights among Hukareka women.

Caesar Poata took the kick at goal. Hukareka was ahead by 5 to nil.

Clouds began to gather above the space where Grandfather Tamihana was standing. I thought of the scene in The Ten Commandments where Charlton Heston looks up into the sky and calls, ‘My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken me?’ God must have been listening, because four minutes later the Mahana forwards, led by Uncle Matiu, charged down the field with the ball. They pushed through the Hukareka men, knocking them aside like skittles. The try wasn’t the most elegant in the history of rugby, but when Uncle Ruka put his hand over the Hukareka line and touched the pigskin down, bedlam erupted in the grandstand. There were our women doing the hula.

Dad converted the try. Five-all.

That was when the game took off.

Grandfather Tamihana gave a sudden cry. His bad leg buckled under him and he collapsed. The ref blew his whistle for the St John’s men to assist. Rupeni Poata too went to Grandfather’s aid. The whole of the Waituhi part of the grandstand were on their feet in alarm. Bulibasha was more important than the game.

Grandfather waved the helpers away and bravely he stood up. He indicated that he should like to be assisted up into the grandstand. A wave of applause greeted him. Tears sprang to Uncle Matiu’s eyes.

‘Our father’s knee,’ he gulped.

It was like the Mahana version of the rallying cry at the Alamo. As soon as the scrum went down it was obvious to the Hukareka players that Mahana had gone into top gear.

‘Neke neke!’ the scrum roared. ‘Neke neke!’

My God they were thrilling — like an ancient warrior war party. They pushed the Hukareka players before them, dribbling the ball as they went.

‘Neke neke! Neke neke!’

Hukareka players came charging from all sides. No way could they get into that solid force and extricate the ball. On and on they went, until –

‘Anei!’ old Pera cried.

The scrum had pushed over Hukareka’s goal line. Another try.

With a cry, Uncle Matiu held the football aloft — ‘This one’s for you, Bulibasha!’ And slammed it into touch.

When Dad kicked that ball at the goal to convert the try there was no way he would miss. In one minute flat, Mahana had gone ahead 10 to 5.

At that point the focus on the part of Mahana for vengeance and attempts at resistance by Hukareka unleashed the old blood lust. When play resumed and the scrum went down, the curses and accusations from both sides about women, sisters and mothers could be heard in the grandstand. When the ball came flying out and the backs had already taken play halfway down the field –

Huh? Fists were flying back at the scrum.

‘Break it up!’ the ref yelled. ‘Break it up!’

Tempers flared all over the field. Uncle Ruka and Titus Poata had their own private battle going — they butted and punched each other at every opportunity as if, by some process of attrition, one would knock the stuffing out of the other. Caesar Poata tackled Uncle Matiu. While Uncle was still on the ground, Caesar grabbed his balls and gave a strong twist. A few minutes later Caesar happened to be lying on the ground and Uncle Matiu happened to be trotting back onside. Oh dear, Uncle couldn’t have seen Caesar because he ran over his thighs, stomach and chest in his sprigged boots –

‘Oops, sorry chief, I didn’t see you down there.’

Players were eyeing their assailants and taking every opportunity to pay back. They gave the bugger a shove as they went past. They brought their elbow up into his face. They chopped accidentally on purpose at his windpipe when the ref wasn’t looking. Then my father Joshua scored a brilliant try. He ran from way back, joined the back line as extra man as it surged forward and dived over for our third try of the game. When he converted it, Mahana was 15–5 in the lead.

Then Mahana suffered its first casualty. At the next scrum, when the play moved on, Uncle Ruka remained on the ground, clutching his stomach in agony. The Mahana men went after Titus Poata, the bastard who had done it, and next minute three players had fists up and were brawling. Another two men hit the dust.

‘That’s enough!’ the ref yelled, blowing his whistle. ‘Quit it or I’m stopping the game.’ Didn’t anybody tell him that blowing his whistle wasn’t going to stop a massacre? By the end of that little sortie, four players were being carted off the field and two reserves from each side were being called on.

Only one reserve trotted on for Waituhi. Where was Charlie Whatu? The ref wasn’t waiting around. He blew the whistle to resume play. We were one man down. Hukareka scored and converted. Now Hukareka were only five points behind.

Uncle Matiu roared at me, ‘Tell that fucking Charlie Whatu to get his arse out here!’

Andrew and I ran into the dressing room. St John’s Ambulance men were treating the wounded. We found Charlie Whatu vomiting his guts out in the toilets.

‘I’ve eaten some bad fish, boys. Real bad.’

Just then we heard a volley of booing from the Waituhi side of the stand. There was a drumming of outraged feet, and dust started to fall through the ceiling.

‘What the hell’s happening!’ an ambulance man asked. ‘Is that an earthquake?’

The door opened and Uncle Maaka appeared, swearing and cursing. He had been ordered off for a flying tackle. Our team was down to thirteen men. Oh shit.

Glory would have said, Do something.

Outside, I heard the Hukareka supporters screaming again as Alexander Poata, taking advantage of our misfortune, went over. 15-all.

I looked at Andrew. ‘Be my guest,’ he said.

I nodded. ‘Take off your jersey,’ I told Charlie.

Adults sometimes make the mistake of thinking that a fifteen-year-old boy is just a kid. If you’re the fifteen-year-old in question, you know that you are a man — and most often you look like a man.

The ref saw me coming out of the dressing room wearing the Mahana jersey. He nodded, waited for play to go into touch and then waved me on.

‘Are you crazy?’ Mohi said. ‘You’ll get trounced out here.’

My father Joshua came up and said, ‘Get off the field, son.’ Blood was pouring from a cut on his forehead.

‘I’m not your son,’ I told him. ‘I’m Charlie Whatu.’

Uncle Matiu understood. ‘Ka tika, Simeon,’ he said. ‘Well, even Goliath was felled by David, ne? You don’t happen to have a slingshot do you?’ He laughed. ‘You play at left wing. Any time you get the ball, kick. Or pass it to somebody else. Never mind about being a hero.’

I wasn’t planning to be a hero. But in my own way I thought that my being on the field and making our side up to fourteen might make a difference. Even so I prayed to God, Please Lord keep the play on the other side of the field.

Boy, did He lay His bundle on me.

All the scrums seemed to be on my side of the field. Poor Mohi didn’t know what to do. Whenever our scrum won the ball, he would pass it straight to the second five-eighths rather than me. Then, accidentally, he forgot I was there and shot the ball my way.

‘Oh no,’ he groaned, hiding his eyes.

He knew I was the worst kicker in the entire western world. What he had forgotten was that I was jack rabbit scared. No way was I going to be smashed to smithereens by those Hukareka men.

I saw a gap.

I went through with my eyes closed.

I took Hukareka by surprise and found myself in the clear.

Oh shit, what now?

Mohi was there. ‘Pass it out!’ he yelled. ‘Pass it out!’

Believe me, I would gladly have done that, except Alexander Poata was marking him.

‘Pass it out, you stupid fucker!’ Mohi yelled again.

‘Don’t call me stupid, arsehole!’

I waited. Oh no. Now another two Hukareka players were zeroing in on me.

Come on, Alexander, come to me too. Now I knew what kamikaze fighter pilots felt like. But I’d done it. Alexander Poata joined the other two Hukareka players in chasing after me. Just before they slammed into me I let the ball go –

‘All yours, Mo-’

It was no compensation to hear the roar as Mohi took the ball under his arm and, ten yards later, went over.

When the final whistle blew, Mahana had beaten Hukareka by 18 to 15. Grandfather came down to the dressing room to offer his congratulations personally. He was pretty sprightly for a man who had collapsed at the sideline. He patted Mohi’s back for his try.

Then, just as Grandfather was turning to leave, Pani called out, ‘And what do you think of our little champ here?’

Grandfather paused. He looked at me as if he was seeing me for the first time. ‘That was a stupid thing to do, boy. We could have been disqualified for the rest of the season.’

You’re damned if you do and damned if you don’t.

‘Go easy on Simeon,’ my father Joshua ventured.

‘No, it’s okay,’ I jibed. ‘I only went out there for the family. Not for anybody else. The family always comes first.’

The dressing room went quiet. I had gone too far again.

Just then, old Pera came hopping into the dressing room.

‘Kei te pai, boys,’ he wheezed. ‘Good on you! Those Hukareka people are all having a good cry out there.’ Then he saw me. ‘E Himiona! That was a nice little run you had.’

He turned to Grandfather. ‘Reminds me of the time when you were his age, eh? When you jumped in to help out a senior team. Just like him, eh —’

Wheeze, cough, splutter.

‘Just like him.’

Afterwards, I said to my father Joshua, ‘Dad, I’m sorry. I don’t want to come between you and Grandfather Tamihana.’

He put a reassuring arm around me. His voice was thoughtful. ‘You’re not, son,’ he said. ‘He’s coming between me and my son.’

My father was growing up too. We turned to leave the dressing room, and there, suddenly, was Rupeni Poata. He looked amused.

‘Well done, Charlie Whatu,’ he said.

Chapter 37

Shortly after the rugby game against Hukareka the weather cracked down with a vengeance. Gone were the colours of autumn; clouds brooded greyly over our landscape. Torrential rain came across the hills behind Waituhi, wave after wave of unforgiving assault. The rain funnelled down from the backcountry, following the contours of the land towards the Waituhi Valley. There, with a whoosh of landslips and erosion, the water poured into the Waipaoa.

‘Wail-e-ree, I can hear the river call —’

My sister Glory and I would stand on the river bank, our faces whipped by the stinging rain. We had taken to singing the song from a western movie called River of No Return about a surly hero, a good-time girl and a young boy, and their adventures on a broad rolling river that roared across the screen from left to right. We felt the story had been about our river.

‘If you listen you can hear it call, sometimes it’s peaceful and sometimes wild and free —’

Mud so thick that you could walk across it surged and roared past us. Within its depths were logs as big as steamships. Trees as tall as two-storeyed houses cracked and yawed past in the yellow avalanche. Sometimes a dead sheep or horse, swollen like an obscene balloon, dipped and rolled within the water as if being basted in mud. The very ground we stood on thrummed with the turbulence of the Waipaoa. We knew that the river could be unforgiving. People trying to cross on horseback had drowned in the Waipaoa. A car had missed a bend, careered over and into its depths. Neither the car nor its driver was ever seen again. A rahui, a temporary prohibition, was placed on the river.

‘I’ve lost my love on the river, gone, gone forever down the river of no return —’

We were a young boy and his younger sister standing on the river bank, in love with the river.

One morning, Red was missing from our herd of milking cows. When Glory found her, she was down the river bank. The front part of her body was out of the water, but the back half was stuck in the mud. The river raged around her, trying to suck her in.

‘You’ve done this on purpose!’ I yelled at Red. ‘Just to make my day.’

Leaving Glory on guard, I ran back to the quarters, hitched up our stallion Pancho Villa and brought him to the river bank. I took a rope down to Red and tied it around her midriff.

‘You stupid bitch!’ I screamed at her.

‘Mooo,’ she answered unconcernedly.

To get the rope around, I had to get into the water itself. Suddenly a log or something hit me from behind. Glory screamed. Then Mum was there. She had seen me and Glory from the window of the quarters. She scrambled down the bank and joined me in the river.

‘Here,’ she cried. She had brought the whip with her.

‘Glory,’ I yelled, ‘kick Pancho Villa to pull us out now.’

Glory jumped on to Pancho Villa’s slippery back. ‘Hup!’ she screamed. ‘Hup!’

Pancho Villa whinnied and strained and pulled too quickly. The rope thwanged and Pancho Villa reared in fright.

‘Hold on, Glory!’ I thought my sister would fly off and be gone, gone to the river. But Glory caught at Pancho Villa’s mane and tried again.

‘Hup! Hup!’ My mother and I pushed Red from behind. Pancho Villa began to slip. I had to use the whip.

Dear God, direct the lash.

I laid the whip out and suddenly made it curl toward Pancho Villa’s flank. The sting was enough to make him jerk. The mud gave a slow, slurping motion as Red’s hind legs came free. She started to use her front legs to help herself out and up the bank, dragging Mum and me with her.

In all that time, not once did my mother say to let the cow go. Red was an important part of our lives. We depended on her for her good rich milk. Nor, when my mother and I emerged caked with silt and mud, was there any sentimental embrace. We had simply done our job.

My mother went back to the quarters and Glory and I carried on with the milking. Half way through, I found Glory shaking like a leaf.

‘You won’t ever leave me, will you, Simeon?’

‘No.’

I thought of her, so small, kicking Pancho Villa and no doubt saving our lives.

‘Ever ever ever?’

I held her in my arms. ‘I promise,’ I said.

Did Red thank us? Are you kidding? As I was milking her she arched her back and did a huge cowpat.

‘Next time, you drown,’ I said.

Later I went down to the river and gave a prayer of thanks to it for not taking us. Glory joined me.

‘Wail-e-ree —’

As Dad predicted, our savings dwindled fast. With Grandfather’s permission Dad left all the work at the homestead to me and went looking for work around the district.

My father was one of many men looking for itinerant work and he found knocking on doors a dispiriting business. Sometimes in the past he had been able to count on doing some fencing or horse breaking or mustering — always the worst stretch of fencing or the most vicious horses to break or the most difficult slopes to muster on — and he hoped that the quality of his work would be remembered. One night he came back with the news that he had managed to secure a one-man contract to cut scrub up the back of beyond.

The work was a six-week contract, and Dad decided to camp up there in a lean-to tent. Mum didn’t like the idea, but there was no option. Dad saddled Pancho Villa and, pulling a packhorse with all his equipment and provisions, set off into the back country. During the first two weekends Mum and I joined him in the scrubcutting, taking up with us the provisions that would continue to support him.

The third weekend Mum and I arrived in the middle of torrential rain to find the lean-to vacant and the packhorse standing by with Dad’s slasher and other equipment still tied to the saddle. My mother knew immediately that something was wrong. We rode down the track to the river.

‘Joshua? Joshu-aaa!’

My mother gave a cry. She pointed through the rain. I couldn’t make out what I was meant to be looking at. Then I saw that the track on the other side of the river had fallen away. I followed the slip and, there, at the bottom, was a small figure trapped beneath a fallen horse.

The swingbridge was down but that was no deterrent to my mother. She spurred her horse forward and into the torrent. ‘Joshua! Kei te haere atu ahau ki a koe!’ Of course I had to follow the crazy woman.

‘Hang on, Huria!’ my father cried. ‘Let the horse bring you across.’

By that time I was busy trying to keep my head above water too. I saw a bend coming up and yelled at Mum, pointing it out to her. She nodded and started to urge her horse towards a place where the water was not running so strong. We both touched ground.

‘You could have been killed,’ Dad said.

‘Well I wasn’t,’ she answered.

Two days before, Dad had been riding up to the scrub on Pancho Villa, pulling the packhorse after him. The rain was so heavy he didn’t notice the unstable track, and the ground crumbled from under him. With a whinny of fear Pancho Villa tumbled down with the landslide. Dad tried to pull the horse’s head around so that it pointed down. He thought he might be able to ride the stallion all the way to the bottom. But a sharp tree stump pierced Pancho Villa’s stomach, ripping his guts out. Bawling, Pancho Villa spun and fell, pinioning Dad beneath its weight.

Pancho Villa was still alive. Huge blowflies were buzzing and maggots were already hatching in the dark stomach wound.

‘I think my right leg is broken,’ Dad said.

We set his leg with two branches and bound it tightly. Even so, he screamed and lost consciousness when we levered him out from under Pancho Villa.

‘We only have two horses,’ I said to Mum. ‘We’ll strap Dad onto my horse. You take him back to Waituhi. It’s too dangerous for the three of us to cross the river together.’

She nodded. ‘I’ll come back for you tomorrow,’ she said.

Just as they were leaving, my father’s eyes flickered. His lips were quivering.

‘I couldn’t reach the —’ He motioned to the rifle, still in its pouch, strapped to Pancho Villa’s flank. ‘Thank you, son,’ he said.

He had loved Pancho Villa.

I watched until Mum had forded the river safely, pulling Dad’s horse after her. On the other side my father motioned Mum to stop, as if he was waiting for something.

I went down to Pancho Villa, put the rifle to his head and pulled the trigger. The sound echoed around the hills.

My father’s leg was fractured in three places. The doctor put a plaster cast on it to help the bone to knit, but Dad was worried about finishing the scrubcutting. We needed the money.

‘I’ll have to hand the job over to Pani,’ he said. ‘We’ll share the contract money with him.’ He and Mum were whispering in the bedroom.

‘How many more weeks before the job’s finished?’ Mum asked.

Faith and Hope, followed by Glory, came to join me and listened through the wall.

‘Three weeks, might be four.’

‘Then I’ll do it,’ Mum said. ‘I’m as good as you at scrubcutting. Four weeks is not long.’

‘Kaore,’ Dad answered. They began to argue.

Glory looked at me: Do something. I knew what she had in mind.

I took my sisters by the hand and we knocked on Mum and Dad’s bedroom door.

‘You should all be in bed,’ Mum growled.

‘Dad,’ I said, ‘there’s no need for you to get Pani to do the work or for Mum to go out there for four weeks by herself —’

‘Were you kids listening?’ Mum asked, irritated.

‘Do you think you can handle the milking?’ I asked Dad.

‘Ae,’ he nodded.

‘Then Mum and I will finish the scrubcutting together. Faith and Hope will take on her chores in the homestead. Together Mum and I should get the job done in half the time.’

‘What about your schooling?’ Dad asked.

‘I’ll only miss two weeks —’ Glory jabbed me. ‘Oh yes, and so will Glory. She wants to come with us.’

‘Why?’

Glory was offended. What a silly question. ‘I can cut scrub too,’ she said.

The next morning Mum, Glory and I saddled up and headed into the back country. Dad said a prayer for us before we left. He was finding it difficult to let us go. All his life he had been the one to go out to work and now he was watching us take his place.

‘The only reason why Glory wants to go,’ Faith said, ‘is to get a rest from the cows!’

Glory poked her tongue out.

‘Look after your mother and your sister, son,’ Dad said.

‘We’ll send Glory back in the weekend for stores.’

We left, moving quickly through the morning glow, over the hills, past the lake, climbing higher and higher. Just before we turned the bend which would obscure the homestead, Glory turned and called –

‘Bye —’

Her voice echoed around the hills. It was just like the closing scene in Shane.

I wish I could say that the weather improved, but it worsened. Every morning we woke at six to face another day of rain. Cutting scrub was hard enough at the best of times, but working in the rain was many times worse. Mum was disheartened, but –

‘Time to start, son,’ she said.

We left Glory to make breakfast while we started on the scrub. Glory was always good at making a fire with only one match. We worked till eight, my mother always a little ahead of me. She was good at cutting scrub, and I remember how Dad often complained about her speed. He sometimes accidentally on purpose forgot to sharpen her slasher, just to slow her down. Glory brought us our breakfast — a billy of cocoa, fried bread and porridge — riding across the river with the food packed safely in the saddlebags. She stayed to help us until midday — and she was good too! But I can remember how Mum’s lips trembled when, one day, she saw that Glory’s hands were blistered and raw. At midday, Glory returned to the lean-to to make our lunch — usually mashed potatoes, pumpkin and sausages. Then back she would come, joining us until we stopped at four. By that time, sweat and rain had made us sodden.

My mother never liked riding back in the dark. She never liked camping out overnight either — a canvas tent was no protection from kehuas, not to mention Dracula. At nights, after dinner and sharpening our slashers for the next day’s work, Mum was always in a hurry to put out the kerosene lamp so Dracula would have a hard time finding us.

Even though we were separated from our father and sister, Glory still kept up her usual custom of calling out –

‘’Night Dad, ’night Mum, ’night Faith, ’night Hope, ’night Simeon.’

‘Goodnight Glory,’ I answered.

The first weekend, just as Glory was saddling up to go back to Waituhi, we heard a voice shouting. ‘Huria! Himiona!’

Coming up the hill to us was Grandmother Ramona. She had brought our stores, her sleeping gear and another slasher.

‘More hands will do the job quicker,’ she said. ‘My bees are all nice and warm inside their hives and don’t need me, and your grandfather is driving me around the bend with his being at home all the time.’

Grandmother Ramona brought kinder weather — a break in the rain. During that respite the earth warmed, the scrub dried out and became easier to cut. Although the work was hard, we established a rhythm which somehow heightened my senses to all that was happening: moments of beauty and humour as we worked together, epiphanies of illumination –

Glory, learning how to cut scrub left-handed because her right hand was swollen. Grandmother losing her footing, and laughing as she slipped and slid on her bum all the way to the bottom of the hill. My mother working ahead of us, never stopping to rest. Most of all, I remember three generations of women bending and chopping through the scrub, the steam curling off their workclothes as they ascended the hills. They wore wide-brimmed hats to stop either sun or rain from getting into their eyes, and layers of clothes to keep in their body warmth. On their legs, knee-high gumboots.

‘We’re your three women,’ Grandmother said to me one day at smoko. ‘Eh girls? We’re all Simeon’s women.’

I have never felt so proud.

Eight days after we had left Waituhi, we were finished. I put a match to the cut scrub. Whoomph and it burst into flame, bonfires of celebration. Then –

‘Me haere tatou ki te wa kainga,’ I said.

Time to go home.

Chapter 38

Mum, Glory, Grandmother and I were glad to come down from the back country and see the smoke from the chimneys of Waituhi. Grandmother, despite her earlier reassurances, was worrying about her bees and decided to detour to her land. Mum, Glory and I continued along the gully which would take us to the homestead.

‘Simeon,’ Mum said, ‘let Dad know we’re on our way home.’

I lifted the rifle to the sky and let out two shots. The sharp reports surprised the air. When we reached the bend, pulling the packhorse after us, there was the Waipaoa River in the distance — and Dad and our sisters were racing across the paddocks to meet us. Our father was waving and yelling like a madman.

‘Huria! Huria!’

We watched, laughing, as he came run-hopping on his crutches through the mud. My mother was still laughing when he pulled her from her horse. He kissed her with so much passion that she blushed –

‘Joshua. The kids —’

After dinner that night, Aunt Miriam told me that Grandfather had been very scornful of Dad whilst we were away, saying things like, ‘So your wife has to go out and work for you, eh Joshua?’ or ‘I suppose Huria wears the pants in the family now?’

The jibes had gone deeper than Grandfather could possibly have anticipated. In his own way, Dad started to rebel. One night he even took my side in one of my verbal skirmishes with Grandfather. This time I was having him on about the vexed question: when does life begin?

‘Life begins when a baby takes its first breath,’ he said.

‘So abortion is all right then?’ I answered.

‘No, all life is sacred.’

‘But you’ve just said that —’

‘I know what I said,’ Grandfather stormed.

Out of nowhere, Dad said, ‘You don’t have to shout, Father. My son was only asking a question.’

Grandfather stared at Dad open-mouthed. So did we.

When Glory and I returned to school, Mr Johnston was gentle in his reprimand.

‘Just don’t make this a habit,’ he said.

Then Miss Dalrymple announced that she planned to take the senior school into Gisborne for a day’s visit to some of the important industries and city departments.

‘Some of you will be leaving school next year,’ she said. She looked at Mita Wharepapa and I, both fifteen. ‘You should know what possibilities await you in the big wide world.’

Ha! What possibilities could await any young Maori departing school at fifteen and without qualifications other than shearing or working on a farm?

The trip was an annual fixture, and the word was that the best tour to go on was to D.J. Barry’s, the local manufacturer of aerated drinks — you got to taste some free samples. If you couldn’t get on that tour, the one to Watties Canneries was second best. Try to avoid the visits to the abattoirs — stink, man — the Gisborne Harbour Authority or Gisborne City Council — bor-ing. At all costs, avoid the visit to the courthouse.

Guess who got picked for that?

‘Simeon,’ Miss Dalrymple said, ‘would you give the speech of thanks, on our behalf, when we leave the courthouse?’

It wasn’t a question either.

The only person who was pleased about the prospect was my mother Huria. When I told her about the speech she got it into her head that I had been singled out by sheer brilliance, and she gave the occasion more importance than it warranted.

‘Simeon needs a pair of long trousers and a blazer,’ she told Dad firmly. ‘He’s not a boy any more.’

It’s true my school pants had seen better days, and I was growing. Dad agreed, but the money for the scrubcutting was slow in coming. There was no way there’d be money for clothes unless Grandfather was approached for an advance.

‘We’ll pay you back soon, Father.’

‘It’s a waste of money,’ Grandfather answered. He was smarting over all the arguments we were having and all the corners I was pushing him into. I had developed the art of asking questions that had no answers or had not one but a number of answers. ‘The boy is getting too whakahihi. All this education is turning his head. You should take him out of school. Put him out to work like Mohi.’

‘Is that your last word, Father?’ Dad asked.

‘Don’t you start,’ Grandfather warned.

So it was that my mother made her first visit that winter to Miss Zelda. She put on her hat and gloves and stood breathing deeply before entering the store.

‘Why, hello Mrs Mahana,’ Miss Zelda greeted her. ‘Scott? Daisy? Mrs Mahana is here!’

Miss Daisy came scurrying from the back room. ‘We haven’t seen you for ages,’ she said. ‘We heard about your husband’s accident. Is he recovering well?’

Mum was swaying back and forth. Sweat beaded her forehead. Her eyes glazed over.

‘How can we help you, Mrs Mahana?’

‘I–I — I — ’

She had a piece of paper in her hands with my shoulder, waist and leg measurements written on it. Scott, noticing the paper, took it from my mother’s hands and asked, ‘Is this what you want, Mrs Mahana?’ His voice was gentle and reassuring. He was a mild man who hid his gentleness behind glasses and a bluff exterior.

‘I–I — ’ Her eyes blinked. ‘Yes. Thank — you —’

Pakeha customers came into the shop and, birdlike, Miss Zelda and Miss Daisy swooped on them.

‘You take care of Mrs Mahana,’ Miss Zelda told Scott.

‘It’s my department, anyway,’ Scott said to Mum, escorting her along to menswear. Together they chose a suitable dark jacket and long trousers.

‘Oh my,’ Miss Zelda said when Mum returned to the front counter. ‘You have such wonderful taste. Will you be paying by cash?’

‘I–I — ’

‘Mrs Mahana would like to charge her account,’ Scott said.

Miss Zelda’s manner changed. ‘Daisy?’ she called. ‘Is Mahana, Joshua, in the red?’

The Pakeha customers stopped to listen in. My mother looked down to the floor. Miss Daisy investigated.

‘No, sister.’

‘That will be all right then,’ Miss Zelda smiled. ‘It’s only when our customers are in the red, Mrs Mahana, that we cannot advance credit. You understand.’

She was firm and businesslike. She took the ledger book and entered, ‘One blazer, £21; one trousers, £6, comes to £27 exactly —’ She wet the end of a pencil and began to inscribe the amounts.

Scott coughed. ‘No, sister,’ he said, ‘the blazer is £15.’

Miss Zelda glared at him. ‘It says clearly in the stock book that —’

‘It’s my department, sister,’ Scott reminded her. ‘We have overcharged Mrs Mahana by £6.’

Miss Zelda rubbed out her pencilled amounts and changed them.

‘I wish you would run your department more efficiently, Scott. What will our customers think, eh, Mrs Mahana?’

Chapter 39

From the moment I boarded the school bus at Patutahi for our day out in Gisborne, Haromi and Andrew kidded me mercilessly about my new mocker — not that they had any reason to worry about my eclipsing their style. They had scored the visit to D.J. Barry’s.

‘Why tempt Fate?’ Andrew was intent on rubbing salt into the wound as I fumed about having to go to the courthouse.

‘And I’m the only Maori with the group going there,’ I groaned.

Andrew shrugged his shoulders. ‘Shit happens,’ he said.

Miss Dalrymple was a stickler for being on time. We dropped the other classes off on the way to the courthouse — the bus was getting whiter and whiter — and at five to ten we were pulling up outside.

‘Should you be addressed by the judge, you must refer to him as “Your Honour”,’ Miss Dalrymple said. ‘This is the title by which he is known. Everyone else may be addressed as either “Sir” or “Madam”. Our guide while we are at the courthouse is Clerk Simpson and he may be addressed as “Sir”.’ On she went — blah blah blah yackety yack. Slowly I was aware that she was looking directly at me –

‘No Maori is to be spoken.’

Jeez, can’t a guy even breathe?

‘I am very pleased to welcome you,’ Clerk Simpson said as we assembled outside the bus. ‘Court is in session right now, but there is so much else to see. I think we shall start in the chambers, shall we?’

We followed him dutifully around the side of the building. Just then two policemen came out with a young man handcuffed between them. He was about nineteen, and Maori. Our eyes connected. I knew him immediately. He’d been Haromi’s date on Christmas Eve.

‘Oh dear,’ Clerk Simpson said. ‘I’m sorry about that, girls and boys.’

We watched as he was pushed across the front lawn. I heard Miss Dalrymple clucking away when Clerk Simpson told her, ‘The boy has just been sentenced to jail for assault. He swore at his employer.’ As the police van sped away, the young man’s mother came running from the courthouse screaming his name.

‘Mihaere! Mihaere!’

The chambers were cool and comfortable, gentlemanly and tastefully decorated. Photographs, diplomas and plaques adorned the walls, reminding me of the drawing room at the homestead. The judge came away from the courtroom to greet us.

‘Judge Forbes,’ Miss Dalrymple explained to us, ‘has a short break before the court reconvenes. We are very lucky to have him say hello to us. Please thank him for taking the time.’

Thank you Judge Forbes Judge Forbes Forbes orbes orbes es.

His eyes twinkled.

‘Well, ladies and gentlemen,’ he said, ‘thank you for coming to see me on the right side of the bench.’

Ho ho ho, what a funny fellow.

Judge Forbes proceeded to tell us how important he was, why justice was important and why the judicial system in New Zealand was the best in the world.

‘Does anybody know why?’ he asked.

‘Because it is based on the Westminster system,’ said Bobbie Brown, who had been primed to respond.

‘And the Westminster system,’ Angela Simpson continued, ‘is practised throughout the British Commonwealth.’

‘Very good,’ Judge Forbes answered. He beamed at Miss Dalrymple. ‘We may have the makings of two fine lawyers here, what?’

Haw haw haw, jolly boating weather and all that.

Just to show how busy and important he was, Judge Forbes asked Clerk Simpson to show us the schedule of cases he had dealt with during the month.

‘Well,’ he ended, ‘I must read up on the next case. I understand you will be sitting in on my court?’

‘Yes, Your Honour,’ Miss Dalrymple answered. ‘But we will be quiet, won’t we, boys and girls?’

Yes Miss Dalrymple Dalrymple rymple pimple imple.

The judge swept out of the lobby, Miss Dalrymple bobbing as he went past. Clerk Simpson guided us to Judge Forbes’ schedule. One by one we filed past and oohed and aahed at the number of cases on his plate.

Judge Forbes

Presiding Judge

9 am

White v. Hakopa

10.30 am

Crown v. Wharepapa

1 pm

Crown v. Karaitiana

2 pm

Williamson v. Heke

On and on and on. Page after page after page of cases involving being drunk and disorderly, murder, intent to obstruct justice, manslaughter, casting offensive matter in public, grievous assault, car stealing, domestic dispute, indecent behaviour, theft, petty larceny, land dispute, attempt to defraud, and so on.

‘Simeon?’ Miss Dalrymple interrupted. ‘Don’t take up all the time. Let someone else look.’

I stepped to one side. The rest of the class had their turn. When we had become suitably impressed Clerk Simpson said, ‘Well then, let’s go into the public gallery, shall we?’

We filed into Courtroom No. 1.

This was the place of judgment. Here in this large quiet room panelled with polished wood and hushed with the weight of legal process, people were put on display, like deers’ antlers, their futures determined with a stroke of the gavel. Over there, higher than anybody else, was where the judge sat. In front of him sat the recording clerk. To the right and left were the prosecuting lawyer and the lawyer for the defence. At right a small corridor led to the room where the defendant waited to be called for trial. In front were the seats for the public.

‘Not a word,’ Miss Dalrymple hissed.

The public gallery was packed. I knew just about all the people there. All of them stared straight ahead, down a narrow funnel of vision, as if afraid to see who was sitting left and right. That suited me fine. I hunched down, hoping I wouldn’t be seen either. I felt as if I was on the wrong side.

The session that morning seemed to be one where the defendants had already pleaded guilty and were being processed for sentencing.

‘How do you plead?’

‘The defendant pleads guilty, Your Honour.’

‘Fined £100.’

The judge lifted his gavel, and bang. A pair of antlers on the wall.

‘How do you plead?’

‘The defendant pleads guilty, Your Honour.’

‘Term of imprisonment, one year.’

Bang, the gavel again. Another pair of antlers.

‘How do you plead?’

‘The defendant pleads guilty, Your Honour.’

This time the judge paused and looked gravely down at the defendant. ‘Your crime is a particularly heinous one in our society, young man. Assault on another person with intention to commit grievous harm must carry with it the maximum penalty available to the law. Five years imprisonment.’

Bang. More antlers for the wall.

At each sentencing the defendant bowed his head and nodded as if all this was to be expected. His family group did the same. They were passive in their acceptance of the law and of te rori Pakeha. The Pakeha’s place was to be the punisher and the Maori’s place to be punished. There was a sense of implacability about the process, as if they were always right and we were always wrong.

Why didn’t we fight back? We didn’t know how.

Bang Bang BangBangbang ang ang

By the end of the court session my whole world had been shattered. When Miss Dalrymple asked me to give my speech of thanks to Judge Forbes I shook my head –

‘No.’

‘Just do it,’ Miss Dalrymple commanded. The judge was still in his chair, waiting.

Do it do it it ititit it.

The courtroom was not quite cleared. A family group was sitting waiting for their son to come out from the holding room. He had been found guilty of indecent exposure. I knew the family and was embarrassed to have witnessed their shame. For most of the proceedings I had kept my eyes on the floor, flexing and unflexing my fists.

‘Simeon!’ Miss Dalrymple hissed again.

I wasn’t angry, really. Just lost and bewildered. I looked at the judge in his ridiculous wig and –

‘Sir, I am fifteen years old. I mean no disrespect. All my life people have been saying to me, “Do this, do that,” and I have for the most part appreciated their advice. But there must come a time when you have to do something not because other people tell you to but because you want to do it yourself. I have come to that time in my life.’

I tried to swallow. There was a huge stone in my throat.

‘Your Honour, I want to make choices for myself. To say “No” if I do not believe what is happening is right, even if other people are telling me to do it and that it is right. To say “Yes”, if I believe it is right, even if other people are telling me don’t do it. I have to start listening to me. I thank you for enabling our class to visit. But I cannot thank you for what we have seen today.’

By this time Miss Dalrymple was trying to get me to shut up.

‘There is something wrong, Your Honour, with a place like this, if the majority of the cases which come before you are Maori and are placed by Pakeha against Maori. I cannot thank you for being part of a court which enables this to happen. I cannot.’

Someone in the family group began to sob.

‘How can I thank you for all the Maori people you have jailed or sentenced for one crime or another? All those names in your book, do you know that I am related to all of them? Or that I know them? Sir, what is more, I know them as good people, not as names that you bang your hammer at or put in prison or make pay huge fines. That boy we met when we were just coming in, he was my cousin’s boyfriend, Your Honour. And what was his crime? That he swore at his employer! You call that assault? Are you telling me he should be sent to jail for that? If I thank you, what am I saying to my relations? My aunts, uncles and cousins who have appeared before you this month? That they deserved it? They didn’t —’ It was a cry from the depths of my heart. ‘They didn’t.’

I was almost done.

‘Therefore, Your Honour, I will not thank you.’

Miss Dalrymple was grim-faced as she apologised to Judge Forbes. He was thoughtful and answered –

‘No, the boy is entitled to his opinion. I commend him for that.’

I was told to go out to the bus at once and wait there.

The family group of the boy found guilty of indecent exposure was waiting beside the kerb, hoping to see him before he was taken away. The boy’s mother nodded at me, and as I passed she laid a hand to stop me. She kissed me and I felt her tears against my cheek.

Then somebody else was there. I knew who it was.

‘Ka pai tena korero,’ he said. ‘Ka pai. Kia kaha e tama. You spoke very well, young one. Very well. Your grandmother would have been pleased. Continue to be strong.’ He shook my hand and motioned that we should hongi. Then Saul Poata came out, and his mother, Agnes Poata, began to call to him.

I touched my nose and forehead in hongi with Saul’s grandfather — Rupeni Poata.

Chapter 40

It was my misfortune that somebody from Waituhi saw Rupeni Poata shaking my hand outside the courthouse. When I tried to explain to Grandfather, he wouldn’t listen. He raged and vented his anger on Mum and Dad for allowing me to go to Gisborne that day. His reaction, however, only added to my father’s rebellion against him. Grandfather insisted that Dad give me a beating, but Dad refused, saying I was too old to be thrashed.

Then, one night, I heard Mum and Dad whispering together. When Glory joined me to listen — I put a glass against the wall to hear the conversation more clearly — we realised that something was going on.

‘We can’t keep on like this,’ Mum said.

‘We must bide our time,’ Dad answered.

‘For how long?’

‘When the right moment comes, we’ll take it.’

At the family gathering that month, the moment came. Our father, haltingly, took it and changed our lives for ever.

Dad made his move just as the meeting was ending. The korero had, as usual, mainly been between Grandfather and Uncles Matiu, Maaka, Ruka and Hone. The rest of us — the younger aunts and uncles, spouses and children, grandchildren and friends — were the respectful audience, bound together by a common fear that Grandfather would turn his attention to us — and by relief that we had escaped some censure or other. Grandfather had asked my uncles to give an accounting of the contracts for the next season — how many contracts we had received, how many still had to be negotiated, whether there were any problems now that the agreement with the Poatas had broken down, and so on. The meeting had subsided into small-talk and my aunts were getting up to go into the kitchen to prepare the family kai.

Then I noticed Miriam, who was sitting scared-eyed and staring across the room at Pani. Grandfather was laughing with Mohi, remembering the brilliant sidestep the boastful bastard had made in the rugby game against Hukareka. Sitting next to Grandfather, Grandmother Ramona was serene and as silent as always — Grandfather and his Queen. From the corner of my eye I caught again that scared-eyed look of Aunt Miriam’s, this time directed at my mother. Aunt Miriam was in on something.

‘Kaati ra,’ Grandfather Tamihana said. ‘Kua mutu?’ I saw the light dying in Aunt Miriam’s eyes. ‘Are we finished then? Good. Let’s have the karakia and grace. This champion of ours —’ he slapped Mohi proudly on the back, ‘he’s getting hungry, ne?’

Grandfather went to kneel in karakia. We were following him down on our knees. Somebody coughed. Everybody looked up. Grandfather, surprised, wobbled and then stood. So did the rest of us. Aunt Miriam’s eyes widened with terror as if to say, No let’s forget the whole thing.

Somebody coughed again. Grandfather’s eyes swept the room. He saw my father Joshua next to my mother. Both of them were still kneeling, their eyes on the floor.

‘Is that you, Joshua?’ Grandfather asked. He seemed surprised. His voice was dark. ‘He aha te mate?’

My father and mother inched on their knees toward Grandfather. I saw my mother breathing deeply, her eyes firmly closed. When our father began to speak she exhaled a soft sigh.

‘I would like a piece of land, Bulibasha,’ Dad said.

I should remind you that my father was already thirty-three and my mother thirty-one. Dad was the ninth-born of Bulibasha and Grandmother Ramona. As far as male succession was concerned, he was the seventh son. His eldest brother Matiu was ten years older than he was. His eldest sister Ruth was six years older. In the way of all things he could be easily overlooked –

‘Oh, what’s your name again? Joshua?’

When the eldest children grow up, they are the ones who inherit the mana, the prestige, the land, the succession. When that is gone, what is left for the younger ones? The ones like my father, Joshua, or my spinster aunts Sephora, Miriam and Esther? Born to elderly parents, their role is to stay at home when the others have left. To look after the parents and, in the case of my aunts, to remain unmarried.

But let me ask you, can you realise what it must be like to be the seventh and last son. To be on your knees in front of your elder brothers and sisters? In front of your parents?

Yet there he was, Joshua who never said anything or asked for anything. Thirty-three years of age. Ninth child. Seventh son.

Joshua.

Grandfather returned to his seat next to Grandmother Ramona. He waited.

‘Korero mai, Joshua,’ he teased. ‘Korero mai.’

My father began. ‘All my life, Father, I have lived in this house and I am grateful for you and mother Ramona for the roof you have put over our heads and the food you have put in our bellies. The time has come when, like my brothers and sisters before me, I should leave your kindness and make my own home.’

His words were stilted. Careful. Respectful. I wished he would look up at me so that I could flash him a sign, Yes Dad, you can do it.

‘What,’ Grandfather asked, amused, ‘have you done that I should even consider your request?’

‘I have done nothing —’ my father answered.

‘Good,’ Grandfather interrupted. ‘I’m glad you are aware of it.’

My father’s elder brothers smiled.

‘Except,’ my father continued, ‘to obey your every wish.’ His voice was like a guitar string struck right at its centre where the note would vibrate loudest. ‘Like my brothers before me I have obeyed you in every respect. Like my sisters before me I have acknowledged and loved your authority. I have stayed under your roof and been your hewer of wood and tiller of soil and have done all of this because of my love for you and my mother. But the time has come when Huria and I —’

‘Did she put you up to this, Joshua?’ Grandfather asked. ‘Is she the one who has turned your face against me?’

My mother shook her head. ‘No, Bulibasha,’ she said. ‘We do not turn our faces away from you. We have four children now and the quarters we live in are too small for a growing family.’

‘I will build another room on to the quarters.’

‘We wish to be on our own,’ our father said.

Grandfather sighed. He was dismissive. ‘Enough of this nonsense,’ he said. ‘I need you here, Joshua. I need you to cut the wood, to plough the soil, to bring in the meat, to look after me, your mother and your three younger sisters. If you go, who will do the man’s work?’

The question hung on the air. I thought my father Joshua’s cause was lost.

‘I will do it,’ a voice said.

Grandfather’s head swivelled toward the voice. He gave a quick laugh of astonishment as Pani stepped forward.

‘I will do it,’ Pani repeated. He took his cap off his head, came forward and knelt beside Mum and Dad. ‘It would be a great honour to serve your family, Bulibasha.’

Pani was handsome, shy and, at that moment, aglow with strength.

‘But why would you do this?’ Grandfather asked.

Pani turned crimson. ‘Bulibasha, I wish to marry your daughter Miriam.’

‘Miriam?’ Grandfather laughed out loud. ‘Surely, boy, you know she must be ten years older than you.’ He turned to Miriam. ‘How old are you, daughter? Thirty? Is your womb still ripe or has it already dried up?’

At that moment I hated Bulibasha more than I had ever hated him in my life.

‘Why don’t you ask for Esther?’ Grandfather asked Pani. ‘She’s more your age.’

Pani lifted his eyes to Miriam. ‘Although I have respect for Esther, as indeed I do for Sephora, my feelings for them are as I have for sisters. The one I love is Miriam.’

Made radiant by Pani’s love, Miriam came and knelt beside him. Grandfather became very angry. He stared at my father and pointed a finger at him.

‘You put your sister up to this,’ he said. ‘Well, it won’t work. Even if I was able to let you go, where would you go? There is no land left. I have nothing to give you. Nothing. It has all gone to your older brothers and sisters. Yes, once there was land, a little piece of the broken biscuit that the Pakeha left us. But the major portion of that land has gone to Matiu, for he is the eldest and the one who will carry on after I am gone. And what was left has already been divided up. You were born too late, Joshua. There is nothing left.’

All I could feel were tears of frustration and my sister Glory jabbing me with her elbow: Do something.

What could I do? Nothing, except take Glory’s hand and together with Faith and Hope go to kneel beside our father and mother, Miriam and Pani.

‘We too ask this of you, Grandfather,’ I said. ‘If you won’t take Pani, take me. I will remain behind if you let my parents and my sisters go.’ Glory pulled at my arm. ‘And Glory will stay too.’

Grandfather roared with laughter.

I began to rage inside at our helplessness — my mother and father, kneeling here with Aunt Miriam and Pani, they would never be able to get away. Never escape. Never.

Then Grandmother Ramona stood up.

‘Enough, Tamihana,’ she said. ‘Stop playing with them like a dog does a cat.’

She began to walk across the room to where my mother and father were kneeling. She paused a moment beside them. The hem of her long skirt brushed beside my mother.

‘You might not have any land left,’ Grandmother Ramona said to Bulibasha, ‘but I do.’

My mother gave a moan and began to shake her head. But Grandmother was firm. Her voice softened and she patted my father on the shoulder. My mother caught at the hem of her skirt.

‘You can have my land, son.’

At the words, Grandmother swayed as if the giving of the land were a giving of some part of herself. My mother began to cry because she knew how Grandmother loved that land and its fruit trees and hives: it was Grandmother’s heart and sanctuary.

Then Grandmother recovered. Resolute, she swept the room with her gaze. Her voice was authoritative.

‘All of you are witness,’ she said. ‘The land down by the river I give to Joshua, Huria and their children.’

She was gone out of the room before Bulibasha could speak up against her.

Chapter 41

At the end of that winter, my father Joshua and mother Huria moved Faith, Hope, Glory and me from the homestead to the land down by the river.

Grandfather was angry at letting us go, constantly arguing with Grandmother and trying to force her to change her mind. He gave my father Joshua more and more to do, saying it all had to be done before we left. Dad was stoic and patient, despite the fact that Grandfather always found a reason to delay our departure. Finally, exasperated by our wilful and stony silence, Grandfather said to Dad –

‘Go then, go to your mother’s land.’

Mum suspected, though would never say it, that Grandfather wanted us to suffer through next winter. There was little time to prepare the land for crops that would take bud and be ready for the next harvest.

Grandfather was compensated when Pani moved in to take my father’s place. Poor Pani, he agreed to Grandfather’s terms — after one year, Grandfather would offer him ‘my daughter’s hand in marriage’ — without really knowing the extent of his impending servitude. Every morning he was up at six. He was always at Grandfather’s beck and call. He did chauffeuring duties when required. If he was lucky he managed to get into bed by nine. One stipulation, however, Pani fought. This was that he was never to be alone in Miriam’s company. Pani obtained half an hour after dinner to sit with Miriam on the verandah.

Love kept Pani at Grandfather’s stern wheel for the agreed year. At the end of the year Grandfather did indeed offer his daughter’s hand — but Sephora’s hand and not Miriam’s. Was not Sephora the eldest and therefore the one to be wed before her sister? There was something biblical about Grandfather’s gesture, a rightness that was nevertheless vindictive to the course of true love. Yet Pani persevered and agreed to work another year for Miriam.

On the day we moved to Grandmother’s land, my mother found it difficult to leave the quarters. She was a sentimental person and, as the afternoon wore on, became more tearful. No matter what it looked like or how small it was, the quarters had been the place to which she was brought as a young bride. Here she and my father Joshua had shared their passionate life and, from it, become the parents of four children. They had nursed, raised and loved us when we suffered through whooping cough, flu, an ailment which the Maori called puku and other sicknesses. On one occasion Mum had called in an old kuia with healing powers to succour the rasping breathing I developed — Grandfather would have had kittens if he’d found out. The kuia hooked a small finger deep into my throat and pulled out string after string of dry yellow phlegm.

A house, no matter how small or old, is filled with memories.

My spinster aunts were also unhappy about Mum and Dad leaving. We were moving only three miles down the road, but the farewells between Mum and Sephora, Miriam and Esther were agonising. The women had grown to depend on each other. Aunt Sephora, for instance, had been midwife at my birth when I came prematurely into the world. She had always considered herself to be my other mother. As for Aunt Miriam’s romance with Pani, that would never have happened had it not been for Mum telling Miriam to take the chance and forget about the difference in age, that here was a young man who saw beyond physical years to the person beneath.

Our spinster aunts were afraid too. They didn’t want to be left alone with Grandfather Tamihana, whose rages and periods of irrationality could never be anticipated. But Pani would be there, living in the quarters, and he would keep Grandmother and my aunts safe at the homestead.

Dad filled the car with all our possessions, a pitiful assortment of bedding, pots and pans, clothes and a few ornaments and trinkets, and drove on ahead while the rest of us walked along the road, herding Red in front of us. Glory rode Dad’s palomino and pulled the packhorse behind her. Our dog, Stupid, kept barking excitedly.

Grandmother Ramona accompanied us. When we arrived at the land she asked if she might be given a moment to say goodbye to her bees. Of course we agreed, expecting that even though we lived there she would continue to come down to the meadow to keep her hives.

‘No,’ she said. ‘When I gave you the land I relinquished all claim to it.’ When she said it like that, my mother started to cry again, the tears streaming like a river down her face.

The sun was hot that day and the meadow was brilliant with spring daisies and other wild flowers. A slight breeze rippled the long stems, making waves of yellow and green. Grandmother Ramona was not wearing her beekeeping clothes. She walked into the middle of the field and stopped for a moment, breathing in the fragrance. Then she began to karanga to the bees, to call them hither –

‘Haramai, haramai, e nga pi aroha haramai —’

At first there was silence. Then, from the four corners of the meadow rose a humming sound as wave after wave of bees came shimmering and swarming like golden clouds towards her. Grandmother lifted her arms, her lips and her face to the honey bees. They came to rest in her open palms, to kiss her lips and taste her tears.

Afterward, she said that she had only two requests. The first was that we would never cut the meadow. The second was that we would love the bees as she had loved them. They, in their turn, would give us the sweetest honey in the world.

Then Grandmother turned her back and started to walk away. I swear to you that the honey bees made such a sound, such a loud buzzing, that you would think they would die of love.

Since then, whenever I have had to let go of anything or anybody in my life, I have always tried to remember Grandmother Ramona on that day.

She never returned.

That night we had the earth for our floor, the stars for our ceiling and the Waipaoa rustling at our doorway. Strangely enough, my mother was not as perturbed about sleeping in the open as I thought she would be.

‘No vampire in his right mind is going to turn up when we have all of Grandmother’s bees to protect us,’ she said.

There was a derelict house on a small western rise which Dad planned to restore for us to live in. It had three bedrooms, a verandah which had been partially closed in as a fourth bedroom, sitting room, dining room and kitchen. One wall was completely exposed and would have to be rebuilt, and the roof over the back part of the house was missing. Elsewhere there were areas which would have to be patched. There was no bathroom or toilet, and washing would have to be done in the river. Nor was the old outside windmill operable; we would have to repair the vanes and pump to enable water to be drawn up from the river along the rise to the house.

The next morning, when the sun came up, we were ready to begin. The house had been used for storing hay and old clapped-out equipment — heavy pieces of iron, car and tractor parts, all the junk associated with farming. Sheep, birds and dogs had left copious droppings. Huge spiders’ webs were strung in all the rooms. The first task was to clean the whole place out –

‘Let’s get to it,’ Dad said.

I had been given another job — the digging of a drophole for the outhouse toilet.

Just then we heard the sound of cars driving up the track. Our gang, Mahana Four, had come to help us — Uncle Hone and Aunt Kate, Aunt Ruth and Uncle Albie, Pani and Miriam, Sephora and Esther, Sam Whatu and his sons Willie, David and Benjamin, Auntie Molly, Haromi, Peewee and Mackie.

‘Don’t tell Father,’ Uncle Hone said.

‘My name is Charlie Whatu,’ Aunt Ruth winked.

‘Just keep Mother Ramona’s damn bees away from us!’ Aunt Kate added.

By nightfall, the place had been swept and scrubbed, and repairs made to broken window sashes and doors. David and Benjamin had helped me with the drophole and Uncle Sam had rigged up a small private enclosure as a bathroom. An inventory had also been made of what had to be done to the house — new roofing, replacement of rotten wallboards and floorboards, glass for broken windows, new doors and so on. We also needed some fences; Mum wanted to keep some fowls. The list seemed endless.

‘There’s a lot of work to do, Josh,’ Uncle Hone said. ‘I’m glad you’ve got plenty of money.’

My mother and father tried to keep up a brave front, but the real situation was that we were hardpressed for cash, what with the repairs on the car and the extra tithe we were paying.

Then David said, ‘Hey, I think Dad’s got an old window frame you could have.’

And Benjamin said, ‘What about that old roofing iron stacked behind old Pera’s place? He doesn’t want it any more. That’ll do for now for the holes in the roof.’

Auntie Molly said, ‘I’ve got an old wood oven you could use, Huria. Oh yes, and a bath that is too small now — and don’t anybody make a crack about that, thank you.’

Even Haromi came up with something. ‘I’m going into town next Friday,’ she said. ‘I could steal some curtains from Melbourne Cash!’

One by one the inventory of what needed to be paid for began to reduce. By the end of the first week we had a real roof, doors that opened and closed, windows which had sugarbags over them and — a home.

Visitors began turning up with furniture they thought might come in handy. Maggie brought a coal iron. Uncle Pera brought a kerosene lamp and one day he asked me to go around to his place for a wardrobe with a full length mirror!

‘What do I need one of these for now?’ he wheezed. ‘I only gets a fright when I go past it and see that old man in it.’

The visitors would come to visit, pretend to be looking at nothing, but think, ‘Hmmmn, Huria and Joshua need a rooster for their hens —’ When they came back they would just happen to have whatever it was they thought we needed.

My mother was embarrassed about such magnanimity. ‘I’ve got nothing to give in return,’ she said.

‘Nothing?’ the visitors would say. ‘You don’t think we want anything in return, do you?’ But some of them would pause. ‘Well, actually, if you happen to have any of Mother Ramona’s honey to spare —’

Grandmother Ramona had gifted us not only land but also honey to barter with.

There were some items, however, that nobody could give us — fence posts, glass for the window panes and a new pump for the windmill. These things had to be purchased. I can remember clearly how proud we were, after many hours of frustration, when the windmill vanes began to revolve. We had been just about ready to give up and reconcile ourselves to carting water up from the river by drum when there was an imperceptible change in the wind’s direction. The machinery gave a jerk, loosening all the joints, and there was a wheezing like Uncle Pera. The sound of water came slowly gurgling through old systems and flushing up into the house.

Despite the fact that we began to go into debt with the wood mill and hardware store in Gisborne — and we plunged quickly into the red with Miss Zelda, Miss Daisy and Scott — such moments were magical. The final touch was Glory’s.

‘I want you to put this up,’ she said. She had a hammer and the sign she had given Mum and Dad at Christmas.

‘Whereabouts?’ I asked.

‘Over the front door, silly.’

Chapter 42

Spring came again, and with it the shearing. Once more the family gathered at the homestead with the families of Ihaka Mahana and Zebediah Whatu for the September thanksgiving meeting. The telling of the Mahana shearing history retained all its power and mana. At church, Grandfather gave his usual reading –

The Lord is my shepherd I shall not want,

He leadeth me beside the still waters,

He restoreth my soul –

Shortly afterward Haromi left school, tossing aside her school uniform with one hand and turning into an instant nymphet.

‘Watch out, world,’ she squealed, ‘here I come.’

Haromi tried to get a job in Gisborne, without success. She started to hang out with the bodgies at the Starlight Café. Two weeks later Aunt Sarah caught her sneaking in through the window after being out all night.

‘That’s it,’ Aunt Sarah said. ‘You’re coming out shearing. I’m not having you turn into the real Salome and shedding your veils for boys.’

Haromi and Aunt Sarah ended up fighting each other. Haromi moved to Mahana Four.

Dad resumed shearing and I was again the sheriff looking after the one-horse all-women ghost town of Waituhi. Grandfather didn’t let up on me either. One year in a boy’s lifetime, however, can make a big difference in the boy. I was sixteen now, and the ease and assurance with which I tackled the chores sometimes took my own breath away. Without realising it, I had filled out. I had also become taller and muscular and, ironically, seemed to be physically taking after Bulibasha himself. I loved it when old Pera told him this one day.

‘That boy’s the spitting image,’ Pera chortled.

Grandfather hated that. He hated the whole idea that I, the least malleable of his mokopuna, should become the one who resembled him most. I’m sure this is why he really rode me while the others were away.

‘You finished chopping the wood, Himiona? Good. We need three more beasts killed for the gangs. Then after that I want you to shift the cattle to the hill yard. And after that we need a long drop for the new lav —’

He tried in so many ways to run me into the ground. But something else had happened to me. As well as growing stronger and taller I had become resistant to his control and his mind games. Moving away from the homestead to our land had given my family freedom from Grandfather’s constant tyranny. In the wide gap that was developing between him and me, I was able to build a sense of independence, a sense of my own self. It was not just a matter of distrusting his decisions. It was a matter of trusting my own. That, though, did not stop him from hassling me, particularly on the question of my still being at school.

‘You’re useless, Himiona,’ he said. ‘Your father and mother are out there working their guts out. You’re old enough to leave school. What do you want brains for? You’ve got strong hands. Why don’t you help your parents?’

He almost won. One night when Dad came home from the Wi Pere station and our family were eating dinner I tried to give destiny a push.

‘We’ve got big bills,’ I began.

‘The shearing will put us right,’ Dad answered.

‘But we have no savings, and we still have to plant our crops for next year.’

‘I’ll do that,’ said Mum.

‘No,’ I answered. ‘It’s time for me to go out and work.’

‘Where?’ Mum asked.

I shrugged my shoulders.

‘In the shed with your father?’

Perhaps the way to win them over was to parrot Grandfather back at them. ‘Look at Bulibasha,’ I said. ‘He’s managed all right. If God had wanted me to have more brains, He would have given them to me at the start.’

‘No,’ Mum said.

‘But —’

‘Kaore. I don’t want you ending up in the shed, son. You deserve better. You and all of my children.’ Mum was trembling. She looked at my sisters. ‘All of you deserve better. Your dad and I want you to stay at school and get qualified. We want you, Simeon, to try for your School Certificate. Then maybe we’ll talk about your leaving school.’

‘But why?’ I asked.

‘Why?’ Mum echoed. ‘You want to know why?’

She pushed her chair, stood up, and got a piece of paper and a pencil. Then she sat down and slashed an ‘X’ with the pencil.

‘That’s why,’ she said.

Apart from not being able to read, my mother was unable to write even her own name. My father couldn’t either.

The next time I saw Grandfather I wanted him to know he had lost. I grabbed him with my parents’ obstinacies and wrestled him to a standstill.

‘I’m staying at school,’ I said. ‘Don’t try to make me feel guilty, because it won’t work. Mum and Dad want to support me.’

‘What a waste of money.’

‘It’s their money and their decision.’

‘And when you all starve over winter, boy? Words come easy when your belly is full, ne?’

I couldn’t help it. I laughed. ‘Why are you so frightened, Grandfather? Do you think I might be better than you?’

Grandfather was enraged at the suggestion. ‘You’ll never be better than me, boy. Whakahihi, that’s your trouble. Whakahihi.’ He raised his fists. I was no longer afraid. Sure he could still beat the outside me, but the me I was inside? He’d have a hard time there.

Our antagonism increased. Grandfather was always in my way, casting his shadow. He was like a giant wall of Jericho. I wanted to take up a trumpet and make that wall tumble down so I could get on with the business of growing up and becoming myself.

At the end of 1958, two events took place which brought competition between Hukareka and Waituhi to a climax and put thoughts of Bulibasha temporarily on hold. One was the seven-a-side Maori hockey tournament. The other was announced in the Gisborne Herald just before Mum, my sisters and I joined Mahana Four for the season:

New Golden Fleece Award

The New Zealand Wool Board today announced the holding of a national competition to select the best shearing gang in the Dominion. A substantial cash prize of £5000 and the Golden Fleece Shield will be awarded the winning gang. A gold statuette, christened ‘Jason’, will be given to the best shearer of the year, not necessarily from the winning gang.

The new competition has been inaugurated to focus attention on the wool industry and to encourage quality in shearing.

‘As a country which relies on its wool production for its overseas receipts,’ Mr Williams, Chairman of the Board said, ‘it is only appropriate that we should recognise the contribution of the shearing gang to New Zealand’s economy.’

Regional finals would be contested in all the provinces, Mr Williams said. Two finalists from each province will travel to Masterton for the semifinals and finals.

Chapter 43

It was the visionary Apirana Ngata who in the 1940s encouraged the seven-a-side Maori hockey tournament. What a man! His fingerprints were to be found everywhere throughout Maoridom — in politics, business, religion, education, culture and sport. A true Renaissance man for the Maori.

‘Tamihana,’ Apirana Ngata had said when he went to see Grandfather. ‘I have done you one favour and now I ask you a favour in return — a favour for a favour, ne?’ Tamihana agreed. ‘Our people need the spirit of competition to keep our pride and mana and to improve and develop our culture. This is the reason why the haka nights were started, and the hui topu for Maori Anglicans. I want the same thing started up in sport.’ Apirana Ngata’s eyes creased into amusement. ‘I’ve already been to see Pera Smiler and his sister Mini Tupara here in Waituhi. They have suggested hockey as the sport for the tournament because it is a game that all can play, men, women and children. Kua pai?’

‘Kua pai,’ Tamihana said.

Apirana Ngata was clever all right. Sport was just the excuse to get Maori together. Once that happened, the protocols of ceremonial gatherings took place and, before you knew it, a hui was happening.

Ngata well knew that Maori people loved to meet each other and loved to talk. In the formality of meeting, genealogies were exchanged so that one person could find the blood connection between himself or herself and another. Once that was achieved entire histories were exchanged. The tournament was therefore the place where the older people could reaffirm their personal and political relationships. Some hadn’t seen each other for years, so it was important to redraw the map of the present by finding out what had happened, who had died and who had been born. Over five days people discussed the past and the present — land problems, cultural issues, old grievances — all in the language of the iwi. At breakfast, lunch and dinner the old people talked and talked and talked. They would say, ‘Now that we have had kai for our bodies, let us now have the food of chiefs.’ They would lie in the meeting house way after everyone else was asleep, discussing and debating matters affecting the history of the Maori.

Meanwhile the younger men and women were playing sport and, coincidentally, falling in love or having sex. The old people were quick to see who was falling for whom. If they were caught sleeping together, there was nothing for it except to get married. The old people were stern that way. They loved nothing better than to sit around a young couple who had overslept in the morning. When that couple woke up: marriage bells.

In some cases the old ones went further. Sometimes a girl was introduced to a boy she had never seen in her life and told she had been taumau’d to him — promised to him as his bride. This was the way political alliances were maintained.

Apirana Ngata was one of the most successful marriage brokers of all Maoridom.

‘Come on, Mum!’ Faith and Hope yelled. Although I had grown taller, my two sisters hadn’t grown any prettier. They lived in hope and wanted to get to the tournament before all the boys were taken.

This year the seven-a-side tournament was held in Nuhaka. Grandfather and Grandmother — everybody in Waituhi — had left already, taking with them the shields and trophies that were stored in either Mini Tupara’s or Pera Smiler’s house. As usual, we were the last ones left to turn out the lights. Why did we still have to go over to the homestead, lock up and check that the stock were well fed? Would Mum and Dad ever finish?

‘Wait your hurry!’ Mum laughed. Her complexion was rosy and she was giddy with delight.

‘All set?’ Dad asked.

‘We’ve been ready for ages,’ Hope moaned.

‘Let’s put our foot down then, shall we?’ Mum said. With a zoom and a bit of a skid we were off.

By the time we arrived in Nuhaka the main meeting house was packed to capacity. Other marae were taking people in, and it was a matter of going from marae to marae to find our own iwi.

‘Where’s Waituhi sleeping?’ Dad asked.

‘Down the road at Hemi’s pa,’ we were told.

Before we even got there, Mum’s sister, our Aunt Jackie, saw us and screamed a welcome to Mum. ‘I’ve saved a place for you with us!’

As soon as Mum saw Aunt Jackie they burst into tears. They hadn’t seen each other for years. It was so embarrassing to see adults acting like children. Oh, the shame.

‘Didn’t Bruce come with you?’ Mum asked. Bruce was Aunt Jackie’s fourth husband.

‘Him! I think I might trade him in. There must be another man here for me. The local people are expecting to feed a thousand.’

‘Where have they all come from?’ Dad asked.

‘Palmerston North, Whakatane, you name it and they’re bound to be here. I saw Ruatoki and Murupara arriving earlier this afternoon and —’

‘Excuse me,’ someone said. A red-headed young man blushed as he walked past.

‘He’s come with the team from Auckland,’ Aunt Jackie said. ‘If there’s any red-headed kids born next year we’ll know where the shotgun wedding will be held.’

We unpacked, made our beds on the straw mattresses and hung our clothes on the line which ran down the middle of the meeting house. People always brought three or four outfits — hockey clothes, formal wear for the dance, and informal wear for lounging around in. The women took the socialising very seriously, making beautiful dresses of tulle or organza and painting their shoes with glitter. The men wore sports jackets to the dance — literally a white sportscoat and a pink carnation.

Glory started to sneeze — oh no, hay fever.

‘Kia ora!’ people called. ‘Kei te pehea koe?’

Within the melee I saw more dazed blond Pakeha wandering around the meeting house wondering what had struck them. They had been brought to the tournament by whanaunga who were now living in the cities of gold — Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch. They were just ripe to be caught by some young Maori girl or boy. My cousin Moana met David, her naval officer husband, when her brother brought a team from the naval base at Devonport.

‘He just fell into my arms,’ Moana laughed, ‘like an apple from a tree.’

‘Actually,’ David whispered, ‘she had to give the tree a good shake first.’

The dinner gong sounded. Over we went to the wharekai to join the throng and marvel at the meat, pork, fish, crays, watercress, kumara, potatoes, pumpkin which graced the long trestle tables.

‘Haramai konei!’

The local people urged us into their dining hall. Wasn’t the smell of hangi food, fresh from the earth oven, delicious? Look at all that other food! Titiro! Mmmm, Maori bread, fried bread, paraoa rewana, kina, oysters, pupus! And over there, pavlovas, steam puddings, trifles, jellies and soft drinks. Truly, the horn of plenty. How would we be able to lift our hockey sticks in the morning!

I saw more relatives — my cousins Donna, Cindy and Chantelle who used to be Don, Sam and Charlie Jones from Te Puia.

‘Hello, Auntie Huria,’ Chantelle said, and kissed Mum on both cheeks. She left more lipstick on Mum than Mum did on her.

‘What are you doing home?’ Mum asked.

‘We couldn’t miss the hockey tournament,’ Donna said. ‘Anyway business is slow —’ Chantelle hit Donna with her handbag. ‘Oops,’ Donna said. ‘Uh, we decided to come home to see how the folks were.’

My cousins worked days at Carmen’s Coffee Bar and nights up around the strip joints in Vivian Street.

Meantime, Cindy was eyeing me up and down. ‘This isn’t little Simeon?’ she breathed.

‘Yes,’ I squeaked.

‘Oo la la, enchant-é, formi-dable, mon enfant,’ Cindy answered.

‘Take no notice of that one,’ Chantelle whispered in my ear. ‘She went out with a French sailor last week and hasn’t been the same since.’

I saw Saul Poata ogling my cousins in a derisory fashion. Poppy was next to him and she jabbed him in the side: good on her. Most people were used to Donna, Cindy and Chantelle. Although they were loud and bright, like brazen and brilliantly coloured birds of paradise, they were still hometown boys. I was just about to go over and take a poke at Saul when Aunt Sarah’s voice cut through my anger.

‘We’re all wanted back at the marae,’ she told Dad. ‘Come quick. Now.’

In the meeting house the entire Mahana clan was clustered around Grandfather Tamihana, who was lying on his mattress. His eyes were wide and staring. Aunt Sarah was beside him, caressing his hands. We thought he had been taken ill.

‘What’s the problem?’ Dad asked Aunt Ruth.

‘Father has just found out that Rupeni Poata has been made chairman of the Takitimu Maori Council.’

The Maori council framework had also been a creation of Apirana Ngata. The Takitimu Maori Council represented the Gisborne tribes and was the forum through which Maori views could be channelled to government.

‘Why didn’t the other chiefs ask me?’ Grandfather said. ‘Why didn’t they consult me? Why didn’t I know that this was happening? Why have they done this to me?’

I had never seen Grandfather like this before. This was worse than mere physical illness. Somebody had made a voodoo image of Grandfather and was sticking pins in the doll. Here a pin at his right kneecap. Here another pin at his left leg. Now more pins thrusting through from front to back, viciously impaling eyes, mouth, ears, throat, loins — heart, head and soul. The doll was bristling with pins like a human hedgehog. Grandfather was in a state of psychic collapse.

By all rights, Grandfather should have been chairman and not Rupeni Poata. Somehow, Rupeni had persuaded the other elders to choose him. Was it because Grandfather was Mormon?

Grandfather raised his throat and howled. ‘My sons, my daughters, I feel so betrayed.’

In one fell swoop, Rupeni Poata had entered Maori public life and become top man in Gisborne. In doing so he had stolen Grandfather’s mana from him.

‘We must restore our father’s mana,’ Uncle Matiu said. ‘We must retaliate. We must shame all those who were involved in making this decision. We must also stand up for our religion. This year we must win the tournament.’

‘Hukareka must be beaten.’

Chapter 44

Mahana was putting two women’s and three men’s teams into the tournament. Neither Andrew nor I was picked for any of them, although we were school representatives. Grandfather didn’t think we were good enough.

Grandfather was still preoccupied by the news about Rupeni Poata. His eyes followed Rupeni wherever he went; he stiffened whenever his rival was congratulated for his new appointment. The thought came to me that Rupeni Poata defined Grandfather’s life. He had never dreamed that Rupeni would sidestep him by going into Maori politics — his exclusive arena — and that the other elders of Gisborne would agree to it.

‘You can do what you like,’ Grandfather said when I tackled him about Andrew’s and my omission and suggested we make up a fourth men’s team.

I saw Nani Mini Tupara from the non-Mormon part of the Waituhi Valley. She had entered two teams in the tournament.

‘Will you support me if I register a team?’ I asked.

‘Rebelling again?’ She laughed. ‘Sure I will. But if your team wins, I don’t want the trophy in a Mormon house. It comes to my house. Deal?’

‘Put it there, Auntie.’

When the tournament began next day with a parade on the main field, bystanders were left in no doubt as to Mahana’s intensity of purpose. There was something awesome about our march past the grandstand. Aunt Sarah had bullied us into wearing maroon sashes over our good clothes. She had inspected the Mahana teams and arranged them in height and order. Now, right out front, Aunt Sarah was bearing the flag which she had spent all night making — a huge golden angel glittered in the centre of a maroon satin banner. The angel was blowing a trumpet and, as the wind caught the flag, the angel appeared to be flying.

‘Whu —’ the crowd murmured.

Mahana won the march-past.

But who was making the presentation? When Grandfather went up to get the cup, Rupeni Poata shook his hand and then turned it into an Indian wrestling match. How the onlookers laughed! As for us, we should have felt triumphant that we had won the parade. Something in the mere fact that Rupeni had made the presentation made our triumph hollow.

It was all very well for Andrew and me to decide to field a team. The problem was, where would we find players at this late hour? Out of sympathy Dad and Pani said they would join us, but everyone else except Granduncle Pera, Mackie and Peewee had been taken. I was running out of time and out on the fields the games were beginning seriously.

Did I say seriously?

Two of the fields were paddocks from which you had to shoo the cows, sheep or hens before you could play. Sometimes the ball landed in the middle of a huge cowpat or down a rabbit hole. Some teams didn’t have enough hockey sticks, so either borrowed them from other teams who weren’t on their particular draw or played with battens or anything they could hold.

‘This is hockey?’ the red-headed Pakeha from Auckland asked, stunned. He was playing against the oldest hockey players in the world and, because they couldn’t run, three of them were standing in the goal. At least they were better than the players who hopped on, never having played at all. They were dangerous, slashing at the ball as if they were playing golf.

The majority of teams had uniforms, but some didn’t. Pity the poor referee: when two teams without uniforms played each other, he never knew who was on which side. They got confused too.

‘Which is our goal?’ they asked. ‘Are you on our side?’

People expected the preliminary rounds to be a hard case. People cheerfully lost by 50 to nil to the better professional teams. I was losing my battle, too, to find three players.

Then Chantelle came up.

‘Uncle Pera says you’re looking for players,’ she said. ‘The women don’t want us in any of their teams.’

‘Well —’ I hesitated, dumbfounded.

‘Honey,’ Donna said kindly, ‘we may shave our legs but we’re your last resort. Take us or leave us.’

‘We can run faster than Uncle Pera too,’ Cindy said. ‘All that practice running away from the police, eh girls!’

‘And most of the time in high heels,’ Chantelle added. ‘Well?’

‘I’d love to have you,’ I said.

The Waituhi Rebels were born.

As expected the professional teams started to come through the ranks, and by Saturday afternoon bystanders were barracking for their favourites. In the women’s division it was clear from the beginning that the major battle would be between Mahana and Hukareka. Every time one of the Mahana women’s teams met a Hukareka team everybody in Nuhaka could hear it. At first people laughed off the intensity of the Mahana teams as excess energy. Then Aunt Miriam hit a raised ball at the goal and caught Agnes Poata in the stomach.

‘Hey! Mahana! Go easy there!’ bystanders called. People at the tournaments were quick to be put off by bad manners or lack of fair play.

However, when Aunt Sarah fell on the ball and was attacked by Poppaea, The Brute, while she was on the ground, sympathies swung our way again.

‘Hoi! Play the ball! Leave the old bag alone!’

Then Aunt Sarah made us all laugh. She jumped up from the ground and came running over to the sideline. ‘Who said that! Who called me an old bag!’ She didn’t mind being called a bag, but she hated being called old.

Mahana won the women’s division.

So far so good. But the men weren’t faring as well. All the Mahana teams got through the first round, but in the second round Mahana Three and Mahana Four were knocked out by Hauiti and Hukareka. In the third round, Mahana Two succumbed to Te Aowera. In the second round that afternoon, the frontrunners were Hukareka, with two teams still in the championship, Te Aowera and Mahana One. A ding-dong battle was fought between Mahana One and Hukareka and, to great scenes of storm and agony, Mahana lost. The finalists were Hukareka One and Two, Te Aowera and –

Did I forget to tell you that the Waituhi Rebels surprised everybody?

There were two playoffs. One between Hukareka One and Te Aowera and the other between Hukareka Two and the Waituhi Rebels. The winners from each playoff would compete against each other for the top trophy.

That’s when Grandfather Tamihana and I had a showdown.

Five minutes before Waituhi Rebels were due for the first playoff, he started to heavy the team.

‘Joshua,’ he said, ‘I want you to change the name of your team to Mahana and to sack some of your players.’

What? My father wasn’t captain of the team!

‘You haven’t a hope of winning against Hukareka. Not with those three takatapui among you.’

His voice was loud and carried to where Donna, Cindy and Chantelle were standing. Maori homophobia had always been the worst part of their lives. When they heard Grandfather’s words they changed and seemed to diminish.

‘I want them replaced,’ Grandfather said. ‘Ruka, Aperahama and Mohi will play for them.’

‘But —’ Dad began.

‘No buts,’ Grandfather continued.

My father stood his ground. ‘I’m just the halfback,’ he said. ‘My son’s captain.’

‘Then you tell him,’ Grandfather answered.

‘No.’

‘Joshua, I’m ordering you —’

‘You tell him yourself,’ Dad said.

Furious, Grandfather turned to me. ‘Did you hear me, Himiona? You change the name of your team and get rid of those three.’

A crowd had begun to collect around us and Grandfather, aware of the attention, wanted to get the matter over quickly.

Chantelle trotted over and whispered in my ear. ‘We don’t mind, honey,’ she said.

The trouble was, I did. ‘No change,’ I told Grandfather. My heart was thudding in my ears. My mouth was dry.

‘What did you say?’

‘There will be no change in either the name or the team.’

‘You will make a laughing stock of me,’ Grandfather said. ‘I am ordering you to —’

‘Have you ever taken the time to watch us, Grandfather? No, you’ve been too busy watching Mahana.’

‘This is your last chance, Himiona.’

Just then, Nani Mini Tupara, alerted to what was happening, came running over. The light of battle was in her eyes and her temper was up.

‘Are you trying to muscle in on my team?’ she asked. ‘They’re registered under me, Tamihana, not you.’ I could see Nani Mini was enjoying having Grandfather on. She loved to get her own back on him for splitting the valley with that Mormon angel of his. ‘Anyway, cuz, it’s all the same, isn’t it? We’re all Waituhi, aren’t we?’

Meantime, the ref had heard what the ruckus was about and hurried over to assert some authority.

‘Sorry, Bulibasha,’ he said. ‘Mini’s right. This is her team, not yours.’

Grandfather knew he had lost.

‘Himiona,’ he whispered. ‘Why did you register under your Nani Mini? Why not under me?’ His voice sounded so adrift, like an anchor that has failed to take on the sea bed. I felt ashamed. ‘One day,’ Grandfather said, ‘you and I —’

He walked away.

Ask anybody who has played seven-a-side hockey and they will tell you that it is a difficult and punishing game. With only seven players each, teams have to be fast and fit to last the distance — fifteen minutes first half and fifteen minutes second half and not just for one game, either. In a tournament you played eight games or more a day. No good pulling all the stops out at the beginning and running out of steam as the day progressed. The main secret to success was having and keeping possession of the ball. As long as you had possession, you could control the speed and the destiny of the game.

Over the preliminaries I had developed an enormous respect for Donna, Cindy and Chantelle’s abilities to keep possession. Although they were transvestites there was nothing feminine about the way they slammed that ball. They were massive — and they could run.

Could they what!

I had every reason to expect that Waituhi Rebels would give Hukareka Two a good run for their money. What I hadn’t anticipated, however, was that Donna, Cindy and Chantelle would be so devastated by Grandfather’s dismissal of them that they would give up. From the moment they walked on to the field they didn’t even try. They thought everybody was laughing at them.

The Hukareka Two team, led by Alexander Poata, swiftly took possession. Despite attempts by me, Andrew, Dad and Pani to stop the fast Hukareka Two men — Alexander, Tight Arse Senior, Tight Arse Junior, Bill, John and two others I didn’t know — Hukareka Two scored one runaway goal after another. By halftime Hukareka Two were ahead by 15 to nil — a goal a minute.

‘Chantelle,’ I pleaded. ‘We’ve got to turn this game around. Please —’

By now people were laughing at Donna, Cindy and Chantelle. All along the sidelines, men were beginning to heckle us. Some were making effeminate gestures and mincing along like women. Grandfather, having washed his hands of us, was standing like a monument to morality and righteousness.

Nani Mini came over. ‘Huh? What’s wrong with your players?’ she asked. ‘They better pull their stockings up.’

Then I saw Mohi blowing kisses at us and I saw red. I walked up to him and socked him in the mouth. ‘You leave them alone, Mohi.’

‘Whu —’ the crowd rumbled.

Before Mohi could hit me back, the ref had blown his whistle to start the second half. Dad, Pani and Andrew were silent as I trotted back. I started to rearrange the team.

‘Why don’t we just throw in the towel?’ Pani asked.

‘No,’ I answered. ‘If we keep possession of the ball we can keep the score down. I’ll play centre forward; Dad, you play left inner; Andrew, you play right inner, and Pani, you play at centre half.’

‘What about —’ Andrew jerked his head at Donna, Cindy and Chantelle.

I shrugged my shoulders.

‘Play ball!’ the ref cried.

Tears of rage were stinging my eyes. I barged back and pushed Chantelle away from the centre forward position.

‘You bitches,’ I yelled at my cousins. ‘If you don’t want to fight for yourselves, get off the field. Go crawl back into your holes and die.’

I settled down to bully against Alexander Poata. All I could think of was winning the bully, shooting the ball out to Andrew, streaking into Hukareka territory and –

I felt a hand on my shoulder.

‘You better step aside, honey.’ Chantelle’s voice was kind, but there was steel in it. ‘You’re standing in my position and I don’t like it.’

I looked at Chantelle, uncomprehending.

‘Off you go now, there’s a good boy. Me and my girls are going to work.’

I moved back to centre.

‘Are we ready, girls?’ Chantelle asked.

‘Any time, any place, any way you want it,’ Donna and Cindy responded.

‘So why are we waiting?’ Chantelle said. ‘Let’s kick ass.’

The game took off. Chantelle bullied so fast that Alexander Poata was left literally standing in the middle of the field wondering what had happened. He looked like one of those cartoon characters who lose their pants and cross their legs: Eek. She pushed the ball past Tight Arse Senior and yelled to Cindy, ‘Go, girl!’

The ball cracked from Chantelle down the middle of the field. Cindy took off after it, picked the ball up and swerved and dipped past the remaining Hukareka Two players. Like an avenging angel she sprinted down the field and slam –

Hukareka 15, Waituhi Rebels 1.

‘One down,’ Chantelle yawned, tossing her hair, ‘fourteen to go. Ready, girls?’

The onlookers were stunned into silence. Then they let out a surprised roar. Nani Mini was laughing so loud she almost lost her teeth.

Hockey one, hockey two, hockey three and –

Again the ball cracked from Chantelle, but this time to Donna who hit it into the far corner and sped after it. Did I tell you that Donna had been a champion sprinter? None of those Hukareka players had a chance. Donna was there to pick up the ball and leisurely dribble it into the Hukareka goal.

‘What took you guys so long?’ Donna said as the panting Hukareka players caught up.

Alexander Poata was so pissed off about being beaten by a takatapui that he took a swing at Donna who ducked, kneed him in the balls and asked the other men, ‘Next?’ It was the kind of strength that people on the sidelines understood — even Grandfather Tamihana. They cheered and stamped their approval. Donna went to take a bow.

‘Never mind about that,’ Chantelle yelled. ‘We’ve only got another twelve minutes.’

Hukareka 15, Waituhi Rebels 2. We would never make it.

The game got harder, but we had the crowd with us all the way. People like to see born losers clawing back. Against all odds we managed to draw 15–15 in the last second.

‘Extra time!’ the ref allowed. Now the game would continue until the first goal was scored.

Nani Mini was beside herself. She upbraided Chantelle. ‘Why didn’t you fellas play like this in the first half?’

Chantelle looked at me with tenderness. ‘We can fight our own battles, Auntie,’ she said. ‘But sometimes it takes us a while to remember what they are.’

Today people still remember that semifinal game and the one that followed. They remember it not with laughter but with admiration for the team that came from the back and ended in the front. Mind you, people thought Waituhi Rebels had decided on our tactics from the very start.

‘That was clever,’ Granduncle Pera said, ‘to get Hukareka Two all tuckered out first!’

For two minutes the fight of the champions see-sawed from one end of the field to the other. There always seemed to be somebody from either side able to stop the ball from going into the goal. Then the ref blew his whistle and announced that the first team to hit the ball from the circle anywhere over their opponent’s back line would be the winner.

Hockey one, hockey two, hockey three.

I was so exhausted I could hardly stand.

Alexander Poata won the ball. Hukareka were on the attack. Then from out of nowhere Pani stopped the ball. He saw Donna waving from afar and hit it to her. But Donna was tired and the Hukareka players were catching up –

Suddenly Chantelle yelled, ‘Cops, Donna! Cops!’

You should have seen Donna take off — like a rocket. Over the circle and slam.

Oh yes, we won the finals too.

Chapter 45

In the early evening both Nani Mini Tupara and Grandfather, on behalf of Waituhi Rebels, went up to receive the coveted silver-studded shield at the prizegiving ceremony. I had mentioned to Nani Mini earlier why it was imperative that Grandfather join her.

‘All right,’ she agreed. ‘But your grandfather can fight his own battles, you know. Just remember our bargain — I get to take the shield to my place. That’ll fix the old paka.’

So Grandfather did win against Rupeni Poata, sort of, in the end. Not that Rupeni Poata seemed to care. When the official photograph was taken and everybody applauded he caught my eye and raised his arms to indicate his personal applause.

Dad was standing beside me. I turned to him and –

‘Thanks, Dad,’ I said.

‘You were the captain,’ he answered. ‘Not me. Father was wrong in thinking he could change the name of the team and the players. Sometimes there is no choice.’

‘There’s always a choice, Dad.’

‘Not when there’s only one right answer. You were right, son, and Father was —’

Dad still could not make the admission.

The community hall was packed that night for the celebration concert and dance. We young ones were looking forward to letting off steam — the Black Shadows were playing, which meant we’d be able to rock and roll.

Andrew and I had a long shower and doused ourselves with two bottles of cologne; Andrew also drank some. He hoped he would get lucky in Nuhaka. My thoughts, as usual, were on Poppy. I was combing my hair into a duck tail — in those days I had enough hair — when the toilet flushed and Chantelle came out hitching up her skirt. We looked at each other in the mirror. Nothing needed to be said. Chantelle winked and was gone.

I had brought my new pair of grey pointed shoes — they were so long in the toes the only way I could walk was with my feet splayed out at right angles. Andrew lent me his bright red shirt and lime green pants. When I walked into the hall I looked like traffic lights trying to make up their mind whether to show Stop or Go.

By eleven the dance was in full swing — and no sign of the Hukareka crowd. Then Poppy walked in on the arm of Rupeni Poata, and they started to waltz. Everybody went, ‘Aah.’

All of a sudden Rupeni stopped just in front of where Grandmother Ramona and Grandfather Tamihana were sitting. He bowed to Grandmother and, turning to Grandfather, congratulated him on the Waituhi Rebels’ win. I think it was only then that Grandfather considered his mana had been restored.

Just as he was leaving, Rupeni almost fell. As he passed by I saw that he was trembling.

The dance turned hot. Waituhi’s sense of competition against Hukareka was still running high, and the dance hall split down the middle. Waituhi lined up facing our partners — girls in one line and boys in the other. Hukareka did the same. We began to show off our dancing skills, trying to outdo the other side.

‘You think you guys are so great? Take this.’

The music got hotter and hotter. The steps grew more and more complicated. People started to leave the floor to the gun partners, and soon boys were throwing their partners in the air, leaping and falling into the splits and gyrating like tops. The Puerto Rican dancers on the rooftops in West Side Story had nothing on us. The hall was awash with verve and excitement. Haromi took my hand and pulled me into the middle. The band erupted into ‘Rock, rock, rock.’

‘Oh no,’ I said.

‘Oh yes, cuz,’ she answered. ‘All you have to do is stand still. I’ll do the work.’

Haromi was wearing a red dress that flared whenever she spun. She had learnt how to do French rock and roll and nobody could dance like she could. The floor cleared for us as Haromi dipped and circled and jumped into and out of my arms.

‘Go, girl, go!’ everybody chanted.

For one shining, elated moment both Waituhi and Hukareka forgot our differences. When Haromi span like a top — shedding her veils, as Aunt Sarah would have said — we were simply young men and women who felt so lucky to have been born in these modern times. We were kids from many villages, roaring our heads off.

Afterward, Poppy came up to Haromi and said to her, ‘Next year I get to wear the red dress.’ She turned to me. ‘You were pretty good too.’

The dance ended at one o’clock in the morning. Both Andrew and I had struck out in the girls department. I had met a few whom I liked but shyness always had a way of tying my tongue into knots. So my cousin Andrew and I wandered off down the road towards the meeting house. Half way along we heard rustling in a paddock and the sound of a loud slap. A red dress came through the furrows towards us.

‘Men,’ Haromi said. ‘Always after one thing. Look at my dress. Gotta smoke?’

We went to sit on a bank, watching the crowd as they drifted to the complex of marquees around the meeting house. The mood between the three of us sweetened and I felt absurdly happy.

‘Hey guys,’ Andrew said, ‘did you know —’

This was the way he always began whenever he had found something out.

‘Know what!’

‘You won’t believe this —’

‘Believe what!’

The moon came out and flooded the nightscape.

‘Grandfather and Grandmother aren’t married,’ he said.

‘Bulldust,’ I answered.

‘They had all those kids,’ Haromi added.

‘It’s true,’ Andrew said.

I scoffed at the notion. ‘Grandfather is too religious to live in sin.’

‘I heard Aunt Ruth telling Aunt Sarah,’ Andrew insisted.

‘So are you saying,’ I began, ‘that after Grandfather stole Grandmother away from the church they didn’t get married?’

‘Yes.’

‘But why not!’

‘Search me.’

Haromi, Andrew and I stared at each other, unable to comprehend. Haromi began to laugh and laugh with absolute and unyielding delight.

‘Oh fu-uck!’ she yelled. As if she’d heard the most marvellous news of her life.

Chapter 46

Everybody in Poverty Bay was talking about the Golden Fleece competition — everybody, that is, except Grandfather Tamihana. When Uncle Matiu raised the matter at our family meeting and asked Bulibasha if Mahana was entering, Grandfather laughed and said, ‘Why should we go into a Golden Fleece competition? We’re already the best! Waste of time even having a competition. They should give us the prize and save money.’

‘Father,’ Uncle Hone answered, ‘we have to be in to win.’ All the families in Waituhi were feeling the pinch and had pinned their hopes on this shearing competition.

‘In?’

‘In the competition. If we don’t register we can’t compete.’

Grandfather stood up. ‘This is nonsense,’ he said. ‘I will hear no more of this. If the Wool Board want the Mahana family to compete, they can come to ask me.’

In the end his hand was forced. Rupeni Poata, who never stood on his dignity, made it clear that Hukareka would enter the competition.

On Friday night, the closing day for entries, the Mahana clan gathered at Waituhi and drove together to Gisborne to register for the Gisborne-East Coast provincial finals. The venue for registration was the city council chambers, and the mayor had decided to make an occasion of the event. He’d even organised a local orchestra to play oldtime songs just outside the signing area.

Outside the chambers, Grandfather took Grandmother Ramona’s hand, and arm in arm they walked up the entrance to where the mayor was waiting. Grandmother was wearing a hat with a veil covering her face.

‘How do you do, Tamihana,’ the mayor greeted him.

‘All this trouble just for me?’ Grandfather responded curtly. ‘Why didn’t you just nominate one of my gangs to represent the province?’

‘Are all of them entering?’ the mayor asked.

‘Yes.’

The forms were duly signed. The mayor kept talking to Grandfather until –

‘Ah, here he is,’ the mayor said.

Pulling up outside were Rupeni Poata and his family. It was clear that the mayor had arranged a publicity stunt. Rupeni, resplendent in pinstripe suit and with a white carnation in his hand, got out of his Buick with a radiant and proud Poppy.

‘I see,’ Rupeni Poata said when he reached the signing area, ‘that my old friend Bulibasha will be endeavouring to claim the prize.’ His tone was light, but Grandfather took it as a challenge. He stiffened and made ready to escort Grandmother out. At that moment a photographer from the Gisborne Herald called out –

‘Gentlemen, can we have a photograph?’

‘I wish you the best, Tamihana,’ Rupeni Poata said. He extended his hand in friendship. Grandfather had no option but to shake it. The flashbulb flashed.

‘Let us go,’ Grandfather said. He took Grandmother’s arm again.

Just as we were leaving, the wind lifted Grandmother’s veil so that we could see her pallid, grief-stricken features. The orchestra struck up another song. Until that moment Rupeni Poata had maintained his diplomacy and manners. The melody came soaring out of the violins.

— Ramona, I hear the mission bells above –

Oh no.

When I looked back, Rupeni Poata had regained his composure. Poppy by his side, he watched as we stepped into our cars and sped away into the night.

The next day’s edition of the Gisborne Herald carried the photograph of Grandfather shaking hands with Rupeni Poata on the front page. The accompanying report was headlined:

Friends wish each other well in Golden Fleece Competition

Pictured above are two of the best known Maori citizens in the district, Mr Rupeni Poata and Mr Tamihana Mahana. As a young man Mr Poata was a well-known sportsman and he and Mr Mahana were often pitted against each other. Their friendly rivalry will again take place when their shearing gangs compete for the Gisborne and East Coast Golden Fleece provincial finals …

The photograph showed a handsome Rupeni Poata and a scowling Bulibasha. You can just see my face peering between the two of them. Grandfather was annoyed that he was mentioned after Rupeni Poata and that it was Rupeni whose sporting exploits were mentioned.

No useful purpose will be served by describing the Gisborne and East Coast regional competitions in full, except to say that thirty gangs entered, including four from Mahana and three from Hukareka. The mayor was disappointed that not more teams had put themselves forward. His publicity stunt backfired. He had hoped that the photograph of the Mahanas and Poatas registering would encourage others. Instead, when other gangs saw we had both entered, they decided not to bother.

The shear-offs were held at the Gisborne Show Grounds. Grandfather’s entire energies went into supporting Mahana One. He had never seen Poata One shearing and, when he did so, he was alarmed at their speed. He began to crack his whip over the heads of Mahana One to encourage them to increase their speed too. Again, Grandfather was applying the age-old Mahana tactics — get out in front while you can, and stay out in front.

Public interest in the regional finals was so high that each shear-off was fully packed. Every Saturday for a month, cars and trucks turned in at the main entrance. Ticket sales increased as the regional semifinals approached. The competition appealed to the pride of the Gisborne and the East Coast citizenry — of course a Poverty Bay or East Coast team would win the coveted Golden Fleece award! After all, Gisborne was the home of the best shearers, wasn’t it?

Local bookmakers had a field day accepting bets on this shearing gang or that. The punters were favouring Poata One, Mahana One and the Lawson Syndicate, a Pakeha gang which had been specifically brought together for the competition. Suffice to say that in the finals the Lawson syndicate lost out to a Mahana and a Poata shearing gang.

Poata One, of course, led the field. Much to everyone’s surprise, however, it wasn’t Mahana One that won through but — wait for it — Mahana Four.

With the Gisborne and East Coast provincial finals behind us, the family gathered to celebrate at the homestead. The meeting was one of the largest ever. As always, the other patriarchs, Zebediah Whatu and Ihaka Mahana, were in attendance with their families. Then Grandfather Tamihana entered with Grandmother Ramona and the mood was shattered. Grandfather called Uncles Matiu, Maaka and Ruka forward into the middle of the floor.

‘I am very disappointed in my sons,’ he said. Disappointed? Grandfather was appalled that the gang to which he himself was attached had missed out. It was incomprehensible that the premier Mahana shearing gang should have lost.

Bulibasha stood up and looked down at his kneeling sons. None of them dared to look up at him. ‘What happened to you three? What happened to your shearing gangs, eh?’ His questions lashed out. Uncle Matiu flinched. ‘What happened to Mahana One! Mahana One is supposed to be the top gang. You should have been in the finals. Not Mahana Four.’

‘Ma te wa,’ Zebediah Whatu intervened. ‘It wasn’t entirely their fault. Who was to know that Mahana One and Mahana Two would draw to shear against each other in the first round? One knocked the other out. Then Mahana One had to face Mahana Three in the second heat. Same thing. The luck of the draw, Bulibasha.’

‘I don’t like luck,’ Grandfather thundered. ‘Luck isn’t going to help Mahana Four. What hope have they got against the top Poata team? Poata One is the best I’ve seen.’

The entire sitting room was startled at this admission.

‘All in the past, Bulibasha,’ Ihaka Mahana said. ‘At least we have a team in the finals.’

Grandfather Tamihana would not be pacified. He raised his left hand in a chopping motion.

‘I’m very disappointed. You’ve let me down. One of you should have got through. We should have two Mahana teams in the finals. All our best shearers are in your teams — our best wool classers, sheepos, the works. Instead Mahana Four must battle with Poata One. My constant foe is the front runner. There’s only one thing to do.’

Grandfather sat down on his throne and looked at each one of us in turn, staring us down, trying to impose his will. I would not turn away from his glance.

Grandfather laid it on us. ‘I want you, Matiu, to take over from Hone as leader of Mahana Four. Matiu, Maaka and Sarah, you three are to replace some of the members of Mahana Four.’

Thus saith the Lord. No ifs, no buts, no maybes. Trying exactly the same tactics as with the seven-a-side hockey tournament. There was absolute silence.

Grandfather looked to Zebediah Whatu and Ihaka Mahana. ‘Do you agree? You know, don’t you, that ever since I started the Mahana shearing gangs, we have always been first in the district? If Poata One wins, I will never be able to hold my head up in this province. I am not going to trust to chance. The Poata team is fast and good. They are much faster than Mahana Four. The reputation of the Mahana shearing gang rests entirely on our ability to take the crown — the Golden Fleece.’

The family, abashed, nodded in assent.

Yes Bulibasha Bulibasha basha basha asha.

‘Then it is done,’ Grandfather said.

I was sitting at the end of the room, way down by the kitchen.

‘No it isn’t,’ I said. I stood up, my head higher than the Lord of Heaven’s.

‘Let it be, Himiona,’ my father Joshua hissed.

‘Listen to your father,’ Uncle Hone added. ‘It doesn’t matter who leads the team as long as it is a Mahana team.’

I was not going to let Grandfather get away with it. ‘Mahana Four has deserved its place in the finals. It was judged to deserve that place and was given that recognition.’

‘Mahana Four got lucky,’ Grandfather said. ‘Luck will not win this competition.’

‘It was not luck,’ I answered, standing my ground. ‘Mahana Four trained hard for the provincial finals, as hard as anybody else in this room. I have to stand up for that and for the members of Mahana Four.’

‘There will be no discussion,’ Grandfather said.

‘Yes there will.’

‘Himiona,’ Dad called.

I had taken a step past my kneeling uncles. I took another step to where Zebediah Whatu and Ihaka Mahana were watching. No more would I approach Bulibasha on my knees. No more would I be subservient.

‘Why are you doing this, Grandfather? Why must you always make the world go your way? Why don’t you admit that you can be wrong? All these dictatorial commandments —’

‘Whakahihi, Simeon,’ he shouted. ‘Whakahihi.’

‘And that word,’ I continued, ‘why do you always beat me over the head with it? What’s wrong with being whakahihi? Your world is changing, Bulibasha. I’m one of the ones who is changing it.’

I paused. I took a breath. I had gone this far; I may as well go the whole hog.

‘Legally, Mahana is bound to send the same team to Masterton that won. That team is Mahana Four. The rules do not allow substitutions.’

‘Rules are made to be broken. I am the law.’

‘No you’re not. Even if you were, you are not above it. If you persist, Grandfather, the authorities will disqualify us.’

‘What they don’t know won’t hurt them.’

‘But they will find out.’

My mouth was dry. I was about to commit the ultimate heresy.

‘Tell me how?’ Grandfather asked. He was dangerous. His eyes glittered.

‘I will tell them.’

‘The family always comes first, Himiona.’

‘Yes, Grandfather, it does.’ I answered. ‘But not even the family is above the law.’

I knew that I had gone too far — over the lip of the known world and into insanity. Behind and around me was a forbidding hush. I realised I was alone on this issue. When Grandfather Tamihana came for me, hip-hopping across the room, I knew that this was just between me and him — nobody would come to my defence.

Grandfather lifted me up by the scruff of the neck. He pulled me out of the drawing room, past Mum and Dad and into the kitchen. He threw me out into the back yard. When Grandmother tried to stop him, he roared, ‘Stay out of this.’

He turned to me.

‘Ever since you were born —’

Jabbing me like a boxer.

‘You have been like a viper at my bosom —’

Hitting my stomach, my chest.

‘Every time I want something —’

Feinting at my face.

‘You are always there to confound me —’

The first hit to my temple. Blood pouring from the cut.

‘Not any more.’

Slowly and methodically Grandfather began to take me apart. Oh, I could have fought back, but what was the use? Grandfather would have beaten me to pulp in time. Better to let him get it over with. It was faster this way. I tasted blood on my lips. I saw everything in a haze. The family had come out to watch, standing there on the verandah.

Yes, I suppose I had this coming. After all, the family did come first and I had challenged that commandment. Yes, I suppose I did deserve it, but oh shit standing up for your principles hurt –

Then I heard somebody screaming and yelling. Someone small was running across the back yard.

Glory.

‘You leave my brother alone!’

She jumped onto Grandfather Tamihana’s back. She put her legs around his waist and began to claw at his eyes.

‘Run, Simeon,’ Glory cried. ‘Run!’

She was a raging cyclone of fists and fury, spitting like a kitten. I tried to warn her that she was in danger, but my mouth was filled with blood.

No, no, Glory. Play dead, darling. Play dead.

The bastard was hitting her too. He reached behind, tore Glory from his back and threw her against the pump. She squealed with shock.

‘Glory, no —’

I ran to my sister. Grandfather was after us.

‘That’s enough, Father.’

A strong arm came behind Grandfather to restrain him.

‘These are my children, Father. So help me God, I will kill you if you raise another hand against either of them.’

My father, Joshua, was standing between us. His voice was all choked up. He was trembling with sorrow.

‘Get out of the way, Joshua,’ Grandfather threatened. ‘That boy needs to be taught a lesson.’

‘Please don’t make me do this,’ Dad said. ‘Please —’

Grandfather tried to push past him. My father’s fist came up. He cracked Grandfather on the jaw. Grandfather fell. He was like a huge tree, crashing in slow motion to the ground. The silence surrounding his fall was thunderous.

Dad started to sob. ‘Oh God forgive me —’

Slowly, the family emerged from the verandah. My mother and Grandmother Ramona came to me, Glory and my father Joshua. Zebediah Whatu, Ihaka Mahana and aunts and uncles gathered around Grandfather to help him up and into the house. Uncle Hone put an arm around me.

‘It will be all right,’ he said.

A spell was broken that night — a spell that had been cast for a long time. The spell had to be broken so that we could all grow. But as with all momentous changes, the breaking of the spell came with great sadness. The children of Ranginui, when they separated their father sky from their mother earth so that they could walk upright, must have felt exactly as we did on that night.

Chapter 47

Three weeks later a huge crowd from Gisborne and the East Coast came to farewell the special steam express which was travelling from Gisborne to Masterton via Napier, Hastings, Waipukurau and Dannevirke carrying the two teams from Gisborne who were representing the province in the Golden Fleece competition. The whole town was caught up in the excitement, no doubt assisted by the local newspaper editor who likened our journey to that taken by the Greek hero Jason and his valiant argonauts, who sought and finally won the golden fleece. Even the mayor could not resist the opportunity for some classical allusion of his own.

‘The hopes of the district go with you,’ he said. ‘On your return, we will look for a white sail of victory rather than the black sail of disappointment.’

The brass band played. Red and blue bunting fluttered in the breeze. The train conductor called, ‘All aboard!’, and the express began to chug out of the station. The people on the platform were like tiny flags. We burst out of the suburbs into the green country. The steam from the engine was a white pennant curling in the sky.

All of Waituhi was on that train. Carriages five and six were taken by the Hukareka people, including Rupeni Poata. Behind them were supporters from all over the province. We took up carriages three and four, both the Mormon and non-Mormon sides of the valley. Among us was Nani Mini Tupara. Stay at home while everybody was at Masterton? Get off the grass. Religious differences aside, we were all family, deriving common ancestry from Mahaki, the leader of our iwi.

Grandfather Tamihana and Grandmother Ramona, being VIPs, were up in the first carriage with other provincial officials. Aunt Ruth was with them. She had the pip with me and was still siding with her father.

I think all of us were glad that Grandfather was not sitting with us. After the family meeting Ihaka Mahana and Zebediah Whatu had tried to reconcile him with the legal situation about Mahana Four: no substitutions would be allowed. He remained adamant. In the end I suggested a show of hands be taken and, for the first time, Grandfather Tamihana realised he had lost against his own family. Is this how democracy begins?

‘Mahana Four will never win,’ he said when the results of the vote were read to him. ‘However, if that is what all of you want — to support a losing team — then so be it.’

When I think back on it, I know that Grandfather Tamihana was right to be anxious about the composition of Mahana Four. We had gone into the provincial competition with our usual crew — Uncle Hone, Dad, Pani, Uncle Albie and Sam Whatu as our shearers; Haromi and Frances as sweepers; Aunt Sephora as our wool classer aided by Mum, Miriam — Aunt Ruth had gone back to Mahana Two — and Esther, and David and Benjamin on the press. I was still the sheepo with my two mates Peewee and Mackie and, even though she hated the attention, Glory was a grim presence concentrating on her dags. By contrast, both Poata One and the Lawson syndicate were made up entirely of adults. The Brute was doing the dags, for goodness sake.

Being in the national finals was different. No way could we hope to compete and expect to win — not with Haromi still throwing the occasional fleece upside down or Uncle Albie’s slow pace. But there was no turning back. It must have been luck, after all.

At the last moment, Hukareka asked the judges if they could make two substitutions. The judges agreed on condition that Waituhi also have that option available to them. Thus Uncle Albie stepped down in favour of Uncle Matiu and Aunt Ruth replaced Frances. Grandfather at least got part of his way. Wily as he was, he also tried to have Mohi take over either David or Benjamin’s position on the press. Their father Sam would not have it.

Even at the railway station Grandfather was still scheming, trying to convince Uncle Hone to relinquish his rights as leader to his eldest brother Matiu. From somewhere in the stratosphere Uncle Hone found the strength to say, ‘No, Father Mahana. You gave me Mahana Four. You said it was mine. You cannot tell me to step down from being the head of Mahana Four. It is my family.’

I had indeed brought down Olympus.

Publicity about the special train to Masterton had spread over all the island. Whenever the train stopped along the way people were there to wish us luck and congratulations. Some were relatives from Waituhi who were pining just for a short glimpse of a mum, dad, aunt or uncle. In the end — what the heck — some jumped on and came down with us.

At Waipukurau there was a surprise visitor — Lloyd, in a wheelchair, trying to make sounds with his mouth. Mahana Two were overjoyed to see their old friend. The women shed a tear or two. The men yarned to him as if he was the same old Lloyd. When he saw Grandfather Tamihana and Grandmother Ramona he tried to take Grandfather’s hand to kiss it.

‘Th-an-k y-ou,’ he enunciated. He was still on the payroll.

The carriage was quiet after Waipukurau. Lloyd had reminded us of our mortality. He had also made me remember the deep love and respect that people had for Grandfather. When had my relationship with Bulibasha started to go wrong? Or did the ‘when’ really matter? The relationship was broken — that was the reality. And it was not entirely my fault. Grandfather just did not want the world to change. I was a new generation. Somewhere between both lay the reason.

‘Masterton next stop,’ the conductor called.

‘Here we go,’ Uncle Hone gulped.

We started to clean up our carriages and change for the reception we knew was awaiting us. When the train steamed to a halt it seemed that all of Masterton was there — including, to Haromi’s delight, an international film crew who asked her to pose for them on a bale of wool. In a trice her cleavage deepened and her skirt developed a split up the side.

‘I’m the mother! I’m the mother!’ Aunt Sarah cried. She tried to join her daughter in the photograph. Like a true professional Haromi just happened to cross her legs — and kick Aunt Sarah off the bale. There were no flies on Haromi.

The mayor of Masterton said a few words of welcome and offered us all the hospitality of the town.

‘I hope you will not mind,’ he said, ‘but we have a ticker tape parade arranged for all the teams and supporters tonight.’

Did we mind? Not a bit.

People were lined on either side of the road, cheering like mad as we joined the other finalists in a cavalcade of floats down the main street. For this inaugural contest the floats comprised a historical pageant, showing the coming of the first sheep to New Zealand and the development of the wool industry. Some of the floats had models parading woollen garments. Others had bands playing songs like ‘Click Go the Shears Boys, Click Click Click’. There were marching girls, high-stepping along with us, and highland bands playing Scottish songs. Way up front were the Kahungunu Maori Culture Club, singing their hearts out.

The buses were going so slow that Andrew and I pleaded to be let off to march along with the parade — our legs needed the exercise. At that suggestion everybody wanted to pile out too, even old Uncle Pera. Somewhere along the way Haromi got lost, and when we next saw her she was being filmed blowing kisses at us from a long white limousine. How did she manage to get there?

Somebody bumped into me from the back. Poppy. She was laughing and so excited that we did a little dance together in the middle of the street. Full of bravery I pulled her to me and kissed her. She struggled but I held on. I was enjoying it. I had heard that you were supposed to put your tongue down the girl’s throat, but Poppy’s teeth were clamped tight. Aha, but on the side there was a gap and — ouch! Poppy was furious.

‘Oh, you —’

She pushed me away and slapped me hard. Then she ran off.

At last the parade reached the showgrounds where the competition would take place. Streamers were flying, banners were waving and at the entrance was hung a huge golden cloud, glowing with fluorescent lights. The Golden Fleece. Just at that moment three jet planes from Ohakea airbase whooshed across the grounds and vertically into the sky. The planes took my heart up with them.

Later that night, following the official reception, fireworks lit the showground.

‘Are we really here?’ Glory asked.

‘Yes,’ I answered.

She saw that I was lost to the stars. ‘Don’t forget your promise,’ she said.

‘What promise!’

‘You said you would never leave me, Simeon.’

I took Glory’s hand.

We had arrived.

Chapter 48

Imagine this if you can. A bright Wairarapa morning. The sky has just been washed, rinsed and hung out to dry. A traffic officer, all spit and polish in white uniform, directs the line of cars which, today, are all heading to one place — a stadium with a sparkling golden cloud hovering over the entrance.

‘There it is!’

The traffic is directed to park in fields next to the stadium. Family groups are walking swiftly to the entrance, queuing for tickets, bustling through the turnstiles to get a good seat.

‘Let’s find a good seat, Dad. Over there! See?’

The women wear floral dresses and hats. The men wear long trousers and sports coats. The teenagers and children assume an insouciant air, dressed in fashions straight out of the New Zealand Woman’s Weekly. Families have brought hats against the sun, and picnic baskets.

‘Would you like a programme, madam?’ The programme sellers are pretty teenage girls from the local schools. They wear Golden Fleece sashes across their shoulders.

‘Thank you, dear!’

The children want ice creams and pink candyfloss. They settle down for the curtain raiser about to begin.

‘What’s first on the programme, Dad?’

A marching team is performing intricate manoeuvres on the green, right in front of the main seating area. The girls look smart and pretty with braided military jackets, white skirts and white boots. Their leader twirls her baton and blows short sharp whistle commands. The team’s choreography dissolves from military two-step into a ferris wheel pattern, a high-stepping box pattern and back into a perfect single line slow-marching towards the stadium.

‘Oh well done, girls!’

While the girls are marching, local carpenters are still hammering away and adding the final touches to the three stages which have been erected in the middle of the arena.

‘Goodness, will they be finished on time, Dad?’

The stages, marked Stage 1, Stage 2 and Stage 3, are arranged facing each other in a horseshoe shape. This way the shearing gangs can keep an eye on one another as they compete in the heats. The arrangement also means that no matter where you are sitting in the audience, you will have a good view of all the stages.

At the front of each stage is the shearer’s board, with five positions for the shearers in each gang. The board is just wide enough for the sweepers, wool handlers and person on the dags to do their work.

‘They’ll have to be careful, love, otherwise they’ll fall off!’

To one side of the board is the fleecos’ table, where the fleece will be thrown and the sacks for the skirting pieces. Close to the table is the wool press. Behind the board are the shearer’s holding pens and behind them are the bigger pens where the sheep are already waiting to be shorn. That’s where the sheepos will work. When the sheep have been shorn, down they’ll slide to the front of the horseshoe, where the judges will look at them and judge the quality of the shearers’ work.

Shearers shear twenty-five sheep each. The best overall shearer in the competition will get the Jason statuette.

‘Goodness me, how will the judges be able to choose!’

‘It’s going to be ber-loody close, love.’

Let’s have a look at the programme.

Twenty-seven shearing gangs have made it to the finals of the first Golden Fleece championships.

‘Doesn’t that just make you feel so proud to be from Masterton?’

The shearing gangs have come from way up north of Whangarei to way down south of Invercargill. There’s even a gang of Aussie shearers come all the way from Darwin. Doesn’t that just take the cake?

Today are the preliminary heats — nine heats, with three gangs competing in each. At the end of the day there will be nine winners. Tomorrow, the nine winners will face each other in the three semifinal heats. Three days after that, the three winners of those will face each other in the finals.

‘Which shearing gangs are in the first heat, love?’

The spectators begin to place their bets. Let’s see — Morrison (Wanganui), Karaka (Christchurch) and Simpson (Bay of Plenty). Let’s put five quid on Morrison! Oh, and our own Wairarapa gang, the Gregsons, are in the second heat, we must bet on them. Who are they up against? Oh dear, that shearing gang from Otago is supposed to be very good … Ah well, that’s the luck of the draw.

Now, when are the Maoris on? You know, the family whose photo was in the newspaper? Ah, there, heat 6 this afternoon. Wilson (Hawke’s Bay), Jelley (Southland) — and Mahana Four (Gisborne).

Ah yes, the photo in the newspaper. If you ask people today what they remember about that first Golden Fleece championship in 1958, it’s not the name of the shearing gang which won but ‘Oh yes. The family of God.’

The photograph was a lucky snap taken by a photographer from the New Zealand Press Association and wired to all the newspapers in the country as well as to Australia and England. The London Times picked the photograph up and put it on the front page under the headline: The family that prays together shears together.

The photograph shows Mahana Four at prayer the night before the heats. Uncle Hone, Uncle Matiu, Dad, Sam Whatu and Pani are standing at the back. Aunt Sephora, Aunt Ruth, Aunt Miriam, Aunt Kate, Mum and Haromi stand within their protective arc. David, Benjamin, Peewee and Mackie are on the left. Glory and I are on the right. In the foreground, Grandfather Tamihana has his hand upraised. Behind us flutters Aunt Sarah’s flag, the maroon one with the golden angel at its centre. None of us even knew the photograph was being taken. We had our eyes shut.

The photograph caught the public imagination.

In the photograph Mahana Four looks the very picture of serenity and calm. The reality was — hardly. No sooner had we arrived at the stadium than Aunt Sarah, who had been watching the heats all day, came running into the dressing rooms like a chicken with her head cut off.

‘Oh my goodness, oh heck, oh —’ She acted as if it was the end of the world.

‘Now what’s this all about, sis?’ Uncle Hone asked.

‘I knew I should have brought the cloaks,’ Aunt Sarah gasped. ‘Or at least the sashes.’

‘What for?’

‘Have you seen what the other gangs are wearing? They’ve made new outfits! Bright red singlets. Or yellow shirts with their own insignias. Even Hukareka had the presence of mind to bring their hockey shirts. And what is Mahana Four wearing?’

We looked at Aunt Sarah blankly. Didn’t she know? Our usual rough woollen pants held up with string, of course! Our black singlets and sack moccasins, naturally! And Mum and the fleecos were wearing what they always wore — their dresses with coveralls and bedroom slippers.

‘This is how we always look when we’re at the shed,’ Aunt Ruth shrugged.

‘You will look like hobos!’

‘Well,’ Haromi yawned, ‘I wouldn’t say everybody.’ She had teased her hair up and planned to wear high heels.

Uncle Hone tried to calm Aunt Sarah down. ‘This is a shearing competition, sis, not a beauty contest.’ He looked at Haromi. ‘No high heels. You throw the fleeces crooked enough already.’

To top is off, Uncle Matiu started to panic too.

‘Look, bro,’ he said, ‘we’re the only gang with kids in it.’

‘What’s the fuss?’ Uncle Hone asked. ‘This is the way Mahana Four has always been. We’re a family shearing gang.’

‘Don’t you understand?’ Uncle Matiu said. ‘Of the twenty-seven gangs here, all except us are composed entirely of adults. Even Rupeni Poata’s gang. What hope have Simeon, Peewee and Mackie against adult sheepos? Those other sheepos are fast. They’re not worried about beating each other. All they’re worried about is beating the clock. Father wants Mohi to come in as sheepo —’

Uncle Hone sighed.

‘Then,’ Uncle Matiu persisted, ‘having Glory on the dags will make a laughing stock of us, and —’

Uncle Hone had had enough. ‘No,’ he said. ‘The trouble, Matiu, is that you and father have never actually seen Mahana Four in action. You’ve both been too busy burying your heads in the sand to even see how good we are. Mahana Four is a good team, Matiu. We’re all used to each other’s ways. We know each other’s strengths and weaknesses. You’re just a ring-in for Mahana Four. I will not have you and Father upsetting my family like this. Things stay as they are. That is final.’

Way to go, Uncle Hone!

‘Well,’ Uncle Matiu shrugged. ‘Okay, bro, you’re the boss.’

He smiled sickly at us. ‘But I think we better all stay clear of Bulibasha for a while and let him think he’s had his way!’

He looked across at Grandfather and waved cheerily. How Grandfather wanted to interpret that was his business.

Even so, by the time our heat began we had seen enough of the other teams to know we didn’t look like being in the running at all. We also heard that Poata One had won their heat by a mile, outgunning the competition like Machine Gun Kelly’s gang. Although the news was expected it didn’t make us feel any happier. Nor, on a personal level, was I feeling happy either. Since that first kiss Poppy seemed to be avoiding me. Every time I looked at her she looked away. Then, just before we were ready to go on, she came up to me.

‘You’re a Mahana,’ she said. ‘I’m a Poata. We’re on opposite sides.’

The loudspeaker blared. ‘Heat Number Six —’

Six six ix ix nix ix.

‘On Stage 1 the Wilson gang from Hawke’s Bay; Stage 2 the Jelley gang from Southland, and Stage 3 the Mahana gang from Waituhi, Gisborne —’

Gisborne scorn forlorn orn orn or.

I gulped and clutched Glory’s hand. She looked up at me, puzzled. What was all the fuss?

The two other gangs came running out in their bright scarlet and blue mocker. They looked like silver people, smiling and bowing to the audience. We were still cowering in the wings. Aunt Sarah was right. We did look like hobos, even worse than Fred Astaire and Judy Garland singing ‘We’re Just a Couple of Swells’ from Easter Parade. The Vanderbilts would never have asked us out to tea.

‘Ah well,’ Uncle Hone said, ‘let’s say a prayer to make us feel better.’

And there we were, praying again, our heads bowed to the Lord. We didn’t realise that everyone in the stadium could see us. Had we known, do you think we would have done it?

Oh look. So it is true. They do pray.

‘Okay,’ Uncle Hone said, ‘let’s get it over with.’

When we shambled out, me holding Glory’s hand, we were unprepared for the warmth of our reception. We climbed on to the stage and did what we always do. Uncle gave his string belt a tug — and the stadium hummed with amusement.

‘Well I don’t want you people to get a good surprise,’ he said.

Then Aunt Ruth started putting her hair up into a scarf and Aunt Kate shuffled into her old slippers and said, ‘E hika, my toes are poking out.’

Again, laughter rolled around the audience.

Finally, Mum kissed Glory, who ran across the stage between everybody’s legs and sat on her box waiting for the dags to come her way. When people laughed, her face grew grim. She scowled and then poked out her tongue.

Peewee, Mackie and I went to the big pen ready for the race to get the obligatory twenty-five sheep into the shearers’ holding pens.

‘Are you guys ready?’ I asked. Peewee was taking huge gulps of air. ‘I’m counting on you both.’

They grinned.

The starter had his pistol pointed to the air. His voice reverberated across the stadium.

‘Are you ready?’

Ready ready eady eady dy dy.

‘Steady?’

Steady steady eady dy dy.

The pistol crack echoed in the air.

‘Go!’

Chapter 49

Well blow me down and tie me to a lamp post. Mahana Four actually won our heat.

Grandfather was sitting with Grandmother Ramona, Zebediah Whatu and Ihaka Mahana when the winners were announced, and he just about fell out of his seat. Nani Mini Tupara, sitting behind the men, laughed and laughed.

‘Ana! Take that!’

The victory was trumpeted in the newspapers. The publicists for the championships knew a good angle when they saw one. On the morning of the second day there was the mayor of Masterton patting a scowling Glory on the head:

Family of God makes semifinals.

On that second day, however, the news was not so good. The semifinalists were fast, and we were up against the Robinson gang from Northland, Horopura gang from Nelson and Christie gang from Auckland. To bolster our confidence Aunt Sarah presented us with our maroon sashes — she had rung home for them and had them sent down. We were appreciative, but –

‘No, Sarah,’ Uncle Hone said. ‘We still look like hobos. The only difference is that we now look like hobos with sashes on.’

Walking out on Stage 2 was a different experience from the day before. Amidst the applause individual voices were calling out –

‘Come on, Hone!’

‘Show them how to throw a fleece, Auntie Miriam!’

‘Attagirl, Glory!’

As if people knew us personally.

When we lost our semifinals heat to the Robinsons, who finished way ahead, the audience was disappointed. Grandfather was shaking his head. Our luck had run out.

But what do you know? Our marks for quality work took us to the front. Another photograph — Aunt Sarah managed to insinuate herself into this one of Mahana Four sitting on a wool bale — flashed across the Press Association wires:

Halleluiah, they’re in!

Golden Fleece fever hit Masterton. All the shearing gangs were feted, invited to functions and treated like royalty. We were always surprised to be stopped and congratulated. Glory was very popular and hated it. People thought she was just adorable and asked for her autograph. Aunt Molly didn’t escape the limelight either. Although she said she was ‘Just the cook’ she attracted the attention of a food journalist who asked her what she fed Mahana Four.

‘Oh, dumplings, watercress, boiled spuds, kamokamo —’

The article on Auntie Molly came out the next day and said that ‘Auntie Molly’s pièce de résistance is a bouillabaise of a Hungaro-Romanian flavour in which carefully moulded boules of flour enriched with natural spices are marinated with cress au naturel, potatoes à la Provence and a piquant tuber found only in exotic surroundings —’

‘I’m keeping my mouth shut from now on, ‘Auntie Molly said.

Grandfather was in his element, his pride puffing up his chest like a pouter pigeon’s. Wherever he and Grandmother Ramona went they commanded a respectful audience. Grandfather had not lost his misgivings, but he had been surprised at the efficiency and precision of Mahana Four. As far as the finals was concerned, though, he didn’t think we had a hope in Hades. Mahana Four was competing against the Gregson gang, the home team from Wairarapa — and, of course, Poata One, who were widely expected to win. Caesar Poata was the fastest shearer at the championship.

Grandfather’s obsession with the Poata shearing gang had increased during the few days we had been in Masterton. In some respects he seemed more intent on their losing than our winning. I was watching him when he attended the semifinal shear-off involving the Poata gang. I swear that Grandfather never moved a muscle, and yet he seemed to be sending down thunderbolts of psychic energy designed to cripple their shearers or set fire to their wool. The effort was burning him out, turning him into an empty husk. As the finals approached, Grandfather became more jittery. Zebediah Whatu and Ihaka Mahana tried to keep him calm, but the publicity was having an adverse effect on him. The more Mahana Four got the spotlight, the more he worried about the reaction when we lost.

‘The Poatas have the better team. I know they have, because I’ve timed them. They are five minutes faster than the Gregson gang and six minutes faster than us. They will leave us in the dust.’

‘Ma te wa,’ Ihaka intoned. ‘What the Lord wills will be.’

Aunt Ruth tried to jolly him. ‘Father, you never know. One of their women just might eat something the night before and get as sick as a dog —’

‘Or one of their shearers might have a little accident —’ Uncle Hone winked.

‘Just remember the angel,’ Aunt Sarah said. ‘Didn’t the angel promise that the family would prosper?’

‘Ae,’ Grandfather agreed. ‘But it didn’t say we would win the Golden Fleece championship! Anyway, we need more than an angel to win.’

‘You should have more faith,’ I said.

‘Don’t preach to me, Himiona.’

‘We will try our best for you, Grandfather, but that’s all we can do.’

‘You must win.’ Grandfather would not let go.

‘Whether we win or lose,’ I said, ‘is out of your hands anyway.’

‘Oh is it now?’

Grandfather was still trying to manipulate destiny. Not content to allow history to take its course, he was trying to write it according to his dictates. He had decided to take up the pen, forcibly cross out the intended outcome of our lives and alter our destiny to suit his own expectations. The arrogance of that assumption was breathtaking. Driven by the history of the Mahana shearing gangs, and his active role in it, Grandfather could not contemplate anything other than a triumphant ending.

Then the roof fell in.

For some reason, perhaps to do with excitement, it never occurred to us to look at the date on which the finals would be held. Sunday night: the night the family went to church. None of the Mahana shearing gangs ever sheared on a Sunday.

Grandfather called an urgent family meeting, and in a flash resumed control. Once again his decision would determine our course. I hated relinquishing our freedom.

‘Are you sure the final is on Sunday?’ Grandfather Tamihana asked. He could barely conceal his glee. This was a wonderful excuse, the perfect opportunity, for him to withdraw the team. There was even dignity in such a proposal, and it would prevent all the embarrassment of a loss. I knew he would take it.

‘There’s only one thing to do,’ Grandfather Tamihana said. ‘Mahana Four will have to pull out of the championship.’

The newspapers had a field day:

They Won’t Shear On Sundays.

Across the nation editorials applauded Grandfather’s stand. From the pulpit churchmen preached the rightness of the decision to their flocks. Even the Anglican Archbishop sent Grandfather his congratulations. Hasty and urgent meetings were held between the Golden Fleece officials. Delegations of one kind or another trod their way to Grandfather’s door.

‘We can understand your Christian principles, Mr Mahana,’ they began, ‘but is there not a way around all this?’ In other words, Can you change your mind?

Part way through all the furore I happened to have a second with Grandfather.

‘Congratulations,’ I said.

‘What for?’ he asked, surprised.

‘Well of course Poata One will win now,’ I said. Take that, you sanctimonious bastard.

Soon after that, Grandfather became very silent. When delegations came to him he was not available. Finally he said:

‘Nobody can change my mind — except God Himself.’

He locked himself in his room.

‘What’s he doing?’ the reporters asked.

Aunt Sarah dipped into the room to find out. When she came out she looked as if she’d died and gone to Heaven. A thousand-piece Hollywood orchestra and chorus blasted us with holy music.

‘My father —’ she looked holier than usual, her hands clasped in prayer and eyes seeking a vision, ‘is asking God what to do.’

The headlines were predictable:

Tamihana seeks God’s advice.

Grandfather stayed holed up in his room for two days. The press contingent at the Golden Fleece increased daily. The whole of Masterton, New Zealand, Australia and Great Britain held its breath. Sometimes during his period of contemplation and prayer Grandfather came out of his room and went for a walk.

‘Any news for the public, Mr Mahana?’

‘Nothing.’

‘Will your shearing gang be in the finals?’

‘I don’t know.’

Aha. A ‘Don’t know’ wasn’t a ‘yes’ but it wasn’t a ‘no’ either.

Then one night as he was walking, Grandfather happened across Rupeni Poata. They talked and separated. The next morning, Grandfather went for another walk. He met Rupeni Poata again. Rupeni shook Grandfather’s hand, as if congratulating him for his firm moral stand. I didn’t place any importance on the meetings until much later. As for me, my thoughts were as heretical as ever.

A telephone booth. Grandfather Tamihana approaches, enters, puts coins in the payphone and dials a number.

Heavenly voice: wai koe e karanga nei?

(Subtitles: Who is calling please?)

Tamihana: Ko ahau a Tamihana he pononga o te Atua.

(Subtitles: A servant of the Lord.)

Heavenly Voice: Ah, kei te pirangi ahau ki te korero ki a Pa?

(Subtitles: Ah, do you want to speak to Dad?)

Tamihana: Ae.

(Subtitles: Yes.)

There is a click, a pause, and Jesus is trying to tell his father to get out of the shower to answer the phone. Then a voice comes booming down the telephone line.

Te Atua He aha to hiahia!

(Subtitles: So what do you want now!)

Finally, the night before the finals, when suspense was at fever pitch and the officials had pulled out all their hair, Grandfather came out of the hotel room. The reporters crowded around. I looked across at him.

Okay, Grandfather, break our hearts. Be holier than thou. Save your face and hide behind the church –

Whaddyaknow, he surprised me.

‘Mahana Four will shear in the finals,’ he said.

The headlines announced:

God says Yes!

Chapter 50

How we kept our heads in all that circus I’ll never know. Although it was fun at first, the movie-star treatment began to drive us up the wall. Glory summed it up. ‘Are we going home straight after this?’ she asked.

‘Yes,’ Mum answered.

‘Good,’ Glory said. ‘I miss our river.’

Only Haromi and Aunt Sarah, who was dying to get into Mahana Four, seemed to enjoy the stardom. She also pleaded with us to get some new maroon singlets or at least belts to replace the string on our trousers.

‘We are who we are,’ Uncle Hone said.

Why bother? We knew we wouldn’t win.

The night of the finals the traffic outside the stadium was bedlam and people were being turned away from the gates. The Golden Fleece officials were ecstatic. We weren’t. A full house meant more people to look at us and we were tired of being seen as freaks. Then Aunt Sarah burst out that three crews had arrived to film the finals. Oh great. Now our string belts, baggy pants and holey singlets would be seen in America, Europe, Asia and Outer Mongolia.

‘Ah well,’ Uncle Hone said. ‘Last time up, folks. Then hoki mai tatou ki te wa kainga.’ He was terrific. In one phrase he’d lifted our spirits.

Grandfather and Grandmother Ramona came down from the grandstand to say prayers with us. Grandmother looked so beautiful she made my heart ache. She was wearing her dress of Spanish lace. Her necklace glowed like moonstones.

‘I know you will do your best,’ Grandfather Tamihana said. Nothing more, nothing less. Then, escorted by Grandmother Ramona and Aunt Sarah, he returned to his seat.

The loudspeaker blared. ‘Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the finals of the Golden Fleece award —’

Award award oh lord lord ord.

The teams were introduced. Poata One was on Stage 1. The Gregson gang was on Stage 2. Mahana was on Stage 3. At each announcement the teams ran out into the middle of the arena and bowed. The Gregsons had all been to the hairdressers and the shearers had shiny new equipment. The Poatas were spruced up too and they had woollen jackets given by a local sponsor. Then it was our turn. Same old rough-as-guts us.

‘E hika,’ Aunt Ruth whispered.

Under the arc lights we felt like ants being looked at from a microscope. Towering on all sides were the stands of people, hushed, waiting, filled to the brim. Every now and then a battery of flash bulbs would go off. We felt completely forlorn. Mum, I could tell, was just about ready to take off and run away from it all.

Good old bossy Aunt Sarah saved us. Seeing us standing there, so far away, she was moved to tears of pride. She stood up in her seat and let rip with a powerful karanga that soared through the darkness. The karanga told us how proud our people were, to remember that we were from Waituhi and to come forward now. Nani Mini Tupara, then Grandmother Ramona, joined her. Before we knew it, Mahana Four had slipped into a haka, moving forward under the arc lights like a travelling ope. Fearless. Commanding. Unafraid.

‘Ka mate ka mate ka ora ka ora

‘Ka mate ka mate ka ora ka ora —’

I felt so proud. Aunt Ruth was doing the pukana for all she was worth. Aunt Sephora, Aunt Miriam, Aunt Kate and Haromi were quivering their hands and stamping their feet, and when they advanced you knew you’d better look out. Uncle Hone, Uncle Matiu, Dad, Sam Whatu, David and Benjamin went out in an arrow formation to protect the women. They were gesticulating with what they were carrying — handpieces, broom handles, whatever. Peewee, Mackie and I brought up the rear. Oh yes, and Glory too, spitting and squealing her warning to all.

‘Tenei te tangata puhuruhuru nana nei whakawhiti te ra

‘A haupane! Kaupane! Haupane kaupane whiti te ra!’

And all of a sudden there was a wave of applause and people were calling out –

‘Come on the maroon!’ ‘Let it rip Auntie Ruth!’ ‘Rattle those dags, Glory!’

Before we knew it, the darkness was filled with people calling us by our names. People whom we wouldn’t have known from Adam. People who had been following our progress and saw in us something of themselves. Something to do with people who could come out of nowhere and try to get somewhere. Something about reaching for the unreachable, touching the stars with your fingertips, searching after an impossible dream.

The starter came out with his starter gun. Big jolly Uncle Hone, a lump in his throat, pulled his pants up and turned to us.

‘You know me,’ he said. ‘I leave the big speeches to Father or my older brothers.’

‘Kia kaha,’ we answered. At that moment we would have followed Uncle Hone to the end of the world.

‘Work cleanly,’ he said. ‘Don’t worry about speeding. Those other fellas have it over on us when it comes to that. Mahana Four has always had a reputation for good work. I don’t care if we come last as long as we do a quality job. I have never been so proud of my family as at this moment.’

Uncle Hone did not know that microphones were picking up his speech and taking his words via radio to every listening household in the country. From somewhere far away the response came back. Wave after wave of acclamation.

The film crew was ready for action. All of a sudden lights blazed throughout the arena. Aunt Ruth did a double take and brought out dark glasses. Haromi primped her hair in readiness. Aunt Sephora smoothed her overalls. Dad, looking self-conscious, winked at Mum. I gave a special look to Glory, sitting on her stool waiting for the dags. The starter raised his pistol to the night sky.

‘Oh my giddy aunt,’ Aunt Ruth said, ‘doesn’t he know that God lives over there?’

She broke us up and made us laugh.

‘Are you ready?’ the starter asked.

Ready as we’ll ever be –

‘Are you steady!’

No, but that’s not going to stop –

The pistol cracked.

‘Go!’

Peewee, Mackie and I had been born for this moment.

‘Hut!’ Peewee was yelling. ‘Hut!’

There were three judges, one at each of the stages. They sprang to action, watching the sheepos and taking notes on our sheep-handling skills. We pushed the one hundred and twenty-five sheep from the large back pen into the holding pens.

‘Get in there!’ Mackie was whistling.

The strategy was that I would fill Uncle Hone and Dad’s pens; Mackie and Peewee together would fill Uncle Matiu’s, Pani’s and Sam Whatu’s pens. Not until each pen had twenty-five sheep in it could the shearers begin. Our job was to try to give our shearers a head start, get them out front so that they could stay out front.

‘Come on, Molly!’ I was trying Uncle Hone’s trick out on the sheep, pushing them gently into the pens. Peewee was casting a look at how the other sheepos for Gregsons and Poata One were getting on. ‘Don’t bother about them!’ I called. But I couldn’t help sneaking a look myself. The Gregson sheepos were manhandling their sheep over the fences rather than pushing them through the gates. The Poatas were using small sticks to get the sheep through.

Ah well, each to his own technique. I had my own worries to think about. Getting twenty-five sheep in each pen was difficult. The count could easily be wrong.

‘Twenty-five in Pen 5!’ Mackie called.

‘Twenty-five in Pen 4!’ Peewee called.

‘Twenty-five in Pen 1!’ I called.

Already the Gregson and Poata One gangs had finished their counts. No, hang on, the judge over at the Poatas was raising a red flag to indicate their count was wrong!

‘Twenty-five in Pen 2!’ I called.

Finally, ‘Twenty-five in Pen 3!’ Peewee called.

The crowd was roaring. The Gregson shearers had started on their first sheep; we were just behind them and now the Poata shearers had started. However, the job for Peewee, Mackie and me wasn’t over yet. Not until one of the judges had checked our count could we let go our breath.

‘Well done, lads,’ he said.

Phew. But we still had to remain alert. Sometimes when the shearers came in for a sheep, another one would try to get out.

Oh look, that was happening over at the Gregsons! There was pandemonium on the Gregson board as the sheepos tried to catch the culprit and get it back into the shearer’s pen. I gave a look at our sheep.

We love you, Auntie Molly, we really do.

Now it was up to the shearers. The Gregson shearers were positively ripping through their first sheep. Now they were on to their second, rushing with a slam into their pens. The sheep kicked and baa-ed with fear under the arc lights. The Poata gang had drawn level with us. They were fast all right! No, wait, one of the shearers hadn’t quite clicked off his handpiece! It was buzzing like a wild thing out of control and clashing with the other handpieces.

As for us, Uncle Hone was shouting above the noise. ‘Just take it easy, boys. No need to look up at how the Gregsons and the Poatas are doing. Feel the rhythm. Concentrate on your own sheep. We’ve got a long way to go yet.’

‘We’ve got to increase the pace,’ Uncle Matiu shouted back. ‘Otherwise we’ll get too far behind.’ Uncle Hone simply smiled at him. ‘Bro, you do as I say or else —’

Oh it was good to see our shearers moving their handpieces through the sheep’s wool. Then one by one the sheep were going down the slide and our shearers were walking swiftly in to get their second.

Halfway through our second sheep the Gregsons were ahead and going for their third sheep. The Poatas too had pulled ahead of us. They caught up to the Gregsons, shearing neck and neck. The crowd was thrilled. But cries of ‘Tar!’ were going up on their stands.

‘Easy does it,’ Uncle Hone said. ‘Don’t get rattled, boys. We’re here to do a quality job.’

The judge on our stage nodded and made a note.

An instruction came over the loudspeaker: ‘ Change judges.’

The judge from Stage 1 went to Stage 2. The judge from Stage 2 went to Stage 3. The judge from Stage 3 went over to Stage 1. The audience loved the fairness which allowed the judges to get a good overview of the work of all the shearing gangs.

Aunt Ruth and Haromi had begun sweeping in and around each shearer’s sheep.

‘Dags away!’ Aunt Ruth yelled. She pushed the dags over to Glory.

‘Go for it, Glory!’ one of her fans yelled.

Haromi was waiting for Uncle Matiu to finish his sheep. She flicked with her broom at the falling wool — face wool to one side, stomach and underside wool somewhere else. She put aside her broom and started to guide the fleece gently to one side, clearing it as Uncle Matiu shifted the sheep on to its back.

Along came the fleecos, Mum and Miriam, to take the fleeces to Aunt Sephora and Aunt Kate on the table. Oh no, now Haromi had decided to help them. Pulling the fleece clear. Bundling it up in her arms. Then a huge throw like a net and — perfect. The fleece glittered as it unfolded, seemed to pause on the air before falling squarely on the table. No wonder. Haromi had seen the cameras coming to film the action on our board.

‘Talk about lucky!’ Aunt Ruth laughed, hands on hips, forgetting where we were.

‘If you’ve got it, flaunt it,’ Haromi yawned.

They heard the laughter from the stadium and blanched.

‘Oh shi-ucks,’ Haromi said, making it worse. She did a little curtsy to the judge and the crowd.

The Poatas were neck and neck with the Gregsons on their fourth sheep. The crowd roared again as five Poata men on Stage 1 and five Gregson men on Stage 3 went into their pens together, dragging out their fifth sheep. ‘Tar!’ a Gregson shearer cried. Our shearers were just starting the fourth sheep. I took the chance to say to Peewee and Mackie, ‘Thanks, guys. Next season you’re both on the payroll.’ They gasped and reddened. Being on the payroll was even better than coming down to the Golden Fleece. They gulped and shook each other by the hand.

There was a clatter of laughter from the crowd. One of the Gregson shearers, when turning his sheep, had knocked one of the fleecos off the stand! What a hardcase.

‘Never mind about what’s happening over there,’ Uncle Hone said. ‘Let’s get on with our own job.’

‘We’ve got to increase the pace!’ Uncle Matiu said again.

‘Don’t panic,’ Uncle Hone answered. ‘Did I ever tell you about the tortoise and the hare?’

‘Change judges.’

The shearers on Stage 1 and Stage 3 were settling into their sixth, seventh and eighth sheep, and into their rhythm. Caesar Poata was fluid as oil, shearing like a dream. Uh-oh, his brother Alexander was stopping and changing his blades — they were making too many cuts, the blood spurting from the whiteness of the shorn sheep.

‘Tar!’

Our own Mahana shearers were steady and, in their steadiness, commanded respect. I felt so proud of my dad, holding the handpiece as if he had been born with it. Stroke after stroke, surely and calmly, the sheep’s fleece peeled magically away. And here was Haromi again, pulling the fleece away from Dad’s sheep. Gathering it in her arms. The suspense was awful.

‘You must be in love,’ Aunt Ruth said as yet another perfect fleece was cast.

‘Well, someone is,’ Aunt Kate interrupted. She nodded to where Miriam was waiting for Pani to finish shearing his ninth sheep. They had eyes only for each other and didn’t give a tuppenny piece whether we won or lost. Meantime, peering at the dags and getting every piece of wool that she could from her collection was Glory. The camera team shone a bright light in her direction –

‘Go away,’ she said.

The cameraman poked his camera right into her face, so she got a dag and threw it at him. The stadium ricocheted with laughter.

‘I’m doing my job,’ Glory said, ‘and it has to be the best job I’ve ever done.’

‘You tell him, Glory!’

I realised that one of the reasons why the crowd always yelled out to us was because we talked all the time we were working. Not just about shearing either, but about love, life and the whole damn universe. The trouble was that we forgot the audience was there and let out the most awful secrets.

‘Change judges!’

‘Sheepo!’ Aunt Sephora was calling. Like a hare, Peewee tore away. He jumped into the sacking to press down the neck pieces and side pieces. Mackie was helping David and Benjamin pack the fleeces into the press.

‘Hang on a minute,’ Aunt Sephora called. She went toward our pressmen. The judge followed her. ‘This fleece is all right,’ she said to Benjamin, ‘but all right is still not good enough. Leave it aside for the second-class bales.’

‘Good on you, Sephora!’ someone called, approvingly.

The judge paused to take in Aunt’s decision and scribbled something in his book.

‘Change judges!’

The competition was coming to the home straight. Goodness, we’d only just started! The Gregsons were ahead with only two sheep to go, and the Poatas were in second place with three sheep to go. We were trailing with five sheep apiece.

‘Steady does it,’ Uncle Hone kept reminding us. ‘The only competition that’s worth anything is with ourselves. As long as we better ourselves, I’ll be happy.’

Sweat was pouring down the shearers. The heat from the arc lights was stifling. Dark patches were appearing at Aunt Kate’s armpits.

‘Oh what the heck!’ Aunt Kate said. She opened up her overalls and flapped air in. How everybody laughed at that!

The Gregson and Poata shearers were quickening their pace. They were looking across from their stages and going blow for blow down one side of the sheep and then down the other. They didn’t bother to check us because we were so far behind. When shearers raced, something thrilling happened. The racing was like watching gunfighters — like Glenn Ford in The Fastest Gun Alive or Gary Cooper in High Noon. The race was a chance to say: ‘Okay, folks, this is how the top guns do it. Watch how we draw.’

Now the audience was clapping as the last of the Gregson shearers finished his sheep. They clapped again as the Poatas finished. Our shearers droned on.

‘Easy does it,’ Uncle Hone said.

The Gregsons and the Poatas finished classing their wool. Their pressmen had a mighty race — clank, clank, clank went the presses — and were in the last stages of baling their wool when our shearers came to an end. Then the Gregson head shearer raised his hand to indicate that they were finished. Applause came down from the stadium. Caesar Poata soon followed. His pressmen finished sewing their last bale. Up came Caesar Poata’s hand. More applause. Only a matter of minutes separated the Gregsons and the Poatas.

Uncle Matiu, meantime, was trembling in sheer frustration. He wanted Uncle Hone to cut corners. Uncle Hone always insisted that Mahana Four was never finished until we left the board the way we found it. So even though David and Benjamin had finished the baling, we still worked on, Aunt Sephora and the women cleaning up around them, and me and Peewee and Mackie unhooking the sacks and tidying up the work areas. We were four minutes behind the Gregsons and six minutes behind the Poatas. The stadium was absolutely silent. The moon was wan. We worked on.

Glory was the last to finish her job. Amused, Uncle Hone waited until she had nodded her head. Then he raised his hand too. In the gathering tumult, Glory did a little curtsy.

We didn’t hear or care. We had eyes only for each other.

‘We did our best,’ Uncle Hone said to us.

‘Did we what!’ Aunt Ruth answered proudly. ‘I’m changing gangs and coming over to Mahana Four. You fellas are the best.’

We were all sweating and crying like mad and couldn’t tell what was sweat and what was tears. Then we just held each other so tightly so that no cold wind could come between us. Ever. It was over.

After all that, the judges’ decision was a formality. The three teams were asked to wait on the stages. The stadium became hushed. The judges took ages. Then, just as the suspense threatened to kill all of us, the presiding judge took the microphone in front of the main stand. I cast a look at Grandfather Tamihana, sitting with Grandmother Ramona. Zebediah Whatu and Ihaka Mahana looked as if they accepted our fate; Grandfather looked as sick as a dog.

‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ the judge began, ‘boys and girls, we have just witnessed a moment of history.’ People began to clap. ‘Ever since the beginning of our country, at least the beginning of Pakeha history, we have been a land which has been associated with agriculture. In particular, we are known as a country of two million people and six million sheep.’ Laughter rippled the crowd. ‘Thus it is fitting, ladies and gentlemen, that we should have a championship devoted to the art of shearing, for it is upon this art that we depend for our wealth, our overseas income and our economic wellbeing. On your behalf, I applaud all those in the shearing industry.’

The judge began to clap. He was joined by the thousands in the stadium.

Chapter 51

‘We’ve been away too long,’ Aunt Ruth said as the train steamed through the mountains, and the plains of Gisborne spread out to claim us. Twelve days, but it had seemed like a lifetime.

Glory was sleeping in my lap. ‘Wake up, Glory,’ I said. ‘We’re almost there.’ She yawned and stretched. The country unfolded before us. Far off — was that the red bridge? Was that the Waipaoa, glittering far away?

— Wail-e-ree, I can hear the river call –

— Aroha, aroha –

Off in a corner Haromi was dreaming of the stardom that had almost been in her reach. Beside her, Mohi was strumming a guitar, plucking sweetness from the air.

We’ve lost our hearts to the river –

To the river Waipaoa –

Then the conductor was coming through the carriage. ‘Five minutes to Gisborne, folks.’

Scattered farms came into view. Then suburban houses, and as we sped past people waved and tooted the horns of their cars. They captured the sun in their smiles. Then there was Gisborne station ahead, a huge banner: Welcome home winners of the Golden Fleece!

Did I forget to tell you?

This is what the presiding judge continued to say –

‘The judges have found the judging throughout the championships a very difficult task indeed. In the process we have had to think clearly about our criteria. Speed, for instance, should not always be equated with being the best.’ There was a murmur of agreement. ‘To get there first,’ the judge went on, ‘many teams used unorthodox methods. I am not pointing a finger, but manhandling sheep over rails rather than pushing them through gates may get the job done faster but does not win points if we are thinking of sheep as an export product. Nor is shearing flat out but shearing badly conducive to the wellbeing of our industry. The object of the Golden Fleece competition was not to give the award to the fastest shearing gang but to the best shearing gang. Shearing just to get the wool off the back of the sheep was not what we wanted.’

The audience was beginning to prick up its ears.

‘Perhaps the most critical area of all is the wool classing. If our wool classing is bad, how can we expect to maintain our good name as a wool country abroad? Our judges inspected all the bales and found great disparities in the quality of wool classing. Again, classing for speed does not necessarily pay good dividends.

‘And finally, the pressmen. We have seen some wonderful displays of muscle tonight. But again, the emphasis has been on speed. It has been easy to tell a bale that has been packed down inadequately and sewn badly. Our bales of wool must survive journeys of long distance, during which wool is prone to expansion under tropical temperatures before it gets to our markets. Those bales must look good. The buyer must be able to be guaranteed a good quality product — not something which, like cheese, might have holes in the middle.’ The audience laughed. The judge waited for them to stop. ‘All this may be a long speech, ladies and gentlemen, but my fellow judges and I have felt it necessary to spell these things out clearly. May I reiterate that the New Zealand Wool Board was not looking for the fastest shearing gang. We were looking for the best.’

The judge coughed and cleared his throat. ‘Ladies and gentlemen, the best quality work comes from those areas where tradition and a history of practice has meant that skills have been honed, refined and distilled over many years. It should therefore be no surprise that the Jason statuette for best shearer and the first Golden Fleece award, carrying a cash prize of £5,000, go to the Gisborne East Coast and Poverty Bay district.

‘Could I ask Mr Caesar Poata to come forward to receive the Jason Award for best shearer for 1958.’

So Hukareka had won. I watched Grandfather Tamihana’s crestfallen face and, at that moment, I loved him. He was human. Vulnerable after all.

Caesar called his father, Rupeni Poata, to share in the glory of the award. They looked so fine and handsome together, standing in the arc lights.

‘Ah well,’ Aunt Ruth said to Uncle Hone, ‘better luck next year.’

That was when the judge went on.

‘Now, ladies and gentlemen — the premier prize. It is not often that the gang that comes third is awarded first prize —’

What?

The stadium erupted. People were on their feet stamping and yelling with joy. The judge kept on talking above the uproar.

‘The Mahana Four gang epitomises all the qualities of our shearing industry. They are of a Maori family with a tradition of shearing that goes back to the early part of this century. They are the only team to have entered as a family. Their work has been of the utmost quality. The judges could not fault their teamwork and their commitment to the job of good shearing. Their ages ranged from, forgive me Aunt Ruth, somewhere around fifty to seven years of age. I will remember young Glory’s concentration on the task before her for quite some time. Ladies and gentlemen, none of Mahana’s sheep was marked, cut or nicked in any way by their blades. The wool handling and sheep handling was of the highest standard. The wool classer, Miss Sephora Mahana, should be employed by the Wool Board immediately. Throughout the championship her work has been consistent with excellence. Special commendation should also be given to the pressmen, and, oh yes, the sheepos. Who needs sheepdogs when you can have such speed and finesse as was shown by Peewee Mahana and Mackie Whatu under the guidance of their team leader, Mr Simeon Mahana?

‘May I please ask the Mahana Four shearing gang to come to the stage to receive their award.’

Uncle Hone was overcome. He couldn’t speak. Then –

‘Will someone go over and get Dad?’ he asked.

I nodded and walked across the field. I bowed in front of Grandfather. ‘Bulibasha,’ I said. ‘Your family awaits you.’

His lips were trembling. He stood and walked with me into the limelight. The stadium was on its feet in standing ovation. It was the greatest moment of his life — the culmination of all of his years as a shearer, and fitting tribute to his dream. And when, in the gathering roar, Rupeni Poata came over to congratulate him, Grandfather Tamihana attained apotheosis.

‘You are indeed above us all,’ Rupeni Poata said.

Grandfather could go no higher. Acknowledged by Rupeni Poata as his superior, and therefore above even Hukareka, he had assuredly become in prestige as well as in name Bulibasha, King of the Gypsies.

Chapter 52

Although the joy and tumult was still ringing in our ears, my mother and father wanted to escape the civic reception in Gisborne and get back to our land down at the bend of the Waipaoa.

‘Come on children,’ Mum said. ‘Let’s get out of here.’

Just before leaving, however, I managed to have another few words with Poppy.

‘I don’t care if we’re on opposite sides,’ I said. I was remembering my friendship with Geordie and how that was supposed to be wrong too. I was angry at Grandfather for having constructed a world in which some matters had already been decided for me.

Poppy looked at me. Her eyes welled with tears. Then she gave me the most wonderful grin. ‘There’ll be other girls for you,’ she said.

‘Yes, I know,’ I answered, ‘but you’ll always be the first.’

I hugged her, and didn’t give a damn who saw. Then I ran out to where Mum and Dad were waiting. We had parked our old Pontiac by the station and cheered when Dad started the engine. Then we drove on home to sweet Beulah land. Oh it was good to see the meadow, the windmill turning, our house on the rise and our eternal Waipaoa.

That night, after dinner, our father Joshua looked across at Mum and coughed. My sisters and I were beside ourselves with excitement. Dad laid down his knife and fork and put his hands in his pockets. Mum wouldn’t look at him. Dad made a great play of searching in one pocket and then another as if he couldn’t find what he was looking for.

‘E hara!’ he said. ‘I think I lost it. It must have fell out when I was —’ Then his hand pressed against his heart and, ‘Anei,’ he whispered. He drew out a small packet and put it on the table. He pushed it toward our mother.

‘Enei nga moni.’

It was £500, our share of the winnings.

My sisters and I whooped and yelled and screamed with delight. Mum breathed a deep sigh.

‘I accept this token of aroha for me and our children,’ she said, ‘and return it to you as head of the household. I pray, however, that you allow me to take £200 for myself.’

Dad nodded in agreement.

The next day my mother, sisters and I drove into Patutahi. Mum wore her best dress and hat. She put on her white gloves and, at the last moment, applied lipstick. We stopped at the general store.

‘Why look who’s here!’ Miss Zelda cried, putting her hand to her mouth. ‘We listened to all the news on the radio! We just couldn’t believe that our Maoris had won the Golden Fleece award! Congratulations!’

Miss Daisy and Scott came from the back to extend their congratulations. Other Pakeha customers in the store surrounded us to shake my mother’s hand and pat Glory on the head.

‘I–I — I —’ My mother opened her purse.

‘My mother wants to pay —’ I began.

Mum put a gloved hand over mine. With a great effort she said, ‘I — Yes — I — want to pay in — in — full.’

‘Oh why not leave it for a while?’ Miss Zelda smiled. ‘There must be a million other things you want to do with the money. Go around the world perhaps!’ She laughed out loud at the thought.

Mum was firm. ‘No,’ she said. ‘Now.’ Her tone communicated authority. The other customers looked somewhat put out.

‘Well,’ Miss Zelda said, ‘if that’s the way you want it.’ She took out the ledger book and totalled the amount. ‘Two hundred pounds,’ she said.

Mum peeled the notes in front of Miss Zelda’s astonished face.

‘I think you’ll find it all there.’

Miss Zelda nodded. Then, just as my mother was about to leave, Miss Zelda’s voice came out of some dark place to strike.

‘Oh dear, I forgot to add on £6 interest.’

It was such a small thing really. All we had to do was to say to Miss Zelda that we would come back. But my mother recognised it for what it was — a sneer at her back, a piece of spite, a play of power. My mother turned to Miss Zelda. She walked back through the other customers and looked Miss Zelda straight in the eye.

‘You have made a mistake,’ she said.

Pakehas never make mistakes.

‘Yes,’ Mum said, determined. ‘You have made a mistake’ — she pointed at a ledger entry — ‘here.’

I thought, How can Mum know? She can’t read, she can’t do sums, she hasn’t had any schooling. Miss Zelda would have her for mincemeat.

‘Let me see that,’ Miss Zelda said. She picked up the book and took it to the window. ‘I can’t see where —’

‘There,’ Mum said, ‘where the ink is smudged. I remember clearly the day I came in. You charged me too much, got your rubber and rubbed it out, and put the right amount in. There. You overcharged me.’

‘But I would never do such a thing,’ Miss Zelda said.

‘Well you did,’ Mum said. She was trembling. ‘You did that day.’

There was silence. Everyone was staring at my mother. I felt like I wanted the floor to open up so that I could disappear.

Then Scott came from the back. ‘I remember,’ he said, nodding at Mum, confirming what she had said. ‘Mrs Mahana came in here and she looked at new clothes for her boy and we overcharged her by’ — he paused — ‘£6.’

The exact amount owing on interest.

Zelda and Daisy looked at each other.

‘Well, Scott, if you say so —’

With that, Miss Zelda wet her pencil with her lips and slashed a diagonal line across the tab.

‘Paid in full and discharged,’ she said slowly. She handed the tab to my mother. Her eyes were angry but her lips smiled. ‘Thank you, Mrs Mahana. I must also apologise —’

My mother nodded her head. She turned and left the general store, walking as fast as she could towards the shade of the oak tree near the school.

When we caught up with her she was at the pump, pushing the handle frantically up and down and washing her face. We knew she had been crying and was trying not to let us see her tears. She turned to us.

‘Isn’t this a marvellous day?’ she said. Her lips were still quivering. Then she gave a whoop and a holler. ‘Kia tere! Let’s get to town! We mightn’t be able to buy anything, darlings, but nobody is going to charge us for looking.’

She was free. She was no longer a slave.

Chapter 53

At the end of 1959 the faithful and stalwart Pani finally ended his two years’ servitude to Grandfather Tamihana. He again sought Miriam’s hand in marriage. Grandfather, still glowing in the success of the Golden Fleece, and Pani’s part in it, agreed. He was proud to have Pani as his son-in-law. Miriam was thirty-four and her hair was beginning to grey. She and Pani were married at the registry office in Gisborne. They were overjoyed to be together. Nor was Miriam’s womb barren. Within eleven months of their marriage, Miriam bore a lusty, squealing son.

Not long after Miriam’s wedding, my cousin Mohi was drinking late at the Patutahi Hotel with his latest girlfriend Carol and four friends. He had put a down-payment on a red Ford Zephyr convertible with a white canvas hood and white painted tyres; it was the only one in Poverty Bay and looked like it had been driven straight out of Rebel Without a Cause. It was the appropriate car for the sex machine that was Mohi, and it was his pride and joy. That night Fraser Poata from Hukareka happened to be in Patutahi and challenged Mohi to a re-match race across the red suspension bridge. Perhaps Mohi was worried about scratches on his new car. He lost.

According to the coroner’s report, ‘No blame should be attached to the publican, Mr Walker, who refused to serve the young Mohi Mahana and his friends after 6 p.m. closing. It is a tragedy blah blah blah.’

The facts are that the said Mr Walker slipped a crate to Mohi, who was angry at having lost the race against Hukareka, on the understanding that the transaction would remain secret between them. Mr Walker was fortunate that the survivors of the accident kept to that understanding. Around five o’clock in the morning, after drinking steadily all night, Mohi failed to take the corner just past the bridge to Waituhi. My father Joshua and I, up early and on our way to a cattle sale in Matawhero, were the first to come across the car. The Zephyr was upside down in the huge drainage canal which ran parallel with the road. The bodywork had crumpled; the windscreen was starred with broken glass. Week-long rain had filled the canal, and floating upside down were the bodies of Mohi, Carol and a young man called Jake. The other three boys were sitting on the side of the canal, drinking and laughing as if the party was still happening, man, and yelling to Mohi, ‘Hey you black bastard, wake up! Don’t be a piker!’ Brown beer bottles bobbed up and down unbroken in the water.

My grandfather Tamihana Mahana, Bulibasha, King of the Gypsies, took Mohi’s death very badly. Mohi had been his favoured one; in him could no fault lie. His grief was only compounded by the way in which the newspapers made a big fuss of Mohi’s promise as an athlete and of his relationship to Grandfather: this was ‘the grandson of Tamihana Mahana, one of the best known Maori citizens of the district and patriarch of the family which last year won the Golden Fleece’. He was outraged that the local Gisborne Herald reporter should use the opportunity of Mohi’s death to editorialise on the danger of alcohol abuse among young Maori. Grandfather was, after all, a respected elder of a church to which alcohol, tobacco and other abusive substances were anathema. A cynic like myself would have said that Grandfather was concerned only for his own reputation. But even if that was true, there was no denying the depth of his grief.

I mourned for my bastard of a cousin. After he died I could never look in the mirror in the bathroom without expecting him to come up behind me and shove me to one side –

‘Get out of the way, Useless.’

I hadn’t expected him to die, ever. Mohi had existed outside the rules because that was where Grandfather had placed him. He walked higher than the rest of us and was not subject to the same laws of gravity that made us walk the earth. There he floated in supreme confidence that, whatever happened, Grandfather would always support him. I think of him, drowning in the canal, his eyes wide with surprise, the air bubbling from his lips –

‘But this cannot be. This cannot be. I am the grandson of Bulibasha —’

Chapter 54

In 1959, still determined to prove Grandfather wrong about my abilities, I sat School Certificate for the second time. At seventeen I was two years older than most of the students sitting the examination, and Miss Dalrymple had hinted that perhaps I should give up any pretensions to te rori Pakeha.

The day the results came in the post, Andrew telephoned early to say that he had just received his and that he had failed. I thought, ‘Boy, if he’s failed I’m a goner too.’ By the time Mum handed me my letter, I was convinced of it. I opened the envelope. I thought I saw a blur of Fs for Fail.

Since her brush with Miss Zelda at the general store Mum had started to learn the alphabet. She took the letter from me and, in her halting hesitant way, began to read out the results.

‘P, Biology. Pass ne? Ka pai, kotahi P.’

She held both my fists up in the air and made me put one finger up from the right fist. She read the next line.

‘P, English. Pass ne ra? Kapai, e rua P.’

Another finger up, right fist. Next line.

‘F, Geography. Aue, he raruraru! E rua P, kotahi F.’

One finger up, but left fist. Next line.

‘P, History. Kia ora. Pass ano! E toru P, kotahi F.’

Three fingers up, right fist; one finger up, left fist. Final line.

‘P, Mathematics. E wha P, kotahi —’

Mum’s face quivered as she realised I had passed. She held the results in front of her. ‘I think I’ll get a frame for this,’ she said, ‘just to prove I’m not so dumb a mother after all.’

Naturally Grandfather was told and, while I foolishly expected a compliment, a crumb from his table, I was not crushed when it didn’t fall into my eager hands. Grandfather still mourned Mohi who, by virtue of dying young, had become a kind of saint — the person whom no other heirs could hope to emulate. More to the point, Grandfather had always valued things he could see — strength, a well-formed physique, fortitude. Grandfather could see those, could see sweat, or a hillside after all the gorse had been slashed, or a fence where there had not been one, or the shorn sheep after a contract had been completed. But School Certificate results? Marks on paper? Those remained unseen to Grandfather, like chicken scratchings in the dust, and therefore without worth.

Grandfather’s failure to acknowledge my success at the next family meeting was, I assumed, simply a sign that our relationship was taking its normal course. Whatever my achievements, I was still third child of his seventh son. Little did I know that Grandfather was preoccupied with his health. At sixty-seven he was faced with intimations of his mortality.

Grandmother Ramona suspected something was wrong with Grandfather when she saw him cleaning the toilet bowl after having flushed it two times.

‘I can do that,’ Grandmother said.

‘Hei aha,’ Grandfather answered. He motioned her away but she stepped past him. It was strange to see him on his knees doing woman’s work.

‘Didn’t you hear me, woman? Hei aha.’

Grandmother backed away. But she had seen the blood rushing down the bowl with the water.

A week later Grandfather started to have stomach cramps, and although he never complained Grandmother Ramona knew he was in pain. Then Grandfather began to do his own washing — woman’s work again — washing and rinsing his long underwear. She caught him at it and saw there was blood in the front and in the seat of his longjohns.

‘How long has this been going on?’ Grandmother asked.

‘I feel like a woman,’ Grandfather growled. ‘It is only women who pass blood.’

‘Yes,’ she answered, ‘but that is natural for us and only happens every month. It is not natural for the man to pass blood and so often.’

‘You look after your business,’ Grandfather said, ‘and I’ll look after mine.’ Then, ‘I am passing blood from my bum also, kui.’

‘Kaati,’ she answered. ‘It’s time to see the doctor.’

Even in 1959, when they should have known better, Maori used to say, ‘The only time you see the doctor is when you want to be born and when you are about to die.’ Accidental injury was permissible as long as the damage was visible — a fractured limb, a gunshot or knife wound. But something internal — like what had happened to Lloyd or what was now happening to Grandfather — was unseemly and to be feared. The invisible malady was a punishment, retribution for some evil committed when you were younger. So if you were ill from an internal disorder you pretended it wasn’t there and willed it to go away. If it persisted you hid the illness from your close family. If you felt faint you rushed to the bedroom and lay down so nobody would know. If you wanted to vomit you excused yourself and tried to get to the toilet before you spilled your guts. You bore your symptoms with strength and fortitude, in spite of the pain. Much later in life my father Joshua showed exactly the same stupidity when his waterworks stopped and he couldn’t urinate. He remained stoic until finally pain drove him to the doctor. He was lucky to be fixed — unlike Uncle Ihaka who died at forty-nine when the swollen appendix he had been hiding burst and killed him.

My dear cousin Haromi — she was another one. The only recourse for breast cancer in those days was to have a radical mastectomy and even then, according to fatalistic folklore, you ended up dying. When I visited my wonderful cousin in her last week she said to me, ‘At least I will die a complete woman.’ The removal of any part of oneself was a heresy.

Is it any wonder that, in the event of autopsy, the return of a Maori body unblemished by the coroner’s knife and with all body parts in their place, is of such concern to Maori? I can still remember the outrage and agony which attended the tangi of my nephew Aaron, Haromi’s second son, who died of an unknown malady at the age of three. The release of his body was delayed by the coroner. When Aunt Sarah went to bathe her grandson and prepare him for burial she found two neat incisions — one at the base of his neck where his scalp had been lifted, and another across his chest where his heart had been examined.

The body is tapu.

This attitude was the rule with Maori people. Was there any reason to expect that Grandfather would be an exception? No matter Grandmother Ramona’s stern admonitions, he refused to visit the doctor.

When Grandfather’s body began to rot inside, he clamped back the pain. Eating became a nightmare and he turned to the pure Waipaoa water, to kanga pirau, fermented corn, and puha mashed with kumara. When he felt an attack coming on he hissed and clenched his lips. Eyes bulging, he punched out blindly as if trying to render visible the attacker within.

Nobody went to help Grandfather. Nobody offered sympathy, because to do so would mean that Grandfather would have to admit his illness. And that would have meant facing up to that dark deed of the past, for which payment was now being demanded. Instead, a proud complicity of silence surrounded Grandfather as he crashed around the homestead and Waituhi. His body heaved, shat dark red blood, careened, vomited bile, fizzed, pissed poison, staggered, farted rotten stench and bawled like some huge and enraged bull.

Grandmother, Sephora and Esther cleaned up the mess.

This, after all, was Bulibasha. This was the way that such a man, King of the Gypsies, should die.

Bulibasha finally turned to medical help in the second week of April, 1960. By that time, I had been at the Mormon college in Hamilton for two months. When I left, Glory had dismayed us all by screaming, ‘You promised! You promised me, Simeon!’ She ran after the bus until she could run no longer, calling me to come back.

‘You’re a stupid, obstinate, foolish man,’ the doctor said when he was called to Grandfather’s side. ‘I can’t understand how you’ve lasted so long without drugs. You are a miracle of modern science. You have been in terrible pain and I am in no mood to compliment you on your fortitude. Stubborness doesn’t win any medals, Mr Mahana.’

The doctor said he would arrange a nurse to give daily medication and administer pain-killing drugs.

‘My daughters will be my nurses,’ Grandfather answered. ‘I’m not going to have any Pakeha looking at my bum. Anyway, I’m not going to die. Didn’t you say I was a miracle of modern science?’

At the doorway, before leaving, Uncle Matiu asked the doctor whether there was any chance.

‘I shall give that question the contempt it deserves,’ the doctor replied. ‘The man is riddled with cancer. If we had had the chance to operate and remove the malignancies earlier, perhaps —’ He added that Grandfather had a week, ten days at most.

Grandfather must have overheard.

Had I not known him better I would have suspected that Grandfather made another wager with God or that American angel of his. Throughout that time he would not allow people at church to pray for him, persisting in his belief that ‘I’m not going to die’. This same stubbornness, mixed with church disapproval, prevented him from seeking the help of a tohunga. Instead Grandfather turned to the things he knew best. He increased his diet and exercise. Now that he had drugs, he would pump them faster through his body to repel the invader. His body had not let him down before — why should it do so now? After all, he was Bulibasha. The Bulibasha.

Grandfather’s problem was that he didn’t understand that to everyone comes this season of death. Despite his religious upbringing he forgot there was a time to live and a time to die — and his time to die had come. It was as simple as that. His cancer was not an indictment on his life or on him as a person. It was simply his body saying, I am finished now and you must shuck me off as a husk from corn and prepare for your next great adventure. Grandfather never accepted that. He could not leave off asking the question, Why me? As if the cancer had somehow sneaked past God without God’s approval. Or, as if that American angel, so many years before, was welshing on his promise. The cancer was an affront to Grandfather’s ego. It was something else to be battled and triumphed over. And, oh, every breath of air was so sweet.

I could have told him that there was another reason why his time to die had come. He had already achieved the triumphs of his life. There was nothing left for him to accomplish.

Grandfather lasted for another three weeks. Then I received a telephone call from Dad asking me to come home to Waituhi. Grandfather was in the last stages of death.

‘Haere mai koe, Himiona,’ my father Joshua said.

The plane from Hamilton touched down at Gisborne airport late on a Wednesday evening. Glory rushed into my arms, an unruly and impetuous eleven-year-old. I hugged Dad and we kissed. We drove back to Waituhi. God, it was so good to see the Waipaoa River, darkly swirling in the falling light.

Mum, Faith and Hope were waiting at the house on Grandmother’s land. It was nine in the evening, the right time for a departing soul to make its way from Waituhi, across the bosom of the land to the northernmost tip of Aotearoa. The soul would not need to wait too long for the sunrise, the opening of the way to the next world. Together Mum, Dad, my sisters and I walked across the paddocks and along the road to the homestead. The moon was a crescent. There was no sound. No dogs, no cats, no possums squealing in the night. The silence was an indrawn sigh.

Lights in the homestead were blazing. Mourners, dressed formally in suit and tie or in long gown with scarves, waited outside for their turn to go in.

‘Haere mai koutou ma,’ Zebediah Whatu said as we approached.

‘Ae,’ Aunt Molly added, ‘haere mai koutou.’

I stepped into the light and the iwi saw who I was. There was a moan, like banshees on the wind, and old Maggie came to cup my chin lovingly in her hands.

‘Go inside, our father is waiting.’

I had been in the presence of Death many times before, but I was unwilling to be witness to my grandfather’s death. I could still be persuaded, even at that late stage, that Grandfather was invincible. Indestructible. The iconoclast in me wanted to believe he would rise up like Lazarus, or like Christ, and resume his place among us. I could just imagine him doing that, saying, ‘E koe! I fooled you all!’ Laughing in that huge lusty way of his.

Once inside, there was no such delusion. My uncles Matiu, Maaka, Ruka and Hone were standing like first lieutenants at the death of Mark Antony. Aperahama and Ihaka were talking in hushed tones to the priest. I couldn’t see my aunts Ruth, Sarah, Sephora, Miriam and Esther and realised that they — all Grandfather’s women — would be with Grandmother Ramona at the bedside. Bulibasha was dying.

Uncle Matiu saw us arriving and motioned Dad to him. His eyes were red but he was not weeping. He was the eldest son. On him, above all others, would fall Grandfather’s mantle. Others could weep, wail, succumb to the passions of grief, but not him. Never him.

Uncle Maaka joined us. He punched me on the shoulder and commented on how grown up I looked. Then, ‘You should all go into the old man,’ he said. ‘He hasn’t got long now. We’ve all been in to receive our blessing. It is your turn.’

My father burst into tears and, for a moment, I was embarrassed. But at the sight of his tears the iwi inside the sitting room were swept up in his grief. They began to wail like lost souls. My uncles hastened to surround my father, arms around each other like a protective circle. I had forgotten that although my father was seventh son he was also the youngest son. Vulnerable. The baby. Then Dad sighed. He blew on his nose. He motioned Mum, my sisters and I to accompany him.

‘No,’ Uncle Ruka said. ‘Just you, Huria and your girls. Grandfather wants to see Himiona alone.’

I felt fear drain into me. Alone? What for? What enmity still remained unspoken between us? Was damnation to be my blessing?

Mum and Dad went through the door. Grandfather was propped up among the pillows. Grandmother Ramona and my aunts were sitting at the foot of the bed and made room for Mum and my sisters to join them. Dad went to the bedside and knelt. He took Grandfather’s left hand and kissed it. Grandfather placed his right hand on his head and whispered a few words, then Mum and my sisters joined Dad. Grandfather made a sign with his right hand. When Grandfather had finished, Mum kissed his forehead and signed to my sisters to do the same.

Then it was my turn.

The room was brightly lit, as if Grandfather had decreed that all should see him as he was. There was to be no pretence of shadows and curtains to veil the reality of the cancer. A sweet smell perfumed the air. Incense was burning, presumably to mask the rotting of Grandfather’s wasting body. Smoke curled from tapers placed at the four corners of his bed. I looked down upon my grandfather. He still retained his hair and his frame was not skeletal. God had been kind to him, permitting the cancer to eat away his insides but forbidding it to take away the props to face, chest, arms and legs. His body might be scraped hollow inside but outside it still maintained the illusion of substance.

Nevertheless, something intangible marked him as not quite the same. Something to do with aura. His life was draining away, the candle of his life diminishing. The lamp was low.

‘Ko wai ia?’ Grandfather asked. His eyes searched around and I realised that he was blind.

‘Ko Himiona, e pa,’ Aunt Ruth answered.

‘Aaa —’ Grandfather nodded. ‘The viper —’

Grandfather made a sign with his head that the door should be closed. Then he added another sign: Grandmother and my aunts were to leave us alone. Aunt Sarah shook her head but Grandmother Ramona said, ‘Kaati. Haere atu.’

‘Don’t stay for too long,’ Aunt Sarah said. ‘There’s other people more important than you has to see him.’

There was a click of the door as they departed.

‘Himiona —’ Grandfather sighed.

He shook his head and his lips creased into a grin. He put his right hand down to me. I wasn’t too sure whether he was going to take a swipe at me or not. I decided to trust him, and lowered my head to receive his blessing.

‘Kaore —’ he said.

Puzzled, I saw his eyes gesturing at my own right hand. I wasn’t too sure what he wanted. Then I realised: Grandfather wanted to Indian wrestle. He had never wanted to Indian wrestle with me.

I grinned at him and spat on my hand. Grandfather indicated with his eyes that he wanted me to spit on his, too. He opened his palm and, when I went to take it, gripped me with an iron hand. I was startled. This was not a man in extremis. Our hands wavered in the air, and with disgust I noticed that Grandfather was managing to bend mine back to the bed. I knotted my muscles and started to push his hand back.

Even if you’re on your death bed, you bastard –

He laughed. A small quiet laugh, but there was joy in it. Then he said –

‘Drop your pants.’

Drop my pants?

‘Ae,’ he repeated. ‘Down your trou.’

I shrugged. A man’s last wish is a man’s last wish. I took my belt off. My trousers slid to the floor.

Grandfather’s right hand reached down beneath my shirt. I gasped as his hand reached through my pubic hair. I had a sudden thought that maybe he was going to take his revenge by twisting my balls off and turning me into a eunuch. Instead he cradled my balls and took the measure of my cock. He gave a small tug and I was embarrassed to feel myself thickening and lengthening. His eyes looked into mine.

‘Ae,’ he said. ‘Ae.’

There was a look which conveyed all that an old man must feel about youth and the sexuality of one’s grandson. Regret that he will not be able to feel the bucking of another person beneath him in orgasm. Nostalgia for all those times of heated encounters and lust. And pride that one’s own offspring has achieved a rightful inheritance.

‘You and I the same —’ he said.

Was this Grandfather’s blessing? This acceptance that I was one of his? Had I now obtained his acceptance?

‘Ah, Himiona —’ he sighed. There was such regret in his voice. ‘You and I —’

I bent to kiss his eyelids. My lips tasted the salt of his life, my nose felt the warmth of his breath and my skin took the warmth of his cheek.

He took his hands from my thighs. I buttoned myself up.

‘You make the decision,’ he said.

Nothing more. I left the room.

At the end of his life, Grandfather Tamihana was moved from the bedroom into the sitting room. A space was made for him where his throne had been. There, swathed in blankets and propped up by pillows, we looked upon him for the last time. Mother Ramona was by his side. The Mahana clan gathered, kneeling in homage around him, waiting for his last breath. Every intake of breath was ours. Every exhalation was also ours. The windows and doors of the homestead were all open. Outside on the verandah were the Whatus, the Tuparas, the Peres, the Horsfalls, the Kerekeres and all the people of Waituhi.

Grandfather laboured, sighed, coughed, hissed, held his breath and laboured again late into the morning.

‘Maybe,’ Haromi whispered to me, ‘he’s waiting to hear that old Rupeni Poata has dropped dead.’

I grinned at her. It would make Grandfather’s night to know that his arch enemy had gone before him.

Still Grandfather hung on. Even when, at three in the morning, Grandmother reached across to him, patted his shoulders and said, ‘You should go now’, he kept breathing.

‘E hara!’ Grandmother Ramona continued. ‘Go now and let us get some sleep!’

Around four, Grandfather’s breathing levelled out. All of a sudden he took a breath. His eyes flickered open. He looked up and saw something awesome approaching from far away, flying down from the clouds, through an open window and into the room. The curtains billowed with the wind.

He watched alert as something blond and glittering, with blue eyes and lazy smile, flew around the walls, trying to find a way through his defences.

‘Kaya-oraa, Tamay-hana,’ the angel laughed.

The angel feinted, swerved and tested Grandfather to ascertain how it could get through.

‘The best of three falls?’ the angel asked.

Imperceptibly, Grandfather nodded. His eyes darted this way and that in quick flickering movements, following the rippling wings of the angel, waiting for a break. But the angel always seemed to keep out of his reach.

Grandfather became impatient. He let out his breath in one explosive ‘Haaaaa —’. He could wait no longer.

The angel opened its wings as if to claim Grandfather. With a cry the mighty Bulibasha, King of the Gypsies, sprang through its defences and started to wrestle with it.

‘This time I’ll defeat you!’ he cried.

The room opened and Grandfather and the angel fell into searing light.

‘Kua mate o tatou papa,’ Uncle Matiu said.

The dogs which until that time had been silent all started to howl.

Chapter 55

Maori people say that when Death’s angel visits he sometimes takes two people rather than one. I don’t know why this should be so. Perhaps it’s God’s way of saving on travelling. Whatever, when the news spread that Grandfather had died, people associated his passing with the death of my cousin Mohi. They said that Mohi had gone ahead to make ready the way for Grandfather.

Grandfather’s tangihanga was held at Waituhi, on Rongopai marae, and was one of the largest ever seen in the Poverty Bay and East Coast. This would have pleased Grandfather, who always placed great store on size and on ceremony, as if this was a measure of a person. Elders from all tribes travelled with large ope to mourn his passing. Indeed, he became a greater person in death then he had been in life.

During the three days of mourning references were made to Grandfather’s many illegitimate children and to his having killed a man who had the audacity to walk over his legs, and his sporting prowess reached epic proportions. By the third day the family was almost convinced that Bulibasha had been a supernatural person. We kept on looking at him in his casket and thinking, He’s going to get up and start haranguing us any minute for thinking he’s dead.

By the last day over two thousand people had come to farewell Bulibasha. Over and over mourners praised his exploits as a Maori Samson and honoured our family. His links with Ngata were elaborated on. The establishment of the shearing gangs. The fairness, honesty and reputation of Mahana One, Mahana Two, Mahana Three and Mahana Four were all spoken of. References were made to the winning of the Golden Fleece. Finally, accolades were accorded Grandfather’s status as the head of the family of God. He had, indeed, been a faithful servant of his God and, by his works, had been a living witness and testament that God lived.

During the final hours, Grandfather had a surprise visitation. From out of the sun, Rupeni Poata and the people of Hukareka arrived. Their ope numbered over a hundred and they came walking down the road calling and wailing to us. Poppy was on Rupeni’s arm. She was proud, undaunted.

Aunt Ruth was outraged. ‘How dare they come,’ she hissed. ‘Have they forgotten that they come to Waituhi only at their peril?’

‘If they try anything,’ Uncle Matiu said, ‘they will surely pay. With their lives.’

We were all alert for any offence, any slight against our grandfather. We sent out our best women to karanga back to them. Then Uncle Matiu nodded to David and Benjamin to go out and challenge them. We offered up our most fierce haka to assure them that they were not dealing with mere mortals. We watched, our noses flaring and eyes bulging, as they walked onto our marae. The whole earth seemed to become charged with psychic energy. Hukareka, watch out.

Hukareka presented three speakers. All of them were intermediaries between the Mahana and the Poata clans and sought to reconcile us. We listened, our minds alert to their nuances. Was that a criticism? No? How about that one? Well, we’ll let that one slide by –

Then Rupeni Poata himself stood up. He approached the porch where Grandfather was lying in state. He nodded in deference to Grandmother Ramona. Then –

‘I’m glad you’re dead, you bastard,’ he shouted. ‘You hear me? I’m glad you’re lying there in your coffin. The sooner we get you buried the better.’

I couldn’t believe my ears. My uncles and cousins wanted to run out and kill Rupeni right on the spot. We were held back by Zebediah Whatu.

‘All of Hukareka rejoices that you’re dead,’ Rupeni continued. ‘I rejoice. Now that you are gone there is space for us. You cast too big a shadow, Bulibasha. Take it with you and leave us the sun.’

Then Rupeni sat down. The sun polished his face with glowing bronze. He was like a proud statue.

‘Don’t you understand?’ Zebediah asked. ‘Of all the eulogies delivered, that one was the greatest. The greatest compliment, the greatest homage to Bulibasha.’

At the reading of Grandfather’s will, all the land and shares were, as expected, left to my uncles Matiu, Maaka, Ruka and Hone, my aunts Ruth and Sarah and my uncles Aperahama and Ihaka. Grandmother was left the homestead and a large cash settlement for as long as she lived. At her death, the homestead and residue were to be shared equally by my aunts Sephora, Miriam and Esther.

My father Joshua was referred to as ‘already having been provided for by his mother’.

Chapter 56

A month went past. I came home from Hamilton for the holidays. I was falling in love so often at the college that my heart welcomed the rest of Waituhi, and the physical labour. Like all boys in their late teens I was tussling with who I was and what I wanted.

One day, after Dad and I had come in from fencing, my mother said, ‘Something’s happening up at the homestead. Mother Ramona is acting peculiar.’

‘It’s to be expected,’ my father answered. ‘After all, Father was Mother Ramona’s entire life. They were married for a long time. She’s bound to feel his loss.’

‘This is different,’ my mother said. ‘You’d better find out what’s troubling the old lady.’

I too had become aware of some change in Grandmother Ramona. Her daily visits to Grandfather’s grave had been attended by some transcendence, some luminosity of appearance. I often saw her standing up there, a black silhouette against a blood-red sky, unmoving, eternal, appearing for all the world an icon of undying love.

There was a rightness about Grandmother’s faithfulness to Grandfather. If the Mahanas had been Hindu, no one would have doubted that Grandmother Ramona would gladly have gone to the funeral pyre with him. Perhaps she was ready to die now.

But what was this?

‘Mother’s been talking to somebody on the telephone,’ Mum said. ‘Sephora has caught her at it a number of times now. Mother Ramona hangs up immediately. She has also started locking her door. One day Esther saw her through the doorway. Mother Ramona had taken that old wedding dress of hers out of her hope chest. She was ironing it.’

Later that month came the event we had all been dreading — the first gathering of the family since Grandfather’s death. The full complement were present to confirm the ongoing nature of the Mahana clan. Zebediah Whatu and Ihaka Mahana had agreed out of respect to us that they would not attend.

‘Where’s Mother Ramona?’ Uncle Matiu asked. Being the eldest, he was expected to take over the running of the family meetings.

‘She’s not ready yet,’ Aunt Esther answered.

‘Aue, poor Mum,’ Aunt Sarah sniffed.

There was an uncomfortable silence while we waited.

‘Are you going to take Father’s seat?’ Uncle Aperahama asked Uncle Matiu. He motioned to Grandfather’s now vacant throne. Uncle Matiu gave a slight hop of alarm.

‘No, that would be disrespectful. Next week I’ll go into town and buy a new one.’

Then Grandmother Ramona arrived, regal in black gown and greenstone earrings. Aunt Sarah began to sob as if life had broken into tiny pieces. I watched Grandmother keenly as she made her way through the family to her accustomed chair. There was something different about her. Some resolve. Some sense of purpose. Her procession was marked by increasing sobs and wails from Aunt Sarah. Grandmother Ramona sat down and sighed — ‘Oh shut up, Sarah,’ she said. ‘Carrying on all the time as if the world was going to end. No wonder your husband took to the bottle and your daughter has run away.’

Our mouths fell open.

Then Grandmother Ramona’s eyes softened. Her demeanour became supplicatory.

‘Your father is dead. You are his children. I am your mother. The dead to the dead. The living to the living. I have a request. I have done my duty by him, your father, and by you all. I want you to let me go now. Go back to him who I have loved all my life.’ She paused. ‘To Rupeni.’

To Rupeni?

There was a shocked silence, then Aunt Sarah stepped up to Grandmother Ramona and said, ‘You’re over sixty, you stupid old woman. What the hell are you playing at?’

Bedlam broke out.

It is very difficult to trust adults once you have found them out. All my life I was accustomed to the usual Mahana evasiveness whenever I had any questions. Answers like, ‘Ask no questions and you get no lies.’ Or, ‘It’s none of your business.’ Or, ‘When you’re older we’ll tell you.’ These had always been the three main responses to any questions about the enmity between the Mahanas and the Poatas. So is my scepticism to be wondered at when a story turns out to be a complete lie from the start?

From the very beginning I had been brought up to fight the Poatas because they hated us. I had been told that this hatred stemmed from Rupeni Poata and his rivalry with Grandfather Tamihana on the sporting field and in haka. But God had always been on Grandfather’s side and thus he was the one who always triumphed. Even where Rupeni Poata happened to excel, it was always because he was good at strategy or on game plan: Grandfather’s physical strength allowed him to win in taiaha and mere, but Rupeni’s intelligence enabled him to triumph in peruperu and haka.

Wrong. Rupeni was the better sportsman and Tamihana always had it in for him because, no matter how hard he tried, Rupeni was the one who consistently came first.

Again, I had always believed Grandfather and Rupeni Poata were natural competitors, never wishing to play on the same side and always playing against each other. The one arena where Grandfather was the clear winner was in the love stakes, where his outright handsomeness and sexuality sidelined Rupeni completely. In the shower room there was no doubt as to who was the more virile man.

Wrong again. Grandfather, despite his physical attributes, was not the clear winner in the love stakes either.

The keystone to the rivalry, so I had been led to believe, was that Rupeni hated Grandfather after he had taken Ramona, who loved Grandfather, from the doors of the church.

Wrong for the third count.

When the First World War came, it is true that Rupeni and some of his friends were advocates of Sir Apirana Ngata and heeded his call to enlist in the Pioneer Battalion. It is also true that Grandfather’s mother refused to let him enlist. And it is true that just prior to leaving for France, Rupeni and Ramona were engaged to be married. But Ramona had never been in love with Grandfather at all. She had been faithfully Rupeni’s for many years, and wanted nothing more than to marry him before he left to go overseas with the Pioneer Battalion.

The truth is: Tamihana had never even seen Ramona until the day before her wedding.

This is how it happened.

Waituhi was playing football in Ramona’s village of Hauiti, and had won the game. On his way back to the pa, where the team was being billeted, Tamihana passed by a house near the church. He heard women inside giggling, and, attracted by the sound, crept up to the flax and peered through.

Tamihana saw a girl in white, her back to him, with her head completely covered by a veil. Her mothers and sisters were fussing over the hem of her wedding dress. The girl turned in profile and the sunlight lit through the veil. Tamihana could see that she was very young. Sixteen.

‘E kare ma!’ the girl trilled.

The girl laughed, her face to the sun, and the wind lifted her veil so that for a moment Tamihana could gaze on Ramona.

Tamihana was eighteen. He had had many women. But he took one look at Ramona and was pierced to the heart by the lightning rod of God. Other women in Tamihana’s life became as nothing to Ramona’s innocent beauty. In one look he devoured her lips, her body, her eyes, her breasts, her hair and her thighs. His physical desire was such that he felt his cock storming out of its phallic sheath like a sword. He knew without doubt that she was a virgin.

When Tamihana found out that Ramona was the ridiculous Rupeni Poata’s bride, and that they were to be married the next day, he roared with laughter.

Came the wedding day and Tamihana, astride a white horse, watched from a hiding place near the church. He saw Rupeni arrive in his Model T Ford. He glanced down the road. Ramona was on her way to the church. The band was playing –

— Ramona I hear the mission bells above –

A woman among the wedding guests saw the party approaching. She began to karanga to Ramona, her mother and father and sisters, all coming along the road. Rupeni, aglow with love, stepped out to greet his bride. Tamihana spurred his white horse along the road. It was all so easy.

The wedding guests scattered as Tamihana galloped through them. He slashed Rupeni’s cheek as Rupeni tried to catch the reins of the stallion. The blood flicked across Ramona’s white dress like glowing rubies. Tamihana leaned down. He lifted Ramona up.

‘Ko wai koe!’ she cried. ‘Who are you?’

Ramona fitted easily into his arms. Her perfume took his breath away and triggered his lust.

‘Kaore,’ she pleaded. ‘Kaore.’

He placed her in front of him. His breath hissed. Even as Tamihana galloped away he had turned her to face him. He prised her legs apart. He heard her whimpering and saw her glance at Rupeni, so far away now.

He unbuttoned his trousers. Lifted her up and onto him.

‘Ruu-penne —’

Screaming, Ramona’s breath sucked the veil into her mouth.

Again Grandmother asked the family: ‘I want you to let me go now, back to Rupeni Poata, the man whom I have loved all my life.’

The family argued all that night. They reached a decision.

‘No.’

Grandmother stood up.

‘I will abide by your decision,’ she said.

Chapter 57

A week after that fateful meeting I was digging in some fence posts at our farm. Glory was helping me.

‘You have to do something,’ she said during our smoko. ‘Grandmother Ramona has decided to die.’

So it was true then.

‘Why me?’ I asked.

Glory shrugged. ‘It’s your job.’

‘My job?’

She looked at me as if I was hopelessly dumb. ‘Of course, silly.’

Since the family meeting, Grandmother Ramona had locked herself in her room and refused to eat. Every morning, noon and evening Aunt Sephora pounded on her door. No answer.

‘She’ll come around,’ Aunt Sarah said. ‘When she gets hungry she’ll eat.’

Grandmother never did.

‘This is emotional blackmail,’ Aunt Sarah said angrily. ‘If Mother Ramona wants to die, then so be it. I will not have our father’s name and mana trampled on. If Mother goes to Rupeni it will be like shitting on all our father stood for. There has always been war between the Mahanas and Poatas.’

Glory’s words were still ringing in my ears when I went around to the homestead. I tapped on the window. Grandmother came to it but wouldn’t open it. Her face was ethereal.

‘What’s this all about, Grandmother?’

‘You must help me,’ she said.

I went back to work. My father Joshua had taken over digging in the fence posts.

‘Dad,’ I said, ‘if you hadn’t met Mum, would you have been able to fall in love with somebody else?’

He paused. He looked at me strangely. My father has always been a man of the soil. The earth is something he knows. Emotions? Those too he knows with his heart. He does not need to explain with words. There is a language of the heart which is more profound than words from the lips. He tried his best.

‘There’s never been anybody else for me but your mother,’ he said.

That settled it.

‘We have to have another family meeting.’

So it was that the entire family gathered again to discuss what to do about Grandmother Ramona. Grandmother had agreed to come out of her bedroom to listen, but she was so fatigued she had to be helped to her chair.

The discussion didn’t get off to a good start. Straight away Grandmother’s sons and daughters took over, as was their right, and nobody else could get a word in edgeways. The first hour was filled with argument and counter-argument between them.

Aunt Sarah got hot under the collar. ‘Why should we be discussing this?’ she asked. ‘Mum has already said she will abide by our decision. We have made that decision. If she wants to starve to death, that’s her decision. Let it be on her own head.’

‘How dare you say that,’ Aunt Sephora interjected. ‘How dare you let our own mother die!’

‘Don’t be stupid!’ Aunt Sarah scoffed. ‘There’s no way the old lady will kick the bucket. This is just a try-on —’

‘Now wait a minute —’ Uncle Jack, Aunt Sarah’s husband, tried to intervene.

‘Who pressed your button?’ Aunt Sarah was withering. ‘You’re not part of the family. Speak when you’re spoken to.’

Uncle Jack’s nostrils flared. My mother looked down. In one fell swoop Aunt Sarah had re-established the pecking order, reducing all the spouses of Grandfather’s sons and daughters to people whose opinions came second. This was the way it had always been.

‘You’ve said enough,’ Aunt Ruth said. ‘I’m the eldest of the girls, Sarah. Get back into line.’

Then Grandmother Ramona made a slight movement of her head, as if the wind had lifted a veil from her face. It was significant enough to make everybody look at her.

‘He took me against my will,’ Grandmother Ramona said. Her voice knifed up from the past. ‘You’re all old enough to hear the truth. Your father stole me away from Rupeni and took me against my will.’

Esther started to sob. ‘No, Mum, I don’t want to hear —’

Aunt Ruth, sensing what was about to happen, waved her arms at us who were the grandchildren –

‘All you kids clear out.’

It was too late.

‘You,’ Grandmother Ramona pointed at Uncle Matiu, ‘are the first one born from his taking of me against my will. And you,’ she pointed at Uncle Maaka, ‘are the second.’

‘Didn’t you kids hear? Out of the room, all of you!’ Aunt Sarah was beside herself. ‘Everybody out. Everybody except the family.’

But Grandmother was merciless. ‘Stop ordering everybody around, Sarah. This is not your house. Everybody stay. You should all hear this.’ Her eyes glittered. Her voice, when it came again, was precise, matter-of-fact.

‘He took me into the scrub and he kept me locked up in a shearing quarters. He had planned it all along. He took me. Six times the first day. Six times the second. It hurt. It always hurt with him. He was like a bull. So big. He gored me. Trampled on me every time. I pleaded with him to stop. I knew I was already pregnant. As soon as he did it to me that first time, I knew.’

Uncle Matiu’s face was quivering.

‘Shut your ears, all of you,’ Aunt Sarah said. ‘Mother doesn’t know what she’s saying.’

‘Don’t you tell me what I know and what I don’t,’ Grandmother Ramona answered. ‘You know nothing, Sarah. Nothing. I tried to get away from him. I knew that Rupeni must have been looking for me. Once I heard somebody in the scrub and thought it must be him. On the third day I managed to get free, but’ — her voice drifted — ‘Rupeni was already on his way to France. I thought that Tamihana would let me go, after he’d had his way. But he wanted to keep me. What for? I don’t know. Who knows how a man is or how he thinks? Anyway, it was too late. I was hapu. I couldn’t go back to anybody — to Rupeni or my father and family. A week after I was stolen away, Tamihana brought me down from the bush. My father was waiting with a shotgun and wanted to kill him. I said, “No, e pa, for I am with this man’s child. It is too late.” He asked me, “How do you know?” A woman always knows. When the seed gets planted inside here’ — Grandmother pointed to her thighs — ‘a woman knows. She is supposed to feel joy. But for me there was no joy. There was only shame. You know, four years later when Rupeni came back — I had three babies by then — he asked me to be with him. Did you know that? He said he didn’t care that I had been taken by Tamihana. But I knew if I went to him that he would always have pictures in his head of your father sleeping with me, and raping me, and they would always come between us. All my children would be reminders that Tamihana had taken me first.’

Grandmother looked across at Matiu. She raised an arm to him. ‘It was not your fault, son, that you were born of rape. It was not mine either. When I was carrying you, I hated you. I wanted to take a stick and push it up inside me and kill you. When you were born I hated you because you looked so like him. Every time I looked at you I would think, “You should have been Rupeni’s. You should have grown from Rupeni’s seed.” But my breasts were heavy with milk and, after a time, I grew to love you because you had nobody to defend you.’

Grandmother gestured to all her sons and daughters. ‘I grew to love you all.’ Yet she was firm. ‘But all of you, even my grandchildren, all of you are the result of couplings in which Tamihana took me against my will. It is the truth. I swear it before God.’

Uncle Ruka snorted in contempt. ‘I don’t believe any of this. Dad wasn’t like that.’ He looked at Grandmother Ramona. ‘You’re telling us that he raped you every time?’

Grandmother Ramona lifted her head. ‘It is always like the male to think that women enjoy being taken when they don’t want to be taken, ne? You think we will get used to it, ne? It’s one of your fantasies, ne? Hear the truth then. It was always rape. Yes, I got used to it. I got used to closing my eyes and wishing he would get it over with. And of course there were times when he was good for me. Your father could make me tremble with need. He could look at me and I would start to moisten and flower for him. I am an animal, yes. But those times, too, were rape. At those times I would shut him away out of my head. I never initiated my times with your father. And when I cried out, it was always Rupeni’s name that was on my lips. Your father hated that. You want to know why he always beat me? Because whenever we made love and he was enjoying it I would spit out Rupeni’s name. Right to the very end.’

‘Did Father ever love you?’ Aunt Miriam asked. ‘Did you ever love him, Mother?’ Miriam was a romantic. She needed something to cling on to in the maelstrom.

‘Ah, love,’ Grandmother mused. ‘That is a different thing. Yes, your father loved me. He asked me to marry him, but I always refused. When he found religion it was a release for me too. I said “Yes” when he asked me to be baptised with him. But I always said “No” when he wanted us to marry. To marry him would have been to bless that act of abduction, and you know our teachings: I didn’t want to be tied to your father for all eternity.’ Grandmother paused, thoughtful. ‘Love? I think your father loved me because he wanted to possess me and he never could. There have only been two people in this family he was never able to possess. Me and Himiona.’

Me? Did that mean Grandfather loved me?

‘But there was something else,’ Grandmother continued. ‘In the beginning he wanted me because he didn’t want Rupeni to have me. You understand? He would never have taken me if I hadn’t been intended for Rupeni. His jealousy of Rupeni was beyond understanding.’ Grandmother paused again. ‘Did I love your father? I stayed with him for over sixty years.’

‘But you had all of us,’ Uncle Ihaka remonstrated.

‘Yes,’ Grandmother answered drily. ‘I didn’t have any choice.’

‘But why did you stay with him?’ asked Uncle Maaka.

Grandmother Ramona smiled. ‘I was his property. His possession. I was a woman. I had nowhere else to go.’

‘And in all that time you still loved Rupeni?’ Aunt Ruth persisted. The eldest girl. Trying to restore control.

‘Yes, always,’ Grandmother answered. ‘Even when Rupeni married. After all, he was a man just like any other, he had the needs of all men. His wife Maata was a proud woman and I liked her very much. I was jealous of her for a while, especially since he seemed to love her. Most of all I was pleased for him that he had found a woman able to give him fine children. When she died, I suppose I could have gone to him then. I don’t know why I didn’t. I think, by that time, I was so old I’d forgotten that everybody has a second chance. I want to take that chance now.’

‘Did Rupeni ever try to come between you and Father?’ Uncle Hone asked. We needed to know, now.

Grandmother Ramona shook her head. ‘Never. Oh yes, we exchanged a few words every now and then. I thought he had lost his love for me. We were always so formal with each other. I have never touched him since that day your father stole me. But there were times when we would tremble when we were near. If we touched each other I would be afraid —’ She swayed. Recovered. ‘Deep down in our hearts Rupeni and I knew that we loved and wanted each other. But I would never have gone to him. I was Bulibasha’s. I was a mother with twelve children. I had respect for Bulibasha. He was the father of my children.’

‘So why go to Rupeni now, Mum?’ Aunt Miriam asked.

‘Because Bulibasha is dead,’ Grandmother said, ‘and I am alive and Rupeni is alive.’ She straightened. ‘I say again, I have done my duty to your father and to the Mahana family. Nobody can say that I have not been dutiful. But now I have another duty. To put right what your father put wrong forty-five years ago. To go to Rupeni as I would have done when I was sixteen.’

‘Have you talked to Rupeni?’ Uncle Matiu asked. ‘Has he agreed to have you?’

‘Yes. He wants me. I want him. It is as simple as that. But he too has said he will abide by your decision.’

‘We’ll be the laughing stock of Gisborne,’ Aunt Ruth muttered.

‘That’s all you can think about, isn’t it,’ Grandmother Ramona said. ‘The mana of the house of Mahana. You think Rupeni’s family wants this to happen too? Not a chance.’

‘You’ve never loved us, Mum,’ Aperahama said.

‘Oh my son, love for you is why I will not do this unless you agree to it. If you don’t, then let me die. But I beg of you, let me go to Rupeni. Besides, there’s one more thing that you should know —’

Grandmother reached into her dress pocket and took out a letter. ‘He sold me,’ she said. ‘Your father sold me to Rupeni Poata.’

There was a shocked silence.

‘This is the proof. It is my bill of sale. Here —’ She gestured to Uncle Matiu.

‘You see,’ Grandmother said, ‘your father wanted to win the Golden Fleece so badly that he went to Rupeni Poata and said that if Rupeni threw the playoff he would give me over to him. As it happened, Rupeni Poata didn’t accept, though he let your father think he did. Mahana Four won because it was the best.’

‘Of course it was,’ Uncle Hone snorted.

‘Rupeni gave this bill of sale back to your father after the competition. I found it in his drawer. I rang Rupeni to ask about it. Rupeni told me he said to your father, “You should have trusted that angel when it said it would look after you.” Your father never told me about this.’

‘But it doesn’t count,’ Aunt Sarah said.

‘No. But your father’s intent was very clear. He would have sold me if he had to. I am angry with him for even thinking of it. It was the last straw. I do not feel obliged to him any longer.’

‘Well, that was then,’ Uncle Maaka said. ‘This is now. There’s a big difference. I don’t think any of us need to take into account your story.’

He turned to the others. ‘Kua pai?’ he asked.

‘Kua pai,’ they agreed.

Glory was kneeling next to me. She jabbed me in the side and nodded:

Do something.

I frowned back at her. What could I do?

Then I remembered Grandfather’s words. ‘You make the decision,’ he had said. Nothing more.

I coughed and tried to speak. My father looked at me, curious. I coughed again.

‘I think we should vote,’ I squeaked.

All eyes in the room swivelled around to peer at me. ‘Hei aha?’

‘I said,’ I repeated, ‘that we should all take a vote.’

Aunt Sarah pursed her lips and looked at me askance. ‘Why is it,’ she said, ‘that every time you mention a vote, Himiona, I always feel like I’m about to be had! No vote.’

‘Don’t you believe in democracy?’ I asked.

‘Yes, but —’

‘The vote is the only democratic way.’

‘Listen to the boy,’ Aunt Ruth snorted. She rushed to take Aunt Sarah’s side. ‘This isn’t an election, Himiona. And who’s we? If anybody is having a say in this matter it’s the adults. Not kids.’

‘I still think,’ I said, ‘that there should be a vote. Perhaps only — our parents?’

Glory nodded vigorously.

‘Who do you specifically mean?’ Aunt Ruth asked, enunciating each word carefully. ‘And where do you get all this nonsense? School is making you whakahihi.’

Then Uncle Hone spoke up. ‘I think Simeon has a point. We don’t seem to be getting anywhere. Why don’t we try it? How about all Mother and Father’s children and our partners?’

Mum’s eyes widened. So did Uncle Jack’s and Uncle Albie’s. Let the in-laws in on a decision? Are we hearing right?

Astonishingly, ‘Sounds worth a try,’ Uncle Matiu said. ‘Agreed? Kua pai?’

There was a mumble which appeared to indicate agreement. The in-laws shuffled nervously.

‘I’ll give you a few seconds to think about it,’ Uncle Matiu said, ‘then I shall ask for a show of hands. How many of us? Twenty?’

‘This is ridiculous,’ Aunt Sarah exploded. But before she could elaborate, Uncle Matiu had called for the vote.

‘How many for Mother Ramona?’

Eleven hands.

‘How many against?’

Nine hands.

‘Mother wins.’

‘I knew it wouldn’t work,’ Aunt Sarah said. She turned to Uncle Jack, ‘Why did you vote against me?’ She looked at Uncle Matiu. ‘Jack’s just changed his vote. A draw.’

‘I’ll vote the way I want to,’ Uncle Jack said. ‘The vote stays as is.’

‘Well, I don’t like the vote,’ Aunt Ruth said and folded her arms. That’s that.

‘So we should lock Mother up for the rest of her life? Or let her die?’ Esther asked. ‘Is that your solution?’

Aunt Ruth turned on her. ‘We’ll force feed her if we have to.’ She turned on everybody. ‘How can you all take Mother’s side? We’re talking about the mana of the family here, and don’t any of you forget it. Our father is lying up there in his grave. He fought all his life against Rupeni Poata. Look what Rupeni did to our father’s leg. I loved my father. Did any of you? You are being persuaded by a silly old woman who is losing her marbles. I can’t let you do this.’

I raised my hand again, hoping to stop Aunt Ruth from turning the tide.

‘Perhaps there should be three votes,’ I said. ‘You know, have three shows of hands and the majority vote wins.’

Aunt Ruth looked like she could murder me.

‘Ka tika,’ Uncle Hone nodded. ‘The boy has some brains, after all. Maybe we should all go for our School Certificate.’

Everybody laughed.

‘Well,’ Uncle Matiu asked Aunt Ruth, ‘does that sound fair to you?’

Come on, Aunt Ruth, come to Simeon.

‘Oh, all right.’

Gotcha.

‘Round number two!’ Uncle Matiu said.

My heart was pounding. Glory was humming beside me. She looked totally unconcerned. What was the fuss all about?

‘How many for Mother this time?’ Uncle Matiu asked.

This time nine. Uncle Jack was still hanging out against Aunt Sarah.

‘How many against?’

This time eleven.

Grandmother Ramona looked across to me, her face wan. She knew Aunt Ruth’s impassioned defence of the Mahana mana had appealed to the family’s sense of honour. There was only one vote to go. What should I do? There had to be some way of giving Grandmother a fair chance. Surely there were some of the family who, under other less public circumstances, would vote for –

Then I knew. I put up my hand again.

‘The third vote should be by secret ballot,’ I announced. ‘Then people can really vote the way they feel.’

Aunt Ruth stared at me. ‘If I ever get into trouble with the law, remind me to engage you as my lawyer,’ she said.

‘So,’ Uncle Matiu asked, ‘we take Simeon’s suggestion? Kua pai. Then hand out sheets of paper and everybody vote. Simeon, you can count them when we’ve finished.’

‘Not on your life!’ Aunt Sarah exploded. ‘If anybody’s going to count the votes it will be me and Ruth.’ Then she began to whimper, then sob, then heave. Tears ran down her eyes. She looked as if she was going to have a heart attack.

‘Our father was a good man,’ she wailed. ‘We love our mother too, but Mum, you have only selfish desires in your heart. Our father is up there, dead. Dead! Nobody can speak for him except us. Even though he is dead, he is still Bulibasha.’

I thought, Oh shit, shit, shit.

Uncle Matiu coughed. ‘Let’s vote now,’ he said.

The room was filled with the sounds of scratching. Then quiet descended and gradually the papers started to come my way. I recognised my mother’s wilful ‘Ae,’ in favour of Grandmother. My father had also voted ‘Ae.’ So had Miriam, Pani, Sephora and Esther, Jack and Albie. But with growing despair I knew that Aunt Sarah’s last speech had brought the sword of Damocles to hang above Grandmother’s head.

Nine for Grandmother, eleven against. We had almost done it, but almost was not good enough.

‘Well, Simeon,’ Aunt Sarah, said, ‘bring the papers for me and Ruth to count. Don’t take all night.’

My feet had turned to lead. I started to walk across the room. Glory stopped humming. She gave a sigh of exasperation and glared hard at me. Her eyebrows knitted together: Well? What next?

I nodded: Play dead, Glory.

She fainted.

My mother rushed up to her with a cry. Aunts and uncles crowded around. Just for a moment the vote was forgotten.

Out with my pencil. Add two slips of paper with ‘Ae’ on them; subtract two slips with ‘Kaore’ on them.

‘I’m all right,’ Glory said, reviving.

Her look told me, You owe me one, brother.

Chapter 58

Sometimes when I think of Grandmother Ramona now I imagine a silent film with people walking in the fast jerking way we used to laugh at when we were children. Dressed entirely in white, she is la paloma, a beautiful white dove, in an overdressed Spanish court. Her lover is a young man who demonstrates his love with his hands across his heart.

He has nothing to give Ramona. Not riches, not lands, not even a proud castle in Spain. Nothing — except his love. A love which will endure for ever.

The night after the vote was one of unparalleled beauty. The sky was so clear that you could see to the end of the universe. My father Joshua and I were standing with the men of the family at the bottom of the steps to the homestead. Through the wide open windows, their curtains billowing in the evening breeze, we could see the women. Grandmother Ramona was sitting in front of her mirror, combing her hair. My sister Glory was threading yellow daisies through it. Aunt Ruth and Aunt Sarah were still haranguing their mother, their voices like cicadas.

Uncle Matiu came out the front door. ‘Rupeni’s on his way,’ he announced.

I flushed and had to hide my face in the shadows. Yes, I was ashamed. My manipulation had changed the course of family history for ever. There was something arrogant in the notion, something God-like in the assumption.

‘You make the decision.’

But underpinning it all was a new emotion, a reckless disregard for the rightness of things. I could play with people as if they were toys. There was not so much difference, after all, between me and my grandfather, the Bulibasha.

Of course Aunt Ruth and Aunt Sarah had just about died when they counted the votes. They looked at each other and blanched and counted again. Then Aunt Ruth pierced me with a glance. She suspected something. She and Aunt Sarah continued to protest, but in the end they had to agree that the result meant Grandmother could go to Rupeni Poata.

I don’t know how long we waited that night. Members of the family came and went. Zebediah Whatu turned up, and strong words were sent to Grandmother. Ihaka also had a go at her. Even Granduncle Pera wanted a few words. Every now and then there’d be the sound of yet another screaming match in the house as the women, too, argued with each other. Maggie came for a moment; so did Auntie Molly. Everyone had their own opinion.

Another hour passed. Uncle Hone looked at his watch and said, ‘Rupeni’s sure taking his time.’

‘Maybe he doesn’t want her after all,’ Uncle Aperahama suggested with a laugh.

‘Well,’ Uncle Matiu said, ‘maybe we don’t want her either.’

Then a sound began to pierce the darkness — the phut phut oogle oogle of a vintage car. Now we knew why it had taken Rupeni so long to get to Waituhi. Along the road came the headlights of a Model T Ford, the one which Rupeni had locked in his garage for forty-five years. The car turned into the driveway; its bonnet and cab were festooned with ribbons. Two tiny dolls dressed in wedding clothes were affixed to the radiator.

The Model T coughed to a stop in front of the homestead. Rupeni got out. I didn’t know what to think at first, because he was wearing a morning suit that was much too small for him and his pants were tight across his bum. There was a ripping sound from his coat as he strained to push shut the rickety car door, and to add insult to injury his wing collar burst open and he had to clutch at his bowtie to stop it from falling off.

‘Ko ahau,’ he said. ‘It is I.’

‘You stay there, Rupeni Poata,’ Uncle Matiu yelled out to him. ‘Dad never let you come across the threshold when he was alive, so don’t think you can cross the threshold now. Your woman will come to you.’

Rupeni nodded.

‘What’s he doing now?’ Uncle Ihaka asked.

Rupeni had gone around to the back seat of the car. He reached in and began cranking furiously with his arm. Then –

— Ramona, I hear the mission bells above –

Good grief.

Grandmother appeared on the verandah with her daughters beside her like a chorus of unwilling bridesmaids. My sisters were there too, as flower girls. Glory caught my eye and pointed at her artwork in Grandmother Ramona’s hair. I gave her the thumbs-up. Grandmother Ramona was wearing the old wedding gown, pinned and tucked with safety pins, a simple white dress like a nightgown falling to her ankles. Glory’s flowers were lovely, but the rest of Grandmother Ramona looked wrong, her attempt at turning back the clock a foolish and pathetic charade. Yet there was a rightness too in the challenge, an integrity in a gesture made in the face of Time.

‘E kui, ma te Atua koe e manaaki,’ Mum said. Mother, go with God.

‘I’ll never forgive you, Mum,’ Aunt Ruth said.

In desperation Aunt Sarah yelled out, ‘Hone? Matiu? For goodness sake, stop her.’

My uncles reacted without thinking to the peremptory demand, but in a flash Dad was there, stopping them.

‘Let her go,’ he said. ‘Let her go.’ He looked up at Aunt Ruth. ‘She’s already been through enough, sis.’

My father, Joshua. Finding his voice, his authority. And knowing that he owed Grandmother Ramona much for the piece of land she had given us.

‘Go to him, Mum,’ he said.

Grandmother nodded. She kissed Dad’s hand as if he alone had made it right for her to leave. As she passed by me, she bent her head in acknowledgement.

I will never forget the look of love on Rupeni’s face. His eyes were filled with tears, spilling with glowing moonstones. Then I looked at Grandmother Ramona, and it seemed that the years were folding in on themselves with every step she took from the verandah. She was getting younger and younger as time turned back forty-five years.

There was magic in the air that evening. It had the power to set things right.

And Ramona was coming along the road, a sixteen-year-old bride-to-be, and dogs were growling and snapping at the wedding party. But Ramona didn’t care about the kuri nor about the cowpats and horse dung strewn along the way. In the distance she heard a woman in karanga.

‘Haere mai koutou, haere mai, haere mai, haere mai —’

Ramona saw the old Model T Ford standing there beside the church. She searched among the crowd and there was Rupeni gazing at her from afar.

Ramona thought, He should be inside waiting for me. Doesn’t he know that this is bad luck for him to be standing there? Then she was there, facing him.

‘Rupeni —’

‘Ramona —’

She giggled because the band was playing her song.

‘Ko taku aroha ki a koe kaore e mate,’ Rupeni said. ‘My love for you will never die.’

‘Nor mine for you,’ she answered.

Suddenly Ramona heard the drumming of horses’ hooves. Something screamed in her mind. Her own voice called out to the gods: Kaa-ooo-rrr-eee — She turned, frightened, expecting to see a white horse coming down the road and a fierce man whom she did not know stooping to snatch her away. But it was only the wind playing tricks with her imagination. Only a white horse ambling riderless along the road. Nothing more. There was only Rupeni taking her hand.

I saw Rupeni open his arms wide to Grandmother Ramona. Some trick of light turned them into youthful bride and groom. It was almost as if the years between had been a mere delay.

Grandmother Ramona lifted a hand to Rupeni. They touched for the first time since that aborted wedding day. The lightning rod of God struck.

So that is what it’s like. The tingling sensation compounded of love, desire, lust, yearning and aching for completeness. With a moan, Grandmother Ramona collapsed into Rupeni’s arms. And they were again a man and a woman, both in their sixties, weeping, tracing their faces with each other’s hands, not quite believing, holding each other.

The recording had stuck in the groove of the record –

— bells a-bove a-bove a-bove –

Rupeni took the needle off the record. He escorted Grandmother and opened the passenger door for her. She hesitated a second.

I thought, No, don’t look back at us, Grandmother. Don’t. Although you know the strength of Rupeni’s love you still might change your mind. This is your chance, Grandma. Take back your life. Go for it.

‘Hey, old lady,’ Uncle Hone called. ‘Haven’t you got a suitcase?’

Grandmother turned to us. ‘I came to your father’s house with what I am wearing. I leave his house the same way. He owns everything else.’

‘You are a foolish old woman, Mum,’ Aunt Ruth cried. ‘You, Rupeni, you are a stupid old bugger.’

Aunt Sarah began to sob again. ‘Mum? Please don’t go. It’s not too late to stay. Mum?’

Grandmother Ramona seemed to waver. Then she took a deep breath and stepped into the car. Rupeni closed the door behind her.

‘I thank you all, sons and daughters of the King of the Gypsies,’ he said. Then Rupeni made a sweeping sign for me alone. ‘And I pay my respects to you —’

He bowed low. His eyes were twinkling, as if he knew I had dealt in chicanery, taken a card from the bottom of the pack and put it on top. Theatrically, he flung his arms in the air.

‘True heir of the great Bulibasha.’

Rupeni started the car. He turned it out of the driveway and along the road. Aunt Ruth began to run after it. Aunt Sarah ran after her. Then all the other sisters were running, Sephora, Miriam and Esther, running, running, running –

‘Mum? Mummee!’

It was too late. The road was a ribbon of moonlight.