Then Enok changed his rhythm. It was so subtle you couldn’t tell how he did it. I was dancing by then and suddenly found my feet stepping differently. I can’t say what it was. But for a while we kept the line and the step going. The story was changing too. Of course we all knew the real version but suddenly that boy had us all ears over a completely new story. Oh, it was a ringing tale — but one of Enok’s making, the cheeky boy. I thought Niclas would have a heart attack on the spot, the way the blood drained from his face.
Slowly the dancing ceased, the chorus faded away. Everyone was drawn into the new saga but you can’t dance if you don’t know how it will turn out. So we stood there facing him as he sang alone. I am one for the old ways, as you know, but I have to say he had me spellbound. Say what you like about the uproar when it was over — in the telling he was a master. My son is a storyteller born. Oh, the way he held us that night — his voice so strong and lively, singing the words directly into our hearts. I swear not a soul thought of criticism while the tale lasted.
And what a tale! Brynhild and Sjúr∂ur and that wicked Nibelung clan were still the main characters, but in Enok’s version the freeing of Brynhild told of a cunning ruse involving a perfect replica of the maiden, fashioned out of wood and branches and clothed in a beautiful embroidered gown. The replica was thrown into the river to fool the Nibelungs. But Sjúr∂ur’s plan misfired, because his companion and true shield-friend tried to rescue the dummy and was killed in the attempt, and of course Sjúr∂ur was consumed with guilt.
Here Enok’s voice changed. Somehow the tune was richer, deeper — more complicated, I suppose, than a true kvæ∂i. Haunting and lonely, it sounded. That lamentation of Sjúr∂ur had all our hearts aching. Enok took from his pocket a piece of carved wood on a string — a New Zealand singing stick — and whirled it above his head as he sang, making the loneliest, saddest moans you could imagine, like ghosts crying in the dark. My tears flowed rivers. I heard Clara Haraldsen sob out loud, for all her later protestations about lack of purity.
It was so skilfully done, so dramatic, that only later did I recognise the story. That soft-headed son of mine was making a disguised confession. He was singing about Napoleon Haraldsen’s death! Only Enok would turn his own anguish into a story. And such a good one. At the end of the lamentation the despairing Sjúr∂ur bared his breast to the tyrant’s sword. The hero knelt, drew off his fabulous and cursed ring and offered it to the king of the Nibelungs, thus passing on the curse.
As he sang the last dramatic stanza Enok drew off his own ring — his father’s ring, treasure found in the sea so long ago. In a great open gesture he held the ring towards us, as if he were offering it to any taker. There was not a sound in the room. No one knew what to do. Finally Enok broke the mood with a laugh and a bow.
The uproar and the argument that followed were almost beyond belief. Old Niclas stayed out of it, I’m pleased to say, but the young ones all had to have an opinion and to voice it loudly. The children loved it, of course, leaping around Enok as if he were the hero himself. That wild boy Lars Larsen tried on the ring, then feigned a horrible death, screaming that the curse had got him. But the students and the poetry club were another matter. How those noisy students argued and fussed! Enok had desecrated a sacred saga; the portrayal of Sjúr∂ur was too unflattering; the use of instruments was not correct. Otto Dahl commended the performance but suggested the style was incorrect for a saga — his condescending praise more damning than the loud criticism. Oh, they were so full of themselves, those young puppies, I could have slapped the lot of them! What do they know of the real heart of a saga? Clara was clearly puzzled. ‘Why, why?’ she kept asking him, her eyes sad and hurt. ‘After all we have done to preserve the sagas …’
Of course I knew. I could recognise the story well enough. My worry was whether any of the Haraldsens would make the connection. Then where would our betrothal be? Alas, I need not have worried on that score, as it turned out.
Finally old Niclas Patursson rose from his chair and began to hobble towards the door. Not a word said during all the pandemonium. Our Enok, who also had remained stunned and silent like an island in a stormy sea, broke from the mess of cheering children to bar his way. Others saw this and fell silent.
‘Will you not offer an opinion when all the world seems to have one?’ said my son, shaking his head as if to clear it of an annoying buzz.
The great old man leaned on his stick then, and looked up at his pupil. All waited to hear his words. ‘Unfinished,’ he said, and then after another silence while all waited, ‘Not yet ready to be performed.’
Enok spoke only to him, quietly at first and then, as the argument developed, with a kind of force that betrayed his hurt.
‘Must the performance always be perfect?’
‘Yes.’
‘Always follow the old rules?’
‘Of course. The rules are there because they are right. Good.’
‘But surely a new saga could follow new rules?’
Old Niclas moved his hand slightly as if to brush away cobwebs. ‘Then it would not be a true kvæ∂i.’
Enok’s question was almost a cry. ‘How, then, can we ever change?’
Old Niclas remained patient but would not give the boy an inch. ‘Our kvæ∂i need no changing. They have already been perfected.’
He was right, I suppose, but oh, if only he had bent a little I might still have my son, and live to hear him sing again.
Enok had by this time worked himself up into one of his passions. Once he has his hook into an argument there is no way to reason with the boy. I have seen it all before.
‘Perfection!’ he cried. ‘Perhaps your perfection is another word for reeled in and skinned and laid flat — and dead!’
He was going too far, as he always does. But I’ll say this for old Niclas, the strong words did not anger him as well they might have.
‘Enok, my son,’ he said, forceful himself now and strong in his beliefs, ‘the kvæ∂i are old, yes, but additions may, from time to time — occasionally — be made. Listen to me, my good pupil. You have more talent than any ballad singer I have known, even your father. Your bold attempt tonight was very impressive, deeply moving and strong, though in several places incorrect in style and the content of your narrative unfinished, in my opinion. It is a brave man who wishes to create a new kvæ∂i. But if you work at this piece for some years, if you incorporate important truths and tie the story more carefully to the old sagas (you have been surprisingly careless in this case), if you perfect the style and rhythm, then, then, your creation may, in generations to come, be accepted into the great body of Faroese kvæ∂i. There could be no more noble endeavour. That is my advice as master to pupil.’
Enok took a deep breath. He could have been fighting tears. ‘I cannot!’ he cried. ‘How can I do what you ask? This one here,’ (and he thumped his own chest) ‘is a different man from the pupil you taught. I have learned much from you, master, but also so much more now. From distant people who treasure different customs. From ballad singers and dancers in other lands. My head is bursting with songs and stories and sights from more countries than I have fingers. How can I keep them locked away? How? I have no choice, and if I had I would not want to. They creep into my ballads, they knock on the closed doors of the kvæ∂i demanding entrance. I let them in gladly. “Join in!” I say. “Let us see what we can make together.”’
Here Enok paused and cast his eyes over us all. Searching, I think, for someone who would agree with him. He knew what he was saying, though; knew his words would shock. With a small laugh that was also a question, he said, ‘Surely my new tunes and instruments will only breathe fresh life into the old songs? After all, we must admit our kvæ∂i are at times a little dull.’
Dull! When he said that I knew he would go away. Already in his mind he was separate from us. Clara, I think, also saw that. Saw but could not understand. For all her education, she loves our traditions and would not rock boats or
look for new ways. She is a good girl and I am sorry she is now only my niece instead of my daughter-in-law.
ENOK took very little with him. His scarlet storyteller’s coat and a fresh set of clothes. A few tools. Also he took Hanna. That quiet girl had her fare to London saved up and was all prepared to leave! It nearly broke my heart to see her go. To think that she could prefer a life in that far country, whose name I will not speak, to a warm hearth here on her own island. Foolish, foolish girl.
As he left, Enok kissed me in front of everyone and then pressed into my hand the ring his father had passed to him.
‘It belongs here,’ he said.
I couldn’t speak a word to save myself but held it out for him to take back.
‘No,’ he said, ‘give it to someone else. I will make my own stories now.’
Those were his last words. You never knew what would come out of that boy’s mouth, and half the time I don’t think he knew either.
Thus I lost a son and a daughter. Their father had always dreamed of riding the whale-road to some imagined shore — of catching a wayward current. And so with these two. They reach for things beyond their grasp. If I had known Hanna harboured such desires perhaps I might have armed her against them. But how do you arm your children against dreams? Last year we had a sheep that would not stay within our village outfield but had to wander into the next. The boys tied that sheep to an old wise one until she learned better ways. So a sheep is taught. But with children? Alas, there is no way to tether them to the hearth-fire.
I fear Hanna and Enok will end their lives alone and unhappy.
Often now I think about that night when Enok sang. That argument between him and Old Niclas. Enok was playing with fire, of course, wanting to change our old ways (and never, never will I find our kvæ∂i dull), but still I hear echoes of that beautiful lament streaming in off the sea to ruffle the edges of my quiet life — and sweeten it.
5.
FOR SIX WEEKS, in 1872, Enok and Anahuia are both living in the mushrooming settlement of Wellington, though neither knows of the other’s presence. For one thing, immigrant ships are flooding the port with new arrivals, and for another, Enok and his sister Hanna, sailor and assisted passenger aboard the ship England, are stuck on the little hump of Somes Island in the middle of the harbour. The voyage out was disastrous: sixteen deaths, most from smallpox. Crew and passengers were promptly quarantined until danger of spreading the epidemic was judged over. Enok raged and fretted, anxious to get up to the Monrads’ farm and see his sons, but Hanna was happy enough, having met handsome Jens Olsen. Jens walked off his farm in North Slesvig soon after the Prussians marched in. The Germans, without word or warning, had lowered the Danish flag over his town’s post office and raised the Prussian one.
‘I am not one to serve under people like that,’ said Jens stoutly. ‘They can have the farm, which was poor anyway. I will make a fine new one in this country.’
Jens escaped the smallpox that ravaged the ship, but his friend Las was the first to go down. Half the passengers blamed Las for bringing the scourge aboard from Europe, where an epidemic raged. Indeed, Las blamed himself. He wept and prayed to his God every day to save the children, but one after another the smaller and the weaker ones died, even though they had been vaccinated. On the other hand, Hanna and Enok stayed well, even though they had never even heard of vaccination, a mystery that led several desperate passengers to inquire what powerful and merciful god the Faroe Islanders prayed to.
Enok was amazed by his sister’s transformation. Quiet, stolid Hanna was busy all day on the voyage out. She tended the desperately ill without fear, was never sea-sick, always cheerful. Enok, busy as he was with his duties, could hardly recognise this older sister, who had been renowned in all Su∂eroy for her lazy ways.
‘Well,’ she laughed, ‘now I have an adventure of my own to be cheerful about. Back home I was simply sitting waiting for it to happen.’ And off she would bustle, a favourite among all the immigrants, especially Jens.
On Somes Island the two were married by the ship’s captain, who was incarcerated with them. Winter was setting in and that day a cold wind howled unchecked between headlands and up the harbour, bringing rain and hail to batter the little island. Inside the long wooden hut, salt-encrusted windows rattled, walls creaked and draughts chilled the travel-weary Scandinavians. But for all that, the wedding was a cheerful affair. Enok sang and led the dancing. No one had money for a feast, but after all the deaths the Scandinavians were pleased to witness a new life beginning. Besides, new cases of smallpox had been absent for three weeks, and soon they would be free to go. Hanna and Jens danced together in the centre of an applauding crowd, a strong and handsome couple.
The very day the quarantine is lifted, Enok finds work on a coastal trader bound for Foxton. Hanna and Jens are headed for the Scandinavian Camp, up over the hills and then east into the deep bush of the Wairarapa. Jens has been allocated twenty-five acres of tree-covered land. Now the couple owe the government twenty-four pounds and six shillings, which Jens will pay off by working on the new roads. There is grumbling and even a formal complaint from some immigrants, who expected to go to the more settled areas around Foxton or the new town of Palmerston North. Hadn’t Viggo Monrad, son of the bishop himself, written of the opportunities there? And of Scandinavian families already settled and ready to welcome them? But Jens puts an arm around his buxom and glowing wife as they farewell Enok, and says they will manage somehow.
Hanna looks up at her young brother, tall and strong, the fair skin of his face cracked and wind-burnt from the long voyage, his bleached hair tied back with a plaited leather thong. High on his shoulder sits his dirty canvas bag containing all he owns in the world.
‘Thank you, brother,’ she says. ‘Thank you for this chance. I hope you find your Ana.’ Hanna speaks quietly. Her Jens would not approve, perhaps, of such a relationship. ‘I would like to know how it turns out,’ she adds. This said without much hope: communication of any sort in this big raw country is going to be difficult until she learns to speak English.
Enok grins and shifts his feet, ready to be back on the water. ‘Get someone to write to the Monrad farm, maybe. But I won’t be there long. This time I will find a way to bring her with me.’
Hanna tut-tuts like a big sister should. She knows, by now, the true story of Napoleon’s death. ‘Well, keep your head out of the clouds and your boots on solid ground. You have children to think of, remember. If you can manage it, which I doubt, try to be sensible. Time to grow some roots.’
Enok laughs. ‘Well, I will try. And write to “Conrad”: that is how I am known here.’
Hanna groans. ‘There you are! Off again. Inventing some imaginary fellow. I heard about the navy — how you changed your name there too. But why, silly boy? Anyone would recognise you on a dark night in a storm just by your size. What is wrong with Enok?’
The tall man shrugs. ‘It just happens. New adventure, new name, I suppose.’
‘Running away from old adventures, more like. Grow up, Enok.’
For a moment it seems that Enok will argue, will stand there on the windswept wharf extolling the virtues of invention, but a cry from the leader of the Wairarapa expedition catches their attention. The cavalcade of drays, laden with people, supplies and tools, is setting out. Jens and Hanna run to take their place, while Enok climbs the plank of the little coastal steamer, heading for Foxton.
ANAHUIA never discovered how she managed to miss him. Perhaps she was up at the Methodist Mission, or collecting seafood along the bay with Erenora, the day he came ashore from Somes Island. You would think, with Scandinavians in town, she would have been particularly vigilant, or that one of the labourers on the wharves might have noticed the blond giant and reported it. But on a cold day, with the wind whipping the spray into your face, you pulled your cap low and hunched your shoulders and got on with it.
So Conrad was missed.
6.
IF CONRAD HAD take
n time to ask a few questions at Foxton, his life for the next several years might have taken a very different turn. But then, as the blond giant himself liked to point out, many strange and interesting experiences would not have been available for later storytelling. Coal descending from the sky in great wagons for example, or deformed monsters who could quote every word of the Bible.
And other stories.
Had he taken a walk through the bustling town he might have exchanged a few words with Reverend Duncan Taylor, who was visiting a newly arrived settler down by the river; he might have greeted Tomas Uppadine Cook at the door of his hotel or paused to kick a ball with some of that man’s many children. Any of these people could have told him that Olga Monrad was at that very moment in town with a sickly child, visiting the German doctor. They might have laughed and told the story of how every time she visited the doctor — which was often — Olga insisted that he turn to the wall the portrait of Bismark that hung behind his desk. Not a word would be exchanged until the face of that hated Prussian leader, who had destroyed her father-in-law’s fortunes, disappeared from sight.
Had Conrad waited to greet Olga Monrad or even to beg a ride back to Karere in her trap, he would have learned a different story about Anahuia. But on this fine and chilly April morning, 1872, Conrad is in a hurry. At the little Foxton wharf he steps off his trading steamer, spots a young Maori lad sitting smoking a pipe in the stern of his waka tiwai and negotiates with him by sign-language and a few rusty words of the native language. Within an hour he is helping to pole the canoe upriver through the great Ohutuiti Swamp. Conrad always prefers to travel on water if the opportunity presents itself.
Apart from Conrad’s canvas bag, they are transporting two sacks of flour and one of sugar, a small bag of salt and a battered old tin full of something precious, which the lad keeps close to him. Conrad has not the language to ask what is in it and the lad doesn’t offer. The wind is mercifully at their backs and the river lazy, which makes the journey easy. Conrad kneels in the prow, incongruously large in this small canoe made from the trunk of a young totara. Gradually he learns the rhythm of the long punting strokes that drive the canoe inland against the seaward flow. The lad in the stern poles too, laughing and righting the balance effortlessly when Conrad’s enthusiasm threatens to overturn the craft.
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