Jake's Long Shadow

by Alan Duff

  For some reason being called by her adopted name made Polly feel good, kind of that much more removed from here. She promised Simon she wouldn’t make light of his real concerns of being in this wholly unfamiliar territory. But I will say what I’ve been telling myself: this is your country,

  Simon Harding. Believe it or not. And Simon nodded most gravely to that, but said no more. Simon’s perception was also a costing eye, at the bare dirt driveways, what they would cost to concrete; corrugated iron fences in haphazard fashion and covered in graffiti scrawl; the absence of decorative plantings, not a tree, a shrub, a flower garden in sight. Five hundred bucks of plantings a property, Polls, and we’ll add five grand of value.

  She told him of growing up here and being alone in noticing that Pine Block’s difference was so much in the plantings; for where Pine Block physically ended it was also symbolic that, on the other side of a wide stretch of vacant land, another suburb started with immaculate gardens and lawns, an abundance of trees, and yet the houses were little different, just modest suburbia. Polly said, I must have been about ten or eleven, I realised that if it wasn’t money separating us then it must be something else. Later, I figured it was attitude. If you want your surroundings to look better then you’ll find the means. That’s when another Polly Heke — as I was then — started to evolve.

  So now you’re back, the prodigal daughter, looking at buying up the neighbourhood you grew up in. How does that feel?

  (It feels strange, like a betrayal. And yet exhilarating. Like revenge against — before anyone or anything — my father, Jake. I just can’t find it within me to forgive you completely, Dad. Unless the word is forget.) Tell you something, Si. I see my father’s shadow everywhere here. In a way, a kind of legacy for giving us, his children, his former wife, the model to be the opposite of. (That’s what I feel. That this is Jake’s territory.)

  The houses had cheapest fibre-board exterior cladding, and many had holes kicked in and damaged or missing corner moulding. Each was a most basic square box design, bereft of any imagination. Iron roofs showed rust, or peeling paint. Downpipes from sagging roof gutters were missing. Iron fences put up by hands that couldn’t care less, just to gain separation from a cheek-by-jowl neighbour, were becoming hoardings for the graffiti writers’ spray-can block-squiggle.

  Pine Block Avenue ran through the centre, and began with state houses and ended with the add-on of privately constructed houses, where Simon said were the investor opportunities. A gang HQ stood out for its high, barbed-wire-topped fencing, two houses short of the newer construction.

  It took a week of every day for hours at a time before Polly could get her mind around Simon’s assurances they could make a lot of money buying up properties here, and the more run-down the better. They drove the streets and walked them to get a feel for the place; had different real-estate agents show them various properties for sale, to investigate the market as well as test the quality of agent, for good ones were far and few between.

  On their walks they caught sight of children being beaten up, and Polly warned Simon not to think for a moment about intervening; sad little faces in too many windows, out on lawns or kerbs, stark pictures of physical abuse. Polly was brought to angry outbursts, You see this? I know this world. Help’s not coming for those who need it. Nor for those who don’t help themselves. Hardening herself inside so she might be objective (you mean ruthless, Polls) about this new venture.

  They came across full-scale parties raging in the middle of the morning. Fights, brawls out on front lawns, in the street. (Brown. They’re all brown. This is my country, these are meant to be my people.) Men and women were out of their minds on drink and social chaos, like out of some film of incoherent malcontents. It brought it all home for Polly, the past she thought she’d forgotten.

  The first house an agent showed them through was a culture shock to Simon. It was proof that poverty is a state of mind, a reflection of the spirit, in this bountiful country it was. There were filthy living conditions: mattresses on living-room floors sleeping several, no other furniture, not even a table to dine off, except the colour television and beer crate seats to watch it from.

  Simon said to picture the property in refurbished form; think of the capital gain, and a rental surplus after servicing borrowings, to get beyond the filth, the wretchedness. To Polly these sights, the stench, were just long-suppressed memories stirred to life.

  The first property they pitched their offer at twenty per cent less than the asking price. Then they waited out in the car whilst the sales agent took the offer to the owner on the spot. He came out with a flat, No. Simon wanted to up their figure. Polly told the agent it was a final offer. The agent went back to the vendor, who asked for a mere one thousand dollars more. Simon said, Yes. Polly, No, they’re already going to sell it to us.

  She was right. This was easier than she’d assumed. They put in two more offers that week. One was accepted without negotiation, the other came back asking a modest increase, but again Polly refused even though they were well below asking price. Both properties went unconditional, so that made three in a week.

  Simon had got together three teams of cleaners, painters and handymen. Their contract rate was very modest and they invoiced the company the pair had set up. It took on average four weeks to completely transform a property, inside and out, including laying down a concrete driveway and installing a pre-built garage. For a property in a very bad state of disrepair, settlement dates were staggered so they weren’t servicing mortgages without the investment returning income. Polly’s savings capital had yet to be called on.

  Smaller lending institutions lent seventy-five per cent of valuation, unlike banks, which concerned themselves with how much the investor put in, lending against whatever was the lesser, valuation or purchase. Banks, Simon enlightened Polly, are fair-weather friends. But you don’t take it personally, you deal with what is.

  From day one a property had to be valued at least twenty-five per cent more than its purchase price. As they bought more properties, it sometimes happened that their refurbishment work became the equity if a property was in a particularly bad state of repair, by getting a new valuation after the work had been done.

  A few properties did require capital to start with, if a house was on a bigger section and could be subdivided to accommodate another house, preferably a low-priced relocation. Bad tenant risk was reduced by the couple personally interviewing prospective tenants. Steady employment, good references, and plain face-to-face assessment. Polly found her early life experiences an advantage in judging tenant quality.

  In three months their property venture owned twelve houses, which were returning on average seventy per cent of rental income in surplus after interest was paid. The pair now knew Pine Block inside out. Twice Polly had used her capital, and after revaluation got it back in geared borrowing. According to the registered valuations, they had close to a quarter million dollars in equity, with a rental surplus of about $50,000 per annum. Polly’s life could be said to have changed dramatically. Though she would say it was her destiny, of her own making, with a little parental help from Beth and Charlie.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  DEGREES OF PERCEPTION

  THE JUDGE LOOKED a real gentleman. Like the judge who’d sat on Tania’s murder case. They had a look the same, used their spectacles as a stage act, and a voice to suit. Seemed to Abe that this one would have children near Abe’s age, so he’d be sympathetic, if not completely understanding, that a man had had no choice. (I swear I had no choice.)

  Dave Busby had just given a sworn reference in the witness box, in praise of Abe Heke, his employee, and the person he saw with potential to be in business himself. Abe felt a kind of affirmation to hear his boss describe him as a true gentleman, for it meant he had achieved his goal of distancing himself from his father’s ways. Dave Busby told the judge that one of his tests of a man’s character was how he conducted himself with drink, that it was a truth potion
that spoke well of Abe Heke, and whilst awaiting this court appearance had he promoted Abe to foreman and had no reason to regret the decision, for the young man had leadership skills to burn.

  Dave went on to say he was in no doubt his employee must have been severely provoked because he was not a man of violence, not under any circumstance.

  The judge reminded Dave, and in a sharp tone, that Heke had pleaded guilty and been subsequently convicted on an assault charge of a most serious kind, that of grievous bodily harm. He warned Mr Busby to confine his comments to reference on Heke’s behalf, not an opinion of law or fact. That’s my job.

  Abe wanted to speak out of turn, out of order if he must, to tell the judge, Sir, if you’re confronted by four guys with only one agenda, to do you and your mate over, you just fight like hell. You go into a necessary blind kind of rage because you know you’re going to get hurt badly. Even if Abe had felt a calmness come over him, and no sense that all was lost.

  Ryan was in the courtroom. The seven months since the incident they’d talked it to death. Ryan knew he had provoked it, and that he’d not put up any fight. What could he say but sorry?

  Abe’s lawyer offered mitigation along the lines of Dave Busby’s plea. Judge Armstrong nodded and seemed to be pleased at how well thought of Abe Heke was. Now it was his turn.

  Abe had this last thought, that the judge was not going to send him to prison. (I just know he’s not.)

  Judge Armstrong recapped what Dave Busby had said and how good it was being a foreman of a thriving sheetmetal business, and how rare it was to have before him someone who had such a position of responsibility, not least given the nature of the charge — which on the face of what we’ve heard of your character, Abraham Heke, does not fit the picture of one who inflicted such injuries on three of these four young men. Notwithstanding that they had followed you and your friend and that their confrontation in numbers of two to one was in no doubt intended to be violent. For that is only the face of it, perhaps a fairly commonplace event between young males testing one another. However … (however what?)

  However, the judge said on a sigh and a personality change all in the one expulsion of breath, this court cannot condone, nor be seen to condone, any extreme act of violence unless the situation is life or death. It has to be asked why your companion of that fateful night did not react with any violence and yet he was the first to be assaulted by these four men on their own admission.

  Abraham Heke, you tore away a wooden fence paling and you set upon these four young men and inflicted sickening physical harm to three of them. (But, judge.) You used your fists on them after you had knocked them to the ground with this make-shift weapon. (Well, sure I did. What fists are for, given you’ve made the reluctant decision to use them. I’m not to know if they’re going to get up and turn the tables on me.) Can you tell us why you acted in such an extremely violent manner?

  Abe was nervous in the instant. The answer just spilled out: I lost it. (I lost it completely. It was like this other person existed inside me who just came charging, roaring, flailing out.) I just lost it, sir.

  You lost it, did you? Sounds to me like that’s a cop-out. I mean you can’t blithely say you lost it. Lost what? For clearly the evidence, the outcome of serious injuries against these complainants — victims, may I remind you — is proof that you never had control to lose in the first place.

  Abe wanted to refute that. More than anything he wanted to refute the judge’s viewpoint. (I’m not like that. I don’t talk violent. Even in the sometimes truthful realm of dreams, I, the dream character Abe Heke, am not violent. Jesus Christ, judge, in my dreams I’m hugging and comforting babies, rescuing children in danger. Crying for a host of different, sometimes unfathomable, reasons.)

  You lose what you have. That is the definition of lost in this context. You-lose-what-you-have. The judge looked over the rim of his spectacles again, a gesture now frightening to the guilty-pled defendant. Despite all the sworn testimony I have heard on your behalf, despite the fact you felt your life was threatened, despite my taking into account the glowing testimonial put to this court by your employer, Mr Dave Busby, despite your own obvious good qualities, I keep asking myself why someone so responsible, so blessed with leadership qualities, would act as violently as you did.

  And the question asks itself again: why your companion that night did not resort to the same violence? (Because he was too drunk, your honour. He started it and then dropped his bundle when trouble came.) I accept that these four men were out to do physical harm to you and your companion. But in listening to their evidence I do not believe they intended inflicting any more physical harm on you and your friend than fist blows. Their unblemished criminal records suggest they were guilty of immaturity. But immaturity and a physical confrontation, Abraham Heke, do not demand being set upon with a heavy piece of wood. Therefore I am going to sentence you to a term of imprisonment …

  Ryan was in shock, and Dave Busby’s mouth fell open. Abe even saw his lawyer stiffen in surprise. And he looked up at the judge and thought: Appearances are deceptive. He’s read this and me all wrong here. Or am I missing something?

  Abe turned and whispered to his lawyer, Am I allowed to say anything in my defence?

  No, his lawyer said. I’m sorry. We’ve said it.

  I sentence you to a period of two years’ imprisonment.

  (Did he say two years? Or two months? Or a lifetime?)

  The cause of it, Ryan, sitting there bawling into his hands. Or did it go way back, to the father who had so affected a son? (Is this your curse, Jake Heke?)

  Abe turned to his boss and nodded thanks anyway. Ignoring a weeping Ryan. Then his right wrist was handcuffed to the wrist of a prison officer. His life had changed and he hadn’t prepared for this.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  APE SWAYS THE COMMITTEE

  TWO SCREWS ESCORTED Apeman from the main wing to the office area, the grilles clanging shut behind them as familiar as a toilet flushing, meant nothing, not after going into the seventh year. Maybe not ever.

  The screws made jokes about Apeman’s face tats sure to go against him, even though it was only a transfer application, not a parole bid. Then again it might turn the rich woman committee member on, said the big Maori screw, who even Apeman admitted was a friendly and humorous man, for a screw he was, and he never threw his weight around, yet you didn’t mess with him neither. He respected you, you respected him.

  Whatever, said Ape. Whatever happens happens. In that way of his, never meant nothin’, nothin’ close to thought came into play, it was just th’ mouth lettin’ go with sumpthin’ to pass the time a day, eat up another minute without you knowin’ it’d passed. That much closer.

  In the meeting room in the admin block the three committee members were at the far end of the table whilst Apeman sat the door end, between the two big screws (real apes), so if he cut up rough they could drag him out before he could reach the good citizens. There were three committee members and the buffer between the female member and Apeman: Mr Grant, the 2IC, with years enough in the prison service to disbelieve everything an inmate said. It told like a neon sign on his permanently frowning forehead: never believe an inmate. And he was right, absolutely, without exception.

  First to greet Ape was Neil Richmond, a lawyer known nationally for his pro-prisoner views and whom even the inmates had seen from time to time described in newspaper features as the ultimate bleeding-heart white liberal. He called Ape by his real name, the name on his file, Good morning, Montgomery.

  Ape nodded back to the man whose efforts on prison inmates’ behalf, as their faithful advocate, they thought a joke. Since none of Richmond’s claims of injustice and unlawful acts against inmates was true. Strange, too, that he took his citizen peers to task for failed morality, whilst forgiving the far worse immorality of convicted criminals, especially dangerously violent ones. It was as if he felt the need to forgive them when he’d never forgive his own law-abiding contemporarie
s a fraction of moral descent or failure.

  Then there was Pora. Manu Pora, the requisite token Maori and the only committee member being paid specially to be here. A pompous, self-described elder — kaumatua in the lingo — barely past fifty who wore a big jade piece outside his shirt so no one would miss the obvious point that he was a cultural Maori. Manu Pora was a charlatan, not fooling this warehouse full of raw charlatans. Being Maori, he was not here in a voluntary capacity like his two European contemporaries, he had a private contract. Pora was also on the Maori Leaders Roundtable, another bunch of corrupt men calling themselves Maori leaders, when the only leading they did was themselves to the public money trough.

  Apeman Black knew how to play this Pora guy, with his own ace card: Maori. As in we’re victims. It’s never our fault. So he inclined his head in greeting a little more loaded with empathy than to the two white committee members. Men who needed each other.

  Then there was the inevitable woman, even though Hotel Bad-arses was not a place for them, didn’t they know about men here and their attitude to bitches? (Guess they’re too arrogant to be told.) Worse, this one was filthy rich, the screws said her husband was on the Rich List. Rich and breezily blind to her opposites in the money state not just in here, but most of the outside world.

  Sarah Hudson was said to live in a massive mansion up on Ainsbury Heights. She insisted on being called Sarah, not Mrs Hudson, and mouthed every Maori word she thought correctly, when even uncultured dudes like Apeman could hear her pronunciation like missed musical notes. And for someone who claimed to care, she sure did a lot of talking and little listening. Though this time Ape sensed Sarah Hudson would be quiet, he saw the promise in her eyes of his transfer application already decided as far as she was concerned. She greeted him a cheery, Good morning, Monty.