Flight of a Maori Goddess

by Lark, Sarah

  “Integrate more crossbeams and bring them in at an angle,” she explained. “It’s bamboo after all, Richard. The little bit of extra weight won’t make a difference, and the aeroplane will gain stability.”

  Richard happily incorporated her suggestion. He declared euphorically that the flying machine’s stability was better now than in any previous model. He had tested it by holding the machine by only one wing and pushing it along, which he then demonstrated. Again, she marveled at the enormous energy he summoned.

  “It won’t break off, even when I run quickly alongside it and let it run downhill. It’ll work, Atamie. This time it won’t all end in the broom hedge.”

  Atamarie giggled to herself, imagining what a sight Richard was presenting his neighbors, walking an aeroplane as one might a dog.

  “They call it my ‘Beast,’” Richard admitted, laughing when Atamarie made a comment to this effect. “And it simply has to fly this time, or I’ll make an irrecoverable fool of myself.”

  Atamarie was happy that he was able to laugh at himself again. Richard seemed pleased and self-confident, and he was also doing better in everyday matters. Even without Shirley, who had yet to make an appearance. Nevertheless, the house was not even half as squalid as before. Atamarie still had to sweep and change the sheets before she felt halfway comfortable, but perhaps every bachelor’s home was like this.

  Hamene continued taking charge of the farm work. The young Maori looked crestfallen when she asked about Shirley.

  “Richard sent her away,” he said. “Or she left on her own. I don’t know. Mr. Pearse is wildly angry about it, and Mrs. Pearse—”

  Atamarie pricked her ears. “What did she say?”

  Hamene raised his hands helplessly. “I don’t know English that well. I only understood half of it. But it was about Richard being ungrateful. And that Shirley was there when he needed her, whereas you—”

  “Well, sure, they ran me out of town,” Atamarie exclaimed. “I would have been happy to stay with him.”

  Hamene looked at Atamarie seriously. “You wouldn’t have liked it.”

  Atamarie frowned. “What?”

  Hamene tugged on his lower lip. “After Richard came out of the hospital. It was, it was as if, as if he were dead. He didn’t do anything. Not on the farm, not in the barn. He didn’t speak with the gods either. Just sat there. Waimarama said the darkness had enveloped him. She prayed for him.”

  “He didn’t do anything at all?”

  Atamarie could hardly believe it. What about Richard’s sleeplessness, his enormous energy, the overabundance of ideas he had always had. On the other hand, after getting out of the hospital, he had not written Atamarie for six months.

  “Anyway, that’s when Shirley came,” Hamene continued. “And so, it slowly got better again. But now, she’s gone.”

  “And Richard has me,” Atamarie insisted. “He doesn’t need her anymore.”

  Hamene looked at her skeptically but held his tongue.

  In the months that followed, Atamarie came to Temuka more often, even long after her vacation was over. She happily followed how the work on the flying machine progressed. Richard no longer seemed impatient the way he had the year before, instead submitting his machine to countless tests before he finally tried it once again. Peterson rolled his eyes as he watched Cranky Dick, as he still called him, in his horse pasture. Richard rolled the flying machine down a hill, running after it and handling the control lever with lines firmly attached to it.

  “Maybe that thing will pull your plow, at least,” he teased. Then he spied Atamarie. “Oh, and our Miss Turei is back again.” Atamarie was watching Richard’s test run from a hill. “She’s what gives you wings, right?”

  Atamarie did not respond. She still disdained Peterson and was annoyed at being seen. During her last few visits, she had not caught sight of any of Richard’s family or neighbors, but now all their gums would be flapping again. It could not be helped, and Atamarie did not want to hide anymore. She suggested holding the first test flight closer to town, in front of the school.

  “The road there is smooth, and there’s a hill to roll down. Plus, there are always people around.”

  Richard, however, shied away from the attention. “I don’t want them to laugh if it goes wrong again. It’d be best to do it secretly.”

  A few days before the big event, he began to doubt himself again. His father had just taken him to task. The endurance tests and attempts to steer the “Beast” had not escaped Digory Pearse’s notice.

  Atamarie huffed and gathered the silverware. She had cooked for Richard and eaten dinner with him, happy that he’d taken the time for that. She had been worrying anew of late because he had not been eating or sleeping.

  “Secretly? The first flight in a motorized aeroplane? Richard, you’re going to make history that day. Your name will be in every paper, and in fifty years, probably in every schoolbook and encyclopedia. But for that, you need witnesses. The best thing would be to find a photographer and invite a few newspaper reporters. This needs to be documented. Maybe we should give the aeroplane a name too.”

  Richard snorted. “A name? It’s a machine, not a dog or horse.”

  “People name ships,” Atamarie objected, “and zeppelins. It would be lovely if there were a name in the newspaper.”

  She energetically banished the thought flitting about her brain that Richard might name the aeroplane Atamarie, or at least Sunrise. He shook his head, however.

  “Childish nonsense,” he declared. “And besides, I need to take off before anything appears in the newspaper. Let me fly, and then you can tell the whole world, for all I care.”

  Atamarie was confident it would work, even if she would have done little things differently in its construction, which he had not addressed. Lately, Richard had been hypersensitive to criticism again. Atamarie never knew exactly where she stood with him. Fortunately, now he would finally be celebrating success and should be correspondingly euphoric. In fact, he brought her from one climax to another on the night before the renewed attempt at flight—he no longer seemed the querulous procrastinator of the last few days.

  And then, the day was there. Atamarie and Richard used the morning to make final tests. Around midday, Richard surprised Atamarie by rolling the aeroplane a long way down the road toward town, stopping in front of the school, as she had suggested. Class had just ended, and the pair had a grateful audience in the schoolchildren. However, other spectators quickly assembled, too, when Richard made his first attempt to start the engine. Atamarie was horrified when it did not function right away. Everything had gone so well during their last test. Now the machine roared a few times before dying again.

  Atamarie groaned. “What did you put in for fuel? A new mixture? Oh no, please don’t say that. We agreed not to do any more experiments. Now we need to clean the spark plugs again. Shall I?”

  She looked down at herself somewhat unhappily. For this memorable day, she had worn a simple but still-clean light-green dress. A reform dress, but one of Kathleen’s creations, elegant and conservative. There was even a matching hat. Like this, Atamarie would not look too exotic should someone take a photograph, and the neighbors’ talk would, she hoped, stay within bounds. Today, the talk should focus on Richard’s attempt at flight and not on the woman at his side, which it would if she witnessed Richard’s triumph in a shabby, oil-stained dress.

  “I’ve got it,” Richard snapped, as if Atamarie’s offer insulted him.

  She could clean cylinders and change oil just as well as he, but he did not seem to want to reveal that to his neighbors. More and more were assembling, and they did not have to wait for the first jeers. No wonder, since Richard was tinkering with his motor in front of everyone while Atamarie tried to make small talk. It was unbearably embarrassing to chat with Peterson and Hansley about the weather while Richard grew perceptibly more nervous. Atamarie worried about the winds that were picking up as well. It might influence the aeroplane’s
handling. In the end, what was it but a steerable kite supported by a motor?

  Atamarie reflected that it probably would have been better not to start in the direction of the Pearse farm but in precisely the other direction, but she did not want to make any more suggestions to Richard. He was already tense enough. And then, when really no one was expecting it anymore, when the mass of spectators was beginning to disperse, the motor suddenly sprang to life.

  Richard leaped into the pilot seat—here, too, he had undertaken improvements; greater mobility in the seat should prevent injuries in a crash—and the machine rolled forward. The spectators ran behind and watched as he lifted into the air. Atamarie could not contain herself. She screamed in quite unladylike excitement as the aeroplane rose, light as a bird, until it hovered some ten feet off the ground. Then, suddenly, she shook her head violently. Richard was fiddling with the elevator. He wanted to go even higher.

  “Slowly, Richard,” Atamarie roared, though she knew that he couldn’t hear her. “Don’t take such a steep angle, or it’ll become unstable. It—”

  It happened even as she was yelling. The machine’s nose lifted up, and the aeroplane lost its balance, which was exacerbated by the wind now seizing it from the side. Richard’s flying machine fell into a spin and crashed to the earth, landing in yet another broom hedge. The spectators who had just been dumbstruck broke into booming laughter.

  “These hedges must have some irresistible magnetic force!” Peterson shouted. “Come on, men, let’s go fish him out.”

  “But he flew this time,” cried Atamarie. “You all saw it, didn’t you? He flew!”

  Hansley laughed. “Sure, sure, he flew. No offense, little lady, but if birds landed like that, they’d’ve all died out.” The others joined in his laughter.

  “He’s just more kiwi than swallow, our Dicky,” another neighbor scoffed—kiwis being flightless birds and blind to boot.

  Atamarie had a terrible, sinking feeling. Even this incredible success would not make Richard’s community respect him. What was more, he seemed to have injured himself. He held his shoulder as Peterson and Hansley pulled him out of the aeroplane. She decided not to pay any attention to the smirking spectators and threw her arms around Richard.

  “You did it,” she said, and tried to sound happy although his bowed posture and his empty gaze did not bode well. “You flew, Richard. You’re the first. You’re the first with a motorized—”

  “I didn’t fly,” said Richard.

  He sounded almost uninterested. He did not respond to Atamarie’s embrace either. He let Peterson push him toward his wagon with a frozen gaze.

  “We’ll take you to the hospital instead. Something seems broken.”

  Atamarie tried again. “But everyone saw, Richard. Everyone can testify. You—”

  “I didn’t fly,” Richard whispered.

  Atamarie looked at him in shock as the men led him away.

  Chapter 5

  “Once again, Miss Turei. And this time slowly and from the beginning, and don’t spare the details. Richard Pearse incorporated our old Otto motor into a flying machine, and the thing took off?”

  Professor Dobbins steered Atamarie into his office. Really, he had a lecture to give, but the students would have to wait.

  Atamarie followed the professor, cheered and relieved. Since Richard’s flight, she had slowly begun to question her sanity, or at least her perception. A man had made history, but the witnesses could not think of anything better than to amuse themselves about crash landings in broom hedges. Richard’s parents were furious with him for having ended up in the hospital again, this time with a fractured collarbone. And the pioneer himself repeated again and again that the flight had not taken place.

  Richard’s family had ignored Atamarie at the hospital where she had waited on news of her friend. The doctor informed her curtly that Mr. Pearse did not desire any visitors, but he allowed Shirley, who came with his parents and seemed just as agitated as they.

  In the end, Atamarie had not known what to do and had fled to her hotel room in Timaru. The next day, Atamarie decided to return to Christchurch to tell Dobbins everything. The professor did not even mention her absence while school was in session. On the contrary, he was bowled over by Richard’s achievement.

  “It’s really incredible,” Dobbins gushed, “and you no doubt had your share in it, Miss Turei. Don’t deny it. But why am I only learning about this now? It should have been in the newspapers. Did someone photograph it? You have to document such things, Miss Turei, but you know that already.”

  Atamarie nodded and decided to confide in her teacher, pouring her heart out to him. She described Richard’s concerns before the flight, his inability to savor his triumph—and finally found herself telling the professor about his violent mood swings and family problems.

  “Pearse always was—well, he tended toward melancholy,” the professor replied. “They say it occurs frequently in geniuses, such episodes of self-doubt and then soaring spirits. And he is a genius, no question. It places demands on his family. And on his fiancée? I don’t mean to be indiscreet, but you are a couple, are you not? You must always bring him back to earth, Miss Turei, or in this case, back into the air. He needs to do it again. The flier wasn’t damaged too much, you said? And even if it was, then he must repair it and make another go before the eyes of the world—not just in front of a few hicks in the Waitohi Plains. Alert the press, but under no circumstances the Timaru Herald or whatever the rag’s called there—the press in Christchurch instead, the Otago Daily Times, and the newspapers in Wellington and Auckland would be best. You now know the machine works, so there’s no risk in having all the reporters come. Make a to-do of it, Atamarie, before someone beats Richard to it. Motorized flight is”—Dobbins laughed excitedly—“up for grabs. Others are working on it too. So, get ahold of your sweetheart, and document that he was first.”

  Atamarie sighed. She looked into the ecstatic face of her professor, but only thought of Richard’s empty eyes. I didn’t fly.

  How was she supposed to pull him in front of the press like that?

  Atamarie let another weekend pass before she returned to Timaru. She did not know how long it took for a fractured collarbone to heal, but Richard should surely be back on his farm—if his parents had not brought him to theirs to recover. So, Atamarie braced for renewed disappointment. Under no circumstances did she want a confrontation with Richard’s family. If it came to it, she would simply turn around and go back on the night train. Just in case, she wanted to get a room in Timaru—and was surprised when that proved not to be so easy.

  “I have only a rather cheerless room to offer you, Miss Turei,” explained the proprietress of the inn where Atamarie usually stayed. She was friendly and discreet—and had never breathed a word about Atamarie not even spending most of the nights she paid for in her room. “I’m only even offering it because you’ve become a sort of regular. I hate to turn you away. But this weekend, you really should have booked in advance. It’s the annual fair and farming exhibition, you know. They’ll be showing off everything from the best stud bulls to the biggest pumpkins. All the region’s farmers are here.”

  Atamarie thanked both the innkeeper and fate. Richard would hardly come to Timaru to present produce. But Joan Peterson would be dying to see the pumpkin competition. Surely the Hansleys—Shirley and her mother, at least—would have some oversized vegetables to present, and with a good deal of luck, so would Richard’s parents and siblings. Atamarie would have her friend to herself. She made her way contentedly to the farm on her rental horse, happy on the one hand but also regretting the lost opportunity: the fair in Timaru would have been ideal for showing off Richard’s aeroplane to a larger crowd. There were more than enough hills around. But Atamarie knew she had to build Richard back up before they could make another attempt. She was determined to be happy for small favors and sighed with relief when she spied neither Peterson’s nor Digory Pearse’s wagons in Richard’s yard
. The “Beast” sat sadly in a nearby field.

  At first glance, the farm looked abandoned, but then Atamarie saw Hamene puttering about one of the barns. He was tinkering with a plow, which alarmed Atamarie. Since when did Richard leave the care of his equipment to Hamene? He might hardly have taken care of anything else on the farm, but his equipment was always in good condition.

  Atamarie wanted to ask Hamene about it, but then she spied Waimarama. The old Maori was just stepping out of the house.

  “I brought her,” Hamene said, and gave Atamarie a searching look. “I thought she might be able to help. Richard’s—well, he’s not doing anything again, you see.”

  What Atamarie saw was that Hamene had also used the absence of Richard’s family to take matters into his own hands. Buy why did Richard need the Maori healer? She bowed reverently to the old woman.

  “You’re back?” Waimarama asked. “Do you mean to stay now?”

  Atamarie frowned. “I’m afraid I won’t be asked to. But I want—Waimarama, no matter what he says or how he’s doing, he flew!”

  “He yearns for the light, but his path leads to darkness,” said Waimarama. “Perhaps the gods do not want to share the sky with him.”

  Atamarie fought down a bad feeling. But it was nonsense, of course.

  “Maybe the hedge spirits have an unhealthy relationship with science,” she replied. “We should entreat them not to constantly pull him magically to them. He flew, Waimarama. There are no two ways about it. And he should be proud of that instead of moping about. He is moping, or did I misunderstand Hamene?”