Dogside Story

by Patricia Grace

  That got rid of them. The four ended up together out on the path of trampled grass between the rows of tents and vehicles. They talked and made noises together for a while, keeping an eye on where their parents were at, then gave up on parents and went off spying.

  The three older kids had something itching, creeping round inside them that was airy and not quite there most of the time, though at other times there was a specific vegetable or animal feel about it. It was like plantlife putting out sticky clamps and climbing one two, one two, through chest and arms and head, or putting down hairy roots in a way which wiggled down through lower torso and legs. It was as if they were about to sprout green. Or it could have been something animal—leggy insects scuttling about and taking up spaces, could even have been legless and wormy making tunnels and funnels, tickling all over and keeping the three all the time on the move, all the time gabbing, giggling, hooting and crashing, all the time awake.

  Max and Leanna were serious lover-spotters who soon infected Ryan. Tamsin was a pain, a cling-on who couldn’t be talked down, bribed, or threatened with anything to make her stay behind. They couldn’t even lose her in hide-and-seek games, so she had to go with them.

  Not that there was much to spy. People were still busy fixing up their places, carrying cartons and dishes and food, establishing their lamps and stoves and barbecues. There was no one at it, not even in the trees, where they’d found a track leading through scrub towards the sea. No one there. Just trees.

  They made their way along until they found themselves looking through a fringe of manuka down on to the beach. What they could see from there was people swimming, kids playing in the sand, kids coming in on boogie boards, which reminded them they’d better get back because sometimes their parents changed their minds if there was no one to keep nagging at them.

  But just as they were about to return to camp they saw two people coming their way, so they shushed each other and waited. What came by was an old, freckly man with a bare, freckly chest wearing old man shorts and a towel round his neck, and with him was a dried-up, orange woman in a two-piece outfit, walking right past under their noses. The two were joined at the hip and had their arms round each other.

  ‘Lovers,’ yelled Leanna.

  ‘Lovers,’ yelled Max.

  ‘Lovers,’ yelled Ryan, getting the idea.

  The kids turned, crashed into each other on the narrow track, fell, got up and ran with Tamsin behind calling out to them to wait, complaining she didn’t see, threatening to tell their mother.

  Before they came to the camp they slowed to a walk. There wasn’t much doing but they decided they’d have another try later when it was dark, and as they came out into the clearing and walked towards the tents they straightened themselves and their clothes getting their faces ready to whinge.

  That night while parents were meeting neighbours and relaxing with their wines and beers, the kids set off with a torch. They were going for a walk along the beach, was what their parents half heard them mumble as they strolled off in that direction. They walked until they knew they were out of sight before making their way round behind the furthest row of tents and caravans that were in against the trees.

  From there they began their snooping, with no need of torches, creeping close to see in tent windows, or rolling themselves up against tent sides, lifting flaps to look in.

  Nothing.

  Spare it.

  Empty mattresses or babies asleep.

  Everyone was out front talking, inspecting each other’s set-ups and caravans, some recognising each other from some place last year or the year before or five years ago.

  The kids left the camp site and went down to the beach where people were walking at the water’s edge or up on the sand. They spied out couples who they thought might be likely to have a go, followed them at a distance with their torches turned off, but there was nothing doing. They followed a man and woman as far as the inlet where there were high banks of driftwood, tufty trees, sandy mounds. The creeping four lay in cold grass watching, waiting for the two to drop, or even kiss.

  But nothing happened.

  The couple sat on opposite pieces of driftwood talking, talking, and after a while went down and dabbled their feet at the edge of the inlet, talk, talk, talk, before returning along the sand where two girls came running towards them calling out.

  Nothing doing. There was more going on in the streets of Palmy and Papakura they reckoned.

  They went up to the row of houses but couldn’t get near for dogs, except for one place where they got close enough to look in a window and see a creepy old man sitting by a fire with his jersey on, his dog beside him, and two kids asleep in the bedroom.

  It was on their way home and keeping to the shadows at the top of the beach that Max, who was in the lead, tripped over what must’ve been lovers, who probably were at it, who yelled and swore at them. The four ran for it, yelling, ‘Lovers, Lovers,’ dragging Tamsin who was again complaining that she didn’t see. Leanna and Ryan hadn’t seen either, nor had Max for that matter though they all made out they had.

  But Tamsin, despite all her disappointments and complaints was getting the hang of this lover business from listening to the talk of the older kids. Lovers were a man and woman holding hands or having their arms round each other, or kissing, or in bed together kissing or sleeping, or hiding somewhere in the bushes naked and kissing, or humping, or something.

  By the next day, which was New Year’s Eve day, the kids had forgotten about lover-spotting. There were waves coming in and no one was stopping them going in the water anytime they liked. Cool. It was choice. They forgot their hibiscus and Body Glove outfits and their cargo pants, dropped them on the floor of the tents and spent all day in their togs. There was wood being stacked along the beach for bonfires and they helped with that in between swims. They had fireworks stashed away for after dark and they were going to be allowed to stay up all night.

  It was primo.

  Chapter Thirty

  He woke on New Year’s Eve morning to hear boats going out knowing that if it hadn’t been for Operation Dining Room he and Arch would be out there too pulling in a few big ones. Even before he got out of bed he knew the day was right for it—overcast, windless, the tide at half, which was making movement of the boats churning through the mouth slow and easy. One by one they made it through, throttling out and scooting across the bay heading for the reefs and deep water. There was another full-on day ahead, but he thought he might be able to take time later to go for a dive, or go night fishing, bring in a couple of congers for the New Year hangi.

  Then he remembered that he’d woken earlier and heard a boat out there at some funny hour after midnight—which was all wrong. Too early, too dark and not a good tide to be going out, though you never knew what some mad holidaymakers would do. Whoever it was wouldn’t have got through the inlet at that time without their propellers ending up in sand and their motors breaking down.

  After a while he had realised it wasn’t a boat going out that he was hearing, but one returning, motor on slow, passing by the inlet because the tide was too far down. Even with the tide right they wouldn’t have been able to see well enough to get through in the dark.

  But maybe they hadn’t wanted to come in at the inlet anyway in case they were copped. Doing what?

  The boat had gone into the distance, on to the next bay he reckoned, where it would take at least four men, two entering the water from the beach, to get it in. Then what? Then there’d be a four-wheel-drive vehicle with a winch waiting and they’d be on the road within an hour.

  Off somewhere in the dark with a load of crays? Who?

  Couldn’t be Brad and Horomona who hadn’t been seen since Atawhai sent them back to Oz.

  ‘I know they’ve been selling. I know they’ve found a market somewhere,’ Atawhai had said. ‘I should’ve got the police but ahh, didn’t want to upset my sister. Anyway I told them to sell up and get back to Oz quick if they didn’t want
the cops or the brothers on them. Next thing I hear they’re packing up. They skedaddled pretty fast.’

  So who, when it was only themselves who knew about the cray rocks? Or maybe just some crazy tourists joy-riding with lights? He’d got out of bed and gone down to the beach from where he could hear the boat somewhere out by the point. There were no lights.

  ‘Picking plums for Those Two,’ Kid said when he asked where she was going with her plastic bags.

  ‘Your Aunties.’

  ‘Those Two,’ she said.

  ‘Well, you want to?’ he asked, ‘Pick plums for them, for Those Two?’

  ‘Me, Georgie, Hinewai. Those Two making jam for their stall.’

  ‘Want to or not?’ He knew she could hear something disapproving in the question, knew he was putting her on the spot.

  ‘It’s OK,’ she said.

  And of course it was OK. If someone didn’t find time to pick the plums in the next day or two they’d fall and rot on the ground. It was a good job for kids, one of the jobs he’d always enjoyed and it wouldn’t take long at all. Kid having fun with her cousins, doing what other kids did, was what he’d always wanted.

  Those Two had been grinning all over themselves lately, greeting him as though there was nothing wrong between them, everything to do with Kid on hold for the moment. Crazy Mamas.

  But after all this business was over he was going to get Wai and Arch to bring everyone together to talk, because he didn’t believe they needed family court sessions. If they all got together the older ones could talk Amiria and Babs round, no problem, no mucking around. One good hui, put the squeeze on, and Those Two would give up once they found they had no backers and once they realised their case wasn’t strong enough to take to court—which was what Heke Norman believed.

  Anyway that was for later. They’d all been flat out since the campers arrived—rubbish collecting, cleaning showers and loos, loading and unloading. Now today there was wood to collect and cut for the hangi, a trailer load of stones to get, a hole to dig and benches to set up. It was a long time since he’d been able to do that sort of work and he was looking forward to it.

  ‘Spent half the day looking after their beers,’ Para was saying when he went into the tent just on nightfall. ‘In and out the fridge truck. Holy shit I was getting a thirst up.’

  ‘It’s a fact. Bloody hot day.’

  ‘So how come this woman here conned us into going dry, new year and all, new millennium and all?’

  ‘Ah, suckers,’ Wai said, coming in with choppers and knives.

  ‘True, suckers all right.’

  ‘It’s a fact, suckers.’

  ‘Never mind,’ Wai said. ‘Once we see the last one off in a week or so, we’ll have us a big hua of a party.’

  ‘There’s talking.’

  ‘Party-up large.’

  ‘Archie been doing up our knives,’ Wai said. ‘You coulda rid to town bareback on these.’

  ‘Ah, knives.’

  ‘Chopping and cutting ’til millennium, us.’

  ‘Well maybe we have us just a mini celebration while we work,’ Wai said. ‘Get us a few cans, a chateau cardboard, just enough to see the New Year in. How’s that?’

  ‘Ah that’s the one.’

  ‘That’s the story.’

  ‘Now you’re talking, Sis.’

  He could see that there was a big enough crew getting the meat ready, peeling spuds, hacking up pumpkin, diving into breadcrumbs, so he thought he would have time to get over to the cove. ‘You want a few congers to put in the baskets?’ he asked.

  ‘Ah, we do.’

  ‘Mmm, Son,’ Arch said. ‘Take a hunk off my piggy here to bait your hooks, my little Yumyum.’

  ‘That’s me too,’ said Jase. ‘I get me some shorts.’

  ‘And us, us,’ Kid said from outside the tent in the dark, where she was hanging around with Georgie and Hinewai. Younger children were already asleep in the wharenui but the three of them were staying up all night with the older kids, according to them.

  ‘You should stay,’ he said. ‘Bonfires, crackers, all that.’

  ‘We come back through the hole after, when it all starts,’ Georgie said.

  Well they could, the hole would be empty by then, the tide was on its way down already.

  ‘A torch, then we’re off,’ he said.

  Even in the dark he could see the buoys. They were like gaps, opposites of themselves, holes in the water rather than solid things on top of it. There were two close in but he knew there would be more. Dumping the gear on the ground he sat to remove his limb and his shirt. Jase was already heading down to climb round the barricade of rocks and up onto the banks with the torch.

  ‘What?’ Kid said, ‘What you wild about?’

  ‘Stay here,’ he said to Kid, Georgie and Hinewai. ‘Stay here and light us a fire.’

  It was a hot night. The heat of the day had collected in the basin, and without a breeze to shift it had remained there. It was topped by damp air filtering from a low sky.

  The water sprayed up in phosphorescent drops about him as he struck out in the dark for the first buoy, and on reaching there he dived down, feeling about at the end of the buoy rope, hearing crays clicking away as he went. He clutched the struts of the first pot and tried hoisting it, surfaced, then went down to try the second one. Already too heavy. Jase, on the track above him with the torch, was too far away to make good light.

  ‘Low tide we could drag them out,’ he called, ‘or cut them. Could be more.’

  Jase tried to keep up with him along the track with the light as he began swimming in the direction of the deep rocks. There he found a cluster of buoys, which meant there’d have to be a big boat coming to collect. Maybe two boats, or one boat making more than one trip in the dark.

  ‘We need help, need gear,’ he called but Jase was already making it back along the track as fast as he could.

  ‘Ropes and cutters. And take the kids home,’ he called as he started out for shore.

  He returned to the first cray pot and began shifting it little by little without making much progress, so he decided to wait for help, for gear, the low tide. When he got back to shore he found that Georgie and Hinewai had gone but Kid was still there putting the sticks in the fire. ‘You shoulda gone home,’ he said.

  ‘What you wild for?’

  There was a weightless rain falling, a steamy heat and the fire the kids had made was becoming smoky and scented. Water was pulling back from the hole. He began drying himself down with his shirt wondering why the cove was always so thundery, so exploding, so full of everything—like Te Aro Park, like the city streets, all of life always going on.

  ‘Cray pots out there,’ he said. ‘Someone robbing crays. It’s people’s crays, our aunties’ and uncles’ crays, your crays getting stolen. Set pots there, catch heaps all at once, then the crays are gone. Gone, that’s it. Nothing.’

  ‘Who done it?’

  ‘Our relations maybe.’

  ‘What for?’

  ‘Want to get rich maybe.’

  The first rockets were going off when he heard voices and saw the torches as Jase and the others began returning through the blowhole. The fireworks burst out into white stars and coloured balls, fuzzy-edged against a watery sky. Water was still going out through the hole and he knew the ones coming would be making their way in against the walls, feeling for each foothold as they came through in the dark. He boosted the fire. Eight he counted, coming out in fragments of torchlight. Bones, Eva, Reggae and Dion with torches, Moana and Jase with ropes, Jackson with an axe, Joeboy with a gun and a belt full of ammo. But what they really needed was cutters. Without cutters they’d have to get the crays out of the pots one by one.

  Anyway with two ropes they could get two teams working. He swam with the ropes to the nearest buoys and made his dives, securing the ropes through the struts of the pots. Eva, Jackson and Dion were in the water behind him while the others had gone to the near banks to begin hauling i
n from there.

  They pulled the first pot towards the banks, hoisting it over and around rocks, through the crevasses, moving aside the heavy weed and steadying it through the channels of rushing water. Once they’d got it near enough to the water’s edge they lifted it out and returned for the second one.

  The axe was useful after all because once they’d taken some of the crays out of the pot they were able to tip the rest to one side and chop enough of a gap to free the remaining ones which went flicking back into the lagoon.

  Out at the far rocks where the water was still deep, he and Jackson dived down together making many attempts to get the rope tied to the struts, but in the end had to be satisfied with tying it to the buoy line. The pots then had to be tipped up and dragged from the centre. There was nowhere to anchor themselves so the others got into the water to help, the fire on shore giving them a line. It was going to take hours and he was thinking about Bones and Jase. Not the kind of job either of them should do for too long.

  With two more pots to go they lay in the grass resting, listening to the shouting, laughter and music coming from over at the beach. Beside him Bones was creaking. ‘Go back,’ he said to Bones. ‘Take Kid back.’

  ‘Nah, it’s OK.’ A glow from the bonfires outlined the ridges, an occasional burst of stars littered against the sky. Dion was talking, on on on. But now there was something else he could hear, something knocking in his head, knocking, slow and even.

  ‘Hear it,’ he said.

  Jackson stood and began scooping handfuls of sand on to the fire. ‘Ha, ha, let’s go,’ he said, picking up the axe and the torch and making for the banks with Joeboy behind him doing up his ammo belt, slinging the gun over his shoulder.

  ‘You gotta come with me, stick with me,’ he said to Kid.

  ‘Better get your leg on,’ she said and when he’d done that they followed the others down the slope round the edges of the water, which had pulled right back now giving them space to pass round the shore side of the rocks, then round the hill slope, all the time listening.