by Karen Zelas
‘Oh, they seemed to think one branch of his family was descended from French settlers at Akaroa. But,’ she shrugged, ‘the only family I’ve known are English and Scottish.’
‘Aren’t you the dark horse? How exciting. Fancy you wondering who you are and ignoring the fact you’re partly French. How exotique, Madame!’
‘Hardly. Besides, I don’t even know if it’s true.’
‘Well, you’re the historian. Find out. Now, let’s set a date for our next decent meal. Then I’ll tell you what’s been happening in the Henderson ménage.’
Annie flexed her arm and glanced at the large-faced watch on her wrist. ‘Bother. I’m due at work in five minutes.’
‘You go. I’ll fix this.’
‘Merci beaucoup. Adieu, Madame.’ They embraced.
Sue grimaced. French. She was not sure about “exotic”, but interesting, maybe. She had majored in French as well as in history, for no particular reason other than that she liked the sound of the language and that it came easily. She had not used it since she and Ben had spent a disastrous two weeks there years ago; she had not expected his fierce reaction, his attributing every minor impediment to “French arrogance”. It had quite spoiled the trip for her and she had been relieved to return to England.
Sue watched Annie dart through the traffic. There was always a flurry in her wake, skirt flowing, hair flying. The buildings had gained depth and perspective now that the sun was no longer directly overhead. She listened to the Arts Centre clock chime two. She did not need to head for home yet. The roses would wait for dead-heading.
Without thinking clearly, she crossed the road to the Art Gallery and strolled along the base of the glass frontage – hundreds of panes, each at a slightly different angle, each a slightly different tint of clear and each reflecting a piece of fluffy white cumulus floating in blue. She felt herself lifted, floating, appearing in one image after another, on this cloud then that, as she drifted towards the main doors. The hard ring of her heels as she crossed the foyer and mounted the marble staircase to the mezzanine floor grounded her, but still she did not know where her feet were leading. Turning right she entered the gallery that held the permanent collection of historical New Zealand works.
Her feet stopped in front of a pale pen-and-wash drawing: a low indented foreshore with a few clusters of meagre cottages, iconic wire fencing, a scatter of sheep, hills densely clad in native bush, while in the foreground the rear of a woman and child, mourners perhaps, heading downhill towards the settlement, away from her. Akaroa, from the Cemetery, looking N.E., 1852, by William Howard Holmes.
How different from the township of today, Sue thought. Not at all the tourist town where history meets folksy meets eco-friendly. The geography had not changed: the same outline to the hills and the foreshore, but the bush had all but gone, with pasture and housing in its place, and one continuous stretch of town in the foreground; like a child’s activity book: a black outline which had been filled in with coloured stickers of buildings, boats, buses, churches, shops and people, until all the stickers and all the space had been used up. She noted that the cottages in the painting were of a style that predated even the oldest of the structures still in existence.
Sue stepped close, then she stepped back, examining every line, every pale brush-stroke, every nuance. A thrill ran through her and despondency gave way to a surge of anticipation. This must have been the landscape as her French forebears knew it.
Finally, she knew why she had come and where she was going.
3.
A passion. Annie’s words reverberated as Sue sat with her family at the dinner table that night. Much to her annoyance, Ben had needed two calls to excavate him from his study and was late to the table.
‘Dad!’ Charlie complained. ‘We’ve nearly finished. Your dinner will be cold.’ Suppressing an approving grin, Sue offered to warm Ben’s food in the microwave; she could afford to be indulgent.
‘It’s fine. It’s fine.’ Ben wiped her generosity aside, leaving Sue feeling in the wrong. Perhaps she was. Perhaps she should be more accepting, as she used to be. Ben was the income earner; he had no doubt been at work in his study; she had no right to complain.
Ben ate in a quiet and distracted manner.
‘How’s your day been, Charlie?’ said Charlie. ‘Not bad, Dad,’ she answered herself. ‘Not spectacular, but not bad. All the better for your asking, Dad.’ Jason sniggered, scooping the last of the food off his plate and looking sideways at his father. Sue laughed; she could not help herself. Game, set and match to Charlie. She covered her mouth with her serviette, watching her husband carefully.
Ben lifted his head, frowning, seeming to register their presence fully at last. A grin spread slowly, transforming his features, and Sue felt herself relax, aware, perhaps for the first time, how much Ben’s mood influenced the family climate. ‘Point taken, Charlie. How’s my princess?’ He tousled his daughter’s hair.
‘Dad, don’t.’ Charlie pulled away, brandishing her fork. ‘You’ll mess it up.’ Sue and Ben exchanged amused glances. If it was not already a mess … Charlie caught the look and pulled a face.
These days Charlie was challenging Ben, declining to fit the mould; Sue wondered to what extent she might dare do likewise. She had a sense that something needed to change, but was not yet sure exactly what.
‘Any more food, Mum?’ Jason was half out of his chair, craning across the table to survey the contents of the serving dishes.
‘Help yourself.’ Sue chewed slowly. Passion. Did sixteen-year-old boys have passions? Maybe; but she should not mistake impulse for passion, she thought. She looked at her son; thin, lanky, in the middle of a growth spurt. She was still startled by the deep and unfamiliar voice that issued erratically from between his sculpted lips. His growth was so rapid he seemed not to know where he ended and the rest of the world began. Sometimes it seemed impossible to think that she had spawned him, this youth, this almost-man. But Jase was not too big to hug and still confided in his Mum when he felt like it – not often these days, and certainly not as frequently as Sue would like. Having your children grow to independence was like … like losing a piece of yourself, she decided. People talked about letting go, but it seemed to Sue that it was more like having her arm wrenched off.
A chill spread through her, in spite of the mild, nor’west evening. She remembered with a pang how they had nearly lost Jason as a tot. It had been terrifying. The panic when he had not been able to breathe. He rarely had asthma now, just a bit of a wheeze after rugby practice on a cold afternoon. He would be a forward to contend with, she thought, when he filled out a bit. He would have to fight off the women. That profile. The sweep of his high forehead. The wisp of fine hair falling across his left eye – like his father. Adonis. But shy and unsure, as his father had also been when they met.
‘Mmm?’ Sue became aware Charlie was speaking to her.
‘Hello-o. You’re as bad as Dad. Where is everybody tonight?’
‘Your mother’s a bit upset.’ Ben spoke, Sue thought, in a condescending manner. And he was speaking out of turn.
She frowned at him. ‘No, I’m not.’ She was not going to let him use her to divert attention from himself. And if he wanted to raise the subject of cancer with the children, he should have discussed it with her first. ‘I was just thinking,’ she said vaguely. Ben knew she had decided not to tell Charlie and Jason until she was certain of the results. Over the years, she had become skilful at not giving her own problems space and had protected her children from her deeper feelings. As a consequence, Charlie and Jason thought teenagers had a monopoly on emotions; parents were taken as read. Now Sue was wondering whether that was such a good thing.
‘I had lunch with Annie today,’ she said. ‘She wanted to know what you’re all up to.’ Charlie looked from one parent to the other, apparently astonished at the change of direction, but making no comment. Sue realised how well Charlie had come to understand the rules of engagement, wondere
d what she and Ben were doing to their children.
‘I was asked to review a funding application from K.I.D.S. to the Whetherby Trust. Annie’s name was on it.’ Ben forked lemon chicken and rice into his mouth. ‘I supported it, of course. The earlier we can identify and help these kids the better. Can’t blame the children though. It’s – ’
‘– the parents’ fault,’ Jason chipped in, a cheeky grin on his face, ducking as if he expected his father to clip his ear.
‘– the social context in which they’re raised,’ Ben continued without pause. ‘Principally lower SES with certain ethnic groups over-represented.’ Sue had heard it all before.
‘Why don’t you say what you mean, Dad?’ Charlie thrust out her jaw as she confronted her father. ‘Maori.’ The small scar on her chin where she had fallen from her tricycle stood out white against her tanned skin. Sue remembered the blood and the screams, and the horror that her beautiful daughter would be scarred for life.
‘Well, that is true. I don’t like to say it. But that’s what the stats tell us. Fifty-five per cent of Maori males will end up in prison at some time in their lives.’ Sue’s thoughts drifted away, as they tended to do when Ben was in full flight. She had long ago given up posing a counterargument. Ben was passionate about his work, she thought. But was it “a passion”, or was he driven by aspirations? He aspired to a full professorship and had recently been passed over. His self-righteous anger had been hard to take after a while. But in what Ben did not say, in his silences, despondency, withdrawal, Sue heard his self-doubt ring clear, and his hurt pained her. Now he had to work with the new incumbent, Des Grey. Worse, Des was imported from Tasmania, “probably convict stock” – it had been Ben’s disappointment speaking. Sue gently chided him, but still hurt in sympathy. Des could be there for a long time.
Sue was not exactly surprised that Des had been appointed over Ben. She had seen his CV; he had published much more than Ben. But if Ben could not see this, she was not going to point it out. She just listened and watched and soothed as best she could. His authoritative veneer might fool some, but not Sue – and not, apparently, the Appointments Committee.
‘Dad, you’re such a racist!’ Charlie’s words cut through Sue’s reflection.
‘I’m as liberal as the next man, just better informed,’ countered Ben, drawing himself straight in his chair. ‘Maori have every opportunity in our society, same as anyone else, and only a handful prosper.’
‘Whose fault is that?’
‘Theirs,’ said Ben firmly.
‘That’s bullshit! You’re on about Maori every chance you get, and you’re not even honest enough to admit it.’
‘Charlie!’ said Sue, shocked at her attack on Ben. ‘Your father just tells it according to the facts. We have nothing against Maori.’
‘No, some of your best friends are Maori,’ mocked Charlie.
‘Well, they are,’ replied Sue; she felt unaccountably on the back foot.
‘When you’re older, you’ll realise I’m right,’ said Ben.
‘I thought sociologists were supposed to be open-minded and interested in people.’
‘They are. I am.’
‘Or did you become a sociologist to confirm your prejudices?’ Charlie pushed back her chair abruptly and flounced from the room, leaving silence behind her. Sue saw hurt rather than anger in Ben’s countenance.
‘She’ll grow out of it,’ she said after a moment.
‘Yeah,’ said Jason, grinning.
‘That’s enough from you,’ Sue said.
Akaroa,
26th August, 1840.
Ma chère Maman,
I am told that the British ship “Britomart”, which has been lying in the harbour since our arrival, is expected to leave tomorrow and will take our mail. So I am rushing to write a few more words to tell you of the exhausting things that have engaged us these last few days. I have fallen on to my mattress of fern leaves as soon as the light has faded every night. Were it not that I am so tired, I would be unable to sleep pressed at close quarters with so many other bodies. It is not what I am used to, Maman, and I pine for my little attic room in La Rochelle.
Our first few days were taken up with establishing camp in the rain. First we pitched tents and the women set up the cooking facilities – extended fires with rows of cooking pots over them under a canopy, to prevent our fires being washed away. After so many months of inactivity at sea, it felt good to have a task to perform and has been pleasant working in the company of the other women. I am coming to know them better, now we are no longer seasick and preoccupied with our own troubles, and I can already distinguish the willing hands from the lazy and the complainers. (I discount Mesdames Gendrot and Chardin, who are still grief-stricken after the loss of their little ones.) Most of the women are considerably older than me, or are sick, or with child. But I am strong, though slight, and healthy, therefore useful.
By the time we had completed our “kitchen”, the rain had stopped and the sky cleared. It is amazing how rapidly the weather changes here from clement to inclement and back again. But there has been little drying in spite of the sun and the mud is impossible. We have strewn many armfuls of ferns around the fires but they have disappeared into the mud in no time.
Four days ago the men were gathered to draw lots for our initial plots of land. They then marked out the boundaries, cutting their way through the bush. Imagine, Maman! Land of our own! We will later receive the rest of the 5 acres promised in the deed we signed at Rochefort. Now it is up to us to begin to meet our obligation “to work with care and zeal at clearing the lands” entrusted to us. I am so excited at the prospect, although I have no illusions about the difficulties that lie ahead.
Unlike some men who seem daunted by the prospect of digging out scrub and fern roots, my husband has wasted no time in getting started. Our land is flat and sited about half a kilometre from the shore. It is close enough to hear the waves hiss rhythmically up the sand and slap against the rocks at high tide and to see the wind approaching across the water.
It is such hard work clearing the land. Although my husband has barely stopped to eat during daylight hours, there is little to see for his labours. With these months at sea, he is no longer used to hard physical labour. His hands are raw and I have strapped them in rags, but still he continues, so determined is he. Yesterday afternoon I could bear it no longer and went to help him in spite of the disapproving glances of the older women. I know it is not a woman’s work, Maman, but here the usual niceties do not seem relevant. I shall return again when I have delivered this mail to the ship.
My husband, Maman, wishes to waste no time in getting me with child. But I am fearful of lying-in in this raw country and of what might befall both me and the little one. I know these are disloyal thoughts but I am unable to staunch the fear when it grips me. I am inclined to wait and see how others fare first, so my mind can be eased. In the meantime, I will help my husband in every way possible and we will profit by my strength and good health.
How is Papa’s health, Maman? Sometimes I fear I may never see any of you again. It is a thought I cannot allow myself to dwell upon. May God protect us all!
Please give my love to the children and hold them close for me. Kisses to you, chère Maman, and embrace Papa as well.
Your loving daughter,
Bibi
Sue struggled all the next day with the decision about when she should tell the children, feeling detached, as if she were grappling with a philosophical question. If the biopsy showed nothing cancerous, then perhaps they need never know anything about it; but if it was cancer, then they deserved as much time as possible to prepare themselves. And since Sue was convinced it was cancer, she concluded the second option was the course she must follow. Besides, part of her had the magical idea that only by preparing for the worst might she ensure it did not happen.
By the time everyone arrived home that evening, she was feeling quite calm – an artificial calm, feelings blunte
d, numb. Ben hugged her long and hard and kissed her face all over while she stood like a rag doll. He led her into the living room and called the children. When Sue spoke, it was as if she were speaking of someone else.
‘They must have got it wrong,’ said Jason, springing to his feet. Sue took his hand, held it tightly, and drew him back down. It was a large hairless hand, bigger than hers, with long fingers, attesting to the size of man he would be. But to Sue, it was her little boy’s hand, as she caressed it with her fingertips.
‘It won’t be wrong,’ said Ben. ‘Something must be there. But we shouldn’t jump to conclusions about what it might be.’ His lean face had become drawn and grey. Sue felt she should be comforting him, though somewhere inside, her own voice cried out for comfort, reassurance.
Charlie nodded. She looked as though she was trying hard not to cry, to be grown up and matter-of-fact. ‘When will they do it, the biopsy?’ she asked.
Sue shrugged. ‘I see the surgeon later this week.’ It had been arranged so quickly; another sign to her that all would not be well.
‘I’ll come with you,’ said Charlie, her eyes glistening.
Sue hugged her daughter; it was so nice to have an adult daughter.
‘Dad will come with me. Won’t you, Ben?’ Her eyes pleaded.
‘Da-a-ad.’ Charlie jiggled from one foot to the other, challenge in her voice.
‘Of course. I’m sure it will be nothing.’ He put his arms around Sue and she gripped him fiercely. Some of her tension eased, and a flood of emotion escaped her grasp. She wept into Ben’s shoulder, constrained, gulping sobs. Her children would just have to cope with her feelings for once.
4.
The biopsy results proved to be negative. The lump was a lipoma, a benign, fatty lump, Dr Clarke explained to Sue and Ben, not cancer. Removing it would be a small day-surgery procedure.
‘I’ve had a reprieve,’ Sue sighed. ‘The Grim Reaper will have to wait a while for me.’