Toward the Sea of Freedom

by Sarah Lark

  Everyone seemed to look at Michael as if he were her accessory. The Maori hardly noticed him, and even the reverend regarded him only peripherally when he and Lizzie talked about the Bible, spirits, and demons. Michael could get over the reverend. It was the matter of the Maori that aggravated him.

  Lizzie visited their marae often and insisted that Michael accompany her. The tribe had to get to know him and accept him, she claimed, but Michael had the feeling they were mocking him. The men invited him over to their fire and were friendly, but they barely even tried their meager English out on him. In their songs and stories, Michael often thought he recognized parodies of the miners, traders, and lovers among the pakeha, and felt himself targeted. The Maori treated him obligingly. It was not like before with Tane’s tribe, where Michael’s knowledge regarding sheep husbandry and dog training were respected. Here, he was simply Lizzie’s companion.

  The Maori treated Lizzie with reverence. Michael had no idea whether or how they knew of her involvement in Ian Coltrane’s death, but their tohunga, Hainga, did not tire of praising Lizzie’s exertions for the land of the Ngai Tahu.

  When Michael once asked about it in broken Maori, they told him that, on that day, Hainga had heard Lizzie’s karanga—the cry as a summons to the gods. Michael could not imagine that. The Maori camp was several miles from the waterfall.

  In any case, Lizzie had acquired significant mana and was treated accordingly. Men and women worked for her favor, they were happy when she played with the tribe’s children, and the gifts she had once brought from Tuapeka—the blankets and cooking utensils—were handled with respect, as if set with gold and diamonds. Even the chieftain addressed Lizzie. He turned to her for advice regarding negotiations with the pakeha. Lizzie gathered even more mana by passing on his questions to the reverend, who then discussed them with a lawyer in Tuapeka.

  For Michael, worst of all was when a friendly hapu, another family grouping of the Ngai Tahu, visited the tribe on the Tuapeka River. Then the tribe asked Lizzie—and her man, of course—to come to the festival. Michael felt that they wanted to lead the two pakeha around like trained poodles.

  This again was such a day.

  “Do I really need to come?” Michael asked grumpily as Lizzie told him about the invitation.

  With visible pleasure, Lizzie was wrapping herself in Maori festival clothing, which the women of the tribe had given her. In winter, pakeha clothing suited the climate better, but for summer dances, the native women wore skirts of hardened flax leaves, which generated a strange rustling when they moved. Along with that went minimal woven upper body coverings in tribal patterns.

  “Of course you do,” said Lizzie. “It’s a formal matter with extensive powhiri. It will take hours until they’re done with it. But there will be food, dancing, a proper festival. We’ll take some whiskey. Now don’t make that face. The reverend will bring us more when he comes next. And I’ll sacrifice my last bottle of wine. Hainga loves wine.”

  Now that Lizzie was swimming in gold, she treated herself to as much wine from Dunedin as the reverend was prepared to haul up to them. She savored the expensive bottles that mostly came from France, Germany, or Italy. She opened them slowly, decanting them as she had once done in the Busbys’ house, and then shared them with Michael. He did not think much of them, however.

  The last two bottles of their whiskey supply were to go to the Ngai Tahu, who never refused a drop. Michael expected that he would only get a few gulps for himself. So he was pleasantly surprised when he and Lizzie arrived at the festival and he discovered that their whiskey donation was not the only one. The visitors had also brought several bottles along. Better still was that he recognized most of the men of the wandering hapu. The tribe came from Kaikoura, and Tane hooted as he embraced Michael before the tribes began the official celebrations.

  “We talk later,” Tane assured Michael as the chieftains and elders approached each other. Tane had lived for decades among pakeha and would surely have preferred to limit the greetings to a short rubbing of noses and a glass of whiskey together. But he had his traditional duties for the haka. After everyone had prayed together, Tane reached for his spear and danced the wero—announcing, through special movements, that his tribe came with peaceful, not militant, intentions. This demonstrated Tane’s station as the tribe’s leading warrior, which made Lizzie happy. If Tane was Michael’s friend, then Michael’s mana in the tribe would climb considerably.

  Indeed, people seemed to greet Michael with greater respect when he took his seat at Tane’s side. During the feast, the two friends exchanged news and drank, and at the end of the night, they were the last two sitting at the fire. All the others had withdrawn to tents or sleeping lodges. Lizzie slept in Hainga’s separate tohunga hut, which represented a great honor. Or was it that the old woman wanted to keep her from sleeping with Michael in front of the tribe? Lizzie had the feeling the tohunga did not approve of her connection to him.

  “Clouds gather above you and this man,” Hainga said when Lizzie asked her about it. “The gods do not reject you two, but I do not see a limitless blessing. Two forces fight for you.”

  “For me?” asked Lizzie, confused, but Hainga told her nothing more.

  Michael, caught more in the here and now, and his tongue loosened by whiskey, found in Tane a less difficult confidant.

  He turned to the Maori warrior for advice as the fire slowly burned down. “How do you all do it, in the tribes? With the women, I mean. You let them be tohunga. Nothing happens unless someone runs around screaming at one of your powhiri. You give them weapons, but they stay there where they belong. The men hunt and fish, the women cook and weave, and the chief lays down the law. Why isn’t it like that with Lizzie? She does what she wants.”

  Tane furrowed his brow. “Chief does not lay down law,” he corrected. “Tikanga custom does. Also tohunga lays down often—sometimes man, sometimes woman. Depends on mana. And chief has much mana.”

  “So, the trick is to have more mana than your woman?” asked Michael.

  “Yes. But also woman with mana respects tikanga. Tikanga says man wars, women children. Depends on time, of course. When times bad, women also warrior, also fisher, also hunter. But when times good, everything as always.”

  So that’s how it was. Michael and Lizzie had bad times behind them. Lizzie must have used her mana—whatever that was exactly—to get out of that. Now good times had arrived, and Michael should say how things were. As custom dictated.

  As far as cooking, weaving, and hunting, the customs of the Maori and pakeha were more than similar. Michael decided to tackle the matter the very next week.

  The opportunity to do so arose when Lizzie once again weighed and appraised their gold yield. She found that it was enough. As sorry as she was for the end of their dreamlike summer in the mountains, it was time to break camp.

  “Good, then I’ll ride to the plains and look for land,” Michael said. His heart pounded with his declaration, which he hoped would not lead them to a fight.

  “On your own?” asked Lizzie, taken aback. “Shouldn’t we do that together?”

  Michael shook his head. “Dear, with your riding style”—he smiled broadly, hoping it would take the edge from his words—“we wouldn’t make it to the plains in three months.”

  Lizzie furrowed her brow. “But we could take our wagon. We could ride to Tuapeka and yoke my horse on again. I don’t think he’s forgotten how it works.”

  Michael laughed at this idea. “Of course a horse doesn’t forget how to pull a wagon, Lizzie, but the wagon will slow us down. I’m faster alone on my horse.”

  “Why are we in such a hurry?” she asked. “It’s only just February. Fall hasn’t begun yet. It will be weeks before it’s too cold and wet to drive overland. The roads around Christchurch are supposed to be well paved now, so a little rain won’t be a problem. And as for the farm, you’re going to commission someone for that anyway.”

  Anger welled up in Michael. Tru
e, he had not believed she would take his assertion completely without reservation. The fact that she had already made plans was too much. He did not need help buying land, but she probably already knew with whom he would need to talk.

  “I thought I’d talk with the Ngai Tahu myself, actually.”

  Lizzie nodded patiently. “Another possibility. But then you really need me. Your Maori—”

  “Good God, Lizzie, don’t you understand that I would like to do something myself for once?” Michael exploded. His eyes flashed with rage. “If you show up to the Maori, they’ll probably greet you with open arms, singing and dancing until they collapse, and then they’ll lay their land at your feet.”

  Lizzie did not understand. “And?” she asked. “What’s wrong with that? If they give us a good price because I have friends in the tribe, then that’s even better. We can buy more sheep and build a lovely house and—”

  “What if I want a house that’s already been built?” asked Michael. He knew he was being petulant and unkind, but his frustration had grown too great.

  “Then you shouldn’t talk with the Maori. At most they’ll have a meeting house to offer,” laughed Lizzie. “What’s wrong, Michael? Are you upset about something?”

  “Upset? Me? You wouldn’t let things get so that I could be upset. Before I can worry about something, you’ve long since arranged it. Can’t you just stay out of something for once, Lizzie? Can’t you just let me do something?”

  “But Michael, we both want to live in the house. And the land is for our children. So why do you want to go alone?”

  “Because that’s the custom, Lizzie,” Michael roared at her. “Tikanga, if you prefer. The man brings his wife home. The man builds the nest; the woman watches the kids. Don’t you understand that?”

  Lizzie furrowed her forehead. “I’m supposed to watch the kids? But Michael, so far we’ve done everything together.”

  Michael leaped to his feet. “Together, you call it? When you give the orders, and I follow? I have a different notion of togetherness.” He began to pack his things.

  Lizzie’s patience was wearing thin. Fine, if he wanted to fight . . . “Well, my ideas haven’t been all that bad,” she said sharply, “if you have six pounds of pure gold to build a nest with.”

  “I knew you would rub my nose in that at some point.” Michael stuffed clothing into his saddlebags. “But now it’s my turn, Lizzie. I’m the sheep farmer. I find the house and the land. I buy the animals. I—”

  “Well, I hope you know more about wool than gold. You see, I don’t want to clean up after the sheep. It’s enough that I always have to clean up after you. After whatever crazy plan to flee Australia in a rowboat or all the fuss about Mary Kathleen.”

  Michael glared at her. “You just can’t let go of that, can you, Lizzie? That I had the gall to look at a girl before you. And what’s more, a better one. A gentle, beautiful, virtuous girl.”

  Lizzie bristled. Until then, she had not granted the fight too much importance. Now she was hurt, and her gentle blue eyes sparked with fury.

  “Then it’s better you don’t build a house, Michael. Better you take the money and start a church. Dedicated to the ghost of Mary Kathleen. Maybe you can even have her made a saint, though I’m sure that’s more expensive than six pounds of gold. So you’ll have to shear a few sheep or butcher whales or any one of those things you could have done to get rich without me. Go to hell, Michael Drury! And don’t come back until you’ve put your ghosts back where they belong.”

  Michael bit his lip. She was right, of course. He’d gone too far. He should never have compared her to Kathleen. No more.

  “Lizzie, Lizzie, I’m sorry. I do love you.” He wanted to take her into his arms, but Lizzie shook him off.

  “I don’t believe you, Michael,” she said calmly. “And I can’t compete with a ghost. Just go, Michael. Find a house, build a nest, or a church, or a barn—you can take all the gold, except for Ann’s share. I’ll pan a little longer and then—”

  “Lizzie, don’t,” pleaded Michael. “I didn’t mean it like that. I don’t want to lose you; I just want to do something myself, I . . .”

  Lizzie felt the wisdom of old Hainga within her. She could not help herself from saying one last word for the road. “So go and increase your mana, Michael,” she sighed. “If that’s what you have to do. Maybe you’ll increase it serving the spirits, who knows? I’ll stay with the tribe a while. Hainga asked me to, so I’ll do her the favor. Maybe I still have something to learn. But no more than a few months, Michael. Maybe until winter. If you’re not back by then—free of Mary Kathleen’s ghost—then I’ll look for something else.”

  Lizzie did not allow him to give her a farewell kiss. She sat still and silent until he had packed his things and saddled his horse. Only when she heard him ride away did she stand up and prepare herself for the hike to the village. She thought about how the spirits were guiding her to live with the Maori; she could have done that more than ten years ago. She thought of Kahu Heke, for whom she could have been a queen.

  Chapter 3

  Kahu Heke had not yet been elected chief. That was largely because his uncle, Kuti Haoka, still led the Ngati Pau. It was also because Kahu Heke had passed through years of change that only rarely led him to his tribe or let him find peace there. His parting with Lizzie had left him restless. Long after their escape in the chief’s canoe, Lizzie’s image came to him—her soft long hair, her warm smile, and her blue eyes that were so different from the mostly dark eyes of his tribe’s girls. For Kahu, the sky was reflected in her eyes, the sky on a spring day. Not yet the shining blue of summer, but still a promise. He had loved her clever manner, her courage, and her devotion. Kahu Heke had known there was another man. No girl lived as cloistered as Lizzie had in her years with Mr. Busby if she was not living from dreams, whether lovely or dashed dreams. Kahu had seen the reflection of both in Lizzie’s eyes. But she had never spoken of the man, and at some point she had to forget him.

  In the first years after Kahu had left Lizzie on the South Island, he had wished for nothing more than to take the place of this stranger in her heart. To be closer to her in spirit, he had returned to the pakeha. He applied for work on their farms, at first even in viniculture because it meant so much to Lizzie. It was not hard for him to find employment with James Busby, but when he tasted his wine for the first time, Kahu knew he could learn nothing about winemaking there, so he went on to Auckland, where the pakeha had already established a flourishing community. Though it pained him, he invested half a month’s salary in a bottle of good French Bordeaux—and then could better understand what drew Lizzie to winemaking. The deep-red wine tasted earthy but possessed an aroma of ripe fruit, berries, and apples. It caressed the tongue, velvety as a kiss.

  Kahu had gained access to the new university’s library and quickly learned that the quality of the wine depended only in part on the vintner. Mr. Busby might have been doing everything right with pressing his wine, but the grapes and the soil in which they grew played a role. Indeed, everything had to fit together, the sun and rain, too, so the wine could reveal a particular taste.

  It would take decades of trying different varieties of grapes and harvest times to produce a union between the soil of his homeland and a suitable grape variety that resembled the kiss of the gods. Mr. Busby lacked the patience and imagination. Lizzie might have the passion, but not the knowledge. And Kahu lacked all of it.

  Handling animals suited Kahu more, and for a time he hired on to a sheep farm near Auckland and did well for himself, but in the end, he was not content to work for the pakeha. Above all, Kahu was interested in his people’s rights. He regretted that he had not gone farther with his formal education among the whites. It would have been best to study law, in order to strike back at the pakeha with their own weapons of word.

  Kahu was a master of whaikorero, rhetoric. He could trumpet his outrage at the injustices his people encountered at the hands of the immigrants f
rom the Old World. However, no echo came from the tribes. If Maori and pakeha fought, it was only over individual issues, and the iwi and hapu ended the fighting as soon as they reached a settlement. The natives thought it right that the whites should govern themselves in their cities according to their customs, so long as they could hold on to their customs in the countryside.

  Kahu Heke, who took a longer view and had studied European history, foresaw a catastrophe. The whites always took friendliness for weakness; that would be no different in New Zealand than in their old homeland. They let the Maori be, as long as they did not need their land. The pakeha numbers were growing, however. Kahu saw the ships in their harbors and their cities spreading outward; one day they would lay their hands on that land too. Kahu would have been happy to arm his people against that, but no one listened to him.

  His self-appointed task of being the intermediary between the pakeha and the tribes kept him in contact with the Ngai Tahu, and this was how he occasionally got news about Lizzie.

  Kahu had heard of Lizzie’s tavern and Michael’s distillery in Kaikoura. Her adaptability charmed him: if she could not make wine, she made whiskey—or got her man to do so. The Maori, however, claimed there was nothing between Lizzie and the Irish sheep shearer and distiller. Kahu wondered if that were true—recently, he had caught word that they had appeared on the Tuapeka River. Kahu no longer pictured Lizzie so clearly. He had gotten used to not having her around, and other goals had emerged for him.

  Although Kuti Haoka was still in good health, he was getting quite old. He would soon have to give up his title of chief, and this was Kahu’s last chance to win more influence among his people so that he might follow his uncle. Thus, Kahu returned to his tribe, hunted, fished, advised people, and told stories. He increased his mana, and his heart beat more heavily when the chieftain finally ordered him to come to him.