Solomon's Song

by Bryce Courtenay

  ‘Your grandmother has promised me she will do as Tommo wished and that you be included in her will. If you obey and honour her wishes you will become a very wealthy lady. You will be able to help a great many more of your people. Be a little patient, my dear,’ Hawk pleads. ‘A few years to be kind to an old woman and then you may do as you wish, I will not stop you.’

  ‘Ha! You would bribe me, Uncle,’ Hinetitama says scornfully. ‘I must sit at the feet of an old woman, I must lick her boots so that I may feed the poor. Is that what you are saying?’

  ‘It is not a sin to be rich and then to spend what you have on those less fortunate than you.’

  ‘And it is not a sin to be poor with strong hands and a good heart. The Maori do not need the pakeha money, their handouts, what we need is to regain our pride. I will do more for them working among them in torn clothes than strutting around in new boots and with an open purse.’

  Hawk sees in Hinetitama the same idealism he himself felt at her age and he secretly admires her for her determination. God knows the poor and the destitute among the Maori in the city have need enough for someone of their own kind to care about them. Since the Maori wars things have gone from bad to worse for the indigenous people of New Zealand and poverty, sickness, malnutrition and drunkenness promise to do as much to eliminate them.

  But Hawk also has Mary with whom to contend. Mary has never accepted that her only grandchild should be raised among the savages and has railed against it for years. Now he must tell her that Hinetitama will not be coming into civilisation. Hawk well knows Mary’s hidden agenda, she wants great-grandchildren, heirs to carry on with the business empire she has so brilliantly begun and Hinetitama is her last chance. And so Hawk, putting aside his conscience, tries for several more days to persuade Hinetitama to travel to Tasmania. But Tommo’s daughter is resolute in her decision.

  Hawk finds himself between the devil and the deep blue sea. In all conscience he can find no reasonable argument with Hinetitama’s ambition. After all, she has no aspirations to be a white person, a tribe she is deeply suspicious of. Raised under the influence of Chief Tamihana she is steeped in Maori tradition and in the knowledge that the Maori have been cheated and swindled by the pakeha. She simply cannot see any virtue in learning to be a proper lady or adopting European values and ways.

  As the days go by, Hawk finds it increasingly hard to counter her defiance. Several times his anger at her unreasonableness has reduced her to tears, but she weeps from frustration that he cannot see her viewpoint. Hawk notes that after each such occasion she seems strengthened in her resolve.

  Finally, having exhausted every argument and plea, he agrees that she can stay. He has been warned of her stubbornness by Chief Tamihana, but he always felt that because of his love for Tommo’s daughter over the years and as her guardian, she would obey him without question. It is not the custom for a subservient female member of a family to disobey the wishes of the predominant male in either white or Maori society.

  Hinetitama is trained in the Anglican Mission Hospital as a nurse and shortly after she completes her two-year training she leaves the hospital to work among the Auckland poor. She is unusual in this for she is a Maori princess and her bandages and treatments do not come wrapped in a sermon or a plea to repent. Hinetitama brings only her hands and her heart to the slums, together with the songs of her nation, to remind those who have lost their pride, their mana, that they belong to a unique people.

  Hawk has now taken to visiting her every two years, for despite his letters pleading with her to visit Tasmania, if only for a period brief enough to satisfy her grandmother, she stubbornly refuses, insisting that her work must come first. Mary, for her part, has grown too old to travel to New Zealand.

  Hawk grows increasingly frustrated, but realising the futility of punishing Tommo’s daughter by withdrawing her small allowance, he deposits a monthly stipend in the bank to see that she has income sufficient to maintain a small clinic. It is obvious to him that she spends little on herself and that she is much loved and respected by the Maori slum dwellers, though whether she is able to do any good among the poor is problematic. It is, he concludes, probably sufficient that she is there among them, a princess of their own, and that the bandages and the salves do less for her patients than her cheerful and compassionate nature and the fact that they see her as one of their own.

  Alas, unbeknownst to Hawk and no doubt because of fatigue and the ongoing frustration of dealing with the poor who never seem to improve in their circumstances, Hinetitama has begun to drink herself. At first she is a tippler, an ale or two taken after a long day and for the opportunity to have a bit of a laugh among those for whom she cares, but as time goes on she discovers the false seduction of cheap gin and becomes more and more dependent on grog until she is unable to do without it in her life. She has inherited her father’s weakness and his craving.

  While Hinetitama continues to work among the disadvantaged, over a period of two years the drink takes possession of her. With her twenty-fifth year approaching, Hawk arrives in New Zealand for his second visit since she came of age only to discover that the clinic has been closed and that Hinetitama has disappeared.

  Hawk seeks out the Maori people in her neighbourhood and asks them if they have any news of her. He is a rangatira and his moko shows him to be of very high rank, so that they must by tradition tell him what they know. But apart from confirming that she is now always drunk and that the clinic has been shut for several months they do not know her whereabouts.

  After several days and nights of walking the streets and enquiring in all the harbour-front taverns, he is accosted by a Maori prostitute.

  ‘You want to know about Hinetitama?’ she asks him in the Maori language.

  ‘Yes.’ Hawk goes to his purse, knowing that information from her kind is seldom given freely.

  ‘No, I don’t want your money, Black Hawk.’

  ‘You know me?’ Hawk asks in surprise.

  ‘We are from the same tribe,’ she answers simply.

  ‘Ah, you know Hinetitama?’

  The prostitute nods.

  ‘Do you know her whereabouts?’ Hawk now asks.

  ‘She’s taken up with the Dutchman, a gamblin’ man, them two’s gone to Wellington, last thing I heard say,’ she replies.

  Hawk continues to question her closely but she cannot help him further though she has the name of Hinetitama’s paramour. ‘It is Slabbert Teekleman.’ She giggles and says in English, ‘He is known as Slap ’n Tickle, but he ain’t like that, you know, nice? He a bad bugger that one.’

  Hawk thanks her and tries to press a half-sovereign into her hand for her trouble. ‘I have given you sad news, Black Maori, it would be tapu. Hinetitama Te Solomon is a princess of the Ngati Haua.’ She points to Hawk’s face, to his moko. ‘I cannot take your money. You are rangatira.’

  Hawk comes away gratified, thinking that Chief Tamihana may have been right after all, and that the Maori, despite their dispossession, have not entirely lost their pride and dignity.

  He hasn’t lost his touch and he knows that a gambler can always be found if you know where to look. In

  Wellington he visits the waterside pubs and eventually discovers the Dutchman’s whereabouts.

  Hawk takes a horse cab into the slums of Thorndon and is finally let down in front of a miserable hovel, made of planking, the single window so crusted with dirt that he is unable to see through it into the interior. He knocks on the door, at first politely and then more loudly until, in the end, he is battering at it with his fist. He is about to smash it in with his shoulder when a bleary-eyed man, with dirty yellow hair and bloodshot eyes of a quite startling blue, opens it, though no more than about twelve inches. Hawk sees that he is clean-shaven and still handsome, though he carries several days of growth upon his chin.

  ‘What you want?’ the man asks.

  ‘You Teekleman?’ Hawk enquires. It is not the sort of neighbourhood where a man qualifies fo
r any status beyond his surname.

  ‘Ja, maybe?’

  ‘Slabbert Teekleman?’

  The man ignores Hawk’s question, ‘What you want, hey?’ It is clear he is losing patience and the door begins to close.

  Hawk kicks his foot forward, jamming the door open and starts to push it inwards. ‘Hey, nigger, what you doing?’ the man shouts in alarm. But Hawk has taken him by surprise and pushes the door, his huge shape filling the doorway. Hawk’s free hand shoots out and he slaps the surprised man across the face, sending him reeling backwards so that he loses his balance and falls to the floor.

  ‘Get up, you bastard!’ Hawk snarls, moving into the hovel so that daylight now pours inwards through the doorway.

  The Dutchman gets to his knees and wipes the blood and mucus from his nose with the back of his hand. ‘Please, you don’t hit me, please, sir!’

  ‘Where’s Hinetitama?’ Hawk growls.

  ‘Who?’ the man says, though he hesitates a fraction before he speaks and Hawk knows immediately he’s covering up.

  ‘Get up, so I can beat the living shit out of you!’ Hawk growls again and takes a step towards the Dutchman.

  The drunk at his feet pulls back whimpering, scrambling away like a monkey on all fours until he is backed up against the far wall of the tiny room. From the corner of his eye Hawk can see a doorway leading to another room on his left. ‘Where’s Hinetitama?’ he demands again.

  The man nods his head to the right and Hawk turns slightly to look at the doorway leading to the next room. ‘She dronk.’ He gives Hawk a conspiratorial grin. ‘Too much the brandy, she Maori, heh?’ He shakes his head deprecatingly. ‘No goet for grog.’

  The doorway has no door and Hawk takes the two or three steps necessary to get to it. Hinetitama is passed out, sprawled naked on a mattress. She is dirty and unkempt with a mass of black hair spread across the top of the filthy mattress. He is too preoccupied to see that her sweet face is unlined and her small, neat body is still firm and beautiful.

  Hawk turns back to the man and takes out his purse and throws two sovereigns to the ground. The Dutchman, still on all fours, scrambles after them grabbing one up, testing it with his teeth and then he finds the second coin and does the same again. It is a gesture Hawk will later recall. Then Teekleman grins. ‘I go. I don’t make no trouble. You see I go now.’ He nods his head in the direction of the bedroom door where Hinetitama lies unconscious. ‘She go fock herself.’

  Hawk for the first time realises that Teekleman is a big man, six foot at the least and perhaps fifteen years younger than him, a strapping fellow who, if he had the heart, the moxie, might be a bit of a handful in a fight. He takes another step forward so that the Dutchman cowers against the wall. He feigns a punch, pulling back his fist, and Teekleman gasps and brings his hands up to protect his face. Hawk sees the terror of a true coward showing in his eyes.

  ‘G’arn, get yer things and scarper, piss off!’

  Hinetitama comes screaming through the door to Hawk’s left and jumps onto his back from behind and with her arms clasped about his neck she fastens her teeth into his left ear. Hawk has no trouble breaking her grip and she falls naked to the ground. He brings his hand up to where she has bitten him and it comes away bloodied. Then he sees that his shoulder is already covered with blood which seems to be pouring from his ear. Hinetitama has now got him about the leg and fastened her teeth into his calf, snarling like a wild beast. He leans down and pulls her arms away and jerks her up to her feet, then with the other hand holds her about the neck at arm’s length so that she is powerless, though she still tries to kick him, lashing at him, but her legs are not long enough to reach him. She is snuffling like a wild animal, too furious to scream. His powerful hand about her throat could easily close down her windpipe and render her unconscious, but she doesn’t seem to care, his niece is a hellcat who knows no fear.

  ‘You bastard! You fucking bastard! Leave him alone!’ she screams.

  In the meantime the Dutchman has taken up his shirt, boots, his violin case and his jacket and hat and is going out the door, fleeing as fast as he can. ‘Piss off, you scum!’ Hawk shouts after him. ‘If you come back I’ll break your fucking neck!’

  ‘I go, I go!’ the Dutchman cries fearfully.

  Hawk has one hand to his ear and with the other holds Hinetitama at bay about the throat. The ear is bleeding so copiously that the blood runs down the back of his hand and down his wrist and is soaking his shirt cuff and saturating the sleeve of his jacket.

  Hawk is suddenly conscious that his niece has gone quiet and sees that her eyes are popping out of her head as she tries to breathe. With the concern for the blood pouring from his ear he has inadvertently tightened his grip about her throat and Hinetitama is choking under his grasp. He lets go of her and she falls at his feet, clutching at her neck and coughing, desperately attempting to regain her breath.

  Hawk quickly takes off his jacket, bundles it up and holds it to his ear then drops to his knees beside Hinetitama and touches her on the shoulder with the unbloodied hand. ‘Are you all right, my dear?’ he asks anxiously. ‘I’m truly sorry if I’ve hurt you.’

  Hinetitama lies with her knees up against her breast, still gripping her throat with both hands. She has regained her breath and is panting heavily. Her golden body is wondrously beautiful, caught in the light from the door as she turns her head slightly to look up at him. ‘Uncle Hawk,’ she croaks in a small, plaintive voice and passes out.

  Hawk is suddenly conscious that the light has changed and he turns to see two urchins silhouetted in the doorway. The two boys turn to run but Hawk calls, ‘Hey, stop! I need your help!’ The urchins turn to face him, legs triggered to the ground, ready to flee like scared rabbits at the slightest suggestion of danger. ‘Is there a doctor lives nearby?’ Hawk asks. Although his own body shields Hinetitama’s nakedness, the two boys can plainly see that there is someone lying on the floor.

  ‘Is she dead, mister?’ one of the lads asks.

  ‘No, she’s fine.’ Hawk removes his bundled coat from his left ear so that they see the blood covering his neck and soaked into his white shirt. ‘My ear, it’s torn, it needs to be stitched up. Is there a doctor hereabouts?’

  ‘There’s Mrs Pike,’ the other urchin replies.

  ‘Is she a doctor?’

  ‘Nah, I think she’s a sort o’ nurse,’ the boy says, ‘fer ’avin’ babies.’

  ‘There’s a sixpence in it for both of you, go fetch her, tell her to bring her stitching stuff.’

  The boys do not move. ‘G’arn, be off with you and hurry.’

  ‘Where’s our money, mister?’

  Hawk sighs and pulls out his purse, allowing the blood to run from his ear, and takes a sixpence from it. ‘One now, one when you return.’ He holds the little silver coin up to the urchins.

  ‘Throw it here,’ one of them says. Hawk throws the sixpence in his direction and both boys drop to the ground in a scramble, pushing and shoving each other out of the way to reach the small fortune at their feet.

  ‘Damn you, get moving!’ Hawk barks. ‘And close the door!’

  One of the lads has secured the coin and they both run off, to return half an hour later with a stout, big-breasted woman who huffs and puffs as she makes her way through the crowd beginning to gather outside the hovel. She carries a leather doctor’s bag and shouts, ‘Out of the way! Out of the way!’ pushing the crowd aside by banging the bag against them until she reaches the door. The two lads are still with her. ‘G’arn, be off with you!’ she says, shooing them away.

  ‘It’s our sixpence, we’s got a sixpence comin’ from the nigger man!’ one of them protests.

  ‘Honest, missus!’ his companion confirms.

  Not bothering to knock, Mrs Pike pushes open the door. ‘Sixpence! You promise them sixpence?’ she shouts into the darkened interior. She turns to the two boys. ‘Wait here,’ she commands imperiously as she steps into the hovel.

  Hawk finds the
second sixpence and hands it to the nurse who drops it into the pocket of her nurse’s pinny and turns to the two urchins. ‘You two stand here at the door, I’ll need it open to let in the light, don’t let nobody come in, you hear? You’ll get yer sixpence later when I’m good an’ ready.’

  She looks over the heads of the two urchins at the crowd. ‘G’arn, piss off the lot’a ya! This ain’t none of your business.’

  In the time it has taken the two boys to fetch the nurse Hawk has found a threadbare blanket and torn a strip off it and bound his head several times around to contain the bleeding from his ear in order to free both his hands. He finds a bucket half filled with water and a tin mug and splashes as much blood from his hands as is possible. Then he returns with a mug of water to find Hinetitama sitting up with her face in her hands.

  ‘Better get dressed, my dear,’ Hawk says to her, handing her the mug.

  Hinetitama takes it in both hands and drinks thirstily, downing the entire mug without taking a breath. Then she gets slowly to her feet and, bringing her hands down to cover her pubic region, she goes back into the little bed chamber and begins to get into her filthy gown. She has no hosiery or underwear and finally she pushes her dirty feet into a pair of badly scuffed and worn boots and dumps herself in the middle of the mattress with her legs tucked under her and waits. She has not said a word to Hawk since her recovery.

  Mrs Pike, it turns out, is the local midwife, which is a stroke of luck, as she well understands how to insert stitches. She does a neat enough job of Hawk’s ear, stemming the bleeding and inserting the stitches which run halfway down the ear by using horsehair and what has the appearance of a small darning needle. It is a rough enough job but soon the bleeding stops. ‘It ain’t pretty but the parts I ’as to stitch in me midwife’s work don’t need no fancy darning,’ she says gruffly, then adds, ‘Better than bleedin’ ter death.’

  Mrs Pike has become aware of Hinetitama sulking on the mattress within the tiny bed chamber. She nods her head towards the door, ‘Bite you, did she?’ Hawk doesn’t reply and Mrs Pike continues. ‘Mouth bite ain’t a nice thing, could turn very nasty.’