by Alan Duff
Mum and I ate breakfast while Henry was at the baths. Mum wasn't a big eater and she said her people ate far too much.
In winter the coal range heat drew us to the kitchen. Our sitting room had an open fire, but if Henry was around then I went elsewhere in the house. Our bedrooms were freezing. I'd get under the blankets and lose myself in imagination's landscape and settings. Sometimes Mum and I would go and soak in Falls, relishing the bitter cold air as we sweated in the wet heat. Henry and Barney had built a shelter so bathers could change and keep clothes dry. They were war mates and Henry was very protective of him: no kid dared tease Barney.
I'd walk into the sitting room or kitchen to Henry laughing or talking to my sisters, my entrance causing a sudden, awkward silence. Mata just stared straight ahead and would talk about anything to fill the silence. Wiki looked down and said nothing, a bit like the child who closes his eyes to make people disappear. Manu too young to understand. Boy, I hated those times.
He was gone before we went to school; my family knew I relaxed and became my cheeky self then: I loved to play tricks on my sisters, or if I was feeling thoughtful I liked to be buried in a book and say nothing till we walked to school.
Chud waited for me every school day and weekend mornings too. Often he'd have the marks of a beating but we learned not to say anything. Chud liked the talk to be about anything but himself and his terrible father and mother. If my sisters went to school with their pals, Chud and I did sometimes share what he went through at home, but not too much. We'd rather talk about what we'd do by way of revenge when we grew up, the versions of accidentally on purpose throwing them into a boiling pool, poisoning their food with a special plant old Merita would tell us where to find in the forest up on Totara Hill, how to prepare it. Mostly we were just boys living in our childhood.
As for bullying, no one, not even boys much older, dared touch Chud as he had a nasty temper and would use anything as a weapon to defend himself. He let others know that no one could touch me either.
School was different. Chud had no interest but I found it exciting and challenging and the teachers liked me in their classes. I took books home from the library. Not that I was a bookworm, I just liked words and what the imagination could do. Chud loved nothing better than throwing and kicking a rugby ball; he tackled young tree trunks, tackled me from behind if we were walking on grass, crawled all over me like a laughing big cat and would tell me, one day I'll be a rugby star.
The evenings were ours, to gather round the radio or play cards or games. We could be ourselves as we knew Henry's pattern to drink with his boss and their mates after work, often go to a party that didn't finish till after we were in bed. Rarely was Mum invited out socially with him.
At our make-believe parties in the sitting room Mum would dance to different songs, teach us steps to the waltz, the jitterbug, tango. Mata would warn, better not let Dad catch you teaching us dance steps from the war. Meaning learned from a certain American. We all sang along to the songs played regularly on the radio. Mata had a great memory for lyrics and she could sing. Like her father. My family encouraged my singing too; I could imitate well once my voice got a bit older. Mum promised puberty would bring the best change. I couldn't wait. Nor could I wait for other kinds of change: even thought of running away from home.
Maybe Henry would get ill and die. Yet the thought made me sad, sometimes overwhelmingly so. Maybe I loved him, even though he never loved me back.
Two, three times a year Henry would come home with a mission: my mother. Punish her for the crime of bringing me into this world and, I later figured, the act that led to it. Something about sex that gets to men. All men, according to Merita. Not that the old lady called it that, she called it the business.
He'd bring it up, in front of us if we happened to be there. Asking did she miss him. Not saying who. We knew. We'd try and melt away at first opportunity but feared getting his attention, especially me, Mrs Sinner's living piece of damning evidence resident in the victim's home.
Our mother had her pattern of reaction too: she would sigh and look away, then back at him and say, how many times do I have to tell you, I never give the past a thought? It's behind us.
Henry would say, oh, yes you do. Just that he's dead. But if he was alive?
If he walked into this house, Henry, I'd tell him to get out. He's dead, like I wish the subject was. How long you going to hold a grudge? And didn't you sleep with anyone when you were away?
He'd say, you were a married woman. How could you do this?
She'd say, why don't we cut the talk and you just hit me?
And Henry would march up to her, teeth gritted, fists bunched. You humiliated me. I'm a respected man and you humiliated me.
I've said sorry over and over. Just do it, Henry. But not in front of the kids. Please?
His finger would prod her chest — hard. You did your slut thing while your own kid was back here being looked after by your parents. Did you think about my daughter?
Kids, go to bed.
Mata would beg her father, please, Dad? Please don't hurt Mum. I love you, Dad.
Go to bed, I said.
We'd hear him yelling. The thump of her being struck, slammed against the wall. We'd hear Mata and Wiki's names yelled at him. But never mine. I wanted to hear my name spoken, to feel I existed too as someone who breathed and talked. But Mum never spoke my name to Henry and nor did he utter it. I got guilty that when he beat Mum it was my fault. I'd cry in private, as a boy crying in front of anyone is shameful. Weeping with guilt that my very existence was a permanent reason for harm done to my mother.
But mostly, once I learned to see it more objectively, Henry was a passive man who truly loved his daughters. He was very popular in the village, people looked up to him. I wondered why he didn't toss me and Mum out, get another wife, rid of me.
I heard him say to Mum, there is not a day in my life I am not reminded of what you did with that Yank piece of shit, and his damn kid living with us.
I wanted to rush out and say, my father is not a piece of shit — you are. Where will Mum and I live — in a cave?
I heard Mum tell Mata, because she was older, that Henry tortured himself about what happened. Mata said tell me about it. Us while he's at it. I'm sick of it, Mum. You didn't murder anyone. You gave life to my brother.
A brother who liked hearing that. Loved her too.
He did a lot of work for the village, at no charge. He said responsibility was thrust upon him by the elders and he must live up to it. I wondered if they minded him hitting my mother several times a year. Guess they didn't, probably hit their own wives. A lot of men did. Did the villagers know Henry never spoke a word to me? Probably wouldn't care, he was their favourite son.
Henry was in a constant battle with the town council and with the government for taking Waiwera land and, to add salt to the wound, taking most of the entry fee charged to tourists. He called it arrogance of white people.
At the hotel he fought with trouble-maker patrons. They said he'd never lost a fight, but never did he pick them. Which made me proud, even though he didn't like me. Something about an undefeated man that stirs a boy, even if man and boy don't talk.
Mum and Henry didn't talk a lot either. Though Mata said obviously with Wiki being born they must do the other. Only meant something when I found out what the other was. And then I felt like throwing up. Manu's birth when I was nine felt like a generation between us. Soon I was old enough to imagine the act that created him and I was disgusted. How could my mum let Henry? Or did he force himself on her?
But my life was a joy compared with my best pal Chud's. Which was what my mother kept reminding me of: there are others worse off no matter what your situation is.
CHAPTER SIX
FROM MERITA'S VERANDAH I CALL out to the few local humans below: Shamed warriors who have been captured and enslaved, I own you!
Slaves! Former warriors who took capture rather than honourable death, so shall
you bury our sewage, do the heavy tasks. I despise you!
Merita's told me all the great Maori chiefs had slaves, some destined for the cooking ovens. Our school books tell us Egyptian slaves built the pyramids. The lowest of the low who laboured on every great world monument, like the Taj Mahal — and who remembers their names? Slaves are to be held in contempt. Better to be dead.
Go and build something to honour me, slave dogs! A castle, a huge mansion built atop Totara Hill, so all my subjects can adore me. But you shall be forbidden to cast your lowly eyes upon my person — look down, slaves! Do not ever gaze upon me lest you foul my presence.
Suddenly I mean something in this place dominated by Henry: This is I, your great warrior chief! Dare look me in the eye and I will hurl you into a boiling pool!
Merita tells me not to talk like that or someone will give me a biff round the ear. But she has told me my mother is of a high-born family, so that makes me high-born. Merita's spiral tattoo design says she herself is high-born. No ordinary woman is given such honour. The high-born endure pain as a mark of their superior status. This high-born kid endures the pain of living in Henry's house.
One day I'll make you one of my slaves, Henry Takahe. One day my father is going to arrive and then we'll see you tremble in front of a real man. Kneel, slave, my father will say. And you will kneel. Then he will behead you for how you treated his son.
CHAPTER SEVEN
THIS SIDE OF THE BRIDGE a rock face spills down to the water from a dirt road alongside, where early starters mill around, waiting for the decision on what to do first, hit the cold river or warm up in any one of four selections of baths. A complex process, not one you can rush. Boys and girls shuffle bare feet in the dust, swish a foot in a puddle, look down, look up, at the river, over the main thermal area, at the sky, down at the Smith house that lost two sons in the war, at each other, away somewhere on their own; each has his and her own best hope but not theirs to say, not anyone's, it just happens, the moment you join with a group you become owned by its mysterious will. Even the strong personalities don't always decide on where the day starts.
Not that Yank has a preference; he loves all and any of it in no particular order.
It's the river. Boys move down and spread over the rock face like goats ready to leap, shed of all but shorts, girls in tee-shirts as well, even those with but a hint of breasts, shivering even if it's summer warm, arms clutched around bodies, grinning and giving little giggles, eyes only between the steady flowing water and each other.
Then someone jumps, letting out a cry as he goes, a big belly-flop splash to begin the day. The other goats leap through the air after him. That shock of hitting the cold wet; sweet immersion in a liquid playground. No time to muck around, there are games to play, old tried contests to engage in, swimming races above or below the surface, horseplay, tickling of someone's body parts, a wrestle.
It's called rattling. The money-hungry ones start immediately, diving down and whipping up sand and grit till a jingle is heard and up he or she comes, two joined hand-scoops of material to wash like panning for gold, so the coin edge emerges like a fulfilled promise especially if it's the largest denomination, a half crown: feels like God Himself placed it. Puts the coin find in his mouth, nature's purse, a perfect pouch for holding real cash treasure and down he and she goes, into the murk if rain has muddied it, or it's clear and they see each other and smile or glare, predators hunting down the money prey but friends too.
A half crown is the silver nugget supreme, two shillings and sixpence, two and six, with endless buying power as well as certain human drawing power, kids hoping the luck will rub off or they'll get some of the sweets and food purchases; a sibling a cousin might buy a ticket to the pictures, pay the bus fare. Kicking feet protrude from several kids rattling down there against the rock face where coins have nowhere else to go but sink deeper into the sand and fine pebbles, waiting for lucky kids to find them.
Yank today with another purpose moves quite a way upstream, quite a struggle wading against the flow. Reaches a spot out of the others' sight, turns, breathes deep, slips beneath the waters. Gone.
To his own private galaxy: it could be the heavens he races across — he's found a means to position his body forward in a crouch and run as if sprinting, the current speeds him across the watery sky, he becomes a comic-book hero, his own person none can see or witness, picking up speed; he can see bodies ahead so he can avoid them as he sweeps downriver, swift, a hero with power of flight, mind taken somewhere none can know, for he is alone in this discovery with no intention of sharing it; his mates think he just swims underwater like they all do, but this is different.
He's doing it for his father. For the grinning Yank in the cowboy outfit looking down from that bridge, waiting for his son to pop up. Or he's John Wayne in US marine uniform, as he must have appeared to the boy's mother, in dry-cleaned clothes (an American custom they brought here). Man of perfect features and perfect grooming looking out for his boy.
Up Yank comes, to the surface grinning up at the imaginary figure beaming back at him. Father throws his son a half crown. For you, son. Don't let anyone else get it. And down Yank goes, into the clear water, can see the biggest coin of all looping its way down: propels at it with feet driving off the sand. Gotcha!
Up he comes. Thanks, Pops!
The first coach-loads of tourists are dropped at the spot near the memorial archway where local women guides wait to take them on their thermal wonderland tour. Soon the first group appears on the bridge above, many nationalities, Americans dominating, Australians, English, Canadians, those from different European countries but not former foes — Germany, Italy, Japan.
Throwapennyplease! Throwapennyplease! When really, they want the silver coins thrown, especially a half crown. And Yank just wants to see the face of the father come back to take him home — to America!
The others are fierce competitors now, relation or no, this is treats in their bellies, entrance to the pictures, status and confirmation, affirmation, acquired by charm and begging, beauty, grace and courage: just watch them sail down twenty feet from the bridge into less than their height of water. Lady, I'll jump off for sixpence. Sir, I'll dive off the top rail for a shilling, do a toe-touch dive, mister, for two bob. Ma'am, you should see my swan dive. Two and six for a somersault and pay after you've seen it.
Yank clambers up the rock face on to the bridge. Asks his Yank father in his mind does he want his son to jump or dive? Naturally Pops wants to see a dive. Which is a lot more scary and difficult than jumping. But if he doesn't do it then his father will just disappear.
So he steps up on to the rail, the water so far below he wants to die. For Pops, Yank. Do it for your father.
The American tourists call out encouragement, a local kid asks who is he diving for, meaning he didn't see Yank put a coin in his mouth.
Yank focuses on the place his body will break apart in front of his father's eyes, wishing there was another way to impress. There isn't. Not at Waiwera. It's what kids do. What the son of the American must do.
Takes some time before he can find the courage. Several Yank women suggest he step down: it's too dangerous and we can see you don't want to do it. But he must do it. For his daddy.
Okay, ready now, Dad. Watch this.
Throws himself into the air and all fear departs, legs held together, arms out, feels like falling forever. Fingers slice into the water, he bends his back to break the descent, hears a snatch of cheering above him before the water encloses him and so does pride at showing his father what a bold son he has.
Surfaces to sight of his handsome father laughing proudly, pointing and telling his fellow Americans, that's my son you just saw! Isn't he something! Yank waves that he'll see his father later, there's money to be earned. Joins the others in real time.
Following a threepenny piece as it dances and flits like a butterfly, the larger shilling makes broader arcs, a two shilling coin short and fast falling, the
prize half crown its own zigzag loop. Bodies clash and fuse and break loose under the water, it's another world, another dimension. The winner breaks the surface triumphant, holding the prize aloft.
Kids stay in the river as long as bodies will stand then head for the other blessing of warm baths. To the social warmth of touching bodies. Water as if with a slight oil content soft to the touch, slippery on the skin, all around sky and steaming wet.
Talking, jabbering, laughing, spit-squirting, food-smacking mouths, the mouths just on the surface blowing bubbles, mischief brewing in the eyes, smiles breaking white against a deep brown backdrop of complexion and uniform black hair, heads that sink beneath and hold breath for an impossible time and break free sucking air spitting laughter, triumph at a record broken. Hard truth of those who surpass the record and no one cares.
Still, this is their place all: those of weak personality, the strong, bland, boring, the lame the limited the dumb the mentally defective, the numbed of too harsh a home life too early, it cannot be discussed, quite a few suffer it, just know every kid feels for you, just stay close and stay loyal, die for us if asked and we'll give you comfort in return and die for you.
There are the ones born angry even furious, at something or just nothing, they're in too, the social cripples, the retarded of body and mind, the ugly, hideous, plain, the lucky gloriously lovely, the handsome, beautiful, gorgeous of feature and body, you're the better part of it but you owe too, everyone owes. Chud, you're one of us, you too, we don't care your stink parents. Yank, you're in too, don't care your name its origin, what some call your mother, none of that here, you're with us, of us.
Growing up in paradise like an underground garden sprouting a thousand steaming manifestations. And one day a father, come all the way from America here to claim his son.