The Fire Blossom

by Lark, Sarah

  So he opted for the complaints of his mother and sisters, who would rather blame an act of God for their unfortunate predicament than the village elders, who’d ignored all the warnings they’d been given. He led the horses and let the children take turns riding on them. Of course the settlers’ children complained about sore feet and hunger, and most of the women were unmotivated to search for edible plants or catch fish. The only exception was Cat. She was often nauseated in the mornings, but by noon she was hungry like a she-wolf. For the blonde Maori, of course, the woods offered a plentitude of nourishment. She dug roots, encouraged Ida and Elsbeth to pick berries, and caught fish skillfully, even without traps. Erich Brandmann often joined her, so Frau Brandmann and her daughters didn’t have to go hungry even as they indulged in pointless weeping and lamenting.

  It was getting on Erich’s nerves. “We won’t starve to death,” he told them calmly as he skillfully built a fire to roast the fish over. Cat had taught him how to do that, too, and as with all the other survival techniques he’d learned, he turned out to have a natural talent for it. “There’s plenty of work for carpenters in Nelson. Father just has to learn English, even if he doesn’t like the idea.”

  “Are we all going to stay together?” Franz asked fearfully. “Father said that the community would be together even if we had to give up Sankt Pauli Village.”

  “Yes, that’s what my father says too,” Erich replied. “But we’ll see if that’s even possible.”

  “I think it’s best if you learn to speak English, Franz,” Ida said, stroking her little brother’s head and handing him a branch of skewered fish to hold over the fire. “Do you remember what the Partridges called you?”

  Franz smiled. “Francis!” he said. “I want to see Paul. We’re going to live with the Partridges again, right?”

  As it happened, the citizens of Nelson were just as accommodating as they had been a year earlier. They were sad to hear about the flood and opened their homes to the washed-out settlers. Almost all were able to stay with the families who’d hosted them before. Ida watched enviously as Elsbeth threw her arms around Mrs. Partridge. The shopkeeper’s wife returned the embrace happily but wrinkled her nose.

  “You smell, Betty,” she remarked. “You need a bath. And you have a new roommate! May I introduce Amanda? My baby!”

  Ida greeted the Partridges briefly and admired Amanda. Of course she knew that, even without the new member of the family, there would be no place for her there. Ida was married now and belonged with the Brandmann family. But the Brandmanns were having a hard time finding a host because the McDuffs had made excuses not to take them again. Ida wasn’t surprised. After all, Frau Brandmann and her daughters hadn’t made themselves very popular there.

  “We’ll find another place for you,” said the magistrate’s secretary, whom Wakefield had sent to meet the settlers. “Tonight we’ll bring you to Mrs. Robins’s guesthouse, and then we’ll see what we can find.”

  The Brandmanns listened without comprehension until Ottfried translated. Not one of them had learned a single word of English in all this time.

  “What about us?” Ida asked her husband. “Are we going to the guesthouse too? And what about Cat, and Chasseur?”

  Ida was anxious because she knew they couldn’t pay. Of course Ottfried would be able to find work soon, but Ida had been raised with the belief that there was almost nothing as shameful as debt. Besides, the strict and tidy landlady surely wouldn’t tolerate a dog.

  Cat was reluctant for other reasons. So far, no one in Nelson had recognized her. In the influx of German settlers, she was just one more blonde woman among many. But Mrs. Robins would recognize her and start to gossip again immediately. Cat would have liked to stay in Nelson for a few days. At the very least she wanted to know what would become of Ida before she left to find the Ngai Tahu, and she wasn’t eager to undertake a long, lonely hike in bad weather.

  The women gave each other unhappy glances as they considered the possibilities. Surprisingly, Ottfried came up with a solution.

  “I’ll find something for us, Ida, don’t worry,” he boasted. “After all, I have a lot of friends here in Nelson. Come with me, I’ll get us a place.”

  Ottfried waved to his parents and set off determinedly. Ida and Cat followed.

  “His friends don’t live in the best part of town,” Cat murmured as they turned toward the docks.

  Indeed, Ottfried led them to a pub with a façade that looked derelict and neglected, even though the house couldn’t be very old. Ida looked unhappy, and Cat was worried when she saw the rickety sign over the door. “Paddy’s Hideaway.” Was it just a pub, or a brothel too?

  Ottfried pushed the door open, and they were immediately enveloped in the scent of beer and unwashed bodies. There were scrubbed tables made of raw, cheap wood; a stained floor; and a long bar that was being wiped down by a red-faced pub owner. Ida seemed frightened, but Cat thought sarcastically that she should probably feel at home. At least the room was relatively clean, which was more than could be said for Barker’s Pub.

  Ottfried stepped up to the bar determinedly. “Paddy, old mate, greet I you!” he improvised in broken English.

  The pub owner returned his greeting in a friendly voice but raised his eyebrows when he saw Ida and Cat.

  Ottfried went on. “I need you help. We much water in village. We gone. Now need place, room for me and my wife.”

  Paddy grinned. “Does that mean Sankt Pauli Village finally sank, and you old martyrs finally learned your lesson? Hallelujah! And now you want to move in here with your wife and dog?” He glanced at Chasseur, who had already settled by the cold fireplace. Then his gaze shifted between Ida and Cat.

  “Your two wives,” the pub owner said. “Unless I’m seeing double.” Ida lowered her head with shame. Cat attempted to look as though she didn’t care, while Paddy’s grinning face slowly took on a look of admiration. “Damn, Ottie, I never believed you when you boasted about your two women! But now I see it with my own eyes. Two of them, and one more beautiful than the next! Which one is married to you? And is the other one available for the general public if I let you live here?” Paddy licked his lips.

  Ottfried grimaced. It was hard to tell if he was proud or embarrassed. But before he could say anything, Ida spoke.

  “Mr. Paddy,” she said in slow but correct English, “my name is Ida Brandmann, and this is our maid and my friend, Katharina. I don’t know how it is in England or Ireland or wherever you’re from, but where we come from, men only have one wife. As far as Cat is concerned—”

  “Girl want job,” Ottfried interjected, pointing to Cat.

  She glared at him. The pub owner observed with fascination.

  “And I’m not looking for the kind of job you’re offering, Paddy,” Cat said angrily.

  Paddy held up his hands appeasingly. “All right, all right. I wasn’t trying to insult you. It was just a question. It’s just that, after everything Ottie said, he comes in with you two beauties . . . What do you want, Ottie? A room for three? Or just one for you and your lady?”

  Ottfried was clearly squirming with embarrassment. “For three. But don’t know, how rooms—”

  “It would be nice if we could all stay here for a short time, assuming you have rooms to rent,” Ida said calmly and respectfully.

  Cat couldn’t help admiring her poise. In spite of everything, Ida still seemed to be the embodiment of the tidy and respectable settler’s wife. And their daily English lessons had clearly paid off.

  “However, we are without funds at the moment, as you surely understood from my husband’s excellent English.” Ida’s eyes flashed with sarcasm. “We had to give up Sankt Pauli Village. So we must—”

  “Paddy and me agree about money,” Ottfried said arrogantly. “We friends, no?”

  The pub owner rolled his eyes. “I’m not running a guesthouse here,” he said. “I only have a shed behind the pub. I let the ones sleep there who won’t be able to find their
way home otherwise. And there’s one room upstairs. I rent that out—how shall I say it without offending the ladies . . . ?” He rubbed his nose and actually seemed to be a little embarrassed. “Well, I rent it by the hour. If I let you have it, I’ll need some kind of compensation. At least as much as Lucie pays. But you can have the shed. You’ll have to clean it up yourselves, though. If you’ll pardon my saying so, it’s a shit hole. In compensation, perhaps the ladies can make themselves useful around here. No, don’t worry, nothing unsavory. Just cleaning. Lucie, the strumpet who’s been doing it, is better suited for the room upstairs.”

  Ida blushed hotly.

  “So, where did you sleep when you spent the night here?” Cat asked, giving Ottfried a cynical look. “In the shed or with the strumpet?”

  Ottfried bit his lip, and proved that there was still enough Raben Steinfeld left in him to make him turn a brilliant shade of red.

  “That says it all,” Cat said soberly. “Thank you, Paddy. Mrs. Brandmann and I will sleep in your shed. We’ll be happy to tidy it up, and we’ll also clean your barroom. However . . .”

  She slowly pulled the knife out of her belt, aimed at the dartboard that hung on the pub wall, and sent the blade flying. Paddy gasped when it cleanly hit the center and stuck there.

  “However, neither of us will be ‘available for the general public,’” Cat finished. “And as far as Mr. Brandmann is concerned, he and Miss Lucie will surely come to an agreement, as you obviously have before. Of course this is all temporary. Mr. Brandmann will want to find a proper home for his family soon. My friend is expecting a child. And as he said, I’m looking for a job. Now, where is the shed?”

  Part 6

  IN THE HANDS OF THE SPIRITS

  NELSON AND CANTERBURY PLAINS, NEW ZEALAND (THE SOUTH ISLAND)

  1844–1845

  Chapter 38

  Paddy Reilly, the pub owner, had been right about the shed. It was tiny and full of garbage, dust, and spiderwebs. Ida almost broke into tears at the sight. She had kept herself under firm control in the pub, but now she looked as though she were about to have a breakdown. She desperately needed a bed and something to eat. Upon the refugees’ arrival in town, the helpful citizens of Nelson had improvised a soup kitchen offering bread and hot tea, but Ida had been so worried and exhausted that she’d barely managed to get anything down. And now they were in this terrible place that would have to be thoroughly cleaned before they could even sit. The women examined the stained mattress that Paddy kept for his drunken guests with disgust, and even Chasseur turned away after sniffing it.

  “Guaranteed to be full of lice,” Cat remarked. “We need a new one. Or at least straw. Where are the horses being kept?”

  “In the magistrate’s barn,” Ida answered tiredly. “There will surely be arguments about who owns them. The community put funds together to buy the team, and now everyone needs money.”

  Cat sighed and reached for a broom, and began to remove the spiderwebs and the worst of the dirt. Then she fetched some water. Ida collected the empty bottles and cartons and the rest of the garbage Paddy had been hoarding in the shed. There was no sign of Ottfried. Since he didn’t have to sleep in the shed, he didn’t feel responsible for cleaning it.

  “Hopefully he’ll at least look for work soon,” Ida said, “and not just wait for new land to be assigned or whatever the others are planning now. We have to eat somehow.”

  Cat nodded sanguinely. “Mostly, Ottfried will be drinking,” she said. “And Paddy didn’t look as though he would give it to him for nothing. Lucie won’t let him sleep in her bed out of undying love either.”

  Ida blushed. “He betrayed me,” she affirmed, as though it had only just become clear to her. “I guess I knew that he’d had . . . encounters earlier, but since we’ve been married . . . that’s a sin!”

  Cat shrugged. “If you ask me, it’s a sin before marriage too. Women shouldn’t be for sale. Your God doesn’t seem to care very much about that.”

  “But the flood—”

  Cat slapped her forehead. “Ida, I’ve told you ten times already. There have always been floods there. That Karl of yours knew that. Who is Karl, anyway? Every time he’s mentioned, your father looks like he’s going to explode, Ottfried, too, and you—I don’t know, you seem to glow. You’ll have to tell me what happened between you. In any case, Karl predicted the floods, and it had nothing to do with Ottfried’s whoring. Your God had no part in it, Ida! If any gods were involved, then perhaps it was Te Ronga’s river gods. They don’t worry about people, they just make the rivers rise and fall as they wish.”

  “We’ve all sinned,” Ida murmured. “But Ottfried sinned more than I!”

  Cat rolled her eyes. “Say that, if it makes you feel any better. In any case, Ottfried’s sins cost money, and now he can’t steal from the community funds anymore. If you go to Frau Brandmann tomorrow and cry to her that you have to live in a pub while you’re pregnant, maybe she’ll make him provide you with a better place to live.”

  Ottfried didn’t reappear that day, but about an hour after the women had begun cleaning, a young woman with stringy blonde hair in a stained ruffled dress arrived with tankards of beer and a plate of bread and grilled meat.

  “Here, Paddy sends you this,” she said without bothering to greet them. “Already looks good out here . . .” Her blue eyes flickered over the room. “Paddy could have a second whore working here once you move out.”

  “Are you Lucie?” Ida asked, her throat tightening.

  The woman nodded and bowed cynically. “At your service, madam. You’re the wife, are you? And this is the Maori?” She seemed to be undressing Cat with her eyes. “Nice,” she said appraisingly. “You could earn a bundle. Although, no one gets rich here. This backwater is too hidebound. Most of the men just come to drink. Go ahead and eat up, Paddy said he’s putting it on Ottie’s bill.”

  Ida watched in disbelief as Lucie left with her hips swinging. “How can he possibly love her?” she asked quietly.

  Cat laughed. “You aren’t really jealous, are you? He doesn’t love her, Ida. He’s just using her. Just like—sorry, but just like you. Now, let’s eat something, and then I’ll go ask Paddy if he could at least give us a small table and two chairs. Maybe he can also tell me where I can find straw to make a pallet with.”

  The pub was already full of revelers when Cat, hand surreptitiously on her knife, entered that early evening. She sighed and lowered her eyes, steeling herself to run the gauntlet across the barroom. She didn’t dignify Ottfried with a glance as he sat there having a whiskey with a group of other men. Of course her appearance was followed by the usual scurrilous remarks and propositions.

  “Sorry about that,” Paddy said as she finally reached him and told him what she needed. “The boys don’t mean any harm. They just don’t often get to see something so sweet. Are you sure you don’t want to take advantage of it? You’re the blonde Maori, aren’t you? The one everyone’s been talking about here for months. You surely weren’t so prude when you lived with the savages.”

  “There’s no word in the Maori language for ‘prude,’” Cat said shortly. “There isn’t a word for ‘whore’ either. Please leave me alone. My friend and I just need some basic furniture and a place to sleep by ourselves.”

  Finally, Paddy enlisted two still sober, very young men to bring a small table and two chairs to the shed, and to fetch straw for Cat from the closest livery stable. The men seemed to respect Ida, and were very cautious in their dealings with Cat. So, she thought, Paddy had already spread the knife-throwing story. But older stories, too, were still circulating. As Cat left the barroom, she heard Lucie’s shrill voice.

  “She doesn’t just do it with everyone, boys! Jamie, the Beits’ old houseboy, said she’s a kind of Indian whore. If they want a woman, they have to give her a scalp first, and then they eat human flesh together!”

  Cat shuddered. If those rumors started again . . .

  “Nonsense!” Cat recognized Ott
fried’s drunken voice. “She not do it with you, she only do it with me. Heard me, understand? Woman is mine!”

  Cat rubbed her forehead in consternation and walked away. Ottfried must have been telling lies about her for a while now. But it was probably safer to be known as Ottfried Brandmann’s concubine than to be labeled a cannibal and a whore.

  That night, Ida and Cat slept like the dead in the shed behind Paddy’s pub, and in the following days, they found that the unusual arrangement worked surprisingly well. Ottfried left the women alone, as did Lucie, who seldom came out of her room before midday. And Ottfried was actually earning some money doing odd jobs on the docks, like many men from Sankt Pauli Village.

  “Day laborers,” Ida said with a crooked smile. “In Raben Steinfeld they looked down on Karl for it, and now they’re all living hand to mouth.”

  By now she had told Cat about Karl, but not about her special relationship with him, and especially not about his marriage proposals.

  Cat had been to the Partridges’ shop to buy a few absolute necessities and had spoken with Elsbeth. Ida’s sister had morosely told Cat about her father, who was appearing before the magistrate daily and annoying everyone he met with demands for new land. The settlers were obviously still hoping for another chance, even though John Nicholas Beit was long gone, as was Colonel Wakefield. Surveyor Tuckett had taken over his position with the magistrate, but he was now surveying land for Scottish settlers in Otago. There was no hope for the Germans, but most of them still refused to seek steady work or settle anywhere close to Nelson among English neighbors. Instead, they preferred to take odd jobs and pray for miracles.

  Elsbeth could tell her father only so many times that he would never get out of Nelson, and his narrow-minded determination filled her with worry. If Lange and Brandmann saw even the slightest spark of hope to start a new Raben Steinfeld, they wouldn’t hesitate to do so.