Tommo & Hawk (42 page)

Four Maori come around the corner. One of 'em can't be mistaken - he's near big as me brother with only one arm and hair what sweeps back like a hammer. I quickly rub away my tears.

'Tommo, it's me, Hammerhead Jack!' the one-armed giant shouts. 'Why do you run away? We are your brothers. We searched everywhere, we looked for two days. Did you kill those two pakeha?'

'Nah, just messed their faces a bit and took a couple o' fingers off one of them's pullin' hand.'

Hammerhead Jack laughs. 'We couldn't hang around to look - too many pakeha.'

'How'd ya know it were me what done it?' I asks.

Hammerhead Jack laughs again. 'Maori women in the alley saw it all. Every wahine in town is looking out for you, man! One went to find us, the other stayed to watch and follow if you left the grog shop.'

I look at my tweed suit. 'But how'd they know it were me?'

'Whores know everything. Your hair, Tommo, it's cut Maori and your smell, they smelled you. You smell like Maori now!'

'How's Maori smell?' I asks.

Hammerhead Jack smiles. 'On the whaling ship Maori smells no different, but in the village they smell different from the pakeha. It is the food. Besides, you spoke to them. How many pakeha do you think speak Maori?' He looks at Billy. 'Who's this?' Then he breaks into a broad smile. 'Billy Lanney!'

Billy steps forward and pats Hammerhead Jack on the chest. 'Plurry good, plurry good, Hammer Jack, eh?'

I laugh. 'He's had a few. Didn't stop him running faster than me, though.'

Hammerhead Jack claps Billy on the shoulder. 'Billy good!' he says, sort of absent-minded. Then he turns to me. 'We must get you out, Tommo. You can't stay here.'

'I know that,' says I. 'Can't get a drink here anyways!'

'We've got a boat waiting,' Hammerhead Jack points across the field on me left to the coastline, 'not too far from here.'

'What about Billy? Can't leave him here. Could we take him back to his ship so he's safe?' I asks.

'He can come,' Hammerhead Jack says.

So off we sets across the field what's wet from the earlier rain and sown with rye about ten inches grown, so that we leave a dark stain as a trail for all to follow. One of the Maori has picked up my axe and blanket and is carrying it under his arm. I'm feeling more and more dizzy in my head.

Soon enough we get to a path down a small cliff which leads onto a pebbly beach where several fishing boats are moored as well as a small ketch. The mooring is in a cove away from the main wharf, on the Maori part o' the waterfront. Several Maori lads comes out from the shadows to greets us, yawning and knuckling the sleep from their eyes. Hammerhead Jack says something quiet to one of them. Three of 'em pulls a dinghy down to the edge o' the water and Jack turns to Billy and tells him that two of the boys will row him back to the Cloudy Bay.

Billy comes over to me. Swaying a little, he pats me gently all over to say goodbye. 'Plurry hell, cheerio, top o' the mornin' squire, eh, Tommo!'

Despite the pain in me head, I laugh. 'Where'd you hear all that, Billy? That be proper toff's language.'

His footsteps zig-zag across the pebbled beach to the dinghy where the two Maori lads waits with their oars shipped. He climbs in, the lads steadying him. Two of the lads on the beach push the dinghy off into the harbour. Billy waves to me, then, with a great grin in the moonlight, he shouts, 'Ikey Solomon, he give me my name in Van Diemen's Land, he teach Billygonequeer speak English most good, my dears, omegawd plurry hell!'

Hawk

The Tasman Sea

July 1860

We are on board ship, bound for Sydney, and Tommo is in a bad way. When Hammerhead Jack took him in the Maori trading ketch from Auckland, they sailed to the Coromandel. It was here that I met him and we boarded the topsail schooner Black Dog, under the command of Captain Joshua Leuwin.

Of Tommo's voyage from Auckland he remembers little. Not long after he was taken aboard by Hammerhead Jack he fell into a delirium. His wound had turned bad on the outside and his head was aching beyond endurance. He was soon lost in a fever, murmuring gibberish.

Hammerhead Jack told me of their fearful voyage. The ketch was a decrepit old tub, one of the many derelict vessels replaced in Australia by steam. It was no doubt purchased by some errant Johnny strike-it-rich from Sydney who sailed it in fair weather across the Tasman to sell to the Maori, who can seldom afford a new vessel locally made.

A head wind blew most of the way from Auckland, so that sailing the small ketch with its heavy flaxen sails was most onerous. The wind blew ceaselessly in the wrong direction and the boat punched into the waves, which marched forward in unending grey-green lines flecked with foam. The vessel lurched up and down from trough to crest, constantly leaning at twenty-five degrees away from the wind. The lee rail was often under water, a state of affairs which even for the hardiest man on board creates a great propensity for seasickness. Many lost the contents of their stomachs overboard, though the Maori are good rough-weather sailors.

To all this was added the crew's fear that Tommo's illness had been caused by the spirits of the dead. They knew he had run away from the tribe but had no notion of why, and thought that he must be in breach of some commandment. They believed he was being punished by the atua or ghost -the spirit of a dead kinsman which enters one's body and preys on some vital part. They would not approach him, nor touch anything he used, a dish or spoon or cup, for fear that he was tapu.

Even Hammerhead Jack, who has sailed the seven seas and seen the ways of the world, suggested bringing the priests, the tohunga, to our ship in the Coromandel. He proposed to delay our sailing several days so that they might come to cast out the evil spirit which dwelt in Tommo. He was of the most serious opinion that the spirit residing in my twin's head may have entered him through the arsehole of the dead soldier, whom Tommo had killed and then lain upon in the swamp.

Though I have become Maori in many ways, I politely declined Jack's kind offer, saying that I would nurse Tommo myself and seek further help when we reached Australia.

'Ha, pakeha medicine!' Hammerhead Jack snorted. 'Tommo spent much money on O'Hara's costly sulphur ointment, bought to heal our wounds, but what good did it do us? None!'

I acknowledged his point here. Superstition among the Maori produces some bad, but much good comes from it as well. By ascribing the protection of the dead to the chiefs, the tribes confer upon them an authority which they might not otherwise possess. This has created a remarkable sense of law and order within the community, and a respect for one another's property and rights.

It is a respect scarce seen in European societies, where greed among the wealthy together with crime and violence among the poor cause such great misery. In these societies, too, little punishment is meted by the law when the powerful cheat the weak, and the threat of prison or the rope seems not to deter those who would practise violence for gain. Alas, I fear we shall never learn to live differently. Most of those who have settled these lands of New Zealand and Australia have suffered in their mother countries of England, Scotland and Ireland. The Cornish tin miner, the Irish peasant and the Scottish clansman - all driven from their ancient lands by rapacious masters - now drive the Maori and the Aborigine from their lands. It is as though each man must have his turn against the fellow below him in the pecking order.

Somewhere, somehow, there must be some better system of justice which does not depend on superstition, religion or the rule of English law, for this last always favours the rich and powerful above the common herd. How this Utopia might come about I cannot say, and who would help in this cause I do not know. As Ikey often opined, 'The poor be like mangy strays who fight in the dust over a dry bone but cannot think long enough to get together and raid the butcher shop, my dear. They may be relied upon to do as much to prevent an improvement to their circumstances as those who exploit their poverty and despair.' But perhaps Ikey may be proved wrong and some sort of brotherhood of those who are exploited could be formed against those who exploit them.

I confess myself too young and ignorant to know the answers, but the questions persist in my head and I shall not give up thinking upon their solutions.

I have dressed Tommo's head with sulphur ointment obtained from the skipper of the Black Dog, and have brought down his fever by placing poultices of vinegar upon his brow. Now, nine days out to sea, he is much improved, though he complains of headaches and constant nausea. His body has had a great shock and I can only hope that he will recover fully.

In my own passage to meet the Black Dog I was most fortunate. The Ngati Haua tribe owns several small coastal traders, in addition to the one which was taken by Hammerhead Jack. Included amongst these is a somewhat larger boat, a gaff ketch which is the sole property of Chief Tamihana himself. It is the vessel most prized for coastal trade, a carvel built in Tasmania and constructed of Huon pine, which is renowned for its strength and its resistance to woodworm and rot. Some of these boats, which were built forty years ago, are said to be still as good as when they left the shipwright's shed.

The equal of this ketch is seldom to be found in Maori hands and it was a great honour when Tamihana insisted I be taken in his vessel to meet my brother. We sailed in comfort to our destination and I was not once troubled with seasickness.

The Black Dog, on which we now sail, is of the best American design. Only ten years ago she worked as an opium clipper, making racing passages from Bombay to the Canton River. She has a long, low, narrow hull and the distinctive raked clipper bow. Her hull is curved back from the long bowsprit in a reverse curve to the waterline. She is painted black with a red strake and black masts. Never was such a fair ship more badly named. Though I confess myself romantic, should I own such a vessel with its great spread of billowing canvas, I would call her Black Butterfly.

Alas, there is little of the romantic about Captain Leuwin. He looks upon me with a most jaundiced eye and addresses me as though I am a nigger matelot. Of Tommo he has no opinion whatsoever and I do not believe he has said a word to him since we sailed. He has encouraged the four other Europeans aboard, the three mates and the bosun, a rough-looking lot, to act in the same truculent manner towards us. We are expected to sleep and eat with the crew and to draw the same rations. Luckily, because the voyage across the Tasman is a short one, these rations include some fruit and vegetables and, for the first three days, fresh meat.

I had greatly looked forward to talking with the officers aboard. It has been over three years since Tommo and I went to live with the Maori and there is much news to be caught up on and a thousand questions to ask. Instead I have made friends with the ship's hands, who are an odd assortment of Maori and Pacific folk from the Loyalty, Caroline and Marshall Islands. The Black Dog trades copra and cuts sandalwood for the Chinese market from all of these tropical ports, though our cargo at present is kauri timber from Arotorea destined for Sydney.

There is something strange going on amongst the men, which I cannot fathom. At the conclusion of each meal, Tommo and I are made to come on deck and remain there for an hour with one of the ship's officers standing beside the hatch to ensure we do not venture below decks. Even on the first three days, when Tommo was gravely ill and his mind wandering, Captain Leuwin insisted that I leave him below alone while I stood on deck. Despite all my protests, I would be kept on deck for an hour before being allowed back into the fo'c'sle to care for him. As soon as Tommo was conscious again, he was required to accompany me on every such occasion.

When I asked Leuwin why this was necessary, the captain replied that the crew had work to do, adjusting and lashing timber which had shifted in the hold, and that it was too dangerous for us to remain below. I knew this to be untrue. The crew made me realise this, for they avoided my gaze whenever they spoke, and I knew they were afraid to tell me the truth, whatever it might be.

We are expected to reach Sydney tomorrow, where I shall be most grateful to disembark. With the heavy timber cargo it will have taken us a full ten days at sea to reach our port. There has been little of interest to break the boredom of our voyage beyond the daily noon sightings to determine our course and the twice daily streaming of the log to gauge our speed. Even though I have offered to help with duties on board, I have been refused. At least the voyage so far has been a smooth one, free of winter storms. The greatest blessing is that each day Tommo grows stronger, and his headaches have grown less severe, sometimes vanishing altogether for an hour or two.

I am not sure how Chief Tamihana persuaded Captain Leuwin, a man of immense ill humour and impatience, to remain an extra three days in harbour so that we might be taken aboard. He may have offered him money but I suspect he recalled some past favour that needed to be repaid. Whatever his method of persuasion, Leuwin does not feel obliged to be courteous towards his two passengers. He summons us on this last evening to the wheelhouse and says that, if the weather holds and the wind persists fair, we shall be coming into Sydney Harbour in the early part of the morning.

'You will please leave my ship immediately the gangplank is lowered. You will oblige me by not talking of me, nor making reference to your passage under my care. If I hear that you have spoken to anyone of this, I shall report you to the authorities. Do you understand me?'

'And what is it you shall say of us to them, Captain Leuwin?' I ask, curious to find out how much he knows of Tommo and me.

'Aye, there is always something,' he snorts. 'Chief Tamihana said naught about you two, not even giving your names.' The captain stabs a stubby finger at my belly. 'That can only mean there is much to conceal!'

'I will tell you anything you wish to know, Captain Leuwin,' I offer.