Captive Wife, The (13 page)

The sheep struggled free of the canoe. Te Rauparaha got in in its place. He pushed out to sea and was gone into the dark night of the Strait. I heard his oars swish and paddle and then I went back to the house where Betsy had my dinner waiting.

I thought that some time I might pay for that.

Te Awaiti, 1831
    

The truth is I need Te Rauparaha.

I see now that Te Awaiti is not the best place for a station and Cloudy Bay is in my mind. This area is away from the prevailing winds that sweep across the Cook Strait, the deep torrent of water between the 2 big islands of this country. In my head, I see the spot I want for my own, a sheltered bay full of kakapo, 1 of many bays and inlets that wd make a site for a port. I cannot do this unless I have Te Rauparaha on my side. He thinks he owns Cloudy Bay.

I went to see Mr Campbell on my next trip to Sydney. Mr Campbell I said it is time to build another station. I have just the place for you.

Oh yes and how much will that cost me.

4000 pounds I said. You will get the money back in short order.

At which he seemed happy enough for he has had good returns on all his investments with me. I showed him my books
that are very neat thanks to Betsy's hand. I saw he was impressed.

I made a deal with Te Rauparaha. I thought I wd keep it to myself because Betsy does not like the man. I set up another book that I filled in in my own hand and kept it with my pistols which Betsy is not allowed to touch. If the Maoris come for you do not try to fight I have told her. You will come off worst. Go with them and I will come and get you back.

So I built a base at the bay I have chosen. I was taking things a step at a time. I did not want to squander Mr Campbell's money. But I reckon I am right about the place for it is so much easier to nab the whales here. We set up a lookout on a hill above the bay and watched for them to come. We called the lookout Hungry Hill for it is a way to go should you run out of tucker. Soon as we saw a whale down we go and launch the boats.

As I have related the mother will not leave her calf so we tether it and then she is handed to us, easy as that, no fuss about it.

The male is smarter. He does not often come in shore.

So now I have 2 whaling stations working at the same time and 2 ships and more men are coming here to work.

I did not find it easy to take to my brother and his fancy ways. He had brought books to read. Sometimes, back at Te Awaiti, I came across him and Betsy sitting and laughing like there was no work to be done. They made me not at ease. Charley is more fair of complexion than me, his hair light brown and wavy, his beard soft and fluffy like a puppy dog's tail. I said Charley I think it is time you looked to find yourself a woman. There are women round here who will live with you.

He shook his head and smiled to his self. I wanted to shake him.

Charley I said have you had a good look at any of those darky women.

I can't say that I have. Not looking me straight in the eye.

Well then I said, that is a mighty strange thing for a man your
age not thinking about what to do with his poker. Not unless you have been putting it in the backsides of men which is useful when there is no women to be had but buggering around is not the same as putting it in a woman.

You would know about that he asked with a bit of a smirk.

I have spent more time at sea than you have Charley boy I said without raising my voice. I know what some men is like when they have been without the necessaries for some time.

So what is this about he said and I hear his insolent tone. Is this because you're afraid Betsy might fancy me more than you.

I felt my heart grow still and cold. This is my brother and I cannot kill him the same way I could Te Rauparaha but I wondered if I might have to do this yet.

Betsy is going to have a baby I said. You will treat her with respect.

Then Betsy asked me why doesn't Charley talk to me any more.

Why do you think.

When she doesn't answer I said because I have told him not to. You are too friendly with him by far. You belong to me Betsy.

But I have done nothing she cried out.

I want to believe this is true. But yesterday I walked up from the beach. We had caught a whale and the men were trying the blubber on the shore, the sky was dark with smoke and steam. I saw that Charley was not there and we needed all hands.

He was standing outside our house and why does this not surprise me. When he saw me he tried to move away but I was too fast. I grabbed him by the back of his collar and threw him down the bank.

Inside Betsy was sitting at the table. It is a table I have built myself. She held her head in her hands.

So Charley is your darlin' I said and yanked her to her feet.

She flung my arm from her.

What have you been doing with Charley?

Nothing she said. As God is my keeper. Her face was red like
rhubarb. I could not tell whether this be from anger or guilt. Why are you so cruel when all I do is what you tell me.

She is lonely my brother said. He had picked his self up and walked back to the hut. He was leaning against the door as if he owned the place and it was all I could do not to break his neck. If he had not been my bro. that is what I wd have done. She worries after her little brother he told me. Can't you tell that she misses her mother and her aunty he says to me.

Then she can go back to them, you tell her that.

Tell her yourself Charley said.

You are talking about me as if I'm not here Betsy yelled.

Be quiet I said grabbing her by the arm.

She is young my brother said, not much more than a child.

She is 16 years. And I could not help myself I touch the swelling apple of her belly the pip-squeak container of my own flesh and blood.

At that my bro. turned towards the beach, his eyes narrow against the smoke. I can tell that he does not like the work and he does not much like me but these are troubles I cannot fix.

I dropped Betsy's arm without so much as a word for what was there to say.

Te Awaiti, 1831
    

That was a month ago and as I take up my pen to write I think that I should speak to my wife for silence is a habit hard to break. She has hung on my arm and pleaded for a word from me but I have not been in my right mind for words. My tongue seems to have become frozen around words. All around me are the sounds of Maori lingo and yet they take on English words at the same time as if they are laying claim to my mother tongue. At the same time I hear Betsy and Charley and the men of Te Awaiti using the words of Maori so there is no telling where 1 begins and the other leaves off. But I cannot make head nor tail of much of it and so I become more alone in my self.

It is like the thoughts I have about who is God. Who is God that would shackle men in irons, starving in their manacles, worked like oxen and worse from dawn till dark. That thrashes them and beats them and turns their souls upside down until there is no good left in the cup. Around me are men who have been to hell and back. They will stand by me these men. I treat
them well. But what have we made here at the end of the earth but another place of toil and dirt and grog. For that is all they know. Their women are like mine, big with children, but they will be a different race, not one thing nor another. The Maoris will go on fighting and burning us if we do not make a place of order.

But there is no order in my head. I know I cannot stay silent long for soon Betsy's time will come and there must be a woman at her side. I have no knowledge of how to help her and we have stayed silent for so long that I do not know how to begin again.

You are a surly bastard my brother said 1 morning. We had not had a whale for a week and for once the air is clean and clear of smoke as a May morning in the English countryside.

You never knew our mother I said as if he had said nothing.

Your privilege he said with a sneer in his voice.

I was fortunate I said. Although it is hard for me to recall her exact look. But sometimes I think that I see a look of her in Betsy.

He looked at me surprised then. You have never said anything of that.

I have not always thought of that I said. It has come to me that that is why I chose her, for a look that is familiar. A way of walking as if she is proud but obedient with it. Not pretty not plain but not caring one way or another. Perhaps I said, for this thought had come to me in a flash, she has a way of holding herself that I saw in my mother before she gave birth to you.

And then said Charley in a quiet voice you never saw her again.

That is so.

I cannot carry that blame on me forever.

No. I do not ask you to. I am thinking I should get Betsy back to Sydney for the birth of this baby.

I think perhaps it is too late for that he said.

That is for me to decide. I am her husband. Charley is getting away with too much.

Dan Hatton's woman will look after Betsy he said. My brother was ignoring me as perhaps I deserve. Dan Hatton's wife is a woman of the Rangitane tribe who has been all but wiped out by Te Rauparaha. The women, what is left of them, have been eager for the protection of the whalers.

Her mother lives here in the bush he said. She is an old kuia and knows what to do.

I heard how he was slipping into their way of talking. Does Betsy know this I asked.

They have spoken with her about it. Or that is what Dan has told me. But how should I know for I have not spoken to Betsy. You should ask her yourself.

It is the 1st day of the month of October. My wife has been often with the women in the week that is past. The women do not call my wife by any of her given names. There is no b sound in the Maori lingo nor any s. Peti they call her, dropping these foreign sounds. I have heard them call to her at the river and seen her raise her head in answer.

Betsy I said when I go to the hut for my dinner.

She did not turn around. I thought her sullen but that is not in her nature. Rather, that is the beast in me.

Betty I tried again and she turned as if in a dream.

When you has had this baby I said we will go to Sydney and bring your brother David back here.

Thank you Jacky she said whispering as if there was someone else in the room. These are the first words we had spoken in a long time.

Elizabeth.

Betsy.

Peti.

She has been reborn in this place.

Her hands were cupped beneath her belly. It is like rods of fire in here she said. Fetch someone Jacky. Help me.

This was how I came to find myself at the door of Dan
Hatton's hut. An old woman without teeth and her daughter who I know as Hine were wrapped in shawls beside a fire. The kuia wore a round cap of black feathers. When they saw me they stood up as if they had been waiting for my signal. They rose and followed me across the cleared ground between our huts.

When my wife saw that they had come she said Jacky I wish I did not have to do this.

I wish you did not have to do it either. There is no other way out.

They could cut me open she said piteously.

Then you would surely die.

Down at the beach my brother Charley stood looking out to sea smoking on his pipe. I know how women die giving birth and it could be he was thinking about this some more even though as we have agreed he is not to blame for our mother's death.

The women were waiting for Betty. I saw their brown hands reaching out to her and I thought that perhaps theirs wd be the last to touch her living flesh and I was very afraid.

There is no other way I said again.

She followed the women down a bush track to a new hut which had been built just for women to give birth. I thought I should not let her go.

I heard Betty's voice in pain and the women chanting.

I made to follow them. From the door of the hut I saw Betty naked from the waist down, kneeling in front of a pole running down the middle of the room. She seemed to be holding it and pressing against it. Hine's mother looked up and saw me and the 2 women waved me away their faces angry as if I should know better. I knew them to be right, a man should not be near his wife at this time.

I went to our hut and although there was work to be done about the place I could not settle to any thing. So I took down the book given to me by my father so many years ago. I thought that if there is a God now was the time to take notice of His word. It is springtime and the air is clear and the sea calm. In the
stillness of the bay I heard screams that rose louder and louder.

I lit the lamp's wick and as the dark fell I read again the Husband's Duty as set out in my book, which forbids all harshness and roughness to the Wife: Men are to use them as Parts of themselves, to love them as their own Bodies, and therefore to do nothing that may be hurtful and grievous to them, no more than they would cut and gash their own flesh. Reading these words I saw I must do better by my wife and thought that I wd pray and if He answered me this one time I wd do better and be more kindly to Betty. I got down on my knees while the distant screams grew thin and asked that God spare my wife's life. I promised that if He did I wd work harder to believe.

I looked up from these prayers and saw Charley at the door again with that smile that makes a mockery of me.

Betty has been working hard while you were on your knees. You best get over to the whare he said, they have news for you.

In the doorway the old woman held up my son for me to see. Hine clasped a blood covered shell. Behind them Betty lay on a bed of bracken covered by a blanket from our bed. I wanted to go to her, but again my way was barred. This room is tapu Mister Haari says Hine. There is still work to be done.

So I stood humble at the door and thanked God that my son was alive and squealing like a little pig and my wife was mopping her face with the back of her hand, and I heard her say, tell him that John is born, tell him it is all right. I turned back and looked at the night sky and saw it full of stars. My son will have a good life I thought. I will see to it. Nothing will harm him. He is why I have been put on earth.

Charley was sitting on a bank near the path as I made my way back to our house.

She is well I said. I have a son.

He nodded. I am pleased for you. His voice sounded young and lost.

I have been too harsh I said. It will not happen again. You are my brother and my wife is a good woman.

I saw a smart reply on his lip and then he thought better of it.

We will take a cup of grog I said. So we went inside and for a moment I put my arm about his shoulder.

There is new trouble among the Maoris. I have said nothing to my wife but the men know all about it. So does Charley I suppose but I say nothing to him either. We are friends again him and me but I have always kept myself to myself and nothing has changed that. Besides I do not want to spread alarm around our camp by making too much of this trouble though it is known by every ship's master sailing in and out of Cook Strait. Te Rauparaha has pulled off one of his craftiest tricks and things have taken a turn for the worse. Te Rauparaha has been after a chief called Tamaiharanui at Akaroa for a long time in revenge for the death of his wife's father at the hands of Ngai Tahu.

Now he has made his raid with the help of a white man called Stewart, master of the brig
Elizabeth
. Te Rauparaha offered good trade if he wd hide them in the ship's hold rather than take their war canoes down the coast and warn their enemies of their coming.

Stewart had with him a man by the name of Cowall who thought nothing of how he came by flax and other cargo, he talked Stewart into saying yes. Stewart is an ignorant man. White men do not mix their trade with native wars. But Stewart wanted favours of Te Rauparaha and said yes. He took Te Rauparaha's war party to Akaroa. When he got there he did not let on what cargo he had aboard.

Stewart tricked Tamaiharanui on board the ship. Then his wife. Then his children. And they were all captured. The crew had become afraid and begged Stewart that he sail away. But the war party was now in charge, through sheer weight of numbers and Stewart could not control what he wd do next.

In the night Te Rauparaha and his men took the ship's skiff and whaleboat and landed ashore. They set about killing every
last person at Akaroa. It's said Akaroa's hills were that night lit by the fires of burning whares, the creeks dyed with the blood of those slaughtered. A feast of bodies was held upon the beaches and the next day the remains of what had not been eaten stowed upon the
Elizabeth
. The ship sailed for Kapiti still with the chief and his family on board.

Tamaiharanui killed his daughter on the voyage north rather than let her die by Te Rauparaha's hand. Back at Kapiti, Stewart handed over Tamaiharanui to Te Rauparaha, turning his back on what was to follow. Te Rauparaha killed and ate the chief, eyes first.

But it was there at Kapiti that trouble rose for Stewart. Another ship was at anchor there, the
Dragon
. The master of the ship, Captain Briggs, took the story back to Sydney and reported Stewart. But Governor Darling did not act quickly enough to bring Stewart to justice and he has got clean away.

Well where wd we be without the flax trade. Te Rauparaha is very helpful if you get on the right side of him.

But this is not the way to do it. Soon there will be more fighting and worse, of that I am certain. And the pakea is in for dangerous times.