Tom Murphy Chapter 11

What are you fellas doing here?

Those words had a brutally familiar tone. Whatever sort of adventure we were having had reached its finale. Now all that was left were guileful excuses.

Gustav and myself were walking along an embankment overlooking the river. When the steamboat had berthed at the river hotel and the other passengers had disembarked for the night, we had slipped away. For two days we had tramped up the river gravel roads and slept under the stars. At night, we had lit driftwood fires on the river shore and snuggled together for warmth.

Now we stood challenged by three angry young Maori men.

You fellas are treading in our kainga. How would you like us to tread in your garden?

I was taken aback. I looked down and saw the ground was ploughed over and filled with potatoes.

My only experience of Maoris were of huddled figures in town. In town, one only stepped around them when they lay in a drunken stupor around the drinking houses.

These three young men looked like brown Hollywood cowboys. They wore colourful wide flannel trousers and broad-brimmed hats with shiny feathers. The man, who challenged us, fondled in his arms a guitar.

Before we had a chance to apologise for our trespass, he turned his face away and spoke sharply in Maori to the other men. Then with the disdain of a lord, he proceeded to strum his guitar and mournfully sing and whistle. I picked up the song Stormy Weather. It had lately mingled melodiously with the cacophony of the town.

Through a path through the dense undergrowth to the edge of the soft garden earth, another man's heavy sounds disturbed the wash of the river. He appeared, stooped and angry looking. I recognised with mixed feelings Maori Jack. Maori Jack took off his Panama hat, and bowed to me with the grace of a swan.

Ehoa, taihoa. This is Tom Murphy, the tama of pirihimana Murphy.

My heart sunk. The name of Sergeant Murphy, or pirihimana Murphy as the Maoris called him, aroused the variety of responses one might expect from a thunder storm. It all depended whether you were at a picnic or in a desert.

But it seemed this would be a picnic. The young man stopped whistling and strumming.

Aee, they all said with all smiles through pearly white teeth.

Your old man is a tough old bastard but he is fair to us Maoris,
said the man with the guitar.
The other police only want to put us in the clink. He gives us a kick up the nono and sends us on our way.

All the Maoris seemed to find this verity exceedingly funny. They switched to Maori and conversed among themselves.

Haeremai, come and join us. We are going to a picnic.

We followed behind the Maoris through the heavy bush, still not sure whether we were guests or prisoners. We were too faint with hunger to argue with them. We were conserving our provisions of meat pies and sandwiches. One travelled far and long to find stores on these roads. This morning, we had feasted on cherries from a grove of ancient and neglected cherry trees. Maori Jack stood beside us and spoke quietly.

Most of us Maoris like pirihimana Murphy. But some of the old fellas don't like any sort of pirihimana or Pakeha

The first pa sounds that greeted us was the yapping of curs. They snapped at our heels and sniffed hopefully at our pockets. A bustle of activity assaulted our first sight of the pa at the end of the winding muddy path. Men, women and children were scurrying in and out of punga and tin shacks. A rusty and paint faded Ford truck was being loaded.

Eee, Pakeha, Pakeha, came squeals from a host of little kids.

They ran up to us and pointed. The smallest ran under a fat old woman's skirt and howled.
We were startled. There was a huge cackle of laughter from the circle of old women. The fat old woman pulled out the child.

Mokai, that is not a Pakeha. That is pirihimana Murphy's tama.

The infant stopped crying and gazed at me with trusting eyes.

Tama of pirihimana Murphy, tama of pirihimana Murphy, came a hum of awed voices.

I was taken aback. Sergeant Murphy was a thundering presence in town. Pirihimana Murphy appeared to be a writ of the King's peace that stretched over the bush and mountainous dominions of the river.

Then a man, with blood shot eyes and face scaly with age, sitting on a blanket in the dust, cleared his throat and spat.
Maori Jack led us away from this spitting old man. He spoke quietly to me.

Koro is a bit porangi in the head. He still thinks he's living in those olden days when he was a hauhau and split his enemies' heads open and sucked out their brains.

The name hauhau could sometimes be heard among the older town residents. It was a expression of reproach for any sort of troublesome Maori, or even an especially vexatious white person. I knew vaguely about a great battle when the hauhau had stormed our town. Stone monuments in the city's domains and gardens honoured the British soldiers slain by the hauhau. An older citizen would occasionally make a passing reference to a grisly hauhau act that had happened on a nearby landmark. I had once asked Dad about the hauhau war. Dad had barely looked up from Truth.

'Tis not healthy to think about such brigands, son. They were the dark years before civilization came to this part of the world.

I sometimes wondered about Dad.
I was however delighted to meet a real hauhau. Even though he was old, scaly, and acidic.

It seemed the pa had invited us to the picnic. So Gustav and I joined in carrying the bundles and boxes to the trailer. Hone – I had found out that was Maori Jack's pa name – climbed into the cab. All the Maoris scrambled up and held tight to every free inch of the trailer. An elderly man, in an immaculate suit and waistcoat, walked dignifiedly and stiffly to the cab. He seated himself beside Hone. I was somehow reminded of Groucho Marx giving himself airs.

Gustav and I stood hopefully on the dusty ground under the panting happy curs that had also jumped on to the trailer.

Groucho called out the cab window.
Brothers, aren't you going to join us for the picnic?

There is no room, replied Gustav.

Brother, there is always room at the feast,
replied the man we now recognised as the pastor.

With much laughter and heaving a space was made, and my friend and I buried our faces in the rumps and tails of the curs. With a rattle and bangs the Ford coughed to life. The children began to clap and sing a Maori song, the men muttered to each other in Maori, the young women preened themselves. I noticed with disgust the young women's lips were bright with red lipstick and their black hair rolled down to their shoulders as elegantly and sinfully as Mexican dancers. The older ladies kept their silence and took out and lit their pipes. I was accustomed to them, but Gustav stared open mouthed at their smoking pipes and their tattooed chins.

The Ford rattled and banged down a winding red clay path through the bush and scrub. Soon bush melted away and a fire blackened scrub terrain opened up around us. Magpies squawked savagely and hovered menacingly above black tree stumps and a rusty forlorn tin chimney. This desolate landscape stretched before our eyes to faded hills and grey wisps of clouds. I noticed Gustav had shifted his stare to a point in the landscape. I looked in his direction and I gaped too.

There was a tiny bungalow cottage. A skinny white woman and three wild looking children stood on the verandah and waved with a hint of pleading to us. The Maori children shouted and waved back. The men took off their hats and bowed politely. The Ford suddenly ground to a churning stop. The older children jumped from the truck and were running to the cottage. The children on the verandah hopped and pulled the woman's apron.

She shook her head, then she picked up the two smaller children and they disappeared into the bungalow. The child left behind was running hysterically fast to the Ford. A white man suddenly ran on to the verandah. He shouted and gesticulated, and finally chased after the children.

Eoma! Eoma! squealed the children.

They all raced to the Ford and leaped frantically aboard the trailer as if a maniac was in pursuit of them.

Go! God forgive him or us!
I overheard the pastor say through the open cab window.

The Ford drove on. The Maoris all laughed uproariously as the white man pursued them down the road. The dogs barked at him. Even the old women took out their pipes and cackled sourly. The last we saw and heard of the white man was a shouting gasping tiny figure at the bottom of a low hill. I glanced at the old hauhau beside me. He was buried under a dog's rump in a snoring contented sleep.

As soon as his father had disappeared, the white boy began to annoy the old people. He pulled off their hats. When they remonstrated, he laughed savagely and called the hauhau a tuatara.

With a speed that cast off his ancient years like layers of skin down to the youthful warrior, the hauhau seized the boy by the throat. He dangled the boy out of the trailer. When the boy became mute with terror, he returned him to the other startled children. With the blood drained from his already anaemic face, the white boy was as white as a cod with a scurvy blotch of red freckles that covered him all over. He blinked short sightedly and squinted into the sun.

The afternoon sun was blazing when we stopped at a shingled foreshore of the river. We all grabbed boxes and bundles and carried them down to the shore. The older people lay down mats. Kits were opened and potatoes and puha emptied into billies. Beachwood was gathered. The billies were deposited on top of the beachwood. Small fires were lit underneath.

The children ran to the water line. The girls hitched up their skirts without a hint of coquetry or shame and paddled. Some small boys stripped down to their bare skin and jumped into the deep water. They slid silently along the river bank and plunged their arms into the soft bank mud. Gustav and I watched them bewildered.

Suddenly a boy of about nine whipped up his right arm. We gasped in stupefaction. He was holding aloft a wildly flapping slimy black eel as big as himself. He gripped its head with his teeth and ran to the shore. He dropped it, picked up a stone and smashed its brains to pulp. The eel continued to wriggle mournfully while the boy joined again his companions in the river. Soon several more eels were whipped out of their warm mud beds and lay silently on the bank.

The girls picked up the river trophies and took them to the picnic. The men and women with sharp knives and nimble fingers cut off the heads and peeled off the skins.

We filled our plates with pork and pigeon poured out from kerosene tins in an odorous liquid of pig fat. Then we scooped the potatoes and puha from the bubbling billies over our meat delicacies.

Gustav and I were now secretly faint from hunger. We both made a grab for a potato and stuffed them into our mouths. The white boy sunk his teeth into the feast as greedily as the sniffing curs.

Two, four, six, eight, bog in, don't wait,
squeaked the cheeky squinting white boy.

The pastor looked at us white people reprovingly.
We will thank Almighty God. Let us pray.

The men took off their hats and I removed my cap. We all bowed our heads and closed our eyes.

For what we are about to receive may the Lord make us truly grateful.

Now we entered into the feast with gusto. I was surprised at Gustav. He was not eating but was contemplating his dish. Then he said to me,

It is not possible to eat kosher now but I can't starve.

He swallowed a mouthful with a face as if he would love to spit it out.

When our stomachs were replenished, the pastor got up and proceeded to organise the picnic games.
At first there was the tug of war. A long rope was taken out of the Ford. People grabbed each end. The pastor stood in the middle and apportioned out the competitors. I and Gustav took our places.

The team that wets all the others wins, pronounced the pastor gravely.

In my manhood, I would fight in a great war. That was tedious. In this rope battle every seafaring British hero stood and strained at my shoulder. On the other side, Romans, Spaniards, and Germans, gibbered in their swashbuckling armour. With a final heave the muscular young men and women dragged us all – old men, women, and children – into the drink.

When the water was up to our knees, the pastor blew a whistle. We all returned happily to the shore. Now it was the hour for the races.

The children ran first and the winners were awarded lollies from the pastor's kit. Gustav now kept a studious withdrawal and I held back.

Then the women ran with much merriment. After that it was the men's turn. The pastor allotted head starts for the older and fatter men. The fattest man was led by the pastor to a position a big distance from the other men. I noticed he seemed reluctant and his eyes seemed filled with an old pain. The pastor blew the whistle. How we all shouted encouragement as the fat man, his pants waggling under his huge gut, charged manfully forward. The young men sped, their bare feet coursing the sand. The final line was just a few tantalizing inches from the fat man. The young men were blowing hot air into the nape of his neck.

C'mon Porky! the bystanders screamed.

The man fell as heavily and undignifiedly as a sack of potatoes. He lay on the shingle completely still. We bystanders forgot the race and shrieked with laughter. Hone and the pastor rushed over, picked up the fat man and hoisted him up. For a terrible moment his face was stony grey, and then he began to gasp. As soon as he was on his legs, the pastor pointed to a hole in the ground and we all laughed again.

After that race, I noticed the young men slipping away behind some scrubby trees. They returned wiping their mouths with the back of their hands.

Dark clouds descended, and a shower sent us rushing back to the Ford. The eels had been strung on a cord of flax hung over two bushes. They were now hurriedly cut down, wrapped in leaves, and deposited into kits. A tarpaulin was hoisted over us. We lay on the trailer and chatted about the picnic. When the shower was over, we gathered up the belongings. With a rattle and bangs the Ford set off back to the pa.

The rain drummed on to the tarpaulin. When it had stopped, I poked my head out. The desolate hard landscape of the morn had been transformed by evening into a misty soft Eden. The Ford ground again to a halt.

Everyone get out! ordered Hone.

A small creek had become a torrent beneath a hillock. We got out. We watched the truck roar and skid its path through the torrent. Its wheels inched up the slippery hillock. Then I saw the white boy. He was in the water and with a stick was poking at a churning wheel. Then the truck with a shudder fell back. A cry of horror filled the air. The wheel missed the young lad by the merest inches. The truck, at the second attempt, ascended the hillock.

We clambered back on board and went on our way.