Sleep in the Woods

by Dorothy Eden

  Briar murmured. “No, they must have missed this ship. I must go out, if you please. I’m to look for a maid to take to the country, and if I go down to the barracks where the newly arrived people are I might find someone.”

  At least she had successfully changed the subject, for Sophia looked up with interest and amusement.

  “You choosing a maid! That’s really funny. You’d better let Aunt Charity do it. She’ll know what sort of girl looks capable and trustworthy.”

  Briar tied on her bonnet decisively. “I think I’m quite capable of knowing that myself.”

  “There’s no need to be so hoity toity. It just seems so odd—but I’m sure you’ll manage very well. I don’t think we ever knew you before. You hid behind that meek face, and we thought you were so good. But you’re not good at all, are you?”

  No, she wasn’t good. She was lying and deceiving and scheming. She lied about a non-existent family, and she let Saul think she wanted to marry him. This latter thing was the biggest deception, for she still awoke shuddering from his image in the night. Like Prudence and Sophia, she had the vaguest notion as to what actually happened when one was married. But whatever else might happen, marriage certainly consisted of sharing the same bed, of lying sleepless while that dark head and strange gleaming unknowable face of her husband lay on the pillow beside her. It meant more of those disturbing kisses, and perhaps Saul’s hands on her body.

  At that point in her imaginings Briar always stopped, and added firmly to herself that marriage was not spent entirely in bed, that a great deal of it she would be able to accomplish very well. She must do this, for there was nothing else for her in life but this lonely battle to prove that she could be somebody loved and desired.

  How could there be letters for her on the Lady Sally when there was no one to write them?

  Briar felt tears stinging in her eyes as she hurried down the street towards the wharf. She remembered Mrs. Whitmore’s persistent inquiries about her family, and realized that explaining away the absence of letters today was another hurdle to overcome. She thought wistfully of Andrew Gaunt. He would have written to her had he been alive, long intellectual letters full of quotations from the classics which would have impressed everybody. But as it was she had nothing visible to prove her relationship with anybody, only an accent that would have been rare indeed among the lower classes.

  There was a knot of people on the wharf, and a great deal of bustle and shouting. Briar recognized the looks of bewilderment and lostness on many of the faces. There were women clasping children, and others still pallid from prolonged seasickness. Baggage was strewn everywhere, and little was being done about organization. Someone was yelling in a stentorian voice, “All those requiring food and shelter or assistance, come this way.”

  A young woman near Briar got up to obey. She was carrying a baby, and also attempting to lift the wickerwork traveling bag on which she had been sitting. To this bag had been strapped what seemed to be two pictures in gilt frames, but as the bag was moved the strap broke and the pictures fell with a clatter.

  Briar sprang to help. She found herself looking at the painted faces, very pink and white and blue-eyed, of a middle-aged man and woman.

  “Oh, thanks,” said the woman. “Those wretched portraits. Dan said to bring them and I did, but he’s never here to carry them, and what we’re to do with all this stuff if we go straight off to California is more than I can guess.”

  “California?” said Briar.

  “Dan’s heard about the goldfields. You’d think now we’ve come so far he’d want to stay a little while, wouldn’t you? For mine and baby’s sake at least. But no. As soon as he can get a passage on a ship we’re off to California, he says, and I drag these pictures around the world again. They’re not even my parents, they’re his.”

  “They’re nice,” Briar said slowly.

  The stranger looked at her curiously. “Do you like paintings? Oh, yes, they’re nice people, though you’d never think they were the kind to have a son who was so footloose. I hardly knew them, to be truthful, and if my husband can’t look after his own mother and father, why should I have to?”

  The girl was scarcely Briar’s age. Her indignant weary face looked at Briar helplessly. The baby in her arms was whimpering and she herself was near to tears.

  “It’s all so strange,” she said, “and I don’t know where we’ll sleep tonight.”

  “Would you sell me those portraits for a guinea?” Briar asked.

  “You mean you’d like to have them!”

  “Yes, I would, very much. If you’re really going to California, and don’t want too much luggage. A guinea is all I have with me.” (It was her entire wages to date, and all she had in the world.)

  “Oh, my!” whispered the girl. Tears did spill over on to her cheeks then. “I don’t know why you want them, but a whole guinea—I won’t tell my husband. I’ll keep it for the baby, if we’re in trouble.” With youthful resilience she began to twinkle through her tears. “I’ll tell him the pictures fell in the sea.”

  She waved with jauntiness as she walked away, and Briar picked up the portraits slowly, then clasped them to her bosom, avariciously. She had a family at last. Her parents were not any longer two imaginary people. For they were here, with faces and names.

  “Mr. and Mrs. Johnson,” she whispered. “Meet your daughter!”

  But she did not feel she knew them well enough yet to take them to Aunt Charity’s. Besides, how would she explain her sudden possession of them? She decided to leave them with Jemima Potter who loyally would ask no questions. But now, she thought exultantly, I can show that snobbish old woman, Saul’s mother!

  Later she remembered her original errand, and found, among the newly arrived immigrants, a half dozen girls who wanted positions as housemaids or cooks.

  She didn’t ask a lot of questions. She felt, all at once, that she herself was one of this forlorn group, hoping eagerly for a kind mistress and a good home, and praying that no searching questions would be asked about background and family. She became shy and inept, and pointed almost at random to the youngest, a red-headed freckle-nosed creature, little more than a child, who looked as if she had an irrepressible cheerfulness, and who said her name was Katie O’Toole.

  She’d be glad to take a position anywhere, especially with such a pretty lady. “Begging your pardon, ma’am,” she said, blushing violently and endearingly. She could cook and scrub and bake bread, and when Briar warned her about the possibility of attacks by the Maoris, she said optimistically that she didn’t think she’d be afraid of murdering heathens like that.

  All in all, the acquisition of the portraits and Katie O’Toole cheered Briar immensely. She felt much older and more confident, and Katie had thought she was a lady.

  Perhaps she would make Saul a good enough wife after all.

  X

  EXCEPT FOR the sound of birds, it was very quiet in the forest. Every footstep Saul took seemed to crash echoingly. The brown kaka flew screeching from his approach, and a bellbird sent out its lovely delicate cry, its miniature chime of bells, before flitting away. Wood pigeons gave their comforting gurgle, and the friendly black fantail slipped coquettishly from bough to bough, spreading its tail and chirping irrepressibly.

  If the birds had been silent he might have been able to detect other sounds. The ferns were broken, as if someone or several persons had passed this way not long ago.

  Saul had his rifle cocked, and Fred Potter, sweating behind him, was in a deplorable state of nerves. But Saul had deliberately taken him on this scouting venture. If he was to be of any use in this country while hostile bands of Maori still roamed, he had to go through his baptism of fire, or at least this nerve-racking absence of a visible enemy.

  The reason for the lonely foray was that a Maori, naked except for the traditional flax skirt, had been seen lurking suspiciously on the edge of the bush within sight of Lucknow, but when challenged had disappeared silently into the scree
n of tree ferns and scrub.

  He might not have been alone, Saul knew. Even now the forest might be full of brown men lurking behind the massive kauri trees and screening ferns, ready to fire or spring on him with upraised hatchet.

  But he was as experienced a fighter as they, and his only sign of tension was his narrowed eyes and the taut muscles of his cheeks. Every few steps he motioned to Fred to stop, and in the stillness listened.

  There was no sound but that of the everlastingly talkative birds. When finally he decided they had gone far enough to ascertain that the single intruder must have been alone, he turned back. Fred’s relief was so palpable that it was almost humorous. He mopped his face and muttered, “Sorry, boss. This is new to me.”

  “You’re living on a frontier up here,” Saul said crisply. “If you don’t like it, say so, and I’ll take you back to Wellington when I go. But if you stay, you’ll have to be prepared to do not only this but defend your home in an attack.”

  Fred nodded. His face was red with exertion and a multitude of emotions. But his eyes were steady.

  “I’ll stay, boss. Jemmie’s depending on it. I look at it this way, she risks her life every time she has one of my brats, so I can risk mine doing what she wants.”

  “Good man,” said Saul approvingly. “Then let’s go and see what Mabel has thought up for supper.”

  Half an hour later they came into the clearing where the buildings of Lucknow, the large new house and the shearing sheds and outhouses, lay in the green hollow.

  One of Saul’s shepherds saw them emerge from the bush and ran towards them shouting excitedly. “Boss, those devils have stolen the horses!”

  “Damnation!” exclaimed Saul.

  So it had been a trick. The lone Maori had lured him into the forest, and the rest of his band had stolen around the other side, and with only Mabel Kingi, probably fast asleep in her afternoon stupor, and this elderly shepherd about, had had no trouble at all in catching the three horses.

  “How many of them?” he demanded.

  “I’m not sure. I just caught sight of them riding off. About five or six.”

  Saul narrowed his eyes against the forest-bound horizon. Everything was peaceful. The cattle grazed on the cleared land, and a blue drift of smoke rose from the kitchen chimney.

  Part of the Maori tactics was this marauding. It kept the settlers nervous and ready to jump at their own shadow. By the time a planned attack was launched the morale of the women, anyway, was at its lowest. Often, however, the thieving that went on was done by lazy natives of peaceful tribes, and this particular theft may have had no more significance than that.

  Saul reported the matter to Captain Maltby of the local militia, and kept an all-night watch that night, and for several nights after. But nothing more happened to disturb the peace.

  Nevertheless, Saul was deeply uneasy both about leaving Lucknow at this time and bringing a wife up here. Was it right to bring women into this atmosphere of false peace? For there was no doubt that there would be a flare-up of hostilities, if not here at least in the surrounding country. He shuddered at the thought of exposing women to that frightfulness. He had seen too much himself. The unleashed indecency of the fighting native knew no limits, and after every indecency had been inflicted on the dead body of his enemy, it was often prepared for the feast.

  Saul had once witnessed a horrible ceremony when eyeless heads, stuck on poles, had been carried in a ghastly procession. And worse than that, when the curious revolting smell of roasting human flesh had seeped through the forest.

  A week before he was due to leave, he called on the Reverend Peabody, that gallant man known to everybody simply as ‘the Reverend.’ He was in his habitual shabby black clothes, his white hair flying, his round pink face as calm as if he talked in an English vicarage about a delinquent child.

  He was a wonderful man, the Reverend Peabody, and his wife Martha was a fit mate for him. She seemed to know no fear, and quoted constantly her favorite text, Thou shalt not be afraid of the terror by night, nor for the arrow that flieth by day.… Indeed, she had been known to include it in a recipe for baking bread. It was one of her weapons. Her others were her calm-faced husband and her own tolerant, serene outlook that accepted every phase of human behavior.

  The Peabodys lived in a cottage next to the tiny wooden church. One room was overflowing with books, and the other was the bedroom. Behind that was a kitchen, and in front a verandah. A loft above provided a spare room for the not infrequent guest. It was a working man’s cottage, but the Peabody’s behaved as if they lived in luxury, and no one was more fortunate than they. They could, if circumstances demanded it, fire a gun with deadly accuracy, but the Reverend was happier with a Bible in his hand, and his wife with her wooden mixing spoon.

  They listened seriously to Saul’s problem.

  “What’s the little lassie like?” the Reverend asked.

  “She’s not one to be afraid of her own shadow.”

  “She’s bonny, of course,” said Martha Peabody. “Bring her here as soon as you can Saul. You need her, and we’ll take care of her.”

  “But supposing—”

  “Now, look,” said the Reverend philosophically, “this fiend Te Kooti, when he escaped from the Chathams, had his boat becalmed. Have you heard this story? So he pushed an old man overboard to placate the gods, and at once a wind sprang up, and carried him to these shores. Now how far can a man who behaves like that succeed? He’ll be stricken down at any moment by a just God who abhors human sacrifice.”

  “What is to happen, will happen,” came Martha’s calm voice. “If your wife is to die, she will die, no matter where she is. But why should she die? You bring her here, Saul. We’ll give her courage.”

  “She has that already,” said Saul, smiling ironically. “That at least, I know about her.”

  Martha looked puzzled and a little anxious. “You do love her, Saul?”

  Saul lifted his black brows. “Love? I need a wife. That’s the long and short of it. To be truthful, I scarcely know her.”

  “But you’re concerned for her safety,” Martha pointed out shrewdly.

  “No one wants to see a woman scalped. Besides, she has pretty hair. Oh, she’s pretty, Martha, if that’s what you’re wondering.”

  “And you’ll love her and make her happy!” Martha said severely.

  Saul grinned. “The books say love comes after marriage.”

  “It should come before, you foolish boy! Otherwise, think of the ordeal for a woman, coming up here to this strange lonely country with a stranger. You know as well as I do how some women have gone, for lack of companionship or understanding. Oh, you men!” Martha’s broad face was full of impatience. “As long as your wife cooks your food and has your children you think you’ve done your duty by her. But you listen to me, Saul Whitmore! You set to work and be a loving husband.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” said Saul, his eyes gleaming. “But Briar has to be tamed before she can be loved, and I’m not sure that I want her tamed. So there’s a pretty problem.”

  He shrugged and turned to the Reverend Peabody. “Then, sir, you think this winter will be fairly safe?”

  “Oh, there’ll be trouble in patches, you can be sure of that. Mind you, the Maori has a certain right to a grievance. He’s parted with his lands ignorantly, for sometimes less than two shillings an acre, and he’s resentful and angry about being deceived. Everything wasn’t settled at the Treaty of Waitangi when those fine old chiefs laid down their arms. But this devilish kind of warfare must be stamped out. Te Kooti is simply deliberately stirring the Maori’s wild fighting blood. There’s one of his kind bred every generation or so, whether it be here or in Europe or the Americas, and we can only cope with the trouble he causes as best we can.”

  “I’ve heard,” said Saul, “that some of the soldiers don’t care to fight the Maori. They say their ancestors might merely be men who escaped from Cromwell’s persecution and now are browned by two or three ge
nerations of sun.”

  The Reverend nodded in approval. “I agree. The Maori will be a fine fellow when he loses his savagery. He might even be fighting side by side with us for the British Empire one day. But that’s looking a long way ahead, and we’ve got this winter to get through. We’re going to build a stockade in the village, and the militia is never far away. We’ll come through safely. Don’t worry, my boy. Your wife will be needed here, most likely.… And whether you love her or not,” his eyes twinkled, “as I can see my wife is going to argue ad infinitum, I can’t see you being foolish enough to choose either a spoiled beauty or a timid mouse. So bring her to Lucknow as soon as you can.”

  XI

  PETER FANSHAW made an extremely dashing and handsome bridegroom. After the ceremony, he went about boldly kissing all the girls, who shrieked and giggled, his bride giggling most of all, as if getting married were a tremendous romp.

  But Briar evaded his amorous advance. She ran from the room like any shy schoolgirl, and heads nodded approvingly. She was, after all, to be married herself in a few weeks, and this fastidiousness proved her devotion to Saul. No one could know that she was still bitterly resenting the fact that her plans had gone so awry. Peter would have been such a suitable and tractable husband. She could have shaped him to her wishes. Saul, she knew, would never be shaped.

  She looked at the assembled guests scornfully, despising them for their lack of perception. But then she caught old Mrs. Whitmore brooding on her behavior and she realized that there was one who was not deceived. “She knows my true feelings!” Briar thought in a panic, and suddenly she was afraid she was never going to be able to go on with her own wildly improbable marriage.

  But Sophia and Peter had at last departed, Sophia posessively and triumphantly taking Peter’s arm as he led her to the carriage. The last glimpse Briar had of her was her triumphant face, and Peter leaning tenderly towards her. She clenched her first and muttered, “I will marry Saul. I’ll show them.”