"He also said that he had good news about the Pakeha. In the case of the kidnapped family, he had negotiated a purchase with the white whaler for some land back down south near Te Pukatea. The man was on his way back from Sydney with supplies to set up a shore-whaling station he said.”
"I asked if it was a big burly man with black hair, and he said yes. My heart jumped. I asked if the wife and children were all right, and he said yes. I was overjoyed. I told him all about Jackie, Sam, Groggy, and Happy.”
"Robulla said the whalers looked for Maori who would help them set up camp. He said that I should offer my services as a Maori and not as a former black white man, and see how I get on. It did seem like a good idea. He told me to go on down there and tell the Maori that he had sent me, and that I had first shot at helping the new whalers. He said the place was called Kakapo Bay. Just follow the coast up from Te Pukatea, he said.”
"So we said our farewells, and he gave me his assurances of peace in the region, with whites and Maori alike. I told him again that the white people would not go out of their way to kill any Maori if he helped them and did not pester them. He understood, but he was still not gonna go all soft. We laughed and did the hongi, and I set off with a little better feeling in my heart for life and the world as a whole.”
"When I got to Kakapo, I really liked it. It was a little bit like Pukatea: A nice, small bay with hills and trees running down to it, and a good, flat beach. I thought that Jackie had purchased a good spot for only a few guns, some old blankets, and a keg of moldy tobacco. I wouldn’t mind purchasing some land, I thought, but first I had to earn some money. I got over my earlier anger and settled in to live with the Maori there. They had heard of me, and they respected Robulla. They were waiting for the whalers to return from Sydney with all the wood and things that they would need to get the station started. Some of the men had been out on a few whale hunts down at Te Awaiti before the owner’s shipwreck. One woman wished she was a whaler’s wife as well.”
"When the ship pulled in, I greeted them in full warrior dress. I wondered if Jackie and his wife would recognize me. At first, it seemed like they did. Jackie’s eyes lit up. He said I was the blackest Maori that he had ever seen. He did not recognize me after all those years. I was happy to leave it at that. Besides, he was happy to have someone young, big, and strong to make their life easier at their new home. It was all good. They got off to a flying start, Jackie being eager to pick up his booming business where the other station had left off.”
"From 1836 to 1843, everything in life and business went exceptionally well. Looking back, it seems like a dream. That period of my life was just as exciting and interesting as my time with the Maori. Ironically, it too would come to a similar, untimely end. But before that happened, I can honestly say that I had attained happiness again.”
"The whalers at the bay were amazed at my ability. They had never seen such raw savagery from someone who seemed like a novice. They often asked me to be their headsman. There were many times that I was first to the whale, and many more times that I would leap upon its back and finish the beast fearlessly and single-handedly. Without boasting, I can say that I became a legend of the seas during that time; only because my keenness for killing, which sprang from a former life, had now become one of my few satisfying pleasures. When once I had blindly slaughtered my fellow man, I now boldly butchered the Black Whale with the same senselessness. To spare you all the gory details, I will only tell you the bigger things from that era of my life as a Tonguer.”
"What’s a tonguer?” Asked the Judge.
“It is the man responsible for cutting the huge muscle out of the dead whale’s mouth. Now, listen.”
Chapter 18
From a worm's-eye view, a large, wobbling droplet of water drips from a roof gable in slow motion, splashing to the ground. Another drop falls, illuminated within by the cool, gray sky; then another. The rain comes again. The sound is like hushed sandpaper brushing the lone house. The winds from the shore rush its drab sides and stir the scrubby bushes growing down to the sea.
On the beach is a large kettle, a try-pot, smoldering over its guarded coals. The drizzle spatters and hisses on the hot, black iron, tiny droplets vainly stippling the ashes skirting the angry embers. Small, meteoric craters open in the sludgy, smoking surface of lard brimming over the lip. Rhythmic belches of greasy steam with rancid vapors take flight in timely puffs from the irreverent cauldron boiling the remains of the whale. The muffled bubbling harmonizes with the continuous sizzle of repelled rain, in concert with the steady downpour. Like a lonely sailor, the kettle hovers amid the barrage above the smooth black sea pebbles crowding the beach. Mingling among them is the scant sand that washes in and out with the punctilious tide.
The sheets of rain sailing sideways in the torrent sweep the beach, smacking the royal blue water of the virgin bay penciled charcoal in the dusk brought early by the storm clouds. A long line of white curves rises from the gritty stage, a row of whale ribs bleached by the long-gone sun. Their stark, alabaster radiance mocks the cast and pall of the day. They form a holy cathedral of sorts, a collection of flying buttresses suited for the Notre Dame itself. They are understated by their resemblance to carefully arranged headstones.
From a certain perspective, the bones frame the simple outline of the grog shop up the hill, with the din of its seafarers quelled by the strong beating of the wet tympani outside. Across the bay, the fluid chorus pauses momentarily, as the rain ceases. A woman bolts from the house onto the runny deck and cries, “Suns breaking! Whale Watch, post!”
The white door of the one-room grog shop springs open as the pounding of many pairs of greasy, muddy boots upon its slick wood nearly drowns the shattering sound. A glass pane perched precariously in the path of a poorly placed doorknob crashes to the ground in pieces.
“I’ve told you about that door, mate, about a thousand goddamn times!” Yells the shopkeeper. The whalers take no notice of him in their ruckus, fleeing from their dim, dank den and carrying on loudly down the slope toward the beach. One man remains behind to fill the day’s honorary position of Watchman, considered a fortuitous role by many because of its easy access to free grog and tobacco for the duration of duty. Leisure or not, the job comes with the onerous responsibility and expectation that any whale within eyesight will immediately be spotted and promptly and called out.
To keep him on his toes, there are many horror stories about the proverbial neglectful and unproductive Watch, who when at the end of the day had spotted nary a whale, was sharply castigated and ostracized by his mates for days on end; so that by the completion of the roster rotation, his senses had been keenly honed and sharpened by his sympathetic cohorts; and he was once again deemed fit for duty with the condition that a second fruitless watch would result in a verdict of his total failure, whether there had actually been any whales about or not. Black Jack simply referred to this practice as, making fun of the poor bugger until he went barking mad.
Such was the pressure placed on this focal member of the whaling team; and the average leviathan chaser had no problem with it after one or two weeks following his arrival at the bay, so that most of the men enjoyed the trust and faith of their fellow flensers, save for the odd loser or two. But by-and-large, everyone kept a keen eye out for the Black Whales that roamed the bay.
Chapter 19
Black Jack awoke before dawn. From his hut, he could still hear the revelry of the shore-whaling party down the beach. The conversation was unintelligible from his distance. The pattern of sounds was a continual repetition of the same things, with low muffled bantering and occasional highs of grumbling, followed by a peal of laughter and various hoots and hollers for a period of time, falling back to more low grumbling. Black Jack likened it to listening to a rainstorm blow in and out of the harbor. Ironically, this particular morning was clear, calm, and warm. It was Summer, and the whalers had stayed up all night celebrating.
Other than the sailors, there were
no other sounds throughout the pa. The dawn was close to breaking. The light blue hue was beginning to obscure the stars. The landscape was becoming visible to those who cared to look around. The beach gang’s bonfire was dying down. The party was showing signs of disbanding for the night. It was the off season for whales. An unwary passerby would be guilty of overestimating the amount of work that the whalers did during these days. That is to say, absolutely none, except for the barest minimum of effort required for survival. Gathering food, shifting goods, and perhaps occasionally doing odd jobs around the hut for their wives; such were the lives of the whalers now. Other than that, summer was a time of leisure and recreation between arduous and dangerous hunting seasons. Everyone treated it as such with no exception, lest they be banished down the beach.
As the party broke up, Black Jack heard silence return to the bay. There was no wind, only vague sounds from small breakers on the beach, and men’s shoulders occasionally brushing low branches as they made their way through the winding foot paths leading to their respective huts. The cove was like a large amphitheater facing the ocean, with huts arranged randomly along the paths up the side of the bowl. The hill was covered with scrub brush that grew from its ridge down to the sea: A perfect place for a small, peaceful whaling village.
The quiet lasted only a few moments. Suddenly, the silence was pierced by the singing of several birds. Their melodious wild music emulated small silver bells. The whalers called them Bellbirds. These were followed by the crowing Kaka birds, who added an element of baritone to the arrangement. Then, the Kakapo chimed in with their intermittent mid-range notes. The entire symphony was completed by the staccato interjections of the Takahe as they strutted around the yards of the villagers. It was a beautiful cacophony of natural sound. Black Jack lay there enjoying it in the early morning light.
This concert continued uninterrupted for many minutes. Suddenly, Black Jack heard a different sound mingling with the others. It was a bird he could not readily identify. Among the bell sounds, between the low crows and the middle warbles, came a soft murmuring sound in starts and stops. It began to come in regular intervals, eventually becoming quite rhythmic. Sounds like heavy breathing, thought Black Jack.
The sound became like the moaning of a large animal. It did not sound like the distressed groans of a dying beast. The mysterious sound had a pleasant, pulsating feel. Then came another set of shorter, higher tones, from further up the hill. The two sets of sounds faded in and out, intertwining with one another in differing tempos but with similar timber. Finally, a third such sound, this one deeper in quality, began emanating from a spot a few yards below Black Jack’s hut. He sat up, straining his ears to listen between the singing of the birds and the playing of the strange bellows. With his ear perched at the window, he heard a fourth and different sound altogether, echoing throughout the cove in the clear dawn air.
Coming in waves, it increased in volume along with its frequency. It became faster as it got louder. Black Jack listened intently in all direction. He seemed to be surrounded by the beast. For a time, he imagined the sounds were bird beaks softly striking the trunks of trees. Then he was reminded of children running softly on stone floors. Slap, slap, slap, went the sound. Then, whap, whap, whap, louder. Lastly, slap, slap, slap, softer again. All the sounds were intermingled with the moans. They all ranged up and down the hillside in various tones. Is someone getting flogged? Black Jack asked himself.
That is when Black Jack realized the sounds had a voice-like quality. He recognized one of the voices making the low, throaty sounds. It’s the wife of one of the whalers! Black Jack thought. And then it all dawned on him as the sun broke the back of the ridge and brilliant, orange light rushed into the bushy valley. All the moans simultaneously gave way to an orchestra of loud shrieks and flutters as the excited and confused birds took flight all at once. The village became silent once again.
Moments later, Black Jack heard giggling outside the door of his hut. He got off his mat and pulled back the leather drape. Just outside, a row of women sat along the hillside. They looked at him and laughed quietly. The first one stood up and moved closer. He recognized the unmarried Maori girls of the pa, twelve in number aged from sixteen to twenty. The first one motioned her desire to come in. Bewildered, Black Jack let her pass. Once inside, she hastily disrobed and made her way under his wool blanket. She smiled, beckoning for him to join. Black Jack hesitated. He peered out the doorway at the long line of ladies waving him while they cackled coyly. Seeing no other eyes about the hill, he ducked back in and started the task at hand.
I reckon it would be rude to wreck their honor and refuse them all, he thought. Time was of the essence if he were going to finish the job before the rising sun exposed his unplanned scheme.
II
What started as a favor soon became Black Jack’s job. Hurriedly pressing on, Black Jack would push weekly to complete his duties with the unloved women of the pa. It was always an uncelebrated affair, of which he made no fanfare nor any attempts at elaborate posturing. He merely pleasured each one in turn discretely in the most direct manner, while the others sat along the walls of his hut. The women would chat and laugh, seemingly uninterested at times with the primary activity in progress. They would gibber on excitedly about the ordinary, using animated hands, frequently breaking into long trills of heightening tones, as a piano keyboard being run in scales from bass to treble. Other times they would sound like birds, chirping in a cacophony of conversation between groups of twos and threes criss-cross around the room, cutting sharply into catty banter apparently pertaining to topics of harmlessly negative connotation. All the while Black Jack kept a methodical and modest pace atop the current quarry beneath his blanket. There was never any time for luxury. With the burden of his work continually threatening to outrun his enjoyment of the task at hand, he scarcely managed to restrain himself throughout runs that frequently extended to a dozen customers. He became extremely shrewd and adept at detecting even the more reserved partner’s displays of satisfaction. He would prudently require their resignation and withdrawal from the race after only one rack of shudders. It going without saying, come the final contestant, he often pounced and finished her with a confident sprint, both hound and hare deriving pleasure from the proverb of the lucky last.
“What is sovereignty?” a deep male voice asked, sending Black Jack bolting upright beneath his blanket and silencing the gallery. Robulla stood at the door peering in. He seemed unconcerned with the internal affairs of the hut. Black Jack scrambled to throw his clothes on. He stepped outside with Robulla. The old chief cracked a smile as he asked, “How are things going my friend? Quite well, it would seem, from the looks of it.”
“Yes. Well, I’ve been a bit tired lately.”
“Ah, that is fine, my son. Summer is supposed to be a time of rest for you whalers.”
Now further from the hut, they did the hongi. Black Jack asked, “Now, my friend, what is it that I can help you with?”
“What is sovereignty?” Robulla asked again.
“That is an English word. Why on Earth are you asking me about that?”
“The white man is here in great numbers out on the bay today. Myself, Te Rangiarata, and other chiefs of Cloudy Bay are meeting with them to discuss an agreement between the Pakeha and Maori. They are talking about signing a treaty.”
“A treaty? What is all this about? It is the first I have heard of it.”
“Well, that is what you get for living with the Pakeha. You expect them to tell you anything?”
“No, my friend, but this sounds serious. What does this word you mention have to do with it?”
“All right. Here it is: All the captains of the ships are on this one ship, and they’ve got us all gathered around this barrel, pointing to this big piece of paper. It's got all kinds of Pakeha writing on it. At the bottom, it’s got a little picture of some kind of flower and what looks like a chief’s headdress. The picture is all bumpy, with wax around it, li
ke someone carved it into the paper. Only, instead of feathers, the headdress has colored stones and shiny metal on it. Does that sound familiar?”
“It sounds like they want you to sign some sort of contract. Like the one that made me a slave to the ship. What are they saying it means, again?”
“I’m telling you, they are talking about, Sovereignty of the Crown over Maori land. I don’t know what they mean.”
“Well, if I remember correctly, it means the same as you sittin’ on a hill and overseeing your land. Yes, that’s it: Being master of all you survey, without no one tellin’ you what to do. That’s what that means!” Black Jack seemed impressed with himself. “Or wait, maybe it means being master of your own destiny. I can’t remember which.”
Robulla said, “Master of all I survey? What, they want to take all the land, do they?”
“No, no. I’m sure they wouldn’t be foolish enough to try that on you. Remember what I said about the white man coming? I told you there’s a whole heap of them. They’re probably just makin’ sure that it’s all right that they start comin’ down here. You know, so there’s no trouble with the Maori and all.”
“Well, there won’t be any trouble if they don’t try to take what isn’t theirs. Besides, we don’t really own the land. We belong to the land. The white man doesn’t seem to understand that. That’s why I’m so confused about them wanting to officially declare this sovereignty thing on paper. How much land do they think they need? They act as if they are going to fill every available inch!” He laughed at his own words.
Black Jack said, “Yes, well, I know what you mean. It is not enough for the white man, it seems, merely to use the land sparingly for what he needs. He seems to have a burning desire to subjugate the land, as he does animals and people. That may be a good thing, though.”
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