The Fire Blossom (The Fire Blossom Saga)

by Sarah Lark

  One morning in the barn, as Ida reached for the milking stool, she saw the rat, or one of its friends, sniffing at the bucket of grain she’d placed in front of the cow. Calmly, Ida pulled the Colt out of her pocket, released the safety, and aimed. Only a moment later, she pulled the trigger coolly and confidently. Ida felt the recoil, but she didn’t close her eyes fearfully anymore. She saw the rat explode when the bullet hit it, and immediately fired another shot at the bloody remains. It was unnecessary; the animal couldn’t have survived the first shot, yet the deed had changed something inside of Ida.

  “Die!” she screamed. “Die, you—you horrible beast! Die, you—you—”

  Ida fired a third, fourth, and fifth bullet at the dead rat. She felt waves of satisfaction, revenge, rage, anger, and joy. She fired at all her demons, ghosts, and all her fears. And she felt more free, light, and joyous than she ever had before—except perhaps when Karl Jensch had kissed her.

  Finally, she lowered her weapon, cleaned up the rat’s remains, and began to perceive the world around her again. She had been inebriated, her senses muddled, her body merging with the weapon. But now, she could hear the children crying.

  Ida coaxed a shaking Chasseur back out from behind a bale of hay, and then went to calm the children. Linda held out her little arms to be picked up, and Carol’s tiny forehead was furrowed again. The little one glared at her—her eyes would probably stay blue, but Ida thought of steel rather than porcelain when she looked at her daughter’s face. And for the first time, she was proud of that fact. It seemed that the child already knew how to feel anger.

  “I’ll teach you how to shoot,” she promised the tiny creature. “You’ll never have to pray for humility.”

  Part 7

  BUSINESS

  CANTERBURY PLAINS, NEW ZEALAND (THE SOUTH ISLAND)

  WELLINGTON, NEW ZEALAND (THE NORTH ISLAND)

  1845–1846

  Chapter 48

  While Chris Fenroy worked from dawn until dusk, his young wife struggled with displeasure and boredom, much as she had in her father’s house for as long as she could remember. It wasn’t as though there was nothing to do on their farm in the plains. On the contrary, Jane was more occupied than she had ever been, which was usually due to her “staff.” The Maori girls she had chosen as helpers for the house and garden showed up almost every day. After Jane had snapped at them impatiently one day, they hadn’t returned for a time. They came back eventually, but Jane soon gave up on trying to get them on a schedule. The self-confident women weren’t content with Jane assigning them tasks either. Apparently, they were used to working side by side with high-ranking tribal elders, and they wished to be entertained while they worked. For that reason, Jane taught the girls English, and not only that, Hera insisted that Jane contribute to the garden work and patiently repeat the words of the correct karakia for planting kumara and sowing the grain.

  “You sing with us. You live here with spirits. If not sing, spirits angry, and then grain no grow.”

  Jane was annoyed by all this, but she didn’t have the vocabulary to explain the relationship between masters and servants. Occasionally, Maori tribes had been known to enslave the losers of a war, but the Ngai Tahu hadn’t waged any wars in a long time. Furthermore, the women didn’t seem to see skin color as a sign of status but simply as an intriguing difference. Christopher had to fend off the occasional proposition.

  And there were hardly any means of demonstrating the intellectual superiority of the white race to the natives. But if Jane was honest with herself, the Maori learned English a lot faster than she herself could learn Maori. With only a badly translated Bible to go by, Jane’s language studies were agonizingly slow. She was an analytical sort of person, and the easiest way for her to understand a language was with the help of a grammar book. However, there was no grammar book for the Maori language yet. Either one picked up the language intuitively, which was hard for Jane, or one painstakingly acquired the verb forms and prepositions through comparative Bible studies. That was what Jane attempted to do, and she was losing hope, especially since her husband wasn’t much help.

  Chris wasn’t ignorant, but he had never attended a real school. His mother, who had received a proper girl’s education in England, had taught him to read and write and had awakened his interest in books. Chris mostly read whatever he could lay his hands on, but that enthusiasm didn’t extend to grammar texts. As a result, he barely knew what Jane meant when she talked about conjugation or declination. He might have been able to translate words and sentences into Maori for her, but he couldn’t create the tables, paragraphs, or lessons she wanted.

  Additionally, the Maori had a completely different way of thinking. There simply didn’t seem to be any translation for certain things, and a literal rendering could be easily misunderstood. Everything they said was permeated by myths and spiritual considerations. Again and again, Jane got exasperated with the women’s conversations, even when she understood the words.

  “You have to open your mind to it more!” Christopher would insist.

  He wished Jane would open her mind to her new life, too, and the world he had brought her into. He couldn’t grasp why she didn’t feel the need to conform, but only to shape. So, despite all her business, Jane felt the same way she had in her parents’ house. It felt as though she were swimming in mud when she would have preferred to glide through clear water. Every effort she made was tedious and didn’t take her where she wanted to be.

  Back home, Jane had liked to take out her general feelings of dissatisfaction on her staff, as her mother had done before her. Once she’d realized that it didn’t work with the Maori, Christopher was the one who had to endure all her resentment and bad moods. Jane would grumble that the house wasn’t being built fast enough because Chris was out in the fields all day and, on the other hand, that the farm would never yield anything if he occupied himself with building the house. She complained about the food her Maori cook brought to the table, although she was earnestly trying. Arona liked to cook and patiently attempted to re-create Jane’s favorites such as roast beef and Yorkshire pudding, but it didn’t quite work, because Jane knew how things should taste but didn’t know any of the recipes. She didn’t have much patience for trial and error, so the Maori woman preferred to cook foods she knew. Almost every day, grilled fish and sweet potatoes were served at the Fenroys’ table.

  Christopher didn’t comment on the subject. He liked fresh fish, and he didn’t really care at all what he ate, as long as it didn’t leave him hungry. He would have been glad to take charge in the bedroom, though, or at least to have some say in how things were done there. But there was no talking to Jane on the subject. She alone determined when Christopher could lie with her, and she still seemed to find enjoyment in tormenting him. She invited him to her bed, uninvited him at the last moment, and goaded him. All it took was a snide remark to make his erection go limp again. It was incredibly embarrassing to Chris. He had never had any such troubles in the past, but he wasn’t very attracted to Jane, even before the cruelty. He would have liked to avoid sleeping with her altogether, but he saw it as his duty. Besides, he was hoping for a child. He even hoped Jane would become gentler and more balanced if she had a child.

  Chris did his best, but their nights together were too irregular to hope for a fast conception. Jane didn’t want it anyway. She didn’t ever want a child, she said irrefutably when he broached the subject.

  “I can’t even get the staff to make the beds and do the dishes without asking! How am I supposed to instruct a reasonable nanny?”

  The thought of taking care of a child herself didn’t even cross her mind.

  “I’m not really the motherly type,” she said on another occasion. “Children bore me.”

  “For God’s sake, what doesn’t bore you?” he shouted.

  “Nothing I could do here,” she replied maliciously. “I could keep the books for the farm if you earned anything. But so far, you haven’t accomplished a
thing.”

  Christopher finally gave up talking to Jane. He could only hope that his first harvest would be successful and that the farm would finally thrive. Then, at least, Jane would have some reason to respect him, if they couldn’t love each other.

  Later, however, Jane Fenroy found she had power in a place she would never have expected.

  Te Haitara, the chieftain of the nearest Maori tribe whom Jane had met at the powhiri, was often a guest at Chris Fenroy’s house. The ariki was interested in everything that happened on the farm. He seemed to want to learn every detail about the pakeha’s way of living. He let Chris explain to him how the agricultural machines worked, petted the horses awkwardly and reverently, and watched in fascination as a man from his tribe milked the Fenroys’ cow. He explicitly supported his fellow tribesmen’s work for Jane and Chris and accepted their payments of seeds and blankets instead of asking for money. Chris thanked God for that, since he didn’t have any money, and also because, without Te Haitara’s intercession, he certainly wouldn’t have managed to convince the women Jane had insulted to come back for a second attempt.

  For Te Haitara, Chris Fenroy’s land was a wonderland of modern achievements, and when the members of his tribe could explain some of it to him, he praised them glowingly. He inspected the woodstove on which Arona prepared the food, and the fireplace Reka stoked, which provided much more warmth than the open fires of the Maori. He was especially eager to learn English. And he was the only one who tried to take actual lessons from Christopher instead of simply repeating words and sentences like the other Maori. Once, Jane laughed as she caught her husband using her painstakingly worked-out grammar sheets as teaching material.

  “Looks like somebody just can’t be open-minded enough to learn a new language,” she said condescendingly. “Watch out, he’ll be teaching you grammar soon.”

  Ever since then, Jane had felt a certain camaraderie with the chieftain, who always addressed her deferentially, practicing phrases such as How do you do, madam? Meanwhile, she didn’t find his tribal tattoos quite so disconcerting anymore.

  Still, she was a little startled one day when she saw him sitting on the bank of the Waimakariri River, completely motionless and lost in thought. Jane had hiked up the river as she had done nearly every day since it had been warm enough. She didn’t care much for walks, but she was an enthusiast of regular hygiene. She had enjoyed the modern bathrooms in the Beits’ houses in Hamburg and Nelson. Here on the farm, of course, there was no such thing. There was a bathtub, but no servant to fill it. Christopher had only laughed when Jane suggested entrusting one of the Maori helpers with the task.

  “Jane, please, I don’t want the natives to think we’re mad! If you want to bathe, do it in the river.”

  During her first summer, and even more the following winter, Jane had rejected the idea as unsuitable. Grumbling, she had cleaned herself with towels soaked in warm, soapy water. Now, in her second summer, she had discovered the river for herself. Diving in felt refreshing, and there were quiet places where fern fronds hung like curtains over the water, letting Jane undress without worry. At her favorite bathing spot, the light was dusky green even on bright, sunny days, as though a green-glass banker’s lamp were shining its cozy light, and she had stopped being afraid of the insects that buzzed around her.

  Jane didn’t like wetas and fly larvae, but she didn’t feel disgust or irrational fear toward them either. There were no poisonous or dangerous animals in New Zealand. She had been told that, and she believed it. On her walk from the farm, Jane tried to identify the shade trees, such as the cabbage palm and the tea tree, called manuka by the Maori. She even allowed herself to think some of the plants were pretty, such as a variety of forget-me-not that bloomed on the edge of the river. It was certainly prettier than the rata growing everywhere on the farm! Jane inhaled the scent of the flowers and delighted in their abundance of color, but the thought of picking them and putting them in a vase on the farm didn’t cross her practical mind.

  Now here was a mighty Maori warrior, sitting in the grass among the wild flax and cattail-like raupo reeds, his long black hair in a warrior’s knot, his eyes squinted into slits. He was wearing traditional clothing, and his torso was naked. Clubs and knives hung from his belt, and he had laid his spear down beside him. Jane was startled; when Te Haitara visited the farm, he wore a shirt and denim trousers, like the other members of the tribe who worked for the Fenroys.

  As though in trance, the chieftain stared at the river, and Jane wasn’t sure if she should bother him at all. On the other hand, it would be rude to just walk by.

  “Kia ora, ariki!” she greeted him.

  He turned around slowly—the experienced warrior had probably heard her coming from a long way off, long before she noticed him.

  “Good day to you, madam!” Te Haitara got to his feet.

  “Oh, you needn’t get up,” Jane said. “I didn’t mean to bother you.”

  The ariki smiled. “Nobody must stand when ariki sit,” he said. “That tapu. Not want that you must say sorry to spirits.”

  Jane raised her eyebrows. “I’m not afraid of any spirits.”

  Te Haitara laughed. “You woman with much mana. Could be, spirits fear you.” Then he sighed. “Spirits can be fear pakeha,” he mused. “Today no speak to me.”

  Jane allowed her gaze to wander between the raupo, the flax, and the nearest manuka tree. “You’re here to speak to the spirits?” she asked. “The spirits in—the plants?” The women who worked for her did it often, but somehow, Jane had given the chieftain more credit than that. “Are the ones here special? Because there’s flax and raupo closer to the village.”

  Te Haitara shook his head gravely. “With spirits of river. Spirits of plants no can know. Always in same place. But river flow. To pakeha too. Can be, knows answer.”

  “Answer to what?” Jane went over to one of the four rocks that seemed to be growing out of the grass near the bank.

  “To question,” Te Haitara said. “This sacred place, madam. River, rocks, many spirits. Better sit between rocks, not on.”

  Jane lowered herself onto the grass. The chief, some distance from her, did the same.

  “If the question is about the pakeha, I might be able to help you,” Jane offered. “I’m sure the spirits aren’t the best intermediaries there.”

  The chief continued to ponder. “Ariki seeks advice from spirits when tribe not happy.”

  Jane wondered if the spirits would mind if she leaned on one of the rocks. It was hot, and she would have liked to make herself comfortable. The chieftain was sitting upright effortlessly, but his eyes were full of worry.

  “Your tribe isn’t happy with you?” she asked.

  Jane wondered what the ariki would have to expect in such a case. Would he be voted out? Would he have to stop a rebellion? And would he be eaten if he didn’t prevail? The last idea amused her, since she had never believed in the rumors of cannibalism.

  “Not with me,” Te Haitara corrected her. “And ‘happy’ not right word. Is more like want and not get.”

  “Not satisfied?” Jane guessed.

  The chief nodded grimly.

  “What does your tribe want?” Jane asked.

  Te Haitara tore off a few raupo leaves and toyed with them; the tohunga of his tribe probably wouldn’t have approved of him not singing a karakia first. Jane leaned back on the rock.

  “Money,” the chief said tersely. “Tribe want buy things. Things like have pakeha.”

  Jane nodded. “Yes, I know. But I don’t find that so objectionable. True, it’s quite warm today, so your, um, skirt might be more comfortable than my dress. But in winter, you must be cold. And those flax blankets and blouses may be pretty, but they’re awfully thin. Apart from the fact that nobody wants to eat only sweet potatoes. If I were in your people’s place, I’d like to have blankets and seeds and livestock and things like that.”

  “Yes. More blankets and things, but no money. I ask spirits: How
get money?”

  Jane laughed. “My husband always wonders about that too. Maybe I should send him to you.”

  The chief gave her a serious look. “Yes. I already ask Chris. He not know either.” He tore the raupo leaves to shreds.

  Jane bit her lip. Up until now, no man had ever listened to her when she talked about money. Or at least, they had never taken her seriously.

  “See here, ariki,” she began. “It’s like this with money: you trade it, for goods or work. Work is out of the question for you; the only one here who needs workers is my husband, and he barely has any money himself. Besides, you don’t earn very much going into service with somebody. A merchant earns a lot more.”

  “What is ‘mershann’?” the chieftain asked attentively.

  “Merchant. It’s somebody who buys and sells things. Another word is ‘trader.’”

  “Trader like Ca-pin-ta!” Te Haitara said. “Tom Ca-pin-ta. Come with cart and want to sell things. Blankets, clothes, all things what have pakeha. But want have money.”

  “Of course,” Jane said. “You see, ariki, Carpenter doesn’t make the things himself. He buys them somewhere because he thinks he can sell them somewhere else. So you must do it the other way around: You sell Carpenter something he wants to have. He gives you money for it, and with that money, you buy everything your people want.”

  The chief furrowed his brow. “We no have things to sell. Nothing that pakeha want.”

  Jane pursed her lips. “I wouldn’t be so sure,” she said. “It’s all about supply and demand. And advertising. You should read Heinrich Stilling and Adam Smith . . .” Jane laughed as the chieftain gave her a blank look. “Let’s say, all you have to do is get the right spirits on your side. When this tradesman comes—Chris used to translate for you, didn’t he?”