The Fire Blossom (The Fire Blossom Saga)

by Sarah Lark

  “Kia ora, ariki,” Jane said in greeting. “You’ve decided to get into the sheep-breeding business, after all?”

  “Get into?” Te Haitara replied. His English had become quite good, but some expressions were still unfamiliar. “Get into, like into a house?”

  Jane frowned as Cat smiled and translated.

  The chieftain answered enthusiastically in English. “Yes. You look, nice sheep, no? We do like you say. But sheep from Cat not ‘investment’! So better, can sell wool and still buy more things for people from Ca-pin-ta!” He smiled.

  “Ariki, the people have had everything they need for a while now,” Jane said with a sigh. “What about the extra work? Will you find enough volunteers?”

  “Volunteers?”

  Jane’s diction that day was clearly too much for the chieftain.

  “She wants to know if our people will want to work with the sheep,” Cat said, this time in English so Jane wouldn’t be left out.

  Te Haitara nodded enthusiastically. “Oh yes! Like much more than making medicine! Sheep not need so much karakia. Tohunga already asked gods’ blessings on hipi today.”

  He pointed to the sheep, which didn’t look as though they’d been particularly affected by the blessing. However, they all looked well nourished and satisfied. Even now, at the start of winter, there was enough grass around the Maori village for them.

  “Fine,” Jane said. “Then we just have to work out the logistics. Where are we going to get food for all the animals?”

  The chieftain smiled widely again. “Oh, Cat did that! Whole wagon full of hay and oats, still at Chris’s station. Comes soon.” He regarded Jane expectantly, and then looked at Cat with open admiration.

  The young woman had filled Ida’s covered wagon with food for the sheep at the Deans brothers’ farm and had ordered more hay to be delivered. After she had bought the sheep, there had been plenty left over from the jewelry money for their care until she could make her first profits from selling the wool.

  “Well, then you don’t need me anymore,” Jane said reluctantly, and turned away. “But I’ll try to come up with something for the shearing. I read that we should have men trained for it. The shearing has to be done professionally if we want to get the best price for the wool.”

  While Chris continued to bemoan that Cat had withdrawn from him, and Karl made an effort to be patient about his situation with Ida and Ottfried, Jane started a detailed conversation with several of the large sheep breeders in the North Island. Meanwhile, Pete, the boatman, stopped at Fenroy Station almost every time he headed west. He brought letters for Jane and passed on news. The town of Christchurch was finally going to be built, and the Redwoods were planning to move there. They already had interest from buyers for their farm. The case of their missing sheep had never been solved.

  “But they have to be somewhere,” Pete said. “There aren’t that many sheep on the South Island.”

  “Maybe someone slaughtered them,” Jane said disinterestedly. “Some Maori tribe that isn’t civilized yet.”

  She herself was enthusiastically continuing her efforts to “civilize” the Ngai Tahu, as was Cat, in her way. The young woman took seriously the duties with which she had been entrusted when the tribe had adopted her. She taught the children English, reading, and writing. Only mathematics was still difficult for her. Jane was conflicted about Cat’s activities. On one hand, she welcomed every effort at education, and on the other, she looked on with annoyance as Cat gained increasing influence within the tribe. She hated seeing her in a confidential conversation with the chieftain. Previously, Te Haitara had regarded only Jane with such admiration when she had clarified pakeha matters for him. Of course, it was easier for Cat, with her fluent Maori. For the first time in her life, Jane felt jealous.

  Karl and Ida managed to hide their finally consummated love from Ottfried for the rest of autumn and winter. It wasn’t easy. Chris and Cat both found the longing glances and the stolen touches hard to miss. When the two could no longer stand it, they had to come up with a place to meet. In the cold, rainy season, their best options were the barn or the new shearing shed. Additionally, Carol and Linda could walk well now and were quite lively. They wanted to be kept busy, and they certainly couldn’t be around to see Karl and Ida’s amorous play. That meant the trysts required complicated preparation. The children would have to go to the Maori village with Cat, or be watched by other women, which wasn’t without danger. If Ottfried had found out Ida had been apart from the children, he would have asked questions. But the lovers took the risk repeatedly, and not just because Karl wanted to.

  Actually, it was Ida who could hardly believe the wonder of it, and who always wanted to be reassured of Karl’s love for her. Every time, she embraced Karl with greater passion. Slowly, she began to develop into the woman she could have been, had she grown up somewhere other than Raben Steinfeld. She stopped lowering her eyes and no longer monitored each of her thoughts for its godliness. She was overflowing with creative ideas and humor, and inspired Karl to laughter and amazement. When they made love, he still touched her carefully, but the more they were together, the more confidence she gained.

  After the episode in the pub, Ottfried had left Ida alone for a while. Either her outburst actually had shaken his self-esteem, or he didn’t dare take revenge while Karl and Chris were around. Both of the men were keeping an eye on things, and Ottfried knew that he shouldn’t test their patience. When they had taken over the shopping in Port Cooper, they had discovered that Fenroy Station was, indeed, in debt to the animal food supplier and the ironmonger, and that had led to a serious argument. Chris Fenroy didn’t hesitate to lay it on the line. He threatened to exclude Ottfried from the partnership. And Ottfried didn’t want to risk being put out in the middle of the winter with his family and a flock of more than a hundred sheep, and have to manage by himself. After all, the Brandmanns were still living in Chris’s old farmhouse. Ottfried’s ostentatious plans for building a large house on his own land hadn’t come to fruition.

  But even if Ida’s husband didn’t torture her for entire nights on end, he had begun to sleep with her again, after some time had passed. He usually took her quickly, cantankerously, and carelessly, the way a spoiled child mistreats toys. As before, Ida felt violated, and approached Karl self-consciously and fearfully. Once she had been rubbed raw again, when she came to him in their improvised bed of straw in the barn, Karl didn’t want to make love to her, for fear of hurting her. But Ida encouraged him to do it anyway.

  “Take me to Bahia for a while, Karl. Otherwise, I’ll go crazy here in the cold and rain.”

  Karl was constantly trying to come up with plans to help Ida get out of her marriage, but aside from running away with her and living under an assumed name, he couldn’t think of one. He would have done it for Ida, but she wasn’t ready. Especially not when she discovered in spring that she was pregnant again.

  “That’s exactly why we have to leave!” Karl insisted. “It’s our child, Ida! It has to be!”

  Ida gazed at him sadly. “God alone knows that,” she said. “It could just as easily be Ottfried’s. I’m scared, Karl! I don’t want to give birth while we’re running away somewhere. And for the birth, I need Cat!”

  Karl put his arms around her. “You don’t have to be afraid when I’m with you. Besides, there are midwives all over the world.”

  But Ida shook her head. “I don’t want any midwife,” she insisted. “I want Cat!”

  “You just don’t want to leave,” Karl said.

  It wasn’t an accusation. He didn’t want to leave either. Karl was content at Fenroy Station. He was enjoying the lambing season and looking forward to the first shearing. His sheep and those of the Maori would be spending the summer in the highlands. He would ride out with Chris and drive them there. He dreamed about taking Ida with him and spending nights in a tent with her, or making love to her under the open sky by the light of the stars. She still dreamed about Bahia and didn’
t know enough about New Zealand to be able to love this place too. Karl understood. Aotearoa, as Cat called it, hadn’t been very kind to Ida so far, but that couldn’t be changed. Karl thought his intelligent, curious Ida fit well with this part of the world. He doubted that Bahia would have been able to offer so many possibilities for her and the children, let alone for his own professional prospects. Karl had been very comfortable as a surveyor, but he loved being a farmer.

  Ottfried didn’t like farming, and the more he thought about it, the more he realized he’d never wanted a farm. But all the cottagers in Raben Steinfeld had been so eager to own land that it hadn’t occurred to him that he could want something else. Only in Sankt Pauli Village had he truly discovered what drudgery it was to work the land. Now, he didn’t even have much fun with his learned profession as a carpenter. As a recognized craftsman in a city or town, there would have been more possibilities. He could have spent his evenings in an inn, dressed himself and his family well, and shown off in church on Sundays. He could have had a team of fancy horses and a coach. Instead, Ottfried was stuck on a farm working from morning to night.

  Of course, it would be even better to own a business! He’d enjoyed his time with Gibson. It was a pity that it hadn’t worked out the way they had planned. Perhaps it was just too soon. Now, more settlers were arriving in the plains. After Avon had been established, there would probably be even more of them. But there was still another chance: his rise as a sheep baron! Sheep were much less work than cultivating the land. So far, Ottfried had been able to avoid even that work, though. Sure, the Maori had complained to Chris one or two times that his flock was grazing on their land and mixing with Cat’s sheep, but Ottfried wasn’t terribly worried about it. After all, there was plenty of grass in the plains, and it didn’t cost anything. But wool brought in good money.

  All things considered, Ottfried would have felt good about the future if he only hadn’t had to share the farm with Fenroy and Jensch. That damn day laborer, trying to tell him what to do! He had also witnessed Ottfried’s humiliation in Port Cooper. He balled his hands into fists just thinking about it. One day he’d make Ida pay!

  The scandal in Jefferson’s Pub was still having an effect on Ottfried, even though a couple of months had passed. He’d hoped that people would forget about it if he just didn’t turn up in town for a while. Unfortunately, Karl and Chris were keeping the whiskey away from him, and he hadn’t been able to lay in a good enough supply since he’d had to leave Port Cooper so abruptly. Now he was stuck at Fenroy Station, as high and dry as in the first weeks of Sankt Pauli Village. And Ida wasn’t making such an effort with the cheese dairy anymore either. Of course she blamed it on the season, and said that the sheep just produced less milk at this time of year, and also had to be allowed to stop for a while after the lambing. But Ottfried thought that was a dumb excuse, and as soon as she’d finally managed to produce a reasonable number of cheese wheels again, he seized the chance to ride to Port Cooper. He didn’t ask Chris and Karl for their permission, and certainly not Ida. To hell with everyone having to reinvest proceeds into the farm. The cheese was his property, made by his wife from the milk of his sheep! He could and would sell it as he pleased.

  Ida and Karl sighed with relief when he loaded the wagon one morning without a word and set off for Port Cooper. Sure, they’d have to write off the loss of the cheese, but at least they would be spared Ottfried’s presence for a few days.

  “But what if he starts to boast again?” Cat asked. She had come by to talk about the upcoming shearing. “Aren’t you worried, Ida?”

  Ida shrugged, and Karl could only laugh. “Good old Ottie will be amazed,” he predicted. “Port Cooper is a sleepy little town. They’ll remember what happened in Jefferson’s Pub for the next ten years, mark my words.”

  Of course he was right. Neither had Ida’s appearance in the pub been forgotten, nor Chris’s anger that Ottfried had accumulated debts without his knowledge. So Ottfried was able to sell the cheese, but he wasn’t recognized as an official representative of Fenroy Station. Even his poker and drinking pals let him down. After he paid his debts to them with the proceeds from the cheese, both his fellow players and the pub owner refused to give him new credit.

  “What wrong with you? I hundred sheep, I rich! You take sheep if I not pay!”

  “You may have the sheep, but you can bet that we’d have to get past your wife first, and then Jensch and Fenroy, if we tried to pawn them,” Georgie said. “We aren’t going to do that to ourselves. My head is still ringing from the last time I tried to help you, when you had trouble with Potter. No, Ottie, a bird in the hand is worth more than a sheep in the bush. So put your money on the table or get lost!”

  Ottfried’s mood was even worse than it had been at his departure, when after only two days in Port Cooper, he harnessed the horses and drove back to the plains. He wouldn’t put up with all this much longer. Maybe after the shearing he’d have enough money for his own farm, especially if he found someone to buy the land Chris had signed over to him. He’d go somewhere else, maybe Otago. As soon as he’d put Fenroy Station behind him, he’d teach Ida how to be a proper little wife!

  As it turned out, Karl Jensch knew how to shear sheep reasonably well, and he was able to teach Chris Fenroy and their two Maori farmhands. That way, the men planned to take care of the first shearing by themselves. Jane could only shake her head.

  “The Maori boys will leave and shear Cat’s sheep as soon as they’ve figured out how it works,” she said jeeringly. “And how many sheep do you have? Three hundred? How long do you think it will take if you need an hour for each sheep? Do you think your English buyers will wait that long? That’s not going to work, Chris.” Then she waved a letter in the air. “But fortunately, someone here has got something between the ears! I’m hiring shearers from Australia. They can help us here and teach our people as well. My God, Chris, one day you’ll have two thousand, four thousand, maybe ten thousand sheep! You’re going to have to be prepared for that!”

  “But we can’t pay them,” Chris said in a small voice. “Just the trip from Australia must cost a fortune.”

  He still cringed when Jane gave him a dressing-down, and this time, he had to admit, she might be right. The shearing was an enormous task that they were hardly prepared to tackle on their own.

  “We’ll have to get together with others,” Jane said. “I’m going to Te Haitara this morning. He’s the first one we have to get on board.”

  But Te Haitara wasn’t in the village when she came to talk to him.

  “Chieftain on journey. To west, to mahinga hipi of Mista Butla,” said a little girl, in the English she’d been learning from Cat.

  “He’s on Butler’s sheep farm?” Jane asked, taken aback. “What’s he doing there?”

  “Is with Cat,” the girl said. “Cat say, must take off wool from hipi. But can’t alone, too many hipi. Must have people to show men how works. And do together with Mista Butla.”

  Jane flinched as though the little girl had slapped her, but of course she kept her emotions under firm control.

  “Cat wants to coordinate her shearing with the Butler farm?” she asked in a flat voice. “And the chieftain is with her? The two of them alone?”

  The girl shook her head. “Not alone. With four warriors. Can’t go alone, ariki. Ariki great man! And we meet other ariki who Mista Butla have land from. But no have fear, Miss Jane!” The girl seemed to have misinterpreted Jane’s pallor. “Not war. Other tribe also Ngai Tahu. Friends, kin.”

  Jane had to force herself to thank the girl before she turned and left. So, it had gone that far. Cat was traveling with the chieftain. Alone. The escort of warriors didn’t count; they weren’t chaperones. Jane wondered why it bothered her so much. Cat was free to do as she chose. The chieftain was too. And just because Cat had gone to him first with the idea about shearing didn’t have to mean anything. Cat had no obligation to ask for Jane’s permission, or to ask the men at Fenroy
Station. They were her own sheep. Perhaps she should have told Cat about her correspondence with Australia.

  Jane rubbed her temples. She felt just as ignored and useless as she had in her father’s house. But this time, there was more to it. It was as though her heart was in pain. She felt as though Cat and Te Haitara had betrayed her. Jane walked back to the farm with her head down. Before, she had been full of vigor, but now she just felt tired.

  Long before it got dark, she crawled into her bed and cried, not knowing why.

  Chapter 64

  Cat was in a wonderful mood when she returned from the headwaters of the Waimakariri River and stopped to tell Chris and Karl about her trip. Ottfried sat there looking surly because Cat didn’t translate into German, and Jane had joined them as well. She listened to her rival with an expression almost as sour as Ottfried’s. For the first time, she realized how pretty the young woman was with her shining blonde hair and her nut-brown eyes, which were now flashing with enthusiasm. It was no wonder Te Haitara was attracted to her. In the end, all that counted for men was looks. All the same, Jane couldn’t deny that Cat was also pretty good at business.

  “Captain Butler thought the idea of getting shearers from Australia was a good one, and he has the right contacts there,” she said. “But we have contacts too. Why didn’t you tell us, Miss Jane, that you’d been corresponding with Morgan and Holder, the sheep breeders?”

  Jane frowned, but she didn’t answer as Cat continued unselfconsciously. “Mr. Butler was afraid there was some kind of rivalry going on, or a kind of race—that is, our shearing against his. Whoever gets the wool on the market first wins, or something like that. But of course that’s ridiculous. It’s much better to do it together. In any case, Mr. Morgan in Adelaide definitely wants to send us an experienced group of shearers, and if everyone joins in, they can come to Port Cooper and start with the Redwoods, then the Deans brothers, and then us, and lastly Mr. Butler. It would be practical to organize the transport of the wool together as well. It’s cheaper, and the buyers won’t need to travel to each individual farm. We’ll bring the entire yield to Port Cooper. Could you write to Australia to tell them we’d like to do it that way, Miss Jane?”