The Whale Rider Page 8

The following summer, when Kahu was three, was dry and dusty on the Coast. Koro Apirana was concerned about our drinking water and was considering at one point bringing it in by road tanker. One of the boys suggested that the sweetest water was DB light brown and that the hotel up at Tatapouri would be happy to deliver it free. Another of the boys added that we’d have to escort it to Whangara because, for sure, someone would want to do a Burt Reynolds and hijack it.

Into all this rough and tumble of our lives, Kahu brought a special radiance. Koro Apirana was as grumpy with her as ever but, now that Porourangi was home, and now that the school sessions were attracting young boys for him to teach, he seemed to bear less of a grudge against her for being a girl and the eldest grandchild.

‘Don’t blame Kahu,’ Nanny Flowers used to growl. ‘If your blood can’t beat my Muriwai blood that’s your lookout.’

‘Te mea te mea,’ Koro Apirana would reply. ‘Yeah, yeah, yeah.’

In particular, Koro Apirana had discovered three sons from royal bloodlines to whom he hoped to pass the mantle of knowledge. And from the corner of his eye, he could see that Porourangi and his new girlfriend, Ana, were growing very fond of each other. Now she didn’t have any Muriwai blood so, you never knew, Porourangi might come up with a son yet.

Under these conditions, the love which Kahu received from Koro Apirana was the sort that dropped off the edge of the table, like breadcrumbs after everybody else has had a big feed. But Kahu didn’t seem to mind. She ran into Koro Apirana’s arms whenever he had time for her and took whatever he was able to give. If he had told her he loved dogs I’m sure she would have barked, ‘Woof woof’. That’s how much she loved him.

Summer is always shearing season for us and that summer the boys and I got a contract to shear for the local farmers around the Coast. On the first few mornings when Kahu was at home I would see her staring at us over the windowsill as we left. Her eyes seemed to say, ‘Hey, don’t forget about me, Uncle Rawiri.’ So one morning I made her life happy.

‘I think I’ll take Kahu to the shed with me,’ I said to Nanny Flowers.

‘Oh no you don’t,’ Nanny Flowers said. ‘She’ll drown in the dip.’

‘No. No. She’ll be all right. Eh, Kahu?’

Kahu’s eyes were shining. ‘Oh yes. Can I go, Nanny?’

‘All right then,’ Nanny Flowers grumbled. ‘But tomorrow you have to be my mate in the vegetable garden. Okay?’

So it was that Kahu became the mascot for me and the boys and it only seemed
natural, after a while, for us to take her with us wherever we went — well, most places anyway and only when Nanny Flowers didn’t want her to help in the garden.

But that first night I got my beans from the old lady.

‘Hoi,’ she said, and bang came her hand. ‘What did you do with Kahu at the shed? She’s tuckered out.’

‘Nothing,’ I squealed. Biff came her fist at my stomach. ‘She just helped us sheepo and sweep the board and press the wool and pick up the dags and —’

Swish came the broom. ‘Yeah,’ Nanny Flowers said. ‘And I’ll bet all you beggars were just lying back and having a good smoke.’

You could never win with Nanny Flowers.

At that time the school sessions were proving to be very popular. All of us felt the need to understand more about our roots. But Nanny Flowers still grumbled whenever we had our hui. She would sit with Kahu in her arms, rocking in the chair on the verandah, watching the men walk past.

‘There go the Ku Klux Klan,’ she would say loudly so that we could all hear.

Poor Kahu, she could never keep away from our school. She would always try to listen in at the doorway to the meeting house.

‘Go away,’ Koro Apirana would thunder. But there was one school that Kahu could not eavesdrop on, and that was the one which Koro Apirana led when he took us out in a small flotilla of fishing boats to have a lesson on the sea.

‘In our village,’ Koro Apirana told us, ‘we have always endeavoured to live in harmony with Tangaroa’s kingdom and the guardians therein. We have made offerings to the sea god to thank him and when we need his favour, and we have called upon our guardians whenever we are in need of help. We have blessed every new net and new line to Tangaroa. We have tried not to take food with us in our boats when we fish because of the sacred nature of our task.’

The flotilla was heading out to sea.

‘Our fishing areas have always been placed under the protective custody of the guardians,’ Koro Apirana said. ‘In their honour we have often placed talismanic shrines. In this way the fish have been protected, attracted to the fishing grounds, and thus a plentiful supply has been assured. We try never to overfish for to do so would be to take greedy advantage of Tangaroa and would bring retribution.’

Then we reached the open sea and Koro Apirana motioned that we should stay close to him.

‘All of our fishing grounds, banks and rocks have had names assigned to them and the legends surrounding them have been commemorated in story, song or proverb. Where our fishing grounds have no local identification, like a reef or upjutting rock, we have taken the fix from prominent cliffs or mountains on the shore. Like there and mark. And there and mark. In this way the fishing places of all our fish species have always been known. And we have tried never to trespass on the fishing grounds of others because their guardians would recognise us as interlopers. In this respect, should we ever be in unfamiliar sea, we have surrounded ourselves with our own water for protection.’

Then Koro Apirana’s voice dropped and, when he resumed his lesson, his words were steeped with sadness and regret. ‘But we have not always kept our pact with Tangaroa, and in these days of commercialism it is not always easy to resist temptation. So it was when I was your age. So it is now. There are too many people with snorkelling gear, and too many commercial fishermen with licences. We have to place prohibitions on our fishing beds, boys, otherwise it will be just like the whales —’

For a moment Koro Apirana hesitated. Far out to sea there was a dull booming sound like a great door opening, a reminder, a memory of something downward plunging. Koro Apirana shaded his eyes from the sun.

‘Listen, boys,’ he said, and his voice was haunted. ‘Listen. Once there were many of our protectors. Now there are few. Listen how empty our sea has become.’

In the evening after our lesson on the sea we assembled in the meeting house. The booming on the open waters had heralded the coming of a rainstorm like a ghostly wheke advancing from the horizon. As I went into the meeting house I glanced up at our ancestor, Paikea. He looked like he was lifting his whale through the spearing rain.

Koro Apirana led us in a prayer to bless the school. Then, after the introductions, he told us of the times which had brought the silence to the sea.

‘I was a boy of seven years’ age,’ he began, ‘when I went to stay with my uncle who was a whaler. I was too young to know any better, and I didn’t understand then, as I do now, about our ancestor, the whale. At that time whaling was one of the great pastimes and once the bell on the lookout had been sounded you’d see all the whaling boats tearing out to sea, chasing after a whale. Doesn’t matter what you were doing, you’d drop everything, your plough, your sheep clippers, your schoolbooks, everything. I can still remember seeing everyone climbing the lookout, like white balloons. I followed them and far out to sea I saw a herd of whales.’

The rain fell through his words. ‘They were the most beautiful sight I had ever seen.’ He made a sweeping gesture. ‘Then, down by the slipway, I could see the longboats being launched into the sea. I ran down past the sheds and the pots on the fires were already being stoked to boil down the blubber. All of a sudden my uncle yelled out to me to get on his boat with him. So there I was, heading out to sea.’

I saw a spiky head sneaking a look through the door. ‘That’s when I saw the whales really close,’ Koro Apirana said. ‘There must have been sixty of them at least. I have never forgotten, never. They had prestige. They were so powerful. Our longboat got so close to one that I was able to reach out and touch the skin.’ His voice was hushed with awe. ‘I felt the ripple of power beneath the skin. It felt like silk. Like a god. Then the harpoons began to sing through the air. But I was young, you see, and all I could feel was the thrill, like when you do a haka.’

He paused, mesmerised. ‘I can remember that when a whale was harpooned it would fight like hang. Eventually it would spout blood like a fountain, and the sea would be red. Three or four other boats would tow it ashore to the nearest place and cut it up and share out the meat and the oil and everything. When we started to strip the blubber off the whale in the whaling station, all the blood flowed into the channel. Blind eels would come up with the tide to drink the blood.’

I heard Kahu weeping at the doorway. I edged over to her and when she saw me she put her arms around my neck.

‘You better go home,’ I said, ‘before Koro Apirana finds out you’re here.’

But she was so frightened. She was making a mewling sound in her throat. She seemed immobilised by terror.

Inside, Koro Apirana was saying, ‘Then, when it was all finished we would cut huge slabs of whale meat and sling them across our horses and take them to our homes —’

Suddenly, before I could stop her, Kahu wrenched away from me and ran into the meeting house.

‘No, Paka, no!’ she screamed.

His mouth dropped open. ‘Haere atu koe,’ he shouted.

‘Paka. Paka, no!’

Grimly, Koro Apirana walked up to her, took her by the arms and virtually hurled her out. ‘Go. Get away from here,’ he repeated. The sea thundered ominously. The rain fell like spears.

Kahu was still crying, three hours later. Nanny Flowers was livid when she heard about what happened.

‘You just keep her away from the meeting house,’ Koro Apirana said. ‘That’s all I say. I’ve told you before. And her.’

‘My blame,’ Kahu wept. ‘Love Paka.’

‘You men,’ Nanny Flowers said. ‘I can show you where you come from.’

‘Enough,’ Koro Apirana said. He stormed out and that ended the argument.

Later that night Kahu kept sobbing and sobbing. I guess we thought she was still grieving about being growled at, but we know better now. I heard Nanny Flowers going into Kahu’s bedroom and comforting her.

‘Shift over, Kahu,’ Nanny Flowers soothed. ‘Make a little space for your skinny Nanny. There, there.’

‘Love Paka.’

‘You can have him, Kahu, as soon as I get my divorce tomorrow. There, there.’ Nanny was really hurting with love for Kahu. ‘Don’t you worry, don’t you worry. You’ll fix him up, the old paka, when you get older.’

In the hiss and roar of the suck of the surf upon the land I listened to Nanny Flowers. After a short while Kahu drifted off to sleep.

‘Yes,’ Nanny Flowers crooned, ‘go to sleep now. And if you don’t fix him,’ she whispered, ‘then my oath I will.’

Hiss and roar. Ebb and flow.

The next morning I sneaked in to give Kahu a special cuddle, just from me. When I opened the door she was gone. I looked in Koro Apirana and Nanny Flowers’ bedroom, but she wasn’t there either. Nanny Flowers had pushed Koro onto the floor and had spread herself over the whole bed to make sure he couldn’t get back in.

Outside the sea was gentle and serene, as if the storm had never happened. In the clear air I heard a chittering, chattering sound from the beach. I saw Kahu far away, silhouetted on the sand. She was standing facing the sea and listened to voices in the surf. There, there, Kahu. There, there.

Suddenly Kahu turned and saw me. She ran toward me like a seagull. ‘Uncle Rawiri!’

I saw three silver shapes leaping into the dawn.