’Ahune
Mauatua/Maimiti
1788

A group of young boys, who had been playing on the sand spit of Matavai, came running with the news. ‘A ship, white men, a ship!’

It was the first Popa’a ship they had seen. Even the adults had almost stopped speaking of such things and little remained at Matavai to remind anyone except a few rusty tools and worn-down blades.

The message flew out in all directions and canoes were already arriving from Pare and Papenoo by the time the ragged ship, with sails hanging in tatters, a few exhausted-looking wretches of men heaving on the ropes, crept into the bay. People watched with dismay as the sailors collapsed on the decks, unable to stand to greet those who were climbing aboard from the canoes.

‘They are sick,’ the word came back. ‘They have been blown off course and have run out of food.’

‘Pah, that ship is stinking!’

‘Food will make them well again. Bring plenty of food!’

‘Are they Peretane?’

‘Where is Tute?’

‘This is not his ship. Tute is dead they say.’

‘That great chief, dead! How?’

‘Killed at Havai’i!’

‘Eaten!’

Aue! A woman began to wail. A row of gaunt white men watched them from the rail of the ship. A ship of ghosts!

The discussions and arguments raged night after night. Some believed the ship of starving white men was an omen of death and destruction, but Taina’s priests assured him that the signs indicated another, more fortunate, vessel would arrive soon. So Taina installed a deputy, Poino, to oversee Matavai, and built him a new house there, ready for the long-awaited foreigners.

Now at Matavai I was a guest at my own birthplace, and understood the destiny of a woman whose cord has been thrown into the ocean. Vehiatua’s curse had returned, it seemed, with that ghost ship, and it was to haunt me long after it had sailed away. I walked up into the mountains, following the steep slippery paths to Hinuia’s cave, and came down again with her incantations hanging on me like garlands of stones, her admonitions flaying my ears, and a new name.

‘You with your painted cloth, you by your white man’s words, you have brought this ship of death! Do you see now that it does not please the gods if you worship the white man’s gods and idols? Tute is dead, they say? Tute has been dead for years, news travels fast in the spirit world. Tute is dead, and the white man is a liar. More war, more disease, more death, that is what the white man will bring. Turn your eyes back to your own land and your own people. Mauatua – Cling-to-the-gods – was the name we gave you. But you should have another name, a name for a woman who waits on the shore. Maimiti – Sickness-for-the-sea – should be your name. May the ocean atua protect you, for you will need them.’

I was at Nu’urua with Rehua and our son when the message arrived that the predicted ship had anchored at Matavai. Rehua commanded a canoe and we sailed back together. From Pare we paddled inside the lagoon and joined the busy traffic of canoes rounding the point of Tahara’a.

And there lay a ship, at last.

Afloat on the singing light of noon.

In a moment I had stripped off my pareu and leapt from the canoe. I dived down and when I came up it was still there. I trod water, laughing, then I swam without stopping, ducking and diving among the canoes which crowded about it, the greenery and flowers strewn on the water, until my fingers were touching its timbers. I swam all around it, and wherever I looked up the men were laughing in the sky, the masts were full of people, girls were diving from the rails, scrambling up the ropes, hands were beckoning to me. From the tip of the prow, where a war canoe carries its ti’i, a carved woman leaned out as if to point the way forward across the waves, her cloak blowing from her shoulders. At the rear a great banner of red cloth was hoisted, pronouncing its origin, its holiness. Peretane! Below it, painted across the stern, framed with flowers and fruits and leaves, were the six signs of the ship’s name.

BOUNTY. A shining silent word, speaking to me.

I kicked back out to the clear water where I could float on my back and see everything. The dog’s-tooth peak of Orohena piercing the everlasting mantle of cloud, dark shadows drifting slowly up and down the valleys. A frigate bird going over slowly, rising and falling in its passage, tipping its head to look down at the new ship. The shining word written everywhere, on the sparkling water, on the sky.

BOUNTY.

From then on I watched. I counted at least forty foreigners, all men, as usual. I was glad.

The chief was easy to identify in his elaborate clothes and big hat, calling orders in a strident, impatient voice. He was quickly recognised as Parai, who had been one of Tute’s underchiefs on his last visit to Tahiti, a friend of Tute. Tapitane Parai, he was called, as if he had taken his dead friend’s place and title. Was he the chief for me, or would he refuse women, as Tute had done?

But he was short, too small for a woman my height, even if he had been attractive. Not Parai then.

Poino came to escort them to his house. Poino the pretender, acting the part of a real chief; Parai followed by two of his hatted underchiefs, their faces running with sweat. Mats were spread. The people crowded around the house curiously. I remembered when Tute had sat here the first time with my grandfather, and I was a little child gazing at him from my grandmother’s lap.

The formalities were long and the white men began to look ill – their clothes were clearly too hot. Poino knew few English words, Parai remembered some Tahitian ones, with difficulty. Poino asked about Tute, the great chief, dead?

I watched Parai carefully. He had large eyes, like a woman’s, and a small, soft mouth. There was fear in them as he looked around at us, blindly. ‘Cook is not dead,’ he said. ‘No, he sends his greetings.’

This caused a stir, a ripple of unease. The white man lies.

Or maybe not. Does it matter when Matavai Bay is full of people and food, when important guests are honouring you, when there are speeches and firing of guns, dances, feasts to prepare for, novelties of every sort, tricks and surprises? It was better than the arioi. Upa upa Peretane! The people rushed to embrace their new friends. ‘Taio, taio!’ was the word. It was a race to claim a taio. Brother friend, to exchange names with, exchange gifts. Honoured guest, honoured host. Taio.

There were plenty to choose from. Tall, short, hairy faced, balding, pale, dark. Even two men dark as ourselves, both in the clothes and decorations of underchiefs. Some scarcely out of boyhood. Others ugly, scarred, toothless, strong to smell from eating dried meat for months. Some noisy, others shy. One who appeared to be blind. All smiling, smiling, happy to see us. ‘Taio, taio!’

It did not take long to see that although Parai was the chief there was another man who was better respected. One of the dark-skinned ones, a strong, handsome man. I marked him well.

Long after sunset people sat watching the lights on the ship, the shapes of men passing across them. Drums were beating again in Matavai, and no one slept yet.

Taina and Itia crept back into Matavai that night, he overland, she by water, in the stealthy manner they had adopted since Pare was ransacked. At dawn they sent to the ship that they had arrived, and were arraying themselves in the best of their remaining finery. Taina had had a pig slaughtered and Itia had managed to appropriate a long sheet of cloth that had been beaten at Nu’urua for a wedding. She chose Vahineatua to be wrapped in it as a gift to Parai. I helped to wind it around her waist until she was padded out so far she could barely move.

‘A nice small girl, she makes the cloth look big,’ said Itia approvingly. ‘We will make the English chief happy.’

‘I think he’ll be difficult to please,’ I said.

‘There will be something he wants, or he is not a man. Hurry with those wreaths, girls. Where is Maunu to fix my hair?’

Parai’s boat, manned by four sailors, was pulled up on the beach waiting to take us to the ship. They stared at us in wonder as we climbed aboard. Taina and Itia went first, not knowing whether to sit facing forwards or backwards. Then there was a scramble for places. Vahineatua, wrapped in the cloth, almost fell into the water. The pig went in with its trotters tied around a bamboo cane, sticking up between Taina’s knees. Maunu, who had managed to get aboard, wearing a headdress of cloth ribbons and fluttering reva reva made especially for the occasion, immediately began to flirt with one of the sailors, and the boat was in an uproar before we had pulled away.

‘Mamu!’ Quiet! We turned to look at who had spoken, standing in the prow. It was the dark one, the chief who was not chief. How did he know our word already? He was smiling at us. ‘Mamu!’ responded Taina, and we all began to laugh again.

‘Pull away, lads!’

‘Aye aye Mr Christian!’

The small boat was heavy with our desires. Taina and Itia’s for the iron and weapons they knew would be aboard, the girls’ for clothes and trinkets. Mauatua’s whole desire stood behind her in the prow. Wedged between Vahineatua and Maunu, she could not see him. Only feel his eyes on the back of her head.

It was a game to get aboard in our long robes. Now I saw why the foreigners wore those two legged garments. Vahineatua, in her bundle of cloth, was carried up on a sailor’s back, but no sailor was game to put Itia on his shoulders. She had to manage the tiny steps, shouldered from below by Taina, losing half her skirt to the sea.

Parai was waiting, the sailors standing back against the rails to make way for us, all eyes upon us. Overhead, the dizzying masts were festooned with more ropes than could be counted.

The greetings were enthusiastic on both sides. Taina and Itia embraced their saviour like a long-lost brother. ‘Taio!’

They presented their oven-ready hog, several baskets of breadfruit, and then called on me to unwrap the gift of barkcloth. Vahineatua and I stepped up before Parai, and as Vahineatua slowly turned, I began to draw the cloth from her, unwinding it arm length by arm length. A murmur of anticipation began to rise from the men as they recognised the intention, and as her nakedness approached it grew to a roar of appreciation. I smelled a wave of masculine lust and remembered the white man at Pare. How I had run from him. Vahineatua stood revealed for only a moment before I enclosed her in her own pareu.

‘All right lads!’ It was Parai shouting this time.

He dismissed them back to their work and invited us to follow him down a narrow staircase into the belly of the ship. Down there it was a goblin world. There were tiny narrow passageways and openings, which Itia kept sticking in. Nowhere could I stand upright. In one place there was a huge metal firebox where two men were stirring food in metal dishes. We could smell the taro and pumpkin that had been traded on board yesterday. Parai showed us to a room large enough for us to all press into. He presented Taina with boxes of metal tools of all kinds, which rendered him and Itia almost speechless with satisfaction, but when Itia received only necklaces and ear drops for herself she soon regained her tongue. ‘Are a child’s playthings a gift for the highest chiefess of Tahiti?’ she said, passing the trinkets to us. ‘I also need axes to cut trees and build houses, tools for the canoe builders, metal for hooks and blades. Do not dishonour me, e friend Parai?’

We saw that Parai did not understand. She pointed to the gifts he had given Taina and said to him, ‘More. For Itia.’

Everybody laughed, she winked at us. ‘Which one of you will bring me the contents of his coat pockets tomorrow?’

‘Maunu,’ suggested someone in a whisper. ‘The queen of pocket thieves!’

I remembered how Tute had terrified the people of Aimeo when his goat was stolen. The Peretane do not admire a cunning theft.

While everyone was admiring the gifts and speculating on the value of the many different blades and items of iron, I slipped away and retraced the narrow passageways to the staircase, intending to see what was happening on deck. As I approached the steps a pair of legs was descending them. Entranced I watched the ankles clad in soft white cloth, the thick breeches, the jacket encrusted with glittering metal, the throat ornament of pleated white cloth. And the smiling face of Titriano. He made way for me, removing his hat and bowing slightly from the waist. ‘Madam,’ he said.

Like a simple girl, I began to laugh, with astonishment and happiness. ‘What is “madam”?’ I asked.

‘A name for a woman of high rank, madam.’

‘What is man of high rank?’

‘Mister, madam.’

‘What is the name of this ship, mister?’

‘The name is Bounty,’ he said.

‘Paunti?’

‘Bounty. Means much much goodness, enough for everyone.’

‘Plenty. ’Ahune.’

‘’Ahune.’

‘Maitai roa.’

‘Very good.’

‘How did you learn our language?’

‘From Captain Bligh.’

‘Is he a good chief, Tapitane Parai?’

‘Very good. My friend.’

‘Taio?’

‘Like taio.’

In the dimly lit space, the whites of his eyes showed, and his teeth. I was close enough to hear his breathing. ‘In Tahiti we do this,’ I said. I came closer and pressed my forehead and nose against his, to exchange our breath. In height we were equal, heart to heart. His ihu flowed into me, I inhaled it deeply, smelling the unfamiliar sharpness. The ship creaked in its timbers as it rocked gently beneath us. His hand on mine was firm, and moist.

‘Maitai roa,’ he said into my ear.

They were the words of a long-ago poet of our people that I whispered in reply, too ancient and vague for him to understand. ‘I am the woman of your longing,’ I told him.

It was a charm, a simple thing. A Tahitian man might have thrown it back at me, laughing, but the white man, the white man was lost. I lifted the wreath from my head, to his. ‘Maeva, maeva, welcome to Matavai.’

Within days Matavai was swarming with people. Envy and craftiness arrived by the canoe load, curiosity came down every path from the valleys, while Taina and Itia and Parai exchanged gifts and visits with endless ceremony. From land we could hear the laughter and cheering long after dark, the firing of guns, the visiting chiefs from other districts invited too, drinking foreign ’ava through the night.

Finally Parai’s desire was revealed. He wanted young breadfruit plants to take to his king. Only breadfruit plants! Of those Tahiti had more than enough. People were pleased when they heard this: It was a good exchange, breadfruit plants for iron, and good to think of the king of Peretane eating Tahitian breadfruit. Taina was elated. The men began coming on shore, putting up their sailcloth houses. Titriano was in charge, but he stripped to the waist like the men and worked under the hot sun.

I watched other women begin to vie for his attention. The sailors had quickly chosen manahune and teu teu women to pair with, but the underchiefs, the officers, were for the high ranking women to choose from. As there were only nine of them, the competition was strong, and more women were arriving every day. Titriano liked to flirt and play and I watched to see if any other woman had tried to break my spell on him. I was extra vigilant with tupu, careful to leave nothing that could be used in a spell against me, not a hair or nail.

I cleared away the vines and weeds that had grown over my old family marae and returned the atua to her altar there. Turning up the secret stones I uncovered the sacred relics of our family: locks of hair, red feathers, and parcels of bones, crumbling like things abandoned. I cleaned them, replaced them wrapped in fresh cloth. The altar was within sound of the white men working. The black ti’i listened. It was what the gods wanted: they wanted to meet the white atua that strode in from another sky.