Mornings like this one, where everything was vibrant and silently harmonious, were not uncommon in Harry’s experience, but he hadn’t had this buoyant feeling for quite some time. He wouldn’t say though that he’d been unduly agitated lately. But ever since his electrocution while repairing the spouting his life had been … well, wintry. Yes. He’d hit a few patches of black ice. But today was promising to be a warm and sunny spring day. The air he breathed, ahhh, slipped in and out of his lungs carrying valuable oxygen and indifferent nitrogen but no pollen or spores. Perfect.
Harry focussed on benign concordance again as he stood gazing down at the movements of mercurial light on the surface of Lake Karapiro. He was the shifting glints and the water: he was the air and he was the lake. That was what was good about the day. Sako sat by his feet and Harry realised he had been stroking his dog’s head without thinking. The collie had been unreflectively accepting the movements of Harry’s hand. But in turning this awareness over, now, the harmonic moment faded. If he-and-the-lake-and-the-light had been an instance of meditation then it wasn’t a cranky New Age thing at all. He’d arrived where he was under his own pedal power. Being where you were was pretty important. Saying I am here had all kinds of ramifications – especially when you thought about being somewhere else like Machu Picchu or the mainland.
He was here on this hectare of benevolent earth with his cottage, grass and trees. And his hens and veggie garden. Not forgetting Sako and the Triumph 2.5 TC. He hoped that Shugo and Thomas had had an amicable time together on their drive to Kawhia. Harry could move all these pieces of life around without anxiety. It was just like playing draughts or dominoes.
Sako jumped up and ran towards the gate and Harry heard a car slowing. Perhaps it was Thomas paying a surprise visit and bringing a bottle of that concentrated pine oil. It was too early for the mail and the collie-cross had given up greeting the postie’s car once he realised that edible things were never put in the box.
The entrance to Harry’s property wasn’t visible from where he was standing but he heard the hasp and chain drop against the galvanised farm gate. Sako was barking excitedly. He must know who the visitor was.
A lop-sided, hand-painted white station-wagon was coming slowly up the gravel drive. The noise from the constant velocity joints was horribly familiar. Nuggy, nuggy, nuggy – just like that decaying Subaru he’d once been induced to buy. Sako ran alongside the car which drew level with Harry and stopped. The passenger door opened with a shriek of rusty stays and hinges. Whoever had been driving the car wasn’t visible from where Harry stood. He moved so he could peer inside the vehicle. The driver was lying prone across both front seats with his arms stretched forward. Harry recognised Shugo immediately even though the WWOOFer was face down on the car’s torn upholstery. He was wearing his vintage T-shirt with its cartoon images of Ches and Dale singing the Chesdale cheddar jingle. We are the boys from down on the farm/we really know our cheese.
‘Let me give you a hand, Shu….’ Harry said, but Sako had half-jumped into the car. He balanced on his hind legs like a circus dog and wagged his plume of a tail. He was trying to lick Shugo’s face.
Harry eased his dog out of the way and got hold of the young man’s arms. Shugo’s right leg seemed to be jammed behind the manual gear lever. He would have had more room if he’d stuck the car in fourth, Harry thought.
‘No, please!’ Shugo said. Harry let go of him. One good pull and the Japanese student would have popped out of the car like a slippery calf but he seemed reluctant to accept help. Perhaps the Japanese don’t like close contact with other people. Except in rush hour trains. Or other special circumstances.
‘I am sorry,’ Shugo said. ‘I have to make emergency exit every time.’
‘But where did you get this bomb in the first place?’
‘The South Island.’ Shugo’s voice was muffled. His face was still pressed into the sway-bottomed passenger seat. ‘I bought in Tekapo for eighty dollars full price.’
The Japanese student reached out of the car with both arms and placed his hands on the gravel drive. He eased himself forward, still face down. ‘Ah, ah,’ he gasped. ‘So many small stones.’
‘Why are you doing this like this? Crawling, I mean.’
‘My door is not good.’
Shugo hand-walked on the painful gravel until he could swing his legs out of the car.
‘So where’ve you been hiding the limousine in the meantime?’ Harry walked round the front of the Nissan as Shugo rubbed the grit from his hand and slapped at his orange needle-cord flares.
‘Meantime? Sorry, I don’t understand. My car broke down in Hamilton and now it’s fixed.’
Shugo bent to stroke Sako and then he began to search all his pockets. ‘I have something for him,’ he said.
Harry looked at the driver’s door which was badly dented. It looked as though another vehicle had gone head-on into the Wingroad but this must have happened some time ago. There were rusted areas where the metal had been crumpled inwards. Harry yanked on the door but it wouldn’t open.’
‘You might be able to pick one up at a wrecker’s,’ Harry said.
‘Another car?’ Shugo looked dismayed. ‘I like this Nissan. I will drive it to Cape Reinga.’
‘Not a bad idea,’ Harry said. ‘But I mean another door. There’s a wrecker’s yard in Cambridge.’
Shugo found a small package in his pocket. It was neatly wrapped in foil. Sako sat at attention until the WWOOFer revealed a chop bone. Sako ran away across the grass to bury his new treasure.
‘Good,’ Harry said. ‘You remembered he can’t have cooked chicken bones.’
‘He is very beautiful dog.’ Shugo looked down at his grey running shoes. ‘Is it possible I can stay tonight?’
‘Of course,’ Harry said. ‘Or longer if you want. I’ve started thinking about a conical herb garden.’
‘Ano … tomorrow I must drive up north.’ Shugo smiled at Harry. ‘I wish to see where two oceans join.’
‘Sounds good.’
‘But nothing will be like Lake Tekapo,’ Shugo said. ‘I stay there all day and all night. Looking, thinking, looking. Water and stars. It is the most beautiful place in New Zealand.’
Harry closed the passenger door of Shugo’s Wingroad. He leaned against the car and looked all around his property.
‘It’s pretty good here too,’ he said. ‘But I’m starting to get itchy feet as well.’
‘I have some special oil in my backpack,’ Shugo said. ‘Eucalyptus. It will cure every problem.’