3

Rats

They drove along the beach next morning, as soon as the tide had gone out far enough. Pop left their bags on the hard sand and drove high up the beach to park the car. The boys lugged the bags over the soft sand to the bach, breathing in the salty, seaweed-flavoured air, the sea breeze ruffling their hair.

By the time Pop came back, they had put the bags in the two bedrooms, collected firewood and done one hundred pulls each on the handle that pumped water into the header tank.

“You boys are worth your keep, all right! Now, I’ll set a cray pot on the reef, Awatea can get seaweed and you—” he handed Tai a rusty screwdriver,
“—are on pāua duty.”

They grabbed a sugar bag, put on their holey old sandshoes and ran down to the sea, leaving Pop way behind carrying a chicken wire cray pot on his head.

Awa didn’t have to go far for karamū. He collected sea lettuce too. Tai turned over rocks, looking for pāua hiding underneath. He made sure to put the rocks back afterwards. They were back at the bach with their kaimoana before Pop. Tai pointed out his red and blue checked shirt waving in the breeze far out by the edge of the reef.

“Tai, it’s lunchtime,” said Awa. “If we cook up some pāua and cut some bread for lunch, we can have the whole afternoon to ourselves!”

Tai sang, “Oh yeah, oh yeah!” and lifted his knees in a dance.

Awa lit the fire in the coal range and shucked the pāua. Then he bashed them a few times with the pāua patu, washed them in a bucket of sea water, sliced them up thinly and dusted them with flour. He put some butter in a pan just as Pop walked in the door.

When lunch was over, the boys took off, leaving Pop to put his feet up. Their bare feet trod in the hoof marks left by Pa Rumble’s draught horse. The Rumbles’ place was up a sandy track away from the sea, sheltered between low hills. Dark macrocarpa trees blocked the southerly winds.

They walked quietly up the steps onto the verandah. The front door was open. Ma Rumble was kneeling on the floor with her back to them, inspecting the contents of a cupboard and mumbling to herself. Large tins and jars were laid out on the floor. Her greying hair was in its usual state of curly disarray. Carrot’s perch was empty.

Awa knocked gently. As she struggled to turn round, Awa said, “It’s only us, Ma. Awa. And Tai.”

“Boys!” She got to her feet slowly. “Come in.” Her apron was damp, and her sleeves were rolled up. She gave them both a warm, plump, floury hug. “You know we hardly see anybody here. Good to see you! I started on a shopping list and ended up going through the cupboards. I s’pose Pop is with you at the bach? That could be good news because I need to get a shopping list together … and a ride to town. We had a rat problem this winter. Carrot was terrible, he hates rats. He squawked all night long. It drove us crazy until we finally got rid of them.” Ma dusted herself down. “Glass and tin containers with good lids! If not for them, we would have starved out here. Toss brought us mutton. He reckons hungry rats travel for miles in winter!”

Awa was glad his friend Toss the shepherd was still on his beat, but he was suddenly worried about rats at Kawa Gang HQ.

“Anyway, Awa, you must be looking for Carrot. He’s at the shed with Pa. I’ll tidy up here, put the kettle on and see you later.”

“Thanks, Ma Rumble. See you on the way back.”

They followed the cart tracks to the seaweed shed among the macrocarpas. The big doors were open. Pa was inside, standing on boards placed on top of a large seaweed bale.

Carrot saw them before they saw him. There was no warning “Look out!” He flew straight at Awa and yelled “Boy!” as he landed on his shoulder. “Boy-Boy,” said Carrot, nodding to Tai.

“Carrot-Carrot,” said Tai, nodding too.

“BOY! BOY!” Carrot yelled.

“Arrr! Come here, Boy-Boy!” called Pa. “I need your youthful vigour! Climb up here.” Pa pointed at the boards he was standing on.

Carrot wouldn’t leave Awa’s shoulder. They climbed onto the back of the seaweed cart.

“Here and here,” pointed Pa. The boys stepped onto the boards each side of him, and he gripped their shoulders. “Arrr! That’s better. I’m going to stand still and you boys jump up and down on the count of three. One, two, three, one, two, three, keep going … that’s it.” Carrot squawked and flapped, but he stayed put on Awa’s shoulder.

The springy dried agar underneath their feet slowly compressed into the baling bag.

“Just a few more jumps, and I can sew this bag up. You better be here next time I do this, eh Boy-Boy? Kawa Gang, seaweed packers!”

As Pa stitched up the bale, Awa spotted some strange objects on the back wall. The boys went to look.

“Sea horses!” Tai shouted.

“Look out!” Carrot shouted.

“I told you I had a collection, boy!” Pa grunted as he worked.

Tai tried to count. “How many?”

“Don’t know, the first one went up there about thirty years ago. Salted in the sea and dried by the sun. Up there, they keep well … might be a hundred by now.”

There were more drying on a bench. Awa picked one up. Hard, knobbly, tight dry skin stretched over bones, not soft and wriggly like the live one he had rescued from a clump of seaweed, washed up in a storm.

“I only keep the dead ones, boy. I put the live ones back. They get washed in with the seaweed. Interesting little critters. The males keep the babies in a pouch.”

“Can I please have one, Pa?” asked Tai, searching through the sea horses on the bench. He picked one up and took it towards the light, looking for a pouch.

“Sure, boy. That one might pong a bit yet. They’re used for medicine in China, worth a bit of money.”

Tai sniffed and pulled a small face. “It smells all right to me. Like goldfish food. But I wouldn’t eat it! Weird medicine. Thanks.” He put it carefully in his shirt pocket.

Carrot, on Awa’s shoulder, murmured, “Find, find, find, find.”

“Sounds to me like your bird needs a walk. Where’s your tomahawk, boy? I might need some kindling later.”

Awa remembered. “It’s at Kawa Gang HQ! We better go and check it out.” But Awa was thinking: “Your bird needs a walk. ”

My bird?

Pa had promised to give him Carrot one day.

Pa Rumble reached under the bench and pulled out a tin with a hole cut in the side. There was a heavy rattle as he shook it. “Take this, Boy-Boy. Rat poison. Put it where Carrot can’t get into it.
I reckon you might have rats up there. Destructive
varmints!”

As they left at a steady jog, Awa said to Tai, “Bloody rats. We left our stuff all packed up and watertight, but they chew through anything.”

The ground beneath the pōhutukawa was littered with bits of the small forest surrounding it. The boys began to climb up to their tree hut. Carrot beat them to it. “Look out, look out, zealots!”

Awa poked his head up over the edge of the platform. “Oh no. What a mess!”

“Oh no! Look out! Zealots!” yelled Carrot.

Awa climbed onto the platform and retrieved the oilskin tarpaulin from the hollow under the roof branch. He unwrapped it and spread their supplies on the mingimingi bed.

“Disgusting rats,” muttered Tai, kneeling beside him.

They shook the blankets. Ragged tufts and chunks of wool drifted up in the air. Rat droppings pattered onto the platform. There were holes in the tarpaulin and holes in the blankets.

Tai threw them over the side. “Rat piss stinks.”

The box was a mess of tattered toilet paper, shredded condensed milk tubes, paper bags and onion skins. The tins were grooved with tooth marks but were still intact. Awa’s friend Tredget had built the hut years ago. He put Tredget’s storage containers to one side and Pa’s rat poison deep in the hollow with the containers back on top.

“Tredget hasn’t been back, or he would have tidied up.” Awa looked at the roof and checked the platform. “Everything else is still good.”

The Kawa Gang carried the tarp and the blankets to the little creek and stamped them into the gravelly bottom to clean them. Soon the tarp and the heavy, dripping blankets were hanging on a branch to dry.

With matches and tea from Tredget’s rat-proof tin, Awa and Tai lit a fire and put the billy on. While they waited for it to boil, Tai swept the tree hut with a leafy broom and stacked some dry twigs and branches in a new firewood pile. Awa washed the billy and their mugs.

“Crusty, Boy! Crusty!” Carrot was hungry.

“Sorry, Carrot, rats ate everything.”

“Zealots!”

Awa remembered his old treasure stash: X marks the spot . He walked back to the pōhutukawa, stepped five paces north and kicked the rustling leaves aside. There. A large X was scratched into the top of a flat rock. He slid it aside and pulled out his treasure jar. Back beside the fire, he unscrewed the lid and fished out the contents.

“Arrr, Carrot, treasure,” he said quietly. “We sold
the ambergris we kept in here, and the money is in the bank, but we have emergency rations. Condensed milk and gingernuts!”

“Shhh, Boy, crusty, mmmm.”

The Kawa Gang sat by the fire and dipped slightly soft gingernuts in their billy tea.

“We can do it, if we wanna sleep out up here again, Tai, but—”

Tai broke in. “We could collect more equipment. There are cupboards in Mrs Carol’s house. No one uses anything in them, or the stuff in her shed. When we get back, we should explore! Maybe Mrs Carol can lend us what we need.”

Awa wasn’t sure about taking stuff from Mrs Carol’s. “Or if Tredget comes back, he can get us stuff.”

“But where is he?”

“Could be anywhere. Or Kim.” Awa gave Carrot a long drink from his mug.

“Mmmm, Boy.” He put his head back and gurgled before swallowing.

“Manners, Carrot,” said Tai.

“Crusty, Boy-Boy,” said Carrot.

Awa watched a sunbeam streak through the trees and light up a shrub with small white flowers. He left Carrot and Tai and went over. “Koromiko! Yes!” As he plucked some of the leafy tips, he brushed against another plant his Nan had taught him about. “Kawakawa too. Here is Nan’s medicine,” he said to Tai. “Good for a sore puku. Try it.”

Tai nibbled a leaf and spat it out. “Tastes OK, but I haven’t got a sore puku. I don’t need one, either.”

“Nan chews koromiko, a bunch like this, seven leaves from the tip. This is what she wants, but kawakawa is good too, for all sorts of things.”