‘What about the parcels?’ Peleiupu asked, immediately after he finished speaking. Arona looked puzzled. ‘We received a big black parcel every so often, and we assumed it was from you.’
‘I forgot about those.’ His eyes lit up with mirth. ‘Yes, whenever my guilt became almost unbearable, I wrapped one up and sent it, and I never knew whether any of them got to you. It was like sending out a plea for forgiveness and praying it got through to our parents and their generosity of heart.’
‘Yes, we got them — or some of them. And Lalaga and Mautu and all of us looked forward to getting them. The parcels became part of The Tales of Arona the Sailor!’ Peleiupu and Tavita laughed.
‘You didn’t come home but the rumours and stories and the parcels did,’ Tavita added. ‘Arona the sailor became a living, fabulous person in Satoa, even though you stayed away.’
‘But he wasn’t enough for our parents, eh?’ Arona asked, sadly. Peleiupu and Tavita looked away. ‘I can never make up for that.’ For a while they sat in silence.
‘What are you planning to do now?’ Peleiupu interrupted.
‘I don’t know,’ Arona replied. ‘I can’t break my promise to our parents.’
‘No, you can’t,’ Areta emphasised.
Right then a short, compact papalagi man in a grey woollen shirt and black jacket slid silently into their midst. He waited politely until he caught Arona’s attention and then said, ‘It’s time.’
‘This is my friend Tom Quitnott,’ Arona introduced him. The man stepped forward and shook hands with Tavita and then Peleiupu, who was surprised to find that the mythical Quitnott was quite small.
Areta got up. Peleiupu moved over and held her. ‘Do you have to go now?’ she asked Areta.
‘Yes,’ Arona said. ‘We’ll get together again soon. Tom will contact you. By that time you’ll have decided whether I’m still worthy of being your brother. I have so much death with me.’
‘You had to do what you had to do,’ she said. ‘God understands.’
‘We’re so happy meeting you today,’ Areta whispered. ‘Arona has yearned for this all his life away from Samoa.’ Arona bent down, kissed Peleiupu’s forehead and pulled away. Tom started heading for the door. ‘We’ll meet again.’ Areta kissed Tavita and then followed Arona.
‘Someone will come and take you back to your hotel,’ Arona said. He put his arm around Areta and steered her out the door. Areta turned, waved, and was gone.
Ten minutes later they had to run through the dark, cold rain to the car that was waiting for them.
In silence the driver drove slowly through the thick deluge, with the windscreen wiper barely able to keep the windscreen clear. Tavita reached over and held Peleiupu’s hand. ‘They’ll be all right,’ he tried consoling her. She shook her head.
Back in their suite, she spent a long time under the hot shower, then dressed in her thick woollen dressing gown and slippers and joined Tavita for the hot tea and biscuits he’d ordered. Her hand shook as she raised the cup to her mouth.
‘Did you believe his story?’ she asked after her third sip.
‘What do you mean?’
‘Just that: did you believe him?’
‘Of course I believed him! Are you crazy? He’s your brother and my friend!’
‘We believed your father’s stories and look how true they turned out to be.’ She was deliberately hurting him. ‘Look what they did to Arona. Even Arona’s way of storytelling is like your father’s.’
‘Pele, my father may have embellished a little …’
‘A little. Huhh!’
‘Why are you doing this? Why are you deliberately hurting me — and Arona and Areta?’
‘Because it was your storytelling father who led him astray.’
‘Astray? What do you mean, astray?’
She placed her cup firmly in the saucer and then, gazing into his eyes, said, ‘You know much of your father’s version of his life was a lie, admit it.’ He looked away. ‘Don’t forget your father bequeathed his official version to Mautu and me, so I know.’ Not long after they’d married, and she could no longer bear his intense curiosity about his father’s life, she’d told him what Barker had written.
‘How do you know that written version is the truth?’ He had her and felt good about it. ‘Because it’s written down? Because in that written version he swears it is the truth?’
‘Bugger you!’ she snapped.
‘Anyway, why would Arona lie to us?’
‘Shut up!’ Trembling and pale with anger, she jumped to her feet.
While she stood there on the verge of tears, he poured her a gin and tonic and whisky for himself. She tried to push the drink away but he opened her fingers, wrapped them around the glass and raised the drink to her mouth. ‘Cheers,’ he said. Reluctantly she took a sip. ‘If Arona is lying, then Blundell doesn’t exist and we’re not in danger. So we don’t need to be afraid,’ he added. She drained her glass and extended it to him. He went to refill it.
Peleiupu mellowed. ‘As I listened to him I had to try to rid myself of all the exaggerated stories, tales, rumours — in fact all the fiction and mythology that he’d become for us over the years, and I tried to see the Arona and Mautu I knew but I couldn’t. And today what he told us about his life is even larger than the fiction we’d inherited. But is it any truer? And I’m trying to believe this Arona doesn’t enjoy manipulating and killing people — that he’s had to do it to survive.’
‘Hold on, darling. Think of some of the methods we’ve used to build up our business and protect our interests and family.’
‘We’ve always stayed within the law.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘We’ve never killed anyone.’
‘We’ve destroyed some people.’
The phone rang. Tavita picked it up. ‘It’s Bart,’ he mouthed. After the call he reported the news to Peleiupu. ‘Like you instructed, Bart and his crew followed Arona and Areta as far as Warkworth. No one was tailing them.’ He came and sat down beside her on the sofa.
‘I’m glad they’re safe,’ she said. She buried her face in his neck. ‘I want to love the Arona we met today. But I’m frightened for them.’ She opened her dressing gown and he nuzzled into the soft, warmth of her breasts and body. ‘They’re family, Tavita. We’ve got to save them.’ He started kissing her breasts. She held his face and, turning it up, she licked at his eyes and mouth. ‘Make love to me, Tavita. I’m afraid!’ she whispered.
They made love, wildly, frantically, wanting to bury their fears in each other.
She couldn’t sleep for a long time, disturbed deeply by the realisation that the history of her aiga, from the first Atua Fatutapu and Sina’s vengeance exercised through the frigate to subsequent Tuifolau, was a story of exacting revenge for any wrongs committed against them. And though she tried, she couldn’t convince herself she wasn’t following that tradition herself. She remembered how she had helped her brother Iakopo die, and she couldn’t dispel the thought. To add to that pain, she couldn’t make herself believe Arona’s story, and that hurt more because her love for him was her life itself.
Tavita was pleasantly surprised when he woke the next morning and heard her humming as she dressed. ‘Hurry up, we have so much to do,’ she urged. ‘I’ve rung Bart about Mr James Blundell. I told him we want to do business with him. That way, we can get close to him.’
When he joined her in the dining room, after a quick shave and shower, she hugged and kissed him, and he recognised she was back to the Peleiupu who knew what she wanted and how to achieve it. ‘It was great last night,’ she grinned.
‘Respectable daughters of respected pastors are not supposed to talk about sex and brag about their multiple orgasms!’
‘You must’ve woken up the whole hotel with your one long, long, long, loud coming!’ she laughed.
When Bart arrived an hour later he confirmed much of what Arona had said about Blundell, and then warned them that Blundell, in his early rise to power in Auckland, had been suspected of having links with criminal gangs in Australia and Asia; even now it was rumoured that his legitimate companies were being used to launder the money from his criminal activities. ‘Why are you interested in him?’ Bart asked.
Peleiupu didn’t hesitate. ‘Mr Service has asked if we’re interested in buying into some of Blundell’s businesses and acting as his agents in Samoa for importing and selling his products.’ Tavita never ceased to be amazed at how easily she could lie. But was it a lie? Or was this the way she was going to approach Blundell?
‘He’s a very scary man, Pele,’ Bart said. ‘A pillar of respectable Auckland society, but scary. You don’t cross him.’
‘You don’t think an innocent, naive, sultry South Seas maiden can do business with him, mate?’ she said, smiling.
Was it jealousy Tavita was feeling as he looked at Bart and recognised admiration and infatuation as he gazed at Peleiupu? He’d seen it before — in nearly all the men who worked closely with her. They all fell under her spell eventually.
She wasn’t in bed. Half-past-one, his watch said. He slid out of from under the sheets, went into the sitting room and switched on the light. The balcony doors were open and he found her in the cane chair, wrapped in a sheet, gazing out at the dark city. The light wind smelled of high tide, and the city rolled away from them towards the gulf in waves of orange, yellow, red and blue lights. Above them, the heavens were a fathomless black silence. Standing behind her, holding her shoulders, he asked, ‘What’s the matter?’
‘I couldn’t sleep. I’m too scared about our inability to protect Arona and Areta. And then the bird visited me.’
‘What bird?’
‘Our bird. You know — the frigate. It flew in from the east through the black sky and over the city and perched on this railing. I came out to it. It was as real as you are now.’ She paused and caressed his hands. ‘It dripped black water and stank of decaying coral, and just stood there staring at me with those fierce, haughty, female eyes. I kept asking it why it had come but it refused to answer, so I said, “Bugger off then. Go on. If you’re not going to be civil, bugger off!” Then the bird said, “It hasn’t taken you long to learn New Zealand English, eh, mate?”’ Tavita smiled.
‘“You’re not supposed to know any English!” I heard myself carrying on that ridiculous conversation.
‘“Ha, I’m not just your kuaback, from-the-bush bird!” it said, puffing up its chest. “I’m sophisticated, highly educated, intellectual, well-read, well-travelled, ageless, and multi-lingual, mate!”
‘“And you’re immortal and an atua, I suppose.”
‘“Too right, bitch!” It flapped its threatening wings and thrust its head and beak at me, its eyes blood-red with anger. “I’m your atua. I know what’s happened, is happening, and is going to happen. Ha!”
‘So I asked it what was going to happen.’
“‘If I told you, you’d almost die with grief!” Then it must have been scared it had said something it shouldn’t have, because it covered its face with its wing and started scuttling along this railing.’
‘I pleaded with it not to go and woke up to find myself in this chair.’
Tavita came around and, kneeling before her, rubbed her cold hands.
‘Why did the bird come?’ she whispered.
He helped her up and they returned to bed.
Except for the receptionist at the desk, the hotel lobby was still empty of people. Tavita stopped and looked again and saw Bart in the armchair at the far side. Bart had rung him to come down. Tavita hurried over. Bart held his arm and steered him away from the reception area.
‘Did you listen to the news this morning?’ Bart asked. Tavita shook his head. ‘There’s been an accident.’ Stopped. ‘Up North, near Kaikohe — a car went off the road into a gorge.’
‘And?’
‘They were killed.’
‘Who?’
‘The couple in it …’
‘Do we know them?’
‘It just said they were Maori, and the police are trying to contact their relatives.’
‘It’s not them — it can’t be them!’
‘I’m going to Kaikohe to check.’
‘Who’s going to tell Pele?’ Tavita heard himself pleading.
‘Better wait until we know for sure,’ Bart said, avoiding the responsibility.
Once Tavita was back in the suite he downed two quick whiskies and then ordered breakfast. When he went into the bedroom she was at the dressing table putting on her make-up. ‘Do I look devastating?’
‘Yes, darling, absolutely killing!’
‘Enough to melt the hard hearts of hard-hearted palagi lawyers and gangster businessmen?’
He tried to laugh. ‘Yeah, but what about the ones without hearts?’
She got up and, straightening her dress, said, ‘I never thought of those.’
‘Pele, they have other organs you can melt!’ She hurried over and they held each other for a long time, laughing intermittently.
At breakfast he suggested that their programme for the day should include a meeting with Mr Service to arrange a meeting with Blundell — perhaps in the following week; finalising the contracts for their cinema in Apia; booking their return fares on the Matai — perhaps in a fortnight’s time; having afternoon tea with their copra agents, and signing contracts; telegramming Mikaele about the shipments of goods to Apia for their stores; and having dinner with their children. He was surprised when she agreed to all of it. He rang Pierce to come and pick them up.
Before they left the hotel he sneaked another whisky. Throughout the day, while fulfilling their schedule, he would continue drinking without her knowing, and keep hoping and praying for good news from Bart.
Next morning, Tavita woke for the early news. Nothing about the accident. Anxiously he continued waiting for Bart’s call. He paced the room and finally relented and took his first whisky for the day — and hated himself for being so weak.
At first he didn’t hear the cautious knocking. Then when he heard the distinct rap-rap-rap he rushed to the door and pulled it open. An unshaven, tense Bart stood in the doorway. Behind him, avoiding his eyes, was Tom Quitnott; he too looked as if he’d been up all night.
‘We tried to get here as soon as possible,’ Bart said. Tavita stepped aside and the two men came into the room. ‘I’m afraid it’s bad news,’ Bart said. ‘Arona and Areta were the couple in that accident.’ Tavita wanted another drink to still the shuddering that was surging from his belly and radiating out to the rest of his body. ‘It looks like an accident and the police believe it was.’
‘But I know it wasn’t,’ Tom said quietly. ‘Arona told me it was going to be this way.’
‘Do you want me to tell Pele?’ Bart asked.
Tavita shook his head furiously. ‘I can do it.’ Bart poured him a whisky. Tavita declined it. ‘I’ll wake her up.’ He started for the bedroom. But Peleiupu, in her white dressing gown, was already emerging. Tavita looked at the other two.
‘It’s bad news, isn’t it?’ Peleiupu asked, looking at Bart.
‘Yes, it’s bad news,’ Bart replied, avoiding her eyes. ‘They’ve been killed.’
What she did next would stay with Tavita for a long long time. There was no visible sign of shock, horror, grief or anger. ‘Sit down, gentlemen,’ she said matter-of-factly. She sat down on the sofa and patted the space beside her. Tom sat there. ‘I expected it,’ she said. ‘The bird came and told me the other night.’ When she saw Bart’s puzzled look, she added, ‘The frigate bird is our family’s god.’
‘It was my fault, Mrs Barker,’ Tom said. ‘I allowed him to hesitate, I offered him the wrong option, I allowed him to see you and thereby come out of hiding, and I didn’t provide them enough security and protection …’
‘It was also our fault,’ Pele interrupted. ‘By insisting that we meet them, we forced them out of hiding.’ She paused and then, touching Tom’s arm, added, ‘It couldn’t have ended any other way, eh?’
‘Arona was the only human being I trusted with my life. He and Areta and Naomi are my family, the only one I’ve ever known,’ Tom said. Tavita noticed there were tears in his eyes.
Peleiupu straightened up, smoothed her hair, clasped her hands in her lap and, face utterly composed, declared, ‘We must observe a time of mourning, and make sure they have a proper funeral and cremation.’
‘But we can’t wait,’ Tom said urgently. ‘Blundell may act now — against us!’
‘It is our way,’ she ordered. Again she touched Tom’s shoulder, gently. ‘We’ve arranged to meet Blundell next week. I’m sure he’s curious about us. Let them suffer, too, worrying about what we’re going to do.’ Tom bowed his head. ‘Bart, I want you to take some of your staff and make sure all the funeral arrangements are done properly. Don’t be extravagant — we don’t want public attention. Tavita will come with you.’ She turned to Tavita. ‘I know, darling, it is not our way to have cremations, but it is the only way we can take Arona and Areta to Samoa and home.’
‘What about Naomi?’ Tom reminded them. ‘I want to take her to her parents and their funeral.’
Peleiupu was now in full command. ‘No, you will stay with me. We have many things to do. Tavita will take Naomi.’
‘But they’re after her too — she’s not safe!’ Tavita protested.
‘We want them to know where she is, just as they know where you and I and our children are. With us and our loved ones in their full view, they know we can’t retaliate against them because they can see what we’re doing.’
‘What if the press gets hold of Arona’s real identity?’ Bart asked.
‘I’m sure Mr Mullheath won’t want that,’ Tom replied. ‘Not yet, anyway. The press may trace Arona back to him and his dirtier earlier life.’
‘Areta and Arona should be cremated under their present identities,’ Peleiupu said. ‘By the way, encourage the police to believe it was an accident.’
Tom rang Naomi’s school and, after talking to the matron, told Tavita Naomi would be waiting for them when they got there. ‘When we get there her name is Naomi Waihiri. That’s her mother’s maiden name.’
Quickly, Peleiupu packed a bag for Tavita and one for herself — she was to spend two days with Tom.
No one said anything as Tom drove them to the school. They all expected a long trip into the country but at the bottom of Queen Street, Tom headed up through the university to Parnell and St Stephen’s Avenue. Queen Mary’s School for Maori Girls was down a driveway lined by flax and shrubs.
‘Is this it?’ Tavita asked. Tom nodded.
‘Right under their noses: good move,’ Bart said. ‘I thought you had her hidden in the wop-wops!’
‘She’s waiting in the matron’s office,’ Tom said.
When they got out of the car Tavita glanced up at Peleiupu. She looked tense and upset. He held her hand. ‘I’m sure she’s a strong child,’ he said in Samoan.
They followed the other two down a long corridor that smelled of long wet days. Some of the students smiled and nodded as they passed. At the door of the office Peleiupu stopped, turned and started retreating. ‘It’ll be all right, I’ll handle it,’ Tavita said, releasing her hand. He followed Tom and Bart into the office.
He stopped as soon as he saw the teenage girl Tom was embracing and kissing on the cheek. When she turned and looked at him, he almost gasped. Lalaga. The same prominent forehead and deep-set, alert eyes; the same slow, winning smile; the same long torso and short limbs. ‘This is your Uncle David,’ Tom introduced him. ‘You know, the one your dad keeps talking about?’
She stepped towards Tavita. ‘Kia ora, Uncle,’ she said. ‘Did you come all the way from Samoa?’ He nodded, unable to speak. ‘Did Aunt Pele come with you?’
‘Yes, I did,’ Peleiupu’s voice rescued him from tears. Peleiupu stepped past him and swept Naomi into her large embrace. ‘You look just like Lalaga, your grandmother. We’re happy, so happy to meet you at last.’
Tavita bent down and kissed Naomi on the cheek. ‘Your grandmother was a very strong woman,’ Tavita said. ‘Your aiga has always had exceptional women.’
‘And a few exceptional men,’ Peleiupu added. She sat down with Naomi, holding her hand.
‘Like your dad and your grandfather Mautu.’
‘Are you strong too?’ Peleiupu asked. ‘Your Uncle Tom tells me you are strong.’ Naomi nodded hesitantly, and waited. ‘Because you’ve had to help your parents and protect yourself, eh?’ Naomi nodded again, this time more resolutely. ‘You’ll be able to meet your cousins Lefatu, Maualuga and Iakopo very soon. They’re going to boarding schools right here in Auckland. You want that?’ Naomi nodded again and waited. They suddenly didn’t know how to go on; they couldn’t look at one another.
‘You know your mum and dad and I have been preparing you for this, eh?’ Tom found another way, finally. She nodded and continued waiting. ‘So you know what has happened?’ She winced and nodded and waited, her grip around Peleiupu’s hand tightening. ‘Is your bag ready?’ She nodded and rose to her feet.
They watched her as she walked across the floor and picked up her black bag, which was lying by the matron’s desk. ‘I’m ready,’ she declared.
She refused to let anyone touch her as they hurried to the car.
They stopped beside a burgundy car parked by the wharf. Peleiupu hugged and kissed Naomi. ‘Be brave,’ she whispered. She kissed Tavita and got out hurriedly with Tom. They waited until they saw them disappearing around the corner, heading north; they were to return in two or three days’ time.
‘Some of my men are up there already,’ Tom informed her. ‘They’ll work with Bart, and they’ll make sure nothing happens to Naomi.’ He opened the door and she got into his car. ‘You’re too trusting, Mrs Barker,’ he said when he was seated behind the wheel.
‘And you don’t know much about me, Mr Quitnott,’ she countered. But for the first time she was wary of him.
‘I have a letter that Arona left for you,’ he said as they drove into Freeman’s Bay, a run-down, shabby neighbourhood in the centre of the city.
‘We don’t have much time to prepare,’ she said.
‘For Blundell and his crew?’ he asked. She nodded. ‘We don’t need much time. Arona has already prepared me and some of our blokes for that purpose. Just tell us when, Mrs Barker.’
‘Don’t tell me that part. Just let me know about his other activities and what he and Areta wanted for Naomi’s future.’ She paused, and looking cautiously at him, added, ‘I’ll let you know about that other move before we leave for Samoa.’
‘When do you meet Mister Blundell?’
‘Next Friday, mid-morning.’
He drove the car into a small garage in front of a villa that was wedged in between two others in a narrow street of villas. He took her bag and she followed him through the tar-smelling garage and along a path around to the back of the house and a small vegetable garden bordered by what she thought were papaya trees. ‘A couple use the house as if it’s their home. They won’t be in while we’re using it.’ He unlocked the back door and she followed him into the neat, warm, well-lit kitchen and dining room. ‘Apart from a few trusted people I’m going to bring to meet you, no one else will know we’re here.’
‘I like it,’ she said. Family photographs, comfortable sofas and chairs, trophies, ornaments on every surface as if it were still Victorian times, a wood fire in the fireplace ready to be lit, and above the mantelpiece a framed photograph of a majestic Mt Everest.
‘The house is always fully provisioned. I’m not much of a cook, though.’ When she didn’t offer to do the cooking, he said, ‘Your brother was a bloody good cook. I loved all the island dishes he made.’
‘I don’t want any tears or sorrow,’ she heard herself saying.
‘Sorry,’ he murmured. ‘I’ll show you your bedroom.’
A few minutes later, back in the sitting room, he asked if she wanted to see Arona’s letter. She hesitated and then said yes. He handed it to her. ‘I’ll leave you alone. Call me when you’re ready to start work,’ he said.
The small white envelope had only one sheet of paper in it, she figured. She fingered her name on the envelope. Pele, was all it said, yet she was afraid to open it, for with it would come a responsibility she believed she wasn’t ready or able to assume. She wandered over to the glass doors, which opened out to a garden that smelt of ripe compost. A flash — a white cat scuttled through the vegetables and up into the shrubbery.
She sat down at the hefty rimu dining table and didn’t falter as she peeled up the back flap, pulled out the folded sheet of paper and spread it out in her hands. His handwriting hadn’t changed much — it was still ornate, with wild flourishes and large rounded letters:
Pele, lo’u tuafafine pele,
In the time I’ve been away from our beloved Samoa I’ve lost most of the Samoan language I knew. I want so much to talk to you in the language of our childhood and growing up, but I can’t.
You are reading this short letter because Areta and I are dead. (I instructed Tom to give it to you only if that happened.) I hope with all my heart that Naomi is alive and with you. If she isn’t then I’ve wasted my miserable life.
I have set up the Satoa Trust with you as its sole trustee. It is to be used to care for, protect and help Naomi and our aiga. My lawyers and Tom will give you all the details. All my legal businesses are in that trust.
My ‘other’ businesses and investments I leave to Tom and to you to do with as you wish.
Areta and I want you to care for Naomi as one of your own children. We want you to take her to Samoa with you and raise her in the life I chose to leave. I want her to grow up and be like you and Aunt Lefatu and Ruta and Naomi in that long genealogical line of the Atua Fatutapu and the frigate bird.
I chose to explore the world, and look what I found. Areta and Naomi and my own sister and aiga again. I’m also proud that I’ve kept my final promise to our parents.
I hope my beloved Areta and Naomi can forgive me.
My alofa to you and Tavita and our sisters and aiga.
Arona.
She refolded the letter and slid it into her pocket. While the afternoon shadows lengthened across the garden and started crawling up the houses behind them, she stood at the glass doors, gazing out and recalling the life she’d enjoyed with her brother and sisters and parents, and what it could’ve been if Arona hadn’t left home.
They worked deep into the night, with Tom detailing the structures and personnel and connections in and of all their organisations and activities. Every time he stopped, she prompted him with questions. She came to admire his memory and ability to shift and connect and relate the important details and themes and people. She kept notes on this information. He complained of a headache finally and staggered off to bed. She showered, had a cup of tea and, though fearful and anxious about Tavita and Naomi, fell asleep quickly.
He had a simple breakfast of toast, tea and marmalade ready when she woke. During breakfast he declared he was ‘full of beans, ready ta eat up the whole planet and the evil Blundell monster!’ There was a cunning, intelligent, calculating, better-be-careful-of-me Tom who, once committed, wouldn’t quit, but there was also a childlike Tom who didn’t seem to understand the simple, ordinary things of the everyday world, she observed.
During that day Tom brought to her Arona’s lawyer and other people. From them she collected detailed information about the trust and Arona’s other businesses.
For a frightened while she didn’t understand why she was sitting up in bed drenched with sweat and crying and shivering. She stripped off her nightie and, while drying herself, remembered her dream, full of ominous one-eyed creatures with steel scales and long talons who, as she approached them, turned into fiery missiles that shot at her, zinging violently past her ducking head. When she couldn’t shake off her fears she hurried out to the back veranda and watched the dawn spilling across the city.
Later Tom walked onto the back veranda and found her praying. Politely he sat down and waited for her to finish. ‘Do you do that often?’ he asked.
She gazed at him in disbelief. ‘Yes, I do it regularly. Our family is of the church. We are staunch Christians.’
‘Yeah, Arona and Areta used to have — what do you call it in Samoan?’
‘Lotu?’
‘Yeah, that, every Sunday evening.’ He pondered for a while. How could a man who had killed and destroyed others be such an innocent? she thought. ‘I don’t know much about religion,’ he said. ‘There wasn’t any of that in the foster homes I was in.’
‘The Bible is a very beautiful book,’ she tried to encourage him.
He got up and retreated into the house. When she went in a few minutes later, he was cleaning the kitchen and stoking the coal range.
‘All right, mate, seeing you’ve been good, I’ll cook us a Samoan lunch.’
‘Just give me a list of the stuff and I’ll go and get it.’
‘It’s Sunday, no shops are open.’
‘Hell, what’s the bloody use of having connections if ya can’t get groceries and food on Sundays!’ She slapped him on the shoulder, playfully.
When he returned, he boasted he was an expert table-setter — Areta had taught him. That had been his contribution to their meals. So while she cooked, he set the table. The food was ready within two hours and she carried it out to a perfectly set table: white linen tablecloth and serviettes in real silver rings, silver cutlery and expensive crockery and glasses, Samoan pandanus tablemats, and a vase of tiger lilies, ‘Areta’s favourite flowers’.
‘You do know how to set a table!’ she congratulated him.
‘Jesus, I’m as hungry as an empty dunny!’ he said to cover up his embarrassment at her compliment. Such a colourful but inappropriate remark, she thought.
They sat down. He immediately started dishing out the food but stopped when he noticed she was looking at him. ‘Let us pray,’ she said, bowing her head.
After grace he waited for her to start. ‘I know all the dishes you’ve cooked,’ he said. ‘That’s sapasui, that’s oka, fa’alifu fa’i, and of course cucumber and vinegar salad, and whole baked snapper.’
Surprised at his correct pronunciation, she asked, ‘Who taught you the language of the civilised?’
‘Arona. Cunning bugger refused to let me taste any of the food until I could say the names correctly. Boy, did I learn fast!’
She started heaping food on to his plate. ‘Your reward.’
He was a neat but fast eater. She tried not to look at him as he ate. Every time his plate was half empty she heaped more food onto it. ‘Will you be able to find the people who were hired to do it?’ she asked.
He nodded. ‘When I find them, what do you want done with them? Remember they were just doing a job they were paid to do.’
‘Are you saying they bear no share of the responsibility for it?’ He refused to answer. ‘Nothing will be done with them until I say so,’ she instructed.
‘Okay, boss,’ he said, and then started digging into the side of the snapper.
‘Please don’t call me that again. I’m not part of …’ She couldn’t say it.
He paused in his eating and looked unwaveringly at her. ‘Are you sure, Mrs Barker? Arona was your brother, family, blood. And that blood is pumping wildly’ cause you’re enjoying the game, the hunt, eh?’
It was early Tuesday afternoon when Tavita, Naomi and Bart returned. After Peleiupu brought Naomi into the suite and they embraced and cried together, Peleiupu said, ‘You’re staying with us now. You don’t have to go back to school.’
‘She was very strong and brave up there, but it’s been hard for her,’ Tavita said. ‘She should try and sleep.’ He handed Peleiupu Naomi’s bag.
As she steered Naomi to her bedroom Peleiupu said, ‘We’ve prepared this room for you, and tomorrow you’ll meet your cousins.’
Tavita went to the bar, and got a beer for Bart and a whisky for himself. ‘Where shall I put this?’ Bart asked about the large carton he’d brought in. Tavita indicated the side-table by the mantelpiece.
‘It’s so bloody sad,’ Tavita sighed, sinking into the armchair. ‘All her short life she’s had to learn to live under another name and help protect her parents.’
‘Kids usually find it difficult to keep secrets, but she has. She coped hell of a well up there.’
‘Yes, but how do you live with the pain of your parents’ death?’ Tavita murmured.
Peleiupu returned, saw the carton and went to it. ‘Is this it?’ she asked.
‘The urns are in it,’ Bart replied.
She caressed the top of the carton. ‘How was it in Kaikohe?’
Bart glanced at Tavita, who appeared to have withdrawn into himself, so he told Peleiupu about what had happened: how when they’d reached Kaikohe the police had released the bodies to them with the official verdict of death by accident; how they’d hired funeral directors and the bodies were prepared and laid out in their coffins in the funeral parlour; how they had then taken Naomi — poor, poor kid — in to be with her parents, and she’d tried not to break down. ‘But when she got to her mother, she …’ Bart stopped, unable to go on.
‘She cried, but there was no sound,’ Tavita continued in Samoan. They remained silent for a while. ‘You should’ve been there, Pele.’ She didn’t react and that annoyed him more. ‘Naomi didn’t want to leave her parents.’
‘We managed to get her to our hotel and got a doctor to see her, give her a sedative …’ Bart said.
‘Yeah, you should’ve been there,’ Tavita insisted.
‘I had other things to attend to,’ she stopped him.
When Bart saw the anger in Tavita he said, ‘We had a service at midday the next day. The funeral directors provided a minister. He was Maori: a wonderful man who befriended Naomi immediately.’ He paused. ‘Apart from us and two of Tom’s men and the local police sergeant there was no one else at the service. It was obvious Areta and Arona had kept very much to themselves. Tavita said a short eulogy in Samoan. The minister prayed for their souls …’
‘And that was it before the flames turned them into ash,’ Tavita interrupted. ‘A convenient form for us to carry to Samoa.’
‘Were they there?’ Peleiupu ignored Tavita and asked Bart.
‘They probably were but I didn’t care if they were. As you’ve said, it’s best that you’re out in the open, in their full view,’ Bart replied.
‘I’ve arranged a family service for Arona and Areta tomorrow evening at the Catholic seminary in Ponsonby,’ she told Tavita.
‘We’re not Catholics!’
Again ignoring his anger, she said, ‘Father Tomasi, your friend, is staying at the seminary and he’s agreed to conduct a simple family service.’ Tavita drained his glass. ‘I thought it’d be appropriate for Naomi and our children and us to be there as an aiga.’ He remained silent as he held his empty glass out to Bart. ‘We’ll have a full, proper service for them when we get to Samoa.’ She stopped and then asked, ‘Is that all right?’ He started on his third drink. ‘Have I done something wrong?’
Tavita shook his head. ‘No, Pele, you never do anything wrong. Everything you do is perfect. You always decide everything, you …’ He jumped up and stormed away into the bedroom.
‘He’s very tired,’ Bart said. ‘He’s been through a hell of a lot.’
‘So have we all.’
‘I’m going home to get some rest. Is there anything you want me to do before I go?’
She shook her head. ‘I’ve talked to Mr Quitnott about things. There are matters I’d like your advice on but they can wait.’
‘Pele, I’m sorry about your brother and Areta.’
‘Thank you for all your help since we got here.’ He turned to leave. ‘By the way, do you have a family?’
He nodded. ‘A wife and two daughters.’
‘Would you like to bring them to the service tomorrow night? We’d love to meet them.’
He hesitated. ‘My wife and I are separated. She’s got the girls in Wellington.’
She didn’t know what to say. He left quickly.
The west was aflame with the colour of blood and rich sea-egg roe as Pierce drove Tavita and Naomi and Peleiupu through the arched gateway of the seminary. Bart had gone to pick up the children.
At the bottom of the chapel steps stood Father Tomasi. His white mane and black soutane glittered in the sunset light and made him appear to be floating.
Father Tomasi stood on the running board and opened the car door. Tavita stepped out and they kissed each other on the cheek. ‘I’m sorry, so sorry about your brother and his wife,’ Father Tomasi said to Peleiupu as he embraced her. ‘And who is this beautiful young woman?’ Father Tomasi greeted Naomi.
‘Naomi, my niece,’ Tavita replied. Father Tomasi embraced Naomi.
The other children arrived with Bart, and Father Tomasi greeted them enthusiastically. Then Peleiupu introduced them to Naomi. Looking solid and formidable in their school uniforms, Lefatu and Maualuga hugged and kissed Naomi and then held on to her arms.
Pierce got the carton out of the car boot. Tavita took it from him and followed the others up the steps.
The small chapel with the high dome was austere and bare. Its only extravagance was the five stained-glass windows through which the sunset was now pushing a slowly moving, psychedelic light. The altar was covered with a shimmering ie toga; on it was a stand of burning candles. The combination of lights made them appear unreal, without form.
As the others took their seats in the front pews Father Tomasi took the carton from Tavita, opened it, wiped the urns with a white silk cloth and and placed them at the centre of the altar. Tavita turned to see who was behind them. Bart sat at the end of the back pew. Out of the darkening doorway stepped Tom, who acknowledged him with a nod and walked right up the aisle to sit down beside Naomi, who immediately held on to his arm.
Father Tomasi cleared his throat, then welcomed them in Samoan oratory. Not once did he make a mistake in the genealogies of the Aiga Sa-Sao and the Aiga Sa-Tuifolau, or in the appropriate oratorical language. ‘On behalf of our spiritual family here in Ponsonby, I welcome you this evening,’ he switched to English. ‘I greet you in the name of our Lord and Saviour. We are gathered here as an aiga to welcome back to our midst our beloved Arona and Areta …’ Tavita heard a muted sobbing; he refused to look at the children. When he remembered that, as head of their aiga, he had to speak later on, the tension in his chest and belly worsened. All he’d intended was to bring his family on a holiday, put the kids into school, do some business, and look for and find Arona. End of story. But look where they were now.
He surfaced from his fears when Peleiupu and Iakopo started singing Arona’s favourite Samoan hymn.
He joined in, and so did his daughters.
After the hymn, Iakopo went up and read from Ecclesiastes, a passage that Peleiupu had chosen. Tavita’s anger at Peleiupu mounted again as he listened to his son’s reading. She controlled everything, even this service was hers, part of the dangerous game she thrived on, risking even their children’s lives.
‘Papa, they’re waiting for you,’ Maualuga whispered. He stood up and hurried to the front.
In formal Samoan oratory he greeted Father Tomasi and the other visitors, describing Tom Quitnott as ‘Arona’s true friend and brother’. He avoided looking at Naomi as he spoke. ‘… We came to New Zealand to look for Arona. God was kind. He led us to Arona and to the magnificent lady he chose to love and marry, Areta, and to their wonderful daughter, Naomi.’ He was weakening, but he held on. ‘Tragically, Arona and Areta were killed in a motor accident.’ He paused, swallowed. ‘We can never read God’s way; we can’t always hold on to the people we love …’
He felt weak and drained when he returned to his seat. Maualuga moved up against him and held on to his arm. He would avoid Peleiupu for the rest of that evening.
After the service, Iakopo and Lefatu picked up the urns. Peleiupu invited everyone to their hotel for dinner. Tom declined and left. Once outside in the falling dark, all the children chose to go in the car with the urns, with Bart as their driver.
During dessert, Peleiupu announced that after it, all the young people were going to bed. They didn’t object. ‘May I sleep with Fatu and Maua?’ Naomi asked.
‘Of course you can,’ Peleiupu replied. ‘Iakopo can shift into our suite.’ She’d booked the adjoining suite for the children.
A few rushed minutes later Peleiupu thanked Father Tomasi, said goodnight, and left with the children.
Tavita didn’t want to be alone with Peleiupu. Not yet. So he offered his guests port, liqueurs and cigars. Bart and Pierce declined and left. After the service, Tavita had been hanging out for his first drink, and he hadn’t cared who noticed how greedily his mouth had grabbed at the glass, hadn’t cared if they’d heard his relieved sigh as the first sip had slipped smoothly down his throat and chest, warming him through. But after that first drink — and he’d really looked forward to a night of heavy drinking with Father Tomasi — his thirst had vanished. He’d tried enticing it back with the second drink, but it had refused to be enticed. During the meal, he’d noticed that Father Tomasi wasn’t drinking much either.
While they lingered over their cigars, Father Tomasi told him he’d run into Bernie Griff and his wife Bileen in Wellington. Immediately Tavita’s thoughts moved to Bileen. How he wished he was with her, away from this pain and trouble, immersed mindlessly in the ecstasy and voluptuous heat of sex … He stopped that interior surge of euphoric escape: it was inappropriate, callous, sinful at this time of mourning and sorrow.
Peleiupu’s bedside lamp was still on and she was lying with her back to him. He undressed quickly and slipped into bed.
‘What was that all about?’ she accused him over her shoulder.
He deliberately took his time. ‘What are you talking about?’
‘Don’t play games with me, David!’ She called him David whenever she was angry with him. He felt her turning around. ‘You’ve been angry with me ever since you got back from Kaikohe.’
He turned his back to her. ‘I’m tired.’
She scrambled up and knelt behind him. ‘Do you think it’s been easy for me?’ He refused to reply. She grabbed his shoulder. ‘I’m trying to organise things so it’ll be easier for you and every one else!’
‘Bullshit!’ he snapped, rolling onto his back. ‘It’s all for you, Pele. You’re obsessed with controlling everyone and everything!’
‘God, you’re stupid!’ She drove her fist into his chest. He caught her hands and held them.
‘You enjoy controlling and manipulating the people around you — me, your kids, Bart, all your hapless servants. You didn’t even love your brother deeply enough to take his daughter to his funeral.’
‘That’s not true!’
‘You don’t like what Arona became, darling? Just take a good look at yourself!’
‘You’re just jealous!’
‘You’re not doing this out of genuine love for your brother, but because you’re enjoying avenging his death — you don’t like losing to anyone, ever.’
‘Does that mean you’re not going to help me?’ She was now astride him, trapping his hips between her thighs.
‘Too right I am, but it’s not going to be good for us.’
‘You’re just scared of …’ She tried to free herself as he wrapped his arms around her and pulled her down towards him, and started kissing her breasts. ‘That hurts!’ she cried as he sucked her left nipple. When he refused to release it she reached down, grabbed his genitals and squeezed. He tried to wrench his hips away but she held on. The cutting pain shot up into his belly. He released her nipple.
‘Fuck you, fuck you,’ he murmured.
‘Fuck you too, fuck you!’ She wrapped her arms around his neck, pressed her forehead hard down on his, raised her hips and then came down and around him. And held him and held him.