The flower wreaths have wilted above the soft earth. The petals scatter in the wind, like a host of butterflies, fluttering across the graveyard on a hill at Waituhi.
A small girl chases white wings as they flit and circle above the railway platform. Elsewhere, an old woman cradles a child on her lap, singing the child to sleep. Two lovers hold hands against any invasion of their world.
So many people are here this bright morning. A whole world is with me waiting to travel away on the train to Wellington. A thousand lives revolving, corresponding destinies evolving. Chapters begun, episodes ending, stories continuing. I try to put off thinking about my journey ahead by listening to the strangers around me:
You will look after yourself, Dear … If you love me you wouldn’t be going away … Say hello to Jean when you see her … Thanks for having me …
I am one of these people, Tama Mahana, twenty years old. This is my life beginning. Above the railway platform the large ornate clock snaps the time forward. Five minutes to eight. Only five minutes to go before the train is due to leave. Five, ive, ve, e.
If I could I would grasp those ticking hands and force them back through all those yesterdays gone, just to be with my father again.
Do you remember, Dad, that time when you took me into town one crowded night so many years ago? I was only a little boy then, about five, I suppose.
You wait here, you said. I’ll only be a minute.
You disappeared into the throng and left me on the pavement.
And so I stayed and waited.
Are you lost, little boy? a lady asked.
No, I told her. My father’s just gone away for a while. I’ll be okay, thank you.
So, the lady left me. I wanted to shout: Come back! But she had disappeared.
I waited such a long time, Dad. And I became frightened. All those people, they jostled and pushed against me. They couldn’t see me, I was so small. I felt as if I was in a land full of giants.
In the end I wandered along the streets trying to find you. I pulled at a man’s coat to make him turn around. But he wasn’t you. I went into the shops, pushing between people’s legs. I tried to look in all the dark places, but I wouldn’t go into them because they had too many shadows.
I went to a hotel and I said to the man on the door: Have you seen my father?
Go away, Kid, he growled. You’re not allowed in here.
I saw Auntie Ruth among the crowd. I ran to her, but by the time I got to the place where she’d been standing, she had gone too. So, I sat down on the kerb. I looked at everybody passing. I tried to be brave. Then I saw you. You were looking for me just as I was looking for you. And I shouted:
Dad! Here I am!
And I hit you hard. An adult should never tell a child he or she will only be a minute, they take it literally. And when you don’t arrive they wonder if you ever will.
Don’t leave me again, e Pā. Don’t you leave me like that again.
You promised you wouldn’t.
The clock ticks, the clock tocks. I cannot stop the clock.
You have left me, Father, and this time I can search as long as I like but I’ll never find you.
I better get on the train, I say to my mother.
Already most of the passengers have stepped aboard. And now it is one minute to eight.
Linking arms with her, I walk with her along the platform to my carriage. My sisters and small brother follow after us. Mum is our world now.
Hers is a handsome face, framed with a long, black scarf. The features are sculpted of earth and sky, the chiselled planes have been softened by wind, rain and sun. It is a face that has seen the passing of the seasons and understands that all things decay and fall of their own accord. A calm face, which accepts the inevitable rhythms of life: that the sun rises and sets, night follows day, and that winter always comes.
But death? Coming out of time? No.
This is a woman who would indeed have set out on a snow-filled morning to find her husband and bring him home. Nor was it the first occasion.
On another instance, she looked out the window and saw the hills not drifting with snow but streaming with torrential rain. Her husband was still out there somewhere and her son was with him. And there were more battens to be taken across the river.
She put on her gumboots and a raincoat. Then she went down to the shearing shed where the battens were stacked. She loaded the packhorse with the rails, saddled the pinto, and rode down the track toward the river. Her husband and son saw her coming.
Go back, Huia! Go back!
But she wouldn’t listen. The piebald whinnied with fright at the sound of the torrent and the sight of the rushing water. She screamed at it, and there was fury in her voice. She whipped at the pinto, urging it into the river. And she pulled the packhorse after her.
Dad became anxious because he thought the loading on the battens was not balanced well. If they shifted and if the packhorse happened to slip …
Ka huri, Wife! Go back!
The river was swollen and thick with silt. It roared with the voice of thunder. Every now and then an uprooted tree careened past Mum on the heaving water.
We rushed down to the river, still waving at Mum to abandon the crossing. She took no notice. All we could do was stand there and watch as the pinto and the packhorse battled against the current. Mum held on tightly while the yellow water pounded down upon her. When the piebald hesitated and looked back, Mum wasn’t having any of that. She pulled its head round again, toward the bank where we waited.
Hang on, Huia! Hold fast! Dad cried.
Then: Hup!
Mum commanded the pinto to rise from the river bed onto the shingle. Dad waded toward her to help her. He lifted her from the horse and embraced her in the rain. His voice lifted above the roar of the storm:
Must you always be so disobedient to me?