Garth held the boat steady for Tina to get in. She hesitated before stepping through the shallow water.
“Aren’t you taking the transistor?” she said.
“No. I never do, on the lake,” he replied.
Tina Maxwell pouted. She hardly ever went anywhere without pop music drumming in her ears, and she’d seen the transistor lying idle on the window ledge of the farmhouse where she’d come with her parents to spend the day. Garth was her cousin and they were both the same age, seventeen, but she didn’t know him very well. His family had moved down from the north only recently to take up this farm. Garth was a strange one, Mrs Maxwell said; he didn’t have much to say, but he was good with boats and he’d take her sailing.
“How dismal. There’ll be nothing to listen to,” said Tina.
“You can listen to the lake,” said Garth.
“Has it got its own pop band?” she said, trying to make this sound like a joke.
“Wait and see. Or rather, wait and listen,” was all he said.
The yacht was small and open, with room for only two, and the striped red-and-white sail looked too big for its body but performed well. The breeze blowing offshore took them quickly out onto the wide water in the bright sunshine. Garth wasn’t talking. When Tina spoke to him he answered her questions only briefly. She had nothing to do but watch the shore receding, the shape of the trees round the house, and backdrop of the hills and gullies dark with bush. It was really quite beautiful. Tina loved to sketch: she must memorise the scene so that she could draw it tomorrow…
. . . and then she realised she was not only looking, she was listening; listening to the wind in the sails, the lake water chuckling past, two seagulls crying plaintively overhead.
A delighted smile puckered her face, and Garth noticed.
“Were you listening?” he asked.
“Yes, and looking too. Where are you heading?”
“The other side of the lake.”
“All that far! Won’t we be away too long?”
“I’ve got something over there to look at and it won’t keep. If we get into trouble for being late back, don’t worry, I’ll take the flak.”
Before long, the farthest shore became nearer. It was not very inviting; there were no tall trees standing out from the reeds and the flax. When they came ashore the ground was wet and their feet were squelching over marshy grasses. Clumps of rushes were scattered around like islands. Garth looked carefully into each one.
“What are you after?” said Tina.
“I can’t remember which one it was,” he answered.
Suddenly two birds rose noisily into the air and flew ahead, quite low, flashing their blue wings and trailing their long legs.
“Pūkeko!” cried Tina.
“Silly birds,” said Garth. “They should know better than to give the show away.”
He parted the next clump of rushes to reveal a nest shaped like a shallow bowl, and inside it a huddle of chicks clothed in black fuzz that stuck out stiffly, like fine wire, with outsize beaks poking upwards.
“So that’s what they’re like!” exclaimed Garth, all excited. “I hoped they’d be hatched by now.”
He picked up one of the chicks and held it securely in his hand, laughing at its agitated piping.
“Is it all right to do that?” said Tina. “Won’t you scare it to death, or chase its parents away or something?”
“I don’t think so. Did you follow the films about how they saved the black robins on the Chatham Islands? They shifted them all over the place by hand.”
“Yes, but the robins are an endangered species. They had to take risks to save them. Pūkeko aren’t endangered, are they?”
“No more than other birds – or us for that matter. We’re all endangered species, in a way. Go on, hold one.”
Tina’s chick wriggled and piped so shrilly that she nearly dropped it. “Oh, it tickles!” she said happily. “I’ve never held a baby bird like this before!”
“Worth coming to see, wasn’t it?” said Garth.
Carefully they returned the chicks to their nest, squelched back to the shore and pointed the yacht for home.
“Weren’t they cute, those chicks?” said Tina.
“Cute? They’re incredible. When you think of the adult birds, how they stalk about like lords and ladies in their royal blue and crimson, and flicking their tails in that superior way – and this is how they begin, just balls of black fuzz.”
Tina was astonished. The boys she knew never talked like this. They got steamed up about rugby and cricket, pop bands, cars and motorbikes, themselves and each other. Garth was a strange one all right.
She was going to ask what he meant when he said they were all endangered species in a way; but the gleam of the setting sun on the lake took the question out of her mind. It took longer to sail home because they had to tack against the wind, and navigate through the darkness by the lights of the farmhouse. The evening was warm and there was no possible danger, but when they pushed open the kitchen door, a storm of words broke over their heads: Tina’s mother had just convinced herself that they must have been drowned in the lake.
But it was worth it, Tina told herself when at last she was home in bed, thinking of the lake and remembering the sound of the wind and the water and the seagulls crying overhead, and finding the nest in the rushes.
Next day at school, in her art lesson, she sketched the shoreline of the lake, and then the pūkeko chick in its wiry black fuzz and its outsize beak, nestling in her hand.
It was nearly the end of term and she thought it would be the end of school too; but it wasn’t. All through the summer holidays, in between the beach and the tennis court, she looked for a job. She wanted to be a dress designer, or something else with an artistic side to it. There was nothing. Like so many others, she went back to school to fill in time.
The only lessons Tina took seriously now were in art, where her teacher said she was good, and her painting scenery for the drama presentations. She saw Garth occasionally when her parents had time to drive out to the farm by the lake; but he went to a distant high school, and he wasn’t one of the bunch she spent her spare time with. And the yacht was taken out of the water for the winter, so they didn’t go sailing again.
Because there were no examination goals for students like Tina who would leave school as soon as they had a job to go to, extra subjects were introduced. These included Peace Studies, which didn’t excite Tina at all; it was too much like politics, which was usually rubbished in the Maxwell household. So when Miss Walters was going on and on in class about the effects of H-bombs, Tina switched off her attention. Her father always said it was never going to happen, the big chiefs were too scared of their own skins to let those things go bang. Her mother said they only made them because there was money in armaments and it kept the economies going.
Tina took out her sketch book and turned over the pages, Miss Walters’ voice went rolling over her while she went through the reminders of autumn, winter, spring.
“What’s that thing?” whispered the girl beside her.
“A pūkeko chick,” she answered. And it all came back, the nest, Garth telling her it was all right to pick up the chick and hold it –
And Miss Walters’ voice broke through, saying birds!
“Remember this,” she said. “It isn’t only people we need to think of, it’s the world web of life and the balance of nature. The insects would have the best chance of survival and the birds would have the least, so they’re exposed –”
The horror of it broke over Tina’s consciousness like surf breaking. She put her hand over the sketch, instinctively wanting to protect the helpless chick; then drew it away aware that this was futile. Those little birds, all burned up, stifled or slowly poisoned; and the seagulls overhead, the most exposed of all; the trees and the animals and the people – oh, it was monstrous, that anyone should leave even the slightest chink open, for such a disaster to happen!
Tears pricked at her eyes. Embarrassed, she clutched her sketchbook, muttered, “Excuse me,” and rushed into the grounds and the shelter of a rhododendron bush where she could weep uncontrollably. Now she saw not only the chick but the adult birds flying with their long legs trailing, and heard Garth saying, “We’re all endangered species, in a way.”
What was the use of crying? It was all so hopeless. New Zealand wanted to keep out of the whole thing, being nuclear-free, but if the Northern Hemisphere blew up no place on earth could be isolated. Tina had taken in more of Miss Walters’ information than she thought she had.
The buzzers sounded for morning break. At once the grounds were noisy with students talking, laughing, hassling one another, throwing balls about, taking practice shots at the netball goals. Tina bent her head and stayed where she was, hoping not to be noticed, but a girl slid onto the seat beside her.
“Why did you rush out like that?” she said. “What upset you?”
It was Olivia, not a special friend of Tina’s, but a calm sort of girl who never picked on other people or got nasty. Silently, Tina showed her the sketchbook.
“Hey, you sure can draw!” Olivia said admiringly. “What a funny fellow. What is it?”
“A pūkeko chick.”
“Is that right! But I can’t believe you were crying over a pūkeko chick.”
“Yes I was! Him and all the other birds and the animals and the people . . . what Miss Walters said, they could all be lost forever . . . I’ve never really thought about it before.”
“You pushed it all away. Most people do.”
“Dad says not to worry, it will never happen. So does Mum. They say nobody’s so mad as to drop those bombs in earnest.”
“Huh!” said Olivia. “They were mad enough to drop them on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Bikini and Maralinga –”
“Maralinga, where’s that?”
“Australian desert. They didn’t clear out the Aborigines first.”
“Didn’t they? How horrific!”
“They hushed it up. They don’t tell us what’s really going on, ever.”
“That’s it then,” said Tina. “It’s all hopeless, we can’t do a thing about it. This nuclear-free thing, old Lange thinks it’s great, it’s all right I suppose, but who takes notice of a little country like New Zealand?”
“Is that what your dad says?”
“Yes, why?”
“You quoted him before. I don’t listen to my father. He’s had half his life. We’ve got more to lose than they have.”
“What is in it for us anyway? I can’t see much ahead of me, not even a job. I wouldn’t have come back to this stupid school if I could have found something.”
“You haven’t got that on your own. Me too – but I wasn’t thinking about that. This nuclear thing: if it worries people here enough to get ourselves declared nuclear-free, mustn’t it worry those people still more when they’re near the action, like Europe and Russia and America?”
“I suppose so, but they can’t do anything either.”
“Oh Tina, you have got the miseries bad! Look, you ought to come with us on Friday night, I belong to a peace group –”
The buzzer sounded and the students began streaming back indoors. “I’ll tell you about it later,” said Olivia.
Friday night – and the Maxwells thought Tina was going shopping. Why tell them? She didn’t feel up to any arguments or explanations. It was dark already, clear and cold. As she cycled towards Cathedral Square, Tina saw the first spring blossoms glowing pink in the light of the street lamps.
In front of the Cathedral a cluster of people was steadily growing. Banners were propped up saying NO MORE HIROSHIMAS, and STOP FRENCH NUCLEAR TEST, and FOR A NUCLEAR-FREE AND INDEPENDENT PACIFIC. Tina wandered through the crowd; all sorts were there, old and middling and young, and small children well wrapped up in their padded jackets and hoods. They were all friendly, but she couldn’t find Olivia or anyone else she knew.
A woman stood on the Cathedral steps with a megaphone and made a speech to the passers-by. “Tonight we remind ourselves of Hiroshima and Nagasaki,” she said, “when the atom bombs were dropped for the first time in deadly earnest. Hiroshima was about the same size as Christchurch here, it left a hundred thousand dead – “
“It finished the war, lady,” shouted a man. “I know better than you, I was in the Islands then.”
“It didn’t finish anything!” said the woman. “It’s what it started that counts. We remember those first victims so that it won’t happen again. In Hiroshima they float lanterns on their river in memory of the dead. We have our own Avon River and it flows into the same ocean, the Pacific Ocean that links us together, and we’re going to float lanterns too in solidarity with all who work for peace on earth –”
“Here they come! Make way!” came a voice.
“About time too, I’m freezing,” said another.
A van edged its way through the crowd and stopped near where Tina was standing. Five people sprang out: the driver and his wife, a tall man with a beard, and Olivia, and – why, that was Garth! He disappeared quickly round the other side of the van, and then it was all action as the doors were opened and the lanterns were passed around.
They were simple home-made lanterns. Two pieces of wood placed cross-wise, a candle fixed in a holder at the centre, a surround of white paper to shield the flame from wind, and a wire handle. People were crowding in to make sure they didn’t miss out. The children were eager, it was fun for them. Tina held back, not wishing to push in when she was new to all this – but here was Olivia saying, “Oh there you are Tina! Grab this one.”
Guitars began to play and a woman sang into the microphone “Send the boats away”, the song about the Peace Squadron, the fleet of little boats that went out into the harbour to show the warships they weren’t welcome with their nuclear missiles. “We did succeed about that, didn’t we?” said Olivia. “The Government had to say No in the end.” Then she was gone again.
When the song ended the call came to line up for the march to the river, and the candles were lit. It was a straggling sort of march with no military precision about it, just guitars and singing and big banners and small home-made signs and symbols.
People came out of the shops and lined the pavement, most of them silent, some shouting encouragement, and a few of them abusive. Tina felt oddly exposed, as if all eyes were on her alone, actually marching on the open street.
Garth appeared at her side. “I didn’t expect to see you here,” he said.
“I didn’t expect to see you either. You could have knocked me down with a feather when I saw you get out of that van.”
“Have you come on your own? What does my uncle say?”
“I didn’t tell them I was coming. What about you?”
“They’re all right. I came with a peace group from school.”
“You never told me about that.”
“You never gave me the chance.”
They had come to the river, where the lawns made a gentle slope to the water. Voices were calling, “Garth, Garth! Over here, Garth!”
“Come and see my peace group,” he said.
“I’ll catch you up in a minute,” said Tina, fiddling with her scarf and the buttons on her jacket.
But she didn’t. She let Garth melt into the crowd so that she could take in the scene in her own way. It really was beautiful, with the street lamps shining through the tracery of the leafless branches of the trees, and making golden spotlights on the water. Men with long poles were helping the children launch their lanterns well out into the current. Tina stood back, waiting her turn.
“Can I take yours?” said the tall man with a beard who had come with the van. He was carrying a sort of hoe with three barbed hooks at the end.
“Could I do it myself?” said Tina. She wanted to say, “I’ve marched in front of those crowds and I want to finish it properly,” but she didn’t have to.
“Certainly,” said Bill, giving her the tool.
She found a small space free of people, slipped the wire handle over one of the hooks, and stretched out the pole. The lantern wouldn’t come off; she was afraid to shake it too hard in case it fell in upside down and doused the candle. “Give it a twist like this,” said the man, showing her how. She tried again, the lantern slipped easily into the water and floated merrily away.
People were running along the riverbanks to follow their lanterns, laughing and chattering. The children were having a wonderful time playing hidey and chasey around the trees. The candles twinkled across the twelve metre width of the river. Tina tried to keep her own lantern in view but soon lost it, and ran ahead to watch them pass under a bridge, squeezing a place for herself among the spectators. “Isn’t it pretty?” they were saying.
A man stopped his car just long enough to ask, “What’s all this about?” Nobody answered. I should have told him, thought Tina; and when another man, on foot this time, asked the same question, she was ready. “It’s Hiroshima Day. They float lanterns in Hiroshima in memory of the people killed by the atom bomb.”
“The Japs!” said the man. “Our enemies! You wouldn’t know what they did to us, you weren’t even born!”
“That bomb killed babies who hadn’t done anything to anybody,” she retorted.
This started quite a discussion, which quickly became political. Tina let them argue; she had said her piece and now she only wanted to look, to fix the scene in her mind so that she could capture it on paper tomorrow.
When the lanterns had nearly passed under the bridge she ran on, past the Town Hall with its fountains like glowing balls of dandelion fluff. The river flowed more slowly here and the lanterns kept getting stuck. One brave burly fellow plunged in up to his thighs, squealing comically at the cold, amid a barrage of shouts and jokes from his mates on the bank. The lanterns were released and floated on.
At last they had to be taken out, by order of the City Council which did not want the river littered with derelicts. Olivia appeared at Tina’s side. “I’ve been trying to catch up with you,” she said, “but people kept talking to me. Come on, I’ll shout you a coffee.”
Coffee! Marvellous. Oh, how cold it was! She hadn’t realised before.
Olivia still carried a peace sign and the six or seven people in the coffee bar stared curiously. But soon the whole place filled up. The tall bearded man with the tool came in, and the burly one with his trousers well soaked – and Garth.
“How do you two know each other?” asked Olivia.
“We’re cousins,” said Tina. “It was Garth who found the pūkeko chick.”
“Which got you here,” said Olivia.
“How come?” said Garth, quite mystified.
“I made a sketch of that cute little chick, and Olivia saw it,” said Tina, “and you’d said, We’re all endangered species in a way – oh, I can’t explain! But tonight we’re reminding ourselves of something terrible that has happened and something worse that could happen, and yet it’s been happy too! – and so beautiful; I didn’t know our river could look so pretty. I’m going home to sketch how it all looked from the bridge. I can’t explain that, either. Why should I feel happy?”
“You look prettier yourself now you’ve lost that helpless look,” said Olivia.
‘The Lake and the River’ was most recently published in takahē 100 (December 2020).
Elsie Locke (1912-2001) was a writer, a social historian, one of the pioneers of the New Zealand family planning movement, an activist for social justice, women’s rights, environmental preservation, peace and civil rights. But she is best known as a writer for children. Her children’s books and stories have been treasured by successive generations, and The Runaway Settlers (1965) has been continuously in print longer than any other New Zealand children’s book. She also wrote copiously for adults: books, journalism, pamphlets and poetry.