‘Simeon? Are you awake?’
‘No.’
‘The cows are waiting,’ Glory said. ‘I’ve already got them in the bail. Hurry up, otherwise we’ll be late for prayers again.’
‘I’ve decided to take the day off.’
‘Si-meon.’ Glory came in, eight years of sunshine and innocence. ‘Come on. If we’re late today of all days, Grandfather will get really angry.’
‘Anybody would think the sun shone out of his bum,’ I said.
Glory gasped. ‘Wash your mouth out with soap and water!’ She began to pull at the blankets.
‘Ouch,’ I said. ‘You go on.’
When she left I lifted the blankets and looked down at myself. I punched the air. Yay, I wasn’t going to be a eunuch.
Thank you, God, thank you, thank you.
Ever since she was born, Glory and I have had a special relationship. I never realised it at first, regarding her as all brothers do their younger siblings — as a brat. When she was a baby my two elder sisters Faith and Hope thought she was ador-able, until she shat in her nappies. After that they wanted nothing to do with her. As for me, I was already used to shit in the cow bail and shit in the sheep pens and shit whenever my father Joshua and I had to fill in one dunny hole and move the outhouse over another. It was second nature to change Glory, and at least her shit smelt passable. By the time she was walking it seemed only natural that I would assume responsibility for her toilet training, her feeding and her bedding down. My cousin Mohi, the Stud Who Walks, once commented drily, ‘You should have had tits, man, then you could’ve weaned her too.’
That put me off Glory for a while, but by that time she had latched on to me. Wherever I went, she went. Whatever I did, she wanted to do it too — including helping me with the milking.
One morning I had just finished bringing in the cows from the far paddock with our sheepdogs, called Stupid, Hopeless and Dumb because they never obeyed instructions. Despite his limited intelligence, however, Stupid had learned to perform tricks.
‘Roll over, Stupid,’ I said, and he did.
‘Shake my hand,’ I said, and he put out his paw.
‘Sing a song, Stupid.’ He started to howl.
That’s when I heard Glory behind me. She was five at the time and she was howling along with the dog. I smiled, thinking nothing of it, and threw Stupid a watercracker.
‘Woof.’
I looked at Glory. She was eyeing me dangerously.
‘Woof,’ she growled again.
Woof?
She tilted her head at my pocket and I started to laugh. ‘You want a biscuit too, darling?’ I asked. ‘Of course you can have one.’ But I didn’t catch on until I said to Stupid, ‘Okay, play dead now.’
Stupid gave a whine and rolled on to his back, his four paws pointing at the sky.
So did Glory.
I shucked on my work clothes and crept out of the bedroom past the Frog Queens, the nickname I had for my two elder sisters. They were, as usual, fast asleep with their mouths in their customary position — open.
Mum was just waking. She looked up and over Dad’s stranglehold around her neck, pushing her hair away from her face.
‘Kei te haere koe ki te miraka kau?’ She smiled and illuminated my life.
‘Ka pai. Good.’
Then I was out the door, over the stile and across the back paddock to the cow bail where Glory was waiting with Red, Brindle, Blacky, Ginger, Albino and Tan, pausing a moment to breathe the fresh air and to see the mist drifting off the hills. Magic was still about at that time of the morning, wraiths and kehua reluctant to give up their domain to the sun; lingering with their memories of battles between iwi and iwi or with Pakeha; still singing the old blood songs of revenge, heart songs of love and lonely songs of death; still reaching out to us, disturbing our dreams, lingering, saying, Never forget, never forget –
I raced up the rise and took another deep breath before going into the cow bail. Glory had already washed and greased Red’s udders, and she stood aside as I placed the stool beneath Red, butted my head into her right flank and put the bucket between my legs.
‘Okay, Red,’ I sighed.
There is nothing worse for a young boy with the whole world before him than to be faced with cows’ udders every morning.
‘Phew,’ Glory said as we humped the last milk bucket into the kitchen of the homestead. The milk frothed and foamed, warm and pungent. The smell of newly drawn milk is like no other in its sweetness and freshness. I grinned at Glory and jokingly threw her a watercracker. Although she had grown out of pretending to be a dog, we still kidded around with the fantasy, sometimes using the ‘Drop dead’ routine to get us out of trouble.
Glory looked at the biscuit and sighed. ‘We’re not allowed,’ she said.
‘Good girl,’ Mum said.
We always fasted on Sundays, and that was another reason for hating them. On Sundays, so Grandfather said, God’s food sustains even the most famished soul. That might be true, but it wasn’t my soul that was hungry. And today was going to be worse — no kai until dinner time.
The side door slammed. ‘Get out of the way, Useless.’
My nemesis, Mohi, was dressed already — of course, he had no chores in the morning — and snaking his way out to the De Soto, grabbing a piece of bread and munching on it in front of Mum and my aunts, knowing they wouldn’t tell. Eighteen and already a prick.
‘Glory, you better go and have a wash,’ my mother said. ‘Your sisters are already in the bathroom. Tell them to hurry up. As for you Simeon, you can use the outside pump. Kia tere!’
She had her eye on the clock. Five-thirty. We would be expected in the drawing room of the homestead at six, and she and my aunts were running five minutes behind schedule.
From the window she saw me shambling over to the pump, taking off my shirt and loosening my braces. I thought she wasn’t looking so just dabbed my eyes, enough to get the pikare out.
‘No you don’t, Simeon,’ she yelled. ‘And don’t forget behind your ears and under your arms.’
In the distance that sonofabitch Mohi was doubling over with laughter because I looked like the skinny guy whom Charles Atlas was always exhorting to try his muscle-building course.
Can’t a person have any privacy?
Chapter 3
‘Kia tere,’ my mother said. ‘Kia tere.’
She was stooped over, trying to get the seams of her stockings straight, her hat in danger of falling off. My father was slicking down his hair and putting his black jacket on.
‘Simeon? Oh, pae kare —’
I was struggling, as usual, to put a windsor knot in my tie.
‘Here,’ Mum said. She loosened the tie, began to knot it for me and hesitated. ‘Why do you want to wear this one?’ It was the tie my cousin Haromi had bought me for my birthday and had Hawaiian hula girls all over it. ‘You know your grandfather hates this tie. And look at your hair! I told you to get it cut last week.’
Yes, I know you did, Mum, but tough.
‘You know how important this day is,’ Dad chimed in.
‘Mu-um,’ Faith interrupted. She pointed airily at the clock.
Two minutes to six.
‘Oh Hi-miona,’ Mum said, as if it was all my fault.
It was always the same performance on Sundays, but it was even worse today, for this was the first October Sunday before shearing. Today, together with Uncle Ihaka’s and Zebediah Whatu’s families, we had thanksgiving. We had to get over to the main house at six for prayers and the family service, and then go on to church. The only consolation was that we wouldn’t be the only ones running around like hens with our heads chopped off. My uncles Matiu, Maaka, Ruka and Hone, named after the first four saints of the New Testament, would be well on the road to the homestead by now. As would be my aunts Ruth and Sarah, named for goodly women from the Old Testament; no doubt Aunt Ruth would be haranguing Uncle Albie, and Aunt Sarah would be giving both Uncle Jack and her daughter Haromi hell. Following close behind them on the road would be my uncles Aperahama and Ihaka, after Abraham and Isaac in Exodus, and their families. All of them had been given land to live on by Grandfather.