‘Treble, up to a ceiling of one hundred pounds,’ Anna said firmly, ‘but if you clear the funds for me within the fortnight, I’ll pay you two hundred, in cash money.’
Fellowes raised his eyebrows. ‘Dear me,’ he said. ‘This is very bold.’
‘It comes with the training,’ Anna said.
But here Anna Wetherell made a misstep. Mr. Fellowes’ eyes widened, and he shrank away. Why, she was a whore, he thought—and then it all came back to him. This was the very whore who had tried to end her life in the Kaniere-road, the very day of Staines’s disappearance, and Wells’s death! Fellowes was new to Hokitika: he did not know Anna Wetherell by sight, and had not immediately recognised her name. It was only at her brazen remark that he suddenly knew her.
Anna had mistaken his discomfiture for simple hesitation. ‘Do you consent to my terms, Mr. Fellowes?’
Fellowes looked her up and down. ‘I shall inquire at the Reserve Bank about this alleged retortion,’ he said. His voice was cold. ‘If the rumour you heard was a good one, then we will draw up a contract; if it was not, then I’m afraid I cannot help you.’
‘You are very kind,’ Anna said.
‘None of that,’ said Fellowes, roughly. ‘Where might I find you, say in three hours’ time?’
Anna hesitated. She could not return to the Wayfarer’s Fortune that afternoon. She had no money on her person, but perhaps she could ask an old acquaintance to stand her a drink at one of the saloons along Revell-street.
‘I’ll just come back,’ she said. ‘I’ll just come back and meet you here.’
‘As you wish,’ Fellowes said. ‘Let us err on the side of caution and say five o’clock.’
‘Five o’clock,’ Anna said. She held out her hand for the charred document, but Fellowes was already opening his wallet, to slip the piece of paper inside.
‘I think I’ll hold onto this,’ he said. ‘Just for the meantime.’
MOON IN ARIES, CRESCENT
In which Te Rau Tauwhare makes a startling discovery.
Te Rau Tauwhare was feeling very pleased as he leaped from stone to stone through the shallows of the Arahura River, making his way downriver towards the beach. He had spent the past month with a party of surveyors in the Deception Valley, and his purse was full; what’s more, that morning he had come upon a marvellous slab of kahurangi pounamu, the weight of which was causing his satchel to thump against his back with every step.
Back at Mawhera it would be time to dig the crop of kumara from the ground: Tauwhare knew it from the appearance of Whanui in the northern sky, the star low on the horizon, dawning well after midnight, and setting well before the dawn. His people called this month Pou-tu-te-rangi—the post that lifted up the sky—for at nights Te Ikaroa formed a milky arch that ran north to south across the black dome of the heavens. It hung between Whanui, in the north, and Autahi, in the south, and it passed through the red jewel of Rehua, directly overhead: for a moment, every night, the sky became a perfect compass, its needle a dusty stripe of stars. At the dawning of Whanui the crops would be unearthed from the ground; after this was Paenga-wha-wha, when the tubers would be piled upon the margins of the fields to be classified and counted, and then taken to the store pits and storehouses, to be stacked for the winter months ahead. After Paenga-wha-wha, the year came to an end—or, as the tohunga phrased, it, ‘to a death’.
He rounded a bend in the river, left the shallows, and mounted the bank. Crosbie Wells’s cottage was looking more forlorn with each passing day. The iron roof had rusted to a flaming orange, and the mortar had turned from white to vivid green; the small garden that Wells had planted had long since gone to seed. Tauwhare strode up the path, taking sorrowful note of these tokens of decay—and then halted suddenly.
There was somebody inside.
Slowly, Tauwhare came closer, peering through the open doorway into the gloom of the interior. The figure in question was curled on the floor, either dead or asleep. He was lying on his hip, with his knees angled close to his chest and his face turned away from the door. Tauwhare came closer still. He saw that the man was dressed in a jacket and trousers rather than digger’s moleskin, and as Tauwhare watched, the fabric over his rib moved very slightly, rising and falling with the motion of a breath. Asleep, then.
Tauwhare passed through the doorway, taking care that his shadow did not fall across the man’s body, and wake him. Moving softly, he edged around the wall behind him, to look down upon the sleeper’s face. The man was very young. His hair was darkly matted with dirt and grease; the skin of his face seemed almost white by contrast. His face would have been handsome had it not been so plainly ravaged by privation. The lids of his eyes were mottled purple, and there were deep shadows in the hollows beneath them. His breath was fretful and inconstant. Tauwhare cast his eye over the boy’s body. His dress had been worn almost to tatters, and apparently had not been changed in many weeks, for it was thick with mud and dust of all varieties. The coat had once been fine, however—that was plain—and the cravat, stiff with mud, was likewise of a fashionable cut.
‘Mr. Staines?’ Tauwhare whispered.
The boy’s eyes opened.
‘Hello,’ he said. ‘Hello, there.’
‘Mr. Staines?’
‘Yes, that’s me,’ the boy said, speaking in a voice that was high and very bright. He lifted his head. ‘Excuse me. Excuse me. Is this Maori land?’
‘No,’ said Tauwhare. ‘How long have you been here?’
‘It’s not Maori land?’
‘No.’
‘I need to be on Maori land,’ the boy said, struggling up into a sitting position. He was holding his left arm oddly across his chest.
‘Why?’ Tauwhare said.
‘I buried something,’ said Staines. ‘By a tree. But all the trees look the same to me and I’m afraid I’ve got myself into a bit of a muddle. Thank heavens you’ve come along—I’m ever so grateful.’
‘You disappeared,’ Tauwhare said.
‘Three days, perhaps,’ said the boy, sinking back again. ‘I think it was three days ago. I’ve been mixing up my days: I can’t seem to keep them in any sort of order. One forgets to mark the hours, when one’s alone. I say: will you have a look at this, please?’
He pulled down the neck of his shirt and Tauwhare saw that the soiled darkness on his cravat was in fact the sticky tar of old blood. There was a wound just above his collarbone, and even from his distance of several feet Tauwhare could see that it was a very grave one. It had begun to putrefy. The centre of the wound was black, and fingers of red speared away from it in rays. Tauwhare could see black speckles of powder-burn, dark against the white of his chest, and deduced that it could only be a gunshot wound. Evidently somebody had shot Emery Staines at very close range, some time ago.
‘You need medicine,’ he said.
‘Exactly,’ said Staines. ‘Exactly right. Will you fetch it for me? I’d be most exceedingly obliged. But I’m afraid I don’t know your name.’
‘My name is Te Rau Tauwhare.’
‘You’re a Maori fellow!’ said Staines, blinking, as though seeing him for the first time. His eyes crossed, and then focused again. ‘Is this Maori land?’
Tauwhare pointed east. ‘Up there is Maori land,’ he said.
‘Up there?’ Staines looked where Tauwhare pointed. ‘Why are you down here, then, if your patch is up there?’
‘This is the house of my friend,’ said Tauwhare. ‘Crosbie Wells.’
‘Crosbie, Crosbie,’ said Staines, closing his eyes. ‘He was euchred, wasn’t he? Lord, how that man can drink. Hollow legs, both of them. Where is he, then? Gone fossicking?’