Chapter One
October 9th, 1940 Hokianga New Zealand
In the Opo Pub of Opononi it was lively. Men and women of the community gathered in great number to drink, dance, socialize, and sometimes fight. It was the only thing to do here, especially with the storm brewing outside. Many, were from the other side of the bay, Rangi Point, Rawene, or Miti Miti; where there was no electricity, and could only reach here by boat or horseback since there were no roads.
Most of the patrons were Maori, the rest pakeha (white). All drank together like one big family. Perhaps one of the only times that all were equal. One patron was Haki Matiu, a handsome man, though short in stature. He was half-blood Irish and Maori. Could drink better than most, and was mean and short tempered. He was singing along with the band that night, a country ballad The Green, Green, Grass of Home. A beer in one hand and a Maori girl on the other. A cigarette dangled from his full lips.
“Ah, piss!” he spat looking from the clock.
“What is it, Haki?” the girl asked smiling.
“Late!” he swallowed the last of his glass hard, “Late as!”
“Back to the wife then?” she said disappointed.
He crushed out his cigarette and laid a sloppy kiss on her lips. She pulled him closer and the kiss went deeper.
“Hey, Wolley?” he hollered over to the bar keep, “Put it on my credit, aye?”
“Right, Jack!” Wolley hollered back, “Know where you live, brothah!”
And off he went. Stumbling across the road to the beach where his rowboat sat. The waves were capped with white. He looked to his left and could see the inlet where the Tasman Sea crashed hard against the rocks. The sky above rumbled lightly and flashed with distant lightning. He pushed his boat out and paddled across Hokianga Harbour to his home in Rangi Point, still singing about the green, green grass of home.
She was angry. She knew who Haki was with, had been on a number of nights. While she sat at home, pregnant with one, and raising two others. Up keeping their home, on land her father had given them. 21 years young and a man who was out getting pissed up with some other. She was fuming. Pakihau, the oldest, had come out of the bedroom once for water and she snapped at him to get back into bed. Guilt bit at her for that but her rage was drowning it.
Haki’s violence was unmatched when he was drunk, but it did not matter to her. She wasn't going to stand for it any longer. No man was going to intimidate her, he was going to own up for what he was doing. It was no secret to everyone around, and Nono TeRore Matui wasn’t going to back down.
Haki came in, still whistling The Green Green Grass of Home. It annoyed her even more.
“What you lookin’ at, woman?” he wouldn’t look her in the eyes as he took his gumboots off at the door.
“Don’t play games with me, Haki Matui!” she started, “Tell me where you been?”
“Off at Opo, where the feck you think?” he snarled.
“With who?” she got up to his face.
“Ne’ mind that, woman. Put on a feed fer me, willya?”
Put on a feed for you?
“Put yer own feckin’ feed on, Haki, or have your Opo whore do it for ya, aye?”
His guilt fueled his temper and it began to rise in his guts.
“Don’t you start on this again, Nono!” he warned, “I’ll have no more of yer attitude tonight then!”
“I’ll not have you feckin’ some brown whore and then comin’ into my bed! I’ll tell you that much, Haki!”
His right fist, fast and quick like the lightning that struck outside, connected with the bridge of her nose. She cried out and fell back.
“You make me do this, woman!” he went after her.
“You stay the feck away from me, Haki, you stay the FECK a-!”
Her words cut off when Haki lifted her up by her hair and he smacked her open-handed in the face and then threw her again.
“Don’t you tell me what the feck I can and cannot do in my own home, girl!”
He marched over to her spilled body. She grasped her stomach to protect the baby inside of her. He lifted his foot and planted it into her sides. He pulled her hair again to his face. It stunk of sour beer, whiskey and cigarettes.
“Now, git yer arse up off the floor and make me sumthin to eat!” he shoved her down again.
She laid there sobbing. Something inside of her felt...wrong.
“The baby!” she cried.
“I’m going to my dad’s, you calm down a bit!” and Haki was gone.
A terrible cramp twisted inside her. There was blood above and blood below. She couldn’t get up, and was beginning to panic.
“It’s coming!” she whispered frantically, “Oh, dear God, it’s coming!”
Hune TeRore sat on the porch of his large, white columned farm house. It overlooked Hokianga Harbour, and he loved a good storm. He sat there with his tea, rocking on the porch swing staring at the lights of the city across the way.
He was a large man. A chief of the modern day. Known by many for his wisdom and his kindness. To look at his eyes, he knew pain from his past, knew about loss. Lightning flashed in those eyes.
“Hune!” Mereanna called from inside. Her voice alarmed.
“Hmm?” he knew that tone she had and didn’t like the way it left shivers in his spine, “What is it, luv?”
“Nono!” Mereanna came from the front door, her hands in knots, “Something’s wrong!”
Mereanna was the daughter of an Irish Missionary. In those days, the European missionaries married off their daughters to the Maori’s to thin out the blood line. But this was love between them, nothing about land rights. She had a ‘gift’ for sensing things, usually impending doom. Most of the time, she was right.
“Probably just the lightning, luv.” Hune tried to comfort, “You know how Nono hates the storms? She’ll be ka pai (fine).”
“I don’t know, Hune.” she wouldn’t sit, “This doesn’t feel right.”
Though he didn’t want to instill panic, he stood up from his post and gave her his tea and sat her down.
“There,” he said softly. “You relax with the tea, I’ll have one of the boys run over and check on her, aye?”
Mereanna sipped her cup nervously, “Okay. I hope it’s nothing.”
“I’m sure it is.” he concurred.
He calls Bay and Kohunga from the barn and tells them to get the horses and check on their sister. They saddled up and rode down the beach with the storm subsiding above and the moon started to shine through the storm clouds to light their path.
A half hour later, Bay is coming back riding to beat the devil.
“Dad!!” he hollered, “Dad! Ya bettah come quick! Sis is in trouble with the baby! You bettah come now, dad!”
Hune hooked up his carriage to a team and he and Mereanna rode off to their daughter’s home.
“Hold on, sis!” Kohunga calmed Nono on his lap. She was still trying desperately to have the baby. “The ol’ mans on the way!”
Pakihau and Olive stood in the doorway of their room crying, worried for their mother lying on the floor, with blood coming from her private place.
Kohunga didn’t know if he could take any more of her groaning and screaming. He didn’t know if he could watch a still birth either.
Just then, the door came open. Hune came in and took Kohunga’s place, Mereanna went to the stove to put on water.
“Nono!” Hune was holding his tears back, “What happened?”
“Haki....”she gasped, “Caught ‘im, dad....caught ‘im messin’....”
His teeth grit, “Ssssshhhhhh......it’s okay, bub, just relax...”
“The baby, dad? The baby???”
“We’re gonna help the baby along, luv, oy kay?”
The labor was difficult. The body wanted to let the baby out, but the baby wasn’t ready to come. It was premature and there was a lot of internal trauma. The blood was over everything. Pakihau and Olive were crying and hysterical. More of the family had come and helped take care of the kids.
“C’mon, luv...” Hune felt the tears coming on and swallowed them down hard, “We’re going to have to push. It’s going to be all you, I know you haven’t the strength, but I need you to be strong.”
“oy kay, dad!” Nono gasped.
She pushed, giving all the strength a mother could give. The baby moved along slowly through the birth canal. Despite it’s small size. Some of the nerves were damaged and so were the muscles. Haki had done a lot of damage. Her short life flashed before her eyes as she pushed. Her father’s cries and coaching were like muffled murmurs in the background. And then, she felt it, the release. The baby was out. She could hear her father’s triumphant cry....
“It’s a girl!” Hune yelled, “It’s a girl, luv! A beautiful little fragile girl!”
He wrapped the small preemie, the size of his fist, in white linen Mereanna had given him. He lowered her down to his daughter, “Nono...it’s a....”
Nono was gone. The last of her strength given to her daughter.
Hune cried out. The rest of the family joined in his wailing, including the new life that was born October 10th, 1940. The baby was called the “miracle baby” by the locals, Hune named her after her mother, Norah.
