Once Were Warriors Read online

  Now look at him, sitting here with his face on permanent S for scared, he’s been running scared all his life. And then Bennett came out.

  They here yet? Who? Your mother and father. Or one ofem’d do. Boogie shaking his head, looking at Grace for support. But Grace no picture of self-confidence herself, not to a man in a suit, so looking down, reddening. What, they still asleep? Uh, yeah. Both ofem? Uh, they had a late night. And Grace glancing up to see the big welfare officer take a step backwards, cry, Aee. Maoris, eh. Always the late nights. Always the excuses from their lawful responsibilities. But Boogie shrugging his lack of understanding, and Grace just grasping what the Maori welfare officer was saying. Sighing, Well alright then, you’re first to be called, young Heke. Then taking his huge frame over to the main cluster of people opposite the Heke siblings.

  Grace following Bennett with her eyes, a phrase flashing in her mind as she looked across at the people: The Lost Tribe. The Lost Tribe, The Lost … it kept repeating. Mystifying her. Eyes riveted to the human scene, and that Lost Tribe phrase going on and on in her head.

  The mothers with fags in their mouths, in hands that had a tattoo, an arm with one, two of them that Grace could see. Most ofem — there’d be eight or nine mums — fat things. And most wild-looking. The Lost Tribe …

  Leaned against the wall, scowling, two gang prospects, Grace knew em from Pine Block; just a couple of kids maybe fourteen, fifteen, mad keen to become Brown Fists; already covered in home-made tats, their hands and exposed arms purple with tats. A glance at Boog to confirm that he was trying to catch their eye, eager to greet them, givem the old lifted eyebrows greeting, anything, just to be in sweet withem. But they’d not return his greeting, didn’t he know that? No one in Pine Block, let alone gang prospects, is gonna be seen acknowledging the existence of a wimp.

  Teenagers of all shapes and sizes lounging around, slouched, pacing, fooling with each other, talking loud or not at all, Maori every one ofem but two. And look how they were trying to crawl their way in with the Maori toughs.

  Lost Tribe … Oh look, that mother’s breastfeeding. Oh, isn’t that sweet. When I have babies I’m gonna breastfeed em for as long as I can, because I read it makes em grow up healthier, and anyway it’s good forem in creating a bond between baby and mother. And I sure want that with mine. If I ever get married, that is … if I find a boy who’ll have me; ugly thing like me — (Oh, but inside I’m not ugly. In fact, I feel, you know, somehow beautiful inside, though spose ya can’t exactly cut me open to find this out.)

  A couple of toddlers runnin around. (Oh, aren’t they cute.) I love kids. One ofem started to make a hell of a racket: banging the metal ashtray up and down on the floor, Grace givin the kid a little smile, thinking so what, he’s only a kid. But next minute the kid was scooped up by — Grace supposed — its mother. Up in the air she had him … and Grace having those words, The Lost Tribe … going through her mind as she watched the incident like it was in slow motion.

  Fat bitch’s arm went back. And Mr Bennett just turning his head. Arm coming in (oh hell!) and the kid’s body jolting like a train’d hit it. (You bitch! You fuckin bitch!) Bennett saying, What the — when the woman came back with another swing. Mrs Renata! Bennett scolded, obviously knowing the woman. And Mrs Renata giving the welfare officer glistening eyes of hatred whilst Bennett’s tongue went tch-tch-tch. She lit a smoke. She sucked hard on it. Several times. Her fat chest went up and down with drawing in angry breath. Then her face was half hidden in a cloud of smoke. Then Grace heard her say to Bennett, And don’t you be stickin your nose in my affairs. Bennett saying nothing, just telling Boogie as he came past back to the courtroom, I’ll be calling you next.

  Grace’s mind going over and over with, The Lost Tribe …

  3. They Who Have History

  Oh far out! Grace at all the wood everywhere, the quiet, the paintings on the wall. The whole atmosphere of the place. Like a church.

  Sitting down where Bennett indicated. Oh wow, at the ceiling with its fancy plasterwork, scrolls and things. Oh, but you wouldn’t think it exists just through those big doors. And them on the other side, what a girl has grown up with, she knows them (though does not understand nor empathise with them) and here, a kind of palace, a church, a place to respect and fear all in one on the other side. Who’d believe such a place exists here in little ole Two Lakes? Grace thinking this must be how the Trambert big house looks; or sort of.

  Oo, so quiet: the court officials talking in whispers. Maybe they don’t want us to know. Maybe it’s like a secret club where the members jealously guard their secrets and special codes and exclusive membership.

  Grace looking at Boogie to see his reaction, and not surprised to see him with hands wringing, eyes to the floor. Oh poor Boog, can’t blame him. Mr Bennett said he might get sent away to a Boys’ Home. I’ll come and visit you as much as I can, Boog, Grace promising herself. I’ll get a job in the supermarket in town after school, they hire Maoris there even if you’re from Pine Block, probably because most of Pine Block does their main shopping there. There and the pub.

  Those pictures: great big things in fancy frames and every one ofem a grey-haired white man. Hah, imagine a Maori in one ofem. Some chance. Only Maoris in here get to sit where we are, I bet. Unless they got a high-up job like Mr Bennett here. But how many Maoris like him around?

  Grace staring at each portrait in turn, counting them. Each man with headmaster-type gown up around his shoulders, and each with the same headmaster-type solemn look. Smile and their faces’d crack, as Mum says about me. Nine of them. Nine portraits of men who must’ve done something good to be up on the wall here. Might be some ofem are dead. In Pine Block you die, you die. Grace’d known many a person, usually young, in their teens, early adulthood, one minute alive next dead. And the kids in the street talking about it, describing the gory detail of the accident or murder or manslaughter that killed the person. One day a living, breathing entity, next, a nothing. A lifeless shell and no fancy portraits hung up of them.

  Man, what a place. Reminds me of the Queen, Grace registering the familiarity of the coat of arms above the magistrate’s bench. The Queen and her loyal, faithful servants, that’s it. So where do we fit in this picture? Me and more especially my poor brother here? Then startled by a voice booming out: ALL RISE!

  And in he swept.

  Silver hair. Suit. Bet he’s gonna appear on the wall one day. Where’s his robes then? Maybe his missus forgot to iron them (hahaha!) Grace couldn’t help herself, it was nervous inner laughter more than anything. She got like that when she was nervous, scared. Giggly, too. Oh please don’t let me break out in the giggles.

  Five of them, the court officials. Three women, two men. In nice outfits and suits. One of the women good-looking (oh real good-looking.) It’s not fair. Bitch knows it too. Grace studying their faces, clues niggling away at her, instincting something about them — prefects. That’s it. They look just like school prefects: prim and proper and better than you; they’d pimp on you soon as look at you. Specially you, Maori kid. Yes, and distant like school prefects, of knowing them when they were ordinary like you, and day after their appointment you were looking at a stranger.

  Then magistrate (God) spoke from his on high position of slightly higher elevation.

  Made Grace’s heart jump. An inner panic that for some extraordinary reason he was speaking to her. (Oh I’d just die if he spoke to me.) The parents, Mr Bennett? I don’t see any sign … and Mr Bennett getting to his feet, Uh, no, your honour. They haven’t appeared at this stage. At this stage, Mr Bennett? You mean this is going to be in several stages? Uh, no, sir. I meant — Simply, Mr Bennett, they are not here. No, obviously not, sir. And are they likely to be here? Bennett glancing left of him and Boogie waiting with a shrug, Grace managing to squeak that she didn’t think so. Hoping he wouldn’t ask why. No, your honour. I’m afraid Mark Heke’s parents won’t be here in all probability. Magistrate sighing at that, shuffling through paper
s, the rest of the wood-panelled portraited room silent.

  Now, let me run through this with you, Mark (Boog’s real name) Heke, the history leading to your appearance here in this court …

  And all through it Boogie not lifting his head once, and Grace willing her brother to do so, just once, don’t let this man make you feel worse than you already do.

  Grace inspired, angry enough to push her normal shyness aside, looked at the man ranting waffling on about her brother as if he was some kind of — kind of — She didn’t know, but it sure didn’t feel nice even being the sister of the subject under scrutiny.

  She built up a picture of the magistrate, his background, how he must come from a nice home, he’d never seen his father beat up his mother for not cooking one of his friends fried eggs with boiled meat and potatoes.

  He’d never been woken from sleep or been unable to sleep for the din of brawling going on beneath you. He’d not experienced any of what the people before him like Boogie have had to endure. Yet here he is telling poor Boogie what a bad boy he is.

  Telling Boogie, We all didn’t like school as youngsters, young man, but most of us went because we had to.

  Oh it’s not fair. Boogie plays the wag from school because half the time he’s scared of being picked on, or he’s being led by other kids and he’s too afraid to say no. He doesn’t go to school because he can’t see what good school is going to do him anyway. Lots of us don’t.

  Alright for him up there, I bet he went to some posh school and oh of course university; and just like the Pakeha kids in my class, I bet he got read to when he was young, encouraged with his homework, even taken to special tutoring if he had difficulties with some of the subjects. They do that for their kids, do the Pakehas. Not the rough Pakehas, but then most Pakehas aren’t from rough families. And they do a lot more besides.

  Like taking their kids to different places, different things to do. And they don’t spend half their life in the pub drinking like our fathers and lots of the mothers do. Man, if I had a head start like they do I could be a magistrate too. Well, maybe not that, but something high up.

  Silence. Magistrate had imposed his desire for silence on all. Only his breathing, the odd rustle of clothing, someone shifting position. A cough. A sigh. And Boogie won’t stop scuffing his feet! A long sigh from the bench, then: Mark Heke, I have no choice but to declare you a ward of the state. The state? Grace thinking. Like in a state house? Where you shall be under the control of the child welfare authorities … Grace not able to figure it, what it meant in terms of Boogie’s future and yet knowing it was his future that’d just been decided by a stranger.

  A complete stranger, who Boog’d never set eyes on before in his life, and he was making Boog a ward of the state handing him over to the welfare — Oh poor Boogie, Grace letting out a tiny groan before catching it at mention of a Boys’ Home, where, the magistrate was promising or assuring or threatening, Mark Heke would find discipline and — through discipline — direction.

  Grace’s mind reeling, and what would Boog’s mind be doing? Looking at him, oh you poor kid, even though she was younger she felt older, and his eyes fixed to the floor, head shaking, hands clutched tightly together. She saying, I’ll come and visit you as much as I can, Boog.

  Wanting to put an arm around him but afraid to, not in here, the magistrate might say something, he was sure not to like gestures like that: love for your brother. Not showing it. Not here in this precious damn room with all his mates up around the walls supporting him, giving him not only the law on his side but them, the ones up on the walls in their big fancy frames, the education they must’ve had, the head starts. History. (He’s got history, Grace and Boogie Heke, and you ain’t.)

  Then the magistrate was wishing Mark luck — luck. Asking for the next case. Just like that.

  4. … And Those With Another

  Through the big doors, out into the other world waiting their turns to be judged; you could smell the feet, the socks that hadn’t been washed, and armpits, and that smell of fat people in a tight confine or airless space.

  Grace could smell the violence too, she could almost see it, it was like shimmers from a sunbeaten road.

  Bennett holding Boogie firmly by the arm, steering him in the direction of the main cluster. Everyone looking. (Oh God. No way to hide.) Grace fast on the heels of the big welfare officer, but seeing the looks poor Boogie was getting and no doubt because he was crying.

  Someone, it turned out to be one of the Brown Fist prospects, asking, Whassa madda, bubs? The beak hit you with his powder puff? Laughter.

  Then another, this one a woman: Oh, we got our little sister to hold our hand have we? Though that woman was immediately told to shut her mouth by another female adult voice.

  Come on, come on, out of the way, Bennett going to some ofem. Cigarette smoke and armpits and obesity and the shimmers of violence and the echoes of taunting laughter, and the looks they were giving a girl after they’d finished with her sobbing brother. Except for that lone supporter catching Grace’s eye and telling her, Don’t you mind these buggers, girl. Good on you for sticking with your brother. Grace too shy to smile her appreciation, just wanting out of here.

  The walk taking ages.

  Bennett stopping at a door and fiddling with a key, taking an eternity, and comments being made from a girl’s teenage fellows from mostly Pine Block, smartarse, mocking. A voice behind calling out: TURANGA! William James. And a collective ooooo! going up, watch he don’t hit you with his powder puff, Billy. Grace hearing quite distinctly — because it was a very common utterance of her father’s: Fuckim (Fuckim, fuckim, fuckim, echoing on and on in her head like that Lost Tribe had) as Bennett finally got the door unlocked.

  Sweat broken out all over Grace’s face; sticky, clammy, feeling smelly herself. Bennett’s voice from seemingly far away telling Grace she had ten minutes with her brother then, he was sorry, she’d have to go. The door closing, cutting short the last of the teasing, and laughter, and powd — of powder puff.

  Oh so much quieter in here. The world changed again. But not Boogie, he hadn’t changed, sobbing away there.

  Poor Boog. Poor, soft, failed Mark Heke. A sister wondering who’d done this to him, this giving a kid a flaw in his makeup and borning him in Pine Block. A wimp thrown into a den of warriors. And she put her arms around him. But she could not cry.

  5. Tennessee Waltz

  Beth woke — and stayed awake, not losing the struggle this time of sleep pulling her back into its merciful embrace. But I don’t want to be awake. Wanna die. Closed her eyes, felt immediate pain in one of them. And her heart ached just as bad.

  She lay there, staring at the ceiling, gathering her thoughts, the events of this early morning rapidly reshaping. But she tried not to let self-pity creep in — Fuckit. I’m made of stronger stuff than that. She moved her hip ever so slightly, felt his presence beside her; never ceased to be amazed how they slept in the same bed even after he’d beaten her. She touched her face — gingerly. Ooo, that bastard. One day I’ll kill you. It hurt all over.

  She got quietly out of bed, went to the bathroom.

  Look at me — look at me, at her reflection in the medicine cupboard mirror with the silver starting to break up behind the glass and mould formed in the lower two corners. And this face — if you could call it a face — framed there, beaten to a barely recognisable pulp. And him, the doer of this to me, laying back there in bed — my bed — as if nothing happened. I’ll killim. I’ll kill the black bastard.

  The right eye puffed shut, nose broken — again — lower lip swollen with a deep cut about midway and leaking blood. Bruises all over. Beth sighed, shook her head in a kind of astonishment. You mad mad crazy bastard, Jake Heke.

  The house was quiet. Kids must’ve gone to school. Wonder what ti — Oh God. Boogie. He’s in court today. Ten o’clock. She hurried downstairs, to the kitchen where the clock was — so clean, oh, you good good kids. Clock. Where the hell is it? On the
windowsill above the sink — What? Five to one? In the afternoon! Oh poor Boogie, I should’ve been there. Rushing back up to the bathroom, the mirror … Look at me, son. Look at the state of me: I couldn’t’ve come looking like this. I couldn’t’ve. The guilt, or something, bringing tears to her eyes — and oh, stinging the bad one. Grinding her teeth together in frustration and rage. Standing there for several minutes willing herself not to lose control.

  She found herself in the younger ones’ bedroom; again, tidy. I trained em well, no one can take that away from me. Over to Huata’s bunk, her youngest; could remember like last week him suckling on her, that special feel of feeding your own with your own body, its produce. The love imparting through it. The tears sprang anew, she wiped at them forgetting the damn eye, jerking her hand away in pain. You black cunt! I hate his guts. She ruffled Hu’s pillow. Felt the emotion rushing up again. The hell’s up with you, woman? You’ve had hidings before. So what’s new?

  Above to Polly’s bed, and Sweetie tucked in under the pillow. Kid’d had that doll since her first birthday, little thing with its shiny blonde hair. You’d think you could buy Maori dolls too.

  Oo, Beth got a sudden new perspective of Polly’s doll, it looks like a damn corpse with its eyelids closed and blonde locks spread out beneath her. Beth touched the face, There there, Sweetie, I didn’t mean you were dead, only you look like it. She touched her own face to reassure herself that she couldn’t possibly have appeared in court in this mess. I couldn’t, Boog.