Sarah, was munching scone and swinging her legs as she sat on the bench beside him. “I’ve been told the Maori language is one of the most beautiful, in the world ... musical, with a rhythm ... because you pronounce every vowel. Someone on the ship said it was a lyrical as running water. Would you say something to me in Maori, Hori?”
There was a flash of white teeth. “I sure would. Miss Isbister.” He went into his own tongue, finishing up, “Me te mea ko Kopu ka rere i’te pae.”
Sarah blinked, enchanted. “What does it mean?”
Grant, who had come to stand beside her at that moment, translated for her. “He says you are so beautiful ... and finished up by comparing you to Venus rising above the horizon.” He paused, and added, “Hori, if you had to use a proverbial saying, you old flatterer, why didn’t you say, ‘Te wahine i te rangaringa, me te waewae kakama moea, te wahine i te ngutungutu whakarerea atu’?”
The Maori clapped his hands on his dusty knee, and turning to Sarah, said, “Now I translate ... he has courage, our boss, but not to say it in English ... He said, ‘Marry a woman who is nimble with her hands and feet; leave alone a woman who is nimble with her lips.’ ”
Sarah laughed with them, real merriment in her eyes, accepted the cigarette Hori offered her, and let him light it for her; her burnished gold head close to the crinkled dark one made a striking picture. As she looked up she caught the gleam of something in Grant’s eyes. She thought it was pleasure, respect.
As Sarah walked back to the house, swinging the empty baskets, she thought there was something about New Zealand that warmed the heart ... The friendliness, the lack of class distinction, the pride of race inherent in the Maoris, the harmony in which the two races existed for the most part... maybe it wouldn’t be perfect, there would be the odd, hidebound survival who would be snobbish and false, but in the main, it was a harmonious community.
Sarah wished that she had come here, not as an interloper, but as an immigrant, prepared to start from the bottom and work up.
It certainly was a mad rush of a day, full of dust from a rising nor’wester, noisy with barking dogs, curses, the bleating of distressed ewes and lambs. For Sarah, refreshed by the outing to the sheds, it was a case of getting on with more bread-baking. She counted herself lucky that she got the loaves into the oven before tea. In between the kneadings and risings, she kept busy shredding lettuce, peeling more potatoes, carving cold mutton, setting out the bowls of beetroot, slabs of cheese, jars of pickles.
Yet, as she surveyed the long table, groaning with food, all ready before she heard the men scrubbing up on the verandah, she was aware she had enjoyed it all. For the first time for weeks her heart was lighter, and she knew a glimmer of hope for the future.
She was glad, after the tea meal, of the big dishwasher, and the fact that the bread was due out any moment. There had been a message from the baker that he had been able to arrange for bread to be sent up from Christchurch three times a week till the bakery was repaired.
Suddenly the hot, dry wind stilled, the peace of twilight—all too short a twilight here in the southern hemisphere—fell upon the parched garden; the bleating outside gradually diminished as the lambs found their strangely shaven mothers, the bread came out, Sarah thankfully let the range fire die down, aware that tomorrow she could probably manage with the electric range alone.
She swept her floor, left the windows open to the cool, sweet air, sent the tired children up to bed, telling them that although it was early, they could read, knowing that in two minutes their heads would be sunk over their books.
She heard the voices of the men fading as they walked across the yard to their quarters, and wondered if Grant would go straight over with them.
She heard his step on the verandah. He said, as he came in, “Thought I’d stay over home for a while. The men feel more relaxed if the boss isn’t with them all the time. Do you mind? It’s only sensible for you to stay on here when you’ve to get up so early.”
Sarah found she not only didn’t mind—she was glad. Odd how folk liked company ... even uncongenial company ... for Grant Alexander’s company was uncongenial, she told herself!
“I’ve got the kettle on for a cup of tea—will you have one? I thought it would be heavenly to sit down with it and not hurry.”
“Yes, thank you, Sarah, I will. Time for a shower before it’s ready? Good. I’ll feel a new man then.”
All very friendly, but Sarah knew it wouldn’t last. This was expediency. At the present moment, if they didn’t pull together, it would gum up the works. This amiability was all on the surface, it didn’t mean Grant trusted her any more. If he did think about it all, he probably put her hard work down to the fact that if the shearing was held up, income would suffer, and neither partner would be pleased. When this crisis was over, Grant Alexander would probably continue with his plans for ousting them. Something more than a solicitor’s letter this time, she supposed. At present he was making the best of a bad job.
The whole thing seemed unreal, fantastic, sitting here waiting for her partner to come to share a meal with her ... children sleeping above them, the quietness of a country night outside, and inside, a man and a woman at a kitchen table, a symbol of domestic happiness, not betraying at all the feelings of resentment which seethed beneath the surface.
Grant brought into the kitchen with him the pleasing aroma of a man newly tubbed and shaved, a blend of hair oil and lavender soap, and a pleasing masculine presence. Sarah caught herself up on the thought. She must be mad.
Grant finished his second cup of tea, and with the satisfied sigh of a man who has worked hard, fed well, and is now relaxed, reached for a cigarette.
He said, “Yon lot of bread looks even better than last night’s.”
Before Sarah could answer him, the phone rang. There was a sense of urgency about the ring. The party code call was repeated three times with scarcely a break.
Grant picked it up, said, “Hullo? Oh, you, Nan. What? Oh, my god! ... Yes, she’s here ... yes, she’s a nurse. We’ll be right over. Get right on to your bed, and hang on. We’ll be with you in a matter of minutes.”
He banged the receiver down, said, “Did you do maternity? That’s Nan Granger in a real panic. She thinks—in fact she’s sure, her baby is on its way, and Gordon’s out at a meeting in Cheviot. She had even the first mighty quick, I know. Can you—”
“Yes, of course. What about the children?”
Grant said, “Ring the men while I get the car out. They can play cards up here. Nan sounded bad, and desperate. Hurry. She had to stop to groan once.”
Sarah flew to the telephone, gasped out her request, seized the first-aid kit that had been left here after Mrs. Mac’s accident, grabbed a pile of old sheets out of the linen cupboard and jumped into the car. Grant had the door open for her.
“I’ll go by the road,” he said, rattling over the cattlestops. “It seems quicker across the paddocks, but there are too many gates to open. I can make speed this way.” He did.
He roared up the drive of the lovely farmhouse set against an emerald hill, leapt out, as Sarah did. As they opened the back door, they heard two sounds, each from a different room. One was small Josephine.
She was crying bitterly. “Mummy, please come, quickly. I’ve got a pain, I want my—”
The other was a low, urgent groan that jerked Sarah in its direction.
She gave a gesture towards the child’s bedroom, and a faint smile touched the corners of her mouth. “I’m sure you’d sooner cope with that room, Grant.” And she disappeared into the big bedroom.
The girl on the bed had only had time to throw back the quilt and get on to the blanket.
She said, gaspingly, “It’s coming too quickly. I’ve been trying to hold in my breath till you got here ... can you manage?”
“I can manage,” Sarah, comfortingly, quietly. “I’ve brought dozens of babies into the world, and never lost one yet. Now relax a little, and Nature will do the rest. Let it come naturally. It will be all over in a moment.”
She arranged linen, bent over the girl.
“Ah, what did I tell you?” she said gaily, a moment or two later, reaching for her tape and scissors. “A lovely baby boy ... eight or nine pounds, I should say. He’ll make a hefty farmer later on.”
Sarah slapped cotton-wool and a wide bandage around the baby’s middle. “Nothing wrong with his lungs,” she said admiringly. “We don’t have any complications with him, thank goodness. I’ll bath him when I’ve got you comfortable, and made you a cup of tea.”
She swathed the baby in one of the folded sheets, walked to the door, called, “Grant?”
He came instantly. She thrust the baby into his arms. “Here, hold this for a moment till I finish with the mother. I’ll be about five minutes, I suppose. Sit down in a low chair with him. Is the little girl all right?”
“Yes,” said Grant rather proudly. “She is now, I coped all right.”
Sarah grinned. “You’re adding to your experience, Mr. Alexander. And don’t worry about him yelling. While he’s yelling I know he’s all right.” Grant, a slightly ludicrous, stupefied Grant, disappeared kitchenwards.