Witi Ihimaera - The Parihaka Woman

He collapsed, stunned. ‘Eruera, have you gone mad?’

‘There was blood on his head and shoulders and arms,’ Erenora wrote. ‘I was screaming and screaming, and the prisoner in his mokomokai was wailing and the tuatara were slithering all over the cave, climbing the rocky walls, trying to get away. But then —’

Erenora began to sob. She put her shovel down.

‘I can’t do it,’ she said to Rocco. ‘I can’t stop a murder by committing a murder.’

She thought of her mother, Miriam, killed so long ago in Warea. Mama, kei w’ea koe?

She looked at Rocco, tears streaming down her eyes. ‘And I can’t make an orphan of a young girl who lost her mother, by killing her father.’

She knelt on the ground. ‘Mein Herr,’ she wept, ‘I place my life and the life of my husband in your hands.’

Rocco gave a cry. ‘I knew it,’ he said. ‘I knew the emotions I had for you were those of a man for a woman. What is your name?’

‘It is Erenora.’

Rocco gave a gasp. ‘And the prisoner … you say he is your husband?’

Erenora nodded her head hopelessly. ‘I have been looking for him for a long time. Even just to spend some last moments with him, to touch his face, to caress his skin, to hold him, has made my search for him worthwhile.’

Oh, even wounded Rocco could have overpowered Erenora easily enough. He could have bound her so that when the assassin arrived he would have two victims, not one, to dispose of. But Rocco had already come to his own decision:

‘O, armer Mann,’ he had said when he threw down his shovel. ‘Oh, you poor man.’

‘I don’t know how long I lay weeping.

‘Rocco had become silent but the prisoner was agitated. “Taku ’oa wa’ine? My wife? Is she here like an angel to escort me to heaven?”

‘Then Rocco spoke to me. His voice was hoarse but the accustomed gruffness had gone. “Welch unerhörter Mut, Erenora,” he said with wonder, “what unheard of courage.” His voice softened further, as if peace was coming to his soul; all this time he had been greatly troubled by his conscience about the prisoner and now he was being delivered from it. “I cannot believe that a woman as you,” he continued, “would go to such lengths to save a criminal with blood on his hands. In my heart of hearts I have suspected this accusation wasn’t true. And now, Erenora, you are willing to sacrifice yourself and him to me and place yourselves at my mercy? That only confirms your and the prisoner’s goodness.”

‘He helped me up and smiled gently. “Your husband has suffered long enough. Perhaps he will forgive me for my role as his gaoler. Here is the key.”

‘All I could do was sob as Rocco put the key into my hands. And then I tried to put the key into the padlock of the mokomokai. Aue, after all these years the padlock had rusted. With a cry of frustration I pushed Horitana against the rocks and, taking up my shovel again, struck the padlock.’

The sound boomed and echoed around the cave, but the deed was done. The tuatara disappeared into the gloom.

‘No, wait,’ Horitana said.

Erenora looked at the man in the mask. He was panting, holding tightly to the pole, whimpering.

‘I have lived so long in the mokomokai,’ he said. ‘It has been like an old friend. Let me say goodbye to it.’ He began to caress it

with tenderness, and then he gave a sigh of acceptance. ‘And now, you who have come to release me of it, lift it off my shoulders.’

Erenora put her fingers under the rim.

‘I took off the mokomokai.’

And Horitana gave a huge, painful sob.

At the final moment when the prisoner’s face was revealed, Erenora became afraid. Again the same doubt: What if it wasn’t Horitana?

His face was entirely covered by a thick beard and his hair was long, lank. The skin beneath was pale, scabrous and scaly. He would not look up. He buried his face in his hands.

‘Horitana?’

At the sound of Erenora’s voice, the prisoner pushed the hair out of his eyes. He gave a cry as the light from the grille of the doorway beat down upon his face and he reeled away from her. ‘Is it really you, Erenora, here? Oh Lord of Heaven, why do you punish me so?’ He was shielding his eyes.

Erenora took a few steps after him but he pushed her away. ‘You’re not dreaming. I am here.’

He cried out again, ‘Erenora?’ and he looked at his hands. ‘You, the first person I have touched in three years … and I push you away?’ He collapsed onto the floor.

All Erenora could think of was that he could not recognise her. ‘My hair will grow again,’ she said.

Then she realised that Horitana was blind.

Did that matter? Horitana and Erenora embraced each other tenderly. In that second touch of skin on skin, Horitana knew it truly was her.

‘We have met again in darkness,’ he said as he pulled her forehead close to his. ‘The first time was when we were together in the darkest pit at Warea. The second came when you rescued me from the dead in the trenches, and now you descend into the darkness to me again. You, my courageous wife.’

Erenora pressed her nose against his and, oh, it was as if all the years melted away. Her heart, how it fluttered, ka patupatu tana manawa.

‘I am sorry it has taken me so long to find you,’ she answered, brushing away their tears. ‘’oki mai taua ki te Ao marama. Let us return now to the world of light.’

With Rocco’s help, Erenora guided Horitana from the cave where he had lived for so long. But at the threshold, the opening to the outer world, he backed away, crying, ‘The sun …’ Erenora ripped off her sleeves and bandaged Horitana’s head.

Only then did they leave the darkness.

Just in time. On the horizon was a ship.

As fast as he could, his head aching, Rocco hastened them down to a cove. ‘Wait here,’ he said. ‘Hide and, later, I will bring the skiff.’

‘How will you explain to the executioner?’ Erenora was panicking. ‘When you take him to the empty cave he will know Horitana has escaped, and will come looking for him.’

‘I will tell him that Horitana overpowered me today but I was able to fend him off … and a wave, rushing into the cave, swept him away,’ Rocco answered.

‘He will want to see the body.’ Erenora could not quite believe that they would get away with it.

‘That will not be possible,’ Rocco said. ‘The currents … there’s a storm coming too … the tide will have taken him miles away by now.’

‘But he will find the mokomokai in the cave,’ Erenora answered, ‘and realise that your story wasn’t true.’

‘You must go back and get it,’ Rocco said firmly. ‘There is time.’

With a sigh Erenora made herself believe Rocco’s story. ‘But what about Marzelline?’ she continued. ‘When I don’t return with you …’

‘I will not destroy her girlish dreams,’ Rocco answered. ‘I will tell her there was an accident when you and I were returning from the cliffs. I tripped and would have fallen over. You reached out your hand, saved me, but at the expense of your own life. You pitched headlong onto the rocks below. Nobody would have survived the fall.’ He was in a hurry now. ‘Geh, Eruera, leb wohl,’ he said. ‘Goodbye.’

Erenora took a deep breath: yes, it could work.

She gave Rocco a grateful look, and then spoke again. ‘Mein Herr, you must take your daughter back into the world.’

Rocco’s eyes widened and he shook his head. ‘Nein! Nein! She would know only heartache. Would a man ever look her way? Knowing that she is a cripple? No. I do not want Marzelline to experience the world’s cruelty.’

‘You are wrong. ‘ Erenora took his hands in hers. ‘You must take the chance. Your daughter is stronger than you think. Give her the opportunity to live .’