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THE VISITOR
“Where is Mr. Bill Stewart, nurse?” asked the slightly dark-skinned young man.
One of the two nurses, leaning on the verandah railing, keeping an eye on their dozen or so charges among the outdoor area, raised her hand and pointed toward several small blocks of rose gardens surrounded by grass verges. Smooth concrete pathways meandered between the blocks.
“Just down there.”
“Which one is he?”
“Oh sorry,” the nurse replied. “I presumed you knew him. He’s the one in the wheelchair wearing the yellow sun-cap.” She pointed again. “His back’s to us, he’s just enjoying the afternoon sun. Careful when you approach, I mean don’t startle him, he’s probably miles away with his thoughts.”
“What? Dementia?”
“No. Hell no. He’s sometimes as cheeky as ever, though lots less now since his youngest son died in an accident a few weeks ago. He really went downhill then. His youngest was the only one of his four children to regularly visit and stay to talk. Actually, you’re his first visitor since then.”
“I see him. Thanks nurse.” The visitor walked down the wheel-chair ramp, and along the freshly swept concrete path. Already feeling the warmth of the mid-Spring sun on his back, he could understand the patients wanting to spend the time outdoors. The man he had come to see was almost 50 metres away at the extreme end of the gardens. Nobody else was closer than 25 metres.
As he got to within 15 metres, he thumped his feet down a little harder to warn of his approach, but the concrete merely absorbed the sound. Instead, he tried to think of some song to whistle, but his mind had gone blank. Anything would do, so he pursed his lips, blew, but nothing came out. He licked his lips and tried to get some saliva in his mouth, then tried again.
This was stupid. He felt nervous and more eerily unsettled the closer he got. Some tuneless whistle finally managed to emerge, and the wheelchair seated man’s head under the yellow cap slowly turned.
“Mr. Stewart?”
“Och . Aye. That be I,” came the reply in a broad Scottish accent.
‘Strange,’ thought the visitor. His grandfather had never mentioned the man was Scottish.
“Good morning sir, I’m….”
“What? Well bugger me. Have they finally given me a knighthood?” interrupted the old man.
“No sir, I mean that’s not what I’m here for.”
“Damn. If I’m not a knight, you’d better call me Bill.
The visitor put out his right hand and was surprised at the strong grip response to his handshake. He also noticed that the Scottish accent had quickly disappeared. A friendly grin looked back at him. The sun protected fair-skin reflected the 81 year age of the wheelchair occupant but the features, especially the strength portrayed in the eyes, seemed to show someone 20 years younger.
“I have something that should’ve been given to you 15 years ago when Granddad died.” He lifted his left hand which contained an ornately carved oblong box, longer but slightly shallower than a shoe box, a piece of aged flax twine tied across its centre. A name tag was tucked neatly under the place where the twine crossed. He gently placed it on the old man’s lap. As he did so he noticed that the old man had no legs below the knee. He had not noticed initially because the old man’s legs were covered with a thin blanket.
“Gee, it’s a heavy bugger. My God, it’s beautiful too.” The old man removed the small name-tag, examining it briefly; then let his hands softly flow over the grooves and intricate shapes of the box surface.
“It’s actually what’s in the box that’s the gift, but the box is part of it.”
“Your grandfather you say?”
“Yes sir. He said that many years ago you were closer to him than any of his brothers or sisters; even his own children.”
The old man raised a pale white hand off the box to indicate silence. Then he lowered his head again, continuing stroking the box. It was perhaps two minutes before he stopped. He then placed his hands at both ends of the box and slowly raised it to his forehead.
“Matiu, my dear friend. Thank you. I think of you often.”
He lowered the box to his lips and kissed it gently, before replacing it on his lap.
The silence continued for a further couple of minutes and the visitor saw the old man wipe tears from his eyes with his hand.
“So. You must be one of Matiu’s grandsons.
“Yes, I’m Wiremu. Both my father and me; both of us are Wiremu I mean. Poppa insisted my father named me after you. Everybody calls me Wiri.”
“Just like Bill. Or Billy is short for William.”
Wiri fidgeted slightly in anticipation of Bill opening the box; but the old man merely continued slowly caressing it with his fingers.
“Can you stay for a while? Even though the dear old bugger’s been dead for a long time I’d like to talk with someone from his family.”
“Sure. I’m not in any hurry.”
“We’d better find somewhere for you to sit.” Bill looked toward a wooden three-person garden seat about five metres away. A slim old man, chin leaning on his walking sticks had just moved in, and sat there alone.
“Bugger off you nosey old bastard,” yelled Bill. “I’ll run you down or knock your sticks out when I’m on my scooter. Go play with yourself you nosey git.”
The stick-man mumbled an obscenity, and made a maximum effort to stand. After rocking backward and forward a few times while leaning forward over his walking sticks, he made it to his feet, then after a minor balance adjustment, and a couple of short steps, he shuffled his way along the concrete path, a scowl on his face, still mumbling obscenities.
“The wrinklies here are a lot of nosey buggers. Can you wheel me over to the bench? Then, you can sit down. I’m not letting go of this box.”
Wiri sat on the end of the seat watching the old man continue to stroke the box.
“You know your Grandpa taught me lots of things. Some still influence me today. He even taught me enough Maori to understand a conversation, though I didn’t speak it very well. Can’t understand a bloody word now though. Haven’t tried to for 60 odd years.”
Wiri nodded in silence.
“But I still do the daily newspaper crossword. He spent hours teaching me the subtle clues, hidden meanings in words, and techniques. Eventually I got it. I think of him most times I start a crossword. He made me look at words in a different light for clues to the real meaning.”
The old man breathed in deeply, exhaled loudly, and patted the box. “That bloody insidious cancer. He fought it ‘til the end.”
Bill raised the box and looked in Wiri’s direction enquiringly. “Why 15 years?”
“Before the cancer took him, Grandad was quite forceful, even had it written in his will, that this unopened box and its contents should pass to you. Dear old Poppa, as I called him, had so much stuff he accumulated over the years, it took a small truck to take it all home. Grandma didn’t want all that stuff around as a reminder. But she gave strict instructions to make sure the items with names on were given to the named people. To be honest, Poppa had become estranged from his children as they got older.”
“Yes,” interrupted Bill. “I remember we talked about that.”
“Do you remember what it was about?”
“Very, very well. I was having the same problem with my older children. In fact it’s still the same now. Money. Though I don’t have any. I just annoy them now by staying alive.”
“Anyway, your box got put away with lots of stuff in an old garage on the family farm.”
“You’ve still got the farm then?”
“Yeah. The way Poppa set it up years before he died, it’s all in trust so we can’t sell it.”
“He was a wiser man than me.”
“Grandma threatened death on anyone who opened the labeled boxes. So when she visited the farm recently and found out Dad hadn’t sorted out all the stuff, she went ballistic. Man, I’d never seen
her like that. Maybe it was her Polish ancestry but boy, did she let fly.”
Bill chuckled quietly as the visions of his friend’s wife flooded into his brain. Then it dawned on him. Those memories were nearly 60 years old. He had not seen her or even a photograph of her since they were all in the late teens and early 20’s.
“What about that massive kauri tree on the farm? Still there?”
“Yeah. Poppa put a preservation order on it. All rights vested in the Forest and Bird Protection Society. Somehow he set up a trust for the tree, and they inspect its health every six months. Poppa doesn’t dare touch it as he forfeits occupancy of the land if the tree is cut down.”
“I lost all contact with your Granddad for about 40 years,” said Bill.
“Yeah. Poppa told me. You don’t know how happy he was after you made contact again even though it was only 3 years before he died.”
“Me too. The problem was, living so far apart; we never actually saw each other again, only talked on the phone. After he died your Gran emailed me a recent photo. So I have two wonderful memories; a young vibrant Matiu and a photo of a serious yet wise looking old man. I think I would’ve walked past him in the street; but not if I saw his eyes”
“When Gran saw Dad still had your box, she went hyper-allistic and called him names I could never think of. I reckon lots of them were in Polish too. I’d never seen Dad go red with embarrassment. It looks kind of funny on a Maori face. At least it did on Dad’s. Well, he was so scared he shot through for a couple of days, which was probably just as well. Over the years, Dad had picked over some of the loose items. Some were pretty valuable artifacts that Poppa had accumulated. Dad got quite a bit of money for some. Attached to lots of them were letters about their origins. Poppa had really done his research. Those items Dad couldn’t sell to collectors he gave to museums and so on. Gran gave the box to me to deliver to you.”
Bill lowered his head and nodded in disapproval. “A lifetime’s history of collecting sold for instant cash.”
Wiri became fidgety.
“You know,” said Wiri. “I think Grandma was the only one other than Poppa who knows what’s in that box. I’m terrified to think what Gran would’ve done if she ever thought that Dad had untied that box.”
Bill’s hand began caressing the box again, each time skipping over the twine, and especially the place where it was knotted.
“How is your Gran?”
“She always seems busy, even at her age. She’s got a foot in two communities. Poles and Maoris. I’m not too sure how that blood mixes.”
“You better hope it’s good because that’s your ancestry.”
“I’m Maori. But my Mum’s actually also Polish. Dad married the daughter of a Polish family who came from the same area as Gran.”
“I remember stirring up your Poppa because his Mum was half Scottish. I told him to spend a quarter of his time researching the Scottish bit. He just called me a cheeky bastard.”
“That sounds like Poppa
“Think of it Wiri. You’re actually only 3/16 Maori, even 1/16 Scottish. That makes you 75% Polish. Isn’t it a bit insulting to not know your Mother tongue.”
“But I do. Poppa made sure we all spoke Maori.”
“As I understand it, the mother tongue is the language you learn on the lap of your mother, the language your Mum speaks. A bit insulting to your Gran and Mum to ignore your major blood line isn’t it?”
“Poppa always said you were direct. I hadn’t thought of it like that.”
Bill raised his eyebrows. “I’m presuming you don’t speak Polish.”
Wiri seemed embarrassed as he nodded his head.
“I suppose I should. I’ve been staying with her. I think that’s why she gave the box to me. She kept Poppa’s papers with all the ancient tribe and family history. I’ve been trying to put it into a chronological sequence, a bit easier with computers. Poppa’s notes were all in longhand because he hated computers. Then I want to put it out in a book; not for my family, maybe the next generation might want to know. I’m hoping to get a grant from Maori Affairs to let me do it full time. I suppose Poppa was really a research scientist but didn’t know it.”
“Did you know your Poppa wrote to me a couple of weeks before he died? It was all in longhand. He knew he didn’t have much longer to live. But he expected your Dad would be coming to see me a few weeks after he wrote his letter, and to deliver this box.”
“I didn’t know.”
“When we were young, fit and adventurous, he wanted to take me into the bush to a secret river area where two streams met. He reckoned there was lots of gold there, just waiting to be panned. Marriage and kids buggered up any chance I had of going bush with him. Then he got married soon after I did. Even up to the last time we spoke, before I went overseas, he still wanted me to go bush with him and look for it.”
“Gran told me he often used to disappear for weeks at a time. She presumed he was looking for old burial grounds and ancient sites.”
“He was probably doing that as well.”
“He brought back quite a few artifacts. Did he find any gold though?”
Bill looked at the lightly tanned young man.
“If he had found any, wouldn’t he have told your Dad? Or your Grandma?”
“I don’t know. She just stored the artifacts.”
“Yep. He told me lots of things in that last letter, some of which he made me promise to keep secret. I don’t think your Gran does know what’s in here. Shall we open it?”
The young man leaned forward in excited anticipation, and watched as Bill opened the knot quite easily and slipped away the aged flax twine around the box. He took his time pushing the flax deep into his jacket pocket. With the box clear of any obstructions, he again ran his fingers over it as if he was feeling it for the first time.
“Beautiful kauri. Such wonderful hardwood. Matiu told me it was carved by his great-great grandfather in the 1840’s to contain a special valuable treasure. He said the box and its genuine contents should always be kept together except in times of war, important tribal meetings; or removed and hidden when the contents were in peril, and then only given to or removed by an acceptably appointed chief or person.”
Wiri had a surprised expression.
“Poppa was certainly a well respected elder with much mana.”
Bill slowly removed the lid. Wiri leaned closer. The item inside was covered with tightly packed aged and crinkled satin. It seemed that more crinkled satin was underneath it. Slowly removing the top layer, Bill heard Wiri gasp involuntarily when he saw the contents.
They looked at a thick 35 centimetre long rough pitted stone with many cracked lines. Bill passed the open box to Wiri who immediately pulled out the stone, quickly examining it; then putting it aside, he removed the remaining crinkled satin to confirm there was nothing underneath.
“This can’t be right,” he said giving the box and satin back to Bill. He picked up the stone to examine it again. “This looks like a common river stone. Nothing significant.” He stood up, looked at Bill, and handed the stone back.
Bill’s expression was neutral. He waved the stone in his hands a few times. “It’s no river stone, it’s rough, and it’s very heavy. He slipped the long heavy stone back into the box.
“Oh Hell, I’m sorry. Maybe Poppa was playing a trick on you.”
“I don’t think so,” replied Bill. “Maybe the box’s original contents had been removed for safe-keeping and the stone put in its place.”
Wiri put his hand to his forehead and rubbed it with his fingers. “God knows what Gran will think when I tell her. I think I’d better go.”
“I know I’ve now got a beautiful kauri box which I didn’t have at the start of the day,” said Bill. “And a stone, which I’m sure has some history inside it.”
“I’m so sorry. I just wished there was something I could do.”
“You can wheel me back to the office.”
“Sure. Oh my God, wh
at’s Gran gonna say?”
Bill sat in silence as Wiri pushed the wheelchair toward the covered deck where the nurses were still watching over their aged patients. Bill had covered the box with the top part of the blanket. Once back on the deck Bill took control, and with a quick spin of one wheel had turned the chair to face Wiri.
“Give your Gran my very best wishes. No, give her my love. Tell her I will respect Matiu’s memory and his wishes.”
Wiri was apparently still dumb-struck. He again put out his hand, and the old man again responded with a firm handshake.
“It really was good meeting a grandchild of my dear friend. And thanks for this magnificent box.”
Wiri nodded a bemused response, turned on his heels and departed.
“Nice to have a visitor?” asked one of the nurses.
“Very different, very interesting, very mysterious, and very late,” Bill replied
The nurses looked at each other.
Bill wheeled off toward the office and smiled at the on-duty receptionist.
“Hi Molly. May I get into my private security box?”
“Sure Bill.” She slid a register of access book in front of him. He quickly signed. With that she swung back the wide flap by the counter allowing wheel-chair entry into a private area. One side of the wall was covered with a number of large pigeon holes of varying sizes, each with solid steel lock-up doors for guests to keep valuables and private papers.
Bill pulled the long string out from around his neck. He quickly inserted the key into the lock of his conveniently-heighted box. He pushed back the envelopes on the top and extracted an oversized bubble-padded bag at the bottom of the pile. After relocking the box he slipped the envelope under the blanket and with a wave wheeled back past Molly.
“Thanks,” he called out and made his way slowly to his private room. He locked the door behind him, though nurses with the proper emergency key could still come in. Filling up and switching on the whistling electric jug as he passed, he wheeled over to the bed. He put the stone-filled box gently on the bed. Then he examined the huge padded envelope on which he had covered the details of the original addressee with a couple of white stick on labels.
From within that, he pulled out a smaller envelope which contained a neatly folded topographical map and letter. He began to re-read the hand-written letter. Though it had been almost 15 years since he had last looked at it, the comments and details were recalled as easily as if he had read it yesterday.
Bill re-read Matiu’s indictment of the financial greed of his family, their lack of respect for their ancestors, and their hands-out attitude believing their rights were God-given and they did not have to work for their share. “I know you will understand,” Matiu wrote on, “because as we spoke the other night, I sensed your frustration with your own family and lack of respect or care for anyone else but themselves. Therefore any mantle that is to be handed down, I give to you even though you’re a white skin pakeha.”
“In this generation, while it outwardly seems there has been a rebirth in Maoridom, too many of our real traditional Maori values, attitudes and beliefs have vanished because they have no cash value. The human remains that the new elders keep claiming back with financial compensation from overseas museums is tenuous. They just get a free overseas trip and a big sorry payout. My research shows that most of the heads and stuff they sold to ship captains were from tribal slaves and enemies they’d eaten. They were unrelated and no kin with their own tribe. To bury the remains of slaves with their own warriors demeans the power of the warriors.”
“I once said to you that our friendship would always be cemented in stone. Check it out like our old crosswords. So remember, if you just get stoned on glue, just boil it up and try and to take the top off it for the nicest feelings. You will know the right thing to do. The other envelope gives a lot of whakapapa, documentation, details of the history of the treasure, the list of the chiefs and the years it was in their possession as far back as I could trace or closely estimate as far back as 1760. Some historians may be able to trace it further back.”
“Its value is inestimable, though with its history, its worth is probably into the 100’s of thousands of dollars to a collector or a museum. You will know I have died after you receive the kauri box. Please replace the item I have posted to you into the box that it was originally carved for when you receive it, and cherish both the proper contents and enjoy the substitute stone while you live.”
“To others, the appearance of a rough but common looking stone in its place is to make my wife believe that someone in my unworthy family may have taken the original genuine contents. They would place a higher value on greenstone than a rough rock, and they would probably just throw a seemingly valueless rock away and keep the box. She will stop judging them through her rose-tinted glasses and see them for what they really are; though I might have taken devious means to get there. Please, respect my wishes and forever keep this secret, together with the map details, between us, never to be revealed. Remember, all of the stone, inside and out, is yours. Always your brown brother, Matiu.”
Bill sighed as he put the letter back in the smaller envelope, but instead of putting it back in the large envelope he placed it in his bedside drawer. He grinned at Matiu’s clues about the stone which anyone else would ignore as a crazy raving. Perhaps they would be surprised that their Father had done such things as glue-sniffing. Next he opened up the topographical map and re-examined it. Just off-centre was a small circled area where two streams converged. No obvious location was given, yet he knew the area could be easily identified from the Survey Plan numbers at the base. He tore off the area identification and then tore that piece into many smaller pieces. Refolding the large section, he reopened the drawer and dropped that beside the other letter. Both he would destroy tomorrow. He left the second large envelope inside the padded bag knowing its thick reams of paper contained the history about the mere. He had already read them.
The jug whistled its boiling status. Picking up the stone, he wheeled to his small cupboard and removed the largest pot he had. After putting additional hot water in the pot, he placed it on the small stove, then, poured in the boiling water and turned on the element. He removed the long heavy stone from his jacket pocket, and slipped it carefully into the water. He returned to the items on the bed and re-examined them until the water in the pot started to boil.
He picked up the bubble-padded envelope and delicately extracted a 40 centimetre long greenstone mere. He held it reverently at the comfortable hand grip. Its edges were ragged as would be expected for such a weapon perhaps used in dozens of battles, yet still sharp enough to easily chop into wood.
His hands now held it at the sides as though in prayer. He felt the greenstone warm to his touch. Rubbing finger-tips over its broad sides, he detected the many scratches. Then, again felt the power it seemed to generate. Placing it flat against his heart, the warmth passed through his clothing. The only word he felt could describe it was magnificent.
The phone ringing by his bed startled him.
“Hello Bill, kitchen here. Are you going to join us for dinner?”
Bill looked at the clock. The time had flown by in his daydreams. “Sorry, I’d lost track of time. Can you bring something over? Anything’ll do.”
“Sure. Be there in 15-20 minutes.”
“Thanks,” replied Bill. He slipped the greenstone mere back into the large padded bag. He would re-wrap it in the silk and replace it into its true home in the long kauri box tomorrow, then everything into the large padded bag obviously chosen to fit the box, and re-seal it with the broad Sellotape. After breakfast tomorrow, he would put it all back in his lock-up box. Tonight the mere would stay under his pillow just as he thought many of the chiefs might have done over the centuries, but under much harder pillows. Perhaps some of its power and strength might flow into him.
He turned his attention back to the now bubbling pot containing the stone. Moving the pot to his small sin
k, he extracted the heavy stone from the hot water with food tongs. The top part of the stone had shifted slightly. Picking up a knife and using a tea towel he angled the stone so the knife could fit into the small gap which had appeared. As he slowly prized the two sides apart he could see the strong glue already re-drying on his knife. He gave the knife a forceful push with a twist and the top part of the stone fell back into the sink.
Bill sat back and nodded his head in amazement. The bottom part of the stone had been carefully hollowed out and six minted gold bars, each about five centimeters long, sat comfortably in the hollow. He turned the base stone over allowing the small ingots to fall onto the bench. He gently picked up each in turn, examining them.
“You’re heavy little buggers aren’t you? So Matiu, you found your gold.”
When the two parts of the stone had cooled enough for him to place the bars back into the base, he put the capstone back on the top and wondered what he would do with this bonus. Back to his bed again, he slipped the second ugly but valuable rough stone under his pillow.
He pulled a large white padded envelope from the drawer to contain the stone. He would Sellotape the stone’s top back on so its contents would be easily found.
He just hoped he would not die in his sleep tonight. Some less than honest person might find the items under the pillow.
He looked at the new details he had addressed on the big padded envelope which would contain the kauri box and the precious mere. It now read “Deliver to The New Zealand Museum Society.” On the envelope in which he would place the stone and its gold he wrote “Deliver to the New Zealand Cancer Society as a gift after my death.”