The People Before

‘Might be some money in that stuff.’

But Jim didn't seem to hear, or understand. His eyes were still bright. ‘That means there must have been Māoris here in the old days,’ he said.

‘I suppose there must have,’ my father agreed. He didn't seem much interested. Maoris were Maoris.

‘I never been here before. I never been in this part of the country before.’

‘Then how do you know that's the hill, eh?’

‘Because,’ Tom said simply, ‘the old men told me. They described it so well I could find the place blindfold. All the stories of our tribe are connected with that hill. That's where we lived, up there, for hundreds of years.’

‘You see,’ Jim added apologetically, ‘I didn't think they really belonged to anyone. That's why I kept them.’

‘Well,’ Tom said, embarrassed. ‘That's real nice of you. Real nice of you, son. But you better keep them, eh? They're yours now. You find, you keep. We got no claims here any more. This is your father's land now.’

So he was still alive, in a way. Certainly it was a long time before he let us alone.

And by then my father had lost all taste for the farm. It seemed the land itself had heaped some final indignity upon him, made a fool of him.