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Amongst the Maoris: A Book of Adventure

Chapter VI

page 61

Chapter VI.

Arrival In Wellington—Jack Meets With A Very Agreeable Waiter, Though He Does Not Meet With the Object of His Search.

It was some days after this that Jack Stanley said suddenly to Bernard, who was standing by him, “I wonder if that man has a son?” “What man?” asked Bernard, glancing at a group of men on deck, either of which his companion might have alluded to; but Jack's own mind being full of one subject, he seemed to imagine that other people must understand him instinctively.

“That man Maitland,” said Jack.

“I do not understand exactly what injury you imagine him to have done your father: I fancy you exaggerate the offence, whatever it may have been,” said Bernard, playing with the end of a coil of rope near him.

“It is not imagination on my part, I should think, that instead of living in comfort and luxury, my father ended his days in poverty; it was no fancy that he was changed from the happy-hearted cheerful man I can remember him page 62 to the careworn anxious man he became. That was no fancy that, going to that hateful office in a fog such as London only can produce, he met his death prematurely.”

“Really, I think,” said Bernard, quietly, “that you can hardly lay your father's death to his charge also.”

“Not to Maitland's charge? I do, then!” exclaimed Jack violently.

“Your father might have died accidentally, had he been still at his place in the country.”

“I don't believe it,” said Jack, still in the same manner. “However,” said he, after a time, more quietly, “all this does not bear upon my remark. I wonder if he has a son?”

“And if you knew that he had,” said Bernard, “what end would it serve you? Would you carry your animosity to the son also?”

“I don't know,” mused Jack. “I think I should very probably. I would rather not be put to the test.”

“Stanley,” said Bernard, “you are much younger than I am, a boy compared to me; but you startle me by the way you speak: you seem to talk more like a heathen than a Christian.”

“If there is any one to blame for that, it is Maitland, then,” said Jack. “I should never have felt so but for him.”

“Well, as you know, I cannot argue,” returned Bernard. “I never could express myself readily; but all this seems to me very wrong. I am older than you, Stanley; but you are much cleverer than I.”

“I don't know that at all. But I wish you would call page 63 me by my Christian name. I have still that of Christianity about me, at any rate. I liked you, Bernard, from the first moment I saw you—a time I shall never forget—and you are about the only man in the world I care for.”

“Well, I think I can return the compliment, Jack,” answered Bernard, looking up and smiling; “I only hope you will not some day change your mind, and hate me instead of liking me.”

“Not likely,” Jack laughed. “I love as strongly as I hate.”

“So I should think,” said Bernard, and lapsed into silence.

On several occasions after that, Jack Stanley tried to make his friend speak of his own affairs; but beyond a few generalities Jack could never get him to go. He evidently knew very little of the father he was going out to join. He had been much attached to the aunt who had educated him, a Miss Bernard; but scarcely remembered his mother. There was an uncertainty in the way in which he spoke of his family which struck Jack as strange, and one day he suddenly asked,

“Did not your father speak of these things to you? My father always made a friend of me.”

“You forget that I have not seen my father for eighteen years, Jack.”

“But in his letters?”

“He never wrote to me in my life,” said Bernard, sadly. “My dear fellow,” said Jack Stanley, putting his arm page 64 affectionately round the shoulders of Bernard, “I can hardly understand such a state of things. Then you are going to your father as to a stranger?”

“Jack, I do not even know where to find my father! When I last heard of him he was in Wellington. I think I ought to find him, and have come out with that intention. And now don't talk any more about it, there's a dear fellow,” said Bernard, with a sigh.

Jack squeezed his hand, and said no more, and the subject was not renewed during the voyage.

Jack Stanley had a keen enjoyment of his life. He was just the boy to make the best of the disagreeables of the voyage, and get all the pleasure he could out of its small adventures. He had not known, during the monotonous years of his life in London, how intense was his love for everything in nature. He had looked back with regret to his life at The Beeches, and had been in the habit of abusing London dust or London smoke, as the case might be; but only now he realized—or began to realize—what the natural world might be. He would spend hours on deck watching the moon and the fleecy clouds, or the glorious constellations, or gazing at the dancing waves, until by some of his fellow-passengers he was voted the idlest creature on board. You would think that this study of nature must have made Jack Stanley a better fellow than he had been; but I am afraid it brought him no nearer God, for between his Maker and himself there was always that barrier of sin, his desire of revenge.

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“He that hateth his brother is a murderer, and we know that no murderer hath eternal life abiding in him.”

This was the boy who, at his baptism, had promised and sworn to be the soldier and servant of Christ, and to renounce the sinful lusts of the flesh; but Jack Stanley never thought of these things now.

Once during the voyage they encountered very rough weather. The ropes and the masts creaked, the winds whistled through the cordage, the ship was rocked and tossed about. Most of the passengers were very much alarmed: they would not go below, although the captain advised them to do so; but crowded together, watching the black sky and the black water, and trembling at the flashing of the lightning, and the women shrieking at the rolling of the thunder.

Hope Bernard was amongst them, striving to control the agitation of the frightened women; but Stanley remained aloof. He was too proud to acknowledge that he quailed with fear, and that his heart stood still as he overheard the observations of the captain to the master, which showed that he thought the ship in danger: he passed such two hours as he remembered afterwards with a shudder. He could hear others calling upon God, but he remained silent. He could hear Bernard—who on most occasions was so slow in ability to express himself where he felt most deeply—roused by the imminence of the time almost into eloquence, speaking of faith and trust, and a hope for the Christian beyond this world. page 66 All was miserable and dark to Stanley as the black sea around him and the dark sky above. He could not at such an hour put away the thought of God from him, and he dared not meet Him.

But after a long suspense, the wind fell and the sky cleared, and the ship still held together, although she had sprung a considerable leak, and the horror and fear were changed to rejoicing. The women and children retired to bed, and all the serviceable men were busy at the pumps and in clearing the deck. Jack Stanley volunteered his services, too glad of active employment to turn the current of his thoughts, and very soon all his fears and uncomfortable reflections were forgotten, for the devil was only too pleased to drive them away, with Jack's own help, and get a firmer standing in his heart.

It was not long after this storm that the first cliffs of the Australian world came in sight. Most of those on board gave way to extravagant delight at the near prospect of the end of their voyage, though it was difficult to account for their rejoicings, as many of them were about to enter on an unknown future.

Jack perceived Bernard leaning over the side gazing at the hills of Kangaroo Island, with a face indicative of anything but pleasure, and going to him, he placed his arm within that of his friend.

“What is it, old fellow?” he asked. “You don't seem to anticipate the meeting with your father very gladly. Do you feel nervous about it?” page 67 Bernard started, then answered,

“I hardly know where to begin, Jack. You see, if he has left Wellington, as he may very probably, I shall feel very awkward.”

“If it were my father I was looking for,” said Jack, “I know how I should act; or indeed if I wanted to find any one very particularly, as I do—as I do, you know well —I shall know where to find him.”

“What should you do?” said Bernard.

“What shall I do, you mean. If I find that my man is nowhere in Wellington, I shall go to the other place, what is it called?—Auckland, and thence all over the island, until I have thoroughly searched it. If he is not there, I shall go to the other islands. I'll find him if he is anywhere.”

Bernard began to speak once or twice ineffectually, then he said,

“And if you do find him, you surely do not still hold to the same purpose you told me of in London?”

“I will expose him and ruin him,” said Jack, savagely. “I have got with me those papers I told you of: they will prove what a villain he is. I have been reading them during the voyage out. I have not had time to do so thoroughly before. I will finish him off, in whatever position he is.”

Bernard gave a great sigh.

“I know what you mean, Hope,” said Jack, “and you are a very good fellow, ten times better than I am; but it page 68 is perfectly useless to argue the question with me. I think for the future we had best avoid the subject.”

Upon arriving in Wellington, for that was the New Zealand town to which the ship was bound, Jack Stanley was in haste to get ashore. He found that his friend would be unable to leave the ship until after all the passengers were landed, as his professional duties would require his presence on board; but such was his own impatience that he would not wait for Bernard.

The harbour of Wellington is very fine, and the first view of the city is beautiful. At the back of the city are mountains thickly grown with trees. At the time that Jack Stanley went there most of the buildings were of wood; but in the present day I fancy he would find the town very different in appearance.

He could not help noticing that Hope Bernard appeared annoyed that he could not wait for him to come ashore; but Stanley called out as he left the ship's side,

“Follow me to the principal hotel. I suppose there isn't likely to be more than one. I shall be there, I dare say, before long.”

As he came into the bay, he saw a great wooden house placarded “Barratt's Hotel,” and, upon inquiry, found it was the hotel of the place; but he intended taking a little walk first. It seemed strange to him every now and then to meet face to face with a native New Zealander mixing with the English settlers. Some of these Maoris were dressed in their native mat, and looked picturesque though page 69 filthy; whilst others had quite destroyed all interest in their appearance by adopting European dress, in which they looked awkward and ridiculous. But though Jack Stanley noticed these things in passing, yet his one idea in traversing the streets of Wellington was to meet with the name of Maitland. He gazed and stared about, too shy—with the shyness of an Englishman or English boy —to speak to those who were passing or standing about, and obtain help from them, and quite unsuccessful in his attempts. He repaired to the hotel to await the arrival of Bernard, feeling rather disheartened, and saying to himself,

“Now that I have arrived in Wellington, by dint of asking for the place, I shall have to run about the streets, like Gilbert à Becket's lady-love, shouting, ‘Maitland!’ till I run against him; for, after all, it seems to me that I have not much more ground than she had to go upon. Never mind; she found her lover.”

And so it might have seemed to most people that Jack Stanley had started on a very slight foundation for success.

Bernard was unable to leave the ship until the following day, and Jack, finding, after he had waited for some time, that his friend did not come, ordered some dinner for himself.

While it was being served, he said to the waiter, who was flitting in and out of the room,

“Is there not a gentleman of the name of Maitland, a shipowner, in business in the town?”

“Maitland, sir? Yes, sir; there were, sir; certainly, page 70 sir, without doubt,” answered the man. “But he have left Wellington, sir—more's the pity—now better than six months, sir.”

“Why ‘more's the pity’?” asked Jack, flushing as if the waiter had intended to insult him personally.

“Mr. Maitland was a gentleman of large property, sir; very much respected in the town, sir.”

“Indeed,” said Jack, looking and feeling disgusted. “I suppose most men of large property are very much respected, whatever they may be.”

“Yes, sir, certainly, sir,” said the waiter, not in the least understanding what Jack Stanley was talking about.

“Do you know where this Mr. Maitland is gone?” asked Jack, after the waiter had flitted in and out of the room again several times.

“They said as he were gone to Auckland, sir,” replied the man. “He has a banking business in Auckland, sir. —Dinner's quite ready, sir.”

“What sort of a place is Auckland?”

“Fine town, sir; but Wellington will be the capital of New Zealand some day, sir.”

“Don't look much like it at present,” grumbled Jack, in a not very complimentary tone to the town of Wellington, and rising in order to take his seat at table.

During dinner Jack Stanley observed to the same waiter, he being the only person he had to whom to talk, and Jack being a young man who would talk to any one sooner than be silent,

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“What an enormous number of flies there are in the room! I declare I flicked hundreds out of the window just before you brought in the dinner, and look now at the table-cloth: it is black with them. It is quite disgusting.”

“Always the way in Wellington, sir,” answered the waiter, as if Wellington had reason to be proud of the fact. “Strangers, they mostly complain of 'em.”

“Well, do you mean to say that you like them?” asked Jack.

“Well, they do say, sir,” said the waiter, with a smile, “as use is second natur', sir; for myself, I don't take much notice of 'em.”

“But they get into everything,” returned Jack, indignantly; “look, there are no less than five brutes in my gravy: why, I might have eaten one of them in another moment.”

“I dare say many and many is eat, sir, unbeknown,” replied the waiter, calmly and respectfully; “and it can't make much difference, sir, so long as it are unbeknown, you see.”

“I don't know that,” said Jack, making desperate hits at the flies with his napkin, at the risk of knocking everything off the table. “If I thought I had eaten one of the disgusting beasts, it would make me sick for a week. Why do not you do something to get rid of them? I do detest flies.”

“You see, sir,” observed the waiter, “there ain't no page 72 swallows in New Zealand, and that is the reason of the flies.”

“No swallows!” exclaimed Jack; “then why on earth do not people bring over swallows?”

“It have been tried, I believe, this several times; but the swallows, they won't live through the passage out; there's the want of proper food and the cold of the South Pole, you see, sir; and swallows, they won't bear confinement, sir, besides,” said the waiter, apologetically.

“Why, a man would be a public benefactor who would introduce them here,” said Jack.

“He would so, sir,” said the waiter.

“And might make his fortune besides.”

“He might, sir,” answered the agreeable waiter.

“Well, I wonder Government does not do something,” observed Jack, with an Englishman's wonted resource when he can blame no one else, and it is not a case of writing to the “Times.” “It ought to be seen to. It is a public nuisance. Something should be done.”

“You see, sir,” said the calm philosophic waiter, as he cleared away Jack's dinner, flies and all, “I suppose even Government can't make the swallows alter their natural habits, sir. Birds won't do that kind of thing, not even for an Act of Parliament, sir.”