This Thing Of Darkness (91 page)

‘Really, Mr FitzRoy,’ she smiled, ‘you do fuss overmuch.’

A polite cough from the doorway interrupted them. ‘If you please, sir.’

It was Andrew Sinclair, FitzRoy’s colonial secretary. The young Scot was actually a naval surgeon, who had headed south on a convict vessel the year before and had decided to stay on. Unable to trust any European in the colony besides the missionaries, FitzRoy had seized the opportunity of employing a Navy man in a much-needed position of responsibility.

‘There are news from Kororareka sir. Chief Hone Heke and a band of men have cut down the flagstaff, two days ago, and have burned the British and New Zealand flags.’

FitzRoy remembered the lonely flagpole on the hill above the resident’s house, which was empty now, Bushby long since fled.

‘Was there a reason for this act?’

‘One of his servants, a girl named Kotiro, has run off and married a white man of that town.’

‘It is but a pretext. Hone Heke has a hundred servants. It is a calculated gesture against the symbol of British authority. He is probing, pushing, trying to provoke us to collision.’

‘What shall we do?’

‘Certainly we cannot ignore it, but we must not be intemperate. Send orders for another flagstaff to be erected, and new flags to be flown. And send a message to Hone Heke that I am willing to meet with him personally, regarding his grievances.’

‘Yes, sir.’

Sinclair performed a naval about-turn and exited the room, leaving FitzRoy alone with his wife. Concerned, she placed her hand upon his. ‘Will it be the first shot of the war?’

‘I most devoutly hope not, Mrs FitzRoy. For the sake of all our lives.’

 

A Navy brig that had docked at Auckland, HMS
Hazard,
ferried FitzRoy north to Kororareka some eight weeks later, together with fifty men of the 80th Regiment, the bulk of his troop strength, under Captain Maynard. News had come through that Hone Heke had cut down the flagstaff for a second time, and had refused FitzRoy’s request for a meeting. The governor had ordered the pole to be re-erected yet again, this time with iron cladding about its base, and had issued a warrant for Hone Heke’s arrest, on a charge of damaging crown property. There was now a price on the chief’s head, which FitzRoy could ill afford, of one hundred pounds. It was, he knew, little more than a symbolic gesture.

On arrival at Kororareka, a council of war was called, to be held in the Christ Church, the only building in the grubby little town that even remotely deserved to be called salubrious. The Christian chief Waka Nene had been invited, as had Mr Williams, representing the Waimate missionaries, Andrew Sinclair, Captain Maynard and his two lieutenants, and the captain and ship’s officers of HMS Hazard. The news was not good. Hone Heke’s men had raided most of the outlying farms, robbing the occupants and burning the buildings to the ground. They had stolen a good many horses, which meant that their band was now mobile and fast. The formerly boisterous, drunken occupants of Kororareka had become nervous and fearful, and were keeping to their homes. The crunch, FitzRoy sensed, had come. One mistake, one wrong decision by him, and scores of people could die. I hold all these
people’s lives in my hands, not to mention the lives of my own family. Lord, give me the strength to act wisely and for the good of all.

‘Hone Heke sends you a message,’ said Chief Waka Nene gravely, the intense black whorls that spiralled furiously about his face giving no clue to his expression. He handed across a piece of paper.

FitzRoy unfolded it and read it out:

‘Damned cheek,’ said Maynard, who had a ruddy-faced, confident air. ‘The man is a self-important thief, who will run at the first sign of opposition.’

‘Tell me, Captain Maynard,’ asked FitzRoy, ‘what battle experience do you and your men possess?’

‘Well, sir ... none of us has actually seen active service yet,’ said Maynard, colouring even further, ‘but we train every day. Believe me, sir, the New Zealander is not a man who can be talked to with any sort of hesitation. He must be talked to with a fixed bayonet, and we are the men to talk to him.’

FitzRoy’s glance flicked across to Waka Nene, to see if Maynard’s generalizations were having any effect, but the chief sat in impassive silence.

‘We’re fully able to give Heke and his followers a good chastisement, sir,’ offered Lieutenant Randall, Maynard’s immediate junior, an enthusiastic youth of some nineteen years.

You are just
a boy,
thought FitzRoy.
How typical of the Army to make lieutenants of barely trained younkers.

‘Your courage does you credit, Lieutenant Randall. But do not forget that there are no fewer than twelve thousand New Zealanders living in the vicinity of Kororareka.’

‘A war would be disastrous for us all!’ blared Williams, in his Cardiff baritone. ‘Catastrophe! Especially a war over a flag on a stick! Can we not simply take the flag into safe-keeping until there can be no doubt as to its protection?’

FitzRoy shook his head. ‘I am afraid, Mr Williams, that the flag symbolizes my authority, and that of Her Majesty, over this colony. It must stay up.’

‘Hone Heke sees the flagstaff as a
rahui.’
Waka Nene broke his silence. ‘A sign - a magic sign - to keep intruders away. If he cuts it down, it will weaken the white man’s magic. Hone Heke is not a Christian.’

‘What a lot of superstitious mumbo-jumbo,’ scoffed Captain Maynard. ‘Claptrap and balderdash.’

‘If the flagstaff is cut down again, we will fight for it,’ promised Waka Nene. ‘We Christians are one tribe, and we will fight for the staff and for our governor.’

‘I thank you, Chief Waka Nene, for your friendship and loyalty,’ said FitzRoy, gravely.

‘The trouble is,’ Williams went on, ‘that many of the young men have come to see the British as occupiers. They are flocking to Hone Heke’s side. They see him as a leader beyond the reproach of the British.’

‘I am afraid, gentlemen, that we must countenance the possibility that Kororareka will be attacked,’ cautioned FitzRoy. ‘Here is what we will do. Send messages to the remaining outsettlers that they cannot be protected unless they remove themselves to Kororareka. Mr Sinclair, if you would send urgently to Sir George Gipps, the governor of New South Wales: “Recent acts of open rebellion demand not only immediate help but permanent resistance. I cannot hope to prevent a desperately calamitous state of affairs unless supported immediately. A local militia, as I have repeatedly and plainly stated, cannot be trusted. Please send reinforcements urgently.” Send also to Chief Hone Heke: “The flagstaff will be defended, and severe loss of life will certainly be the consequence of any further attack.” Captain Maynard, you and your men will garrison the town. I suggest that the
Hazard’s
marines should cover the jetty, in case the town needs to be evacuated at short notice.’

‘I’m sure that course will not be necessary, sir,’ said Maynard.

‘You can rely on us, sir!’ added Lieutenant Randall brightly.

Exhilaration about the upcoming skirmish clashed with self-accusation in FitzRoy’s head, as the knowledge that he might be about to risk men’s lives in combat encroached at speed. He felt strange - as if a story was unfolding that was controlled not by him but by destiny.

‘Thank you, Mr Maynard, Mr Randall,’ was all he could manage.

 

With Waka Nene gone to rally the loyal tribes, FitzRoy sat alone in the cabin allocated to him in HMS
Hazard
. His mind pulsed with activity, the various options open to him dividing, subdividing and rejoining each other once more like a river delta in flood. Andrew Sinclair brought the news that while Maynard’s men had been gathering material to build their defensive structures, one of Hone Heke’s raiding parties had cut down the flagstaff for a third time, iron cladding and all. The die, it appeared, was cast. FitzRoy, thought Sinclair, had a feverish appearance.

‘Give the order that the flagstaff is to be erected once more.’

‘For a fourth time, sir?’

‘For a fourth time, Mr Sinclair.’

The young surgeon looked puzzled. ‘Surely it is academic now, sir? Should not the men concentrate upon building up their defences?’

There are patterns to be followed,
realized FitzRoy,
rituals to be observed. Sinclair cannot see this.
He shut his eyes, and suddenly he could see everything more clearly still. ‘Give the order, Mr Sinclair. The flagstaff must stand. For it points our way to heaven.’

Sinclair gave him an odd look, and left the cabin.

FitzRoy settled back in his cot, if not contentedly then sure, at least, that he was doing the right thing. A wonderful conviction was growing inside him, that their mission here was somehow aligned with the universe and with God’s will, that all these things shared the same grain. There was no point in resisting the natural course of events, as laid down by the Lord. It was a simple matter of following His purpose, and any kinks, any bends in their path would surely straighten themselves out. The forthcoming battle, all their destinies, even the very bedrock of New Zealand itself, all would reshape themselves in His image, smoothing their way forward. His way, it seemed, was clear.

 

It is, of course, well-nigh impossible to defend a town with fifty men, even a town of no more than a few hundred souls. For all his inexperience, Captain Maynard knew this; he concentrated his efforts upon fortifying the stockade that doubled as Kororareka’s powder magazine, which he had placed under his own command, and upon building a musket-proof blockhouse on Flagstaff Hill, to be commanded by Lieutenant Randall. Captain Hazlewood and the small marine detachment of HMS
Hazard
would hold the jetty, as FitzRoy had determined, backed up by their brig’s sparse and ancient muster of cannon. The hope was that this fortified triangle, each of its points within musket-range of the other, would deter the enemy from making an attack on the centre of the town. Mere lip service was paid to FitzRoy’s bizarre order to waste their time rebuilding the flagstaff: it was hoisted to the vertical and clumsily roped to its own stump in an operation lasting no more than five minutes. Hone Heke was their priority now and it was the intention of the 80th Regiment, were he to launch an attack, to give him a bloody nose.

The New Zealanders, of course, waited until nightfall. In the dusk, the defenders could see rustlings and scurryings in the deep ferns at the edge of town. They did not fire their muskets: they had orders not to waste their ammunition. Nor were the natives likely to fire back yet. They were heavily armed, of course, for the Europeans had been eager to sell them munitions aplenty at inflated prices, but they had a more potent weapon at their disposal: fire. Kororareka was an entirely wooden town. When darkness fell, the
pakeha
would be burned out of their settlement.

The first flames appeared on the eastern side of town at about nine o’clock, licking at the rough boards of the settlers’ hovels and quickly gathering pace, until towers of orange flame and fountains of sparks soared like fireworks into the night sky. Some of the attackers were visible now, their streaming hair caught in momentary silhouette against the conflagration. The terrified occupants were fleeing into the street, but the natives were not cutting them down with their muskets, which would have been the easiest of tasks. Instead, incredibly, they appeared to be dancing: drawn up in formation, yelling and chanting in rehearsed unison, their guns and tomahawks raised above their heads, their squat muscular limbs bound with red scarves and gleaming threateningly in the firelight. Their dance was not, in itself, worrying, but the sheer numbers involved were. Hone Heke had obviously garnered more native support than had been realized. The battle for the hearts and minds of the local population had clearly been lost. There were literally hundreds of attackers.

From his vantage-point among the marines guarding the jetty, FitzRoy could see the inhabitants streaming out of their houses in increasing numbers, abandoning their possessions, rushing pell-mell towards the strand. Besides the
Hazard,
there were two other ships in the bay that might provide refuge- the
St Louis
, an American corvette, and the
Matilda,
a whaler — and a flotilla of small boats could be seen putting to sea, their gasping occupants rowing for their lives as they strove towards safety. The flames were taking hold of main street now, devouring the buildings, columns of smoke winding powerfully about each other in their eagerness to choke the life out of anything that moved. Kororareka was proving to be little more than a tinderbox. Flagstaff Hill and the stockade might theoretically have been in line of sight of the jetty, but there was nothing to be glimpsed now beyond jumping flames, frantic sparks and swirling smoke-funnels. Any hope of further communication between the three redoubts was a forlorn one. Then the shooting started: fervent, intense shooting, from the base of Flagstaff Hill and from the buildings around the stockade, coming in short, impassioned bursts. The men of the 80th were blazing away into the darkness. All the marines from the
Hazard
could do was to sit tight and pray.

Entranced by the sheer extravagance of it all, FitzRoy had the exhilarating sensation that he was falling, the ground rushing up to meet him, except that it never arrived. Suspended there, he felt suddenly moved by the beauty of the spectacle, and filled with gratitude that God had chosen him to be at the heart of it. The others around him, he knew, saw only chaos and pandemonium, but he could discern a pattern, a kind of divine geometry. The resplendent illuminations and thunderous reverberations had built into a concerto in his head, his every sense crackling in wonderment and delight. The Lord had put Handel to shame.