‘That’s the chorus isn’t it?’ he added.
‘Yes,’ she said begrudgingly.
‘What are the words?’
She felt like she’d always known the words, and was proud of her Maori accent which Tamati had made sure was correct.
‘E hine e, hoki mai ra. Ka mate ahau, I te aroha e.’
She was right. He did look impressed. ‘You know your Maori. Clever girl.’
Kate looked back at her creation with a shrug. Everyone knew the words, so she didn’t feel clever. But it was kind of him to think so.
‘So what do the words mean?’ he asked.
She closed her eyes to make sure she got the translation right. It was only ever sung in Maori. ‘The chorus means: Oh girl return to me, I could die of love for you.’ She shrugged again. She didn’t like the words. They were silly. ‘I like the Maori better.’
He cleared his throat roughly and she turned to see him swipe his eyes with his sleeve. Must have been the sand — it could sting your eyes.
‘Grandma Ngaire sings that song a lot. Mum says it’s a love song and that Ngaire sings it for Tamati.’
He made a choking sound and stood up. Yep, the sand was definitely hurting his eyes. She jumped up. ‘Do you want my handkerchief?’
He smiled through his tears. ‘That’s kind of you.’
She held it out to him. Ngaire’s name was embroidered in the corner. To her surprise he pressed his lips to it. She regretted the impulse and didn’t think she wanted it back now. ‘You can keep it if you like.’
‘Thank you. I’d like that.’
He was a puzzling man.
‘And thank you for showing me…’ His eyes strayed back to the house, as people arrived and the back door opened. ‘Everything.’
She assumed he meant her beautiful marae she’d made. She glanced down at it.
‘I’d best go now. But please can you do something for me?’
She nodded.
‘Could you go up to the house and tell your grandmother Ngaire that Johnnie called by to see her, but that he’d got the timing wrong as usual. And that… I’ll be in the café for a little while… just in case she...’ He shrugged, but didn’t continue.
‘OK.’ Though she was already wondering if she’d remember all that.
‘Goodbye then.’
She suddenly felt sad, because she liked that this adult spent time talking to her and didn’t just go up to the house and talk to the grown-ups. ‘Are you coming back? Because I could show you the wharenui when it’s finished, if you like.’
He shook his head. His hand trembled as he rested it on his knee. She hadn’t noticed that before.
‘Sadly, no,’ he said, and there was a wistfulness in his voice that had puzzled her at the time. ‘I’m just passing through. I don’t want to disrupt anything. And I won’t be here long anyway.’ His words were even more confusing.
She stood up and watched him walk carefully down the path, through the dunes, glancing once up the beach before carrying along a little way until he reached a footpath which would take him up to the road.
Kate turned to the house. The light was on now in the kitchen and she could see her grandmother talking to someone. Kate knew she should do what the stranger had asked her and deliver the message. But the details of the message were already receding when the wind caught one of her dolls and rolled her away, down the sand dunes. Kate chased the doll down the dunes, where she was distracted by a cluster of shells which someone had left behind. Her imagination was sparked into a story. And it was only much later that she heard her mother call. This time she realised she was very hungry, and so she ran inside.
It wasn’t until later again, when Ngaire was seated with a cup of tea on the window seat, leafing through a recipe book, and Kate was sitting on the floor, raking through the treasures of a button box, that she spotted one of Ngaire’s handkerchiefs and remembered.
‘A man was here before,’ Kate said, frowning as she tried to remember the message. ‘He said to tell you he got the timing wrong again. Something like that.’
