Chapter 38

Reunion

"You were in late," said Kate Skilton.

"The trains were all wrong," replied Max between mouthfuls of breakfast.

"Wet and cold, to boot."

Max shrugged and took a sip of coffee.

"Don't worry," she continued. "Your things are already on the line."

"Thank you Mother. I couldn't do it without you."

"So?" said the Professor, laying aside his newspaper. "How was the Northern Isle? The formidable land of the Māori?"

Max pondered as he digested the last piece of toast.

"Really it's another world. But the people there aren't greatly different from us, just Māori. For the most part they are good Christians, but without iron or steam. Theirs is more a world of wood and stone."

"A stone age?" asked the Professor at once.

"Not exactly. Not if you mean in some way that they are more primitive. From my observation of what we saw in Wanganui I'd say that in many ways their society is more evolved than our own."

"What they wanted you to see," remarked the professor, dismissively.

"Naturally," responded Max. "Don't act like it should be any different. I mean when you tour international visitors around the aviaries you don't take them to see the one-legged Weka or the swearing Magpie."

Mrs Skilton smiled behind her hand at that, and the professor looked like he was going to return to his paper.

"I for one..." she said "...am glad you had the chance to visit the north. Few have. And if it has expanded your world, so be it and all the better. Your father agrees, he is just never at his best on Saturday mornings."

Mother and son laughed, father returned to his reading.

"If you'll both excuse me," said Max standing. "I feel the need to visit with Dickie."

"Of course," responded his Mother. "It's good to have you back."

* * *

"You need a bigger shed," said Max as a way of greeting, as he stood in his usual place by the door of Dickie's workshop. He could see the student inventor's legs sticking out from under some contraption on which he was working. Other than where those booted feet lay there was little clear space on the floor for anyone else, so full was the shed with... stuff... inventing stuff and inventions.

"I know, I know, but what is one to do?" came the muffled reply.

"Invent something that there is actually a market for. Then buy a bigger shed with the profits." No response. "What is this?" Max asked, running his hand over a construction of metal tubes that were lying on a table.

"What's what?!" barked Dickie.

"Looks like... well it looks like a Gatling Gun."

"It's a Gatling Gun. Well, it isn't, as Gatling is a brand name. It's a rapid firing, self-reloading, automatic... machine gun."

"Does it work?"

"Nope."

"Oh. Dickie would it be alright if you came out and we had a talk?"

"Sure." Dickie slid out, stood, brushed himself off and extended his hand. "Hello."

"Hello," responded Max, shaking the hand. "How long have you been under there?"

"Not sure. But I woke up down there just before. My spanner was where I left it, so I picked it up and started working again. Mind I am a little hungry. Like a coffee?"

"Sure."

A few minutes later Dickie found Max sitting on a wooden bench outside his shed. He handed him a mug of coffee and sitting down, placed a large plate of buttered toast between them.

"Help yourself. Right, I'm at your service. A talk is it?"

"Yes, the kind of talk you demanded we have, you know at the Robot Race."

"Alright, I see. I'm all ears."

"I've got a couple of things I need to run past you."

"Fire away."

"Well, the Gothic Masquerade Ball..."

"Yes?"

"It was an interesting night..."

"Do go on."

"You should have been there."

"Why was that?"

"Because Alice was there! Can you just shut up and listen?!"

"Sorry, yes, of course." Dickie thrust a piece of toast into his mouth.

"I had an interaction with the Lady Rowan, and I think you are right." Dickie nodded; Max continued. "In so far as it seems that they want me for something. She had this idea that some dark force was approaching, it reminded me of what you said about rumours of something that would upset the old balance between them and the Classics. Anyway, Lady Rowan suggested that there might even be a war. If there is, she would like to call on my help."

Dickie thought for a moment, then asked;

"Approaching who?"

"Sorry?"

"Who did she say this force is approaching?"

Max was lost for a moment.

"Them, I guess. She didn't say."

"I see," he said, looking serious. "Can she?"

"Can she? What?"

"Call on your help?"

"I said she could." Max was starting to feel foolish now, like he had promised something that was not his to give or without understand both sides of the bargain. "Is that alright?"

Dickie shrugged.

"Hard to say. Some things have come clearer and the next things, having only just been presented are still in shadow. Time will tell. Did she say anything else, about this threat?"

"Only that it has always existed within the Classics. But sometimes it's weak and other times it grows strong. And that when it is strong good people die!"

"Well it sounds like you have chosen the right side then."

Max tendered to agree.

"There was another thing. A strange moment. A young lady intimated to me, during a dance, that the reason that I may have been invited to the Ball could be because I once acquitted myself respectably in a fencing match against Gilbert Lavisham."

"Did she indeed? Insightful," Dickie rubbed his chin.

"I didn't think much of it."

"No of course not." Max wondered if Dickie was mocking him at that.

"But later as I spoke with Rowan, and here was this strange moment, she spotted Gilbert Lavisham and called him, to me, a beast."

"Indeed."

"I asked her if she had no love of Gilbert Lavisham?"

"You asked her that?!" Dickie's eyes were round with surprise. "Whatever did she say?"

Max swallowed. He couldn't help but think he had strayed into unmarked territory. But that was why, after all, he was bringing it up with Dickie.

"Nothing at first. She just looked at me, a little like you are now. Like there was something I should know. Then she just said; No I do not have love for Gilbert Lavisham."

Dickie blew out a long blow of air.

"You don't know do you?" he asked.

Max shook his head slowly.

"I guess not."

Dickie paused for a long moment.

"Remember that boy we talked about, Thomas Villalón?"

"The one that Lavisham killed in a duel?" Max said, recalling their conversion in the Revolution Industrial where Dickie had first warned him about Gilbert.

"Murdered," corrected Dickie.

"Sure."

The inventor clicked his tongue.

"Thomas Villalón was Rowan Villalón's younger brother."

Max stood up, almost in shock. Then pacing, he ran his hands through his hair.

"I.." he began, then stopped and changed tac. "It's terrible. In the first, just the act itself, but then the way I asked her. I..."

"You didn't know."

"Sure but..."

"She would have seen that you were without guile Max."

Max paced for a while longer. Dickie continued to eat toast. Then coming to a halt Max turned to face his friend.

"Do you think that she intends to use me as a weapon against Lavisham? That the fact that I humiliated him in a dual is what caught her attention?"

"Maybe you overestimate yourself on this one. If Rowan had wanted Gilbert punished for her brother's murder there are many ways she could have done so long before now. It happened three years ago." He took a sip of coffee. "Maybe she just wants to draw skilful swordsmen to her banner, for her coming war. But then again, if what last Friday’s papers say are true, then you Max Skilton certainly have a reason or two to want to see Lavisham out of the way."

"I don't think the Goths know about Harriet and I," said Max quietly, before seating himself on the grass.

"Sorry about that too, by the way," added Dickie. "Like I have said before, I think that you and Miss Leith would have made a good match." He shrugged and looked lost, like the whole thing was a complete mystery to him. Something in the earnestness of his tone prevented Max from snapping at him for his words.

"Thanks. I thought so too."

They were quiet for a time then.

"Do you think that a war is coming?" Max asked finally.

Dickie sniffed.

"No idea. But I'd back something a Goth said a long time before I listened to one of those fool Classics."

* * *

Max spent the rest of the weekend imagining the taste of salt on his lips and practising with Harriet's sword. He was tired and slightly overwhelmed with all the things he had seen, heard and felt in the last week. In some ways he felt a little in shock and knew that he wasn't actually feeling the depth of all the emotions that had been offered to him by recent events. He was glad about this and locked himself in the unused and overgrown aviary at the back of the park, to use the sword.

He could tell it was a good weapon. Whether Sword-masters would agree didn't so much matter as the fact that it felt right to him. Well balanced, light and strong, with a straight, double-edged blade and for protecting the hand a complex swept hilt in the Italian style. Why it had come into his possession he was not entirely sure. But he doubted that it was by accident. He chose to believe that Harriet had meant him to have it… a parting gift even. Certainly, in that she had been very generous. The inextinguishable romantic part of him knew that it was one half of a matching pair, and that Harriet still retained the other.

Then Sunday became Monday, as it always does, and the new term began.

* * *

When Max boarded the train to University he hid well his surprise at finding Wang and Jasmine sitting together.

"Morning," he said sitting down in the facing seat and trying to act normal.

"Good morning Max," said Wang cheerfully, though to Max's ear it sounded a little forced. "Have you met the Lady Jasmine?"

"No indeed I have not made formal acquaintance," answered Max. "Although we share an Archaeology class."

"Nice to meet you Max," said Jasmine, inclining her head graciously. "I have not spoken to many boys... young men rather, in our class. I find them, how should I say? Ineloquent."

"They are, I dare say, unmanned by your beauty," answered Max. Inwardly rolling his eyes at himself. This is going to be a long train ride. Come on the next stop and Wiremu!

"Thank you sir." She, at least, had the good grace to lower her eyes and smile self-consciously. "But not you, Max?"

"Ah Maximilian is constantly surrounded by beautiful women," interjected Wang.

Thank you friend. I think that was a save. "He has grown used to their exterior charms and looks now for deeper things." Don't over-do it Wang.

"Does he now?" she responded studying Max closely. "Certainly, at the Gothic Ball he was only ever in the company of the fairest of ladies." Then seeing his apparent discomfort, she rushed to add; "Forgive me, please Max. I am only having fun."

"Nothing to forgive. Anyone looking on right now would observe the same pattern."

She smiled appreciatively, but Max's skin crawled, and not just at his own rhetoric.

Something about you, milady, is not right. He couldn't place his finger on what it was, but recalled that Jo Foo, Wang's grandfather, had claimed that Jasmine had a deadly martial art. Maybe that was it, but there were other deeper secrets, he was sure.

"How was your time in the Northern Isle?" she asked, and the rest of the short trip to Wiremu's station was filled with the answering of that question. When Wiremu climbed on the train Max could tell straight away that something was wrong.

The young Māori looked momentarily uncomfortable at finding Jasmine in their midst, but quickly overcame his unease and taking a seat, completed his own series of polite introductions. A moment later his face returned to carrying the drawn, worried expression that it had worn when he come aboard.

"What's wrong?" asked Max. Wiremu glanced at Jasmine before speaking.

"The Aorere Pā is up for sale. There will be an auction sometime next week!"

Max was stunned.

"So soon? Your home."

Wiremu only nodded and looked out the window. A few minutes of awkward silence followed, which was broken in the end by Jasmine.

"Forgive me if I speak out of turn," she began. "But does it matter? I mean people have always moved about, migrated as situations have changed. Both Wang and I are now living half a world away from where we were born. We survive."

Wiremu looked at her for a long moment before answering.

"It matters because the last thing these small islands need is for the people on them to separate into two groups, one island for Pakeha and one for Māori. Such division would be a great backwards step and in it would be the seeds for all kinds of suspicion, mistrust and bigotry. The only future with any real hope is one where all the peoples who call these island home have learnt to live together, celebrating their differences, and recognising their need for one another."

"Very noble," reflected Jasmine, a little condescendingly.

"Noble? Is it?" shot back Wiremu. "The opposite, in the end, is war!"

Jasmine shrugged that dramatic claim away, so Wiremu continued. "You are sitting here, off to University. Not exactly staying within the walls of Chinatown. So, you're obviously not looking for a life confined to the monoculture of your birth, but to make something for yourself in the wider Dominion."

"Is that what it's about for you? Options?" she replied.

"No. It's about... it's about people rising above kingdoms and empires, above race even, and just being people. People working together, caring for each other."

She studied him for a long moment then, before shrugging and looking out the window.

"If you say so."

As they disembarked at Collingwood Central, Max murmured to each of his friends;

"Lunch? At the tea house."

We need to talk.

* * *

Max didn't go directly into Amelia's Tea House but waited for the other two out in Morpeth Square. Having given Bounce's bronze ear a friendly polish, he leant against the statue of the Vice Admiral, who stared heroically nor-west, into the square as such and out to sea.

Max studied the buildings that towered over the three of them. At Vice Admiral Collingwood's back, over Cuthbert Street, stood Lord Nelson's Hotel and Public House, where Max had seen his first sword fight. Amelia's, with its little French tables out the front, was the first premises on the right, the Benbow Street side of the square. Next to the tea shop was some office of law and then a drapery or some such. And so it went right around the square until the shop fronts rejoined Cuthbert Street at the left hand or Halfleur Street side.

Here the last building, three stories high like the others, caught Max's eye for the simple reason that it stood dark and empty. It had been vacated, he knew, since his last visit to Amelia's and according to the obvious sign on the street level windows was now up for sale.

A whistle and Max turned to see Wiremu leading Wang into Amelia's. He collected his hat from the dog's head, crossed the flagstones and followed them in.

"Afternoon," he called, adding his hat to the coat stand before taking a seat with his friends at a round table in the window. The lunch rush had passed, and the shop wasn't overly busy, so as soon as Max had settled himself Amelia came to attend them herself.

"Good day my Lady. "

"And to you Master Skilton," she replied with a smile. "What would be your pleasure this afternoon?"

Max liked Amelia Penwarden. She was a handsome woman of middle years, tall and commanding, smartly dressed in starched white. Almost nurse-like. A lady who did well at everything she put her hand to.

"The largest pot of tea you can muster, for a start, thank you," replied Max, and their hostess departed.

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

"Right Gentlemen! To the menu!" commanded Max. "You both look half starved. And no holding back, it is my pleasure, good as it is to see you both again. And when we find space and begin discussions, we shall be hearing from you first Wang," Max waggled a finger at his friend. "You will tell us everything of course, beginning and most likely ending with an explanation of that awkward fiasco on the train this morning." Max flourished his napkin and gave the menu card his full attention.

"On fine form he is," said Wiremu to Wang.

"Welcome back Max," remarked Wang. "I have missed you both."

Max favoured him with a wink around the menu before going back to the list.

"Both of me, or both Wiremu and I?" said Max having made his choice.

"All three of you," replied Wang with an uncharacteristically cheeky smile. "Wiremu, Morose Max and Verbose Max!"

"I.. " and Max was about to respond with more cunning nonsense when Amelia returned with a large steaming pot of tea and three cups with saucers, all balanced skilfully.

"Here we are gentlemen," she said placing the whiteware in the centre of the table and straightened, pad in hand, to take their orders. Max tolerated the interruption, not wanting to stop, to pause, to reflect and risk the slide toward grief which silence offered.

"Wiremu?" he asked.

"Ah I will have the mutton sandwich. Thank you."

"Wang?

"The pan fish, please."

"No he won't," interrupted Max. "Your largest steak for Mr Wang. Need more iron sir! No, I insist." And Wang let it go without a fight, which pleased Max, as he felt he was dangerously close to being patronising. But Wang clearly did need more nutrition. "And let me have the fish. Thank you."

Why act so dapper? A new term maybe, a fresh start? Hardly. Wiremu and his people are in real trouble, with no way out. Wang, against his better judgement, has got himself entangled with Jasmine. Me? I've lost the love of my short life. But it is good to be among friends, the simple joy of good food, in a clean room...

"Will that be all?" asked their Hostess.

"Thank you, yes," replied Max. "But first Amelia. Let me ask, this building across the way, vacant and for sale? How so?"

Amelia glanced across Morpeth Square to the building that Max had studied earlier from the shade of Collingwood's bronze likeness. The ground floor had once been a shop of some sort with pedestrian access from the square and maybe Halfleur Street too. The two stores above would have been offices, the top possibly an inner-city residence. All empty and lifeless now.

"That was the offices of the Parapara River Sluicing Company. As the name suggests they had commissioned a floating gold dredge on the Parapara River, at some considerable cost. But last week the thing sank for the third and final time. Forgive the pun but the company followed suit shortly after and went itself into liquidation."

"I see," said Max. "Thank you for your keen local knowledge."

Amelia departed to the kitchen.

"Kaiwhakaruaki strikes again!" said Wiremu.

"I beg your pardon?"

"Kaiwhakaruaki," repeated Wiremu.

"That steam engine?" asked Wang.

"No, its name’s sake. Kaiwhakaruaki the guardian Taniwha of the Parapara River. Remember the story?"

"I do," said Max. "But I thought the story ended with the monster being killed by a great gang of your ancestors."

"That's what you thought," said Wiremu. This time it was his turn to waggle a finger. "You can't kill a Taniwha."

"He's right," confirmed Wang. Max looked from one of them to the other.

"This is not where I thought the conversion would go!" he remarked, pouring the tea. They drunk in companionable silence for a couple of minutes, before Max spoke again.

"Right Wang! This Jasmine. One minute Jo Foo, who I believe enjoys watching waitresses at the Golden Dragon, warns us that she could, what were his exact words? 'Snap a man in half' or some such. You yourself seem, unlike most other young men at Victoria, distinctly disinterested in her, to the point of avoidance... then, next minute, or so it would seem, you two are dancing the close waltz at the Masquerade Ball and snuggling up on train rides to school. What is going on?"

"You have a shocking propensity for exaggeration," muttered Wang.

"I never do. Answers please."

"You needn't act like the dandy inquisition. I promised, before you went to Maoriland, that I'd tell you."

"The floor is yours," added Wiremu.

Wang sighed and looked around furtively for a moment.

"Jasmine Chu," he began in a whisper. "A man named Jie Lam and a second called Chung, are our so-called Coin Hunters, or Chinese Government Agents if you prefer, though I doubt very much that that is what they are." Wang tapped the table top with his finger. "There was a fourth member, but he died, the brass coin he carried, as you know, rolling to the foot of Harriet Leith at the same moment. He was, of course, killed by the Tong, who suspected him of something, although I do not think; of being a seeker of gold coins."

"Go on," encouraged Max and he and Wiremu lent in to better hear.

"After the murder Jasmine and the other two went to ground, keeping to different parts of Chinatown, never being seen together, biding their time. They may well have stayed hidden for a long time, refusing to act and damage their cover. But then events overtook them. Namely a gold coin was found, by Professor Wynyard, in front of a class of witnesses, at Paturau. Miss Jasmine had placed herself in the Archaeology Department for this very reason. To be amongst it, to listen to rumours and to be at hand if any such find was made. She might even be an Archaeologist, most treasure hunters are, in a rude way." Max remembered the strange look on Jasmine's face when Wynyard had unearthed that coin, triumph, but not surprise. "This find forced them into action. Because suddenly the suggestion that there was gold to be found, and they did not want that kind of competition, was almost in the public arena. Almost..." Wang paused to sip his tea. Wiremu and Max held theirs, spell bound. "...but of course the coin disappears, snatched away from the depths of the museum. All evidence removed. As I say they simply couldn't afford the completion."

"Alright," said Wiremu. "But I still don't see why anyone would be looking for Chinese gold in the Dominion. It doesn't make any sense at all. It's like deciding to look for I dunno... Egyptian mummies in Iceland!"

"I agree," responded Max. "It is bizarre. But the fact does remain that Wynyard did find a Chinese coin buried under the ruins of the Paturau Pā, expected or not. It didn't make any sense to him either, he had no explanation. You should have seen the look on his face! But there it was."

"Indeed. Now bear with me gentlemen," said Wang, regaining control of the conversation. "About the existence of that coin; Jasmine knows that you know Max and by extension I know, even though Professor Wynyard swore you all to secrecy. Wynyard himself won't say a word about it because of his vested interest in his own career. Naturally. The other students don't care particularly because they had never seen the bronze double to alert them to the fact that someone had expected such a coin to be found and was even actively looking for more. So, as you yourself have said before Max, we three are the only ones who see the whole picture. And her. The point..."

"Hold on, hold on," interrupted Max holding up his hands. "Last time we spoke about this you wanted nothing to do with any of it. You snapped at Wiremu, or I if we bought it up. And acted as if your life was in danger if anyone so much as mentioned coins or tongs. What has changed to cause your surprisingly creative little brain to spring into life and piece together this fantastic theory?"

"Good question," murmured Wiremu, as Amelia arrived and placed the plates of food in front of each of them. Upon receiving their thanks she departed again. Wang sighed.

"Because my life is in danger," began Wang. "First from slow starvation..."

"Then eat that!" commanded Max, pointing his fork at the massive steak laid out before Wang. Wang cut himself a mouthful and chewing it, continued.

"When Jo Foo fell over in the river and got sick, I saw that we were never going to survive on the few flecks of gold dust the claim was bringing in. I got desperate. I wanted to believe stories, even stories that we had made up, about there being more gold coins to be found. If it was true? If I could find even one?"

"You'd be made," supplied Wiremu. Wang nodded and took another mouthful.

"So, Jasmine has become your key?" said Max, interlinking his fingers before his lips, the plate of fish between his elbows untouched. "You have drawn near to her in the hope she will lead you to the gold, or at least point you in the right direction?"

"I guess you could say it like that, yes," confirmed Wang. "But listen. Here is the main point. Late every Friday night, after work, Jasmine leaves the Golden Dragon in the company of either Jie Lam or Chung. They walk together and giggle, playing the lovers. I have followed them. But when they get to the edge of town, beyond Jo Foo's hut even, they do not fall into one another arms, but don heavy walking boots and disappear over the track that leads across the mountains. They do not come back until very early the following Monday morning. I know this because I have lain in hiding waiting for their return. That path goes to few places; Westhaven Inlet, Mangarakau and if you wish Paturau. I believe she is using the breaks from her job at The Golden Dragon to travel, in secret, to Paturau in order to continue the search for the gold."

"What you are saying is certainly interesting..." began Max, but suddenly Wiremu sat bolt upright, then sprung up front his chair and began pacing the tearoom, chin in hand. His mind was clearly racing.

"What is it?!" demanded Wang. But Wiremu waved his question away, as if it would break an important chain of thought.

"Alright then," said Max, raising a single eyebrow at Wang. "I think Wang has one more important question that he wants to answer. Why are you telling us this now? No don't answer that. A moment ago, you told us that your life is in danger, first from slow starvation. What is it in danger from second?"

Wang sighed.

"The answer is one in the same. You deduced that Jasmine has maybe become my key to the gold, if it exists. Unfortunately, I think that I have failed at the game of spy and that I might have likewise become her key."

"Go on."

"I've come to believe that she suspects I know something, and that I'm playing her." Then with slow deliberateness he added, "Whether she knows that I know, she knows, is now the real question."

"Indeed," agreed Max.

"The fact remains that, like Jo Foo said, more colourfully, she is very dangerous. I am therefore in real danger."

Max groaned inwardly, but sat back for a moment, thinking. Wiremu had stopped his pacing and was looking out the window, deep in thought.

"You need to maintain the course," Max cautioned. "If you pull away, she'll have you. You have to stay close to her, but still not give anything away."

Wang nodded his agreement.

"Can I please speak now?!" interrupted Wiremu, returning to the table and gripping it with his hands.

"Yes, yes, out with it!"

"Listen," he said, fixing both Wang and Max with a very intense look. "When we were in Wanganui I had a meeting with this old warrior, Ikariki Maunga. He was a little hard to understand, but some of what he said is coming back to me know. I think this Maunga was with Te Puoho when they sacked Paturau." Max's heart started to beat loudly in his ears. "He said that they, I guess meaning the Māori's at Paturau, had a golden Taniwha, in a cave."

Wang and Max stared back at Wiremu, unblinking.

"What are you telling us Wiremu?" said Max, a slight tremble in his voice.

"I'm not entirely sure," responded Wiremu, leaning forward. "But I've been thinking. Forget the Taniwha bit, for now. In this case take Taniwha to mean; place you shouldn't go. Now gold... golden things... had no value to Māori. So why the emphasis on a golden Taniwha? Greenstone Taniwha yes, but not Gold. No Māori would make up that story, there is no point. Taniwha guard fisheries, or good hunting grounds, scared clays or dangerous rip tides, always things that are precious to the local hapu, you know the people nearby. There is no need for one to be golden."

"The massacre at Paturau only happened in the 1830's," interrupted Max. "The English were around by then. The value of gold would have been known to everyone involved at Paturau."

"Yes," agreed Wiremu. "But Maunga said that the Māori who lived at Paturau had a golden Taniwha in a cave, such a legend takes a while to establish and is very pre-European. And Wynyard said that the coin had been under the foundations of the Pā for maybe hundreds of years.

"What are you saying?" asked Wang.

"I'm not sure," responded Wiremu. "I'm just working it though. So much of the story doesn't make sense, logically. Maunga thinks he saw a golden Taniwha in a cave near Paturau... the Taniwha part makes sense, very Māori... but the golden reference doesn't. Unless..."

"Unless what?!" Max and Wang were desperate at Wiremu slow ponderings.

"Unless it... the gold... doesn't have Māori origins."

Max and Wang starred at Wiremu.

"Doesn't have Māori origins?" repeated Max. Wiremu shrugged.

"Maybe," a nod toward Wang. "Chinese."

Max brew air out of his cheeks and sat back. But Wiremu wasn't finished. "Finally, and most importantly, as far as Maunga was concerned, whatever is in that cave stayed hidden."

"How do you know that?" asked Wang.

"Because," said Wiremu, a slight smile spreading across his face, "Maunga told me to find it!"

Max looked at Wiremu. Wiremu looked at Max. Max looked at Wang, who was staring at Wiremu.

"And you forgot all this till now?" said Max in disbelief.

"I had other things on my mind," replied Wiremu, a distant look ghosting his features for a moment. "And it's only been a couple of days."

"I think..." said Max, tapping the edge of his plate with his finger nail and letting a smile spread across his face. "That we've finally got a real treasure hunt on our hands."

Max's smile was infectious, and they enjoyed the moment together.

"Oh dear," mumbled Wang.

"What is it?" asked Wiremu.

"We've just given him something to hide from Jasmine," stated Max matter-of-factly. Wang nodded sadly.

"That's a problem," agreed Wiremu.

"You've got more to say?" asked Wang. Wiremu nodded in confirmation. "I'll go then, it's safest." Wang stood quickly.

"Sit down!" commanded Max. "At least finish your meat. We'll talk about something else."

Wang looked down at his meal for a moment before reseating himself and taking up his knife and fork once more. But they didn't talk about anything at all, each content with his own thoughts and his meal. When they had finished Wang said;

"You're going to Paturau aren't you?"

Wiremu and Max looked at him for a long moment.

"Most-likely, yes," replied Max. Wang nodded and looked completely depressed.

"Doesn't matter," he said bravely. "I've got exams this week."

"Listen Wang," Max said, as his friend made ready to leave. "You need to watch our backs here in the city. Stick close to Jasmine. We've got this week until she and one of her boyfriends cross the mountain again. We don't know how close they have got to this cave in their searches."

Wang smiled weakly.

"Sure I can do that."

"We're sorry you can't come with us again Wang," said Wiremu. Max made sounds of agreement.

"Listen good luck and all the best with the exams," said Max gripping Wang's arm. "If you need any help, talk to Dickie. He is the only one we can trust."

When Wang had gone Max refilled their tea cups and fixed Wiremu with his sparkling eyes.

"Right. Where is this cave?"

"Maunga said it was south of the river. I hope he means the Paturau River, because if not there are three others to choose from and a lot of wild country in between."

"Anything else?"

"Said to find it we just had to look through the forest."

"Alright. Sounds like a start. A cave in a forest. Mind missing a class or two?"

"Not for this," laughed Wiremu. "I better ask for the milkings off as well. I'll see if Hehu can do them."

"Hehu?"

"A kid from the Pā. Tomorrow then?"

"Of course. But we can't ride the morning train loaded with gear. Jasmine will see. We'll need to pick up supplies in Gibbstown. Make a list tonight and I'll add it to my tab," joked Max, enjoying the making of plans.

They stood then, thanked Amelia for a fine meal, retrieved their hats and made for the door.

Tabs, milkings, gold claims, if we found just one Chinese coin these would all be things of the past.

As Max reached for the door, it burst open of its own accord and in marched three young ladies. Stepping aside, Max and Wiremu touched the brims of their hats and said;

"Ladies. Good day."

But Rebecca Salasor and her two friends ignored them completely.