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Chapter I
We go to Kamahi

Take an atlas.

Don't be afraid; this isn't a geography lesson. Really and truly, it's the only improving piece in the whole book. But mother said I should let you know just exactly where we live, and this is the best way to set about it.

Now turn to the map of the world. Tucked away down in the south, separated from Australia and America by mile upon mile of blue sea water, you'll find three funny little crinkly islands which look as if the waves had been nibbling, mouselike, at their coasts for countless centuries. These three comprise the Dominion of New Zealand, and that is where we live, and where I am going to take you for a while.

Very far from the rest of the world? Yes, but the boys and girls there are very much like the boys and girls anywhere else, father says. And he ought to know, for he's just come back from England and America, where he was travelling for over a year.

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He went with mother, leaving the rest of us with the uncles at Kamahi. There are six of us, all Malcolms, and our names are— No! I think it would be better if I gave you straight away a list of all the people you are going to meet in this book, just as they give you a "cast of characters" in the theatre programme. I will have it printed in the first chapter, so that you will be able to enjoy the story from the very beginning. You'll know at once how old we are, where we live, what we look like, and what our characters are. If you forget anything you'll be able to turn back to Chapter I. and refresh your memory.

I'll begin with the uncles, because they are quite the most important people in the story.

Characters to Appear in this Story.

• Uncle John, part owner of Kamahi Station, age unknown. Big and fierce, and talks as if you were deaf, but is believed to have a kind heart.
• Uncle Stephen, part owner of Kamahi Station, age also unknown. The "Grey Man." Has grey hair and eyes, and wears grey clothes.
• Uncle Dan, part owner of Kamahi Station, age 24. Is not really an uncle or any relation at all. Uncle Stephen and Uncle John adopted him when he was a little hoy. Makes very poor jokes.page 11
• Kathie Malcolm (real name Katrine), girl, age 19. Just put up her hair. Very pretty.
• Rob Malcolm (his real name is Robert), hoy, age 16. Tall and very thin. Can argue well. Not very strong, but is ever so much hetter now mother says.
• Jan Malcolm (real name Jeanette), girl, age 14. Jeanette should he Frenchy and smart, Kathie says, hut Jan's arms and legs flop all over the place. Has kind of reddy-hrown hair and grey eyes. Has lots of hair-ribbons; you'll see why later on.
• Ngaire Malcolm, girl, age 12 years and 3 months. Thirteen nearly. The author. Has very, very thin legs and short hair.
• Jock Malcolm (John——after Uncle John), little hoy, age 10. Thinks he's a man, but he isn't.
• Pipi Malcolm, little girl, age 9. Awfully pretty. Looks an angel, but isn't one. Ask Uncle John.
• Father—Mr. Malcolm. Mother—Mrs. Malcolm.
• Cowhoy, shepherd, dogs, a housekeeper, cats, Tairoa (a Maori), Denise McLellan and all the other
• McLellans, of McLellan's Point, Paweka (a horse), etc. etc.page 12
• Scene—All the time at Kamahi, the uncles' sheep station, in the Province of Canterbury; in the South Island of the Dominion of New Zealand, in the Pacific, in the Southern Hemisphere, in the World.
• (There are a few paragraphs at the beginning of this chapter describing how we got to Kamahi, but they don't count.)

You will notice that I have left blanks opposite father's and mother's names. I truly tried to think of something to say; but could you sit down and in cold Hood describe your father and mother? Father is just father, and mother is—well, think of everything good and kind and gentle and loving and understanding, and you've got mother. I really can't do it any better than that.

Father and mother haven't got what are called very "big parts" in this story, because all the time I am going to write about—the year we spent with the uncles—they were in England, and mother was under the care of a famous doctor, who was going to make her "quite well." Mother hadn't been "quite well" for such a long time that we had grown accustomed to seeing her on the sofa, and had never noticed that she was getting thinner and thinner, and frailer and frailer, day by day. But when Dad page 13told us that he was going to take her home to England, then, I think, all at once we understood, and knew that if our mother didn't go—

But I don't like to talk about that. I don't even like to think of those last weeks with everyone packing and rushing and nothing going right and everything going wrong. In those days Kathie put up her hair and went out, trying to find some children who wanted governessing, and father searched the papers for a school which would take Jan and Jock and Pipi and me, and didn't ask fees in advance.

Rob was to go to the uncles; and somehow I can't help thinking that father was just a little hard on Rob. Perhaps he didn't understand—quite. You see, there had been several big rows at Rob's school, and somehow or other Rob had got mixed up in them. One day the headmaster wrote to father. It was when Dad was making up his mind to take mother home—only, of course, we didn't know that—and he was fearfully worried and rather disturbed in his mind. Pipi says "awfully snappy" would be nearer the truth. The letter and the rows disturbed him more than ever; after that he wouldn't let Rob stay on at school any longer. The uncles were willing to take him for a year; father said he would have to go to Kamahi and learn sheep farming, whether he liked it or whether he didn't. Rob didn't like it one bit. You see, he wanted to be a lawyer, and you page 14can't learn lawyering in the country when you've got to spend all your time looking after sheep and cattle and growing crops.

It is always darkest before the dawn, mother says, and it was just when we were feeling worst about everything that the uncles' letter arrived. It came at a good time, too, for the lines that pain makes had grown too plain round mother's mouth; father was scolding us all one minute and giving us shillings, which he really couldn't spare, the next; and Kathie was crying in her bed at night because she couldn't find any children who wanted to be governessed, and because she was afraid she would.

Father read that letter, and the worry creases smoothed themselves out of his forehead; mother read it and the tears came into her eyes. Then they read it to us, and the others didn't know whether to be sorry or glad, but Kathie and Rob and I were all glad, not a bit of sorry in us.

Kathie had got her governessing, but she had only to teach Jan and Pipi and Jock and me, and we weren't particular even if she didn't know very much and had to turn up the answers at the end of the arithmetic book. Besides, she wasn't frightened of us, and I know she was scared to death at the thought of teaching strange children.

I was glad because I wouldn't have to be separated from Rob, and Rob was glad because, instead of page 15having to face Uncle John and Uncle Stephen and Uncle Dan all by himself, he'd have five others to back him up.

Think of it! The uncles had offered us a home while father and mother were in England. We were to stay with them at Kamahi, the big sheep station where they had, lived for years, and Uncle John hoped we would all be good children and prove a credit to our parents and a help and comfort to everybody.

Father choked and turned away when he read that last line, but mother had a lovely talk with us—not an everyday talk, but an extra special Sunday one. After that we felt just as if we had stepped straight out of a Sunday-school library. We really meant to do our best and be a comfort and a help to the uncles, who were so old and lonely (not counting Uncle Dan) and who lived on that back blocks station far away in Canterbury.

There were so many things that even children might do, mother said. Jock said he would round up the sheep for them, and Pipi meant to help with the dipping and shearing. I decided to warm slippers and trust to luck and a low fire. Father's soles scorch easily, anyway, Kathie sat gazing contemplatively into space, a little smile round her lips. I knew she was thinking of the cakes she would[gap — reason: damage] and the scones she would bake for supper a [gap — reason: damage]page 16But the worst of it Is that Kathie's cakes lose heart so quickly and seldom rise, her scones hum, and her jellies won't jell. Jan practised pouring out afternoon tea, and decided to dress for dinner, but she didn't get a chance of doing either, as you'll see later on.

And Rob? Well, Rob didn't say anything, but that was because he was thinking so hard all the time.

Time simply flew. Minutes whirled into hours and hours into days. I can only remember the last few weeks in Auckland as you remember a dream with one or two things standing out, and not fitting into each other at all. And then—the day came when we had to go. I can feel mother's arms about me still, holding me hard, but I can only remember her face —her beautiful, beautiful face—through a mist of tears. I suppose I was crying, though I blinked and choked down the lump in my throat. We didn't want to make the parting too hard for mother. Afterwards I was glad to think that, just as the boat pushed off, I squeezed up a little smile.

The memory of that night is a nightmare. We were sad in our hearts because of the parting from mother and Dad, and very, very miserable and sick with the rolling of the boat. The New Zealand coast is always more or less rough and tempestuous, and the Mamma was tossed like a cork from billow page 17to billow. The deep, insistent throbbing of the engines was almost worse than the vagaries of the boat which balanced itself on its head and then on its tail, dipped to one side to see how far it could go without actually turning turtle, then righting itself, rolled steadily again, trying to excel all its previous performances.

Ah, that dreadful roll, roll, roll! Jock and I retired to our berths early, very early, leaving the others to enjoy the fresh air on deck and the dinner in the saloon. Soon after, however, Jan joined us, not because she was ill, but because the stewardess had told her to go to the children't table for tea. It hurt her feelings dreadfully.

Then at last we were in the train and steaming away to our destination—the uncles' station, Kamahi, which was at the foot of the first low range of mountains we came to. The train steamed past most of the small stations, stopping only when there were passengers to take up or set down. It drew up at Ealing—such a funny little station with a small brown goods shed, three small brown houses set in the midst of a wide brown plain, and three gaunt, bent cabbage trees standing grimly sentinel in the background.

"Ealing!" shouted the man on the platform.

"Baling!" repeated Rob, gathering coats, wraps and umbrellas.

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"Ealing!" murmured Pipi sleepily, clinging to Kathie.

Then we all tumbled out, and the guard threw our luggage from the van on to the platform. The train steamed, the whistle shrilled, and then it was off and away, winding through the hills like a long black snake, and leaving us behind it.

A wagonette and a man were waiting for us, and we all climbed in. Unfortunately Kathie slipped and sat down very hard on the wheel. We had left our luggage in a heap on the platform, and the driver gave the reins to Jock.

"Hold her hard. The lad will help me with the boxes."

"It's Uncle John,", said Jock, awed.

"No, it isn't. Uncle John's a big man. This is Uncle Stephen. I saw Uncle Stephen once, and I can remember him."

"Huh! That was years ago when you was a baby. Guess you can't remember much when you was a baby, Ngaire, Kathie remembers when she was a baby. Jock, Kathie remembers years and years ago. Huh!"

Kathie tried to look dignified and Pipi giggled, but they hadn't time to work up a real quarrel, as Rob came back with the luggage and Uncle John, or Uncle Stephen, or Uncle Dan, and off we started.

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We had alighted from the train in the beauty of the early evening stillness, and I wish I could paint the countryside for you as I saw it then. Imagine a winding white road disappearing like a thread into the distance. On one side the tussocks slope away and away till they melt into the horizon; on the other they run down to the river's banks and lose themselves among the boulder and the rough shingle. The river itself it right below, a great expanse of greyness, and you can hear the water dashing over the boulders and roaring down the shingly bed.

On the far side of the river the hills are just going to sleep, and have wrapped soft, filmy clouds about them. I thought this idea rather pretty, but Pipi only sniffed and said that she couldn't see any sense in it. Pipi isn't at all fond of poetry.

Very soon we discovered that the man driving wasn't Uncle John, or Uncle Stephen, or Uncle Dan. He was a shepherd, and his name was McPherson; that was all the information we could dig out of him. We might have heard more, but Jock, who asked all the questions, got so squashed between Kathie and Rob that he hadn't room for talking.

After a while we all grew silent.

We drove and we drove and we kept on driving until at last it seemed as if we had been going On for ever. It grew quite dark, and even if we had wished page 20(which we didn't) we couldn't have seen the hills on the opposite side of the river. Still, we didn't care much for the hills at that moment. We wouldn't have raised our eyes if Mount Everest had come jogging along to meet us. We just knew that we were going on and on and on and were never going to stop. We had been silent so long that my heart jumped quite high when McPherson raised his arm, squashing Kathie, who squashed Jock a little flatter than ever.

"That's Kamahi! Down below, under the hill," he said.

We peered through the darkness. Straight beneath us, at the foot of a steep hill on the summit of which we were driving, we could see the twinkling lights of the homestead. Presently dogs began to bark, and we went rapidly downhill with Jan's hat flying off and Kathie trying to think of what she should say to the uncles; with Pipi waking up as cross as two sticks, and Rob sitting up very straight; with Jock flattened to a pancake, and every single one of our hearts rising and nearly popping out of our mouths at the thought of meeting the uncles.