Tommo and Hawk by Bryce Courtenay

Author:Bryce Courtenay [Courtenay, Bryce]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780857960207
Publisher: Penguin Group
Published: 1998-08-05T14:00:00+00:00

I walk the last two miles into Auckland and arrives as the one o’clock steam whistle sounds from the saw mill near the wharf. What a place! I had set me mind upon something different, perhaps like Hobart Town. I were expecting a proper town, with straight, well-paved, tree-lined streets, houses and cottages of a neat appearance of stone and brick, and shops with a good display of tempting merchandise.

This place ain’t nothing of the sort! And it’s the main port in New Zealand, the centre o’ commercial life for the North Island! I can scarce believe my eyes. I comes across a main wharf what seems to be the centre o’ the town. But the streets leading to it are mud tracks without a paving stone in sight and most with a trench dug to one side. I thought this were to channel the rainwater away, but later I hear it is to lay pipes for gas. I ain’t never heard of a place what’s got gaslights before paving stones.

The shops are mostly o’ wood and brick, though dingy looking. Only one building o’ grand design is to be seen. This be the Union Bank what’s made of white stone, rising higher by three times than any other building. It has large columns from top to toe so it looks like one o’ them Greek temples Hawk’s told me about. I’ve never had no money in a bank, but I remember Ikey used to say that to own a bank and earn ten per cent on other folks’ money is a most advantageous thing. On the other hand to deposit your own money and earn only two per cent is a terrible waste!

The town runs back from the water and up a steep hill, where the toffs live and where the troopers’ barracks are. It’s raining again, having stopped mid-morning, and the streets are muddy puddles, sprouting sudden wings o’ wide brown water as the carts and sulkies go by. I has took to rolling up me breeches, and me feet are covered in red clay.

Now I see why that miserable sod, Nottingham, wanted us brought to trial here, for there ain’t a shred o’ kindness in any o’ the faces around me. Still and all, every town has its bawdy houses and pubs and places what may usually be found with a little questioning. Muddied up to the calves, I walks along the waterfront hoping to find a suitable one-shilling hell. I see that other men has removed their boots, so I be no different to them. I enter a tavern, wipes me feet upon the mat at the door and puts on me boots. I don’t even have the price of a glass of ale so must ask the publican straight out where a friendly card game may be had.

‘Out!’ yells the publican, pointing to the door. ‘We don’t have no truck with yer kind ‘ere!’

Then I sees a grog shop in an alley, some ways up from the wharf, what’s called the Scrimshaw Tavern.

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