Her husband patted her fondly on the arm, touched the baby's laughing lips, and seated himself on the floor by the fire, inviting Edwin to join him.
The sleeping boy gave a great yawn, and starting to his feet, seemed to add his entreaties to his mother's. He held a book in his hand—a geography, with coloured maps—which he had evidently been studying; but he dropped it in despair, as his father only called for his supper.
"Help us to persuade him," he whispered to Edwin in English; "he may listen to a pakeha. Tell him it is better to go away."
"Why?" asked Edwin.
"Why!" repeated the boy excitedly; "because the chief is threatening him with a muru. He will send a band of men to eat up all the food, and carry off everything we have that can be carried away; but they will only come when father is at home."
"A bag of talk!" interrupted Nga-Hepé. "Shall it be said the son of the warrior sneaks off and hides himself at the first threat?"
"But," urged Edwin, "you promised to row back for Mr. Bowen."
"Yes, and I will. I will eat, and then I go," persisted Nga-Hepé, as his wife stamped impatiently.
Two or three women ran in with the supper which they had been cooking in a smaller whare in the background. They placed the large dishes on the floor: native potatoes—more resembling yams in their sweetness than their English namesakes—boiled thistles, and the ancient Maori delicacy, salted shark.
They all began to eat, taking the potatoes in their hands, when a wild cry rang through the air—a cry to strike terror to any heart. It was the first note of the Maori war-song, caught up and repeated by a dozen powerful voices, until it became a deafening yell. Hepé's wife tore frantically at her long dark hair.