“I am trying all the time.”
“What do you think of it?”
“Oh, they are taking us to the sacred place to kill us!”
“It looks like it.”
The thick undergrowth was so close and tangled that there was no hope of escape into it.
“No use,” said Tamate. “God is with us, so let us go quietly.”
From the dry stones of the stream bed and the thick bush, they came to a beautiful cool pool of water, hung round with ferns and moss. Then one of the men who had dragged them along made a speech. They did not know all the words then, but they could gather the meaning of the whole. This is part of it.
“Tamate, look, here is good water. It is yours and all this land is yours. Our young men will begin at once to build you a house. Go and bring your wife and leave these bad murdering people you are with, and come and live with us.”
“Goira” was their word for water.
When Tamate and Beni returned to Suau the natives there could not believe that the people of Tepauri had not hurt them. They looked at them anxiously and said: