In the Land of the Long White Cloud

McDunn?”
    “Did they want to do something to us?”
    “Normally the natives are so peaceful.”
    “Yes, Rosemary says they’re usually so nice.”
    Leonard began to breathe easy as the twins took up their cheerful chattering again. Everything seemed to have turned out all right. Now he just needed to figure out where this path led.
    Now that they had survived their adventure, Mary and Laurie were hungry, but the three of them agreed that it would be wiser to enjoy the bread, chicken, and Rosemary’s tasty cookies on the driving box. Leonard was still unsettled by the business with the Maori. He had heard of uprisings on the North Island. But here? In the middle of the peaceful Canterbury Plains?
    The path wound its way to the west. It could hardly be a public road; it looked more like an unofficial path that had been carved out gradually by many years of use. Riders had gone around bushes and clumps of trees instead of cutting them down. And here was another stream.
    Leonard sighed. The ford did not look dangerous and had surely been crossed recently. But perhaps not with a wagon as heavy as his. In the interest of safety, he had the girls get out first, then carefully maneuvered his team into the water. Then he stopped to let the twins back on—and jumped when he heard Mary scream.
    “There, Mr. McDunn! Maori! They’re up to something, there’s no doubt about it!”
    The girls crawled in a panic under the canvas that once again covered the wagon while McDunn scanned the area for warriors. All he saw were two children driving a cow in front of them.
    They approached curiously when they saw the wagon.
    McDunn smiled at them, and the children waved shyly. And then, to his surprise, they greeted him in very good English.
    “Hello, sir.”
    “Can we help you, sir?”
    “Mister, are you a traveling salesman? We’ve just been reading about tinkerers.” Curious, the girls peeked out from under the provisionally secured canvas.
    “Oh, come on, Kia, it’s just more fleece from the Wardens’. Miss O’Keefe gave them permission to store everything in her barn,” said the boy, while adeptly keeping the cow from escaping.
    “Nonsense! The shearers were here a long time ago and brought everything with them. He’s definitely a tinkerer. It’s just the horses aren’t dappled, is all.”
    Leonard smiled. “We are indeed traders, little lady, but not tinkerers,” he said to the girl. “We wanted to take the road to Haldon, but I think we’ve gotten lost.”
    “Not badly,” the girl reassured him.
    “If you take the main road from the house, it’s only two miles to Haldon,” the boy explained more precisely. Then he looked at the twins, who had dared to show themselves again, in confusion. “Why do the women look the same?”
    “Now that’s good news,” Leonard said without answering the boy’s question. “Could you two tell me where I am anyway? It’s not…what did they just call it? Kiward Station?”
    The children giggled as though he had made a joke.
    “No, this is O’Keefe Station. But Mr. O’Keefe is dead.”
    “Mr. Warden shot him dead!” the girl added.
    As an officer of the law, Leonard thought amusedly, he couldn’t have asked for more informative people. The people in Haldon certainly were chatty; Ruben had been right about that.
    “And now he’s in the highlands and Tonga is looking for him.”
    “Psst, Kia, you’re not supposed to tell people that!”
    “Mister, do you want to see Miss Helen O’Keefe? Should we go get her? She’s either in the shearing shed or…”
    “No, Matiu, she’s in the house. Didn’t you know? She said she had to cook for all the people.”
    “Helen?” Laurie squealed.
    “Our Helen?” Mary echoed.
    “Do you always say the same thing?” the boy asked, amazed.
    “I think you’d better take us to this farm first,” Leonard said finally. “The way it looks, we’ve found exactly what we were looking for.”
    And Mr. O’Keefe, he thought with a grim smile, would not be an obstacle anymore.

    A half hour later, the horses had been unhitched and were standing in Helen’s stables. Helen—hysterical with surprise and joy—had wrapped her arms around her charges from the
Dublin
, whom she had long believed lost to her. She still could hardly believe that the half-starved children from back then had grown into such cheerful, even rather buxom young women, who quite naturally took over the work in the kitchen for her.
    “That’s supposed