KEY POINTS:
Continuing our five-part serial, Coastlines, by Graeme Lay. The story so far: Oliver Norton has come to Logan Bay to interview German mountaineer Werner Weiss. But the retired Weiss is not the bay's most popular resident - he greets Norton at gunpoint
Over the next week biographer Oliver Norton and retired expatriate German mountaineer Werner Weiss talked at length, on Weiss' property, at the hillside house Oliver was renting, and as they walked along Logan Bay's beach.
Oliver had learned that Weiss, who had retired to Logan Bay, was as ardent a conservationist as any Kiwi lover of the land, Pakeha or Maori. Weiss had singlehandedly cleared his land of exotics and planted native trees over much of it, but in spite of this his property had been plagued by vandalism, which he attributed to the fact that as a foreigner, he had bought coastal land.
The two men paused on the track to the headland at one end of the bay, then turned to admire the view: the sweep of beach, the white cliffs at both ends, the five rocky islands scattered in the bay. Currents like snail trails stood out in the bay's calm water. Behind the foreshore were lines of brightly coloured tents in the campground, beneath a stand of pohutukawa trees. Further inland, the land rose steeply to a hillside covered in large modern houses, separated by patches of bush. One of these houses Oliver was renting while he worked on the Weiss story, and from where he now stood he could see the house clearly. Several building sites had been cleared on the hillside, exposing tracts of bare yellow earth, and the snarl of a chainsaw drifted across to the headland from one of the areas of remaining bush.
Werner scowled. "Why do they always cut down the trees? They should be planting trees, not cutting them down. It's crazy." Oliver looked more closely at the hillside. "Those are only old pines and wattles, not natives."
Werner grunted, dismissively. "Doesn't matter. On a steep hillside, any tree holds the soil in place. Cut down the trees and you weaken the land." He looked perplexed. "So why do councils issue building consents for houses on slopes like that?"
"Rates income, perhaps?" Oliver suggested.
Werner flicked his head upwards. "Ja. I think so." He grunted. "But councils shouldn't let trees be cut down. Everyone knows that trees are good for the planet. In all kinds of ways."
They walked on up to the top of the headland. Far below, dark blue swells dashed themselves against the base of the cliffs. Staring down at the sea, Oliver shuddered, aware that it was over this cliff that the invading Ngati Kaha had thrown their Ngati Waiau victims, after they had stormed the pa at night,186 years ago. Oliver thought again of the horror of it, and the paradox that such violence had occurred in such a sublimely beautiful setting. The two men walked across the headland, savouring the spectacular views, then back down the track, which descended to a stream and a grove of ancient puriri trees. Looking around, Werner said, "At least no one can touch these. This is all reserve land." Oliver nodded, but as they crossed a narrow bridge over the stream he looked down and thought: And this must be the stream the Ngati Kaha crept up, on their way to massacre the Ngati Waiau.
As they walked out on to the beach's white sand, the air felt heavy with humidity. Werner paused and looked up. Above the peninsula in the distance was a bank of graphite-grey cloud. Werner squinted at the sky. "Looks like there's going to be a change in the weather," he said.
Oliver sat up in bed. He had been woken by a skittering noise, like the sound of birds' feet on an iron roof. Light rain. Then, gradually, steadily, the sound thickened. There was no wind, just the rain, growing heavier and louder. After another hour the noise intensified. It seemed to be coming from all around the house, and the roaring was so loud that the rain felt solid as well as liquid.
Knowing that sleep was impossible, Oliver got up and walked through the lounge to the sliding glass doors at the front of the house, which led out on to the deck. As he stepped outside he was assailed by the roar of the rain, beating down on the roof, the deck, the garage and the land around the house. The noise was thunderous, so intense that it drowned out everything else, as if the whole world was turning to water. Realising that there were no lights to be seen in the other houses or in the campground below, Oliver tried the switch of the deck's bulkhead light. Nothing. The town was blacked out.
Oliver sat in the lounge with the glass doors open, staring out into the deluge, mesmerised by the noise and the spectacle. Then, at just after midnight, he heard another, different noise, a low rumbling, coming from behind the house. The rumbling became louder. Then there was an enormous cracking, and another, and another. He ran out onto the deck and up to the railing. He saw that the cloudburst had turned the steep concrete drive beside the house into a torrent, and through the darkness he could see that the cascade was carrying branches along with it, and rocks, the source of the rumbling.
Drenched now, Oliver gripped the railing. Then there was a sound which eclipsed even the roaring of the rain - a series of crashes, as loud as mortar bombs. Seconds later a huge object loomed out of the blackness. As it reared towards him Oliver threw himself sideways, skidding on his side across the deck. He just had time to realise that the object was the house's water tank, which had been dislodged from where it had stood, on the hill behind the house.
With explosive force the tank smashed down on the end of the deck, whose planks and railing splintered like kindling, before the tank vanished into the blackness. Then yet another sound joined the storm's cacophony, a high-pitched whine, howling above the roar of the rain and the rushing of the flood. It was Logan Bay's emergency siren, calling out the beachside settlement's volunteer fire brigade.
Tomorrow: Logan Bay gives up its secret.
* Graeme Lay is an Auckland novelist and writer.NZHERALD/OPINION Read earlier chapters online
