THE KILLING OF KANE
Bent and Kane brought before Titokowaru--Kane's flight--Captured
by the Hauhaus--A traitor's end.
When the renegade Charles Kane, or "Kingi," fled from the
Turuturu-Mokai fight after receiving his bullet-wound, he made his way
to the Turangaréré village, and announced that he would not return to
Te Ngutu-o-te-Manu. The Maoris, however, took him back to Te Ngutu,
and he and Kimble Bent were brought before Titokowaru, who was sitting
in the _Wharé-kura_. Bent now appears, from his own account, to have
wearied of his terrible life amongst the Hauhaus.
The war-chief fiercely questioned "Kingi," whom he suspected of an
intention to return to the European camps.
Then turning to "Ringiringi," he said:
"E Ringi, speak! Do you ever think of leaving us and running away to
the _pakehas_?"
Bent confessed that he now desired to return to the men of his own
colour, adding. "But I will never take arms against you."
Titokowaru glared at his white man, then he went to the door of the
council-house and called to the people in the _marae_ to enter.
When they were all in the big _wharé_, Titokowaru ordered them to close
the door and the sliding-window.
In the gloom of the praying-house the people sat in terrible silence,
and the white men trembled for their heads.
Titokowaru, fearfully stern and menacing, addressed the _pakehas_.
"_Whakarongo mai!_ Listen to me. If you persist in saying that you wish
to return to the white men, it will be your death! I will kill you both
with my tomahawk, now, in this house, unless you promise that you will
never leave the Maoris! I will slay you, and your bodies will be cooked
in the _hangi_!"
"Ringiringi," in real fear of his life, made answer that he would
remain with the Hauhaus if Titoko would protect him, for he dreaded
some of the chief's fiercer followers. "Kingi," too, hastened to give
the required promise--a promise which he, unlike his fellow-_pakeha_,
broke at the first opportunity.
When the people had left the _Wharé-kura_, Titoko spoke to "Ringiringi"
in a more friendly and reassuring tone, saying that he wished the
_pakeha_ to remain with him in the _pa_, and that, in order to assure
his life against the wilder spirits in the tribes gathered under his
command, he would _tapu_ him, as Te Ua had done two years before. For
his _tapu_, he explained, was a far more effective and binding one than
that of the Opunake prophet; a spell that no man dared break on pain of
death.
Not many days later the Irish traitor "Kingi" deserted from the _pa_,
taking with him a watch, a revolver, and some clothing which he had
"commandeered" from the natives.
For some little time nothing was heard of him. At length the warriors
of the _Tekau-ma-rua_, while out scouting one day in the direction
of Turangaréré, discovered on the track leading to the settlement a
note addressed to the white soldiers' commander at Waihi, stating that
the writer (Kane) and Bent were at Te Ngutu-o-te-Manu, awaiting a
favourable opportunity to tomahawk Titokowaru, cut off his head, and
bring it in to the Government camp. Kane was evidently clearing the
way for his return to civilisation, and this note--which he had left
in a spot where he hoped the white troops would come across it--was
obviously intended to serve as a palliative in some measure of his
military offences.
The deserter's letter was brought to the "Bird's-Beak" _pa_, where it
was translated by an English-speaking Maori. "Ringiringi," questioned,
disclaimed any knowledge of it, and as to the incriminating reference
to himself, he assured Titokowaru that "Kingi" was lying.
Titokowaru immediately despatched the white man and four armed Maoris
after "Kingi." They found him at Te Paka village; he disappeared that
evening, but was later caught by a party of seven Maoris and confined
in a _raupo_ hut at Te Paka.
They killed him there that night.
Bent was lying half-asleep in a _wharé_ in the settlement when the
seven Maoris, who had brought "Kingi" in, entered, in an intensely
excited state, sat down, and asked him if he had heard of the judgment
on his fellow-white. Then one of them said, "Kingi is dead."
Another man, leaning forward until his passionate face almost touched
Bent's, exclaimed:
"Ringi, had you done as Kingi has done, we would not have killed you in
the ordinary way. Your fate would have been burning alive in the oven
on the _marae_!"
Then the seven, after a conversation between themselves in a strange
language the white man could not understand, listen as he would--the
Maoris sometimes improvise a secret tongue, by eliding certain
syllables in words and adding new ones--the executioners rose and left
the _wharé_.
It was not until next day that "Ringiringi" learned the details of the
deserter's end.
"Kingi," after being given a meal, was left alone in his hut, but was
watched through crevices in the wall until he sank to sleep, fatigued
with his enforced tramp. He lay with a blanket partly drawn over
his head. One of the Hauhaus, a man named Patumutu ("The Finishing
Stroke"), stole quietly into the _wharé_, and attempted to deal him a
fatal blow with a sharp bill-hook. The blow, however, only gashed his
nose, and he leaped up and grappled with his assailant.
The Maoris outside, hearing the noise of the scuffle, rushed in. An
old man--Uru-anini of the Puketapu--seized the white man by the leg,
brought him down, and dealt him a terrible blow with an axe as he lay
on the floor.
The other Hauhaus completed the work with their tomahawks, and the dead
body of the renegade Irishman, cut almost to pieces, was dragged out
and thrown into a disused potato-pit on the outskirts of the village.