THE THREE WISE MEN A CHRISTMAS STORY

Te Ao Hou, December 1961, Page 6

THE THREE WISE MEN A CHRISTMAS STORY by EARLE SPENCER The big man paid the taxi driver and walked into the hotel. The hotel receptionist looked at him and smiled, and he said, “How do you do? I would like to stay here tonight please, if I may.” “Oh yes,” said the girl, whose name was Joan. “Dinner, bed and breakfast, That will be alright. You can have room No. 47.” She wrote for a minute at her desk and then she said, “Would you sign the hotel register please. Just write your name and address.” She handed her pen to him. As he took it he said, “Have my friends arrived?” Joan was puzzled and she said, “I am sorry sir, but I do not know who your friends are.” He smiled quickly and said, “Kaspar and Melchior.” Joan read the names of the people staying at the hotel and she said, “Yes. Mr Kaspar and Mr Melchior arrived earlier this afternoon.” He said “Thank you”; and then he wrote ‘Balshazzar, Africa’, and walked up the stairs to room No. 47. The three men met after tea and laughed and talked together. Kaspar said, “Reception has been very bad at home during these past few weeks. There has been too much static. The last signal said ‘Follow the star’, but I could not find out where it was coming from as I had hoped to do. It seemed to be coming from somewhere in the middle of the North Island.” “I agree with you”, said Melchior, “though I could not hear very well either. The sound was full of shadows. It would be so much better if we knew exactly where to go to find the baby. Do you know what ‘Follow the star’ means?” “It cannot be a real star,” said Balshazzar. “We cannot follow a real star. The message must have a secret meaning that we do not know. But we do know where the messages have been coming from. If you have a look at this map you will see that Rotorua, Hamilton and Taumarunui are round about the middle of the island. Of course Lake Taupo is in the middle of the island but we cannot stay in a lake.” Kaspar's laughter danced everywhere and he said, “We don't have to stay in the lake. We could stay in the township there. We think that the messages come from the middle of the island. Let us go to Taupo. It seems a likely place and when we get there, there may be another message to help us over the last few miles.” “We have travelled so far over land and sea to bring our gifts to the new baby,” said Melchior. “There will be another message for us.” While the Three Wise Men were talking to each other in that hotel in the city, Mary was standing on the front door step of her house on the side of the hill, watching her husband mowing the lawn. Now and then he would stop and marvel at the sunset. When he pushed the mower, the cut grass spun back against his shins and a few pieces slipped into the cuffs of his trousers. At the edge of the lake, at the edge of the town, some children were playing in the sand. Soon they would have to go home to bed. The hills on the far side of the lake spread a cloak of purple shadows on the waters. Mary spoke to herself and said, “I wonder when my new baby will be born. Tomorrow perhaps, or the day after tomorrow. He will be strong and good I know, and he will love these royal colours, the yellow sand, green grass, purple shadows, sunset red, and the blue lake, and the blue sky. Many women have their babies at home, and I can too if I want to.” She saw Ben Thomas and his wife Christine coming down the street. Mr and Mrs Thomas were good neighbours. They were having their evening stroll. They stopped at the gate to talk to her husband and she walked down the path to join in the conversation. They talked about the weather and the baby coming, and then Mr and Mrs Thomas went home and Mary went inside. Her husband, Joseph, finished mowing the lawn and then he went inside and closed the door. All around the house it was peaceful.

The next day the Three Wise Men arrived at Lake Taupo. The summer sun was dazzling down on the lakes and the hills and the shops in the town. The shops were full of people. It was nearly Christmas and lots of people had come to Taupo for the holidays. Kaspar said, “Listen to the children laughing and playing. Hurry up Melchior and Balshazzar. We must find somewhere to stay and then we can go for a walk to the lakeside and perhaps have a ride in one of the launches. After tea we will have to watch and wait for a message about the baby that is going to be born.” Because there were so many people on holiday nearly all the hotels were full but they found a place at the edge of the town that had a room to spare. They unpacked their bags and then walked down to the lake. After they had been sitting for an hour in the sun they asked a man with a launch if he would take them for a ride on the lake. “Certainly,” he said. “Certainly. Jump in and away we go.” He took them swiftly across the fresh water. The spray from the tops of the small waves splashed them. Then the man stopped the boat and let it float. There was not a cloud in the sky. They were in the middle of the lake. On the far side of the lake the high rocky cliffs of Taupo-nui-a-Tia (the great cloak of Tia) fell down to the water's edge. They could hear, faintly, the children laughing on the beach. They trailed their hands in the water as the boat drifted. Melchior said, “I wish, I wish, I wish, I wish that I could go for a swim.” Balshazzar wanted to see some trout and he leaned so far over the edge of the boat, peering into the water, that he nearly fell in. They decided, after that, that it was time to go home. With a sudden loud noise the motor started and before long they were stepping out of the boat on to the land. That night they watched and waited for hours but there was no message and though they were disappointed they went to bed. Melchior lay in the darkness unable to go to sleep and after a time he got up and walked to the window to look out at the lake. “What a beautiful night it is,” he thought, and how brightly the stars were shining. “Although I cannot see the moon I can see its light reflected on the lake.” As he stood by the window, Kaspar, who could not sleep, came and stood beside him. “It looks as though all the starlight was shining on the lake. It is almost as bright as day out where we were in the boat.” And as they looked it seemed as though there was a patch of light in the middle of the lake that was brighter than the rest, and that grew brighter and brighter and began to move slowly across the water until it was no longer shining on the water but on the houses and trees at the edge of the lake. Kaspar and Melchior knelt down at the window. Balshazzar grumbled and mumbled in his sleep, and woke up. When he saw them kneeling and the light shining down, he came, too, and knelt down at the window. Softly the light faded, and moved over the water again, and disappeared. The Three Wise Men stood quietly in the room. Balshazzar said, “We have come to the right place. Tomorrow there will be great joy and happiness here.” In the morning while they were walking slowly along they were attracted by a game some children were playing on the grass under some trees. “That game is called ‘Follow My Leader’,” said Balshazzar. “It is not,” said Melchior. “I use to play ‘Follow My Leader’ when I was a boy and it is different altogether.” They sat down then and there and began to talk about what they had done when they were children. Kaspar joined in and it seemed as though the three of them were going to talk all day when a small boy, one of the smallest three, ran past them. “Excuse me,” said Kaspar. “Could you tell me the name of the game that you are playing with your friends?” The small boy stopped and said, “My name is Eric and we are playing ‘Follow the Star.”' The Three Wise Men looked at each other, and at the small boy as he ran off, and at the other children, and they did

not say anything at all as they walked away down the street. That night they did not get ready for bed. They sat down at the window, waiting. When the light began to grow in the middle of the lake until it seemed as though all the stars in the world were shining down upon Lake Taupo, they left their room and went outside. The light did not come over the water to the land as it had done the night before. Instead it seemed to be all gathered up into one big star in the sky that sent down one shining ray of light. The Three Wise Men looked up at the star and Balshazzar said, “We do have to follow a star. We do have to follow a star.” Now the light from the star moved away from them and they followed in its path until they came to the small neat house on the side of the hill where Joseph and Mary lived. Mr and Mrs Thomas were there and many other people. It was Mrs Thomas who told the Three Wise Men that Mary had had a baby boy. She did not know them and they did not know her. She was only an ordinary woman and they were three kings from distant lands; but they talked together in the light of the star as though they all belonged to the one family. The next morning the Three Wise Men came again to the house where Mary and Joseph lived with the gifts that they had travelled so far to bring. Kaspar knocked at the door and Joseph let them in. One by one they made their gifts and praised the baby again. When they were leaving, Balshazzar said, “What is to be the baby's name?” Mary looked at her husband, Joseph, and at her baby, and she smiled and said to them, “Rangi.”