United States or Brunei ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Then Keawe, because he felt the truth of what she said, grew the more angry. "Heighty-teighty!" cried he. "You may be filled with melancholy if you please. It is not the mind of a good wife. If you thought at all of me you would sit shamed." Thereupon he went out, and Kokua was alone. What chance had she to sell that bottle at two centimes? None, she perceived.
When they had viewed all, Keawe and Lopaka sat on the porch. “Well,” asked Lopaka, “is it all as you designed?” “Words cannot utter it,” said Keawe. “It is better than I dreamed, and I am sick with satisfaction.” “There is but one thing to consider,” said Lopaka; “all this may be quite natural, and the bottle imp have nothing whatever to say to it.
And the fact that the tale has been designed and written for a Polynesian audience may lend it some extraneous interest nearer home. There was a man of the island of Hawaii, whom I shall call Keawe; for the truth is, he still lives, and his name must be kept secret; but the place of his birth was not far from Honaunau, where the bones of Keawe the Great lie hidden in a cave.
Now the truth of it was this: as Keawe undressed for his bath, he spied upon his flesh a patch like a patch of lichen on a rock, and it was then that he stopped singing. For he knew the likeness of that patch, and knew that he was fallen in the Chinese Evil. Now, it is a sad thing for any man to fall into this sickness.
“That is not my idea,” said Keawe; “but to have a beautiful house and garden on the Kona Coast, where I was born, the sun shining in at the door, flowers in the garden, glass in the windows, pictures on the walls, and toys and fine carpets on the tables, for all the world like the house I was in this day—only a storey higher, and with balconies all about like the King’s palace; and to live there without care and make merry with my friends and relatives.”
His wife had given her soul for him, now he must give his for hers; no other thought was in the world with him. At the corner, by the old calaboose, there was the boatswain waiting. "My wife has the bottle," said Keawe, "and, unless you help me to recover it, there can be no more money and no more liquor to-night." "You do not mean to say you are serious about that bottle?" cried the boatswain.
It was as Keawe supposed; the young man had the change ready in a drawer; the bottle changed hands, and Keawe’s fingers were no sooner clasped upon the stalk than he had breathed his wish to be a clean man. And, sure enough, when he got home to his room, and stripped himself before a glass, his flesh was whole like an infant’s.
So it was for days, and Keawe went from one to another, finding everywhere new clothes and carriages, and fine new houses, and men everywhere in great contentment, although, to be sure, when he hinted at his business their faces would cloud over. "No doubt I am upon the track," thought Keawe.
Kokua saw and heard him, like some strange thing in a dream; there were times when she forgot or doubted, and put her hands to her brow; to know herself doomed and hear her husband babble seemed so monstrous. All the while Keawe was eating and talking, and planning the time of their return, and thanking her for saving him, and fondling her, and calling her the true helper after all.
Upon this hill Keawe was one day taking a walk with his pocket full of money, viewing the great houses upon either hand with pleasure, “What fine houses these are!” he was thinking, “and how happy must those people be who dwell in them, and take no care for the morrow!” The thought was in his mind when he came abreast of a house that was smaller than some others, but all finished and beautified like a toy; the steps of that house shone like silver, and the borders of the garden bloomed like garlands, and the windows were bright like diamond; and Keawe stopped and wondered at the excellence of all he saw.
Word Of The Day