Michener, James

by Hawaii

  "It is not kapu," Abner insisted. "It is forbidden by God's law."

  "That's what kapu means," Malama explained patiently. "Now I understand. All gods have kapu. You mustn't eat this fish, it is kapu. You mustn't sleep with a woman who is having her period, it is kapu. You mustn't . . ."

  "Makma!" Abner thundered. "Being married to your brother is not kapul It's not some idle superstition. It's a law of God."

  "I know. I know. Not a little kapu like certain fish, but big kapu, like not entering a temple if you are unclean. All gods have big and h'ttle kapus. So Kelolo is a big kapu and he must go. I understand."

  "You don't understand," Abner began, but Makma was so pleased with her comprehension of this aspect, at least, of the new god, that she was spurred to action, and she summoned her servants in a loud voice.

  "Kelolo will not live in this house any morel He will live in that housel" And she indicated one of the compound quarters about twenty feet removed from his previous residence. The kw promulgated, she beamed at Abner.

  "That is not enough, Makma. He must move out of the compound altogether."

  At this, Makma said something to Keoki which the young man was too embarrassed to transkte, but Abner insisted, and Keoki, blushing, explained, "My mother says that she stopped sleeping with her four other husbands years ago and you need have no fear that she will misbehave . . ." Keoki stopped, for he did not have the words. "Anyway, she says that Kelolo is a kind man and she hopes he can stay within the compound."

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  Angrily, Abner stamped his foot and shouted, "No! This is an evil thing. Tell her it is the biggest kapu of all ... Wait, don't use that word! Tell her merely that the Lord says specifically that Kelolo must move outside the compound."

  Malama began to cry and said that Kelolo was more to her than either a husband or a brother and that . . . Abner interrupted and said simply, "Unless he moves, Malama, you will never be able to join the church."

  She did not understand this and asked, "I will not be allowed inside the big new church Kelolo is going to build?"

  "You may come inside," Abner said gently. "Even the worst sinner may come and listen. And you may sing, too. But you may never join the church . . . the way Keoki has joined."

  Malama considered this for a long time, concluding brightly, "Very well. I'll sing and keep Kelolo."

  "And when you die," Abner said, "you will burn in hell forever and ever."

  Malama knew she was being maneuvered into a corner, so with tears in her big deep eyes she said to Keoki, using sly words that Abner would not be able to detect, "I do not want to burn in hell, so you must build Kelolo a small house outside the compound, but brush the path well so there are no leaves, and at night he can tiptoe back to my room and God will not hear him." Then, in a loud voice she announced: "Makua Hale, I am going to write a new letter."

  When she was sprawled once more on the floor of her palace, she tore up the earlier message, bit her pen and wrote:

  "Liholiho King. I have told Kelolo he must now sleep outside. He is buying a ship. I think it is a foolish thing to do. Your aunt, Malama."

  She handed Abner the letter, and when he had read it she said, "Tomorrow and tomorrow and the day after that I want you to come here to talk with me about the duty of an alii nui. After one moon I shall find a state of grace."

  "It cannot be done in that way, Malama."

  "When can I find it?"

  "Perhaps never."

  "I will find it!" the great woman roared. "You will come here tomorrow and teach me how to find it."

  "I cannot do that, Malama," Abner said resolutely.

  "You . . . will ... do ... it!" she threatened.

  "No man can find grace for another," Abner stubbornly insisted,

  Malama leaped to her feet with strange agility and grabbed her little -mentor by the shoulders. "How shall I find grace?" she demanded.

  "Do you really want to know, Malama?"

  "Yes," she replied, shaking him as if he were a child. "Tell me!"

  "Kneel down," he commanded, and he did so himself, showing her how to pray.

  "What do I do now?" she whispered, turning her big eyes at him.

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  "Close your eyes. Make a temple of your hands and say, 'Jesus

  (Christ, my master, teach me to be humble and to love Thee.'" "What is humble?" Malama asked, her voice lower. "Humble means that even the greatest alii nui in Maui is no more than a man who catches mullet from the fish pond," Abner explained.

  1"You mean that even the slave . . ." "Malama," Abner said in ashen voice, overcome by his own perception of God's law, "it seems to me that right now the lowliest slave hauling sandalwood from the forest has a better chance of Ending grace than you do."

  "Why?" the kneeling woman begged.

  "Because at any moment he may find God, for he has a humble spirit. But you are proud, and argumentative, and unwilling to humble yourself before the Lord."

  "You are proud, too, Makua Hale," the huge woman argued. "Do you humble yourself before the Lord?"

  "If He told me tomorrow to march into the waves until they overcame me, I would do so. I live for the Lord. I serve the Lord. The Lord is my light and my salvation."

  "I understand," the Alii Nui said. "I will pray for humbleness." And when he left, she was still kneeling with her hands forming the steeple of a church.

  For the next several days Abner did not see Malama, for serious riots were sweeping Lahaina, and with Kelolo and the men gone, only Abner was left to combat them. Trouble started when three whaling ships, in from the Off-Japan grounds, sent more than eighty men ashore on overdue leave. The first place they visited was Murphy's grog shop, and from there they branched out through Lahaina, fighting, debauching, and at last murdering. Emboldened by the lack of police to discipline them, they formed mobs and began sacking Hawaiian homes, searching for girls, and when they found any, they dragged them to the ships, not waiting to discover whether these were normal ships' girls or not, and in this way many faithful wives of men off on the sandalwood expedition were raped.

  At last, Abner Hale put on his black claw-hammer, his best stock and his tall beaver hat, and went down to the pier. "Row me out to the whalers!" he commanded the useless old men who were lounging along the shore, and when he reached the first ship he found that the captain was gone, and at the second the captain was locked in his room with a girl and would not speak with the missionary, cursing him through the door, but at the third ship Abner found a captain who sat below drinking whiskey, and to him Abner said, "Your men are debauching Lahaina."

  "That's what I brought 'em here fer," the captain said.

  "They're raping our women, Captain."

  "They always do, in Lahaina. The women like it."

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  "Last night there was murder," Abner continued.

  "You catch the murderer and well hang him."

  "But he could be one of your men."

  "Probably was. Eight of my men deserve hanghi'. I'd love to see 1 'em all swingin' from an arm."

  "Captain, have you no sense of responsibility for what is going on ashore?"

  "Look, Reverend," the captain said wearily, "for the last two nights I been ashore meself. Only reason I'm not there now is I'm too damned old ... for three nights in a row, that is."

  There was a great cry from ashore, and one of the grass houses went up in flames. From the captain's quarters Abner could see the blaze and it seemed near his home, and he was panicked for fear that

  Jerusha might be in danger. Pointing his finger at the captain he threatened: "Captain Jackson, of the Bugle out of Salem, I shall write to your church, Captian, and advise your minister of how one of his members conducts himself in Lahaina.'

  "By Godl" the captain roared, pushing away his grog. "If you mention my name in your letters . . ." He lunged at Abner, but was drunk and m
issed him, his huge bulk crashing into the wall.

  "You cannot be two men, Captain," Abner said solemnly. "A beast 1 in Lahaina and a saint in Salem. You must stop the rioting."

  "I'll strangle your dirty little chicken neck!" Captain Jackson shouted, clutching for the missionary, who had no trouble evading him. "You get off this ship! Lahaina was a good port till you came along."

  Ashore another house went up in flames, and as Abner reached the deck he could see four sailors chasing a girl who had thus been routed out for their sport. "May God forgive them," Abner prayed. "But with such leaders . . ." He swung himself down into his canoe and returned to shore, determined at least to protect Jerusha, lest the violence disturb her pregnancy, but before he could get to her, there was a new commotion, and now even the stragglers along the shore became excited, for three large sailors had been prowling about the back area of Malama's compound and had discovered her young daughter Noelani, and were now dragging her through the dusty streets until they could find a comfortable spot in which to rape her, and she was screaming in Hawaiian, while the sailors cursed in English.

  A few old men, too weak to be with the sandalwooders, proved themselves loyal to their alii and tried to stop the rapists, but they were laughingly pushed aside, for in justice to the sailors they could not distinguish between an ordinary girl, with whom such conduct was customary, and an alii, with whom it was sacrilege. Other old men tried to intervene, but they also were bowled over with shocking jolts to the jaw, and the drunken sailors proceeded with their captive.

  At this point Abner Hale limped up, holding onto his top hat, and he pointed his right hand in the faces of the sailors and cried, "Set loose that girl."

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  "Get out of the way, little man!" the sailors warned.

  "I am a minister of Godl" Abner warned them.

  The first two sailors stopped at this, but the third swaggered up to the missionary and shouted, "In Lahaina there is no God."

  Abner, who weighed only half of what the sailor did, impulsively slapped the man in the face. "God is watching you!" he said solemnly.

  The slapped man quickly squared off, British fashion, to demolish Abner, whereupon the two other sailors released the girl and grabbed their partner, but when they saw fair Noelani run away, the most beautiful girl they had so far found, they became infuriated and started to strike and punch and kick at Abner. He was saved by Malama herself, for the great alii had seen the abduction of her daughter and had hurried up with what men and women she could command.

  "It's the queen!" one of the sailors shouted, and as big Malama waded into the midst of the riot, the men withdrew from beating Abner and ran, cursing, to assemble their mates. Soon more than forty sailors, most of them drunk, crowded the dusty street and shouted imprecations at the missionary and the women who were protecting him. "Come over here, you coward!" they challenged, but whenever an especially bold one spoke, Malama went bravely to him and damned him in Hawaiian, so that after a while the sailors dispersed, and Abner saw with horror that from the shadows two ship's captains had watched the affair with approval.

  "What kind of men are they?" he wondered, and when the mob had gone back to Murphy's grog shop and Malama was attending his bruises, he said quietly, in broken Hawaiian, "Do you see what happens when the men are away gathering sandalwood?"

  "I see," Malama said. "I will send the women to the hills."

  That night was one of terror, for the sailors, goaded by their captains, could find no girls, so they surrounded Abner's home and cursed him vilely till midnight. Then they burned another house and finally found three girls, whom they hauled off to the ship. At two in the morning, when the rioting was its worst, Abner said to Jerusha, "I will leave Keoki and the women here with you. I am going to speak with Pupali." And by a back route he scurried to the home of Pupali, the ardent canoeist whose occupation it was to paddle his own wife and four daughters to incoming whalers.

  He sat on the floor with Pupali, no light showing, and asked in broken Hawaiian, "Why do you take your own daughters to these evil men?"

  "I get cloth and sometimes even tobacco," Pupali explained.

  "Don't you see that some day your daughters may die from the sailors' disease?" Abner pleaded.

  "Some day everybody dies," Pupali rationalized.

  "But is a little money worth this to you?" Abner argued.

  "Men like girls," Pupali said truthfully.

  "Do you feel no shame in selling your own wife to the sailors?"

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  "Her sister takes care of me," Pupali said contentedly.

  "Are you proud when the sailors bum down the houses?" Abner pressed.

  "They never bum my house," Pupali replied.

  "How old is your prettiest daughter, Pupali?"

  Abner could hear him suck in his breath in pride. "Iliki? She was born in the year of Keopuolani's illness."

  "Fourteen, and probably already sick to deathl"*1

  "What do you expect? She's a woman."

  On the spur of the moment Abner said, "I want you to give her to me, Pupali."

  At last something was happening that the rough old man could understand. Smiling lasciviously he whispered, "You'll enjoy Iliki. All the men do. How much you give me for her?"

  "I am taking her for God," Abner corrected.

  "I know, but how much you give me?" Pupali pressed.

  "I will clothe her and feed her and treat her as my daughter," Abner explained.

  "You mean, you don't want . . ." Pupali shook his head. "Well, Makua Hale, you must be a good man." And when morning dawned, Abner, in the dust of riots, started his school for Hawaiian girls. His first pupil was Pupali's most beautiful daughter, Iliki, and when she appeared she wore only a thin slip about her hips and a silver chain around her neck, from which dangled a whale's tooth handsomely carved with these words:

  Observe the truth; enough for man to know Virtue alone is happiness below.

  When the other island families saw what an advantage Pupali enjoyed by having his daughter as an observer within the missionary household, for she could report on the strangest occurrences, they offered their girls, too, which nullified Pupali's superiority, so that he countered by enrolling his other three daughters, and when the next whaling ship touched port, matters were different. Before, sailors had instructed the Lahaina girls in profanity in the steaming fo'c's'ls; now Jerusha taught them cooking and the Psalms in the mission garden, and her ablest pupil was Iliki, Ee-Lee-Kee, the Pelting Spray of Ocean.

  ABNER WAS NOT PRESENT to congratulate Iliki on the August afternoon when she first wrote her name and carried it proudly to her father, for that morning had brought an exhausted messenger to Lahaina. He had run across the mountains from the other side of the island, blurting out so bizarre a story that Abner summoned Keoki to translate formally, and the young man said, "It is truel Abraham and Urania Hewlett have marched all the way from Hana, at the opposite end of Maui."

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  "Why didn't they take a canoe?" Abner asked, puzzled.

  Keoki Tapidly interrogated the gasping messenger and then looked blank as the man explained. "It's hard to believe," Keoki muttered. "Abraham and Urania set out yesterday morning at four o'clock in a double canoe, but at six o'clock the waves were so great that the canoe broke apart, so Abraham brought his wife ashore through the surf. Then they walked forty miles to Wailuku, where they are now."

  "I thought that trail was impossible for women," Abner argued.

  "It is. The worst on Maui. But Urania had to make it, because next month she is due to have her baby and they wanted to be with you."

  "What can I ..." Abner began in bewilderment.

  "They are afraid she is dying," the messenger said.

  "If she's dying . . ." Abner was sweating and nervous. "Well, how did she get to Wailuku?"

  With gestures, the messenger explained, "The
paddlers from the wrecked canoe tied vines under her arms and pulled her up the gullies. Then, when it came time to go down the other side, they grabbed the vines . . ."

  Before the tired messenger could finish, Abner knelt in the dust and raised his hands. He could visualize Urania, a dull woman and frightened, undergoing this tremendous trip, and he prayed, "Dear Heavenly Father, save Thy servant, Sister Urania. In her hours of fear, save her."

  The messenger interrupted and said, "Abraham Hewlett says you must bring your book and help him."

  "The book?" Abner cried. "I thought. . ."

  "They need you now," the messenger insisted. "Because when I left she seemed about to have the baby."

  The idea of assisting at a birth appalled Abner, but he hurried out to the garden where Jerusha was teaching her girls, and from his frightened look she knew that some new island crisis had occurred, but she was not prepared when he said, "Sister Urania was trying to reach us for help, but she has had to stop in Wailuku." The Hales had never spoken of Urania's pregnancy, just as, for reasons of delicacy, they had never mentioned Jerusha's, trusting that by some miracle the baby would either be born without trouble or wait until Dr. Whipple happened along. Now,_under the coconut trees, they had to acknowledge imminent facts.

  "I will take Deland's Midwifery and do what I can," Abner said dully, but what he wanted to cry was: "I will be with you, Jerusha! By the will of God, I will see that your baby is well bom."

  And she replied, "You must help Sister Urania," but what she intended was: "I am afraid, and I wish my mother were here."

  So the two young missionaries, each so desperately in love but lacking capacity to speak of it to the other, because they judged that Congregationalism would not approve, looked at each other in the noonday sunlight, and then looked away; but it was Abner who broke, for when they had gone inside to pack Deknd it was he who could

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  not control his hands, and the package fell awry and the crucial book fell onto the dusty floor, and when he kneeled to recover he hid his face in his hands and sobbed, "Sister Urania, may God spare you!" But it was another name he longed to say.