fro, to and fro, along the balcony, like one
despairing.

"Very willingly could I leave Hawaii, the home of my fathers," Keawe was
thinking. "Very lightly could I leave my house, the high-placed, the
many-windowed, here upon the mountains. Very bravely could I go to
Molokai, to Kalaupapa by the cliffs, to live with the smitten and to
sleep there, far from my fathers. But what wrong have I done, what sin
lies upon my soul, that I should have encountered Kokua coming cool from
the sea-water in the evening? Kokua, the soul ensnarer! Kokua, the light
of my life! Her may I never wed, her may I look upon no longer, her may
I no more handle with my loving hand; and it is for this, it is for you,
O Kokua! that I pour my lamentations!"

Now you are to observe what sort of a man Keawe was, for he might have
dwelt there in the Bright House for years, and no one been the wiser of
his sickness; but he reckoned nothing of that, if he must lose Kokua.
And again, he might have wed Kokua even as he was; and so many would
have done, because they have the souls of pigs; but Keawe loved the maid
manfully, and he would do her no hurt and bring her in no danger.

A little beyond the midst of the night, there came in his mind the
recollection of that bottle. He went round to the back porch, and called
to memory the day when the devil had looked forth; and at the thought
ice ran in his veins.

"A dreadful thing is the bottle," thought Keawe, "and dreadful is the
imp, and it is a dreadful thing to risk the flames of hell. But what
other hope have I to cure my sickness or to wed Kokua? What!" he
thought, "would I beard the devil once, only to get me a house, and not
face him again to win Kokua?"

Thereupon he called to mind it was the next day the _Hall_ went by on
her return to Honolulu. "There must I go first," he thought, "and see
Lopaka. For the best hope that I have now is to find that same bottle I
was so pleased to be rid of."

Never a wink could he sleep; the food stuck in his throat; but he sent a
letter to Kiano, and, about the time when the steamer would be coming,
rode down beside the cliff of the tombs. It rained; his horse went
heavily; he looked up at the black mouths of the caves, and he envied
the dead that slept there and were done with trouble; and called to mind
how he had galloped by the day before, and was astonished. So he came
down to Hookena, and there was all the country gathered for the steamer
as usual. In the