So he led Keawe all over it, from the cellar to the roof, and there was
nothing there that was not perfect of its kind, and Keawe was astonished.

“Truly,” said Keawe, “this is a beautiful house; if I lived in the like
of it, I should be laughing all day long.  How comes it, then, that you
should be sighing?”

“There is no reason,” said the man, “why you should not have a house in
all points similar to this, and finer, if you wish.  You have some money,
I suppose?”

“I have fifty dollars,” said Keawe; “but a house like this will cost more
than fifty dollars.”

The man made a computation.  “I am sorry you have no more,” said he, “for
it may raise you trouble in the future; but it shall be yours at fifty
dollars.”

“The house?” asked Keawe.

“No, not the house,” replied the man; “but the bottle.  For, I must tell
you, although I appear to you so rich and fortunate, all my fortune, and
this house itself and its garden, came out of a bottle not much bigger
than a pint.  This is it.”

And he opened a lockfast place, and took out a round-bellied bottle with
a long neck; the glass of it was white like milk, with changing rainbow
colours in the grain.  Withinsides something obscurely moved, like a
shadow and a fire.

“This is the bottle,” said the man; and, when Keawe laughed, “You do not
believe me?” he added.  “Try, then, for yourself.  See if you can break
it.”

So Keawe took the bottle up and dashed it on the floor till he was weary;
but it jumped on the floor like a child’s ball, and was not injured.

“This is a strange thing,” said Keawe.  “For by the touch of it, as well
as by the look, the bottle should be of glass.”

“Of glass it is,” replied the man, sighing more heavily than ever; “but
the glass of it was tempered in the flames of hell.  An imp lives in it,
and that is the shadow we behold there moving: or so I suppose.  If any
man buy this bottle the imp is at his command; all that he desires—love,
fame, money, houses like this house, ay, or a city like this city—all are
his at the word uttered.  Napoleon had this bottle, and by it he grew to
be the king of the world; but he sold it at the last, and fell.  Captain
Cook had this bottle, and by it he found his way to so many islands; but
he, too, sold it, and was slain upon Hawaii.  For, once it is sold, the
power goes and the protection; and unless a man remain content with what
he has, ill will befall him.”

“And yet you talk of selling it yourself?”  Keawe said.

“I have all I wish, and I am growing elderly,” replied the man.  “There
is one thing the imp cannot do—he cannot prolong life; and, it would not
be fair to conceal from you, there is a drawback to the bottle; for if a
man die before he sells it, he must burn in hell forever.”

“To be sure, that is a drawback and no mistake,” cried Keawe.  “I would
not meddle with the thing.  I can do without a house, thank God; but
there is one thing I could not be doing with one particle, and that is to
be damned.”

“Dear me, you must not run away with things,” returned the man.  “All you
have to do is to use the power of the imp in moderation, and then sell it
to someone else, as I do to you, and finish your life in comfort.”

“Well, I observe two things,” said Keawe.  “All the time you keep sighing
like a maid in love, that is one; and, for the other, you sell this
bottle very cheap.”

“I have told you already why I sigh,” said the man.  “It is because I
fear my health is breaking up; and, as you said yourself, to die and go
to the devil is a pity for anyone.  As for why I sell so cheap, I must
explain to you there is a peculiarity about the bottle.  Long ago, when
the devil brought it first upon earth, it was extremely expensive, and
was sold first of all to Prester John for many millions of dollars; but
it cannot be sold at all, unless sold at a loss.  If you sell it for as
much as you paid for it, back it comes to you again like a homing pigeon.
It follows that the price has kept falling in these centuries, and the
bottle is now remarkably cheap.  I bought it myself from one of my great
neighbours on this hill, and the price I paid was only ninety dollars.  I
could sell it for as high as eighty-nine dollars and ninety-nine cents,
but not a penny dearer, or back the thing must come to me.  Now, about
this there are two bothers.  First, when you offer a bottle so singular
for eighty odd dollars, people suppose you to be jesting.  And second—but
there is no hurry about that—and I need not go into it.  Only remember it
must be coined money that you sell it for.”

“How am I to know that this is all true?” asked Keawe.

“Some of it you can try at once,” replied the man.  “Give me your fifty
dollars, take the bottle, and wish your fifty dollars back into your
pocket.  If that does not happen, I pledge you my honour I will cry off
the bargain and restore your money.”

“You are not deceiving me?” said Keawe.

The man bound himself with a great oath.

“Well, I will risk that much,” said Keawe, “for that can do no harm.”
And he paid over his money to the man, and the man handed him the bottle.

“Imp of the bottle,” said Keawe, “I want my fifty dollars back.”  And
sure enough he had scarce said the word before his pocket was as heavy as
ever.

“To be sure this is a wonderful bottle,” said Keawe.

“And now good-morning to you, my fine fellow, and the devil go with you
for me!” said the man.

“Hold on,” said Keawe, “I don’t want any more of this fun.  Here, take
your bottle back.”

“You have bought it for less than I paid for it,” replied the man,
rubbing his hands.  “It is yours now; and, for my part, I am only
concerned to see the back of you.”  And with that he rang for his Chinese
servant, and had Keawe shown out of the house.

Now, when Keawe was in the street, with the bottle under his arm, he
began to think.  “If all is true about this bottle, I may have made a
losing bargain,” thinks he.  “But perhaps the man was only fooling me.”
The first thing he did was to count his money; the sum was
exact—forty-nine dollars American money, and one Chili piece.  “That
looks like the truth,” said Keawe.  “Now I will try another part.”

The streets in that part of the city were as clean as a ship’s decks, and
though it was noon, there were no passengers.  Keawe set the bottle in
the gutter and walked away.  Twice he looked back, and there was the
milky, round-bellied bottle where he left it.  A third time he looked
back, and turned a corner; but he had scarce done so, when something
knocked upon his elbow, and behold! it was the long neck sticking up; and
as for the round belly, it was jammed into the pocket of his pilot-coat.

“And that looks like the truth,” said Keawe.

The next thing he did was to buy a cork-screw in a shop, and go apart
into a secret place in the fields.  And there he tried to draw the cork,
but as often as he put the screw in, out it came again, and the cork as
whole as ever.

“This is some new sort of cork,” said Keawe, and all at once he began to
shake and sweat, for he was afraid of that bottle.

On his way back to the port-side, he saw a shop where a man sold shells
and clubs from the wild islands, old heathen deities, old coined money,
pictures from China and Japan, and all manner of things that sailors
bring in their sea-chests.  And here he had an idea.  So he went in and
offered the bottle for a hundred dollars.  The man of the shop laughed at
him at the first, and offered him five; but, indeed, it was a curious
bottle—such glass was never blown in any human glassworks, so prettily
the colours shone under the milky white, and so strangely the shadow
hovered in the midst; so, after he had disputed awhile after the manner
of his kind, the shop-man gave Keawe sixty silver dollars for the thing,
and set it on a shelf in the midst of his window.

“Now,” said Keawe, “I have sold that for sixty which I bought for
fifty—or, to say truth, a little less, because one of my dollars was from
Chili.  Now I shall know the truth upon another point.”

So he went back on board his ship, and, when he opened his chest, there
was the bottle, and had come more quickly than himself.  Now Keawe had a
mate on board whose name was Lopaka.

“What ails you?” said Lopaka, “that you stare in your chest?”

They were alone in the ship’s forecastle, and Keawe bound him to secrecy,
and told all.

“This is a very strange affair,” said Lopaka; “and I fear you will be in
trouble about this bottle.  But there is one point very clear—that you
are sure of the trouble, and you had better have the profit in the
bargain.  Make up your mind what you want with it; give the order, and if
it is done as you desire, I will buy the bottle myself; for I have an
idea of my own to get a schooner, and go trading through the islands.”

“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.”

“Well,” said Lopaka, “let us carry it back with us to Hawaii; and if all
comes true, as you suppose, I will buy the bottle, as I said, and ask a
schooner.”

Upon that they were agreed, and it was not long before the ship returned
to Honolulu, carrying Keawe and Lopaka, and the bottle.  They were scarce
come ashore when they met a friend upon the beach, who began at once to
condole with Keawe.

“I do not know what I am to be condoled about,” said Keawe.

“Is it possible you have not heard,” said the friend, “your uncle—that
good old man—is dead, and your cousin—that beautiful boy—was drowned at
sea?”

Keawe was filled with sorrow, and, beginning to weep and to lament, he
forgot about the bottle.  But Lopaka was thinking to himself, and
presently, when Keawe’s grief was a little abated, “I have been
thinking,” said Lopaka.  “Had not your uncle lands in Hawaii, in the
district of Kau?”

“No,” said Keawe, “not in Kau; they are on the mountain-side—a little way
south of Hookena.”

“These lands will now be yours?” asked Lopaka.

“And so they will,” says Keawe, and began again to lament for his
relatives.

“No,” said Lopaka, “do not lament at present.  I have a thought in my
mind.  How if this should be the doing of the bottle?  For here is the
place ready for your house.”

“If this be so,” cried Keawe, “it is a very ill way to serve me by
killing my relatives.  But it may be, indeed; for it was in just such a
station that I saw the house with my mind’s eye.”

“The house, however, is not yet built,” said Lopaka.

“No, nor like to be!” said Keawe; “for though my uncle has some coffee
and ava and bananas, it will not be more than will keep me in comfort;
and the rest of that land is the black lava.”

“Let us go to the lawyer,” said Lopaka; “I have still this idea in my
mind.”

Now, when they came to the lawyer’s, it appeared Keawe’s uncle had grown
monstrous rich in the last days, and there was a fund of money.

“And here is the money for the house!” cried Lopaka.

“If you are thinking of a new house,” said the lawyer, “here is the card
of a new architect, of whom they tell me great things.”

“Better and better!” cried Lopaka.  “Here is all made plain for us.  Let
us continue to obey orders.”

So they went to the architect, and he had drawings of houses on his
table.

“You want something out of the way,” said the architect.  “How do you
like this?” and he handed a drawing to Keawe.

Now, when Keawe set eyes on the drawing, he cried out aloud, for it was
the picture of his thought exactly drawn.

“I am in for this house,” thought he.  “Little as I like the way it comes
to me, I am in for it now, and I may as well take the good along with the
evil.”

So he told the architect all that he wished, and how he would have that
house furnished, and about the pictures on the wall and the knick-knacks
on the tables; and he asked the man plainly for how much he would
undertake the whole affair.

The architect put many questions, and took his pen and made a
computation; and when he had done he named the very sum that Keawe had
inherited.

Lopaka and Keawe looked at one another and nodded.

“It is quite clear,” thought Keawe, “that I am to have this house,
whether or no.  It comes from the devil, and I fear I will get little
good by that; and of one thing I am sure, I will make no more wishes as
long as I have this bottle.  But with the house I am saddled, and I may
as well take the good along with the evil.”

So he made his terms with the architect, and they signed a paper; and
Keawe and Lopaka took ship again and sailed to Australia; for it was
concluded between them they should not interfere at all, but leave the
architect and the bottle imp to build and to adorn that house at their
own pleasure.

The voyage was a good voyage, only all the time Keawe was holding in his
breath, for he had sworn he would utter no more wishes, and take no more
favours from the devil.  The time was up when they got back.  The
architect told them that the house was ready, and Keawe and Lopaka took a
passage in the _Hall_, and went down Kona way to view the house, and see
if all had been done fitly according to the thought that was in Keawe’s
mind.

Now the house stood on the mountain side, visible to ships.  Above, the
forest ran up into the clouds of rain; below, the black lava fell in
cliffs, where the kings of old lay buried.  A garden bloomed about that
house with every hue of flowers; and there was an orchard of papaia on
the one hand and an orchard of breadfruit on the other, and right in
front, toward the sea, a ship’s mast had been rigged up and bore a flag.
As for the house, it was three storeys high, with great chambers and
broad balconies on each.  The windows were of glass, so excellent that it
was as clear as water and as bright as day.  All manner of furniture
adorned the chambers.  Pictures hung upon the wall in golden frames:
pictures of ships, and men fighting, and of the most beautiful women, and
of singular places; nowhere in the world are there pictures of so bright
a colour as those Keawe found hanging in his house.  As for the
knick-knacks, they were extraordinary fine; chiming clocks and musical
boxes, little men with nodding heads, books filled with pictures, weapons
of price from all quarters of the world, and the most elegant puzzles to
entertain the leisure of a solitary man.  And as no one would care to
live in such chambers, only to walk through and view them, the balconies
were made so broad that a whole town might have lived upon them in
delight; and Keawe knew not which to prefer, whether the back porch,
where you got the land breeze, and looked upon the orchards and the
flowers, or the front balcony, where you could drink the wind of the sea,
and look down the steep wall of the mountain and see the _Hall_ going by
once a week or so between Hookena and the hills of Pele, or the schooners
plying up the coast for wood and ava and bananas.

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.  If I
were to buy the bottle, and got no schooner after all, I should have put
my hand in the fire for nothing.  I gave you my word, I know; but yet I
think you would not grudge me one more proof.”

“I have sworn I would take no more favours,” said Keawe.  “I have gone
already deep enough.”

“This is no favour I am thinking of,” replied Lopaka.  “It is only to see
the imp himself.  There is nothing to be gained by that, and so nothing
to be ashamed of; and yet, if I once saw him, I should be sure of the
whole matter.  So indulge me so far, and let me see the imp; and, after
that, here is the money in my hand, and I will buy it.”

“There is only one thing I am afraid of,” said Keawe.  “The imp may be
very ugly to view; and if you once set eyes upon him you might be very
undesirous of the bottle.”

“I am a man of my word,” said Lopaka.  “And here is the money betwixt
us.”

“Very well,” replied Keawe.  “I have a curiosity myself.  So come, let us
have one look at you, Mr. Imp.”

Now as soon as that was said, the imp looked out of the bottle, and in
again, swift as a lizard; and there sat Keawe and Lopaka turned to stone.
The night had quite come, before either found a thought to say or voice
to say it with; and then Lopaka pushed the money over and took the
bottle.

“I am a man of my word,” said he, “and had need to be so, or I would not
touch this bottle with my foot.  Well, I shall get my schooner and a
dollar or two for my pocket; and then I will be rid of this devil as fast
as I can.  For to tell you the plain truth, the look of him has cast me
down.”

“Lopaka,” said Keawe, “do not you think any worse of me than you can
help; I know it is night, and the roads bad, and the pass by the tombs an
ill place to go by so late, but I declare since I have seen that little
face, I cannot eat or sleep or pray till it is gone from me.  I will give
you a lantern and a basket to put the bottle in, and any picture or fine
thing in all my house that takes your fancy;—and be gone at once, and go
sleep at Hookena with Nahinu.”

“Keawe,” said Lopaka, “many a man would take this ill; above all, when I
am doing you a turn so friendly, as to keep my word and buy the bottle;
and for that matter, the night and the dark, and the way by the tombs,
must be all tenfold more dangerous to a man with such a sin upon his
conscience, and such a bottle under his arm.  But for my part, I am so
extremely terrified myself, I have not the heart to blame you.  Here I go
then; and I pray God you may be happy in your house, and I fortunate with
my schooner, and both get to heaven in the end in spite of the devil and
his bottle.”

So Lopaka went down the mountain; and Keawe stood in his front balcony,
and listened to the clink of the horse’s shoes, and watched the lantern
go shining down the path, and along the cliff of caves where the old dead
are buried; and all the time he trembled and clasped his hands, and
prayed for his friend, and gave glory to God that he himself was escaped
out of that trouble.

But the next day came very brightly, and that new house of his was so
delightful to behold that he forgot his terrors.  One day followed
another, and Keawe dwelt there in perpetual joy.  He had his place on the
back porch; it was there he ate and lived, and read the stories in the
Honolulu newspapers; but when anyone came by they would go in and view
the chambers and the pictures.  And the fame of the house went far and
wide; it was called _Ka-Hale Nui_—the Great House—in all Kona; and
sometimes the Bright House, for Keawe kept a Chinaman, who was all day
dusting and furbishing; and the glass, and the gilt, and the fine stuffs,
and the pictures, shone as bright as the morning.  As for Keawe himself,
he could not walk in the chambers without singing, his heart was so
enlarged; and when ships sailed by upon the sea, he would fly his colours
on the mast.

So time went by, until one day Keawe went upon a visit as far as Kailua
to certain of his friends.  There he was well feasted; and left as soon
as he could the next morning, and rode hard, for he was impatient to
behold his beautiful house; and, besides, the night then coming on was
the night in which the dead of old days go abroad in the sides of Kona;
and having already meddled with the devil, he was the more chary of
meeting with the dead.  A little beyond Honaunau, looking far ahead, he
was aware of a woman bathing in the edge of the sea; and she seemed a
well-grown girl, but he thought no more of it.  Then he saw her white
shift flutter as she put it on, and then her red holoku; and by the time
he came abreast of her she was done with her toilet, and had come up from
the sea, and stood by the track-side in her red holoku, and she was all
freshened with the bath, and her eyes shone and were kind.  Now Keawe no
sooner beheld her than he drew rein.

“I thought I knew everyone in this country,” said he.  “How comes it that
I do not know you?”

“I am Kokua, daughter of Kiano,” said the girl, “and I have just returned
from Oahu.  Who are you?”

“I will tell you who I am in a little,” said Keawe, dismounting from his
horse, “but not now.  For I have a thought in my mind, and if you knew
who I was, you might have heard of me, and would not give me a true
answer.  But tell me, first of all, one thing: Are you married?”

At this Kokua laughed out aloud.  “It is you who ask questions,” she
said.  “Are you married yourself?”

“Indeed, Kokua, I am not,” replied Keawe, “and never thought to be until
this hour.  But here is the plain truth.  I have met you here at the
roadside, and I saw your eyes, which are like the stars, and my heart
went to you as swift as a bird.  And so now, if you want none of me, say
so, and I will go on to my own place; but if you think me no worse than
any other young man, say so, too, and I will turn aside to your father’s
for the night, and to-morrow I will talk with the good man.”

Kokua said never a word, but she looked at the sea and laughed.

“Kokua,” said Keawe, “if you say nothing, I will take that for the good
answer; so let us be stepping to your father’s door.”

She went on ahead of him, still without speech; only sometimes she
glanced back and glanced away again, and she kept the strings of her hat
in her mouth.

Now, when they had come to the door, Kiano came out on his verandah, and
cried out and welcomed Keawe by name.  At that the girl looked over, for
the fame of the great house had come to her ears; and, to be sure, it was
a great temptation.  All that evening they were very merry together; and
the girl was as bold as brass under the eyes of her parents, and made a
mock of Keawe, for she had a quick wit.  The next day he had a word with
Kiano, and found the girl alone.

“Kokua,” said he, “you made a mock of me all the evening; and it is still
time to bid me go.  I would not tell you who I was, because I have so
fine a house, and I feared you would think too much of that house and too
little of the man that loves you.  Now you know all, and if you wish to
have seen the last of me, say so at once.”

“No,” said Kokua; but this time she did not laugh, nor did Keawe ask for
more.

This was the wooing of Keawe; things had gone quickly; but so an arrow
goes, and the ball of a rifle swifter still, and yet both may strike the
target.  Things had gone fast, but they had gone far also, and the
thought of Keawe rang in the maiden’s head; she heard his voice in the
breach of the surf upon the lava, and for this young man that she had
seen but twice she would have left father and mother and her native
islands.  As for Keawe himself, his horse flew up the path of the
mountain under the cliff of tombs, and the sound of the hoofs, and the
sound of Keawe singing to himself for pleasure, echoed in the caverns of
the dead.  He came to the Bright House, and still he was singing.  He sat
and ate in the broad balcony, and the Chinaman wondered at his master, to
hear how he sang between the mouthfuls.  The sun went down into the sea,
and the night came; and Keawe walked the balconies by lamplight, high on
the mountains, and the voice of his singing startled men on ships.

“Here am I now upon my high place,” he said to himself.  “Life may be no
better; this is the mountain top; and all shelves about me toward the
worse.  For the first time I will light up the chambers, and bathe in my
fine bath with the hot water and the cold, and sleep alone in the bed of
my bridal chamber.”

So the Chinaman had word, and he must rise from sleep and light the
furnaces; and as he wrought below, beside the boilers, he heard his
master singing and rejoicing above him in the lighted chambers.  When the
water began to be hot the Chinaman cried to his master; and Keawe went
into the bathroom; and the Chinaman heard him sing as he filled the
marble basin; and heard him sing, and the singing broken, as he
undressed; until of a sudden, the song ceased.  The Chinaman listened,
and listened; he called up the house to Keawe to ask if all were well,
and Keawe answered him “Yes,” and bade him go to bed; but there was no
more singing in the Bright House; and all night long, the Chinaman heard
his master’s feet go round and round the balconies without repose.

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. {5}

Now, it is a sad thing for any man to fall into this sickness.  And it
would be a sad thing for anyone to leave a house so beautiful and so
commodious, and depart from all his friends to the north coast of Molokai
between the mighty cliff and the sea-breakers.  But what was that to the
case of the man Keawe, he who had met his love but yesterday, and won her
but that morning, and now saw all his hopes break, in a moment, like a
piece of glass?

Awhile he sat upon the edge of the bath; then sprang, with a cry, and ran
outside; and to and 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 shed before the store they sat and jested and passed the
news; but there was no matter of speech in Keawe’s bosom, and he sat in
their midst and looked without on the rain falling on the houses, and the
surf beating among the rocks, and the sighs arose in his throat.

“Keawe of the Bright House is out of spirits,” said one to another.
Indeed, and so he was, and little wonder.

Then the _Hall_ came, and the whaleboat carried him on board.  The
after-part of the ship was full of Haoles {6} who had been to visit the
volcano, as their custom is; and the midst was crowded with Kanakas, and
the forepart with wild bulls from Hilo and horses from Kau; but Keawe sat
apart from all in his sorrow, and watched for the house of Kiano.  There
it sat, low upon the shore in the black rocks, and shaded by the cocoa
palms, and there by the door was a red holoku, no greater than a fly, and
going to and fro with a fly’s busyness.  “Ah, queen of my heart,” he
cried, “I’ll venture my dear soul to win you!”

Soon after, darkness fell, and the cabins were lit up, and the Haoles sat
and played at the cards and drank whiskey as their custom is; but Keawe
walked the deck all night; and all the next day, as they steamed under
the lee of Maui or of Molokai, he was still pacing to and fro like a wild
animal in a menagerie.

Towards evening they passed Diamond Head, and came to the pier of
Honolulu.  Keawe stepped out among the crowd and began to ask for Lopaka.
It seemed he had become the owner of a schooner—none better in the
islands—and was gone upon an adventure as far as Pola-Pola or Kahiki; so
there was no help to be looked for from Lopaka.  Keawe called to mind a
friend of his, a lawyer in the town (I must not tell his name), and
inquired of him.  They said he was grown suddenly rich, and had a fine
new house upon Waikiki shore; and this put a thought in Keawe’s head, and
he called a hack and drove to the lawyer’s house.

The house was all brand new, and the trees in the garden no greater than
walking-sticks, and the lawyer, when he came, had the air of a man well
pleased.

“What can I do to serve you?” said the lawyer.

“You are a friend of Lopaka’s,” replied Keawe, “and Lopaka purchased from
me a certain piece of goods that I thought you might enable me to trace.”

The lawyer’s face became very dark.  “I do not profess to misunderstand
you, Mr. Keawe,” said he, “though this is an ugly business to be stirring
in.  You may be sure I know nothing, but yet I have a guess, and if you
would apply in a certain quarter I think you might have news.”

And he named the name of a man, which, again, I had better not repeat.
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.  “These new clothes and
carriages are all the gifts of the little imp, and these glad faces are
the faces of men who have taken their profit and got rid of the accursed
thing in safety.  When I see pale cheeks and hear sighing, I shall know
that I am near the bottle.”

So it befell at last that he was recommended to a Haole in Beritania
Street.  When he came to the door, about the hour of the evening meal,
there were the usual marks of the new house, and the young garden, and
the electric light shining in the windows; but when the owner came, a
shock of hope and fear ran through Keawe; for here was a young man, white
as a corpse, and black about the eyes, the hair shedding from his head,
and such a look in his countenance as a man may have when he is waiting
for the gallows.

“Here it is, to be sure,” thought Keawe, and so with this man he noways
veiled his errand.  “I am come to buy the bottle,” said he.

At the word, the young Haole of Beritania Street reeled against the wall.

“The bottle!” he gasped.  “To buy the bottle!”  Then he seemed to choke,
and seizing Keawe by the arm carried him into a room and poured out wine
in two glasses.

“Here is my respects,” said Keawe, who had been much about with Haoles in
his time.  “Yes,” he added, “I am come to buy the bottle.  What is the
price by now?”

At that word the young man let his glass slip through his fingers, and
looked upon Keawe like a ghost.

“The price,” says he; “the price!  You do not know the price?”

“It is for that I am asking you,” returned Keawe.  “But why are you so
much concerned?  Is there anything wrong about the price?”

“It has dropped a great deal in value since your time, Mr. Keawe,” said
the young man stammering.

“Well, well, I shall have the less to pay for it,” says Keawe.  “How much
did it cost you?”

The young man was as white as a sheet.  “Two cents,” said he.

“What?” cried Keawe, “two cents?  Why, then, you can only sell it for
one.  And he who buys it—”  The words died upon Keawe’s tongue; he who
bought it could never sell it again, the bottle and the bottle imp must
abide with him until he died, and when he died must carry him to the red
end of hell.

The young man of Beritania Street fell upon his knees.  “For God’s sake
buy it!” he cried.  “You can have all my fortune in the bargain.  I was
mad when I bought it at that price.  I had embezzled money at my store; I
was lost else; I must have gone to jail.”

“Poor creature,” said Keawe, “you would risk your soul upon so desperate
an adventure, and to avoid the proper punishment of your own disgrace;
and you think I could hesitate with love in front of me.  Give me the
bottle, and the change which I make sure you have all ready.  Here is a
five-cent piece.”

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.  And here was the strange
thing: he had no sooner seen this miracle, than his mind was changed
within him, and he cared naught for the Chinese Evil, and little enough
for Kokua; and had but the one thought, that here he was bound to the
bottle imp for time and for eternity, and had no better hope but to be a
cinder for ever in the flames of hell.  Away ahead of him he saw them
blaze with his mind’s eye, and his soul shrank, and darkness fell upon
the light.

When Keawe came to himself a little, he was aware it was the night when
the band played at the hotel.  Thither he went, because he feared to be
alone; and there, among happy faces, walked to and fro, and heard the
tunes go up and down, and saw Berger beat the measure, and all the while
he heard the flames crackle, and saw the red fire burning in the
bottomless pit.  Of a sudden the band played _Hiki-ao-ao_; that was a
song that he had sung with Kokua, and at the strain courage returned to
him.

“It is done now,” he thought, “and once more let me take the good along
with the evil.”

So it befell that he returned to Hawaii by the first steamer, and as soon
as it could be managed he was wedded to Kokua, and carried her up the
mountain side to the Bright House.

Now it was so with these two, that when they were together, Keawe’s heart
was stilled; but so soon as he was alone he fell into a brooding horror,
and heard the flames crackle, and saw the red fire burn in the bottomless
pit.  The girl, indeed, had come to him wholly; her heart leapt in her
side at sight of him, her hand clung to his; and she was so fashioned
from the hair upon her head to the nails upon her toes that none could
see her without joy.  She was pleasant in her nature.  She had the good
word always.  Full of song she was, and went to and fro in the Bright
House, the brightest thing in its three storeys, carolling like the
birds.  And Keawe beheld and heard her with delight, and then must shrink
upon one side, and weep and groan to think upon the price that he had
paid for her; and then he must dry his eyes, and wash his face, and go
and sit with her on the broad balconies, joining in her songs, and, with
a sick spirit, answering her smiles.

There came a day when her feet began to be heavy and her songs more rare;
and now it was not Keawe only that would weep apart, but each would
sunder from the other and sit in opposite balconies with the whole width
of the Bright House betwixt.  Keawe was so sunk in his despair, he scarce
observed the change, and was only glad he had more hours to sit alone and
brood upon his destiny, and was not so frequently condemned to pull a
smiling face on a sick heart.  But one day, coming softly through the
house, he heard the sound of a child sobbing, and there was Kokua rolling
her face upon the balcony floor, and weeping like the lost.

“You do well to weep in this house, Kokua,” he said.  “And yet I would
give the head off my body that you (at least) might have been happy.”

“Happy!” she cried.  “Keawe, when you lived alone in your Bright House,
you were the word of the island for a happy man; laughter and song were
in your mouth, and your face was as bright as the sunrise.  Then you
wedded poor Kokua; and the good God knows what is amiss in her—but from
that day you have not smiled.  Oh!” she cried, “what ails me?  I thought
I was pretty, and I knew I loved him.  What ails me that I throw this
cloud upon my husband?”

“Poor Kokua,” said Keawe.  He sat down by her side, and sought to take
her hand; but that she plucked away.  “Poor Kokua,” he said, again.  “My
poor child—my pretty.  And I had thought all this while to spare you!
Well, you shall know all.  Then, at least, you will pity poor Keawe; then
you will understand how much he loved you in the past—that he dared hell
for your possession—and how much he loves you still (the poor condemned
one), that he can yet call up a smile when he beholds you.”

With that, he told her all, even from the beginning.

“You have done this for me?” she cried “Ah, well, then what do I
care!”—and she clasped and wept upon him.

“Ah, child!” said Keawe, “and yet, when I consider of the fire of hell, I
care a good deal!”

“Never tell me,” said she; “no man can be lost because he loved Kokua,
and no other fault.  I tell you, Keawe, I shall save you with these
hands, or perish in your company.  What! you loved me, and gave your
soul, and you think I will not die to save you in return?”

“Ah, my dear! you might die a hundred times, and what difference would
that make?” he cried, “except to leave me lonely till the time comes of
my damnation?”

“You know nothing,” said she.  “I was educated in a school in Honolulu; I
am no common girl.  And I tell you, I shall save my lover.  What is this
you say about a cent?  But all the world is not American.  In England
they have a piece they call a farthing, which is about half a cent.  Ah!
sorrow!” she cried, “that makes it scarcely better, for the buyer must be
lost, and we shall find none so brave as my Keawe!  But, then, there is
France; they have a small coin there which they call a centime, and these
go five to the cent or there-about.  We could not do better.  Come,
Keawe, let us go to the French islands; let us go to Tahiti, as fast as
ships can bear us.  There we have four centimes, three centimes, two
centimes, one centime; four possible sales to come and go on; and two of
us to push the bargain.  Come, my Keawe! kiss me, and banish care.  Kokua
will defend you.”

“Gift of God!” he cried.  “I cannot think that God will punish me for
desiring aught so good!  Be it as you will, then; take me where you
please: I put my life and my salvation in your hands.”

Early the next day Kokua was about her preparations.  She took Keawe’s
chest that he went with sailoring; and first she put the bottle in a
corner; and then packed it with the richest of their clothes and the
bravest of the knick-knacks in the house.  “For,” said she, “we must seem
to be rich folks, or who will believe in the bottle?”  All the time of
her preparation she was as gay as a bird; only when she looked upon
Keawe, the tears would spring in her eye, and she must run and kiss him.
As for Keawe, a weight was off his soul; now that he had his secret
shared, and some hope in front of him, he seemed like a new man, his feet
went lightly on the earth, and his breath was good to him again.  Yet was
terror still at his elbow; and ever and again, as the wind blows out a
taper, hope died in him, and he saw the flames toss and the red fire burn
in hell.

It was given out in the country they were gone pleasuring to the States,
which was thought a strange thing, and yet not so strange as the truth,
if any could have guessed it.  So they went to Honolulu in the _Hall_,
and thence in the _Umatilla_ to San Francisco with a crowd of Haoles, and
at San Francisco took their passage by the mail brigantine, the _Tropic
Bird_, for Papeete, the chief place of the French in the south islands.
Thither they came, after a pleasant voyage, on a fair day of the Trade
Wind, and saw the reef with the surf breaking, and Motuiti with its
palms, and the schooner riding within-side, and the white houses of the
town low down along the shore among green trees, and overhead the
mountains and the clouds of Tahiti, the wise island.

It was judged the most wise to hire a house, which they did accordingly,
opposite the British Consul’s, to make a great parade of money, and
themselves conspicuous with carriages and horses.  This it was very easy
to do, so long as they had the bottle in their possession; for Kokua was
more bold than Keawe, and, whenever she had a mind, called on the imp for
twenty or a hundred dollars.  At this rate they soon grew to be remarked
in the town; and the strangers from Hawaii, their riding and their
driving, the fine holokus and the rich lace of Kokua, became the matter
of much talk.

They got on well after the first with the Tahitian language, which is
indeed like to the Hawaiian, with a change of certain letters; and as
soon as they had any freedom of speech, began to push the bottle.  You
are to consider it was not an easy subject to introduce; it was not easy
to persuade people you were in earnest, when you offered to sell them for
four centimes the spring of health and riches inexhaustible.  It was
necessary besides to explain the dangers of the bottle; and either people
disbelieved the whole thing and laughed, or they thought the more of the
darker part, became overcast with gravity, and drew away from Keawe and
Kokua, as from persons who had dealings with the devil.  So far from
gaining ground, these two began to find they were avoided in the town;
the children ran away from them screaming, a thing intolerable to Kokua;
Catholics crossed themselves as they went by; and all persons began with
one accord to disengage themselves from their advances.

Depression fell upon their spirits.  They would sit at night in their new
house, after a day’s weariness, and not exchange one word, or the silence
would be broken by Kokua bursting suddenly into sobs.  Sometimes they
would pray together; sometimes they would have the bottle out upon the
floor, and sit all evening watching how the shadow hovered in the midst.
At such times they would be afraid to go to rest.  It was long ere
slumber came to them, and, if either dozed off, it would be to wake and
find the other silently weeping in the dark, or, perhaps, to wake alone,
the other having fled from the house and the neighbourhood of that
bottle, to pace under the bananas in the little garden, or to wander on
the beach by moonlight.

One night it was so when Kokua awoke.  Keawe was gone.  She felt in the
bed and his place was cold.  Then fear fell upon her, and she sat up in
bed.  A little moonshine filtered through the shutters.  The room was
bright, and she could spy the bottle on the floor.  Outside it blew high,
the great trees of the avenue cried aloud, and the fallen leaves rattled
in the verandah.  In the midst of this Kokua was aware of another sound;
whether of a beast or of a man she could scarce tell, but it was as sad
as death, and cut her to the soul.  Softly she arose, set the door ajar,
and looked forth into the moonlit yard.  There, under the bananas, lay
Keawe, his mouth in the dust, and as he lay he moaned.

It was Kokua’s first thought to run forward and console him; her second
potently withheld her.  Keawe had borne himself before his wife like a
brave man; it became her little in the hour of weakness to intrude upon
his shame.  With the thought she drew back into the house.

“Heaven!” she thought, “how careless have I been—how weak!  It is he, not
I, that stands in this eternal peril; it was he, not I, that took the
curse upon his soul.  It is for my sake, and for the love of a creature
of so little worth and such poor help, that he now beholds so close to
him the flames of hell—ay, and smells the smoke of it, lying without
there in the wind and moonlight.  Am I so dull of spirit that never till
now I have surmised my duty, or have I seen it before and turned aside?
But now, at least, I take up my soul in both the hands of my affection;
now I say farewell to the white steps of heaven and the waiting faces of
my friends.  A love for a love, and let mine be equalled with Keawe’s!  A
soul for a soul, and be it mine to perish!”

She was a deft woman with her hands, and was soon apparelled.  She took
in her hands the change—the precious centimes they kept ever at their
side; for this coin is little used, and they had made provision at a
Government office.  When she was forth in the avenue clouds came on the
wind, and the moon was blackened.  The town slept, and she knew not
whither to turn till she heard one coughing in the shadow of the trees.

“Old man,” said Kokua, “what do you here abroad in the cold night?”

The old man could scarce express himself for coughing, but she made out
that he was old and poor, and a stranger in the island.

“Will you do me a service?” said Kokua.  “As one stranger to another, and
as an old man to a young woman, will you help a daughter of Hawaii?”

“Ah,” said the old man.  “So you are the witch from the eight islands,
and even my old soul you seek to entangle.  But I have heard of you, and
defy your wickedness.”

“Sit down here,” said Kokua, “and let me tell you a tale.”  And she told
him the story of Keawe from the beginning to the end.

“And now,” said she, “I am his wife, whom he bought with his soul’s
welfare.  And what should I do?  If I went to him myself and offered to
buy it, he would refuse.  But if you go, he will sell it eagerly; I will
await you here; you will buy it for four centimes, and I will buy it
again for three.  And the Lord strengthen a poor girl!”

“If you meant falsely,” said the old man, “I think God would strike you
dead.”

“He would!” cried Kokua.  “Be sure he would.  I could not be so
treacherous—God would not suffer it.”

“Give me the four centimes and await me here,” said the old man.

Now, when Kokua stood alone in the street, her spirit died.  The wind
roared in the trees, and it seemed to her the rushing of the flames of
hell; the shadows tossed in the light of the street lamp, and they seemed
to her the snatching hands of evil ones.  If she had had the strength,
she must have run away, and if she had had the breath she must have
screamed aloud; but, in truth, she could do neither, and stood and
trembled in the avenue, like an affrighted child.

Then she saw the old man returning, and he had the bottle in his hand.

“I have done your bidding,” said he.  “I left your husband weeping like a
child; to-night he will sleep easy.”  And he held the bottle forth.

“Before you give it me,” Kokua panted, “take the good with the evil—ask
to be delivered from your cough.”

“I am an old man,” replied the other, “and too near the gate of the grave
to take a favour from the devil.  But what is this?  Why do you not take
the bottle?  Do you hesitate?”

“Not hesitate!” cried Kokua.  “I am only weak.  Give me a moment.  It is
my hand resists, my flesh shrinks back from the accursed thing.  One
moment only!”

The old man looked upon Kokua kindly.  “Poor child!” said he, “you fear;
your soul misgives you.  Well, let me keep it.  I am old, and can never
more be happy in this world, and as for the next—”

“Give it me!” gasped Kokua.  “There is your money.  Do you think I am so
base as that?  Give me the bottle.”

“God bless you, child,” said the old man.

Kokua concealed the bottle under her holoku, said farewell to the old
man, and walked off along the avenue, she cared not whither.  For all
roads were now the same to her, and led equally to hell.  Sometimes she
walked, and sometimes ran; sometimes she screamed out loud in the night,
and sometimes lay by the wayside in the dust and wept.  All that she had
heard of hell came back to her; she saw the flames blaze, and she smelt
the smoke, and her flesh withered on the coals.