Kaiuolani

Back in the mountains or out upon the plains the same spirit (if opposite in form), that under-lay America’s advancement urged a simpler minded, deeper wrought people to gather and organize in defence of an equally inborn prerogative. Hawaiians of old had looked traditionally and knowingly upon Kileaua, and in the thundering, blazing elements discerned the voice and will of Kamehameha.

Answer, they must. And whether confronted by the lone machinations of individual schemers or threatened with annihilation underneath the juggernaut of advancing empire, mattered not; content once roused knows neither fear nor limit. Heeds less, Christianity.

Kaiuolani sought protection at home; there she believed her father, a citizen and patriot, supreme.

In this however, it was as soon discovered that she had reckoned, in one particular, at least, without her host. Sir Charles had already been influenced by Elmsford; who, conceiving the notion of fathering an Utopia of his own, found it quite convenient, upon Uhlrix’s withdrawal and the shifting of fleets, to form a satisfactory coalition with the hard-pressed Cole and his ever-urgent missionaries. Castle Banyan had become their fortress; sheltering alike the disgruntled and the ambitious: having thus inadvertently trapped herself, the princess for once invoked a deliberate, if confusing expedient.

“I shall not surrender, neither disobey; but, mind you, it is a false judgment that holds not until verified,” said she, in answer to her father’s impatient provisioning.

“Silence, Kaiuolani. Do you forget the place?” replied Sir Charles, sternly.

“The castle is yours, I believe, under existing conditions. Pardon me.”

“Elmsford, come here,” continued she, addressing the artist manager, who attended cautiously, in a conveniently nearby room.

“Yes, Kaiuolani.”

“Remove me from this place.”

“Yes, Kaiuolani.”

They were not long in reaching Diamond Head; Elmsford was in her power, and there she set up housekeeping as prisoner in a way as convincing to him that she knew her place as it was provocative elsewhere of the belief that she held in her hand effectively and irredeemably the destinies of them all.

“Go publish the news, broadcast,” demanded she of Elmsford, her slave, before Sir Charles had fairly recovered the shock.

“What news, Kaiuolani?” asked he, meekly.

“That you hold me hostage. I shall have done with this tangle, in a jiffy.”

“And then?”

“I’ll make no promises.”

“By jove, I like you the more, for that. And, don’t forget, Elmsford is no ‘peach.’”

“Hist! No slang, if you would serve me.”

“Yes, Kaiuolani.”

Norton published the notice, on the morrow, in the Ware Wizzard Wise, under double blocked, full page headlines, and Wayntro, her employer, in anticipation of consequences, took Elmsford’s little messenger thence unto himself as wife. Uena-O-Zan had served again her mistress, whom the flag of England once more saved from molestation.

The news spreading like wildfire, drove consternation into the hearts of all Hawaii; as expected and planned by Kaiuolani. Cole and his element believed themselves tricked into a British coup by none other than Elmsford; Young, with better reason, conjectured it a scheme, of Bender’s, to wreak his downfall and, in consequence, sought to heal the breach with Cole: conceding the latter all administrative functions, he reserving only supreme command of the army; the natives fired with determination, and flocked to the support of Bender; who, by this time, had implanted himself firmly as their true god and rightful deliverer.

Having successfully connived the evasion of Young and imprisonment, upon landing at Honolulu, a short time hence, the old spirit seized upon the ranger culprit and carried him well back into the reach of an alluring past.

He had had his try with conventional freedom, the tribulations of bolstered supremacy, and would thence hearken the voice of nature’s own being; let the red blood coursing its way alone speak for glories attained; go down into the wild and rise again by deeds more valorous: Ihoas listened, and together they hastened with importuning a deadlier endeavor.

“Would you sit here and see our nativity swept into the seas?” asked Ihoas, of her father, Prince Kenlikola, in the presence of Bender, who had accompanied her thither, to Kauai, in the hope of planning some reasonable support, elsewhere than within his own imagination.

That these people were slow to comprehend a danger and loath to exert themselves in defense even of an inborn right, Bender well knew; but he also understood the secret of their complacency. Only touch the wellsprings of patriotism and content were a thing as quickly forgotten, the religion of a bygone should burst out again in perfect frenzy, while for their leaders and their gods they would stand ready to fall at the stake.

The prince started at the import of his daughter’s plea, and recalling a former conflab with Bender pondered well the situation. The warmth and heaviness of a tropical environment belied the energies so mildly rising to mind. Here no intrigue had penetrated; satisfaction and plenty reigned everywhere; the very heavens proclaimed peace, invited their enjoyment:

“Why encourage hardship?” asked he, half-weirdly conscious.

“The gods, father. Do you forget—our ancestors?”

Kenlikola looked from one to the other of his auditors. There appeared no likeness between Bender and those he had pictured in the galleries of an indefinite past—yet there grew and throve a liking; others of the court supporters, less removed by consanguinity, had done more to disturb the slumberings of old Kamehameha. The air grew hot and stifling. Ihoas came close. Kileaua flashed the hidden fire, and Kenlikola bounded up a living torch:

“To war, men; the gods do lead!”

Thence there was no halting. Men that hitherto had shunned the bare thought of conflict now sought martyrdom in the ranks. Kenlikola led them, in the North, slowly but determinedly toward Diamond Head, the agreed field and rendezvous, while Bender hastened into the South.

Here the whole populace stood in awe; not that they feared or regarded Honolulu,—the fate or stress of government seldom touched even lightly these faraway, unchanged believers,—but the wonderful forces unbosomed within Kileaua itself portended a returning of the Messiah.

Bender knew them, and proclaimed:

“I am come to save you.”

They gathered round him, kneeling and wailing in fervent supplication.

The pressure remained heavy, and all about them the lavas crawled and crumbled toward the seas. No man’s footing held against the awful insecurity there experienced, and a demon lurked in every crystal formed or pool that congealed, reflecting the crater whence it poured out.

Hard pressed and unrelieved, the natives became alarmed and grew more insistent. Some of Bender’s own men began to doubt. Their eyes enlarged, and they made bold to ask:

“When shall the white man make peace with Kileaua?”

Ihoas heard them, and marvelled the outcome.

Shut within the deepest and darkest confines of the sacred old nearby temple, Kaile, she welcomed a newly found idol and willed him place. Her own father had sent her thither, as an inspiration and a help: Bender fell a victim to the wiles that won him recognition, and when pressed without he too entered the sacred chamber and there adjured liberties that heed neither gods nor destruction.

Here no restraint hindered his own free will and called-up fancy. The walls were thick, and rites as supreme as ancient barred every door. Hoary priests babbled strange melodies or admonished remembrances not of earth; and angels hovering in the mists or crowding fain comprehension quickened the sense and dulled dispute.

The fathers had taught well Ihoas a lesson, and tradition denied her disobedience.

“Fate sent you to me, Ihoas—an inspiration, a fitting rebuke. Let the world rumble on; I am content; Ihoas is sanctified.”

She had placed her trust,—it seemed so very like her,—and all nature at once responded to the parched and withered desires of restricted womanhood. The beauties of creation unfolded within the discarded bounds of an imagined halo—the gods willed it, and Ihoas lived, foretasted heaven.

Outside, a whole populace begged deliverance, and the slumbering princess at last awakened.

Bender bowed submissively before her; the fires had burned low and there appeared no means of escape.

“Save me,” cried he, “save me.”

Ihoas looked the would-be traducer straightway in the face. He had set himself over woman and defied man. Questioned the superiority of wisdom, and sought to make of procreation a convenient plaything. Why such inconsistency? The tenets of her belief made answer; the princess had not yet learned to deny herself the saving privilege of worldly sacrifice.

Then word came of Kaiuolani. Had a like temptation befallen their revered one? If so, her God might with remission cleanse the heart accordingly: Ihoas’s revealed no way so easy, or—uncertain. For grace there must be some atonement.

All around them men and women fell prostrate, imploring the gods to release Kaiuolani.

“Save her, Ihoas, save her,” cried they, with one accord.

Bender had become an outcast; none heeded longer his presence. Their princess sat with downcast look. Had she, too, misjudged him? fallen a victim to the woes of misplaced confidence? Her heart grew with heaviness, as did the atmosphere she breathed. All the elements of nature seemed battling against darkness. There must be some vent, an escaping of pent up forces. Light awaited surely an awakening of the spirit world. Should atonement of individual sin relieve universal doubt? save the world from awful catastrophe? The angels betokened finite gladness. Everybody seemed turning toward her; conformity predetermined the fate of Ihoas.

Sitting there, shut in and alone,—her enticer had long ago retired,—the glories of eternity unfolded certainly and pleasantly within the thought wafted over by a thousand, thousand years of unbroken, loyal condescension.

Were divinity asking too much?

Not as Ihoas saw. It seemed a pleasure to appease wrath: serve humankind. And the grandeur of passing! The beauties of purification! The joy of nothingness!

“My God, I am saved; there is a way; I know it now—Pele, Kamehameha, Kileaua!”

The slumbering, grumbling, grinding earth lay inert and restless at her feet. Ihoas looked out at the jagged, ragged cone just above. A dull red under-glowed and paled against the black blue clouds hanging heavily over the gaping crater, now yawning and persuading within a finger’s reach. Only a drop, and the troubled elements had electrified the earth and cleared the skies.

Ihoas breathed more freely, and no sound escaped her lips or thing of any kind hindered her fleetness of foot: presently the forging heights were scaled, without disturbing anyone or apprising them of her intention, and she stood complacently at the brink.

Far down beneath her, perhaps a thousand feet or more, spread the molten seas, whence danced and fretted little green and yellow wavelets amid gusts of purplish, grayish cloudlets tumbling and vanishing into space. Never had another sight seemed so placid or inviting; and now that consciousness had fairly dawned everything appeared to move or tend toward the center, where a pool of many colors rimmed up and swirled down round endless hollows.

“How sweet to contemplate!” cried she, tiptoeing and balancing at the highest pinnacle around.

It seemed as if she must soar away, and there came to her a winged fairy, wearing at the brow a wreath of coral, who carried in one hand a twig of olive.

“Come,” said he, taking her hand in his, thence leading the way toward such happiness as Ihoas had not yet anticipated.

Only a flit, and the princess, too, had swept into the awful vacuum. In the twinkling of an eye its thirsty elements gulped down the tiny offering, and spitting forth a mighty wave, purging the heart and clarifying the atmosphere, wrought a living, self-explained transformation.

The liquid light shot high up, rending the clouds, precipitating a calm: against the glowing heavens there stood revealed a face. Ihoas smiled back upon a startled world: men with gray and women past usefulness, both the young and beautiful arose from their knees and putting darkness behind them worshipped thence the goddess they beheld. Ihoas had risen, unveiling truth again.

There remained, among them all, only one whose withered conscience and blind philosophy betokened some scientific explanation or begged an unearned forgiveness. Bender skulked off, toward Diamond Head, alone and unreclaimed; though time awaited only the paltry accident of a more rational happening to wreak a lesser change.

American expansion bore hard and fast upon Hawaii’s fate.