Hawaii - James Michener [219]
He wondered if Murphy had revived the hula in his grog shop, but when he crept past the saloon it was orderly. He then went to the pier, suspecting that whalers might have conspired with Kelolo in organizing a debauch, but the ships were silent in the ghostly moonlight.
And then, as he stood at the far end of the pier, staring at the ships, he happened to see out of the corner of his eye a flickering light along the shore some distance to the south. He dismissed it with the thought: "A night fisherman with his torch on the reef," but it did not move as a fisherman's should, and he muttered, "That's not one torch. It's several." And with this he remembered the new grass house at Malama's, and he recalled the kahunas, and like a fish drawn to the torches, he limped off the pier and started walking along the edge of the coral reef, past the fort, past the great alii homes and out toward Malama's, and as he walked silently through the sand, the torches grew brighter and it became obvious that a considerable celebration was in progress, one at which he was not welcome. He therefore moved stealthily, slipping from one coconut palm to the next until at last he came upon a hidden spot from which he could spy upon the palace grounds, and the first thing he saw was a concentration of guards at the gate that led from the public road into the compound, and he thought with satisfaction: "Those guards are there to keep me out. What evil are my people up to?"
He had not long to wait for from a crowd of men who had been feasting on roast pig, Kelolo stepped forth in brilliant yellow robes, accompanied by six kahunas in feathered capes. Kelolo dropped his hand, and from an area near the beach a night drum began to sound, and then another, and finally a high-pitched variant which established a throbbing, disciplined rhythm. Suddenly, from the crowd, six women whom Abner had seen in the house singing hymns moved forth, naked to the waist and with red flowers in their hair, necklaces of polished black nuts about their shoulders and anklets of shark's teeth which clicked as they began an ancient hula.
Abner, who had often railed against this dance, had never seen it, and now as the swaying skirts made of ti leaves moved in the faltering shadows, he noticed how solemn and graceful the dance was, for the women seemed to be disembodied spirits, undulating in response to night winds: a movement would start in their heads, work its way along their supple arms, and pass to their hips in one unbroken symphony of motion. "This isn't what I expected," Abner muttered. "I understood that naked men and women . . ." But his fleeting concession was interrupted by what now took place, for he stood appalled as a chanter leaped before the dancers and began to cry mournfully, yet in exultation:
"Great Kane, guardian of the heavens, Great Kane, guardian of the night, King of the gods, ruler of all men, Kane, Kane, Kane! Attend our ceremony, bless our shore!"
And as Abner stared in -disbelief, from the new grass house Kelolo appeared, bearing in his reverent hands the ancient stone of Kane. It should have been long since destroyed, but it had survived through Kelolo's love, and now he placed it upon the low stone altar near the shore. When it was in position he shouted, "Great Kane, your people welcome you home!” Over the crowd a deep silence settled as each Hawaiian filed past Kelolo to deck the altar with flowers, and when this was done the kahunas chanted. Then at a signal from Kelolo the drums hammered out a new and wilder rhythm; the hula dancers swayed more joyously; and the people of Lahaina welcomed back their ancient god.
In spite of Abner's hundred sermons and two hundred hymns about destroying heathen idols, this stone was the first he had seen, and he stared at it with unholy fascination, for the curious combination of reverence and ecstasy it inspired in these worshipers bespoke its real force, and through it the little missionary comprehended