Hawaii - James Michener [326]
"Apikela," his wife replied, and darted out to haul the Hawaiian maile-gatherer into the forest. The big woman looked at the leper's sad condition and tears came into her eyes. Handing Nyuk Tsin the bundle of food, she gathered the scrawny Chinese to her capacious bosom and whispered, "We will take care of you."
For nearly a month Apikela and her slothful husband Kimo sequestered the Chinese, sharing with them their meager supplies of food. Because there were now four to feed, Apikela had to go each day into the forest to gather maile, which her husband prepared for market by skillfully slitting the bark, cutting out the pithy core, and leaving a fragrant supple vine that could be woven into leis. Periodically he lugged the maile into Honolulu, peddling it among the flower merchants. With the money thus gained he would shoot a few games of pool, buy some breadfruit, a little pork and some rice. Since Hawaiians rarely ate rice, this purchase occasioned comment, which Kimo rebuffed by observing, "I'm switching to rice so I'll be smart, like a Pake."
Once when big, lazy Kimo ambled home with rice, Nyuk Tsin bit her lip and asked, "Why do you do this for us, Kimo?" And Apikela interrupted, saying, "When we were children going to the church we were often told of how Jesus loved the lepers, and it was a test of all good men how they treated those who were sick. And no leper ever came to Jesus without receiving aid, and no leper will come to the house of Kimo and Apikela to be turned away."
"How much longer can we hide here?" Nyuk Tsin asked.
"Until the man dies," Apikela said resolutely.
And they lived like this for another week, and then a spy in the Honolulu store put two and two together, reasoning: "Kimo never before sold such amounts of maile. And he never bought rice, either. It is Kimo who is hiding the mai Pake Chinese!" And this man hurried to the police and told them, "I am certain that Kimo and Apikela, in the clearing up toward the Pali, are hiding the mai Pake." So the spy got a good reward for his ability to think cleverly, and that afternoon the police crept in upon the clearing. When they charged out, Nyuk Tsin grabbed a frail stick and tried desperately to fight them off, and big Apikela tried to wrestle with them, and Kimo shouted, "Who was the evil man who betrayed us?" But weak and shivering Mun Ki walked out of the little near-collapsing grass shack and gave himself up. The police were so pleased with having taken the fugitives that they started immediately to hustle them away, but Nyuk Tsin cried in Hawaiian, "Let us at least thank these good people," but she was not allowed this courtesy, and as she was dragged down the path and onto the highway she looked back and saw the two enormous Hawaiians weeping as their friends were hauled into final custody.
When Dr. Whipple heard that his Chinese servants had been captured, he hurried to the leper station, where the afflicted were assembled for shipment to their outcast island, and sought out Nyuk Tsin and her husband. "I wish you had escaped," he told them in Hawaiian. "I am sorry to see you here."
"Have you taken the children to their homes?" Nyuk Tsin asked.
"Are you determined to be a kokua?" Whipple countered.
"Yes."
"You're free to leave here, if you wish. Until the boat sails." He drove her to his home and showed her the four children, fat and happy in American clothes. She started to laugh and said, "They don't look like Chinese." She gathered them up and said that she would walk with them to their new homes, but Dr. Whipple piled them into his carriage, and they started forth on their unpleasant mission. At the first house, a Punti's, she delivered a son and said, "Bring him up to be a good man." The Punti replied, "It will be difficult, but we'll try."
At the second house, a Hakka's, she said, "Teach him to speak all the languages," and the Hakka grudgingly took the child. At the third, another Punti's, she begged: "Bring him up to honor his father." And at the last house, another Hakka's, she warned again: "Teach him to speak all the languages."