Hawaii - James Michener [328]
"Auwe, auwe!” howled women whose husbands were being dragged away.
"Farewell, my son!" an old man shouted, his face bathed in tears.
"We shall meet in heaven, by the cool waters!" wept a sister whose brother was being shoved onto the ugly ship, this unimpressive ferry to hell.
"Auwe, auwe!" mourned the multitude of watchers as they watched the stricken ones slowly climb the gangplank, overcome by terror and shaking.
In a sense, the lamentation of those on shore was traditional and formalized; but the sounds that now emitted from the decks of the Kilauea were not, for the hopeless lepers lined the railings of the ship and cried back their piteous farewells. Condemned women waved with hands that bore no fingers. Men cried good-bye from faces that had no recognizable features. Some of the lepers were too far progressed in the disease to be able to stand by themselves, and they wailed without purpose, adding their cries to the general lament.
But occasionally, among the forty victims, one would appear whose countenance or character aroused in all an instinctive outburst of sorrow. The first such harrowing case was that of a bright little girl about ten years old who had left the pier with not a member of her family present to bid her farewell. On her face beginning sores were visible as she hurried up the gangplank, and it was obvious to all that she would soon be completely ravaged by the disease, but in wonder and confusion she stepped onto the gently swaying deck of the Kilauea, not able to comprehend the awful step she was taking.
Out of compassion an older woman, also condemned to exile, leaned down to comfort the girl, but when the child saw the awful chinless face coming toward her, she screamed, not realizing that soon she would look the same.
The next case was that of a man well known for his swimming prowess, a big, handsome fellow with broad chest and strong arms. Many came to see him leave for the island from which no leper had ever returned, and as he stood at the head of the gangplank, turning back to wave his hands at his friends, showing them fingers with the first joints already eaten away, the misery of his condition infected everyone and cries of "Auwe, auwe!" sounded. This communion of sorrow affected him, and he hid his face, whereupon the weeping increased.
But the third case was entirely different, so dreadful that it occasioned no public display of sorrow. It was that of a very lovely young wife, with flowers in her hair, on whose body no one could identify the fatal marks. Her feet were clean and her fingers, too. There was no infection on her face, but her eyes were glassy, so the well-informed crowd knew that here was one in whom the sickness lay accumulating its strength inside, ready to erupt generally in one massive sore. The death of this girl would be horrible, a total disintegration, and those who watched her walking slowly and with grace up the gangplank kept their sorrow to themselves.
But she was not to depart in peace, for her husband broke from the crowd of watchers and tried to dash up the gangplank after her, shouting, "Kinau, Kinau, I will be your kokua." Guards restrained him, and his wife Kinau, named after one of Hawaii's most able queens, looked back down the gangplank and with visible compassion cried, "You may not join me, Kealaikahiki." And with considerable dignity she stepped onto the Kilauea and ordered the guards to drag her husband away. Impassively, she watched him go, and if she heard his frantic cries, She did not indicate the fact, and he disappeared from the dock altogether, crying, "Kinau! Kinau! I shall be your kokua."
When the doomed Hawaiians were all aboard, the police produced the Chinese Kee Mun Ki, and since the disease from which he suffered was known as the mai Pake, the crowd somehow understood that he personally was the cause of this day's