On his head he wore my ilima lei, which I had
made for him and placed there. And into the canoes, to the
favoured ones, they on the yacht began tossing their many leis. I
had no expectancy of hope . . . And yet I hoped, in a small wistful
way that I know did not show in my face, which was as proud and
merry as any there. But Lilolilo did what I knew he would do, what
I had known from the first he would do. Still looking me squarely
and honestly in the eyes, he took my beautiful ilima lei from his
head and tore it across. I saw his lips shape, but not utter
aloud, the single word pau" (finish). "Still looking at me, he
broke both parts of the lei in two again and tossed the deliberate
fragments, not to me, but down overside into the widening water.
Pau. It was finished . . . "
For a long space Bella's vacant gaze rested on the sea horizon.
Martha ventured no mere voice expression of the sympathy that
moistened her own eyes.
"And I rode on that day, up the old bad trail along the Hamakua
coast," Bella resumed, with a voice at first singularly dry and
harsh.
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