"A body would think there was something in this," said the missionary. "But if these tales are true, I wonder what about my tales!"
Now the flaming of Akaänga's torch drew near in the night; and the misshapen hands groped in the meshes of the net; and they took the missionary between the finger and the thumb, and bore him dripping in the night and silence to the place of the ovens of Miru. And there was Miru, ruddy in the glow of the ovens; and there sat her four daughters and made the kava of the dead; and there sat the comers out of the islands of the living dripping and lamenting.
This was a dread place to reach for any of the sons of men. But of all who ever came there, the missionary was the most concerned; and to make things worse the person next him was a convert of his own.
"Aha," said the convert, "so you are here like your neighbours? And how about all your stories?"
"It seems," said the missionary with bursting tears, "that there was nothing in them."
By this the kava of the dead was ready and
