Then the head came within the house, but the woman had hidden herself and was not to be found. The wizard stole in; he drew the woman out of the house, and he closed the door. The head called out: “Do not close the door on me; I wish to come outside.” But those outside blocked up the door and would not let it out, for they knew that what was within the house was the demon of the cave that had gone into the man’s head. Then fire burst out in the house; there were twelve loud sounds; the head was shattered, and after that there was nothing ever seen of it. And that is the strange story about Po-o.
And now we can speak of Mo-e Mo-e, or at least we can speak of Mo-e Mo-e’s son. He grew up with a stepfather, for his mother had married again. Now, the stepfather was not always kind to Mo-e Mo-e’s son, and the boy was often punished by him.
One day he said to his mother: “I will go in search of my real father.” “Your father is dead and [[178]]in the sea,” said his mother. “Perhaps he is not,” said the boy. “I will go in search of him, and I will bring with me the spear that my father left for me.”
So he started off in search of Mo-e Mo-e, his father. Now when Mo-e Mo-e had been flung into the sea long before, he had gone down to the bottom. He lay there, for his slumber was still deep. The fish bit at him, but they did not awaken him, and the salt of the deep sea went into his skin. Still he lay there asleep. Then a thunder-storm came. He wakened up. He went to the surface of the sea. Then he swam to the shore.
He had been made bald by the salt water that had got into his skin. His skin had been scraped off by the bites of the fishes. He crawled to a pig-pen, and there he lay down. From that place he crawled to another place. There a wizard found him; he gave Mo-e Mo-e medicine that cured him.
Then he went back to his own home, to the place that he had first come from. He went on no more trips after that, and he took to sleeping like an ordinary man.
And now his son, with the great spear of dark-red wood with the ridges of shark’s teeth upon it, went off in search of him. He came to the Island where Mo-e Mo-e had lived when his name was O-pe-le. He went down into the valley where O-pe-le had had his farm.
The boy came to a field where a man was planting [[179]]taro. He sat down to watch the man, holding the spear in his hands. Two men came along. Seeing the spear that the boy held, they stopped and looked at it. “Is it not like the spear we carried when we took away the man who slept all the way in our canoe and all the time on the black stones of the temple?” one said to the other. “It is the very same spear,” said the other. “You laid it down, and I was looking at it while I was telling you the story of Ka-ma-lo, who went to the cave of the Shark-God.” “I never heard the rest of that story,” said the first man, “and I should like to hear it.”
The two sat together, and then the man who had been telling the story that Mo-e Mo-e had heard, went on.
When Ka-ma-lo had told him all that had happened, the Shark-God said to him: “Go back to Ku-pa’s country and live there with his people. But make ready a great offering for me—an offering of black pigs, white fowl, and red fish—and when the new moon comes take the offering into the temple enclosure, and stay there until you see a cloud coming over the mountains of La-na-i. And when you see that cloud, leave the temple enclosure and get into your canoe and go out to sea.” So Kau-hu-hu said; then he lay down in the cavern and went to sleep. Ka-ma-lo did not stay any longer; he went quickly out of the cavern. [[180]]