“It is true,” said she. “It is a great tale. It is the stuff of the painted pictures of marriage. Such marriage was in the beginning; such shall it always be in my house. The hand of the man takes the woman’s ear, and by it leads her away to his house, where she is to be obedient to him and to his mother. I was taken by the ear, so, by your long honourably dead father. I have looked at your hand. It is not like his hand. Also have I looked at the ear of Li Faa. Never will you lead her by the ear. She has not that kind of an ear. I shall live a long time yet, and I will be mistress in my son’s house, after our ancient way, until I die.” * * * * * “But she is my revered ancestress,” Ah Kim explained to Li Faa. He was timidly unhappy; for Li Faa, having ascertained that Mrs. Tai Fu was at the temple of the Chinese Æsculapius making a food offering of dried duck and prayers for her declining health, had taken advantage of the opportunity to call upon him in his store. Li Faa pursed her insolent, unpainted lips into the form of a half-opened rosebud, and replied: “That will do for China. I do not know China. This is Hawaii, and in Hawaii the customs of all foreigners change.” “She is nevertheless my ancestress,” Ah Kim protested, “the mother who gave me birth, whether I am in China or Hawaii, O Silvery Moon Blossom that I want for wife.” “I have had two husbands,” Li Faa stated placidly. “One was a _paké_, one was a Portuguese. I learned much from both. Also am I educated. I have been to High School, and I have played the piano in public. And I learned from my two husbands much. The _paké_ makes the best husband. Never again will I marry anything but a _paké_. But he must not take me by the ear—” “How do you know of that?” he broke in suspiciously. “Mrs. Chang Lucy,” was the reply. “Mrs. Chang Lucy tells me everything that your mother tells her, and your mother tells her much. So let me tell you that mine is not that kind of an ear.” “Which is what my honoured mother has told me,” Ah Kim groaned. “Which is what your honoured mother told Mrs. Chang Lucy, which is what Mrs. Chang Lucy told me,” Li Faa completed equably. “And I now tell you, O Third Husband To Be, that the man is not born who will lead me by the ear. It is not the way in Hawaii. I will go only hand in hand with my man, side by side, fifty-fifty as is the _haole_ slang just now. My Portuguese husband thought different. He tried to beat me. I landed him three times in the police court and each time he worked out his sentence on the reef. After that he got drowned.” “My mother has been my mother for fifty years,” Ah Kim declared stoutly.