Unfettered Part 15

Dorlan now told of his father and his grandfather. His grandfather had always claimed to be the heir to an African throne, had imbued his, Dorlan's father, with that thought. The father had taught the same to Dorlan. A certain formula, said to be known to no others on earth, was cherished in their family.

"Now! Now!" said k.u.mi when Dorlan recited that fact. "That formula is no doubt a key that will unfold the hiding place of treasures that will make you the richest man in the world. Here is an inventory of what is to be found in that hiding place."

Dorlan took the reputed inventory. The enormous value of the items cited staggered his imagination. "This is incredulous," said Dorlan. "How could Africans, unlearned in the values of civilized nations, know how to store away these things."

"Easily explained," said k.u.mi. "A white explorer spent years in our kingdom collecting these things. We deemed them worthless, gave them to him readily and called him fool. He took sick in our country and saw that he was going to die. He called your great grandfather, our king, to his bedside, told him that civilization would make its way into Africa one day, and urged him at all hazards to preserve and secrete the treasures that he had collected.

Our king was led to believe that these treasures would make him one of the greatest rulers of earth, and he obeyed the dying man's injunction. The white man left this inventory and a doc.u.ment giving the location of his European home, the names and family history of his kin, asking that our king remember them in the day of his affluence.

"Our king gave the formula that leads to the hiding place to your grandfather, your grandfather told it to your father, your father has, I see, no doubt, told it to you.

"As a further proof that I speak the truth I hand you now a few specimen stones that were reserved to prevent this affair from being cla.s.sed as a myth." He now took from a pocket a box of costly stones and handed them to Dorlan.

"How these things would grace Morlene," thought Dorlan, as his eye pa.s.sed from one sparkling jewel to another.

It now occurred to Dorlan that the acceptance of this fortune might entail upon him a sacrifice of which he was incapable. It might involve his leaving this country, a step that he could not even contemplate in view of the fact that Morlene was now free. The looming of this contingency before his mind caused him to drop the jewels as though they had suddenly become hot. k.u.mi looked up at him in great astonishment.

Dorlan's face now wore a pained expression. He had always been profoundly interested in Africa and was congratulating himself on the opportunity now offered to convert the proffered kingdom into an enlightened republic. It now seemed that his own interests and those of his ancestral home were about to clash. He cannot endure the thought of putting an ocean between Morlene and himself. Nor can he with equanimity think of allowing Africa to remain in her existing condition.

"When am I expected to go to Africa?" enquired Dorlan in serious tones.

"You may not have to come at all, and yet serve our purpose."

"How so?" asked Dorlan, arising and drawing near to k.u.mi.

The latter began: "We Africans are engaged in a sociological investigation of many questions. We are seeking to know definitely what part the climate, the surface, the flora and the fauna have played in keeping us in civilization's back yard. Huxley thinks that our woolly hair and black skins came to us only after our race took up its abode in Africa. He holds that it was nature's contribution to render us immune from the yellow fever germs so abundant in swampy regions.

"He thinks that those of our race who did not take on a dark hue and woolly texture of hair were the less adapted to life in the tropics and eventually died out, leaving those that were better adjusted to survive.

"He thinks that these beneficial modifications were preserved and transmitted with increasing strength from generation to generation until our hue and our hair or the physical attributes for which they stand rendered us immune from yellow fever. I may add that Livingstone says of us, 'Heat alone does not produce blackness of skin, but heat with moisture seems to insure the deepest hue.'

"Now, nature, in thus protecting us against yellow fever, by changing our color from the original, whatever it was, has painted upon us a sign that causes some races to think that there is a greater difference between us and them than there really is. So much for our color and the ills that it has entailed."

Dorlan interrupted k.u.mi to remark very feelingly:

"I am truly glad that you are not inoculated with that utterly nonsensical view to be met with in this country, which represents that the Negro's color is the result of a curse p.r.o.nounced by Noah upon his recovery from a drunken stupor. Please proceed."

k.u.mi resumed his remarks. "Mr. Herbert Spencer holds that our comparative lack of energy is due to heat and _moisture_. He states that 'the earliest recorded civilization grew up in a hot and dry region--Egypt; and in hot and dry regions also arose the Babylonian, a.s.syrian and Phoenician civilizations.' He points out that all 'the conquering races of the world have hailed from within or from the borders of the hot and dry region marked on the rain map 'rainless districts,' and extending across North Africa, Arabia, Persia, and on through Thibet into Mongolia.'

"He, therefore, would ascribe our backwardness princ.i.p.ally to a woful lack of energy, a condition brought on by our hot and moist climate.

"When our investigation of these questions is complete," continued k.u.mi, "we will know just what has brought us where we are and can determine whether artificial appliances sufficient to counteract existing influences can be discovered and inst.i.tuted.

"Mr. Benjamin Kidd seems to think that the tropics can never develop the highest type of civilization. In the event that the government of the tropics is to be conducted from the temperate zones, we tropical people will desire Negroes to remain in the temperate zones, to advocate such policies and form such alliances as shall be for our highest good.

"So, it may turn out to be the best for you, our king, to remain here, for our welfare, owing to our peculiar environments, depends, just now, as much upon what others think of us as upon what we ourselves may do. The question of your going to Africa is not, therefore, a pressing one, yet."

"That leaves me somewhat free to deal with a question that _is_ pressing, and pressing hard," said Dorlan, clasping k.u.mi's hand in joy, now that the way was clear for him to serve without conflict his own heart and the home of his fathers.

k.u.mi looked at Dorlan puzzled as to what question it was that was pressing for a settlement. Dorlan did not enlighten him on the subject, however.

But we know, do we not, dear reader?

CHAPTER XXIV.

GOING FORTH TO UNFETTER.

Morlene was yet wearing mourning for Harry, and, as a consequence, Dorlan was forced to delay the inauguration of his suit. If you think that this procedure, or rather non-procedure, was to his liking, but ask the stars unto whom his heart so often entrusted its secrets; ask the wee small hours of the night who saw him restless, times without number.

Somehow his business seemed to require him to pa.s.s Morlene's house rather often; and yet the business could not have been so very urgent, in that he found so much time to spare, talking to Morlene in an informal way at her gate. And, to go further, if the truth must out, Morlene's presence at that gate at Dorlan's time of pa.s.sing did happen, we must admit, rather often to be placed in the category with usual _accidental_ occurrences.

Now and then, at rare intervals, Dorlan would pay Morlene a call on some matter of business, he would say. On those occasions it was interesting to note how quickly the business matter was disposed of--in fact, was so often actually forgotten by Dorlan and, it must be confessed, by Morlene, too.

The truth of the matter is, to be plain, these two individuals had discovered that their souls were congenial spirits, each seeming to need the other, if it would have a sense of completeness. Now, this was the latent Dorlan and the latent Morlene, the apparent Dorlan and the apparent Morlene co-operating with society in its policy of adding to the duration of the marriage vow, which reads until death, but which has been stretched by society to an indefinite period thereafter. This discovery of a bond of affinity, we say, was purely the work of the latent Dorlan and the latent Morlene, for were not those two members of society abstaining from all mention of the regard, the deep regard, the boundless----excuse us, the period of mourning has not pa.s.sed.

One day Dorlan discovered by consulting his memorandum that about the usual time between those business (?) propositions had elapsed and he searched his mind for a plausible excuse for making a call.

When Dorlan arrived at Morlene's home that night, imagine his feelings when he saw on entering the parlor that she had at last laid aside her mourning attire. The thought that she was now approachable set his soul ablaze.

What Dorlan took to be the most wicked of all demons, seemed to say to him, "Don't declare yourself on this the very first occasion. Those gate talks and business visits are not supposed to have been acts of courts.h.i.+p, remember."

"Will you please leave me?" whispered Dorlan's soul to the imaginary grinning demon that made the suggestion.

Utterly repudiating all thought of further delay, Dorlan drew close to Morlene. She saw the love signals in Dorlan's eyes. Rather than have her soul flash back replies, she inclined her head forward and looking down, clutched the table near which she stood.

"Morlene," said Dorlan, "I really believe that my heart will burst if I do not let out its secret. Morlene, I love you. But you know that and you know how well. You have read this and more, too, in my countenance. Will you be my wife?"

Those words spoken into Morlene's ear at close range were elixir unto her soul. Looking up into Dorlan's face, her eyes told of love, deep, boundless. This Dorlan saw. But he saw more than love. He saw despair written so legibly upon that sweet face that it could not be misunderstood and would not be ignored.

"Come," said Dorlan, leading Morlene to a seat. Sitting down by her side and taking one of her lovely hands in his, he said in tones charged with deepest emotion:

"Tell me, dear girl, that you will be my wife. May I, poor worm of the dust, be allowed to call you my own?" plead Dorlan, bestowing on Morlene that peculiar look born of love stirred to its depths by anxiety.

"I do not know, Mr. Warth.e.l.l, I do not know. It----"

"Do not know," gasped Dorlan, dropping the hand tenderly. "My G.o.d! she does not know!" he groaned.

"Wait but a second, and all will be plain," said Morlene, placing a hand upon Dorlan's arm and looking eagerly into his grief-torn face.

"Wait a second," repeated Dorlan mechanically. "A second in moments like these seems akin to an eternity. But I wait."

"Now, Mr. Warth.e.l.l, be fair to yourself," said Morlene, soothingly. "You remarked that I must have read some things in your countenance. Remember your soul has an eyesight, and you have done some reading, too." Her eyes were averted, her tones low, her speech halting as she made this half-confession to Dorlan's eager ears.

Dorlan, who had been feeling more like an arctic explorer than a suitor for a lady's hand, felt his blood running warmer from the effects of this morsel of cheer.

"I will explain to you what it is that I do not know, Mr. Warth.e.l.l. I do not know how long it will be before conditions in the South will warrant women of my way of thinking in becoming wives of men of your mould."