CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE.
THE LAST.
"How comes it," said Lieutenant Lindsay to Harold, on the firstfavourable opportunity that occurred after the meeting described in thelast chapter; "how comes it that you and Kambira know each other sowell?"
"I might reply by asking," said Harold, with a smile, "how comes it thatyou are so well acquainted with Azinte? but, before putting thatquestion, I will give a satisfactory answer to your own."
Hereupon he gave a brief outline of those events, already narrated infull to the reader, which bore on his first meeting with the slave-girl,and his subsequent sojourn with her husband.
"After leaving the interior," continued our hero, "and returning to thecoast, I visited various towns in order to observe the state of theslaves in the Portuguese settlements, and, truly, what I saw was mostdeplorable--demoralisation and cruelty, and the obstruction of lawfultrade, prevailed everywhere. The settlements are to my mind a verypandemonium on earth. Every one seemed to me more or less affected bythe accursed atmosphere that prevails. Of course there must be someexceptions. I met with one, at the last town I visited, in the personof Governor Letotti."
"Letotti!" exclaimed Lindsay, stopping abruptly.
"Yes!" said Harold, in some surprise at the lieutenant's manner, "and amost amiable man he was--"
"Was!--was! What do you mean? Is--is he dead?" exclaimed Lindsay,turning pale.
"He died suddenly just before I left," said Harold.
"And Maraquita--I mean his daughter--what of her?" asked the lieutenant,turning as red as he had previously turned pale.
Harold noted the change, and a gleam of light seemed to break upon himas he replied:--
"Poor girl, she was overwhelmed at first by the heavy blow. I had toquit the place almost immediately after the event."
"Did you know her well?" asked Lindsay, with an uneasy glance at hiscompanion's handsome face.
"No; I had just been introduced to her shortly before her father'sdeath, and have scarcely exchanged a dozen sentences with her. It issaid that her father died in debt, but of course in regard to that Iknow nothing certainly. At parting, she told me that she meant to leavethe coast and go to stay with a relative at the Cape."
The poor lieutenant's look on hearing this was so peculiar, not to sayalarming, that Harold could not help referring to it, and Lindsay was somuch overwhelmed by such unexpected news, and, withal, so stronglyattracted by Harold's sympathetic manner, that he straightway made aconfidant of him, told him of his love for Maraquita, of Maraquita'slove for Azinte, of the utter impossibility of his being able to takeAzinte back to her old mistress, now that she had found her husband andchild, even if it had been admissible for a lieutenant in the Britishnavy to return freed negroes again into slavery, and wound up withbitter lamentations as to his unhappy fate, and expressions of poignantregret that fighting and other desperate means, congenial and easy tohis disposition, were not available in the circumstances. After whichexplosion he subsided, felt ashamed of having thus committed himself,and looked rather foolish.
But Harold quickly put him at his ease. He entered on the subject withearnest gravity.
"It strikes me, Lindsay," he said thoughtfully, after the lieutenant hadfinished, "that I can aid you in this affair; but you must not ask mehow at present. Give me a few hours to think over it, and then I shallhave matured my plans."
Of course the lieutenant hailed with heartfelt gratitude the gleam ofhope held out to him, and thus the friends parted for a time.
That same afternoon Harold sat under a palm-tree in company with Disco,Jumbo, Kambira, Azinte, and Obo.
"How would you like to go with me to the Cape of Good Hope, Kambira?"asked Harold abruptly.
"Whar dat?" asked the chief through Jumbo.
"Far away to the south of Africa," answered Harold. "You know that youcan never go back to your own land now, unless you want to be againenslaved."
"Him say him no' want to go back," interpreted Jumbo; "got all him carefor now--Azinte and Obo."
"Then do you agree to go with me?" said Harold.
To this Kambira replied heartily that he did.
"W'y, wot do 'ee mean for to do with 'em?" asked Disco, in somesurprise.
"I will get them comfortably settled there," replied Harold. "My fatherhas a business friend in Cape Town who will easily manage to put me inthe way of doing it. Besides, I have a particular reason for wishing totake Azinte there.--Ask her, Jumbo, if she remembers a young lady namedSenhorina Maraquita Letotti."
To this Azinte replied that she did, and the way in which her eyessparkled proved that she remembered her with intense pleasure.
"Well, tell her," rejoined Harold, "that Maraquita has grieved very muchat losing her, and is _very_ anxious to get her back again--not as aslave, but as a friend, for no slavery is allowed in English settlementsanywhere, and I am sure that Maraquita hates slavery as much as I do,though she is not English, so I intend to take her and Kambira and Oboto the Cape, where Maraquita is living--or will be living soon."
"Ye don't stick at trifles, sir," said Disco, whose eyes, on hearingthis, assumed a thoughtful, almost a troubled look.
"My plan does not seem to please you," said Harold.
"Please me, sir, w'y shouldn't it please me? In course you knows best;I was only a little puzzled, that's all."
Disco said no more, but he thought a good deal, for he had noted thebeauty and sprightliness of Maraquita, and the admiration with whichHarold had first beheld her; and it seemed to him that this ratherpowerful method of attempting to gratify the Portuguese girl was proofpositive that Harold had lost his heart to her.
Harold guessed what was running in Disco's mind, but did not care toundeceive him, as, in so doing, he might run some risk of betraying thetrust reposed in him by Lindsay.
The captain of the schooner, being bound for the Cape after visitingZanzibar, was willing to take these additional passengers, and theanxious lieutenant was induced to postpone total and irrevocabledespair, although, Maraquita being poor, and he being poor, andpromotion in the service being very slow, he had little reason tobelieve his prospects much brighter than they were before,--poor fellow!
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Time passed on rapid wing--as time is notoriously prone to do--and thefortunes of our _dramatis personae_ varied somewhat.
Captain Romer continued to roam the Eastern seas, along with brothercaptains, and spent his labour and strength in rescuing a few hundredsof captives from among the hundreds of thousands that were continuallyflowing out of unhappy Africa. Yoosoof and Moosa continued to throw aboat-load or two of damaged "cattle" in the way of the British cruisers,as a decoy, and succeeded on the whole pretty well in running fullcargoes of valuable Black Ivory to the northern markets. The Sultan ofZanzibar continued to assure the British Consul that he heartilysympathised with England in her desire to abolish slavery, and to allowhis officials, for a "consideration," to prosecute the slave-trade toany extent they pleased! Portugal continued to assure England of hersympathy and co-operation in the good work of repression, and hersubjects on the east coast of Africa continued to export thousands ofslaves under the protection of the Portuguese and French flags, stylingthem _free engages_. British-Indian subjects--the Banyans ofZanzibar,--continued to furnish the sinews of war which kept thegigantic trade in human flesh going on merrily. Murders, etcetera,continued to be perpetrated, tribes to be plundered, and hearts to bebroken--of course "legally" and "domestically," as well as piratically--during this rapid flight of time.
But nearly everything in this life has its bright lights and half-tints,as well as its deep shadows. During the same flight of time, humaneindividuals have continued to urge on the good cause of the totalabolition of slavery, and Christian missionaries have continued, despitethe difficulties of slave-trade, climate, and human apathy, to sow hereand there on the coasts the precious seed of Gospel truth, which wetr
ust shall yet be sown broad-cast by native hands, throughout thelength and breadth of that mighty land.
To come more closely to the subjects of our tale:
Chimbolo, with his recovered wife and child, sought safety from theslavers in the far interior, and continued to think with pleasure andgratitude of the two Englishmen who hated slavery, and who had gone toAfrica just in the nick of time to rescue that unhappy slave who hadbeen almost flogged to death, and was on the point of being drowned inthe Zambesi in a sack. Mokompa, also, continued to poetise, as in daysgone by, having made a safe retreat with Chimbolo, and, among otherthings, enshrined all the deeds of the two white men in native verse.Yambo continued to extol play, admire, and propagate the life-sizedjumping-jack to such an extent that, unless his career has been cutshort by the slavers, we fully expect to find that creature a "domesticinstitution" when the slave-trade has been crushed, and Africa openedup--as in the end it is certain to be.
During the progress and continuance of all these things, you may be sureour hero was not idle. He sailed, as proposed, with Kambira, Azinte,Obo, Disco, and Jumbo for Zanzibar, touched at the town over which poorSenhor Francisco Alfonso Toledo Bignoso Letotti had ruled, found thatthe Senhorina had taken her departure; followed, as Disco said, in herwake; reached the Cape, hunted her up, found her out and presented toher, with Lieutenant Lindsay's compliments, the African chief Kambira,his wife Azinte, and his son Obo!
Poor Maraquita, being of a passionately affectionate and romanticdisposition, went nearly mad with joy, and bestowed so many gratefulglances and smiles on Harold that Disco's suspicions were confirmed, andthat bold mariner wished her, Maraquita, "at the bottom of the sea!" forDisco disliked foreigners, and could not bear the thought of his friendbeing caught by one of them.
Maraquita introduced Harold to her aunt, a middle-aged, leather-skinned,excessively dark-eyed daughter of Portugal. She also introduced him toa bosom friend, at that time on a visit to her aunt. The bosom friendwas an auburn-haired, fair-skinned, cheerful-spirited English girl.Before her, Harold Seadrift at once, without an instant's warning, fellflat down, figuratively speaking of course, and remained so--strickenthrough the heart!
The exigencies of our tale require, at this point, that we should drawour outline with a bold and rapid pencil.
Disco Lillihammer was stunned, and so was Jumbo, when Harold, some weeksafter their arrival at the Cape, informed them that he was engaged to bemarried to Alice Gray, only daughter of the late Sir Eustace Gray, whohad been M.P. for some county in England, which he had forgotten thename of, Alice not having been able to recall it, as her father had diedwhen she was four years old, leaving her a fortune of next-to-nothing ayear, and a sweet temper.
Being incapable of further stunning, Disco was rather revived thanotherwise, and his dark shadow was resuscitated, when Harold added thatKambira had become Maraquita's head-gardener, Azinte cook to theestablishment, and Obo page-in-waiting--more probably page-in-mischief--to the young Senhorina. But both Disco and Jumbo had a relapse fromwhich they were long of recovering, when Harold went on to say that hemeant to sail for England by the next mail, take Jumbo with him asvalet, make proposals to his father to establish a branch of their houseat the Cape, come back to manage the branch, marry Alice, and reside inthe neighbourhood of the Senhorina Maraquita Letotti's dwelling.
"You means wot you say, I s'pose?" asked Disco.
"Of course I do," said Harold.
"An' yer goin' to take Jumbo as yer walley?"
"Yes."
"H'm; I'll go too as yer keeper."
"My what?"
"Yer keeper--yer strait-veskit buckler, for if you ain't a loonatic yeought to be."
But Disco did not go to England in that capacity. He remained at theCape to assist Kambira, at the express command of Maraquita; andcontinued there until Harold returned, bringing Lieutenant Lindsay withhim as a partner in the business; until Harold was married and requireda gardener for his own domain; until the Senhorina became Mrs Lindsay;until a large and thriving band of little Cape colonists found itnecessary to have a general story-teller and adventure-recounter with anautical turn of mind; until, in short, he found it convenient to go toEngland himself for the gal of his heart who had been photographed thereyears before, and could be rubbed off neither by sickness, sunstroke,nor adversity.
When Disco had returned to the colony with the original of the saidphotograph, and had fairly settled down on his own farm, then it wasthat he was wont at eventide to assemble the little colonists round him,light his pipe, and, through its hazy influence, recount hisexperiences, and deliver his opinions on the slave-trade of East Africa.Sometimes he was pathetic, sometimes humorous, but, however jocular hemight be on other subjects, he invariably became very grave and veryearnest when he touched on the latter theme.
"There's only one way to cure it," he was wont to say, "and that is, tobring the Portuguese and Arabs to their marrow-bones; put the fleet onthe east coast in better workin' order; have consuls everywhere, withorders to keep their weather-eyes open to the slave-dealers; start twoor three British settlements--ports o' refuge--on the mainland; hoistthe Union Jack, and, last but not least, send 'em the Bible."
We earnestly commend the substance of Disco's opinions to the reader,for there is urgent need for action. There is death where life shouldbe; ashes instead of beauty; desolation in place of fertility, and, evenwhile we write, terrible activity in the horrible traffic in--"BlackIvory."
THE END.
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