“Who were Korak and A’ht?” he asked.
“A’ht was a Mangani,” replied Meriem, “and Korak a Tarmangani.”
“And what, pray, might a Mangani be, and a Tarmangani?”
The girl laughed.
“You are a Tarmangani,” she replied. “The Mangani are covered with hair—you would call them apes.”
“Then Korak was a white man?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“And he was—ah—your—er—your—?” He paused, for he found it rather difficult to go on with that line of questioning while the girl’s clear, beautiful eyes were looking straight into his.
“My what?” insisted Meriem, far too unsophisticated in her unspoiled innocence to guess what the Hon. Morison was driving at.
“Why—ah—your brother?” he stumbled.
“No, Korak was not my brother,” she replied.
“Was he your husband, then?” he finally blurted.
Far from taking offense, Meriem broke into a merry laugh.
“My husband!” she cried. “Why how old do you think I am? I am too young to have a husband. I had never thought of such a thing. Korak was—why—,” and now she hesitated, too, for she never before had attempted to analyse the relationship that existed between herself and Korak—“why, Korak was just Korak,” and again she broke into a gay laugh as she realized the illuminating quality of her description.
Looking at her and listening to her the man beside her could not believe that depravity of any sort or degree entered into the girl’s nature, yet he wanted to believe that she had not been virtuous, for otherwise his task was less a sinecure—the Hon. Morison was not entirely without conscience.
For several days the Hon. Morison made no appreciable progress toward the consummation of his scheme. Sometimes he almost abandoned it for he found himself time and again wondering how slight might be the provocation necessary to trick him into making a bona-fide offer of marriage to Meriem if he permitted himself to fall more deeply in love with her, and it was difficult to see her daily and not love her. There was a quality about her which, all unknown to the Hon. Morison, was making his task an extremely difficult one—it was that quality of innate goodness and cleanness which is a good girl’s stoutest bulwark and protection—an impregnable barrier that only degeneracy has the effrontery to assail. The Hon. Morison Baynes would never be considered a degenerate.
He was sitting with Meriem upon the verandah one evening after the others had retired. Earlier they had been playing tennis—a game in which the Hon. Morison shone to advantage, as, in truth, he did in most all manly sports. He was telling Meriem stories of London and Paris, of balls and banquets, of the wonderful women and their wonderful gowns, of the pleasures and pastimes of the rich and powerful. The Hon. Morison was a past master in the art of insidious boasting. His egotism was never flagrant or tiresome—he was never crude in it, for crudeness was a plebeianism that the Hon. Morison studiously avoided, yet the impression derived by a listener to the Hon. Morison was one that was not at all calculated to detract from the glory of the house of Baynes, or from that of its representative.
Meriem was entranced. His tales were like fairy stories to this little jungle maid. The Hon. Morison loomed large and wonderful and magnificent in her mind’s eye. He fascinated her, and when he drew closer to her after a short silence and took her hand she thrilled as one might thrill beneath the touch of a deity—a thrill of exaltation not unmixed with fear.
He bent his lips close to her ear.
“Meriem!” he whispered. “My little Meriem! May I hope to have the right to call you ‘my little Meriem’?”
The girl turned wide eyes upward to his face; but it was in shadow. She trembled but she did not draw away. The man put an arm about her and drew her closer.
“I love you!” he whispered.
She did not reply. She did not know what to say. She knew nothing of love. She had never given it a thought; but she did know that it was very nice to be loved, whatever it meant. It was nice to have people kind to one. She had known so little of kindness or affection.
“Tell me,” he said, “that you return my love.”
His lips came steadily closer to hers. They had almost touched when a vision of Korak sprang like a miracle before her eyes. She saw Korak’s face close to hers, she felt his lips hot against hers, and then for the first time in her life she guessed what love meant. She drew away, gently.
“I am not sure,” she said, “that I love you. Let us wait. There is plenty of time. I am too young to marry yet, and I am not sure that I should be happy in London or Paris—they rather frighten me.”
How easily and naturally she had connected his avowal of love with the idea of marriage! The Hon. Morison was perfectly sure that he had not mentioned marriage—he had been particularly careful not to do so. And then she was not sure that she loved him! That, too, came rather in the nature of a shock to his vanity. It seemed incredible that this little barbarian should have any doubts whatever as to the desirability of the Hon. Morison Baynes.
The first flush of passion cooled, the Hon. Morison was enabled to reason more logically. The start had been all wrong. It would be better now to wait and prepare her mind gradually for the only proposition which his exalted estate would permit him to offer her. He would go slow. He glanced down at the girl’s profile. It was bathed in the silvery light of the great tropic moon. The Hon. Morison Baynes wondered if it were to be so easy a matter to “go slow.” She was most alluring.
Meriem rose. The vision of Korak was still before her.
“Good night,” she said. “It is
