Part 28 (1/2)

”You are stronger to-day,” she said, with a composure that was a little difficult to a.s.sume, as she took a chair beside him.

”I am,” said Ormsgill quietly. ”In fact I have been getting stronger rapidly of late, and I am glad of it. You see, I have been blissfully idle for a while and I have a good deal to do.”

Benicia knew what was coming, but she smiled. ”You are sure of that?”

she said. ”I mean, you still think it is your business?”

”Perhaps it's a little absurd of me, but I do. Anyway, I don't know of anybody else who is willing to undertake it.”

”Ah,” said Benicia, ”would it matter greatly if it was not done, after all? There are so many things one would have altered in Africa--and they still go on. It is possible that n.o.body will ever succeed in changing them.”

It was, though she was, perhaps, not aware of this, a very strong argument she used, one whose force is now and then instinctively realized by every thinking white man in the western half of Africa, and in other parts as well. It is a land that has absorbed many civilizations and continued in its barbarism. Nature unsubdued is against the white man there, and against her tremendous forces his most strenuous efforts are of little avail. Where the air reeks with germs of pestilence and there are countless leagues of swamps breeding corruption, one can expect very little from a few scattered hospitals and an odd mile of drains. Besides, there is in the la.s.situde born of its steamy heat something that insidiously saps away the white man's will until he feels that effort of any kind is futile, and that in the land of the shadow it is wiser to leave things as they are.

Ormsgill nodded gravely. ”Yes,” he said, ”one recognizes that, but, you see, I don't expect to do very much--merely to keep a promise, and set a few thick-headed heathen at liberty. I think I could accomplish that.”

”Why should you wish to set them at liberty?”

”It's a trifle difficult to answer,” and Ormsgill laughed. ”After all, the motive is probably to some extent a personal one. Anyway, it's not a thing I have any occasion to inflict on you. There was a time when you didn't adopt this att.i.tude, but sympathized with me.”

The girl made a little gesture. ”I would like to understand. You and Desmond have all that most men wish for. Why are you risking your life and health in Africa?”

A curious little smile crept into Ormsgill's eyes. ”Well,” he said reflectively, ”there are respects in which one's possessions are apt to become burdensome. They seem to carry so many obligations along with them that one falls into bondage under them, and I think some of us are rebels born. We feel we must make our little protest, if it's only by doing the thing everybody else considers reprehensible.”

He stopped a moment, and his face grew a trifle grim when he went on again. ”In my case it must be made now since I shall probably never have an opportunity of doing anything of the kind again.”

Benicia understood him, for she had watched Miss Ratcliffe carefully at Las Palmas. In fact, she had understood him all along. That he should shrink from any claim to philanthropy was only what she had expected from him, and it was also characteristic that he should have made as little as possible of his motives. Admitting that he had to some extent been swayed by the rebellious impulse he had mentioned, she knew there was beneath it a chivalrous purpose that was likely to prove the more effective from its practical simplicity. The Latins can appreciate chivalry, though they do not invariably practice it now, and she realized vaguely that there is nothing in man more knightly than the desire to strike a blow for the oppressed or at his peril to redress a wrong. Ormsgill's sentiments and methods were, perhaps, a trifle crude, and, from one point of view, somewhat old fas.h.i.+oned. He did not preach a crusade, but couched the lance himself. After all, he belonged to a nation which had once, using crude effective means, swept the slavers off that coast, and still stamps its coinage with the George and Dragon.

It was, however, after all, not so much as a redresser of grievances and a friend of the oppressed, but as a man that Benicia regarded her companion, for she knew that she loved him. She said nothing, and in a minute or two he spoke again.

”There is a thing that has been on my mind the last few days,” he said. ”The fever must have left me too shaky to think of it before. I am afraid, though it was very pleasant to see you, I haven't quite kept faith with your father in allowing you to come and talk with me.

You, of course, don't understand exactly how the Authorities regard me.”

Benicia smiled a little, for she understood very well. ”I don't think that counts,” she said, ”and what is, perhaps, more to the purpose, my father is not here; he has gone, I believe, on business of the State, into the bush country. If you had remembered earlier you would have been anxious to send me away?”

She leaned forward looking at him, and saw the tension in his face. It told her a good deal, and she felt that for all his resolution she could, if she wished, bend him to her will.

”No,” he said, ”I'm not sure I could have done it if I had wished. In fact, the week--is it a week?--I have lain here has been such a one as I have never spent before. Now I am horribly sorry that it is over.”

There was something in his voice which fully bore out what he had said, but Benicia was aware that it was she who had forced the admission from him without his quite realizing its significance. She knew that he would speak more plainly still if she kept her eyes on him.

”It is over? You can countenance no more of my visits, then?” she asked.

”I am,” said Ormsgill gravely, ”going away again before to-morrow.”

Benicia sat very quiet, and contrived that he did not see her face for a moment or two. She had, at least, not expected this, and it sent a thrill of dismay through her. Steady as his voice was, she was aware that the simple announcement had cost the man a good deal.

”You are not strong enough for the journey yet,” she said at length.

”It would not be safe.”