Jack: Book 3 in the Trilogy

Morris Part 7

Morris, whose African name was Diallo Sefu (sword), was born in Portuguese Guinea near the captital, Bissau, to a relatively wealthy family of an Asanti tribe. As a child he learned the ways of his ancestors which included the very important passage of the boy-child to huntsman and even to warrior - a young man whose hunting skills helped to guarantee the continued existence of his family and tribe. His mother and father had three other children - all girls - so that Morris became the favorite of the parents who hoped to marry him to the daughter of one of the village elders.

The girl, Binta Marjani (coral), was only 12 years old. Diallo (Morris) was 16. They both played together, swam in the nearby river and ocean and often met privately. Binta spent much time with him. She felt that time was against her. Her parents did not encourage her to be anything but a childhood friend with Diallo. Instead, they had another match in mind, one that would gain them far more status and perhaps wealth. Binta had been promised in marriage long before she had become enamoured with Diallo. Her parents decided that a match with the youngest of the seven male sons of the local chief would vastly improve the family's position. Binta's many protestations did not dissuade them. They had made up their mind. They had arranged the match with the chief long ago. She would marry the chief's son, Lenarte (lion) Asante, provided that she remained a virgin.

But Binta intended to give up her prized virginity. At 12 years old she decided that the only way to be with Diallo forever was to be deflowered by him. And so Binta constantly sought to make that happen. But Diallo refused to go along with her desires, not until she was 14 years, he constantly told her.

Binta never told Diallo about being promised to the chief's son. She thought it would ruin everything. So she hid that knowledge. She secretly heard her parents talking about the vow one day - the vow that gave her away to Lenarte.

When Binta reached the age of 13, Diallo started to give in to her.
One day, Lenarte was walking down a path near the village which was close to the ocean when he heard a strange noise like a wounded animal over an earth mound in the jungle off the path. He climbed up to the top of the mound and spotted Binta and Diallo lying on the ground below, their clothing neatly placed on a tree limb, apparently making love. Their lovemaking sounds intermittently were drowned out by the heavy high tide waves breaking onto the shore just beyond where the jungle ended. It was the second time for Diallo and Binta. She wanted to become pregnant so that everyone would just leave them be. But she didn't tell Diallo about that part of her plan.

Lenarte watched the lovers from behind some bushes and saw that Binta wanted Diallo to enter her but he would not, saying in his tribal language, "No Binta, only touch, nothing more until you are 14."

Lenarte was angry at this chance discovery.
"So, she will dishonor her family's promise to my father," he thought. He remembered how another young male villager had a similar problem and his father approached his father - the chief - one day and begged the chief to solve the problem of his son who wanted the young daughter of a lowly fisherman. On the next day and in the middle of the night the father had the girl stolen and sold to the Portuguese slavers in Bissau who were collecting Africans for the Caribbean sugar plantations and for plantations in Brazil.