The Dragoman’s Secret E-Book

Otis Adelbert Kline

• Herausgeber: Wildside Press
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 52

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2022

Beschreibung

Khallaf the Strong inflicted dire tortures on Hamed the Attar, and would have done him to death had not a beautiful woman intervened. Classic historical fantasy, first published in the Spring 1931 issue of Oriental Stories magazine. Introduction by  Karl Wurf.

Leseprobe

Table of Contents

COPYRIGHT INFORMATION

INTRODUCTION

THE DRAGOMAN’S SECRET, by Otis Adelbert Kline

COPYRIGHT INFORMATION

Copyright © 2022 by Wildside Press LLC.

Originally published in the Spring, 1931 issue of Oriental Stories.

Published by Wildside Press LLC.

wildsidepress.com | bcmystery.com

INTRODUCTION

Otis Adelbert Kline (1891-1946) worked as an author and literary agent during the pulp era. Much of his fiction first appeared in pulp magazines such as Strange Stories, Argosy, Oriental Stories, and Weird Tales. Kline was an amateur orientalist and a student of Arabic, like his friend and sometime collaborator, E. Hoffmann Price, and he drew on his research for exotic backgrounds for his stoires.

However, in spite of an impressive body of work, Kline is best known these days for an imaginary literary feud with Tarzan author Edgar Rice Burroughs. Kline supposedly gained Burroughs's enmity by producing close imitations of Burroughs’ work, such as The Planet of Peril (1929) and its two sequels—both highly reminiscent of Burroughs’ Martian novels, though set on Venus. Burroughs, according to the story, promptly retaliated by writing his own Venus novels, whereupon Kline responded with an even more direct imitation of Burroughs's work—a pair of adventure novels set on Mars. Kline’s jungle adventure stories, reminiscent of Burroughs’ Tarzan tales, have also been cited as evidence of the conflict.

While both authors did write the works in question, the theory that they did so in contention with each other is supported only circumstantially, reflected most in their thematic resemblance and the publication dates. The feud theory was originally set forth in a fan press article, “The Kline-Burroughs War,” by Donald A. Wollheim (Science Fiction News, November, 1936), and afterward given wider circulation by Sam Moskowitz in his book Explorers of the Infinite (1963). Richard A. Lupoff thoroughly debunked the feud, however, in his book Edgar Rice Burroughs: Master of Adventure (1965). Among the evidence cited by Lupoff: (1) no comment from either writer acknowledging the feud is documented, and (2) family members of the two authors have no recollection of ever hearing them mention it. Further, Wollheim stated, when questioned on the source of his own information: “I made it up!”

In the mid-1930s, Kline largely abandoned writing to concentrate on his career as a literary agent (most famously for fellow Weird Tales author Robert E. Howard, creator of Conan the Barbarian). Kline represented Howard from the spring of 1933 till Howard's death in June 1936, and he continued to act as literary agent for Howard’s estate thereafter. It has been suggested that Kline may have completed Howard’s novel Almuric, which he submitted to Weird Tales for posthumous publication in 1939, although this claim is disputed.

“The Dragoman’s Secret” originally appeared in the Spring, 1931 issue of Oriental Stories magazine, a companion to Weird Tales also edited by Farnsworth Wright. Oriental Stories presented a mix of fantasy and historical adventure with Asian and Middle Eastern themes, with writers drawing on the Arabian Nights and many other sources for exotic material. Not only Kline, but many Weird Tales authors contributed ot its pages, no doubt encouraged by editor Farnsworth Wright.

—Karl Wurf

Rockville, Maryland

THE DRAGOMAN’S SECRET,by Otis Adelbert Kline

1

I have found that there are but three kinds of women in the world, effendi: those whose memory readily departs from us; those whose memory we deliberately put away from us; and those who, were we to live beyond the age of a thousand, we could never forget.

Such a woman was Mariam—a pearl of great price and a jewel among a million—yet for that she was not of the true faith, I nightly ask Allah to forgive me for cherishing her memory. I have had many singular and startling adventures, but none to quite compare with those which befell me when Mariam came into my life.

You would hear the tale, effendi? It is one which I have never dared relate to a Moslem; yet I have longed, these many years, to unbosom myself to an understanding friend. You are of a different faith, and might sympathize. But can I trust you with the secret?

Well then, here is the coffee shop at Silat, where we can sit in privacy and comfort, away from the glare of the noonday sun.

Ho, Silat! Two shishas stuffed to overflowing with the best Syrian leaf, and coffee, bitter as aloes, black as a Nubian at midnight, and hot as the hinges of Johannim’s innermost gate.

Aihee! You, who know me as Hamed bin Ayyub, the bent and wrinkled dragoman, should have seen me in the days of my youth—tall and straight as a Rudaynian lance, with hair of raven blackness, a bold and handsome countenance, and the heart of a lion. Those were the days when rare and interesting adventures befell me.

As I told you, effendi, I have at times attained considerable wealth. There was one time when, through a series of singular circumstances, I fell heir to the wealth, the home, and the beautiful slave girl of a rich young goldsmith.

For two years I lived with her in great joy and happiness, at the end of which time she bore me a daughter. But when she presented me with the child, Allah saw fit to receive my beloved into His clemency.

As I was unable to care for the child, I fared with her to the house of my uncle, who graciously took her into his harim, and whose women gave her loving care. Then, as my bosom was constricted with sorrow, and my mind so distracted with grief that I no longer had the power of peace, I sold my house and all that it contained, and having converted all my wealth into gold, purchased a camel with a shugduf litter and left the city for the purpose of making the pilgrimage to Mecca.

The Jerusalem caravan had already departed, but the great caravan from Damascus was on its way, and I knew that by crossing El Ghor, the Jordan, and camping for a day or two on the Hajj Road until it came up, I would be able to join it.

But alas for the plans of men when they run contrary to the will of Allah Almighty. It was written that I should not complete my pilgrimage, for the first day of my journey had not yet ended when I was beset by a band of fierce harami