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_ "'A Daniel come to judgment' indeed," reflected Hadden, who had been
watching this savage comedy with interest; "our love-sick friend has
got more than he bargained for. Well, that comes of appealing to
Cæsar," and he turned to look at the two suppliants.
The old man, Umgona, merely started, then began to pour out sentences
of conventional thanks and praise to the king for his goodness and
condescension. Cetywayo listened to his talk in silence, and when he
had done answered by reminding him tersely that if Nanea did not
appear at the date named, both she and he, her father, would in due
course certainly decorate a cross-road in their own immediate
neighbourhood.
The captain, Nahoon, afforded a more curious study. As the fatal words
crossed the king's lips, his face took an expression of absolute
astonishment, which was presently replaced by one of fury--the just
fury of a man who suddenly has suffered an unutterable wrong. His
whole frame quivered, the veins stood out in knots on his neck and
forehead, and his fingers closed convulsively as though they were
grasping the handle of a spear. Presently the rage passed away--for as
well might a man be wroth with fate as with a Zulu despot--to be
succeeded by a look of the most hopeless misery. The proud dark eyes
grew dull, the copper-coloured face sank in and turned ashen, the
mouth drooped, and down one corner of it there trickled a little line
of blood springing from the lip bitten through in the effort to keep
silence. Lifting his hand in salute to the king, the great man rose
and staggered rather than walked towards the gate.
As he reached it, the voice of Cetywayo commanded him to stop. "Stay,"
he said, "I have a service for you, Nahoon, that shall drive out of
your head these thoughts of wives and marriage. You see this white man
here; he is my guest, and would hunt buffalo and big game in the bush
country. I put him in your charge; take men with you, and see that he
comes to no hurt. So also that you bring him before me within a month,
or your life shall answer for it. Let him be here at my royal kraal in
the first week of the new moon--when Nanea comes--and then I will tell
you whether or no I agree with you that she is fair. Go now, my child,
and you, White Man, go also; those who are to accompany you shall be
with you at the dawn. Farewell, but remember we meet again at the new
moon, when we will settle what pay you shall receive as keeper of my
guns. Do not fail me, White Man, or I shall send after you, and my
messengers are sometimes rough."
"This means that I am a prisoner," thought Hadden, "but it will go
hard if I cannot manage to give them the slip somehow. I don't intend
to stay in this country if war is declared, to be pounded into /mouti/
(medicine), or have my eyes put out, or any little joke of that sort."
*****
Ten days had passed, and one evening Hadden and his escort were
encamped in a wild stretch of mountainous country lying between the
Blood and Unvunyana Rivers, not more than eight miles from that "Place
of the Little Hand" which within a few weeks was to become famous
throughout the world by its native name of Isandhlwana. For three days
they had been tracking the spoor of a small herd of buffalo that still
inhabited the district, but as yet they had not come up with them. The
Zulu hunters had suggested that they should follow the Unvunyana down
towards the sea where game was more plentiful, but this neither
Hadden, nor the captain, Nahoon, had been anxious to do, for reasons
which each of them kept secret to himself. Hadden's object was to work
gradually down to the Buffalo River across which he hoped to effect a
retreat into Natal. That of Nahoon was to linger in the neighbourhood
of the kraal of Umgona, which was situated not very far from their
present camping place, in the vague hope that he might find an
opportunity of speaking with or at least of seeing Nanea, the girl to
whom he was affianced, who within a few weeks must be taken from him,
and given over to the king.
A more eerie-looking spot than that where they were encamped Hadden
had never seen. Behind them lay a tract of land--half-swamp and half-
bush--in which the buffalo were supposed to be hiding. Beyond, in
lonely grandeur, rose the mountain of Isandhlwana, while in front was
an amphitheatre of the most gloomy forest, ringed round in the
distance by sheer-sided hills. Into this forest there ran a river
which drained the swamp, placidly enough upon the level. But it was
not always level, for within three hundred yards of them it dashed
suddenly over a precipice, of no great height but very steep, falling
into a boiling rock-bound pool that the light of the sun never seemed
to reach.
"What is the name of that forest, Nahoon?" asked Hadden.
"It is named /Emagudu/, The Home of the Dead," the Zulu replied
absently, for he was looking towards the kraal of Nanea, which was
situated at an hour's walk away over the ridge to the right.
"The Home of the Dead! Why?"
"Because the dead live there, those whom we name the /Esemkofu/, the
Speechless Ones, and with them other Spirits, the /Amahlosi/, from
whom the breath of life has passed away, and who yet live on."
"Indeed," said Hadden, "and have you ever seen these ghosts?"
"Am I mad that I should go to look for them, White Man? Only the dead
enter that forest, and it is on the borders of it that our people make
offerings to the dead."
Followed by Nahoon, Hadden walked to the edge of the cliff and looked
over it. To the left lay the deep and dreadful-looking pool, while
close to the bank of it, placed upon a narrow strip of turf between
the cliff and the commencement of the forest, was a hut.
"Who lives there?" asked Hadden.
"The great /Isanusi/--she who is named /Inyanga/ or Doctoress; she who
is named Inyosi (the Bee), because she gathers wisdom from the dead
who grow in the forest."
"Do you think that she could gather enough wisdom to tell me whether I
am going to kill any buffalo, Nahoon?"
"Mayhap, White Man, but," he added with a little smile, "those who
visit the Bee's hive may hear nothing, or they may hear more than they
wish for. The words of that Bee have a sting."
"Good; I will see if she can sting me."
"So be it," said Nahoon; and turning, he led the way along the cliff
till he reached a native path which zig-zagged down its face.
By this path they climbed till they came to the sward at the foot of
the descent, and walked up it to the hut which was surrounded by a low
fence of reeds, enclosing a small court-yard paved with ant-heap earth
beaten hard and polished. In this court-yard sat the Bee, her stool
being placed almost at the mouth of the round opening that served as a
doorway to the hut. At first all that Hadden could see of her,
crouched as she was in the shadow, was a huddled shape wrapped round
with a greasy and tattered catskin kaross, above the edge of which
appeared two eyes, fierce and quick as those of a leopard. At her feet
smouldered a little fire, and ranged around it in a semi-circle were a
number of human skulls, placed in pairs as though they were talking
together, whilst other bones, to all appearance also human, were
festooned about the hut and the fence of the courtyard.
"I see that the old lady is set up with the usual properties," thought
Hadden, but he said nothing.
Nor did the witch-doctoress say anything; she only fixed her beady
eyes upon his face. Hadden returned the compliment, staring at her
with all his might, till suddenly he became aware that he was
vanquished in this curious duel. His brain grew confused, and to his
fancy it seemed that the woman before him had shifted shape into the
likeness of colossal and horrid spider sitting at the mouth of her
trap, and that these bones were the relics of her victims.
"Why do you not speak, White Man?" she said at last in a slow clear
voice. "Well, there is no need, since I can read your thoughts. You
are thinking that I who am called the Bee should be better named the
Spider. Have no fear; I did not kill these men. What would it profit
me when the dead are so many? I suck the souls of men, not their
bodies, White Man. It is their living hearts I love to look on, for
therein I read much and thereby I grow wise. Now what would you of the
Bee, White Man, the Bee that labours in this Garden of Death, and--
what brings /you/ here, son of Zomba? Why are you not with the Umcityu
now that they doctor themselves for the great war--the last war--the
war of the white and the black--or if you have no stomach for
fighting, why are you not at the side of Nanea the tall, Nanea the
fair?"
Nahoon made no answer, but Hadden said:--
"A small thing, mother. I would know if I shall prosper in my
hunting."
"In your hunting, White Man; what hunting? The hunting of game, of
money, or of women? Well, one of them, for a-hunting you must ever be;
that is your nature, to hunt and be hunted. Tell me now, how goes the
wound of that trader who tasted of your steel yonder in the town of
the Maboon (Boers)? No need to answer, White Man, but what fee, Chief,
for the poor witch-doctoress whose skill you seek," she added in a
whining voice. "Surely you would not that an old woman should work
without a fee?"
"I have none to offer you, mother, so I will be going," said Hadden,
who began to feel himself satisfied with this display of the Bee's
powers of observation and thought-reading.
"Nay," she answered with an unpleasant laugh, "would you ask a
question, and not wait for the answer? I will take no fee from you at
present, White Man; you shall pay me later on when we meet again," and
once more she laughed. "Let me look in your face, let me look in your
face," she continued, rising and standing before him.
Then of a sudden Hadden felt something cold at the back of his neck,
and the next instant the Bee had sprung from him, holding between her
thumb and finger a curl of dark hair which she had cut from his head.
The action was so instantaneous that he had neither time to avoid nor
to resent it, but stood still staring at her stupidly.
"That is all I need," she cried, "for like my heart my magic is white.
Stay--son of Zomba, give me also of your hair, for those who visit the
Bee must listen to her humming."
Nahoon obeyed, cutting a little lock from his head with the sharp edge
of his assegai, though it was very evident that he did this not
because he wished to do so, but because he feared to refuse.
Then the Bee slipped back her kaross, and stood bending over the fire
before them, into which she threw herbs taken from a pouch that was
bound about her middle. She was still a finely-shaped woman, and she
wore none of the abominations which Hadden had been accustomed to see
upon the persons of witch-doctoresses. About her neck, however, was a
curious ornament, a small live snake, red and grey in hue, which her
visitors recognised as one of the most deadly to be found in that part
of the country. It is not unusual for Bantu witch-doctors thus to
decorate themselves with snakes, though whether or not their fangs
have first been extracted no one seems to know.
Presently the herbs began to smoulder, and the smoke of them rose up
in a thin, straight stream, that, striking upon the face of the Bee,
clung about her head enveloping it as though with a strange blue veil.
Then of a sudden she stretched out her hands, and let fall the two
locks of hair upon the burning herbs, where they writhed themselves to
ashes like things alive. Next she opened her mouth, and began to draw
the fumes of the hair and herbs into her lungs in great gulps; while
the snake, feeling the influence of the medicine, hissed and,
uncoiling itself from about her neck, crept upwards and took refuge
among the black /saccaboola/ feathers of her head-dress.
Soon the vapours began to do their work; she swayed to and fro
muttering, then sank back against the hut, upon the straw of which her
head rested. Now the Bee's face was turned upwards towards the light,
and it was ghastly to behold, for it had become blue in colour, and
the open eyes were sunken like the eyes of one dead, whilst above her
forehead the red snake wavered and hissed, reminding Hadden of the
Uraeus crest on the brow of statues of Egyptian kings. For ten seconds
or more she remained thus, then she spoke in a hollow and unnatural
voice:--
"O Black Heart and body that is white and beautiful, I look into your
heart, and it is black as blood, and it shall be black with blood.
Beautiful white body with black heart, you shall find your game and
hunt it, and it shall lead you into the House of the Homeless, into
the Home of the Dead, and it shall be shaped as a bull, it shall be
shaped as a tiger, it shall be shaped as a woman whom kings and waters
cannot harm. Beautiful white body and black heart, you shall be paid
your wages, money for money, and blow for blow. Think of my word when
the spotted cat purrs above your breast; think of it when the battle
roars about you; think of it when you grasp your great reward, and for
the last time stand face to face with the ghost of the dead in the
Home of the Dead.
"O White Heart and black body, I look into your heart and it is white
as milk, and the milk of innocence shall save it. Fool, why do you
strike that blow? Let him be who is loved of the tiger, and whose love
is as the love of a tiger. Ah! what face is that in the battle? Follow
it, follow it, O swift of foot; but follow warily, for the tongue that
has lied will never plead for mercy, and the hand that can betray is
strong in war. White Heart, what is death? In death life lives, and
among the dead you shall find the life you lost, for there awaits you
she whom kings and waters cannot harm."
As the Bee spoke, by degrees her voice sank lower and lower till it
was almost inaudible. Then it ceased altogether and she seemed to pass
from trance to sleep. Hadden, who had been listening to her with an
amused and cynical smile, now laughed aloud.
"Why do you laugh, White Man?" asked Nahoon angrily.
"I laugh at my own folly in wasting time listening to the nonsense of
that lying fraud."
"It is no nonsense, White Man."
"Indeed? Then will you tell me what it means?"
"I cannot tell you what it means yet, but her words have to do with a
woman and a leopard, and with your fate and my fate."
Hadden shrugged his shoulders, not thinking the matter worth further
argument, and at that moment the Bee woke up shivering, drew the red
snake from her head-dress and coiling it about her throat wrapped
herself again in the greasy kaross.
"Are you satisfied with my wisdom, /Inkoos/?" she asked of Hadden.
"I am satisfied that you are one of the cleverest cheats in Zululand,
mother," he answered coolly. "Now, what is there to pay?"
The Bee took no offence at this rude speech, though for a second or
two the look in her eyes grew strangely like that which they had seen
in those of the snake when the fumes of the fire made it angry.
"If the white lord says I am a cheat, it must be so," she answered,
"for he of all men should be able to discern a cheat. I have said that
I ask no fee;--yes, give me a little tobacco from your pouch."
Hadden opened the bag of antelope hide and drawing some tobacco from
it, gave it to her. In taking it she clasped his hand and examined the
gold ring that was upon the third finger, a ring fashioned like a
snake with two little rubies set in the head to represent the eyes.
"I wear a snake about my neck, and you wear one upon your hand,
/Inkoos/. I should like to have this ring to wear upon my hand, so
that the snake about my neck may be less lonely there."
"Then I am afraid you will have to wait till I am dead," said Hadden.
"Yes, yes," she answered in a pleased voice, "it is a good word. I
will wait till you are dead and then I will take the ring, and none
can say that I have stolen it, for Nahoon there will bear me witness
that you gave me permission to do so."
For the first time Hadden started, since there was something about the
Bee's tone that jarred upon him. Had she addressed him in her
professional manner, he would have thought nothing of it; but in her
cupidity she had become natural, and it was evident that she spoke
from conviction, believing her own words.
She saw him start, and instantly changed her note.
"Let the white lord forgive the jest of a poor old witch-doctoress,"
she said in a whining voice. "I have so much to do with Death that his
name leaps to my lips," and she glanced first at the circle of skulls
about her, then towards the waterfall that fed the gloomy pool upon
whose banks her hut was placed.
"Look," she said simply.
Following the line of her outstretched hand Hadden's eyes fell upon
two withered mimosa trees which grew over the fall almost at right
angles to its rocky edge. These trees were joined together by a rude
platform made of logs of wood lashed down with /riems/ of hide. Upon
this platform stood three figures; notwithstanding the distance and
the spray of the fall, he could see that they were those of two men
and a girl, for their shapes stood out distinctly against the fiery
red of the sunset sky. One instant there were three, the next there
were two--for the girl had gone, and something dark rushing down the
face of the fall, struck the surface of the pool with a heavy thud,
while a faint and piteous cry broke upon his ear.
"What is the meaning of that?" he asked, horrified and amazed.
"Nothing," answered the Bee with a laugh. "Do you not know, then, that
this is the place where faithless women, or girls who have loved
without the leave of the king, are brought to meet their death, and
with them their accomplices. Oh! they die here thus each day, and I
watch them die and keep the count of the number of them," and drawing
a tally-stick from the thatch of the hut, she took a knife and added a
notch to the many that appeared upon it, looking at Nahoon the while
with a half-questioning, half-warning gaze.
"Yes, yes, it is a place of death," she muttered. "Up yonder the quick
die day by day and down there"--and she pointed along the course of
the river beyond the pool to where the forest began some two hundred
yards from her hut--"the ghosts of them have their home. Listen!"
As she spoke, a sound reached their ears that seemed to swell from the
dim skirts of the forests, a peculiar and unholy sound which it is
impossible to define more accurately than by saying that it seemed
beastlike, and almost inarticulate.
"Listen," repeated the Bee, "they are merry yonder."
"Who?" asked Hadden; "the baboons?"
"No, /Inkoos/, the /Amatongo/--the ghosts that welcome her who has
just become of their number."
"Ghosts," said Hadden roughly, for he was angry at his own tremors, "I
should like to see those ghosts. Do you think that I have never heard
a troop of monkeys in the bush before, mother? Come, Nahoon, let us be
going while there is light to climb the cliff. Farewell."
"Farewell /Inkoos/, and doubt not that your wish will be fulfilled. Go
in peace /Inkoos/--to sleep in peace." _
Read next: CHAPTER III - THE END OF THE HUNT
Read previous: CHAPTER I - PHILIP HADDEN AND KING CETYWAYO
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