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diff --git a/2727-h/2727-h.htm b/2727-h/2727-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..fb9c787 --- /dev/null +++ b/2727-h/2727-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,6724 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" +"http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en"> +<head> +<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=utf-8" /> +<meta http-equiv="Content-Style-Type" content="text/css" /> +<title>The Project Gutenberg eBook of Allan's Wife, by H. Rider Haggard</title> + +<style type="text/css"> + +body { margin-left: 20%; + margin-right: 20%; + text-align: justify; } + +h1, h2, h3, h4, h5 {text-align: center; font-style: normal; font-weight: +normal; line-height: 1.5; margin-top: .5em; margin-bottom: .5em;} + +h1 {font-size: 300%; + margin-top: 0.6em; + margin-bottom: 0.6em; + letter-spacing: 0.12em; + word-spacing: 0.2em; + text-indent: 0em;} +h2 {font-size: 150%; margin-top: 2em; margin-bottom: 1em;} +h3 {font-size: 130%; margin-top: 1em;} +h4 {font-size: 120%;} +h5 {font-size: 110%;} + +.no-break {page-break-before: avoid;} /* for epubs */ + +div.chapter {page-break-before: always; margin-top: 4em;} + +hr {width: 80%; margin-top: 2em; margin-bottom: 2em;} + +p {text-indent: 1em; + margin-top: 0.25em; + margin-bottom: 0.25em; } + +p.poem {text-indent: 0%; + margin-left: 10%; + font-size: 90%; + margin-top: 1em; + margin-bottom: 1em; } + +p.letter {text-indent: 0%; + margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + margin-top: 1em; + margin-bottom: 1em; } + +p.center {text-align: center; + text-indent: 0em; + margin-top: 1em; + margin-bottom: 1em; } + +p.footnote {font-size: 90%; + text-indent: 0%; + margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + margin-top: 1em; + margin-bottom: 1em; } + +a:link {color:blue; text-decoration:none} +a:visited {color:blue; text-decoration:none} +a:hover {color:red} + +</style> + +</head> + +<body> + +<div style='text-align:center; font-size:1.2em; font-weight:bold;'>The Project Gutenberg eBook of Allan’s Wife, by H. Rider Haggard</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and +most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions +whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms +of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online +at <a href="https://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a>. If you +are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the +country where you are located before using this eBook. +</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Title: Allan’s Wife</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Author: H. Rider Haggard</div> +<div style='display:block;margin:1em 0'>Release Date: July, 2001 [eBook #2727]<br /> +[Most recently updated: April 20, 2021]</div> +<div style='display:block;margin:1em 0'>Language: English</div> +<div style='display:block;margin:1em 0'>Character set encoding: UTF-8</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Produced by: John Bickers, Dagny and David Widger</div> +<div style='margin-top:2em;margin-bottom:4em'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ALLAN’S WIFE ***</div> + +<h1>Allan’s Wife</h1> + +<h2 class="no-break">by H. Rider Haggard</h2> + +<hr /> + +<h2>Contents</h2> + +<table summary="" style=""> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap01">CHAPTER I. EARLY DAYS</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap02">CHAPTER II. THE FIRE-FIGHT</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap03">CHAPTER III. NORTHWARDS</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap04">CHAPTER IV. THE ZULU IMPI</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap05">CHAPTER V. THE END OF THE LAAGER</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap06">CHAPTER VI. STELLA</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap07">CHAPTER VII. THE BABOON-WOMAN</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap08">CHAPTER VIII. THE MARBLE KRAALS</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap09">CHAPTER IX. “LET US GO IN, ALLAN!”</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap10">CHAPTER X. HENDRIKA PLOTS EVIL</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap11">CHAPTER XI. GONE!</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap12">CHAPTER XII. THE MAGIC OF INDABA-ZIMBI</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap13">CHAPTER XIII. WHAT HAPPENED TO STELLA</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap14">CHAPTER XIV. FIFTEEN YEARS AFTER</a></td> +</tr> + +</table> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<p class="center"> +DEDICATION +</p> + +<p class="letter"> + My Dear Macumazahn,<br/> + It was your native name which I borrowed at the christening of that Allan +who has become as well known to me as any other friend I have. It is therefore +fitting that I should dedicate to you this, his last tale—the story of +his wife, and the history of some further adventures which befell him. They +will remind you of many an African yarn—that with the baboons may recall +an experience of your own which I did not share. And perhaps they will do more +than this. Perhaps they will bring back to you some of the long past romance of +days that are lost to us. The country of which Allan Quatermain tells his tale +is now, for the most part, as well known and explored as are the fields of +Norfolk. Where we shot and trekked and galloped, scarcely seeing the face of +civilized man, there the gold-seeker builds his cities. The shadow of the flag +of Britain has, for a while, ceased to fall on the Transvaal plains; the game +has gone; the misty charm of the morning has become the glare of day. All is +changed. The blue gums that we planted in the garden of the +“Palatial” must be large trees by now, and the +“Palatial” itself has passed from us. Jess sat in it waiting for +her love after we were gone. There she nursed him back to life. But Jess is +dead, and strangers own it, or perhaps it is a ruin.<br/> + For us too, Macumazahn, as for the land we loved, the mystery and promise +of the morning are outworn; the mid-day sun burns overhead, and at times the +way is weary. Few of those we knew are left. Some are victims to battle and +murder, their bones strew the veldt; death has taken some in a more gentle +fashion; others are hidden from us, we know not where. We might well fear to +return to that land lest we also should see ghosts. But though we walk apart +to-day, the past yet looks upon us with its unalterable eyes. Still we can +remember many a boyish enterprise and adventure, lightly undertaken, which now +would strike us as hazardous indeed. Still we can recall the long familiar line +of the Pretoria Horse, the face of war and panic, the weariness of midnight +patrols; aye, and hear the roar of guns echoed from the Shameful Hill.<br/> + To you then, Macumazahn, in perpetual memory of those eventful years of +youth which we passed together in the African towns and on the African veldt, I +dedicate these pages, subscribing myself now as always,<br/> + Your sincere friend,<br/> + Indanda.<br/> + To Arthur H. D. Cochrane, Esq. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2>ALLAN’S WIFE</h2> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap01"></a>CHAPTER I.<br/> +EARLY DAYS</h2> + +<p> +It may be remembered that in the last pages of his diary, written just before +his death, Allan Quatermain makes allusion to his long dead wife, stating that +he has written of her fully elsewhere. +</p> + +<p> +When his death was known, his papers were handed to myself as his literary +executor. Among them I found two manuscripts, of which the following is one. +The other is simply a record of events wherein Mr. Quatermain was not +personally concerned—a Zulu novel, the story of which was told to him by +the hero many years after the tragedy had occurred. But with this we have +nothing to do at present. +</p> + +<p> +I have often thought (Mr. Quatermain’s manuscript begins) that I would +set down on paper the events connected with my marriage, and the loss of my +most dear wife. Many years have now passed since that event, and to some extent +time has softened the old grief, though Heaven knows it is still keen enough. +On two or three occasions I have even begun the record. Once I gave it up +because the writing of it depressed me beyond bearing, once because I was +suddenly called away upon a journey, and the third time because a Kaffir boy +found my manuscript convenient for lighting the kitchen fire. +</p> + +<p> +But now that I am at leisure here in England, I will make a fourth attempt. If +I succeed, the story may serve to interest some one in after years when I am +dead and gone; before that I should not wish it to be published. It is a wild +tale enough, and suggests some curious reflections. +</p> + +<p> +I am the son of a missionary. My father was originally curate in charge of a +small parish in Oxfordshire. He had already been some ten years married to my +dear mother when he went there, and he had four children, of whom I was the +youngest. I remember faintly the place where we lived. It was an ancient long +grey house, facing the road. There was a very large tree of some sort in the +garden. It was hollow, and we children used to play about inside of it, and +knock knots of wood from the rough bark. We all slept in a kind of attic, and +my mother always came and kissed us when we were in bed. I used to wake up and +see her bending over me, a candle in her hand. There was a curious kind of pole +projecting from the wall over my bed. Once I was dreadfully frightened because +my eldest brother made me hang to it by my hands. That is all I remember about +our old home. It has been pulled down long ago, or I would journey there to see +it. +</p> + +<p> +A little further down the road was a large house with big iron gates to it, and +on the top of the gate pillars sat two stone lions, which were so hideous that +I was afraid of them. Perhaps this sentiment was prophetic. One could see the +house by peeping through the bars of the gates. It was a gloomy-looking place, +with a tall yew hedge round it; but in the summer-time some flowers grew about +the sun-dial in the grass plat. This house was called the Hall, and Squire +Carson lived there. One Christmas—it must have been the Christmas before +my father emigrated, or I should not remember it—we children went to a +Christmas-tree festivity at the Hall. There was a great party there, and +footmen wearing red waistcoats stood at the door. In the dining-room, which was +panelled with black oak, was the Christmas-tree. Squire Carson stood in front +of it. He was a tall, dark man, very quiet in his manners, and he wore a bunch +of seals on his waistcoat. We used to think him old, but as a matter of fact he +was then not more than forty. He had been, as I afterwards learned, a great +traveller in his youth, and some six or seven years before this date he married +a lady who was half a Spaniard—a papist, my father called her. I can +remember her well. She was small and very pretty, with a rounded figure, large +black eyes, and glittering teeth. She spoke English with a curious accent. I +suppose that I must have been a funny child to look at, and I know that my hair +stood up on my head then as it does now, for I still have a sketch of myself +that my mother made of me, in which this peculiarity is strongly marked. On +this occasion of the Christmas-tree I remember that Mrs. Carson turned to a +tall, foreign-looking gentleman who stood beside her, and, tapping him +affectionately on the shoulder with her gold eye-glasses, said— +</p> + +<p> +“Look, cousin—look at that droll little boy with the big brown +eyes; his hair is like a—what you call him?—scrubbing-brush. Oh, +what a droll little boy!” +</p> + +<p> +The tall gentleman pulled at his moustache, and, taking Mrs. Carson’s +hand in his, began to smooth my hair down with it till I heard her +whisper— +</p> + +<p> +“Leave go my hand, cousin. Thomas is looking like—like the +thunderstorm.” +</p> + +<p> +Thomas was the name of Mr. Carson, her husband. +</p> + +<p> +After that I hid myself as well as I could behind a chair, for I was shy, and +watched little Stella Carson, who was the squire’s only child, giving the +children presents off the tree. She was dressed as Father Christmas, with some +soft white stuff round her lovely little face, and she had large dark eyes, +which I thought more beautiful than anything I had ever seen. At last it came +to my turn to receive a present—oddly enough, considered in the light of +future events, it was a large monkey. Stella reached it down from one of the +lower boughs of the tree and handed it to me, saying— +</p> + +<p> +“Dat is my Christmas present to you, little Allan Quatermain.” +</p> + +<p> +As she did so her sleeve, which was covered with cotton wool, spangled over +with something that shone, touched one of the tapers and caught fire—how +I do not know—and the flame ran up her arm towards her throat. She stood +quite still. I suppose that she was paralysed with fear; and the ladies who +were near screamed very loud, but did nothing. Then some impulse seized +me—perhaps instinct would be a better word to use, considering my age. I +threw myself upon the child, and, beating at the fire with my hands, mercifully +succeeded in extinguishing it before it really got hold. My wrists were so +badly scorched that they had to be wrapped up in wool for a long time +afterwards, but with the exception of a single burn upon her throat, little +Stella Carson was not much hurt. +</p> + +<p> +This is all that I remember about the Christmas-tree at the Hall. What happened +afterwards is lost to me, but to this day in my sleep I sometimes see little +Stella’s sweet face and the stare of terror in her dark eyes as the fire +ran up her arm. This, however, is not wonderful, for I had, humanly speaking, +saved the life of her who was destined to be my wife. +</p> + +<p> +The next event which I can recall clearly is that my mother and three brothers +all fell ill of fever, owing, as I afterwards learned, to the poisoning of our +well by some evil-minded person, who threw a dead sheep into it. +</p> + +<p> +It must have been while they were ill that Squire Carson came one day to the +vicarage. The weather was still cold, for there was a fire in the study, and I +sat before the fire writing letters on a piece of paper with a pencil, while my +father walked up and down the room talking to himself. Afterwards I knew that +he was praying for the lives of his wife and children. Presently a servant came +to the door and said that some one wanted to see him. +</p> + +<p> +“It is the squire, sir,” said the maid, “and he says he +particularly wishes to see you.” +</p> + +<p> +“Very well,” answered my father, wearily, and presently Squire +Carson came in. His face was white and haggard, and his eyes shone so fiercely +that I was afraid of him. +</p> + +<p> +“Forgive me for intruding on you at such a time, Quatermain,” he +said, in a hoarse voice, “but to-morrow I leave this place for ever, and +I wish to speak to you before I go—indeed, I must speak to you.” +</p> + +<p> +“Shall I send Allan away?” said my father, pointing to me. +</p> + +<p> +“No; let him bide. He will not understand.” Nor, indeed, did I at +the time, but I remembered every word, and in after years their meaning grew on +me. +</p> + +<p> +“First tell me,” he went on, “how are they?” and he +pointed upwards with his thumb. +</p> + +<p> +“My wife and two of the boys are beyond hope,” my father answered, +with a groan. “I do not know how it will go with the third. The +Lord’s will be done!” +</p> + +<p> +“The Lord’s will be done,” the squire echoed, solemnly. +“And now, Quatermain, listen—my wife’s gone.” +</p> + +<p> +“Gone!” my father answered. “Who with?” +</p> + +<p> +“With that foreign cousin of hers. It seems from a letter she left me +that she always cared for him, not for me. She married me because she thought +me a rich English milord. Now she has run through my property, or most of it, +and gone. I don’t know where. Luckily, she did not care to encumber her +new career with the child; Stella is left to me.” +</p> + +<p> +“That is what comes of marrying a papist, Carson,” said my father. +That was his fault; he was as good and charitable a man as ever lived, but he +was bigoted. “What are you going to do—follow her?” +</p> + +<p> +He laughed bitterly in answer. +</p> + +<p> +“Follow her!” he said; “why should I follow her? If I met her +I might kill her or him, or both of them, because of the disgrace they have +brought upon my child’s name. No, I never want to look upon her face +again. I trusted her, I tell you, and she has betrayed me. Let her go and find +her fate. But I am going too. I am weary of my life.” +</p> + +<p> +“Surely, Carson, surely,” said my father, “you do not +mean——” +</p> + +<p> +“No, no; not that. Death comes soon enough. But I will leave this +civilized world which is a lie. We will go right away into the wilds, I and my +child, and hide our shame. Where? I don’t know where. Anywhere, so long +as there are no white faces, no smooth educated tongues——” +</p> + +<p> +“You are mad, Carson,” my father answered. “How will you +live? How can you educate Stella? Be a man and wear it down.” +</p> + +<p> +“I will be a man, and I will wear it down, but not here, Quatermain. +Education! Was not she—that woman who was my wife—was not she +highly educated?—the cleverest woman in the country forsooth. Too clever +for me, Quatermain—too clever by half! No, no, Stella shall be brought up +in a different school; if it be possible, she shall forget her very name. +Good-bye, old friend, good-bye for ever. Do not try to find me out, henceforth +I shall be like one dead to you, to you and all I knew,” and he was gone. +</p> + +<p> +“Mad,” said my father, with a heavy sigh. “His trouble has +turned his brain. But he will think better of it.” +</p> + +<p> +At that moment the nurse came hurrying in and whispered something in his ear. +My father’s face turned deadly pale. He clutched at the table to support +himself, then staggered from the room. My mother was dying! +</p> + +<p> +It was some days afterwards, I do not know exactly how long, that my father +took me by the hand and led me upstairs into the big room which had been my +mother’s bedroom. There she lay, dead in her coffin, with flowers in her +hand. Along the wall of the room were arranged three little white beds, and on +each of the beds lay one of my brothers. They all looked as though they were +asleep, and they all had flowers in their hands. My father told me to kiss +them, because I should not see them any more, and I did so, though I was very +frightened. I did not know why. Then he took me in his arms and kissed me. +</p> + +<p> +“The Lord hath given,” he said, “and the Lord hath taken +away; blessed be the name of the Lord.” +</p> + +<p> +I cried very much, and he took me downstairs, and after that I have only a +confused memory of men dressed in black carrying heavy burdens towards the grey +churchyard! +</p> + +<p> +Next comes a vision of a great ship and wide tossing waters. My father could no +longer bear to live in England after the loss that had fallen on him, and made +up his mind to emigrate to South Africa. We must have been poor at the +time—indeed, I believe that a large portion of our income went from my +father on my mother’s death. At any rate we travelled with the steerage +passengers, and the intense discomfort of the journey with the rough ways of +our fellow emigrants still remain upon my mind. At last it came to an end, and +we reached Africa, which I was not to leave again for many, many years. +</p> + +<p> +In those days civilization had not made any great progress in Southern Africa. +My father went up the country and became a missionary among the Kaffirs, near +to where the town of Cradock now stands, and here I grew to manhood. There were +a few Boer farmers in the neighbourhood, and gradually a little settlement of +whites gathered round our mission station—a drunken Scotch blacksmith and +wheelwright was about the most interesting character, who, when he was sober, +could quote the Scottish poet Burns and the Ingoldsby Legends, then recently +published, literally by the page. It was from that I contracted a fondness for +the latter amusing writings, which has never left me. Burns I never cared for +so much, probably because of the Scottish dialect which repelled me. What +little education I got was from my father, but I never had much leaning towards +books, nor he much time to teach them to me. On the other hand, I was always a +keen observer of the ways of men and nature. By the time that I was twenty I +could speak Dutch and three or four Kaffir dialects perfectly, and I doubt if +there was anybody in South Africa who understood native ways of thought and +action more completely than I did. Also I was really a very good shot and +horseman, and I think—as, indeed, my subsequent career proves to have +been the case—a great deal tougher than the majority of men. Though I was +then, as now, light and small, nothing seemed to tire me. I could bear any +amount of exposure and privation, and I never met the native who was my master +in feats of endurance. Of course, all that is different now, I am speaking of +my early manhood. +</p> + +<p> +It may be wondered that I did not run absolutely wild in such surroundings, but +I was held back from this by my father’s society. He was one of the +gentlest and most refined men that I ever met; even the most savage Kaffir +loved him, and his influence was a very good one for me. He used to call +himself one of the world’s failures. Would that there were more such +failures. Every morning when his work was done he would take his prayer-book +and, sitting on the little stoep or verandah of our station, would read the +evening psalms to himself. Sometimes there was not light enough for this, but +it made no difference, he knew them all by heart. When he had finished he would +look out across the cultivated lands where the mission Kaffirs had their huts. +</p> + +<p> +But I knew it was not these he saw, but rather the grey English church, and the +graves ranged side by side before the yew near the wicket gate. +</p> + +<p> +It was there on the stoep that he died. He had not been well, and one evening I +was talking to him, and his mind went back to Oxfordshire and my mother. He +spoke of her a good deal, saying that she had never been out of his mind for a +single day during all these years, and that he rejoiced to think he was drawing +near that land whither she had gone. Then he asked me if I remembered the night +when Squire Carson came into the study at the vicarage, and told him that his +wife had run away, and that he was going to change his name and bury himself in +some remote land. +</p> + +<p> +I answered that I remembered it perfectly. +</p> + +<p> +“I wonder where he went to,” said my father, “and if he and +his daughter Stella are still alive. Well, well! I shall never meet them again. +But life is a strange thing, Allan, and you may. If you ever do, give them my +kind love.” +</p> + +<p> +After that I left him. We had been suffering more than usual from the +depredations of the Kaffir thieves, who stole our sheep at night, and, as I had +done before, and not without success, I determined to watch the kraal and see +if I could catch them. Indeed, it was from this habit of mine of watching at +night that I first got my native name of Macumazahn, which may be roughly +translated as “he who sleeps with one eye open.” So I took my rifle +and rose to go. But he called me to him and kissed me on the forehead, saying, +“God bless you, Allan! I hope that you will think of your old father +sometimes, and that you will lead a good and happy life.” +</p> + +<p> +I remember that I did not much like his tone at the time, but set it down to an +attack of low spirits, to which he grew very subject as the years went on. I +went down to the kraal and watched till within an hour of sunrise; then, as no +thieves appeared, returned to the station. As I came near I was astonished to +see a figure sitting in my father’s chair. At first I thought it must be +a drunken Kaffir, then that my father had fallen asleep there. +</p> + +<p> +And so he had,—for he was dead! +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap02"></a>CHAPTER II.<br/> +THE FIRE-FIGHT</h2> + +<p> +When I had buried my father, and seen a successor installed in his +place—for the station was the property of the Society—I set to work +to carry out a plan which I had long cherished, but been unable to execute +because it would have involved separation from my father. Put shortly, it was +to undertake a trading journey of exploration right through the countries now +known as the Free State and the Transvaal, and as much further North as I could +go. It was an adventurous scheme, for though the emigrant Boers had begun to +occupy positions in these territories, they were still to all practical +purposes unexplored. But I was now alone in the world, and it mattered little +what became of me; so, driven on by the overmastering love of adventure, which, +old as I am, will perhaps still be the cause of my death, I determined to +undertake the journey. +</p> + +<p> +Accordingly I sold such stock and goods as we had upon the station, reserving +only the two best waggons and two spans of oxen. The proceeds I invested in +such goods as were then in fashion, for trading purposes, and in guns and +ammunition. The guns would have moved any modern explorer to merriment; but +such as they were I managed to do a good deal of execution with them. One of +them was a single-barrelled, smooth bore, fitted for percussion caps—a +roer we called it—which threw a three-ounce ball, and was charged with a +handful of coarse black powder. Many is the elephant that I killed with that +roer, although it generally knocked me backwards when I fired it, which I only +did under compulsion. The best of the lot, perhaps, was a double-barrelled No. +12 shot-gun, but it had flint locks. Also there were some old tower muskets, +which might or might not throw straight at seventy yards. I took six Kaffirs +with me, and three good horses, which were supposed to be salted—that is, +proof against the sickness. Among the Kaffirs was an old fellow named +Indaba-zimbi, which, being translated, means “tongue of iron.” I +suppose he got this name from his strident voice and exhaustless eloquence. +This man was a great character in his way. He had been a noted witch-doctor +among a neighbouring tribe, and came to the station under the following +circumstances, which, as he plays a considerable part in this history, are +perhaps worth recording. +</p> + +<p> +Two years before my father’s death I had occasion to search the country +round for some lost oxen. After a long and useless quest it occurred to me that +I had better go to the place where the oxen were bred by a Kaffir chief, whose +name I forget, but whose kraal was about fifty miles from our station. There I +journeyed, and found the oxen safe at home. The chief entertained me +handsomely, and on the following morning I went to pay my respects to him +before leaving, and was somewhat surprised to find a collection of some +hundreds of men and women sitting round him anxiously watching the sky in which +the thunder-clouds were banking up in a very ominous way. +</p> + +<p> +“You had better wait, white man,” said the chief, “and see +the rain-doctors fight the lightning.” +</p> + +<p> +I inquired what he meant, and learned that this man, Indaba-zimbi, had for some +years occupied the position of wizard-in-chief to the tribe, although he was +not a member of it, having been born in the country now known as Zululand. But +a son of the chief’s, a man of about thirty, had lately set up as a rival +in supernatural powers. This irritated Indaba-zimbi beyond measure, and a +quarrel ensued between the two witch-doctors that resulted in a challenge to +trial by lightning being given and accepted. These were the conditions. The +rivals must await the coming of a serious thunderstorm, no ordinary tempest +would serve their turn. Then, carrying assegais in their hands, they must take +their stand within fifty paces of each other upon a certain patch of ground +where the big thunderbolts were observed to strike continually, and by the +exercise of their occult powers and invocations to the lightning, must strive +to avert death from themselves and bring it on their rival. The terms of this +singular match had been arranged a month previously, but no storm worthy of the +occasion had arisen. Now the local weather-prophets believed it to be brewing. +</p> + +<p> +I inquired what would happen if neither of the men were struck, and was told +that they must then wait for another storm. If they escaped the second time, +however, they would be held to be equal in power, and be jointly consulted by +the tribe upon occasions of importance. +</p> + +<p> +The prospect of being a spectator of so unusual a sight overcame my desire to +be gone, and I accepted the chief’s invitation to see it out. Before +mid-day I regretted it, for though the western heavens grew darker and darker, +and the still air heralded the coming of the storm, yet it did not come. By +four o’clock, however, it became obvious that it must burst soon—at +sunset, the old chief said, and in the company of the whole assembly I moved +down to the place of combat. The kraal was built on the top of a hill, and +below it the land sloped gently to the banks of a river about half a mile away. +On the hither side of the bank was the piece of land that was, the natives +said, “loved of the lightning.” Here the magicians took up their +stand, while the spectators grouped themselves on the hillside about two +hundred yards away—which was, I thought, rather too near to be pleasant. +When we had sat there for a while my curiosity overcame me, and I asked leave +of the chief to go down and inspect the arena. He said I might do so at my own +risk. I told him that the fire from above would not hurt white men, and went to +find that the spot was a bed of iron ore, thinly covered with grass, which of +course accounted for its attracting the lightning from the storms as they +travelled along the line of the river. At each end of this iron-stone area were +placed the combatants, Indaba-zimbi facing the east, and his rival the west, +and before each there burned a little fire made of some scented root. Moreover +they were dressed in all the paraphernalia of their craft, snakeskins, +fish-bladders, and I know not what beside, while round their necks hung +circlets of baboons’ teeth and bones from human hands. First I went to +the western end where the chief’s son stood. He was pointing with his +assegai towards the advancing storm, and invoking it in a voice of great +excitement. +</p> + +<p> +“Come, fire, and lick up Indaba-zimbi! +</p> + +<p> +“Hear me, Storm Devil, and lick Indaba-zimbi with your red tongue! +</p> + +<p> +“Spit on him with your rain! +</p> + +<p> +“Whirl him away in your breath! +</p> + +<p> +“Make him as nothing—melt the marrow in his bones! +</p> + +<p> +“Run into his heart and burn away the lies! +</p> + +<p> +“Show all the people who is the true Witch Finder! +</p> + +<p> +“Let me not be put to shame in the eyes of this white man!” +</p> + +<p> +Thus he spoke, or rather chanted, and all the while rubbed his broad +chest—for he was a very fine man—with some filthy compound of +medicine or <i>mouti</i>. +</p> + +<p> +After a while, getting tired of his song, I walked across the iron-stone, to +where Indaba-zimbi sat by his fire. He was not chanting at all, but his +performance was much more impressive. It consisted in staring at the eastern +sky, which was perfectly clear of cloud, and every now and again beckoning at +it with his finger, then turning round to point with the assegai towards his +rival. For a while I looked at him in silence. He was a curious wizened man, +apparently over fifty years of age, with thin hands that looked as tough as +wire. His nose was much sharper than is usual among these races, and he had a +queer habit of holding his head sideways like a bird when he spoke, which, in +addition to the humour that lurked in his eye, gave him a most comical +appearance. Another strange thing about him was that he had a single white lock +of hair among his black wool. At last I spoke to him: +</p> + +<p> +“Indaba-zimbi, my friend,” I said, “you may be a good +witch-doctor, but you are certainly a fool. It is no good beckoning at the blue +sky while your enemy is getting a start with the storm.” +</p> + +<p> +“You may be clever, but don’t think you know everything, white +man,” the old fellow answered, in a high, cracked voice, and with +something like a grin. +</p> + +<p> +“They call you Iron-tongue,” I went on; “you had better use +it, or the Storm Devil won’t hear you.” +</p> + +<p> +“The fire from above runs down iron,” he answered, “so I keep +my tongue quiet. Oh, yes, let him curse away, I’ll put him out presently. +Look now, white man.” +</p> + +<p> +I looked, and in the eastern sky there grew a cloud. At first it was small, +though very black, but it gathered with extraordinary rapidity. +</p> + +<p> +This was odd enough, but as I had seen the same thing happen before it did not +particularly astonish me. It is by no means unusual in Africa for two +thunderstorms to come up at the same time from different points of the compass. +</p> + +<p> +“You had better get on, Indaba-zimbi,” I said, “the big storm +is coming along fast, and will soon eat up that baby of yours,” and I +pointed to the west. +</p> + +<p> +“Babies sometimes grow to giants, white man,” said Indaba-zimbi, +beckoning away vigorously. “Look now at my cloud-child.” +</p> + +<p> +I looked; the eastern storm was spreading itself from earth to sky, and in +shape resembled an enormous man. There was its head, its shoulders, and its +legs; yes, it was like a huge giant travelling across the heavens. The light of +the setting sun escaping from beneath the lower edge of the western storm shot +across the intervening space in a sheet of splendour, and, lighting upon the +advancing figure of cloud, wrapped its middle in hues of glory too wonderful to +be described; but beneath and above this glowing belt his feet and head were +black as jet. Presently, as I watched, an awful flash of light shot from the +head of the cloud, circled it about as though with a crown of living fire, and +vanished. +</p> + +<p> +“Aha,” chuckled old Indaba-zimbi, “my little boy is putting +on his man’s ring,” and he tapped the gum ring on his own head, +which natives assume when they reach a certain age and dignity. “Now, +white man, unless you are a bigger wizard than either of us you had better +clear off, for the fire-fight is about to begin.” +</p> + +<p> +I thought this sound advice. +</p> + +<p> +“Good luck go with you, my black uncle,” I said. “I hope you +don’t feel the iniquities of a mis-spent life weighing on you at the +last.” +</p> + +<p> +“You look after yourself, and think of your own sins, young man,” +he answered, with a grim smile, and taking a pinch of snuff, while at that very +moment a flash of lightning, I don’t know from which storm, struck the +ground within thirty paces of me. That was enough for me, I took to my heels, +and as I went I heard old Indaba-zimbi’s dry chuckle of amusement. +</p> + +<p> +I climbed the hill till I came to where the chief was sitting with his indunas, +or headmen, and sat down near to him. I looked at the man’s face and saw +that he was intensely anxious for his son’s safety, and by no means +confident of the young man’s powers to resist the magic of Indaba-zimbi. +He was talking in a low voice to the induna next to him. I affected to take no +notice and to be concentrating my attention on the novel scene before me; but +in those days I had very quick ears, and caught the drift of the conversation. +</p> + +<p> +“Hearken!” the chief was saying, “if the magic of +Indaba-zimbi prevails against my son I will endure him no more. Of this I am +sure, that when he has slain my son he will slay me, me also, and make himself +chief in my place. I fear Indaba-zimbi. <i>Ou!</i>” +</p> + +<p> +“Black One,” answered the induna, “wizards die as dogs die, +and, once dead, dogs bark no more.” +</p> + +<p> +“And once dead,” said the chief, “wizards work no more +spells,” and he bent and whispered in the induna’s ear, looking at +the assegai in his hand as he whispered. +</p> + +<p> +“Good, my father, good!” said the induna, presently. “It +shall be done to-night, if the lightning does not do it first.” +</p> + +<p> +“A bad look-out for old Indaba-zimbi,” I said to myself. +“They mean to kill him.” Then I thought no more of the matter for a +while, the scene before me was too tremendous. +</p> + +<p> +The two storms were rapidly rushing together. Between them was a gulf of blue +sky, and from time to time flashes of blinding light passed across this gulf, +leaping from cloud to cloud. I remember that they reminded me of the story of +the heathen god Jove and his thunderbolts. The storm that was shaped like a +giant and ringed with the glory of the sinking sun made an excellent Jove, and +I am sure that the bolts which leapt from it could not have been surpassed even +in mythological times. Oddly enough, as yet the flashes were not followed by +thunder. A deadly stillness lay upon the place, the cattle stood silently on +the hillside, even the natives were awed to silence. Dark shadows crept along +the bosom of the hills, the river to the right and left was hidden in wreaths +of cloud, but before us and beyond the combatants it shone like a line of +silver beneath the narrowing space of open sky. Now the western tempest was +scrawled all over with lines of intolerable light, while the inky head of the +cloud-giant to the east was continually suffused with a white and deadly glow +that came and went in pulses, as though a blood of flame was being pumped into +it from the heart of the storm. +</p> + +<p> +The silence deepened and deepened, the shadows grew blacker and blacker, then +suddenly all nature began to moan beneath the breath of an icy wind. On sped +the wind; the smooth surface of the river was ruffled by it into little waves, +the tall grass bowed low before it, and in its wake came the hissing sound of +furious rain. +</p> + +<p> +Ah! the storms had met. From each there burst an awful blaze of dazzling flame, +and now the hill on which we sat rocked at the noise of the following thunder. +The light went out of the sky, darkness fell suddenly on the land, but not for +long. Presently the whole landscape grew vivid in the flashes, it appeared and +disappeared, now everything was visible for miles, now even the men at my side +vanished in the blackness. The thunder rolled and cracked and pealed like the +trump of doom, whirlwinds tore round, lifting dust and even stones high into +the air, and in a low, continuous undertone rose the hiss of the rushing rain. +</p> + +<p> +I put my hand before my eyes to shield them from the terrible glare, and looked +beneath it towards the lists of iron-stone. As flash followed flash, from time +to time I caught sight of the two wizards. They were slowly advancing towards +one another, each pointing at his foe with the assegai in his hand. I could see +their every movement, and it seemed to me that the chain lightning was striking +the iron-stone all round them. +</p> + +<p> +Suddenly the thunder and lightning ceased for a minute, everything grew black, +and, except for the rain, silent. +</p> + +<p> +“It is over one way or the other, chief,” I called out into the +darkness. +</p> + +<p> +“Wait, white man, wait!” answered the chief, in a voice thick with +anxiety and fear. +</p> + +<p> +Hardly were the words out of his mouth when the heavens were lit up again till +they literally seemed to flame. There were the men, not ten paces apart. A +great flash fell between them, I saw them stagger beneath the shock. +Indaba-zimbi recovered himself first—at any rate when the next flash came +he was standing bolt upright, pointing with his assegai towards his enemy. The +chief’s son was still on his legs, but he was staggering like a drunken +man, and the assegai had fallen from his hand. +</p> + +<p> +Darkness! then again a flash, more fearful, if possible, than any that had gone +before. To me it seemed to come from the east, right over the head of +Indaba-zimbi. At that instant I saw the chief’s son wrapped, as it were, +in the heart of it. Then the thunder pealed, the rain burst over us like a +torrent, and I saw no more. +</p> + +<p> +The worst of the storm was done, but for a while the darkness was so dense that +we could not move, nor, indeed, was I inclined to leave the safety of the +hillside where the lightning was never known to strike, and venture down to the +iron-stone. Occasionally there still came flashes, but, search as we would, we +could see no trace of either of the wizards. For my part, I believed that they +were both dead. Now the clouds slowly rolled away down the course of the river, +and with them went the rain; and now the stars shone in their wake. +</p> + +<p> +“Let us go and see,” said the old chief, rising and shaking the +water from his hair. “The fire-fight is ended, let us go and see who has +conquered.” +</p> + +<p> +I rose and followed him, dripping as though I had swum a hundred yards with my +clothes on, and after me came all the people of the kraal. +</p> + +<p> +We reached the spot; even in that light I could see where the iron-stone had +been split and fused by the thunderbolts. While I was staring about me, I +suddenly heard the chief, who was on my right, give a low moan, and saw the +people cluster round him. I went up and looked. There, on the ground, lay the +body of his son. It was a dreadful sight. The hair was burnt off his head, the +copper rings upon his arms were fused, the assegai handle which lay near was +literally shivered into threads, and, when I took hold of his arm, it seemed to +me that every bone of it was broken. +</p> + +<p> +The men with the chief stood gazing silently, while the women wailed. +</p> + +<p> +“Great is the magic of Indaba-zimbi!” said a man, at length. The +chief turned and struck him a heavy blow with the kerrie in his hand. +</p> + +<p> +“Great or not, thou dog, he shall die,” he cried, “and so +shalt thou if thou singest his praises so loudly.” +</p> + +<p> +I said nothing, but thinking it probable that Indaba-zimbi had shared the fate +of his enemy, I went to look. But I could see nothing of him, and at length, +being thoroughly chilled with the wet, started back to my waggon to change my +clothes. On reaching it, I was rather surprised to see a strange Kaffir seated +on the driving-box wrapped up in a blanket. +</p> + +<p> +“Hullo! come out of that,” I said. +</p> + +<p> +The figure on the box slowly unrolled the blanket, and with great deliberation +took a pinch of snuff. +</p> + +<p> +“It was a good fire-fight, white man, was it not?” said +Indaba-zimbi, in his high, cracked voice. “But he never had a chance +against me, poor boy. He knew nothing about it. See, white man, what becomes of +presumption in the young. It is sad, very sad, but I made the flashes fly, +didn’t I?” +</p> + +<p> +“You old humbug,” I said, “unless you are careful you will +soon learn what comes of presumption in the old, for your chief is after you +with an assegai, and it will take all your magic to dodge that.” +</p> + +<p> +“Now you don’t say so,” said Indaba-zimbi, clambering off the +waggon with rapidity; “and all because of this wretched upstart. +There’s gratitude for you, white man. I expose him, and they want to kill +me. Well, thank you for the hint. We shall meet again before long,” and +he was gone like a shot, and not too soon, for just then some of the +chief’s men came up to the waggon. +</p> + +<p> +On the following morning I started homewards. The first face I saw on arriving +at the station was that of Indaba-zimbi. +</p> + +<p> +“How do you do, Macumazahn?” he said, holding his head on one side +and nodding his white lock. “I hear you are Christians here, and I want +to try a new religion. Mine must be a bad one seeing that my people wanted to +kill me for exposing an impostor.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap03"></a>CHAPTER III.<br/> +NORTHWARDS</h2> + +<p> +I make no apology to myself, or to anybody who may happen to read this +narrative in future, for having set out the manner of my meeting with +Indaba-zimbi: first, because it was curious, and secondly, because he takes +some hand in the subsequent events. If that old man was a humbug, he was a very +clever one. What amount of truth there was in his pretensions to supernatural +powers it is not for me to determine, though I may have my own opinion on the +subject. But there was no mistake as to the extraordinary influence he +exercised over his fellow-natives. Also he quite got round my poor father. At +first the old gentleman declined to have him at the station, for he had a great +horror of these Kaffir wizards or witch-finders. But Indaba-zimbi persuaded him +that he was anxious to investigate the truths of Christianity, and challenged +him to a discussion. The argument lasted two years—to the time of my +father’s death, indeed. At the conclusion of each stage Indaba-zimbi +would remark, in the words of the Roman Governor, “Almost, praying white +man, thou persuadest me to become a Christian,” but he never quite became +one—indeed, I do not think he ever meant to. It was to him that my father +addressed his “Letters to a Native Doubter.” This work, which, +unfortunately, remains in manuscript, is full of wise saws and learned +instances. It ought to be published together with a <i>précis</i> of the +doubter’s answers, which were verbal. +</p> + +<p> +So the talk went on. If my father had lived I believe it would be going on now, +for both the disputants were quite inexhaustible. Meanwhile Indaba-zimbi was +allowed to live on the station on condition that he practised no witchcraft, +which my father firmly believed to be a wile of the devil. He said that he +would not, but for all that there was never an ox lost, or a sudden death, but +he was consulted by those interested. +</p> + +<p> +When he had been with us a year, a deputation came to him from the tribe he had +left, asking him to return. Things had not gone well with them since he went +away, they said, and now the chief, his enemy, was dead. Old Indaba-zimbi +listened to them till they had done, and, as he listened, raked sand into a +little heap with his toes. Then he spoke, pointing to the little heap, +“There is your tribe to-day,” he said. Then he lifted his heel and +stamped the heap flat. “There is your tribe before three moons are gone. +Nothing is left of it. You drove me away: I will have no more to do with you; +but when you are being killed think of my words.” +</p> + +<p> +The messengers went. Three months afterwards I heard that the whole community +had been wiped out by an Impi of raiding Pondos. +</p> + +<p> +When I was at length ready to start upon my expedition, I went to old +Indaba-zimbi to say good-bye to him, and was rather surprised to find him +engaged in rolling up medicine, assegais, and other sundries in his blankets. +</p> + +<p> +“Good-bye, Indaba-zimbi,” I said, “I am going to trek +north.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, Macumazahn,” he answered, with his head on one side; +“and so am I—I want to see that country. We will go +together.” +</p> + +<p> +“Will we!” I said; “wait till you are asked, you old +humbug.” +</p> + +<p> +“You had better ask me, then, Macumazahn, for if you don’t you will +never come back alive. Now that the old chief (my father) is gone to where the +storms come from,” and he nodded to the sky, “I feel myself getting +into bad habits again. So last night I just threw up the bones and worked out +about your journey, and I can tell you this, that if you don’t take me +you will die, and, what is more, you will lose one who is dearer to you than +life in a strange fashion. So just because you gave me that hint a couple of +years ago, I made up my mind to come with you.” +</p> + +<p> +“Don’t talk stuff to me,” I said. +</p> + +<p> +“Ah, very well, Macumazahn, very well; but what happened to my own people +six months ago, and what did I tell the messengers would happen? They drove me +away, and they are gone. If you drive me away you will soon be gone too,” +and he nodded his white lock at me and smiled. Now I was not more superstitious +than other people, but somehow old Indaba-zimbi impressed me. Also I knew his +extraordinary influence over every class of native, and bethought me that he +might be useful in that way. +</p> + +<p> +“All right,” I said: “I appoint you witch-finder to the +expedition without pay.” +</p> + +<p> +“First serve, then ask for wages,” he answered. “I am glad to +see that you have enough imagination not to be altogether a fool, like most +white men, Macumazahn. Yes, yes, it is want of imagination that makes people +fools; they won’t believe what they can’t understand. You +can’t understand my prophecies any more than the fool at the kraal could +understand that I was his master with the lightning. Well, it is time to trek, +but if I were you, Macumazahn, I should take one waggon, not two.” +</p> + +<p> +“Why?” I said. +</p> + +<p> +“Because you will lose your waggons, and it is better to lose one than +two.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, nonsense!” I said. +</p> + +<p> +“All right, Macumazahn, live and learn.” And without another word +he walked to the foremost waggon, put his bundle into it, and climbed on to the +front seat. +</p> + +<p> +So having bid an affectionate adieu to my white friends, including the old +Scotchman who got drunk in honour of the event, and quoted Burns till the tears +ran down his face, at length I started, and travelled slowly northwards. For +the first three weeks nothing very particular befell me. Such Kaffirs as we +came in contact with were friendly, and game literally swarmed. Nobody living +in those parts of South Africa nowadays can have the remotest idea of what the +veldt was like even thirty years ago. +</p> + +<p> +Often and often I have crept shivering on to my waggon-box just as the sun rose +and looked out. At first one would see nothing but a vast field of white mist +suffused towards the east by a tremulous golden glow, through which the tops of +stony koppies stood up like gigantic beacons. From the dense mist would come +strange sounds—snorts, gruntings, bellows, and the thunder of countless +hoofs. Presently this great curtain would grow thinner, then it would melt, as +the smoke from a pipe melts into the air, and for miles on miles the wide +rolling country interspersed with bush opened to the view. But it was not +tenantless as it is now, for as far as the eye could reach it would be +literally black with game. Here to the right might be a herd of vilderbeeste +that could not number less than two thousand. Some were grazing, some +gambolled, whisking their white tails into the air, while all round the old +bulls stood upon hillocks sniffing suspiciously at the breeze. There, in front, +a hundred yards away, though to the unpractised eye they looked much closer, +because of the dazzling clearness of the atmosphere, was a great herd of +springbok trekking along in single file. Ah, they have come to the waggon-track +and do not like the look of it. What will they do?—go back? Not a bit of +it. It is nearly thirty feet wide, but that is nothing to a springbok. See, the +first of them bounds into the air like a ball. How beautifully the sunshine +gleams upon his golden hide! He has cleared it, and the others come after him +in numberless succession, all except the fawns, who cannot jump so far, and +have to scamper over the doubtful path with a terrified <i>bah</i>. What is +that yonder, moving above the tops of the mimosa, in the little dell at the +foot of the koppie? Giraffes, by George! three of them; there will be +marrow-bones for supper to-night. Hark! the ground shakes behind us, and over +the brow of the rise rush a vast herd of blesbock. On they come at full gallop, +their long heads held low, they look like so many bearded goats. I thought +so—behind them is a pack of wild dogs, their fur draggled, their tongues +lolling. They are in full cry; the giraffes hear them and are away, rolling +round the koppie like a ship in a heavy sea. No marrow-bones after all. See! +the foremost dogs are close on a buck. He has galloped far and is outworn. One +springs at his flank and misses him. The buck gives a kind of groan, looks +wildly round and sees the waggon. He seems to hesitate a moment, then in his +despair rushes up to it, and falls exhausted among the oxen. The dogs pull up +some thirty paces away, panting and snarling. Now, boy, the gun—no, not +the rifle, the shot-gun loaded with loopers. +</p> + +<p> +Bang! bang! there, my friends, two of you will never hunt buck again. No, +don’t touch the buck, for he has come to us for shelter, and he shall +have it. +</p> + +<p> +Ah, how beautiful is nature before man comes to spoil it! +</p> + +<p> +Such a sight as this have I seen many a hundred times, and I hope to see it +again before I die. +</p> + +<p> +The first real adventure that befell me on this particular journey was with +elephants, which I will relate because of its curious termination. Just before +we crossed the Orange River we came to a stretch of forest-land some twenty +miles broad. The night we entered this forest we camped in a lovely open glade. +A few yards ahead tambouki grass was growing to the height of a man, or rather +it had been; now, with the exception of a few stalks here and there, it was +crushed quite flat. It was already dusk when we camped; but after the moon got +up I walked from the fire to see how this had happened. One glance was enough +for me; a great herd of elephants had evidently passed over the tall grass not +many hours before. The sight of their spoor rejoiced me exceedingly, for though +I had seen wild elephants, at that time I had never shot one. Moreover, the +sight of elephant spoor to the African hunter is what “colour in the +pan” is to the prospector of gold. It is by the ivory that he lives, and +to shoot it or trade it is his chief aim in life. My resolution was soon taken. +I would camp the waggons for a while in the forest, and start on horseback +after the elephants. +</p> + +<p> +I communicated my decision to Indaba-zimbi and the other Kaffirs. The latter +were not loth, for your Kaffir loves hunting, which means plenty of meat and +congenial occupation, but Indaba-zimbi would express no opinion. I saw him +retire to a little fire that he had lit for himself, and go through some +mysterious performances with bones and clay mixed with ashes, which were +watched with the greatest interest by the other Kaffirs. At length he rose, +and, coming forward, informed me that it was all right, and that I did well to +go and hunt the elephants, as I should get plenty of ivory; but he advised me +to go on foot. I said I should do nothing of the sort, but meant to ride. I am +wiser now; this was the first and last time that I ever attempted to hunt +elephants on horseback. +</p> + +<p> +Accordingly we started at dawn, I, Indaba-zimbi, and three men; the rest I left +with the waggons. I was on horseback, and so was my driver, a good rider and a +skilful shot for a Kaffir, but Indaba-zimbi and the others walked. From dawn +till mid-day we followed the trail of the herd, which was as plain as a high +road. Then we off-saddled to let the horses rest and feed, and about three +o’clock started on again. Another hour or so passed, and still there was +no sign of elephants. Evidently the herd had travelled fast and far, and I +began to think that we should have to give it up, when suddenly I caught sight +of a brown mass moving through the thorn-trees on the side of a slope about a +quarter of a mile away. My heart seemed to jump into my mouth. Where is the +hunter who has not felt like this at the sight of his first elephant? +</p> + +<p> +I called a halt, and then the wind being right, we set to work to stalk the +bull. Very quietly I rode down the hither side of the slope till we came to the +bottom, which was densely covered with bush. Here I saw the elephants had been +feeding, for broken branches and upturned trees lay all about. I did not take +much notice, however, for all my thoughts were fixed upon the bull I was +stalking, when suddenly my horse gave a violent start that nearly threw me from +the saddle, and there came a mighty rush and upheaval of something in front of +me. I looked: there was the hinder part of a second bull elephant not four +yards off. I could just catch sight of its outstretched ears projecting on +either side. I had disturbed it sleeping, and it was running away. +</p> + +<p> +Obviously the best thing to do would have been to let it run, but I was young +in those days and foolish, and in the excitement of the moment I lifted my +“roer” or elephant gun and fired at the great brute over my +horse’s head. The recoil of the heavy gun nearly knocked me off the +horse. I recovered myself, however, and, as I did so, saw the bull lurch +forward, for the impact of a three-ounce bullet in the flank will quicken the +movement even of an elephant. By this time I had realized the folly of the +shot, and devoutly hoped that the bull would take no further notice of it. But +he took a different view of the matter. Pulling himself up in a series of +plunges, he spun round and came for me with outstretched ears and uplifted +trunk, screaming terribly. I was quite defenceless, for my gun was empty, and +my first thought was of escape. I dug my heels into the sides of my horse, but +he would not move an inch. The poor animal was paralyzed with terror, and he +simply stood still, his fore-legs outstretched, and quivering all over like a +leaf. +</p> + +<p> +On rushed the elephant, awful to see; I made one more vain effort to stir the +horse. Now the trunk of the great bull swung aloft above my head. A thought +flashed through my brain. Quick as light I rolled from the saddle. By the side +of the horse lay a fallen tree, as thick through as a man’s body. The +tree was lifted a little off the ground by the broken boughs which took its +weight, and with a single movement, so active is one in such necessities, I +flung myself beneath it. As I did so, I heard the trunk of the elephant descend +with a mighty thud on the back of my poor horse, and the next instant I was +almost in darkness, for the horse, whose back was broken, fell over across the +tree under which I lay ensconced. But he did not stop there long. In ten +seconds more the bull had wound his trunk about my dead nag’s neck, and, +with a mighty effort, hurled him clear of the tree. I wriggled backwards as far +as I could towards the roots of the tree, for I knew what he was after. +Presently I saw the red tip of the bull’s trunk stretching itself towards +me. If he could manage to hook it round any part of me I was lost. But in the +position I occupied, that was just what he could not do, although he knelt down +to facilitate his operations. On came the snapping tip like a great +open-mouthed snake; it closed upon my hat, which vanished. Again it was thrust +down, and a scream of rage was bellowed through it within four inches of my +head. Now it seemed to elongate itself. Oh, heavens! now it had me by the hair, +which, luckily for myself, was not very long. Then it was my turn to scream, +for next instant half a square inch of hair was dragged from my scalp by the +roots. I was being plucked alive, as I have seen cruel Kaffir kitchen boys +pluck a fowl. +</p> + +<p> +The elephant, however, disappointed with these moderate results, changed his +tactics. He wound his trunk round the fallen tree and lifted. The tree stirred, +but fortunately the broken branches embedded in the spongy soil, and some +roots, which still held, prevented it from being turned over, though he lifted +it so much that, had it occurred to him, he could now easily have drawn me out +with his trunk. Again he hoisted with all his mighty strength, and I saw that +the tree was coming, and roared aloud for help. Some shots were fired close by +in answer, but if they hit the bull, their only effect was to stir his energies +to more active life. In another few seconds my shelter would be torn away, and +I should be done for. A cold perspiration burst out over me as I realized that +I was lost. Then of a sudden I remembered that I had a pistol in my belt, which +I often used for despatching wounded game. It was loaded and capped. By this +time the tree was lifted so much that I could easily get my hand down to my +middle and draw the pistol from its case. I drew and cocked it. Now the tree +was coming over, and there, within three feet of my head, was the great brown +trunk of the elephant. I placed the muzzle of the pistol within an inch of it +and fired. The result was instantaneous. Down sunk the tree again, giving one +of my legs a considerable squeeze, and next instant I heard a crashing sound. +The elephant had bolted. +</p> + +<p> +By this time, what between fright and struggling, I was pretty well tired. I +cannot remember how I got from under the fallen tree, or indeed anything, until +I found myself sitting on the ground drinking some peach brandy from a flask, +and old Indaba-zimbi opposite to me nodding his white lock sagely, while he +fired off moral reflections on the narrowness of my escape, and my unwisdom in +not having taken his advice to go on foot. That reminded me of my horse—I +got up and went to look at it. It was quite dead, the blow of the +elephant’s trunk had fallen on the saddle, breaking the framework, and +rendering it useless. I reflected that in another two seconds it would have +fallen on <i>me</i>. Then I called to Indaba-zimbi and asked which way the +elephants had gone. +</p> + +<p> +“There!” he said, pointing down the gully, “and we had better +go after them, Macumazahn. We have had the bad luck, now for the good.” +</p> + +<p> +There was philosophy in this, though, to tell the truth, I did not feel +particularly sharp set on elephants at the moment. I seemed to have had enough +of them. However, it would never do to show the white feather before the boys, +so I assented with much outward readiness, and we started, I on the second +horse, and the others on foot. When we had travelled for the best part of an +hour down the valley, all of a sudden we came upon the whole herd, which +numbered a little more than eighty. Just in front of them the bush was so thick +that they seemed to hesitate about entering it, and the sides of the valley +were so rocky and steep at this point that they could not climb them. +</p> + +<p> +They saw us at the same moment as we saw them, and inwardly I was filled with +fears lest they should take it into their heads to charge back up the gully. +But they did not; trumpeting aloud, they rushed at the thick bush which went +down before them like corn before a sickle. I do not think that in all my +experiences I ever heard anything to equal the sound they made as they crashed +through and over the shrubs and trees. Before them was a dense forest belt from +a hundred to a hundred and fifty feet in width. As they rushed on, it fell, so +that behind them was nothing but a level roadway strewed with fallen trunks, +crushed branches, and here and there a tree, too strong even for them, left +stranded amid the wreck. On they went, and, notwithstanding the nature of the +ground over which they had to travel, they kept their distance ahead of us. +This sort of thing continued for a mile or more, and then I saw that in front +of the elephants the valley opened into a space covered with reeds and +grass—it might have been five or six acres in extent—beyond which +the valley ran on again. +</p> + +<p> +The herd reached the edge of this expanse, and for a moment pulled up, +hesitating—evidently they mistrusted it. My men yelled aloud, as only +Kaffirs can, and that settled them. Headed by the wounded bull, whose martial +ardour, like my own, was somewhat cooled, they spread out and dashed into the +treacherous swamp—for such it was, though just then there was no water to +be seen. For a few yards all went well with them, though they clearly found it +heavy going; then suddenly the great bull sank up to his belly in the stiff +peaty soil, and remained fixed. The others, mad with fear, took no heed of his +struggles and trumpetings, but plunged on to meet the same fate. In five +minutes the whole herd of them were hopelessly bogged, and the more they +struggled to escape, the deeper they sunk. There was one exception, indeed, a +cow managed to win back to firm shore, and, lifting her trunk, prepared to +charge us as we came up. But at that moment she heard the scream of her calf, +and rushed back to its assistance, only to be bogged with the others. +</p> + +<p> +Such a scene I never saw before or since. The swamp was spotted all over with +the large forms of the elephants, and the air rang with their screams of rage +and terror as they waved their trunks wildly to and fro. Now and then a monster +would make a great effort and drag his mass from its peaty bed, only to stick +fast again at the next step. It was a most pitiable sight, though one that +gladdened the hearts of my men. Even the best natives have little compassion +for the sufferings of animals. +</p> + +<p> +Well, the rest was easy. The marsh that would not bear the elephants carried +our weight well enough. Before midnight all were dead, for we shot them by +moonlight. I would gladly have spared the young ones and some of the cows, but +to do so would only have meant leaving them to perish of hunger; it was kinder +to kill them at once. The wounded bull I slew with my own hand, and I cannot +say that I felt much compunction in so doing. He knew me again, and made a +desperate effort to get at me, but I am glad to say that the peat held him +fast. +</p> + +<p> +The pan presented a curious sight when the sun rose next morning. Owing to the +support given by the soil, few of the dead elephants had fallen: there they +stood as though they were asleep. +</p> + +<p> +I sent back for the waggons, and when they arrived on the morrow, formed a +camp, about a mile away from the pan. Then began the work of cutting out the +elephants’ tusks; it took over a week, and for obvious reasons was a +disgusting task. Indeed, had it not been for the help of some wandering +bushmen, who took their pay in elephant meat, I do not think we could ever have +managed it. +</p> + +<p> +At last it was done. The ivory was far too cumbersome for us to carry, so we +buried it, having first got rid of our bushmen allies. My boys wanted me to go +back to the Cape with it and sell it, but I was too much bent on my journey to +do this. The tusks lay buried for five years. Then I came and dug them up; they +were but little harmed. Ultimately I sold the ivory for something over twelve +hundred pounds—not bad pay for one day’s shooting. +</p> + +<p> +This was how I began my career as an elephant hunter. I have shot many hundreds +of them since, but have never again attempted to do so on horseback. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap04"></a>CHAPTER IV.<br/> +THE ZULU IMPI</h2> + +<p> +After burying the elephant tusks, and having taken careful notes of the +bearings and peculiarities of the country so that I might be able to find the +spot again, we proceeded on our journey. For a month or more I trekked along +the line which now divides the Orange Free State from Griqualand West, and the +Transvaal from Bechuanaland. The only difficulties met with were such as are +still common to African travellers—occasional want of water and troubles +about crossing sluits and rivers. I remember that I outspanned on the spot +where Kimberley now stands, and had to press on again in a hurry because there +was no water. I little dreamed then that I should live to see Kimberley a great +city producing millions of pounds worth of diamonds annually, and old +Indaba-zimbi’s magic cannot have been worth so much after all, or he +would have told me. +</p> + +<p> +I found the country almost entirely depopulated. Not very long before +Mosilikatze the Lion, Chaka’s General had swept across it in his progress +towards what is now Matabeleland. His footsteps were evident enough. Time upon +time I trekked up to what had evidently been the sites of Kaffir kraals. Now +the kraals were ashes and piles of tumbled stones, and strewn about among the +rank grass were the bones of hundreds of men, women, and children, all of whom +had kissed the Zulu assegai. I remember that in one of these desolate places I +found the skull of a child in which a ground-lark had built its nest. It was +the twittering of the young birds inside that first called my attention to it. +Shortly after this we met with our second great adventure, a much more serious +and tragic one than the first. +</p> + +<p> +We were trekking parallel with the Kolong river when a herd of blesbock crossed +the track. I fired at one of them and hit it behind. It galloped about a +hundred yards with the rest of the herd, then lay down. As we were in want of +meat, not having met with any game for a few days past, I jumped on to my +horse, and, telling Indaba-zimbi that I would overtake the waggons or meet them +on the further side of a rise about an hour’s trek away, I started after +the wounded buck. As soon as I came within a hundred yards of it, however, it +jumped up and ran away as fast as though it were untouched, only to lie down +again at a distance. I followed, thinking that strength would soon fail it. +This happened three times. On the third occasion it vanished behind a ridge, +and, though by now I was out of both temper and patience, I thought I might as +well ride to the crest and see if I could get a shot at it on the further side. +</p> + +<p> +I reached the ridge, which was strewn with stones, looked over it, and +saw—a Zulu Impi! +</p> + +<p> +I rubbed my eyes and looked again. Yes, there was no doubt of it. They were +halted about a thousand yards away, by the water; some were lying down, some +were cooking at fires, others were stalking about with spears and shields in +their hands; there might have been two thousand or more of them in all. While I +was wondering—and that with no little uneasiness—what on earth they +could be doing there, suddenly I heard a wild cry to the right and left of me. +I glanced first one way, then the other. From either side a great Zulu was +bearing down on me, their broad stabbing assegais aloft, and black shields in +their left hands. The man to the right was about fifteen yards away, he to the +left was not more than ten. On they came, their fierce eyes almost starting out +of their heads, and I felt, with a cold thrill of fear, that in another three +seconds those broad “bangwans” might be buried in my vitals. On +such occasions we act, I suppose, more from instinct than from anything +else—there is no time for thought. At any rate, I dropped the reins and, +raising my gun, fired point blank at the left-hand man. The bullet struck him +in the middle of his shield, pierced it, and passed through him, and over he +rolled upon the veldt. I swung round in the saddle; most happily my horse was +accustomed to standing still when I fired from his back, also he was so +surprised that he did not know which way to shy. The other savage was almost on +me; his outstretched shield reached the muzzle of my gun as I pulled the +trigger of the left barrel. It exploded, the warrior sprung high into the air, +and fell against my horse dead, his spear passing just in front of my face. +</p> + +<p> +Without waiting to reload, or even to look if the main body of the Zulus had +seen the death of their two scouts, I turned my horse and drove my heels into +his sides. As soon as I was down the slope of the rise I pulled a little to the +right in order to intercept the waggons before the Zulus saw them. I had not +gone three hundred yards in this new direction when, to my utter astonishment, +I struck a trail marked with waggon-wheels and the hoofs of oxen. Of waggons +there must have been at least eight, and several hundred cattle. Moreover, they +had passed within twelve hours; I could tell that by the spoor. Then I +understood; the Impi was following the track of the waggons, which, in all +probability, belonged to a party of emigrant Boers. +</p> + +<p> +The spoor of the waggons ran in the direction I wished to go, so I followed it. +About a mile further on I came to the crest of a rise, and there, about five +furlongs away, I saw the waggons drawn up in a rough laager upon the banks of +the river. There, too, were my own waggons trekking down the slope towards +them. +</p> + +<p> +In another five minutes I was there. The Boers—for Boers they +were—were standing about outside the little laager watching the approach +of my two waggons. I called to them, and they turned and saw me. The very first +man my eyes fell on was a Boer named Hans Botha, whom I had known well years +ago in the Cape. He was not a bad specimen of his class, but a very restless +person, with a great objection to authority, or, as he expressed it, “a +love of freedom.” He had joined a party of the emigrant Boers some years +before, but, as I learned presently, had quarrelled with its leader, and was +now trekking away into the wilderness to found a little colony of his own. Poor +fellow! It was his last trek. +</p> + +<p> +“How do you do, Meinheer Botha?” I said to him in Dutch. +</p> + +<p> +The man looked at me, looked again, then, startled out of his Dutch stolidity, +cried to his wife, who was seated on the box of the waggon— +</p> + +<p> +“Come here, Frau, come. Here is Allan Quatermain, the Englishman, the son +of the ‘Predicant.’ How goes it, Heer Quatermain, and what is the +news down in the Cape yonder?” +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t know what the news is in the Cape, Hans,” I +answered, solemnly; “but the news here is that there is a Zulu Impi upon +your spoor and within two miles of the waggons. That I know, for I have just +shot two of their sentries,” and I showed him my empty gun. +</p> + +<p> +For a moment there was a silence of astonishment, and I saw the bronzed faces +of the men turn pale beneath their tan, while one or two of the women gave a +little scream, and the children crept to their sides. +</p> + +<p> +“Almighty!” cried Hans, “that must be the Umtetwa Regiment +that Dingaan sent against the Basutus, but who could not come at them because +of the marshes, and so were afraid to return to Zululand, and struck north to +join Mosilikatze.” +</p> + +<p> +“Laager up, Carles! Laager up for your lives, and one of you jump on a +horse and drive in the cattle.” +</p> + +<p> +At this moment my own waggons came up. Indaba-zimbi was sitting on the box of +the first, wrapped in a blanket. I called him and told him the news. +</p> + +<p> +“Ill tidings, Macumazahn,” he said; “there will be dead Boers +about to-morrow morning, but they will not attack till dawn, then they will +wipe out the laager <i>so!</i>” and he passed his hand before his mouth. +</p> + +<p> +“Stop that croaking, you white-headed crow,” I said, though I knew +his words were true. What chance had a laager of ten waggons all told against +at least two thousand of the bravest savages in the world? +</p> + +<p> +“Macumazahn, will you take my advice this time?” Indaba-zimbi said, +presently. +</p> + +<p> +“What is it?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“This. Leave your waggons here, jump on that horse, and let us two run +for it as hard as we can go. The Zulus won’t follow us, they will be +looking after the Boers.” +</p> + +<p> +“I won’t leave the other white men,” I said; “it would +be the act of a coward. If I die, I die.” +</p> + +<p> +“Very well, Macumazahn, then stay and be killed,” he answered, +taking a pinch of snuff. “Come, let us see about the waggons,” and +we walked towards the laager. +</p> + +<p> +Here everything was in confusion. However, I got hold of Hans Botha and put it +to him if it would not be best to desert the waggons and make a run for it. +</p> + +<p> +“How can we do it?” he answered; “two of the women are too +fat to go a mile, one is sick in childbed, and we have only six horses among +us. Besides, if we did we should starve in the desert. No, Heer Allan, we must +fight it out with the savages, and God help us!” +</p> + +<p> +“God help us, indeed. Think of the children, Hans!” +</p> + +<p> +“I can’t bear to think,” he answered, in a broken voice, +looking at his own little girl, a sweet, curly-haired, blue-eyed child of six, +named Tota, whom I had often nursed as a baby. “Oh, Heer Allan, your +father, the Predicant, always warned me against trekking north, and I never +would listen to him because I thought him a cursed Englishman; now I see my +folly. Heer Allan, if you can, try to save my child from those black devils; if +you live longer than I do, or if you can’t save her, kill her,” and +he clasped my hand. +</p> + +<p> +“It hasn’t come to that yet, Hans,” I said. +</p> + +<p> +Then we set to work on the laager. The waggons, of which, including my two, +there were ten, were drawn into the form of a square, and the disselboom of +each securely lashed with reims to the underworks of that in front of it. The +wheels also were locked, and the space between the ground and the bed-planks of +the waggons was stuffed with branches of the “wait-a-bit” thorn +that fortunately grew near in considerable quantities. In this way a barrier +was formed of no mean strength as against a foe unprovided with firearms, +places being left for the men to fire from. In a little over an hour everything +was done that could be done, and a discussion arose as to the disposal of the +cattle, which had been driven up close to the camp. Some of the Boers were +anxious to get them into the laager, small as it was, or at least as many of +them as it would hold. I argued strongly against this, pointing out that the +brutes would probably be seized with panic as soon as the firing began, and +trample the defenders of the laager under foot. As an alternative plan I +suggested that some of the native servants should drive the herd along the +valley of the river till they reached a friendly tribe or some other place of +safety. Of course, if the Zulus saw them they would be taken, but the nature of +the ground was favourable, and it was possible that they might escape if they +started at once. The proposition was promptly agreed to, and, what is more, it +was settled that one Dutchman and such of the women and children as could +travel should go with them. In half an hour’s time twelve of them started +with the natives, the Boer in charge, and the cattle. Three of my own men went +with the latter, the three others and Indaba-zimbi stopped with me in the +laager. +</p> + +<p> +The parting was a heart-breaking scene, upon which I do not care to dwell. The +women wept, the men groaned, and the children looked on with scared white +faces. At length they were gone, and I for one was thankful of it. There +remained in the laager seventeen white men, four natives, the two Boer fraus +who were too stout to travel, the woman in childbed and her baby, and Hans +Botha’s little daughter Tota, whom he could not make up his mind to part +with. Happily her mother was already dead. And here I may state that ten of the +women and children, together with about half of the cattle, escaped. The Zulu +Impi never saw them, and on the third day of travel they came to the fortified +place of a Griqua chief, who sheltered them on receiving half the cattle in +payment. Thence by slow degrees they journeyed down to the Cape Colony, +reaching a civilized region within a little more than a year from the date of +the attack on the laager. +</p> + +<p> +The afternoon was now drawing towards evening, but still there were no signs of +the Impi. A wild hope struck us that they might have gone on about their +business. Ever since Indaba-zimbi had heard that the regiment was supposed to +belong to the Umtetwa tribe, he had, I noticed, been plunged in deep thought. +Presently he came to me and volunteered to go out and spy upon their movements. +At first Hans Botha was against this idea, saying that he was a “verdomde +swartzel”—an accursed black creature—and would betray us. I +pointed out that there was nothing to betray. The Zulus must know where the +waggons were, but it was important for us to gain information of their +movements. So it was agreed that Indaba-zimbi should go. I told him this. He +nodded his white lock, said “All right, Macumazahn,” and started. I +noticed with some surprise, however, that before he did so he went to the +waggon and fetched his “mouti,” or medicine, which, together with +his other magical apparatus, he always carried in a skin bag. I asked him why +he did this. He answered that it was to make himself invulnerable against the +spears of the Zulus. I did not in the least believe his explanation, for in my +heart I was sure that he meant to take the opportunity to make a bolt of it, +leaving me to my fate. I did not, however, interfere to prevent this, for I had +an affection for the old fellow, and sincerely hoped that he might escape the +doom which overshadowed us. +</p> + +<p> +So Indaba-zimbi sauntered off, and as I looked at his retreating form I thought +I should never see it again. But I was mistaken, and little knew that he was +risking his life, not for the Boers whom he hated one and all, but for me whom +in his queer way he loved. +</p> + +<p> +When he had gone we completed our preparations for defence, strengthening the +waggons and the thorns beneath with earth and stones. Then at sunset we ate and +drank as heartily as we could under the circumstances, and when we had done, +Hans Botha, as head of the party, offered up prayer to God for our +preservation. It was a touching sight to see the burly Dutchman, his hat off, +his broad face lit up by the last rays of the setting sun, praying aloud in +homely, simple language to Him who alone could save us from the spears of a +cruel foe. I remember that the last sentence of his prayer was, +“Almighty, if we must be killed, save the women and children and my +little girl Tota from the accursed Zulus, and do not let us be tortured.” +</p> + +<p> +I echoed the request very earnestly in my own heart, that I know, for in common +with the others I was dreadfully afraid, and it must be admitted not without +reason. +</p> + +<p> +Then the darkness came on, and we took up our appointed places each with a +rifle in his hands and peered out into the gloom in silence. Occasionally one +of the Boers would light his pipe with a brand from the smouldering fire, and +the glow of it would shine for a few moments on his pale, anxious face. +</p> + +<p> +Behind me one of the stout “fraus” lay upon the ground. Even the +terror of our position could not keep her heavy eyes from their accustomed +sleep, and she snored loudly. On the further side of her, just by the fire, lay +little Tota, wrapped in a kaross. She was asleep also, her thumb in her mouth, +and from time to time her father would come to look at her. +</p> + +<p> +So the hours wore on while we waited for the Zulus. But from my intimate +knowledge of the habits of natives I had little fear that they would attack us +at night, though, had they done so, they could have compassed our destruction +with but small loss to themselves. It is not the habit of this people, they +like to fight in the light of day—at dawn for preference. +</p> + +<p> +About eleven o’clock, just as I was nodding a little at my post, I heard +a low whistle outside the laager. Instantly I was wide awake, and all along the +line I heard the clicking of locks as the Boers cocked their guns. +</p> + +<p> +“Macumazahn,” said a voice, the voice of Indaba-zimbi, “are +you there?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” I answered. +</p> + +<p> +“Then hold a light so that I can see how to climb into the laager,” +he said. +</p> + +<p> +“Yah! yah! hold a light,” put in one of the Boers. “I +don’t trust that black schepsel of yours, Heer Quatermain; he may have +some of his countrymen with him.” Accordingly a lantern was produced and +held towards the voice. There was Indaba-zimbi alone. We let him into the +laager and asked him the news. +</p> + +<p> +“This is the news, white men,” he said. “I waited till dark, +and creeping up to the place where the Zulus are encamped, hid myself behind a +stone and listened. They are a great regiment of Umtetwas as Baas Botha yonder +thought. They struck the spoor of the waggons three days ago and followed it. +To-night they sleep upon their spears, to-morrow at daybreak they will attack +the laager and kill everybody. They are very bitter against the Boers, because +of the battle at Blood River and the other fights, and that is why they +followed the waggons instead of going straight north after Mosilikatze.” +</p> + +<p> +A kind of groan went up from the group of listening Dutchmen. +</p> + +<p> +“I tell you what it is, Heeren,” I said, “instead of waiting +to be butchered here like buck in a pitfall, let us go out now and fall upon +the Impi while it sleeps.” +</p> + +<p> +This proposition excited some discussion, but in the end only one man could be +found to vote for it. Boers as a rule lack that dash which makes great +soldiers; such forlorn hopes are not in their line, and rather than embark upon +them they prefer to take their chance in a laager, however poor that chance may +be. For my own part I firmly believe that had my advice been taken we should +have routed the Zulus. Seventeen desperate white men, armed with guns, would +have produced no small effect upon a camp of sleeping savages. But it was not +taken, so it is no use talking about it. +</p> + +<p> +After that we went back to our posts, and slowly the weary night wore on +towards the dawn. Only those who have watched under similar circumstances while +they waited the advent of almost certain and cruel death, can know the +torturing suspense of those heavy hours. But they went somehow, and at last in +the far east the sky began to lighten, while the cold breath of dawn stirred +the tilts of the waggons and chilled me to the bone. The fat Dutchwoman behind +me woke with a yawn, then, remembering all, moaned aloud, while her teeth +chattered with cold and fear. Hans Botha went to his waggon and got a bottle of +peach brandy, from which he poured into a tin pannikin, giving us each a stiff +dram, and making attempts to be cheerful as he did so. But his affected +jocularity only seemed to depress his comrades the more. Certainly it depressed +me. +</p> + +<p> +Now the light was growing, and we could see some way into the mist which still +hung densely over the river, and now—ah! there it was. From the other +side of the hill, a thousand yards or more from the laager, came a faint +humming sound. It grew and grew till it gathered to a chant—the awful war +chant of the Zulus. Soon I could catch the words. They were simple enough: +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +“We shall slay, we shall slay! Is it not so, my brothers?<br/> +Our spears shall blush blood-red. Is it not so, my brothers?<br/> +For we are the sucklings of Chaka, blood is our milk, my brothers.<br/> +Awake, children of the Umtetwa, awake!<br/> +The vulture wheels, the jackal sniffs the air;<br/> +Awake, children of the Umtetwa—cry aloud, ye ringed men:<br/> +There is the foe, we shall slay them. Is it not so, my brothers?<br/> +<i>S’gee! S’gee! S’gee!</i>” +</p> + +<p> +Such is a rough translation of that hateful chant which to this very day I +often seem to hear. It does not look particularly imposing on paper, but if, +while he waited to be killed, the reader could have heard it as it rolled +through the still air from the throats of nearly three thousand warriors +singing all to time, he would have found it impressive enough. +</p> + +<p> +Now the shields began to appear over the brow of the rise. They came by +companies, each company about ninety strong. Altogether there were thirty-one +companies. I counted them. When all were over they formed themselves into a +triple line, then trotted down the slope towards us. At a distance of a hundred +and fifty yards or just out of the shot of such guns as we had in those days, +they halted and began singing again— +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +“Yonder is the kraal of the white man—a little kraal, my brothers;<br/> +We shall eat it up, we shall trample it flat, my brothers.<br/> +But where are the white man’s cattle—where are his oxen, my brothers?” +</p> + +<p> +This question seemed to puzzle them a good deal, for they sang the song again +and again. At last a herald came forward, a great man with ivory rings about +his arm, and, putting his hands to his mouth, called out to us asking where our +cattle were. +</p> + +<p> +Hans Botha climbed on to the top of a waggon and roared out that they might +answer that question themselves. +</p> + +<p> +Then the herald called again, saying that he saw the cattle had been sent away. +</p> + +<p> +“We shall go and find the cattle,” he said, “then we shall +come and kill you, because without cattle you must stop where you are, but if +we wait to kill you before we get the cattle, they may have trekked too far for +us to follow. And if you try to run away we shall easily catch you white +men!” +</p> + +<p> +This struck me as a very odd speech, for the Zulus generally attack an enemy +first and take his cattle afterwards; still, there was a certain amount of +plausibility about it. While I was still wondering what it all might mean, the +Zulus began to run past us in companies towards the river. Suddenly a shout +announced that they had found the spoor of the cattle, and the whole Impi of +them started down it at a run till they vanished over a rise about a quarter of +a mile away. +</p> + +<p> +We waited for half an hour or more, but nothing could we see of them. +</p> + +<p> +“Now I wonder if the devils have really gone,” said Hans Botha to +me. “It is very strange.” +</p> + +<p> +“I will go and see,” said Indaba-zimbi, “if you will come +with me, Macumazahn. We can creep to the top of the ridge and look over.” +</p> + +<p> +At first I hesitated, but curiosity overcame me. I was young in those days and +weary with suspense. +</p> + +<p> +“Very well,” I said, “we will go.” +</p> + +<p> +So we started. I had my elephant gun and ammunition. Indaba-zimbi had his +medicine bag and an assegai. We crept to the top of the rise like sportsmen +stalking a buck. The slope on the other side was strewn with rocks, among which +grew bushes and tall grass. +</p> + +<p> +“They must have gone down the Donga,” I said to Indaba-zimbi, +“I can’t see one of them.” +</p> + +<p> +As I spoke there came a roar of men all round me. From every rock, from every +tuft of grass rose a Zulu warrior. Before I could turn, before I could lift a +gun, I was seized and thrown. +</p> + +<p> +“Hold him! Hold the White Spirit fast!” cried a voice. “Hold +him, or he will slip away like a snake. Don’t hurt him, but hold him +fast. Let Indaba-zimbi walk by his side.” +</p> + +<p> +I turned on Indaba-zimbi. “You black devil, you have betrayed me!” +I cried. +</p> + +<p> +“Wait and see, Macumazahn,” he answered, coolly. “Now the +fight is going to begin.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap05"></a>CHAPTER V.<br/> +THE END OF THE LAAGER</h2> + +<p> +I gasped with wonder and rage. What did that scoundrel Indaba-zimbi mean? Why +had I been drawn out of the laager and seized, and why, being seized, was I not +instantly killed? They called me the “White Spirit.” Could it be +that they were keeping me to make me into medicine? I had heard of such things +being done by Zulus and kindred tribes, and my blood ran cold at the thought. +What an end! To be pounded up, made medicine of, and eaten! +</p> + +<p> +However, I had little time for further reflection, for now the whole Impi was +pouring back from the donga and river-banks where it had hidden while their +ruse was carried out, and once more formed up on the side of the slope. I was +taken to the crest of the slope and placed in the centre of the reserve line in +the especial charge of a huge Zulu named Bombyane, the same man who had come +forward as a herald. This brute seemed to regard me with an affectionate +curiosity. Now and again he poked me in the ribs with the handle of his +assegai, as though to assure himself that I was solid, and several times he +asked me to be so good as to prophesy how many Zulus would be killed before the +“Amaboona,” as they called the Boers, were “eaten up.” +</p> + +<p> +At first I took no notice of him beyond scowling, but presently, goaded into +anger, I prophesied that he would be dead in an hour! +</p> + +<p> +He only laughed aloud. “Oh! White Spirit,” he said, “is it +so? Well, I’ve walked a long way from Zululand, and shall be glad of a +rest.” +</p> + +<p> +And he got it shortly, as will be seen. +</p> + +<p> +Now the Zulus began to sing again— +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +“We have caught the White Spirit, my brother! my brother!<br/> +Iron-Tongue whispered of him, he smelt him out, my brother.<br/> +Now the Maboona are ours—they are already dead, my brother.” +</p> + +<p> +So that treacherous villain Indaba-zimbi had betrayed me. Suddenly the chief of +the Impi, a grey-haired man named Sususa, held up his assegai, and instantly +there was silence. Then he spoke to some indunas who stood near him. Instantly +they ran to the right and left down the first line, saying a word to the +captain of each company as they passed him. Presently they were at the +respective ends of the line, and simultaneously held up their spears. As they +did so, with an awful roar of “Bulala Amaboona”—“Slay +the Boers,” the entire line, numbering nearly a thousand men, bounded +forward like a buck startled from its form, and rushed down upon the little +laager. It was a splendid sight to see them, their assegais glittering in the +sunlight as they rose and fell above their black shields, their war-plumes +bending back upon the wind, and their fierce faces set intently on the foe, +while the solid earth shook beneath the thunder of their rushing feet. I +thought of my poor friends the Dutchmen, and trembled. What chance had they +against so many? +</p> + +<p> +Now the Zulus, running in the shape of a bow so as to wrap the laager round on +three sides, were within seventy yards, and now from every waggon broke tongues +of fire. Over rolled a number of the Umtetwa, but the rest cared little. +Forward they sped straight to the laager, striving to force a way in. But the +Boers plied them with volley after volley, and, packed as the Zulus were, the +elephant guns loaded with slugs and small shot did frightful execution. Only +one man even got on to a waggon, and as he did so I saw a Boer woman strike him +on the head with an axe. He fell down, and slowly, amid howls of derision from +the two lines on the hill-side, the Zulus drew back. +</p> + +<p> +“Let us go, father!” shouted the soldiers on the slope, among whom +I was, to their chief, who had come up. “You have sent out the little +girls to fight, and they are frightened. Let us show them the way.” +</p> + +<p> +“No, no!” the chief Sususa answered, laughing. “Wait a minute +and the little girls will grow to women, and women are good enough to fight +against Boers!” +</p> + +<p> +The attacking Zulus heard the mockery of their fellows, and rushed forward +again with a roar. But the Boers in the laager had found time to load, and they +met with a warm reception. Reserving their fire till the Zulus were packed like +sheep in a kraal, they loosed into them with the roers, and the warriors fell +in little heaps. But I saw that the blood of the Umtetwas was up; they did not +mean to be beaten back this time, and the end was near. See! six men had leapt +on to a waggon, slain the man behind it, and sprung into the laager. They were +killed there, but others followed, and then I turned my head. But I could not +shut my ears to the cries of rage and death, and the terrible <i>S’gee! +S’gee!</i> of the savages as they did their work of murder. Once only I +looked up and saw poor Hans Botha standing on a waggon smiting down men with +the butt of his rifle. The assegais shot up towards him like tongues of steel, +and when I looked again he was gone. +</p> + +<p> +I turned sick with fear and rage. But alas! what could I do? They were all dead +now, and probably my own turn was coming, only my death would not be so swift. +</p> + +<p> +The fight was ended, and the two lines on the slope broke their order, and +moved down to the laager. Presently we were there, and a dreadful sight it was. +Many of the attacking Zulus were dead—quite fifty I should say, and at +least a hundred and fifty were wounded, some of them mortally. The chief Sususa +gave an order, the dead men were picked up and piled in a heap, while those who +were slightly hurt walked off to find some one to tie up their wounds. But the +more serious cases met with a different treatment. The chief or one of his +indunas considered each case, and if it was in any way bad, the man was taken +up and thrown into the river which ran near. None of them offered any +objection, though one poor fellow swam to shore again. He did not stop there +long, however, for they pushed him back and drowned him by force. +</p> + +<p> +The strangest case of all was that of the chief’s own brother. He had +been captain of the line, and his ankle was smashed by a bullet. Sususa came up +to him, and, having examined the wound, rated him soundly for failing in the +first onslaught. +</p> + +<p> +The poor fellow made the excuse that it was not his fault, as the Boers had hit +him in the first rush. His brother admitted the truth of this, and talked to +him amicably. +</p> + +<p> +“Well,” he said at length, offering him a pinch of snuff, +“you cannot walk again.” +</p> + +<p> +“No, chief,” said the wounded man, looking at his ankle. +</p> + +<p> +“And to-morrow we must walk far,” went on Sususa. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, chief.” +</p> + +<p> +“Say, then, will you sit here on the veldt, or——” and +he nodded towards the river. +</p> + +<p> +The man dropped his head on his breast for a minute as though in thought. +Presently he lifted it and looked Sususa straight in the face. +</p> + +<p> +“My ankle pains me, my brother,” he said; “I think I will go +back to Zululand, for there is the only kraal I wish to see again, even if I +creep about it like a snake.”[*] +</p> + +<p class="footnote"> +[*] The Zulus believe that after death their spirits enter into the bodies of +large green snakes, which glide about the kraals. To kill these snakes is +sacrilege. +</p> + +<p> +“It is well, my brother,” said the chief. “Rest +softly,” and having shaken hands with him, he gave an order to one of the +indunas, and turned away. +</p> + +<p> +Then men came, and, supporting the wounded man, led him down to the banks of +the stream. Here, at his request, they tied a heavy stone round his neck, and +then threw him into a deep pool. I saw the whole sad scene, and the victim +never even winced. It was impossible not to admire the extraordinary courage of +the man, or to avoid being struck with the cold-blooded cruelty of his brother +the chief. And yet the act was necessary from his point of view. The man must +either die swiftly, or be left to perish of starvation, for no Zulu force will +encumber itself with wounded men. Years of merciless warfare had so hardened +these people that they looked on death as nothing, and were, to do them +justice, as willing to meet it themselves as to inflict it on others. When this +very Impi had been sent out by the Zulu King Dingaan, it consisted of some nine +thousand men. Now it numbered less than three; all the rest were dead. They, +too, would probably soon be dead. What did it matter? They lived by war to die +in blood. It was their natural end. “Kill till you are killed.” +That is the motto of the Zulu soldier. It has the merit of simplicity. +</p> + +<p> +Meanwhile the warriors were looting the waggons, including my own, having first +thrown all the dead Boers into a heap. I looked at the heap; all of them were +there, including the two stout fraus, poor things. But I missed one body, that +of Hans Botha’s daughter, little Tota. A wild hope came into my heart +that she might have escaped; but no, it was not possible. I could only pray +that she was already at rest. +</p> + +<p> +Just then the great Zulu, Bombyane, who had left my side to indulge in the +congenial occupation of looting, came out of a waggon crying that he had got +the “little white one.” I looked; he was carrying the child Tota, +gripping her frock in one of his huge black hands. He stalked up to where we +were, and held the child before the chief. “Is it dead, father?” he +said, with a laugh. +</p> + +<p> +Now, as I could well see, the child was not dead, but had been hidden away, and +fainted with fear. +</p> + +<p> +The chief glanced at it carelessly, and said— +</p> + +<p> +“Find out with your kerrie.” +</p> + +<p> +Acting on this hint the black devil held up the child, and was about to kill it +with his knobstick. This was more than I could bear. I sprang at him and struck +him with all my force in the face, little caring if I was speared or not. He +dropped Tota on the ground. +</p> + +<p> +“Ou!” he said, putting his hand to his nose, “the White +Spirit has a hard fist. Come, Spirit, I will fight you for the child.” +</p> + +<p> +The soldiers cheered and laughed. “Yes! yes!” they said, “let +Bombyane fight the White Spirit for the child. Let them fight with +assegais.” +</p> + +<p> +For a moment I hesitated. What chance had I against this black giant? But I had +promised poor Hans to save the child if I could, and what did it matter? As +well die now as later. However, I had wit enough left to make a favour of it, +and intimated to the chief through Indaba-zimbi that I was quite willing to +condescend to kill Bombyane, on condition that if I did so the child’s +life should be given to me. Indaba-zimbi interpreted my words, but I noticed +that he would not look on me as he spoke, but covered his face with his hands +and spoke of me as “the ghost” or the “son of the +spirit.” For some reason that I have never quite understood, the chief +consented to the duel. I fancy it was because he believed me to be more than +mortal, and was anxious to see the last of Bombyane. +</p> + +<p> +“Let them fight,” he said. “Give them assegais and no +shields; the child shall be to him who conquers.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes! yes!” cried the soldiers. “Let them fight. Don’t +be afraid, Bombyane; if he is a spirit, he’s a very small one.” +</p> + +<p> +“I never was frightened of man or beast, and I am not going to run away +from a White Ghost,” answered the redoubtable Bombyane, as he examined +the blade of his great bangwan or stabbing assegai. +</p> + +<p> +Then they made a ring round us, gave me a similar assegai, and set us some ten +paces apart. I kept my face as calm as I could, and tried to show no signs of +fear, though in my heart I was terribly afraid. Humanly speaking, my doom was +on me. The giant warrior before me had used the assegai from a child—I +had no experience of the weapon. Moreover, though I was quick and active, he +must have been at least twice as strong as I am. However, there was no help for +it, so, setting my teeth, I grasped the great spear, breathed a prayer, and +waited. +</p> + +<p> +The giant stood awhile looking at me, and, as he stood, Indaba-zimbi walked +across the ring behind me, muttering as he passed, “Keep cool, +Macumazahn, and wait for him. I will make it all right.” +</p> + +<p> +As I had not the slightest intention of commencing the fray, I thought this +good advice, though how Indaba-zimbi could “make it all right” I +failed to see. +</p> + +<p> +Heavens! how long that half-minute seemed! It happened many years ago, but the +whole scene rises up before my eyes as I write. There behind us was the +blood-stained laager, and near it lay the piles of dead; round us was rank upon +rank of plumed savages, standing in silence to wait the issue of the duel, and +in the centre stood the grey-haired chief and general, Sususa, in all his war +finery, a cloak of leopard skin upon his shoulders. At his feet lay the +senseless form of little Tota, to my left squatted Indaba-zimbi, nodding his +white lock and muttering something—probably spells; while in front was my +giant antagonist, his spear aloft and his plumes wavering in the gentle wind. +Then over all, over grassy slope, river, and koppie, over the waggons of the +laager, the piles of dead, the dense masses of the living, the swooning child, +over all shone the bright impartial sun, looking down like the indifferent eye +of Heaven upon the loveliness of nature and the cruelty of man. Down by the +river grew thorn-trees, and from them floated the sweet scent of the mimosa +flower, and came the sound of cooing turtle-doves. I never smell the one or +hear the other without the scene flashing into my mind again, complete in its +every detail. +</p> + +<p> +Suddenly, without a sound, Bombyane shook his assegai and rushed straight at +me. I saw his huge form come; like a man in a dream, I saw the broad spear +flash on high; now he was on me! Then, prompted to it by some providential +impulse—or had the spells of Indaba-zimbi anything to do with the +matter?—I dropped to my knee, and quick as light stretched out my spear. +He drove at me: the blade passed over my head. I felt a weight on my assegai; +it was wrenched from my hand; his great limbs knocked against me. I glanced +round. Bombyane was staggering along with head thrown back and outstretched +arms from which his spear had fallen. His spear had fallen, but the blade of +mine stood out between his shoulders—I had transfixed him. He stopped, +swung slowly round as though to look at me: then with a sigh the giant sank +down—<i>dead</i>. +</p> + +<p> +For a moment there was silence; then a great cry rose—a cry of +“Bombyane is dead. The White Spirit has slain Bombyane. Kill the wizard, +kill the ghost who has slain Bombyane by witchcraft.” +</p> + +<p> +Instantly I was surrounded by fierce faces, and spears flashed before my eyes. +I folded my arms and stood calmly waiting the end. In a moment it would have +come, for the warriors were mad at seeing their champion overthrown thus +easily. But presently through the tumult I heard the high, cracked voice of +Indaba-zimbi. +</p> + +<p> +“Stand back, you fools!” it cried; “can a spirit then be +killed?” +</p> + +<p> +“Spear him! spear him!” they roared in fury. “Let us see if +he is a spirit. How did a spirit slay Bombyane with an assegai? Spear him, +rain-maker, and we shall see.” +</p> + +<p> +“Stand back,” cried Indaba-zimbi again, “and I will show you +if he can be killed. I will kill him myself, and call him back to life again +before your eyes.” +</p> + +<p> +“Macumazahn, trust me,” he whispered in my ear in the Sisutu +tongue, which the Zulus did not understand. “Trust me; kneel on the grass +before me, and when I strike at you with the spear, roll over like one dead; +then, when you hear my voice again, get up. Trust me—it is your only +hope.” +</p> + +<p> +Having no choice I nodded my head in assent, though I had not the faintest idea +of what he was about to do. The tumult lessened somewhat, and once more the +warriors drew back. +</p> + +<p> +“Great White Spirit—Spirit of victory,” said Indaba-zimbi, +addressing me aloud, and covering his eyes with his hand, “hear me and +forgive me. These children are blind with folly, and think thee mortal because +thou hast dealt death upon a mortal who dared to stand against thee. Deign to +kneel down before me and let me pierce thy heart with this spear, then when I +call upon thee, arise unhurt.” +</p> + +<p> +I knelt down, not because I wished to, but because I must. I had not overmuch +faith in Indaba-zimbi, and thought it probable that he was in truth about to +make an end of me. But really I was so worn out with fears, and the horrors of +the night and day had so shaken my nerves, that I did not greatly care what +befell me. When I had been kneeling thus for about half a minute Indaba-zimbi +spoke. +</p> + +<p> +“People of the Umtetwa, children of T’Chaka,” he said, +“draw back a little way, lest an evil fall on you, for now the air is +thick with ghosts.” +</p> + +<p> +They drew back a space, leaving us in a circle about twelve yards in diameter. +</p> + +<p> +“Look on him who kneels before you,” went on Indaba-zimbi, +“and listen to my words, to the words of the witch-finder, the words of +the rain-maker, Indaba-zimbi, whose fame is known to you. He seems to be a +young man, does he not? I tell you, children of the Umtetwa, he is no man. He +is the Spirit who gives victory to the white men, he it is who gave them +assegais that thunder and taught them how to slay. Why were the Impis of +Dingaan rolled back at the Blood River? Because <i>he</i> was there. Why did +the Amaboona slay the people of Mosilikatze by the thousand? Because <i>he</i> +was there. And so I say to you that, had I not drawn him from the laager by my +magic but three hours ago, you would have been conquered—yes, you would +have been blown away like the dust before the wind; you would have been burnt +up like the dry grass in the winter when the fire is awake among it. Ay, +because he had but been there many of your bravest were slain in overcoming a +few—a pinch of men who could be counted on the fingers. But because I +loved you, because your chief Sususa is my half-brother—for had we not +one father?—I came to you, I warned you. Then you prayed me and I drew +the Spirit forth. But you were not satisfied when the victory was yours, when +the Spirit, of all you had taken asked but one little thing—a white child +to take away and sacrifice to himself, to make the medicine of his magic +of——” +</p> + +<p> +Here I could hardly restrain myself from interrupting, but thought better of +it. +</p> + +<p> +“You said him nay; you said, ‘Let him fight with our bravest man, +let him fight with Bombyane the giant for the child.’ And he deigned to +slay Bombyane as you have seen, and now you say, ‘Slay him; he is no +spirit.’ Now I will show you if he is a spirit, for I will slay him +before your eyes, and call him to life again. But you have brought this upon +yourselves. Had you believed, had you offered no insult to the Spirit, he would +have stayed with you, and you should have become unconquerable. Now he will +arise and leave you, and woe be on you if you try to stay him. +</p> + +<p> +“Now all men,” he went on, “look for a space upon this +assegai that I hold up,” and he lifted the bangwan of the deceased +Bombyane high above his head so that all the multitude could see it. Every eye +was fixed upon the broad bright spear. For a while he held it still, then he +moved it round and round in a circle, muttering as he did so, and still their +gaze followed it. For my part, I watched his movements with the greatest +anxiety. That assegai had already been nearer my person than I found at all +pleasant, and I had no desire to make a further acquaintance with it. Nor, +indeed, was I sure that Indaba-zimbi was not really going to kill me. I could +not understand his proceedings at all, and at the best I did not relish playing +the <i>corpus vile</i> to his magical experiments. +</p> + +<p> +“<i>Look! look! look!</i>” he screamed. +</p> + +<p> +Then suddenly the great spear flashed down towards my breast. I felt nothing, +but, to my sight, it seemed as though it had passed through me. +</p> + +<p> +“See!” roared the Zulus. “Indaba-zimbi has speared him; the +red assegai stands out behind his back.” +</p> + +<p> +“Roll over, Macumazahn,” Indaba-zimbi hissed in my ear, “roll +over and pretend to die—quick! quick!” +</p> + +<p> +I lost no time in following these strange instructions, but falling on to my +side, threw my arms wide, kicked my legs about, and died as artistically as I +could. Presently I gave a stage shiver and lay still. +</p> + +<p> +“See!” said the Zulus, “he is dead, the Spirit is dead. Look +at the blood upon the assegai!” +</p> + +<p> +“Stand back! stand back!” cried Indaba-zimbi, “or the ghost +will haunt you. Yes, he is dead, and now I will call him back to life again. +Look!” and putting down his hand, he plucked the spear from wherever it +was fixed, and held it aloft. “The spear is red, is it not? Watch, men, +watch! <i>it grows white!</i>” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, it grows white,” they said. “Ou! it grows white.” +</p> + +<p> +“It grows white because the blood returns to whence it came,” said +Indaba-zimbi. “Now, great Spirit, hear me. Thou art dead, the breath has +gone out of thy mouth. Yet hear me and arise. Awake, White Spirit, awake and +show thy power. Awake! arise unhurt!” +</p> + +<p> +I began to respond cheerfully to this imposing invocation. +</p> + +<p> +“Not so fast, Macumazahn,” whispered Indaba-zimbi. +</p> + +<p> +I took the hint, and first held up my arm, then lifted my head and let it fall +again. +</p> + +<p> +“He lives! by the head of T’Chaka he lives!” roared the +soldiers, stricken with mortal fear. +</p> + +<p> +Then slowly and with the greatest dignity I gradually arose, stretched my arms, +yawned like one awaking from heavy sleep, turned and looked upon them +unconcernedly. While I did so, I noticed that old Indaba-zimbi was almost +fainting from exhaustion. Beads of perspiration stood upon his brow, his limbs +trembled, and his breast heaved. +</p> + +<p> +As for the Zulus, they waited for no more. With a howl of terror the whole +regiment turned and fled across the rise, so that presently we were left alone +with the dead, and the swooning child. +</p> + +<p> +“How on earth did you do that, Indaba-zimbi?” I asked in amaze. +</p> + +<p> +“Do not ask me, Macumazahn,” he gasped. “You white men are +very clever, but you don’t quite know everything. There are men in the +world who can make people believe they see things which they do not see. Let us +be going while we may, for when those Umtetwas have got over their fright, they +will come back to loot the waggons, and then perhaps <i>they</i> will begin +asking questions that I can’t answer.” +</p> + +<p> +And here I may as well state that I never got any further information on this +matter from old Indaba-zimbi. But I have my theory, and here it is for whatever +it may be worth. I believe that Indaba-zimbi <i>mesmerized</i> the whole crowd +of onlookers, myself included, making them believe that they saw the assegai in +my heart, and the blood upon the blade. The reader may smile and say, +“Impossible;” but I would ask him how the Indian jugglers do their +tricks unless it is by mesmerism. The spectators <i>seem</i> to see the boy go +under the basket and there pierced with daggers, they <i>seem</i> to see women +in a trance supported in mid-air upon the point of a single sword. In +themselves these things are not possible, they violate the laws of nature, as +those laws are known to us, and therefore must surely be illusion. And so +through the glamour thrown upon them by Indaba-zimbi’s will, that Zulu +Impi seemed to see me transfixed with an assegai which never touched me. At +least, that is my theory; if any one has a better, let him adopt it. The +explanation lies between illusion and magic of a most imposing character, and I +prefer to accept the first alternative. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap06"></a>CHAPTER VI.<br/> +STELLA</h2> + +<p> +I was not slow to take Indaba-zimbi’s hint. About a hundred and fifty +yards to the left of the laager was a little dell where I had hidden my horse, +together with one belonging to the Boers, and my saddle and bridle. Thither we +went, I carrying the swooning Tota in my arms. To our joy we found the horses +safe, for the Zulus had not seen them. Now, of course, they were our only means +of locomotion, for the oxen had been sent away, and even had they been there we +could not have found time to inspan them. I laid Tota down, caught my horse, +undid his knee halter, and saddled up. As I was doing so a thought struck me, +and I told Indaba-zimbi to run to the laager and see if he could find my +double-barrelled gun and some powder and shot, for I had only my elephant +“roer” and a few charges of powder and ball with me. +</p> + +<p> +He went, and while he was away, poor little Tota came to herself and began to +cry, till she saw my face. +</p> + +<p> +“Ah, I have had such a bad dream,” she said, in Dutch: “I +dreamed that the black Kaffirs were going to kill me. Where is my papa?” +</p> + +<p> +I winced at the question. “Your papa has gone on a journey, dear,” +I said, “and left me to look after you. We shall find him one day. You +don’t mind going with Heer Allan, do you?” +</p> + +<p> +“No,” she said, a little doubtfully, and began to cry again. +Presently she remembered that she was thirsty, and asked for water. I led her +to the river and she drank. “Why is my hand red, Heer Allan?” she +asked, pointing to the smear of Bombyane’s blood-stained fingers. +</p> + +<p> +At this moment I felt very glad that I had killed Bombyane. +</p> + +<p> +“It is only paint, dear,” I said; “see, we will wash it and +your face.” +</p> + +<p> +As I was doing this, Indaba-zimbi returned. The guns were all gone; he said the +Zulus had taken them and the powder. But he had found some things and brought +them in a sack. There was a thick blanket, about twenty pounds weight of +biltong or sun-dried meat, a few double-handfuls of biscuits, two +water-bottles, a tin pannikin, some matches and sundries. +</p> + +<p> +“And now, Macumazahn,” he said, “we had best be going, for +those Umtetwas are coming back. I saw one of them on the brow of the +rise.” +</p> + +<p> +That was enough for me. I lifted little Tota on to the bow of my saddle, +climbed into it, and rode off, holding her in front of me. Indaba-zimbi slipped +a reim into the mouth of the best of the Boer horses, threw the sack of +sundries on to its back and mounted also, holding the elephant gun in his hand. +We went eight or nine hundred yards in silence till we were quite out of range +of sight from the waggons, which were in a hollow. Then I pulled up, with such +a feeling of thankfulness in my heart as cannot be told in words; for now I +knew that, mounted as we were, those black demons could never catch us. But +where were we to steer for? I put the question to Indaba-zimbi, asking him if +he thought that we had better try and follow the oxen which we had sent away +with the Kaffirs and women on the preceding night. He shook his head. +</p> + +<p> +“The Umtetwas will go after the oxen presently,” he answered, +“and we have seen enough of them.” +</p> + +<p> +“Quite enough,” I answered, with enthusiasm; “I never want to +see another; but where are we to go? Here we are alone with one gun and a +little girl in the vast and lonely veldt. Which way shall we turn?” +</p> + +<p> +“Our faces were towards the north before we met the Zulus,” +answered Indaba-zimbi; “let us still keep them to the north. Ride on, +Macumazahn; to-night when we off-saddle I will look into the matter.” +</p> + +<p> +So all that long afternoon we rode on, following the course of the river. From +the nature of the ground we could only go slowly, but before sunset I had the +satisfaction of knowing that there must be at least twenty-five miles between +us and those accursed Zulus. Little Tota slept most of the way, the motion of +the horse was easy, and she was worn out. +</p> + +<p> +At last the sunset came, and we off-saddled in a dell by the river. There was +not much to eat, but I soaked some biscuit in water for Tota, and Indaba-zimbi +and I made a scanty meal of biltong. When we had done I took off Tota’s +frock, wrapped her up in a blanket near the fire we had made, and lit a pipe. I +sat there by the side of the sleeping orphaned child, and from my heart thanked +Providence for saving her life and mine from the slaughter of that day. What a +horrible experience it had been! It seemed like a nightmare to look back upon. +And yet it was sober fact, one among those many tragedies which dotted the +paths of the emigrant Boers with the bones of men, women, and children. These +horrors are almost forgotten now; people living in Natal now, for instance, can +scarcely realize that some forty years ago six hundred white people, many of +them women and children, were thus massacred by the Impis of Dingaan. But it +was so, and the name of the district, <i>Weenen</i>, or the Place of Weeping, +will commemorate them for ever. +</p> + +<p> +Then I fell to reflecting on the extraordinary adroitness old Indaba-zimbi had +shown in saving my life. It appeared that he himself had lived among the +Umtetwa Zulus in his earlier manhood, and was a noted rain-doctor and +witch-finder. But when T’Chaka, Dingaan’s brother, ordered a +general massacre of the witch-finders, he alone had saved his life by his skill +in magic, and ultimately fled south for reasons too long to set out here. When +he heard, therefore, that the regiment was an Umtetwa regiment, which, leaving +their wives and children, had broken away from Zululand to escape the cruelties +of Dingaan; under pretence of spying on them, he took the bold course of going +straight up to the chief, Sususa, and addressing him as his brother, which he +was. The chief knew him at once, and so did the soldiers, for his fame was +still great among them. Then he told them his cock and bull story about my +being a white spirit, whose presence in the laager would render it invincible, +and with the object of saving my life in the slaughter which he knew must +ensue, agreed to charm me out of the laager and deliver me into their keeping. +How the plan worked has already been told; it was a risky one; still, but for +it my troubles would have been done with these many days. +</p> + +<p> +So I lay and thought with a heart full of gratitude, and as I did so saw old +Indaba-zimbi sitting by the fire and going through some mysterious performances +with bones which he produced from his bag, and ashes mixed with water. I spoke +to him and asked what he was about. He replied that he was tracing out the +route that we should follow. I felt inclined to answer “bosh!” but +remembering the very remarkable instances which he had given of his prowess in +occult matters I held my tongue, and taking little Tota into my arms, worn out +with toil and danger and emotion, I went to sleep. +</p> + +<p> +I awoke just as the dawn was beginning to flame across the sky in sheets of +primrose and of gold, or rather it was little Tota who woke me by kissing me as +she lay between sleep and waking, and calling me “papa.” It wrung +my heart to hear her, poor orphaned child. I got up, washed and dressed her as +best I could, and we breakfasted as we had supped, on biltong and biscuit. Tota +asked for milk, but I had none to give her. Then we caught the horses, and I +saddled mine. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, Indaba-zimbi,” I said, “now what path do your bones +point to?” +</p> + +<p> +“Straight north,” he said. “The journey will be hard, but in +about four days we shall come to the kraal of a white man, an Englishman, not a +Boer. His kraal is in a beautiful place, and there is a great peak behind it +where there are many baboons.” +</p> + +<p> +I looked at him. “This is all nonsense, Indaba-zimbi,” I said. +“Whoever heard of an Englishman building a house in these wilds, and how +do you know anything about it? I think that we had better strike east towards +Port Natal.” +</p> + +<p> +“As you like, Macumazahn,” he answered, “but it will take us +three months’ journey to get to Port Natal, if we ever get there, and the +child will die on the road. Say, Macumazahn, have my words come true +heretofore, or have they not? Did I not tell you not to hunt the elephants on +horseback? Did I not tell you to take one waggon with you instead of two, as it +is better to lose one than two?” +</p> + +<p> +“You told me all these things,” I answered. +</p> + +<p> +“And so I tell you now to ride north, Macumazahn, for there you will find +great happiness—yes, and great sorrow. But no man should run away from +happiness because of the sorrow. As you will, as you will!” +</p> + +<p> +Again I looked at him. In his divinations I did not believe, yet I came to the +conclusion that he was speaking what he knew to be the truth. It struck me as +possible that he might have heard of some white man living like a hermit in the +wilds, but preferring to keep up his prophetic character would not say so. +</p> + +<p> +“Very well, Indaba-zimbi,” I said, “let us ride north.” +</p> + +<p> +Shortly after we started, the river we had followed hitherto turned off in a +westerly direction, so we left it. All that day we rode across rolling uplands, +and about an hour before sunset halted at a little stream which ran down from a +range of hills in front of us. By this time I was heartily tired of the +biltong, so taking my elephant rifle—for I had nothing else—I left +Tota with Indaba-zimbi, and started to try if I could shoot something. Oddly +enough we had seen no game all the day, nor did we see any on the subsequent +days. For some mysterious reason they had temporarily left the district. I +crossed the little streamlet in order to enter the belt of thorns which grew +upon the hill-side beyond, for there I hoped to find buck. As I did so I was +rather disturbed to see the spoor of two lions in the soft sandy edge of a +pool. Breathing a hope that they might not still be in the neighbourhood, I +went on into the belt of scattered thorns. For a long while I hunted about +without seeing anything, except one duiker buck, which bounded off with a crash +from the other side of a stone without giving me a chance. At length, just as +it grew dusk, I spied a Petie buck, a graceful little creature, scarcely bigger +than a large hare, standing on a stone, about forty yards from me. Under +ordinary circumstances I should never have dreamed of firing at such a thing, +especially with an elephant gun, but we were hungry. So I sat down with my back +against a rock, and aimed steadily at its head. I did this because if I struck +it in the body the three-ounce ball would have knocked it to bits. At last I +pulled the trigger, the gun went off with the report of a small cannon, and the +buck disappeared. I ran to the spot with more anxiety than I should have felt +in an ordinary way over a koodoo or an eland. To my delight there the little +creature lay—the huge bullet had decapitated it. Considering all the +circumstances I do not think I have often made a better shot than this, but if +any one doubts, let him try his hand at a rabbit’s head fifty yards away +with an elephant gun and a three-ounce ball. +</p> + +<p> +I picked up the Petie in triumph, and returned to the camp. There we skinned +him and toasted his flesh over the fire. He just made a good meal for us, +though we kept the hind legs for breakfast. +</p> + +<p> +There was no moon this night, and so it chanced that when I suddenly remembered +about the lion spoor, and suggested that we had better tie up the horses quite +close to us, we could not find them, though we knew they were grazing within +fifty yards. This being so we could only make up the fire and take our chance. +Shortly afterwards I went to sleep with little Tota in my arms. Suddenly I was +awakened by hearing that peculiarly painful sound, the scream of a horse, quite +close to the fire, which was still burning brightly. Next second there came a +noise of galloping hoofs, and before I could even rise my poor horse appeared +in the ring of firelight. As in a flash of lightning I saw his staring eyes and +wide-stretched nostrils, and the broken reim with which he had been +knee-haltered, flying in the air. Also I saw something else, for on his back +was a great dark form with glowing eyes, and from the form came a growling +sound. It was a lion. +</p> + +<p> +The horse dashed on. He galloped right through the fire, for which he had run +in his terror, fortunately, however, without treading on us, and vanished into +the night. We heard his hoofs for a hundred yards or more, then there was +silence, broken now and again by distant growls. As may be imagined, we did not +sleep any more that night, but waited anxiously till the dawn broke, two hours +later. +</p> + +<p> +As soon as there was sufficient light we rose, and, leaving Tota still asleep, +crept cautiously in the direction in which the horse had vanished. When we had +gone fifty yards or so, we made out its remains lying on the veldt, and caught +sight of two great cat-like forms slinking away in the grey light. +</p> + +<p> +To go any further was useless; we knew all about it now, so we turned to look +for the other horse. But our cup of misfortune was not yet full; the horse was +nowhere to be found. Terrified by the sight and smell of the lions, it had with +a desperate effort also burst the reim with which it had been knee-haltered, +and galloped far away. I sat down, feeling as though I could cry like a woman. +For now we were left alone in these vast solitudes without a horse to carry us, +and with a child who was not old enough to walk for more than a little way at a +time. +</p> + +<p> +Well, it was no use giving in, so with a few words we went back to our camp, +where I found Tota crying because she had woke to find herself alone. Then we +ate a little food and prepared to start. First we divided such articles as we +must take with us into two equal parts, rejecting everything that we could +possibly do without. Then, by an afterthought, we filled our water-bottles, +though at the time I was rather against doing so, because of the extra weight. +But Indaba-zimbi overruled me in the matter, fortunately for all three of us. I +settled to look after Tota for the first march, and to give the elephant gun to +Indaba-zimbi. At length all was ready, and we set out on foot. By the help of +occasional lifts over rough places, Tota managed to walk up the slope of the +hill-side where I had shot the Petie buck. At length we reached it, and, +looking at the country beyond, I gave an exclamation of dismay. To say that it +was desert would be saying too much; it was more like the Karroo in the +Cape—a vast sandy waste, studded here and there with low shrubs and +scattered rocks. But it was a great expanse of desolate land, stretching +further than the eye could reach, and bordered far away by a line of purple +hills, in the centre of which a great solitary peak soared high into the air. +</p> + +<p> +“Indaba-zimbi,” I said, “we can never cross this if we take +six days.” +</p> + +<p> +“As you will, Macumazahn,” he answered; “but I tell you that +there”—and he pointed to the peak—“there the white man +lives. Turn which way you like, but if you turn you will perish.” +</p> + +<p> +I reflected for a moment, Our case was, humanly speaking, almost hopeless. It +mattered little which way we went. We were alone, almost without food, with no +means of transport, and a child to carry. As well perish in the sandy waste as +on the rolling veldt or among the trees of the hill-side. Providence alone +could save us, and we must trust to Providence. +</p> + +<p> +“Come on,” I said, lifting Tota on to my back, for she was already +tired. “All roads lead to rest.” +</p> + +<p> +How am I to describe the misery of the next four days? How am I to tell how we +stumbled on through that awful desert, almost without food, and quite without +water, for there were no streams, and we saw no springs? We soon found how the +case was, and saved almost all the water in our bottles for the child. To look +back on it is like a nightmare. I can scarcely bear to dwell on it. Day after +day, by turns carrying the child through the heavy sand; night after night +lying down in the scrub, chewing the leaves, and licking such dew as there was +from the scanty grass! Not a spring, not a pool, not a head of game! It was the +third night; we were nearly mad with thirst. Tota was in a comatose condition. +Indaba-zimbi still had a little water in his bottle—perhaps a +wine-glassful. With it we moistened our lips and blackened tongues. Then we +gave the rest to the child. It revived her. She awoke from her swoon to sink +into sleep. +</p> + +<p> +See, the dawn was breaking. The hills were not more than eight miles or so away +now, and they were green. There must be water there. +</p> + +<p> +“Come,” I said. +</p> + +<p> +Indaba-zimbi lifted Tota into the kind of sling that we had made out of the +blanket in which to carry her on our backs, and we staggered on for an hour +through the sand. She awoke crying for water, and alas! we had none to give +her; our tongues were hanging from our lips, we could scarcely speak. +</p> + +<p> +We rested awhile, and Tota mercifully swooned away again. Then Indaba-zimbi +took her. Though he was so thin the old man’s strength was wonderful. +</p> + +<p> +Another hour; the slope of the great peak could not be more than two miles away +now. A couple of hundred yards off grew a large baobab tree. Could we reach its +shade? We had done half the distance when Indaba-zimbi fell from exhaustion. We +were now so weak that neither of us could lift the child on to our backs. He +rose again, and we each took one of her hands and dragged her along the road. +Fifty yards—they seemed to be fifty miles. Ah, the tree was reached at +last; compared with the heat outside, the shade of its dense foliage seemed +like the dusk and cool of a vault. I remember thinking that it was a good place +to die in. Then I remember no more. +</p> + +<p> +I woke with a feeling as though the blessed rain were falling on my face and +head. Slowly, and with great difficulty, I opened my eyes, then shut them +again, having seen a vision. For a space I lay thus, while the rain continued +to fall; I saw now that I must be asleep, or off my head with thirst and fever. +If I were not off my head how came I to imagine that a lovely dark-eyed girl +was bending over me sprinkling water on my face? A white girl, too, not a +Kaffir woman. However, the dream went on. +</p> + +<p> +“Hendrika,” said a voice in English, the sweetest voice that I had +ever heard; somehow it reminded me of wind whispering in the trees at night. +“Hendrika, I fear he dies; there is a flask of brandy in my saddle-bag; +get it.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ah! ah!” grunted a harsh voice in answer; “let him die, Miss +Stella. He will bring you bad luck—let him die, I say.” I felt a +movement of air above me as though the woman of my vision turned swiftly, and +once again I opened my eyes. She had risen, this dream woman. Now I saw that +she was tall and graceful as a reed. She was angry, too; her dark eyes flashed, +and she pointed with her hand at a female who stood before her, dressed in +nondescript kind of clothes such as might be worn by either a man or a woman. +The woman was young, of white blood, very short, with bowed legs and enormous +shoulders. In face she was not bad-looking, but the brow receded, the chin and +ears were prominent—in short, she reminded me of nothing so much as a +very handsome monkey. She might have been the missing link. +</p> + +<p> +The lady was pointing at her with her hand. “How dare you?” she +said. “Are you going to disobey me again? Have you forgotten what I told +you, Babyan?”[*] +</p> + +<p> +[*] Baboon. +</p> + +<p> +“Ah! ah!” grunted the woman, who seemed literally to curl and +shrivel up beneath her anger. “Don’t be angry with me, Miss Stella, +because I can’t bear it. I only said it because it was true. I will fetch +the brandy.” +</p> + +<p> +Then, dream or no dream, I determined to speak. +</p> + +<p> +“Not brandy,” I gasped in English as well as my swollen tongue +would allow; “give me water.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ah, he lives!” cried the beautiful girl, “and he talks +English. See, sir, here is water in your own bottle; you were quite close to a +spring, it is on the other side of the tree.” +</p> + +<p> +I struggled to a sitting position, lifted the bottle to my lips, and drank from +it. Oh! that drink of cool, pure water! never had I tasted anything so +delicious. With the first gulp I felt life flow back into me. But wisely enough +she would not let me have much. “No more! no more!” she said, and +dragged the bottle from me almost by force. +</p> + +<p> +“The child,” I said—“is the child dead?” +</p> + +<p> +“I do not know yet,” she answered. “We have only just found +you, and I tried to revive you first.” +</p> + +<p> +I turned and crept to where Tota lay by the side of Indaba-zimbi. It was +impossible to say if they were dead or swooning. The lady sprinkled +Tota’s face with the water, which I watched greedily, for my thirst was +still awful, while the woman Hendrika did the same office for Indaba-zimbi. +Presently, to my vast delight, Tota opened her eyes and tried to cry, but could +not, poor little thing, because her tongue and lips were so swollen. But the +lady got some water into her mouth, and, as in my case, the effect was magical. +We allowed her to drink about a quarter of a pint, and no more, though she +cried bitterly for it. Just then old Indaba-zimbi came to with a groan. He +opened his eyes, glanced round, and took in the situation. +</p> + +<p> +“What did I tell you, Macumazahn?” he gasped, and seizing the +bottle, he took a long pull at it. +</p> + +<p> +Meanwhile I sat with my back against the trunk of the great tree and tried to +realize the situation. Looking to my left I saw too good horses—one +bare-backed, and one with a rudely made lady’s saddle on it. By the side +of the horses were two dogs, of a stout greyhound breed, that sat watching us, +and near the dogs lay a dead Oribé buck, which they had evidently been +coursing. +</p> + +<p> +“Hendrika,” said the lady presently, “they must not eat meat +just yet. Go look up the tree and see if there is any ripe fruit on it.” +</p> + +<p> +The woman ran swiftly into the plain and obeyed. Presently she returned. +“I see some ripe fruit,” she said, “but it is high, quite at +the top.” +</p> + +<p> +“Fetch it,” said the lady. +</p> + +<p> +“Easier said than done,” I thought to myself; but I was much +mistaken. Suddenly the woman bounded at least three feet into the air and +caught one of the spreading boughs in her large flat hands; then came a swing +that would have filled an acrobat with envy—and she was on it. +</p> + +<p> +“Now there is an end,” I thought again, for the next bough was +beyond her reach. But again I was mistaken. She stood up on the bough, gripping +it with her bare feet, and once more sprang at the one above, caught it and +swung herself into it. +</p> + +<p> +I suppose that the lady saw my expression of astonishment. “Do not +wonder, sir,” she said, “Hendrika is not like other people. She +will not fall.” +</p> + +<p> +I made no answer, but watched the progress of this extraordinary person with +the most breathless interest. On she went, swinging herself from bough to +bough, and running along them like a monkey. At last she reached the top, and +began to swarm up a thin branch towards the ripe fruit. When she was near +enough she shook the branch violently. There was a crack—a crash—it +broke. I shut my eyes, expecting to see her crushed on the ground before me. +</p> + +<p> +“Don’t be afraid,” said the lady again, laughing gently. +“Look, she is quite safe.” +</p> + +<p> +I looked, and so she was. She had caught a bough as she fell, clung to it, and +was now calmly dropping to another. Old Indaba-zimbi had also watched this +performance with interest, but it did not seem to astonish him over-much. +“Baboon-woman?” he said, as though such people were common, and +then turned his attention to soothing Tota, who was moaning for more water. +Meanwhile Hendrika came down the tree with extraordinary rapidity, and swinging +by one hand from a bough, dropped about eight feet to the ground. +</p> + +<p> +In another two minutes we were all three sucking the pulpy fruit. In an +ordinary way we should have found it tasteless enough: as it was I thought it +the most delicious thing I had ever tasted. After three days spent without food +or water, in the desert, one is not particular. While we were still eating the +fruit, the lady of my vision set her companion to work to partially flay the +oribé which her dogs had killed, and busied herself in making a fire of fallen +boughs. As soon as it burned brightly she took strips of the oribé flesh, +toasted them, and gave them to us on leaves. We ate, and now were allowed a +little more water. After that she took Tota to the spring and washed her, which +she sadly needed, poor child! Next came our turn to wash, and oh, the joy of +it! +</p> + +<p> +I came back to the tree, walking painfully, indeed, but a changed man. There +sat the beautiful girl with Tota on her knees. She was lulling her to sleep, +and held up her finger to me enjoining silence. At last the child went off into +a sound natural slumber—an example that I should have been glad to follow +had it not been for my burning curiosity. Then I spoke. +</p> + +<p> +“May I ask what your name is?” I said. +</p> + +<p> +“Stella,” she answered. +</p> + +<p> +“Stella what?” I said. +</p> + +<p> +“Stella nothing,” she answered, in some pique; “Stella is my +name; it is short and easy to remember at any rate. My father’s name is +Thomas, and we live up there,” and she pointed round the base of the +great peak. I looked at her astonished. “Have you lived there +long?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“Ever since I was seven years old. We came there in a waggon. Before that +we came from England—from Oxfordshire; I can show you the place on a big +map. It is called Garsingham.” +</p> + +<p> +Again I thought I must be dreaming. “Do you know, Miss Stella,” I +said, “it is very strange—so strange that it almost seems as though +it could not be true—but I also came from Garsingham in Oxfordshire many +years ago.” +</p> + +<p> +She started up. “Are you an English gentleman?” she said. +“Ah, I have always longed to see an English gentleman. I have never seen +but one Englishman since we lived here, and he certainly was not a +gentleman—no white people at all, indeed, except a few wandering Boers. +We live among black people and baboons—only I have read about English +people—lots of books—poetry and novels. But tell me what is your +name? Macumazahn the black man called you, but you must have a white name, +too.” +</p> + +<p> +“My name is Allan Quatermain,” I said. +</p> + +<p> +Her face turned quite white, her rosy lips parted, and she looked at me wildly +with her beautiful dark eyes. +</p> + +<p> +“It is wonderful,” she said, “but I have often heard that +name. My father has told me how a little boy called Allan Quatermain once saved +my life by putting out my dress when it was on fire—see!”—and +she pointed to a faint red mark upon her neck—“here is the scar of +the burn.” +</p> + +<p> +“I remember it,” I said. “You were dressed up as Father +Christmas. It was I who put out the fire; my wrists were burnt in doing +so.” +</p> + +<p> +Then for a space we sat silent, looking at each other, while Stella slowly +fanned herself with her wide felt hat, in which some white ostrich plumes were +fixed. +</p> + +<p> +“This is God’s doing,” she said at last. “You saved my +life when I was a child; now I have saved yours and the little girl’s. Is +she your own daughter?” she added, quickly. +</p> + +<p> +“No,” I answered; “I will tell you the tale presently.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” she said, “you shall tell me as we go home. It is time +to be starting home, it will take us three hours to get there. Hendrika, +Hendrika, bring the horses here!” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap07"></a>CHAPTER VII.<br/> +THE BABOON-WOMAN</h2> + +<p> +Hendrika obeyed, leading the horses to the side of the tree. +</p> + +<p> +“Now, Mr. Allan,” said Stella, “you must ride on my horse, +and the old black man must ride on the other. I will walk, and Hendrika will +carry the child. Oh, do not be afraid, she is very strong, she could carry you +or me.” +</p> + +<p> +Hendrika grunted assent. I am sorry that I cannot express her method of speech +by any more polite term. Sometimes she grunted like a monkey, sometimes she +clicked like a Bushman, and sometimes she did both together, when she became +quite unintelligible. +</p> + +<p> +I expostulated against this proposed arrangement, saying that we could walk, +which was a fib, for I do not think that I could have done a mile; but Stella +would not listen, she would not even let me carry my elephant gun, but took it +herself. So we mounted with some difficulty, and Hendrika took up the sleeping +Tota in her long, sinewy arms. +</p> + +<p> +“See that the ‘Baboon-woman’ does not run away into the +mountains with the little white one,” said Indaba-zimbi to me in Kaffir, +as he climbed slowly on to the horse. +</p> + +<p> +Unfortunately Hendrika understood his speech. Her face twisted and grew livid +with fury. She put down Tota and literally sprang at Indaba-zimbi as a monkey +springs. But weary and worn as he was, the old gentleman was too quick for her. +With an exclamation of genuine fright he threw himself from the horse on the +further side, with the somewhat ludicrous result that all in a moment Hendrika +was occupying the seat which he had vacated. Just then Stella realized the +position. +</p> + +<p> +“Come down, you savage, come down!” she said, stamping her foot. +</p> + +<p> +The extraordinary creature flung herself from the horse and literally grovelled +on the ground before her mistress and burst into tears. +</p> + +<p> +“Pardon, Miss Stella,” she clicked and grunted in villainous +English, “but he called me ‘Babyan-frau’ +(Baboon-woman).” +</p> + +<p> +“Tell your servant that he must not use such words to Hendrika, Mr. +Allan,” Stella said to me. “If he does,” she added, in a +whisper, “Hendrika will certainly kill him.” +</p> + +<p> +I explained this to Indaba-zimbi, who, being considerably frightened, deigned +to apologize. But from that hour there was hate and war between these two. +</p> + +<p> +Harmony having been thus restored, we started, the dogs following us. A small +strip of desert intervened between us and the slope of the peak—perhaps +it was two miles wide. We crossed it and reached rich grass lands, for here a +considerable stream gathered from the hills; but it did not flow across the +barren lands, it passed to the east along the foot of the hills. This stream we +had to cross by a ford. Hendrika walked boldly through it, holding Tota in her +arms. Stella leapt across from stone to stone like a roebuck; I thought to +myself that she was the most graceful creature that I had ever seen. After this +the track passed around a pleasantly-wooded shoulder of the peak, which was, I +found, known as Babyan Kap, or Baboon Head. Of course we could only go at a +foot pace, so our progress was slow. Stella walked for some way in silence, +then she spoke. +</p> + +<p> +“Tell me, Mr. Allan,” she said, “how it was that I came to +find you dying in the desert?” +</p> + +<p> +So I began and told her all. It took an hour or more to do so, and she listened +intently, now and again asking a question. +</p> + +<p> +“It is all very wonderful,” she said when I had done, “very +wonderful indeed. Do you know I went out this morning with Hendrika and the +dogs for a ride, meaning to get back home by mid-day, for my father is ill, and +I do not like to leave him for long. But just as I was going to turn, when we +were about where we are now—yes, that was the very bush—an oribé +got up, and the dogs chased it. I followed them for the gallop, and when we +came to the river, instead of turning to the left as bucks generally do, the +oribé swam the stream and took to the Bad Lands beyond. I followed it, and +within a hundred yards of the big tree the dogs killed it. Hendrika wanted to +turn back at once, but I said that we would rest under the shade of the tree, +for I knew that there was a spring of water near. Well, we went; and there I +saw you all lying like dead; but Hendrika, who is very clever in some ways, +said no—and you know the rest. Yes, it is very wonderful.” +</p> + +<p> +“It is indeed,” I said. “Now tell me, Miss Stella, who is +Hendrika?” +</p> + +<p> +She looked round before answering to see that the woman was not near. +</p> + +<p> +“Hers is a strange story, Mr. Allan. I will tell you. You must know that +all these mountains and the country beyond are full of baboons. When I was a +girl of about ten I used to wander a great deal alone in the hills and valleys, +and watch the baboons as they played among the rocks. There was one family of +baboons that I watched especially—they used to live in a kloof about a +mile from the house. The old man baboon was very large, and one of the females +had a grey face. But the reason why I watched them so much was because I saw +that they had with them a creature that looked like a girl, for her skin was +quite white, and, what was more, that she was protected from the weather when +it happened to be cold by a fur belt of some sort, which was tied round her +throat. The old baboons seemed to be especially fond of her, and would sit with +their arms round her neck. For nearly a whole summer I watched this particular +white-skinned baboon till at last my curiosity quite overmastered me. I noticed +that, though she climbed about the cliffs with the other monkeys, at a certain +hour a little before sundown they used to put her with one or two other much +smaller ones into a little cave, while the family went off somewhere to get +food, to the mealie fields, I suppose. Then I got an idea that I would catch +this white baboon and bring it home. But of course I could not do this by +myself, so I took a Hottentot—a very clever man when he was not +drunk—who lived on the stead, into my confidence. He was called Hendrik, +and was very fond of me; but for a long while he would not listen to my plan, +because he said that the babyans would kill us. At last I bribed him with a +knife that had four blades, and one afternoon we started, Hendrik carrying a +stout sack made of hide, with a rope running through it so that the mouth could +be drawn tight. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, we got to the place, and, hiding ourselves carefully in the trees +at the foot of the kloof, watched the baboons playing about and grunting to +each other, till at length, according to custom, they took the white one and +three other little babies and put them in the cave. Then the old man came out, +looked carefully round, called to his family, and went off with them over the +brow of the kloof. Now very slowly and cautiously we crept up over the rocks +till we came to the mouth of the cave and looked in. All the four little +baboons were fast asleep, with their backs towards us, and their arms round +each other’s necks, the white one being in the middle. Nothing could have +been better for our plans. Hendrik, who by this time had quite entered into the +spirit of the thing, crept along the cave like a snake, and suddenly dropped +the mouth of the hide bag over the head of the white baboon. The poor little +thing woke up and gave a violent jump which caused it to vanish right into the +bag. Then Hendrik pulled the string tight, and together we knotted it so that +it was impossible for our captive to escape. Meanwhile the other baby baboons +had rushed from the cave screaming, and when we got outside they were nowhere +to be seen. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Come on, Missie,’ said Hendrik; ‘the babyans will +soon be back.’ He had shouldered the sack, inside of which the white +baboon was kicking violently, and screaming like a child. It was dreadful to +hear its shrieks. +</p> + +<p> +“We scrambled down the sides of the kloof and ran for home as fast as we +could manage. When we were near the waterfall, and within about three hundred +yards of the garden wall, we heard a voice behind us, and there, leaping from +rock to rock, and running over the grass, was the whole family of baboons +headed by the old man. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Run, Missie, run!’ gasped Hendrik, and I did, like the +wind, leaving him far behind. I dashed into the garden, where some Kaffirs were +working, crying, ‘The babyans! the babyans!’ Luckily the men had +their sticks and spears by them and ran out just in time to save Hendrik, who +was almost overtaken. The baboons made a good fight for it, however, and it was +not till the old man was killed with an assegai that they ran away. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, there is a stone hut in the kraal at the stead where my father +sometimes shuts up natives who have misbehaved. It is very strong, and has a +barred window. To this hut Hendrik carried the sack, and, having untied the +mouth, put it down on the floor, and ran from the place, shutting the door +behind him. In another moment the poor little thing was out and dashing round +the stone hut as though it were mad. It sprung at the bars of the window, clung +there, and beat its head against them till the blood came. Then it fell to the +floor, and sat upon it crying like a child, and rocking itself backwards and +forwards. It was so sad to see it that I began to cry too. +</p> + +<p> +“Just then my father came in and asked what all the fuss was about. I +told him that we had caught a young white baboon, and he was angry, and said +that it must be let go. But when he looked at it through the bars of the window +he nearly fell down with astonishment. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Why!’ he said, ‘this is not a baboon, it is a white +child that the baboons have stolen and brought up!’ +</p> + +<p> +“Now, Mr. Allan, whether my father is right or wrong, you can judge for +yourself. You see Hendrika—we named her that after Hendrik, who caught +her—she is a woman, not a monkey, and yet she has many of the ways of +monkeys, and looks like one too. You saw how she can climb, for instance, and +you hear how she talks. Also she is very savage, and when she is angry or +jealous she seems to go mad, though she is as clever as anybody. I think that +she must have been stolen by the baboons when she was quite tiny and nurtured +by them, and that is why she is so like them. +</p> + +<p> +“But to go on. My father said that it was our duty to keep Hendrika at +any cost. The worst of it was, that for three days she would eat nothing, and I +thought that she would die, for all the while she sat and wailed. On the third +day, however, I went to the bars of the window place, and held out a cup of +milk and some fruit to her. She looked at it for a long while, then crept up +moaning, took the milk from my hand, drank it greedily, and afterwards ate the +fruit. From that time forward she took food readily enough, but only if I would +feed her. +</p> + +<p> +“But I must tell you of the dreadful end of Hendrik. From the day that we +captured Hendrika the whole place began to swarm with baboons which were +evidently employed in watching the kraals. One day Hendrik went out towards the +hills alone to gather some medicine. He did not come back again, so the next +day search was made. By a big rock which I can show you, they found his +scattered and broken bones, the fragments of his assegai, and four dead +baboons. They had set upon him and torn him to pieces. +</p> + +<p> +“My father was very much frightened at this, but still he would not let +Hendrika go, because he said that she was human, and that it was our duty to +reclaim her. And so we did—to a certain extent, at least. After the +murder of Hendrik, the baboons vanished from the neighbourhood, and have only +returned quite recently, so at length we ventured to let Hendrika out. By this +time she had grown very fond of me; still, on the first opportunity she ran +away. But in the evening she returned again. She had been seeking the baboons, +and could not find them. Shortly afterwards she began to speak—I taught +her—and from that time she has loved me so that she will not leave me. I +think it would kill her if I went away from her. She watches me all day, and at +night sleeps on the floor of my hut. Once, too, she saved my life when I was +swept down the river in flood; but she is jealous, and hates everybody else. +Look, how she is glaring at you now because I am talking to you!” +</p> + +<p> +I looked. Hendrika was tramping along with the child in her arms and staring at +me in a most sinister fashion out of the corners of her eyes. +</p> + +<p> +While I was reflecting on the Baboon-woman’s strange story, and thinking +that she was an exceedingly awkward customer, the path took a sudden turn. +</p> + +<p> +“Look!” said Stella, “there is our home. Is it not +beautiful?” +</p> + +<p> +It was beautiful indeed. Here on the western side of the great peak a bay had +been formed in the mountain, which might have measured eight hundred or a +thousand yards across by three-quarters of a mile in depth. At the back of this +indentation the sheer cliff rose to the height of several hundred feet, and +behind it and above it the great Babyan Peak towered up towards the heavens. +The space of ground, embraced thus in the arms of the mountain, as it were, was +laid out, as though by the cunning hand of man, in three terraces that rose one +above the other. To the right and left of the topmost terrace were chasms in +the cliff, and down each chasm fell a waterfall, from no great height, indeed, +but of considerable volume. These two streams flowed away on either side of the +enclosed space, one towards the north, and the other, the course of which we +had been following, round the base of the mountain. At each terrace they made a +cascade, so that the traveller approaching had a view of eight waterfalls at +once. Along the edge of the stream to our left were placed Kaffir kraals, built +in orderly groups with verandahs, after the Basutu fashion, and a very large +part of the entire space of land was under cultivation. All of this I noted at +once, as well as the extraordinary richness and depth of the soil, which for +many ages past had been washed down from the mountain heights. Then following +the line of an excellent waggon road, on which we now found ourselves, that +wound up from terrace to terrace, my eye lit upon the crowning wonder of the +scene. For in the centre of the topmost platform or terrace, which may have +enclosed eight or ten acres of ground, and almost surrounded by groves of +orange trees, gleamed buildings of which I had never seen the like. There were +three groups of them, one in the middle, and one on either side, and a little +to the rear, but, as I afterwards discovered, the plan of all was the same. In +the centre was an edifice constructed like an ordinary Zulu hut—that is +to say, in the shape of a beehive, only it was five times the size of any hut I +ever saw, and built of blocks of hewn white marble, fitted together with +extraordinary knowledge of the principles and properties of arch building, and +with so much accuracy and finish that it was often difficult to find the joints +of the massive blocks. From this centre hut ran three covered passages, leading +to other buildings of an exactly similar character, only smaller, and each +whole block was enclosed by a marble wall about four feet in height. +</p> + +<p> +Of course we were as yet too far off to see all these details, but the general +outline I saw at once, and it astonished me considerably. Even old +Indaba-zimbi, whom the Baboon-woman had been unable to move, deigned to show +wonder. +</p> + +<p> +“Ou!” he said; “this is a place of marvels. Who ever saw +kraals built of white stone?” +</p> + +<p> +Stella watched our faces with an expression of intense amusement, but said +nothing. +</p> + +<p> +“Did your father build those kraals?” I gasped, at length. +</p> + +<p> +“My father! no, of course not,” she answered. “How would it +have been possible for one white man to do so, or to have made this road? He +found them as you see.” +</p> + +<p> +“Who built them, then?” I said again. +</p> + +<p> +“I do not know. My father thinks that they are very ancient, for the +people who live here now do not know how to lay one stone upon another, and +these huts are so wonderfully constructed that, though they must have stood for +ages, not a stone of them had fallen. But I can show you the quarry where the +marble was cut; it is close by and behind it is the entrance to an ancient +mine, which my father thinks was a silver mine. Perhaps the people who worked +the mine built the marble huts. The world is old, and no doubt plenty of people +have lived in it and been forgotten.”[*] +</p> + +<p class="footnote"> +[*] Kraals of a somewhat similar nature to those described by Mr. Quatermain +have been discovered in the Marico district of the Transvaal, and an +illustration of them is to be found in Mr. Anderson’s “Twenty-five +Years in a Waggon,” vol. ii. p. 55. Mr. Anderson says, “In this +district are the ancient stone kraals mentioned in an early chapter; but it +requires a fuller description to show that these extensive kraals must have +been erected by a white race who understood building in stone and at right +angles, with door-posts, lintels, and sills, and it required more than Kaffir +skill to erect the stone huts, with stone circular roofs, beautifully formed +and most substantially erected; strong enough, if not disturbed, to last a +thousand years.” —Editor. +</p> + +<p> +Then we rode on in silence. I have seen many beautiful sights in Africa, and in +such matters, as in others, comparisons are odious and worthless, but I do not +think that I ever saw a lovelier scene. It was no one thing—it was the +combination of the mighty peak looking forth on to the everlasting plains, the +great cliffs, the waterfalls that sparkled in rainbow hues, the rivers girdling +the rich cultivated lands, the gold-specked green of the orange trees, the +flashing domes of the marble huts, and a thousand other things. Then over all +brooded the peace of evening, and the infinite glory of the sunset that filled +heaven with changing hues of splendour, that wrapped the mountain and cliffs in +cloaks of purple and of gold, and lay upon the quiet face of the water like the +smile of a god. +</p> + +<p> +Perhaps also the contrast, and the memory of those three awful days and nights +in the hopeless desert, enhanced the charm, and perhaps the beauty of the girl +who walked beside me completed it. For of this I am sure, that of all sweet and +lovely things that I looked on then, she was the sweetest and the loveliest. +</p> + +<p> +Ah, it did not take me long to find my fate. How long will it be before I find +her once again? +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap08"></a>CHAPTER VIII.<br/> +THE MARBLE KRAALS</h2> + +<p> +At length the last platform, or terrace, was reached, and we pulled up outside +the wall surrounding the central group of marble huts—for so I must call +them, for want of a better name. Our approach had been observed by a crowd of +natives, whose race I have never been able to determine accurately; they +belonged to the Basutu and peaceful section of the Bantu peoples rather than to +the Zulu and warlike. Several of these ran up to take the horses, gazing on us +with astonishment, not unmixed with awe. We dismounted—speaking for +myself, not without difficulty—indeed, had it not been for Stella’s +support I should have fallen. +</p> + +<p> +“Now you must come and see my father,” she said. “I wonder +what he will think of it, it is all so strange. Hendrika, take the child to my +hut and give her milk, then put her into my bed; I will come presently.” +</p> + +<p> +Hendrika went off with a somewhat ugly grin to do her mistress’s bidding, +and Stella led the way through the narrow gateway in the marble wall, which may +have enclosed nearly half an “erf,” or three-quarters of an acre of +ground in all. It was beautifully planted as a garden, many European vegetables +and flowers were growing in it, besides others with which I was not acquainted. +Presently we came to the centre hut, and it was then that I noticed the +extraordinary beauty and finish of the marble masonry. In the hut, and facing +the gateway, was a modern door, rather rudely fashioned of Buckenhout, a +beautiful reddish wood that has the appearance of having been sedulously +pricked with a pin. Stella opened it, and we entered. The interior of the hut +was the size of a large and lofty room, the walls being formed of plain +polished marble. It was lighted somewhat dimly, but quite effectively, by +peculiar openings in the roof, from which the rain was excluded by overhanging +eaves. The marble floor was strewn with native mats and skins of animals. +Bookcases filled with books were placed against the walls, there was a table in +the centre, chairs seated with rimpi or strips of hide stood about, and beyond +the table was a couch on which a man was lying reading. +</p> + +<p> +“Is that you, Stella?” said a voice, that even after so many years +seemed familiar to me. “Where have you been, my dear? I began to think +that you had lost yourself again.” +</p> + +<p> +“No, father, dear, I have not lost myself, but I have found somebody +else.” +</p> + +<p> +At that moment I stepped forward so that the light fell on me. The old +gentleman on the couch rose with some difficulty and bowed with much courtesy. +He was a fine-looking old man, with deep-set dark eyes, a pale face that bore +many traces of physical and mental suffering, and a long white beard. +</p> + +<p> +“Be welcome, sir,” he said. “It is long since we have seen a +white face in these wilds, and yours, if I am not mistaken, is that of an +Englishman. There has been but one Englishman here for twelve years, and he, I +grieve to say, was an outcast flying from justice,” and he bowed again +and stretched out his hand. +</p> + +<p> +I looked at him, and then of a sudden his name flashed back into my mind. I +took his hand. +</p> + +<p> +“How do you do, Mr. Carson?” I said. +</p> + +<p> +He started as though he had been stung. +</p> + +<p> +“Who told you that name?” he cried. “It is a dead name. +Stella, is it you? I forbade you to let it pass your lips.” +</p> + +<p> +“I did not speak it, father. I have never spoken it,” she answered. +</p> + +<p> +“Sir,” I broke in, “if you will allow me I will show you how +I came to know your name. Do you remember many years ago coming into the study +of a clergyman in Oxfordshire and telling him that you were going to leave +England for ever?” +</p> + +<p> +He bowed his head. +</p> + +<p> +“And do you remember a little boy who sat upon the hearthrug writing with +a pencil?” +</p> + +<p> +“I do,” he said. +</p> + +<p> +“Sir, I was that boy, and my name is Allan Quatermain. Those children who +lay sick are all dead, their mother is dead, and my father, your old friend, is +dead also. Like you he emigrated, and last year he died in the Cape. But that +is not all the story. After many adventures, I, one Kaffir, and a little girl, +lay senseless and dying in the Bad Lands, where we had wandered for days +without water, and there we should have perished, but your daughter, +Miss——” +</p> + +<p> +“Call her Stella,” he broke in, hastily. “I cannot bear to +hear that name. I have forsworn it.” +</p> + +<p> +“Miss Stella found us by chance and saved our lives.” +</p> + +<p> +“By chance, did you say, Allan Quatermain?” he answered. +“There is little chance in all this; such chances spring from another +will than ours. Welcome, Allan, son of my old friend. Here we live as it were +in a hermitage, with Nature as our only friend, but such as we have is yours, +and for as long as you will take it. But you must be starving; talk no more +now. Stella, it is time to eat. To-morrow we will talk.” +</p> + +<p> +To tell the truth I can recall very little of the events of that evening. A +kind of dizzy weariness overmastered me. I remember sitting at a table next to +Stella, and eating heartily, and then I remember nothing more. +</p> + +<p> +I awoke to find myself lying on a comfortable bed in a hut built and fashioned +on the same model as the centre one. While I was wondering what time it was, a +native came bringing some clean clothes on his arm, and, luxury of luxuries, +produced a bath hollowed from wood. I rose, feeling a very different man, my +strength had come back again to me; I dressed, and following a covered passage +found myself in the centre hut. Here the table was set for breakfast with all +manner of good things, such as I had not seen for many a month, which I +contemplated with healthy satisfaction. Presently I looked up, and there before +me was a more delightful sight, for standing in one of the doorways which led +to the sleeping huts was Stella, leading little Tota by the hand. +</p> + +<p> +She was very simply dressed in a loose blue gown, with a wide collar, and +girdled in at the waist by a little leather belt. In the bosom of her robe was +a bunch of orange blooms, and her rippling hair was tied in a single knot +behind her shapely head. She greeted me with a smile, asking how I had slept, +and then held Tota up for me to kiss. Under her loving care the child had been +quite transformed. She was neatly dressed in a garment of the same blue stuff +that Stella wore, her fair hair was brushed; indeed, had it not been for the +sun blisters on her face and hands, one would scarcely have believed that this +was the same child whom Indaba-zimbi and I had dragged for hour after hour +through the burning, waterless desert. +</p> + +<p> +“We must breakfast alone, Mr. Allan,” she said; “my father is +so upset by your arrival that he will not get up yet. Oh, you cannot tell how +thankful I am that you have come. I have been so anxious about him of late. He +grows weaker and weaker; it seems to me as though the strength were ebbing away +from him. Now he scarcely leaves the kraal, I have to manage everything about +the farm; he does nothing but read and think.” +</p> + +<p> +Just then Hendrika entered, bearing a jug of coffee in one hand and of milk in +the other, which she set down upon the table, casting a look of little love at +me as she did so. +</p> + +<p> +“Be careful, Hendrika; you are spilling the coffee,” said Stella. +“Don’t you wonder how we come to have coffee here, Mr. Allan? I +will tell you—we grow it. That was my idea. Oh, I have lots of things to +show you. You don’t know what we have managed to do in the time that we +have been here. You see we have plenty of labour, for the people about look +upon my father as their chief.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” I said, “but how do you get all these luxuries of +civilization?” and I pointed to the books, the crockery, and the knives +and forks. +</p> + +<p> +“Very simply. Most of the books my father brought with him when we first +trekked into the wilds; there was nearly a waggon load of them. But every few +years we have sent an expedition of three waggons right down to Port Natal. The +waggons are loaded with ivory and other goods, and come back with all kinds of +things that have been sent out from England for us. So you see, although we +live in this wild place, we are not altogether cut off. We can send runners to +Natal and back in three months, and the waggons get there and back in a year. +The last lot arrived quite safe about three months ago. Our servants are very +faithful, and some of them speak Dutch well.” +</p> + +<p> +“Have you ever been with the waggons?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“Since I was a child I have never been more than thirty miles from +Babyan’s Peak,” she answered. “Do you know, Mr. Allan, that +you are, with one exception, the first Englishman that I have known out of a +book. I suppose that I must seem very wild and savage to you, but I have had +one advantage—a good education. My father has taught me everything, and +perhaps I know some things that you don’t. I can read French and German, +for instance. I think that my father’s first idea was to let me run wild +altogether, but he gave it up.” +</p> + +<p> +“And don’t you wish to go into the world?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“Sometimes,” she said, “when I get lonely. But perhaps my +father is right—perhaps it would frighten and bewilder me. At any rate he +would never return to civilization; it is his idea, you know, although I am +sure I do not know where he got it from, nor why he cannot bear that our name +should be spoken. In short, Mr. Quatermain, we do not make our lives, we must +take them as we find them. Have you done your breakfast? Let us go out, and I +will show you our home.” +</p> + +<p> +I rose and went to my sleeping-place to fetch my hat. When I returned, Mr. +Carson—for after all that was his name, though he would never allow it to +be spoken—had come into the hut. He felt better now, he said, and would +accompany us on our walk if Stella would give him an arm. +</p> + +<p> +So we started, and after us came Hendrika with Tota and old Indaba-zimbi whom I +found sitting outside as fresh as paint. Nothing could tire that old man. +</p> + +<p> +The view from the platform was almost as beautiful as that from the lower +ground looking up to the peak. The marble kraals, as I have said, faced west, +consequently all the upper terrace lay in the shadow of the great peak till +nearly eleven o’clock in the morning—a great advantage in that warm +latitude. First we walked through the garden, which was beautifully cultivated, +and one of the most productive that I ever saw. There were three or four +natives working in it, and they all saluted my host as “Baba,” or +father. Then we visited the other two groups of marble huts. One of these was +used for stables and outbuildings, the other as storehouses, the centre hut +having been, however, turned into a chapel. Mr. Carson was not ordained, but he +earnestly tried to convert the natives, most of whom were refugees who had come +to him for shelter, and he had practised the more elementary rites of the +church for so long that I think he began to believe that he really was a +clergyman. For instance, he always married those of his people who would +consent to a monogamous existence, and baptized their children. +</p> + +<p> +When we had examined those wonderful remains of antiquity, the marble huts, and +admired the orange trees, the vines and fruits which thrive like weeds in this +marvellous soil and climate, we descended to the next platform, and saw the +farming operations in full swing. I think that it was the best farm I have ever +seen in Africa. There was ample water for purposes of irrigation, the grass +lands below gave pasturage for hundreds of head of cattle and horses, and, for +natives, the people were most industrious. Moreover, the whole place was +managed by Mr. Carson on the co-operative system; he only took a tithe of the +produce—indeed, in this land of teeming plenty, what was he to do with +more? Consequently the tribesmen, who, by the way, called themselves the +“Children of Thomas,” were able to accumulate considerable wealth. +All their disputes were referred to their “father,” and he also was +judge of offences and crimes. Some were punished by imprisonment, whipping, and +loss of goods, other and graver transgressions by expulsion from the community, +a fiat which to one of these favoured natives must have seemed as heavy as the +decree that drove Adam from the Garden of Eden. +</p> + +<p> +Old Mr. Carson leaned upon his daughter’s arm and contemplated the scene +with pride. +</p> + +<p> +“I have done all this, Allan Quatermain,” he said. “When +renouncing civilization, I wandered here by chance; seeking a home in the +remotest places of the world, I found this lonely spot a wilderness. Nothing +was to be seen except the site, the domes of the marble huts, and the +waterfalls. I took possession of the huts. I cleared the path of garden land +and planted the orange grove. I had only six natives then, but by degrees +others joined me, now my tribe is a thousand strong. Here we live in profound +peace and plenty. I have all I need, and I seek no more. Heaven has prospered +me so far—may it do so to the end, which for me draws nigh. And now I am +tired and will go back. If you wish to see the old quarry and the mouth of the +ancient mines, Stella will show them to you. No, my love, you need not trouble +to come, I can manage. Look! some of the headmen are waiting to see me.” +</p> + +<p> +So he went; but still followed by Hendrika and Indaba-zimbi, we turned, and, +walking along the bank of one of the rivers, passed up behind the marble +kraals, and came to the quarry, whence the material of which they were built +had been cut in some remote age. The pit opened up a very thick seam of the +whitest and most beautiful marble. I know another like it in Natal. But by whom +it had been worked I cannot say; not by natives, that is certain, though the +builders of these kraals had condescended to borrow the shape of native huts +for their model. By the way, the only relic of those builders that I ever saw +was a highly finished bronze pick-axe which Stella had found one day in the +quarry. +</p> + +<p> +After we had examined this quarry we climbed the slope of the hill till we came +to the mouth of the ancient mines which were situated in a gorge. I believe +them to have been silver mines. The gorge was long and narrow, and the moment +we entered it there rose from every side a sound of groaning and barking that +was almost enough to deafen us. I knew what it was at once: the whole place was +filled with baboons, which clambered down the rocks towards us from every +direction, and in a manner that struck me as being unnaturally fearless. Stella +turned a little pale and clung to my arm. +</p> + +<p> +“It is very silly of me,” she whispered. “I am not at all +nervous, but ever since they killed Hendrik I cannot bear the sight of those +animals. I always think that there is something human about them.” +</p> + +<p> +Meanwhile the baboons drew nearer, talking to each other as they came. Tota +began to cry, and clung to Stella. Stella clung to me, while I and Indaba-zimbi +put as bold a front on the matter as we could. Only Hendrika stood looking at +the brutes with an unconcerned smile on her monkey face. When the great apes +were quite near, she suddenly called aloud. Instantly they stopped their +hideous clamour as though at a word of command. Then Hendrika addressed them: I +can only describe it so. That is to say, she began to make a noise such as +baboons do when they converse with each other. I have known Hottentots and +Bushmen who said that they could talk with the baboons and understand their +language, but I confess I never heard it done before or since. +</p> + +<p> +From the mouth of Hendrika came a succession of grunts, groans, squeals, +clicks, and every other abominable noise that can be conceived, conveying to my +mind a general idea of expostulation. At any rate the baboons listened. One of +them grunted back some answer, and then the whole mob drew off to the rocks. +</p> + +<p> +I stood astonished, and without a word we turned back to the kraal, for +Hendrika was too close to allow me to speak. When we reached the dining hut +Stella went in, followed by Hendrika. But Indaba-zimbi plucked me by the +sleeve, and I stopped outside. +</p> + +<p> +“Macumazahn,” he said. “Baboon-woman—devil-woman. Be +careful, Macumazahn. She loves that Star (the natives aptly enough called +Stella the Star), and is jealous. Be careful, Macumazahn, or the Star will +set!” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap09"></a>CHAPTER IX.<br/> +“LET US GO IN, ALLAN!”</h2> + +<p> +It is very difficult for me to describe the period of time which elapsed +between my arrival at Babyan’s Peak and my marriage with Stella. When I +look back on it, it seems sweet as with the odour of flowers, and dim as with +the happy dusk of summer eves, while through the sweetness comes the sound of +Stella’s voice, and through the gloom shines the starlight of her eyes. I +think that we loved each other from the first, though for a while we said no +word of love. Day by day I went about the place with her, accompanied by little +Tota and Hendrika only, while she attended to the thousand and one matters +which her father’s ever-growing weakness had laid upon her; or rather, as +time drew on, I attended to the business, and she accompanied me. All day +through we were together. Then after supper, when the night had fallen, we +would walk together in the garden and come at length to hear her father read +aloud sometimes from the works of a poet, sometimes from history. Or, if he did +not feel well, Stella would read, and when this was done, Mr. Carson would +celebrate a short form of prayer, and we would separate till the morning once +more brought our happy hour of meeting. +</p> + +<p> +So the weeks went by, and with every week I grew to know my darling better. +Often, I wonder now, if my fond fancy deceives me, or if indeed there are women +as sweet and dear as she. Was it solitude that had given such depth and +gentleness to her? Was it the long years of communing with Nature that had +endowed her with such peculiar grace, the grace we find in opening flowers and +budding trees? Had she caught that murmuring voice from the sound of the +streams which fall continually about her rocky home? Was it the tenderness of +the evening sky beneath which she loved to walk, that lay like a shadow on her +face, and the light of the evening stars that shone in her quiet eyes? At the +least to me she was the realization of that dream which haunts the sleep of +sin-stained men; so my memory paints her, so I hope to find her when at last +the sleep has rolled away and the fevered dreams are done. +</p> + +<p> +At last there came a day—the most blessed of my life, when we told our +love. We had been together all the morning, but after dinner Mr. Carson was so +unwell that Stella stopped in with him. At supper we met again, and after +supper, when she had put little Tota, to whom she had grown much attached, to +bed, we went out, leaving Mr. Carson dozing on the couch. +</p> + +<p> +The night was warm and lovely, and without speaking we walked up the garden to +the orange grove and sat down upon a rock. There was a little breeze which +shook the petals of the orange blooms over us in showers, and bore their +delicate fragrance far and wide. Silence reigned around, broken only by the +sound of the falling waterfalls that now died to a faint murmur, and now, as +the wavering breeze turned, boomed loudly in our ears. The moon was not yet +visible, but already the dark clouds which floated through the sky above +us—for there had been rain—showed a glow of silver, telling us that +she shone brightly behind the peak. Stella began to talk in her low, gentle +voice, speaking to me of her life in the wilderness, how she had grown to love +it, how her mind had gone on from idea to idea, and how she pictured the great +rushing world that she had never seen as it was reflected to her from the books +which she had read. It was a curious vision of life that she had: things were +out of proportion to it; it was more like a dream than a reality—a mirage +than the actual face of things. The idea of great cities, and especially of +London, had a kind of fascination for her: she could scarcely realize the rush, +the roar and hurry, the hard crowds of men and women, strangers to each other, +feverishly seeking for wealth and pleasure beneath a murky sky, and treading +one another down in the fury of their competition. +</p> + +<p> +“What is it all for?” she asked earnestly. “What do they +seek? Having so few years to live, why do they waste them thus?” +</p> + +<p> +I told her that in the majority of instances it was actual hard necessity that +drove them on, but she could barely understand me. Living as she had done, in +the midst of the teeming plenty of a fruitful earth, she did not seem to be +able to grasp the fact that there were millions who from day to day know not +how to stay their hunger. +</p> + +<p> +“I never want to go there,” she went on; “I should be +bewildered and frightened to death. It is not natural to live like that. God +put Adam and Eve in a garden, and that is how he meant their children to +live—in peace, and looking always on beautiful things. This is my idea of +perfect life. I want no other.” +</p> + +<p> +“I thought you once told me that you found it lonely,” I said. +</p> + +<p> +“So I did,” she answered, innocently, “but that was before +you came. Now I am not lonely any more, and it is perfect—perfect as the +night.” +</p> + +<p> +Just then the full moon rose above the elbow of the peak, and her rays stole +far and wide down the misty valley, gleaming on the water, brooding on the +plain, searching out the hidden places of the rocks, wrapping the fair form of +nature as in a silver bridal veil through which her beauty shone mysteriously. +</p> + +<p> +Stella looked down the terraced valley; she turned and looked up at the scarred +face of the golden moon, and then she looked at me. The beauty of the night was +about her face, the scent of the night was on her hair, the mystery of the +night shone in her shadowed eyes. She looked at me, I looked on her, and all +our hearts’ love blossomed within us. We spoke no word—we had no +words to speak, but slowly we drew near, till lips were pressed to lips as we +kissed our eternal troth. +</p> + +<p> +It was she who broke that holy silence, speaking in a changed voice, in soft +deep notes that thrilled me like the lowest chords of a smitten harp. +</p> + +<p> +“Ah, now I understand,” she said, “now I know why we are +lonely, and how we can lose our loneliness. Now I know what it is that stirs us +in the beauty of the sky, in the sound of water and in the scent of flowers. It +is Love who speaks in everything, though till we hear his voice we understand +nothing. But when we hear, then the riddle is answered and the gates of our +heart are opened, and, Allan, we see the way that wends through death to +heaven, and is lost in the glory of which our love is but a shadow. +</p> + +<p> +“Let us go in, Allan. Let us go before the spell breaks, so that whatever +overtakes us, sorrow, death, or separation, we may always have this perfect +memory to save us. Come, dearest, let us go!” +</p> + +<p> +I rose like a man in a dream, still holding her by the hand. But as I rose my +eye fell upon something that gleamed white among the foliage of the orange bush +at my side. I said nothing, but looked. The breeze stirred the orange leaves, +the moonlight struck for a moment full upon the white object. +</p> + +<p> +It was the face of Hendrika, the Babyan-woman, as Indaba-zimbi had called her, +and on it was a glare of hate that made me shudder. +</p> + +<p> +I said nothing; the face vanished, and just then I heard a baboon bark in the +rocks behind. +</p> + +<p> +Then we went down the garden, and Stella passed into the centre hut. I saw +Hendrika standing in the shadow near the door, and went up to her. +</p> + +<p> +“Hendrika,” I said, “why were you watching Miss Stella and +myself in the garden?” +</p> + +<p> +She drew her lips up till her teeth gleamed in the moonlight. +</p> + +<p> +“Have I not watched her these many years, Macumazahn? Shall I cease to +watch because a wandering white man comes to steal her? Why were you kissing +her in the garden, Macumazahn? How dare you kiss her who is a star?” +</p> + +<p> +“I kissed her because I love her, and because she loves me,” I +answered. “What has that to do with you, Hendrika?” +</p> + +<p> +“Because you love her,” she hissed in answer; “and do I not +love her also, who saved me from the babyans? I am a woman as she is, and you +are a man, and they say in the kraals that men love women better than women +love women. But it is a lie, though this is true, that if a woman loves a man +she forgets all other love. Have I not seen it? I gather her +flowers—beautiful flowers; I climb the rocks where you would never dare +to go to find them; you pluck a piece of orange bloom in the garden and give it +to her. What does she do?—she takes the orange bloom, she puts it in her +breast, and lets my flowers die. I call to her—she does not hear +me—she is thinking. You whisper to some one far away, and she hears and +smiles. She used to kiss me sometimes; now she kisses that white brat you +brought, because you brought it. Oh, I see it all—all; I have seen it +from the first; you are stealing her from us, stealing her to yourself, and +those who loved her before you came are forgotten. Be careful, Macumazahn, be +careful, lest I am revenged upon you. You, you hate me; you think me half a +monkey; that servant of yours calls me Baboon-woman. Well, I have lived with +baboons, and they are clever—yes, they can play tricks and know things +that you don’t, and I am cleverer than they, for I have learnt the wisdom +of white people also, and I say to you, Walk softly, Macumazahn, or you will +fall into a pit,” and with one more look of malice she was gone. +</p> + +<p> +I stood for a moment reflecting. I was afraid of this strange creature who +seemed to combine the cunning of the great apes that had reared her with the +passions and skill of human kind. I foreboded evil at her hands. And yet there +was something almost touching in the fierceness of her jealousy. It is +generally supposed that this passion only exists in strength when the object +loved is of another sex from the lover, but I confess that, both in this +instance and in some others which I have met with, this has not been my +experience. I have known men, and especially uncivilized men, who were as +jealous of the affection of their friend or master as any lover could be of +that of his mistress; and who has not seen cases of the same thing where +parents and their children are concerned? But the lower one gets in the scale +of humanity, the more readily this passion thrives; indeed, it may be said to +come to its intensest perfection in brutes. Women are more jealous than men, +small-hearted men are more jealous than those of larger mind and wider +sympathy, and animals are the most jealous of all. Now Hendrika was in some +ways not far removed from animal, which may perhaps account for the ferocity of +her jealousy of her mistress’s affection. +</p> + +<p> +Shaking off my presentiments of evil, I entered the centre hut. Mr. Carson was +resting on the sofa, and by him knelt Stella holding his hand, and her head +resting on his breast. I saw at once that she had been telling him of what had +come about between us; nor was I sorry, for it is a task that a would-be +son-in-law is generally glad to do by deputy. +</p> + +<p> +“Come here, Allan Quatermain,” he said, almost sternly, and my +heart gave a jump, for I feared lest he might be about to require me to go +about my business. But I came. +</p> + +<p> +“Stella tells me,” he went on, “that you two have entered +into a marriage engagement. She tells me also that she loves you, and that you +say that you love her.” +</p> + +<p> +“I do indeed, sir,” I broke in; “I love her truly; if ever a +woman was loved in this world, I love her.” +</p> + +<p> +“I thank Heaven for it,” said the old man. “Listen, my +children. Many years ago a great shame and sorrow fell upon me, so great a +sorrow that, as I sometimes think, it affected my brain. At any rate, I +determined to do what most men would have considered the act of a madman, to go +far away into the wilderness with my only child, there to live remote from +civilization and its evils. I did so; I found this place, and here we have +lived for many years, happily enough, and perhaps not without doing good in our +generation, but still in a way unnatural to our race and status. At first I +thought I would let my daughter grow up in a state of complete ignorance, that +she should be Nature’s child. But as time went on, I saw the folly and +the wickedness of my plan. I had no right to degrade her to the level of the +savages around me, for if the fruit of the tree of knowledge is a bitter fruit, +still it teaches good from evil. So I educated her as well as I was able, till +in the end I knew that in mind, as in body, she was in no way inferior to her +sisters, the children of the civilized world. She grew up and entered into +womanhood, and then it came into my mind that I was doing her a bitter wrong, +that I was separating her from her kind and keeping her in a wilderness where +she could find neither mate nor companion. But though I knew this, I could not +yet make up my mind to return to active life; I had grown to love this place. I +dreaded to return into the world I had abjured. Again and again I put my +resolutions aside. Then at the commencement of this year I fell ill. For a +while I waited, hoping that I might get better, but at last I realized that I +should never get better, that the hand of Death was upon me.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ah, no, father, not that!” Stella said, with a cry. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, love, that, and it is true. Now you will be able to forget our +separation in the happiness of a new meeting,” and he glanced at me and +smiled. “Well, when this knowledge came home to me, I determined to +abandon this place and trek for the coast, though I well knew that the journey +would kill me. I should never live to reach it. But Stella would, and it would +be better than leaving her here alone with savages in the wilderness. On the +very day that I had made up my mind to take this step Stella found you dying in +the Bad Lands, Allan Quatermain, and brought you here. She brought you, of all +men in the world, you, whose father had been my dear friend, and who once with +your baby hands had saved her life from fire, that she might live to save yours +from thirst. At the time I said little, but I saw the hand of Providence in +this, and I determined to wait and see what came about between you. At the +worst, if nothing came about, I soon learned that I could trust you to see her +safely to the coast after I was gone. But many days ago I knew how it stood +between you, and now things are determined as I prayed they might be. God bless +you both, my children; may you be happy in your love; may it endure till death +and beyond it. God bless you both!” and he stretched out his hand towards +me. +</p> + +<p> +I took it, and Stella kissed him. +</p> + +<p> +Presently he spoke again— +</p> + +<p> +“It is my intention,” he said, “if you two consent, to marry +you next Sunday. I wish to do so soon, for I do not know how much longer will +be allowed to me. I believe that such a ceremony, solemnly celebrated and +entered into before witnesses, will, under the circumstances, be perfectly +legal; but of course you will repeat it with every formality the first moment +it lies in your power so to do. And now, there is one more thing: when I left +England my fortunes were in a shattered condition; in the course of years they +have recovered themselves, the accumulated rents, as I heard but recently, when +the waggons last returned from Port Natal, have sufficed to pay off all +charges, and there is a considerable balance over. Consequently you will not +marry on nothing, for of course you, Stella, are my heiress, and I wish to make +a stipulation. It is this. That so soon as my death occurs you should leave +this place and take the first opportunity of returning to England. I do not ask +you to live there always; it might prove too much for people reared in the +wilds, as both of you have been; but I do ask you to make it your permanent +home. Do you consent and promise this?” +</p> + +<p> +“I do,” I answered. +</p> + +<p> +“And so do I,” said Stella. +</p> + +<p> +“Very well,” he answered; “and now I am tired out. Again God +bless you both, and good-night.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap10"></a>CHAPTER X.<br/> +HENDRIKA PLOTS EVIL</h2> + +<p> +On the following morning I had a conversation with Indaba-zimbi. First of all I +told him that I was going to marry Stella. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh!” he said, “I thought so, Macumazahn. Did I not tell you +that you would find happiness on this journey? Most men must be content to +watch the Star from a long way off, to you it is given to wear her on your +heart. But remember, Macumazahn, remember that stars set.” +</p> + +<p> +“Can you not stop your croaking even for a day?” I answered, +angrily, for his words sent a thrill of fear through me. +</p> + +<p> +“A true prophet must tell the ill as well as the good, Macumazahn. I only +speak what is on my mind. But what of it? What is life but loss, loss upon +loss, till life itself be lost? But in death we may find all the things that we +have lost. So your father taught, Macumazahn, and there was wisdom in his +gentleness. Ou! I do not believe in death; it is change, that is all, +Macumazahn. Look now, the rain falls, the drops of rain that were one water in +the clouds fall side by side. They sink into the ground; presently the sun will +come out, the earth will be dry, the drops will be gone. A fool looks and says +the drops are dead, they will never be one again, they will never again fall +side by side. But I am a rain-maker, and I know the ways of rain. It is not +true. The drops will drain by many paths into the river, and will be one water +there. They will go up to the clouds again in the mists of morning, and there +will again be as they have been. We are the drops of rain, Macumazahn. When we +fall that is our life. When we sink into the ground that is death, and when we +are drawn up again to the sky, what is that, Macumazahn? No! no! when we find +we lose, and when we seem to lose, then we shall really find. I am not a +Christian, Macumazahn, but I am old, and have watched and seen things that +perhaps Christians do not see. There, I have spoken. Be happy with your star, +and if it sets, wait, Macumazahn, wait till it rises again. It will not be +long; one day you will go to sleep, then your eyes will open on another sky, +and there your star will be shining, Macumazahn.” +</p> + +<p> +I made no answer at the time. I could not bear to talk of such a thing. But +often and often in the after years I have thought of Indaba-zimbi and his +beautiful simile and gathered comfort from it. He was a strange man, this old +rain-making savage, and there was more wisdom in him than in many learned +atheists—those spiritual destroyers who, in the name of progress and +humanity, would divorce hope from life, and leave us wandering in a lonesome, +self-consecrated hell. +</p> + +<p> +“Indaba-zimbi,” I said, changing the subject, “I have +something to say,” and I told him of the threats of Hendrika. +</p> + +<p> +He listened with an unmoved face, nodding his white lock at intervals as the +narrative went on. But I saw that he was disturbed by it. +</p> + +<p> +“Macumazahn,” he said at length, “I have told you that this +is an evil woman. She was nourished on baboon milk, and the baboon nature is in +her veins. Such creatures should be killed, not kept. She will make you +mischief if she can. But I will watch her, Macumazahn. Look, the Star is +waiting for you; go, or she will hate me as Hendrika hates you.” +</p> + +<p> +So I went, nothing loth, for attractive as was the wisdom of Indaba-zimbi, I +found a deeper meaning in Stella’s simplest word. All the rest of that +day I passed in her company, and the greater part of the two following days. At +last came Saturday night, the eve of our marriage. It rained that night, so we +did not go out, but spent the evening in the hut. We sat hand in hand, saying +little, but Mr. Carson talked a good deal, telling us tales of his youth, and +of countries that he had visited. Then he read aloud from the Bible, and bade +us goodnight. I also kissed Stella and went to bed. I reached my hut by the +covered way, and before I undressed opened the door to see what the night was +like. It was very dark, and rain was still falling, but as the light streamed +out into the gloom I fancied that I caught sight of a dusky form gliding away. +The thought of Hendrika flashed into my mind; could she be skulking about +outside there? Now I had said nothing of Hendrika and her threats either to Mr. +Carson or Stella, because I did not wish to alarm them. Also I knew that Stella +was attached to this strange person, and I did not wish to shake her confidence +in her unless it was absolutely necessary. For a minute or two I stood +hesitating, then, reflecting that if it was Hendrika, there she should stop, I +went in and put up the stout wooden bar that was used to secure the door. For +the last few nights old Indaba-zimbi had made a habit of sleeping in the +covered passage, which was the only other possible way of access. As I came to +bed I had stepped over him rolled up in his blanket, and to all appearances +fast asleep. So it being evident that I had nothing to fear, I promptly +dismissed the matter from my mind, which, as may be imagined, was indeed fully +occupied with other thoughts. +</p> + +<p> +I got into bed, and for awhile lay awake thinking of the great happiness in +store for me, and of the providential course of events that had brought it +within my reach. A few weeks since and I was wandering in the desert a dying +man, bearing a dying child, and with scarcely a possession left in the world +except a store of buried ivory that I never expected to see again. And now I +was about to wed one of the sweetest and loveliest women on the whole +earth—a woman whom I loved more than I could have thought possible, and +who loved me back again. Also, as though that were not good fortune enough, I +was to acquire with her very considerable possessions, quite sufficiently large +to enable us to follow any plan of life we found agreeable. As I lay and +reflected on all this I grew afraid of my good fortune. Old +Indaba-zimbi’s melancholy prophecies came into my mind. Hitherto he had +always prophesied truly. What if these should be true also? I turned cold as I +thought of it, and prayed to the Power above to preserve us both to live and +love together. Never was prayer more needed. While its words were still upon my +lips I dropped asleep and dreamed a most dreadful dream. +</p> + +<p> +I dreamed that Stella and I were standing together to be married. She was +dressed in white, and radiant with beauty, but it was a wild, spiritual beauty +which frightened me. Her eyes shone like stars, a pale flame played about her +features, and the wind that blew did not stir her hair. Nor was this all, for +her white robes were death wrappings, and the altar at which we stood was +formed of the piled-up earth from an open grave that yawned between us. So we +stood waiting for one to wed us, but no one came. Presently from the open grave +sprang the form of Hendrika. In her hand was a knife, with which she stabbed at +me, but pierced the heart of Stella, who, without a cry, fell backwards into +the grave, still looking at me as she fell. Then Hendrika leaped after her into +the grave. I heard her feet strike heavily. +</p> + +<p> +“<i>Awake, Macumazahn! awake!</i>” cried the voice of Indaba-zimbi. +</p> + +<p> +I awoke and bounded from the bed, a cold perspiration pouring from me. In the +darkness on the other side of the hut I heard sounds of furious struggling. +Luckily I kept my head. Just by me was a chair on which were matches and a rush +taper. I struck a match and held it to the taper. Now in the growing light I +could see two forms rolling one over the other on the floor, and from between +them came the flash of steel. The fat melted and the light burnt up. It was +Indaba-zimbi and the woman Hendrika who were struggling, and, what is more, the +woman was getting the better of the man, strong as he was. I rushed towards +them. Now she was uppermost, now she had wrenched herself from his fierce grip, +and now the great knife she had in her hand flashed up. +</p> + +<p> +But I was behind her, and, placing my hands beneath her arms, jerked with all +my strength. She fell backwards, and, in her effort to save herself, most +fortunately dropped the knife. Then we flung ourselves upon her. Heavens! the +strength of that she-devil! Nobody who has not experienced it could believe it. +She fought and scratched and bit, and at one time nearly mastered the two of +us. As it was she did break loose. She rushed at the bed, sprung on it, and +bounded thence straight up at the roof of the hut. I never saw such a jump, and +could not conceive what she meant to do. In the roof were the peculiar holes +which I have described. They were designed to admit light, and covered with +overhanging eaves. She sprung straight and true like a monkey, and, catching +the edge of the hole with her hands, strove to draw herself through it. But +here her strength, exhausted with the long struggle, failed her. For a moment +she swung, then dropped to the ground and fell senseless. +</p> + +<p> +“Ou!” gasped Indaba-zimbi. “Let us tie the devil up before +she comes to life again.” +</p> + +<p> +I thought this a good counsel, so we took a reim that lay in the corner of the +room, and lashed her hands and feet in such a fashion that even she could +scarcely escape. Then we carried her into the passage, and Indaba-zimbi sat +over her, the knife in his hand, for I did not wish to raise an alarm at that +hour of the night. +</p> + +<p> +“Do you know how I caught her, Macumazahn?” he said. “For +several nights I have slept here with one eye open, for I thought she had made +a plan. To-night I kept wide awake, though I pretended to be asleep. An hour +after you got into the blankets the moon rose, and I saw a beam of light come +into the hut through the hole in the roof. Presently I saw the beam of light +vanish. At first I thought that a cloud was passing over the moon, but I +listened and heard a noise as though some one was squeezing himself through a +narrow space. Presently he was through, and hanging by his hands. Then the +light came in again, and in the middle of it I saw the Babyan-frau swinging +from the roof, and about to drop into the hut. She clung by both hands, and in +her mouth was a great knife. She dropped, and I ran forward to seize her as she +dropped, and gripped her round the middle. But she heard me come, and, seizing +the knife, struck at me in the dark and missed me. Then we struggled, and you +know the rest. You were very nearly dead to-night, Macumazahn.” +</p> + +<p> +“Very nearly indeed,” I answered, still panting, and arranging the +rags of my night-dress round me as best I might. Then the memory of my horrid +dream flashed into my mind. Doubtless it had been conjured up by the sound of +Hendrika dropping to the floor—in my dream it had been a grave that she +dropped into. All of it, then, had been experienced in that second of time. +Well, dreams are swift; perhaps Time itself is nothing but a dream, and events +that seem far apart really occur simultaneously. +</p> + +<p> +We passed the rest of the night watching Hendrika. Presently she came to +herself and struggled furiously to break the reim. But the untanned buffalo +hide was too strong even for her, and, moreover, Indaba-zimbi unceremoniously +sat upon her to keep her quiet. At last she gave it up. +</p> + +<p> +In due course the day broke—my marriage day. Leaving Indaba-zimbi to +watch my would-be murderess, I went and fetched some natives from the stables, +and with their aid bore Hendrika to the prison hut—that same hut in which +she had been confined when she had been brought a baboon-child from the rocks. +Here we shut her up, and, leaving Indaba-zimbi to watch outside, I returned to +my sleeping-place and dressed in the best garments that the Babyan Kraals could +furnish. But when I looked at the reflection of my face, I was horrified. It +was covered with scratches inflicted by the nails of Hendrika. I doctored them +up as best I could, then went out for a walk to calm my nerves, which, what +between the events of the past night, and of those pending that day, were not a +little disturbed. +</p> + +<p> +When I returned it was breakfast time. I went into the dining hut, and there +Stella was waiting to greet me, dressed in simple white and with orange flowers +on her breast. She came forward to me shyly enough; then, seeing the condition +of my face, started back. +</p> + +<p> +“Why, Allan! what have you been doing to yourself?” she asked. +</p> + +<p> +As I was about to answer, her father came in leaning on his stick, and, +catching sight of me, instantly asked the same question. +</p> + +<p> +Then I told them everything, both of Hendrika’s threats and of her fierce +attempt to carry them into execution. But I did not tell my horrid dream. +</p> + +<p> +Stella’s face grew white as the flowers on her breast, but that of her +father became very stern. +</p> + +<p> +“You should have spoken of this before, Allan,” he said. “I +now see that I did wrong to attempt to civilize this wicked and revengeful +creature, who, if she is human, has all the evil passions of the brutes that +reared her. Well, I will make an end of it this very day.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, father,” said Stella, “don’t have her killed. It +is all dreadful enough, but that would be more dreadful still. I have been very +fond of her, and, bad as she is, she has loved me. Do not have her killed on my +marriage day.” +</p> + +<p> +“No,” her father answered, “she shall not be killed, for +though she deserves to die, I will not have her blood upon our hands. She is a +brute, and has followed the nature of brutes. She shall go back whence she +came.” +</p> + +<p> +No more was said on the matter at the time, but when breakfast—which was +rather a farce—was done, Mr. Carson sent for his headman and gave him +certain orders. +</p> + +<p> +We were to be married after the service which Mr. Carson held every Sunday +morning in the large marble hut set apart for that purpose. The service began +at ten o’clock, but long before that hour all the natives on the place +came up in troops, singing as they came, to be present at the wedding of the +“Star.” It was a pretty sight to see them, the men dressed in all +their finery, and carrying shields and sticks in their hands, and the women and +children bearing green branches of trees, ferns, and flowers. At length, about +half-past nine, Stella rose, pressed my hand, and left me to my reflections. A +few minutes to ten she reappeared again with her father, dressed in a white +veil, a wreath of orange flowers on her dark curling hair, a bouquet of orange +flowers in her hand. To me she seemed like a dream of loveliness. With her came +little Tota in a high state of glee and excitement. She was Stella’s only +bridesmaid. Then we all passed out towards the church hut. The bare space in +front of it was filled with hundreds of natives, who set up a song as we came. +But we went on into the hut, which was crowded with such of the natives as +usually worshipped there. Here Mr. Carson, as usual, read the service, though +he was obliged to sit down in order to do so. When it was done—and to me +it seemed interminable—Mr. Carson whispered that he meant to marry us +outside the hut in sight of all the people. So we went out and took our stand +under the shade of a large tree that grew near the hut facing the bare space +where the natives were gathered. +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Carson held up his hand to enjoin silence. Then, speaking in the native +dialect, he told them that he was about to make us man and wife after the +Christian fashion and in the sight of all men. This done, he proceeded to read +the marriage service over us, and very solemnly and beautifully he did it. We +said the words, I placed the ring—it was her father’s signet ring, +for we had no other—upon Stella’s finger, and it was done. +</p> + +<p> +Then Mr. Carson spoke. “Allan and Stella,” he said, “I +believe that the ceremony which has been performed makes you man and wife in +the sight of God and man, for all that is necessary to make a marriage binding +is, that it should be celebrated according to the custom of the country where +the parties to it reside. It is according to the custom that has been in force +here for fifteen years or more that you have been married in the face of all +the people, and in token of it you will both sign the register that I have kept +of such marriages, among those of my people who have adopted the Christian +Faith. Still, in case there should be any legal flaw I again demand the solemn +promise of you both that on the first opportunity you will cause this marriage +to be re-celebrated in some civilized land. Do you promise?” +</p> + +<p> +“We do,” we answered. +</p> + +<p> +Then the book was brought out and we signed our names. At first my wife signed +hers “Stella” only, but her father bade her write it Stella Carson +for the first and last time in her life. Then several of the indunas, or +headmen, including old Indaba-zimbi, put their marks in witness. Indaba-zimbi +drew his mark in the shape of a little star, in humorous allusion to +Stella’s native name. That register is before me now as I write. That, +with a lock of my darling’s hair which lies between its leaves, is my +dearest possession. There are all the names and marks as they were written many +years ago beneath the shadow of the tree at Babyan Kraals in the wilderness, +but alas! and alas! where are those who wrote them? +</p> + +<p> +“My people,” said Mr. Carson, when the signing was done, and we had +kissed each other before them all—“My people, Macumazahn and the +Star, my daughter, are now man and wife, to live in one kraal, to eat of one +bowl, to share one fortune till they reach the grave. Hear now, my people, you +know this woman,” and turning he pointed to Hendrika, who, unseen by us, +had been led out of the prison hut. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, yes, we know her,” said a little ring of headmen, who formed +the primitive court of justice, and after the fashion of natives had squatted +themselves in a circle on the ground in front of us. “We know her, she is +the white Babyan-woman, she is Hendrika, the body servant of the Star.” +</p> + +<p> +“You know her,” said Mr. Carson, “but you do not know her +altogether. Stand forward, Indaba-zimbi, and tell the people what came about +last night in the hut of Macumazahn.” +</p> + +<p> +Accordingly old Indaba-zimbi came forward, and, squatting down, told his moving +tale with much descriptive force and many gestures, finishing up by producing +the great knife from which his watchfulness had saved me. +</p> + +<p> +Then I was called upon, and in a few brief words substantiated his story: +indeed my face did that in the sight of all men. +</p> + +<p> +Then Mr. Carson turned to Hendrika, who stood in sullen silence, her eyes fixed +upon the ground, and asked her if she had anything to say. +</p> + +<p> +She looked up boldly and answered— +</p> + +<p> +“Macumazahn has robbed me of the love of my mistress. I would have robbed +him of his life, which is a little thing compared to that which I have lost at +his hands. I have failed, and I am sorry for it, for had I killed him and left +no trace the Star would have forgotten him and shone on me again.” +</p> + +<p> +“Never,” murmured Stella in my ear; but Mr. Carson turned white +with wrath. +</p> + +<p> +“My people,” he said, “you hear the words of this woman. You +hear how she pays me back, me and my daughter whom she swears she loves. She +says that she would have murdered a man who has done her no evil, the man who +is the husband of her mistress. We saved her from the babyans, we tamed her, we +fed her, we taught her, and this is how she pays us back. Say, my people, what +reward should be given to her?” +</p> + +<p> +“Death,” said the circle of indunas, pointing their thumbs +downwards, and all the multitude beyond echoed the word “Death.” +</p> + +<p> +“Death,” repeated the head induna, adding, “If you save her, +my father, we will slay her with our own hands. She is a Babyan-woman, a +devil-woman; ah, yes, we have heard of such before; let her be slain before she +works more evil.” +</p> + +<p> +Then it was that Stella stepped forward and begged for Hendrika’s life in +moving terms. She pleaded the savagery of the woman’s nature, her long +service, and the affection that she had always shown towards herself. She said +that I, whose life had been attempted, forgave her, and she, my wife, who had +nearly been left a widow before she was made a bride, forgave her; let them +forgive her also, let her be sent away, not slain, let not her marriage day be +stained with blood. +</p> + +<p> +Now her father listened readily enough, for he had no intention of killing +Hendrika—indeed, he had already promised not to do so. But the people +were in a different humour, they looked upon Hendrika as a devil, and would +have torn her to pieces there and then, could they have had their way. Nor were +matters mended by Indaba-zimbi, who had already gained a great reputation for +wisdom and magic in the place. Suddenly the old man rose and made quite an +impassioned speech, urging them to kill Hendrika at once or mischief would come +of it. +</p> + +<p> +At last matters got very bad, for two of the Indunas came forward to drag her +off to execution, and it was not until Stella burst into tears that the sight +of her grief, backed by Mr. Carson’s orders and my own remonstrances, +carried the day. +</p> + +<p> +All this while Hendrika had been standing quite unmoved. At last the tumult +ceased, and the leading induna called to her to go, promising that if ever she +showed her face near the kraals again she should be stabbed like a jackal. Then +Hendrika spoke to Stella in a low voice and in English— +</p> + +<p> +“Better let them kill me, mistress, better for all. Without you to love I +shall go mad and become a babyan again.” +</p> + +<p> +Stella did not answer, and they loosed her. She stepped forward and looked at +the natives with a stare of hate. Then she turned and walked past me, and as +she passed whispered a native phrase in my ear, that, being literally +translated, means, “Till another moon,” but which has the same +significance as the French “au revoir.” +</p> + +<p> +It frightened me, for I knew she meant that she had not done with me, and saw +that our mercy was misplaced. Seeing my face change she ran swiftly from me, +and as she passed Indaba-zimbi, with a sudden movement snatched her great knife +from his hand. When she had gone about twenty paces she halted, looked long and +earnestly on Stella, gave one loud cry of anguish, and fled. A few minutes +later we saw her far away, bounding up the face of an almost perpendicular +cliff—a cliff that nobody except herself and the baboons could possibly +climb. +</p> + +<p> +“Look,” said Indaba-zimbi in my ear—“Look, Macumazahn, +there goes the Babyan-frau. But, Macumazahn, <i>she will come back again</i>. +Ah, why will you not listen to my words. Have they not always been true words, +Macumazahn?” and he shrugged his shoulders and turned away. +</p> + +<p> +For a while I was much disturbed, but at any rate Hendrika was gone for the +present, and Stella, my dear and lovely wife, was there at my side, and in her +smiles I forgot my fears. +</p> + +<p> +For the rest of that day, why should I write of it?—there are things too +happy and too sacred to be written of. +</p> + +<p> +At last I had, if only for a little while, found that rest, that perfect joy +which we seek so continually and so rarely clasp. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap11"></a>CHAPTER XI.<br/> +GONE!</h2> + +<p> +I wonder if many married couples are quite as happy as we found ourselves. +Cynics, a growing class, declare that few illusions can survive a honeymoon. +Well, I do not know about it, for I only married once, and can but speak from +my limited experience. But certainly our illusion, or rather the great truth of +which it is the shadow, did survive, as to this day it survives in my heart +across all the years of utter separation, and across the unanswering gulf of +gloom. +</p> + +<p> +But complete happiness is not allowed in this world even for an hour. As our +marriage day had been shadowed by the scene which has been described, so our +married life was shadowed by its own sorrow. +</p> + +<p> +Three days after our wedding Mr. Carson had a stroke. It had been long +impending, now it fell. We came into the centre hut to dinner and found him +lying speechless on the couch. At first I thought that he was dying, but this +was not so. On the contrary, within four days he recovered his speech and some +power of movement. But he never recovered his memory, though he still knew +Stella, and sometimes myself. Curiously enough he remembered little Tota best +of all three, though occasionally he thought that she was his own daughter in +her childhood, and would ask her where her mother was. This state of affairs +lasted for some seven months. The old man gradually grew weaker, but he did not +die. Of course his condition quite precluded the idea of our leaving Babyan +Kraals till all was over. This was the more distressing to me because I had a +nervous presentiment that Stella was incurring danger by staying there, and +also because the state of her health rendered it desirable that we should reach +a civilized region as soon as possible. However, it could not be helped. +</p> + +<p> +At length the end came very suddenly. We were sitting one evening by Mr. +Carson’s bedside in his hut, when to our astonishment he sat up and spoke +in a strong, full voice. +</p> + +<p> +“I hear you,” he said. “Yes, yes, I forgive you. Poor woman! +you too have suffered,” and he fell back dead. +</p> + +<p> +I have little doubt that he was addressing his lost wife, some vision of whom +had flashed across his dying sense. Stella, of course, was overwhelmed with +grief at her loss. Till I came her father had been her sole companion, and +therefore, as may be imagined, the tie between them was much closer than is +usual even in the case of father and daughter. So deeply did she mourn that I +began to fear for the effect upon her health. Nor were we the only ones to +grieve; all the natives on the settlement called Mr. Carson +“father,” and as a father they lamented him. The air resounded with +the wailing of women, and the men went about with bowed heads, saying that +“the sun had set in the heavens, now only the Star (Stella) +remained.” Indaba-zimbi alone did not mourn. He said that it was best +that the Inkoos should die, for what was life worth when one lay like a +log?—moreover, that it would have been well for all if he had died +sooner. +</p> + +<p> +On the following day we buried him in the little graveyard near the waterfall. +It was a sad business, and Stella cried very much, in spite of all I could do +to comfort her. +</p> + +<p> +That night as I sat outside the hut smoking—for the weather was hot, and +Stella was lying down inside—old Indaba-zimbi came up, saluted, and +squatted at my feet. +</p> + +<p> +“What is it, Indaba-zimbi?” I said. +</p> + +<p> +“This, Macumazahn. When are you going to trek towards the coast?” +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t know,” I answered. “The Star is not fit to +travel now, we must wait awhile.” +</p> + +<p> +“No, Macumazahn, you must not wait, you must go, and the Star must take +her chance. She is strong. It is nothing. All will be well.” +</p> + +<p> +“Why do you say so? why must we go?” +</p> + +<p> +“For this reason, Macumazahn,” and he looked cautiously round and +spoke low. “The baboons have come back in thousands. All the mountain is +full of them.” +</p> + +<p> +“I did not know that they had gone,” I said. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” he answered, “they went after the marriage, all but +one or two; now they are back, all the baboons in the world, I think. I saw a +whole cliff black with them.” +</p> + +<p> +“Is that all?” I said, for I saw that he had something behind. +“I am not afraid of a pack of baboons.” +</p> + +<p> +“No, Macumazahn, it is not all. The Babyan-frau, Hendrika, is with +them.” +</p> + +<p> +Now nothing had been heard or seen of Hendrika since her expulsion, and though +at first she and her threats had haunted me somewhat, by degrees she to a great +extent had passed out of my mind, which was fully preoccupied with Stella and +my father-in-law’s illness. I started violently. “How do you know +this?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“I know it because I saw her, Macumazahn. She is disguised, she is +dressed up in baboon skins, and her face is stained dark. But though she was a +long way off, I knew her by her size, and I saw the white flesh of her arm when +the skins slipped aside. She has come back, Macumazahn, with all the baboons in +the world, and she has come back to do evil. Now do you understand why you +should trek?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” I said, “though I don’t see how she and the +baboons can harm us, I think that it will be better to go. If necessary we can +camp the waggons somewhere for a while on the journey. Hearken, Indaba-zimbi: +say nothing of this to the Star; I will not have her frightened. And hearken +again. Speak to the headmen, and see that watchers are set all round the huts +and gardens, and kept there night and day. To-morrow we will get the waggons +ready, and next day we will trek.” +</p> + +<p> +He nodded his white lock and went to do my bidding, leaving me not a little +disturbed—unreasonably so, indeed. It was a strange story. That this +woman had the power of conversing with baboons I knew.[*] That was not so very +wonderful, seeing that the Bushmen claim to be able to do the same thing, and +she had been nurtured by them. But that she had been able to muster them, and +by the strength of her human will and intelligence muster them in order to +forward her ends of revenge, seemed to me so incredible that after reflection +my fears grew light. Still I determined to trek. After all, a journey in an ox +waggon would not be such a very terrible thing to a strong woman accustomed to +roughing it, whatever her state of health. And when all was said and done I did +not like this tale of the presence of Hendrika with countless hosts of baboons. +</p> + +<p class="footnote"> +[*] For an instance of this, see Anderson’s “Twenty-five Years in a +Waggon,” vol. i. p. 262.—Editor. +</p> + +<p> +So I went in to Stella, and without saying a word to her of the baboon story, +told her I had been thinking matters over, and had come to the conclusion that +it was our duty to follow her father’s instructions to the letter, and +leave Babyan Kraals at once. Into all our talk I need not enter, but the end of +it was that she agreed with me, and declared that she could quite well manage +the journey, saying, moreover, that now that her dear father was dead she would +be glad to get away. +</p> + +<p> +Nothing happened to disturb us that night, and on the following morning I was +up early making preparations. The despair of the people when they learned that +we were going to leave them was something quite pitiable. I could only console +them by declaring that we were but on a journey, and would return the following +year. +</p> + +<p> +“They had lived in the shadow of their father, who was dead,” they +declared; “ever since they were little they had lived in his shadow. He +had received them when they were outcasts and wanderers without a mat to lie +on, or a blanket to cover them, and they had grown fat in his shadow. Then he +had died, and the Star, their father’s daughter, had married me, +Macumazahn, and they had believed that I should take their father’s +place, and let them live in my shadow. What should they do when there was no +one to protect them? The tribes were kept from attacking them by fear of the +white man. If we went they would be eaten up,” and so on. Alas! there was +but too much foundation for their fears. +</p> + +<p> +I returned to the huts at mid-day to get some dinner. Stella said that she was +going to pack during the afternoon, so I did not think it necessary to caution +her about going out alone, as I did not wish to allude to the subject of +Hendrika and the baboons unless I was obliged to. I told her, however, that I +would come back to help her as soon as I could get away. Then I went down to +the native kraals to sort out such cattle as had belonged to Mr. Carson from +those which belonged to the Kaffirs, for I proposed to take them with us. It +was a large herd, and the business took an incalculable time. At length, a +little before sundown, I gave it up, and leaving Indaba-zimbi to finish the +job, got on my horse and rode homewards. +</p> + +<p> +Arriving, I gave the horse to one of the stable boys, and went into the central +hut. There was no sign of Stella, though the things she had been packing lay +about the floor. I passed first into our sleeping hut, thence one by one into +all the others, but still saw no sign of her. Then I went out, and calling to a +Kaffir in the garden asked him if he had seen his mistress. +</p> + +<p> +He answered “yes.” He had seen her carrying flowers and walking +towards the graveyard, holding the little white girl—my daughter—as +he called her, by the hand, when the sun stood “there,” and he +pointed to a spot on the horizon where it would have been about an hour and a +half before. “The two dogs were with them,” he added. I turned and +ran towards the graveyard, which was about a quarter of a mile from the huts. +Of course there was no reason to be anxious—evidently she had gone to lay +the flowers on her father’s grave. And yet I was anxious. +</p> + +<p> +When I got near the graveyard I met one of the natives, who, by my orders, had +been set round the kraals to watch the place, and noticed that he was rubbing +his eyes and yawning. Clearly he had been asleep. I asked him if he had seen +his mistress, and he answered that he had not, which under the circumstances +was not wonderful. Without stopping to reproach him, I ordered the man to +follow me, and went on to the graveyard. There, on Mr. Carson’s grave, +lay the drooping flowers which Stella had been carrying, and there in the fresh +mould was the spoor of Tota’s veldschoon, or hide slipper. But where were +they? +</p> + +<p> +I ran from the graveyard and called aloud at the top of my voice, but no answer +came. Meanwhile the native was more profitably engaged in tracing their spoor. +He followed it for about a hundred yards till he came to a clump of mimosa bush +that was situated between the stream and the ancient marble quarries just over +the waterfall, and at the mouth of the ravine. Here he stopped, and I heard him +give a startled cry. I rushed to the spot, passed through the trees, and saw +this. The little open space in the centre of the glade had been the scene of a +struggle. There, in the soft earth, were the marks of three pairs of human +feet—two shod, one naked—Stella’s, Tota’s, and +<i>Hendrika’s</i>. Nor was this all. There, close by, lay the fragments +of the two dogs—they were nothing more—and one baboon, not yet +quite dead, which had been bitten in the throat by the dogs. All round was the +spoor of numberless baboons. The full horror of what had happened flashed into +my mind. +</p> + +<p> +My wife and Tota had been carried off by the baboons. As yet they had not been +killed, for if so their remains would have been found with those of the dogs. +They had been carried off. The brutes, acting under the direction of that +woman-monkey, Hendrika, had dragged them away to some secret den, there to keep +them till they died—or kill them! +</p> + +<p> +For a moment I literally staggered beneath the terror of the shock. Then I +roused myself from my despair. I bade the native run and alarm the people at +the kraals, telling them to come armed, and bring me guns and ammunition. He +went like the wind, and I turned to follow the spoor. For a few yards it was +plain enough—Stella had been dragged along. I could see where her heels +had struck the ground; the child had, I presumed, been carried—at least +there were no marks of her feet. At the water’s edge the spoor vanished. +The water was shallow, and they had gone along in it, or at least Hendrika and +her victim had, in order to obliterate the trail. I could see where a +moss-grown stone had been freshly turned over in the water-bed. I ran along the +bank some way up the ravine, in the vain hope of catching a sight of them. +Presently I heard a bark in the cliffs above me; it was answered by another, +and then I saw that scores of baboons were hidden about among the rocks on +either side, and were softly swinging themselves down to bar the path. To go on +unarmed as I was would be useless. I should only be torn to pieces as the dogs +had been. So I turned and fled back towards the huts. As I drew near I could +see that my messenger had roused the settlement, for natives with spears and +kerries in their hands were running up towards the kraals. When I reached the +hut I met old Indaba-zimbi, who wore a very serious face. +</p> + +<p> +“So the evil has fallen, Macumazahn,” he said. +</p> + +<p> +“It has fallen,” I answered. +</p> + +<p> +“Keep a good heart, Macumazahn,” he said again. “She is not +dead, nor is the little maid, and before they die we shall find them. Remember +this, Hendrika loves her. She will not harm her, or allow the babyans to harm +her. She will try to hide her away from you, that is all.” +</p> + +<p> +“Pray God that we may find her,” I groaned. “The light is +going fast.” +</p> + +<p> +“The moon rises in three hours,” he answered; “we will search +by moonlight. It is useless to start now; see, the sun sinks. Let us get the +men together, eat, and make things ready. <i>Hamba gachla</i>. Hasten slowly, +Macumazahn.” +</p> + +<p> +As there was no help, I took his advice. I could eat no food, but I packed some +up to take with us, and made ready ropes, and a rough kind of litter. If we +found them they would scarcely be able to walk. Ah! if we found them! How +slowly the time passed! It seemed hours before the moon rose. But at last it +did rise. +</p> + +<p> +Then we started. In all we were about a hundred men, but we only mustered five +guns between us, my elephant roer and four that had belonged to Mr. Carson. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap12"></a>CHAPTER XII.<br/> +THE MAGIC OF INDABA-ZIMBI</h2> + +<p> +We gained the spot by the stream where Stella had been taken. The natives +looked at the torn fragments of the dogs, and at the marks of violence, and I +heard them swearing to each other, that whether the Star lived or died they +would not rest till they had exterminated every baboon on Babyan’s Peak. +I echoed the oath, and, as shall be seen, we kept it. +</p> + +<p> +We started on along the stream, following the spoor of the baboons as we best +could. But the stream left no spoor, and the hard, rocky banks very little. +Still we wandered on. All night we wandered through the lonely moonlit valleys, +startling the silence into a thousand echoes with our cries. But no answer came +to them. In vain our eyes searched the sides of precipices formed of +water-riven rocks fantastically piled one upon another; in vain we searched +through endless dells and fern-clad crannies. There was nothing to be found. +How could we expect to find two human beings hidden away in the recesses of +this vast stretch of mountain ground, which no man yet had ever fully explored. +They were lost, and in all human probability lost for ever. +</p> + +<p> +To and fro we wandered hopelessly, till at last dawn found us footsore and +weary nearly at the spot whence we had started. We sat down waiting for the sun +to rise, and the men ate of such food as they had brought with them, and sent +to the kraals for more. +</p> + +<p> +I sat upon a stone with a breaking heart. I cannot describe my feelings. Let +the reader put himself in my position and perhaps he may get some idea of them. +Near me was old Indaba-zimbi, who sat staring straight before him as though he +were looking into space, and taking note of what went on there. An idea struck +me. This man had some occult power. Several times during our adventures he had +prophesied, and in every case his prophecies had proved true. He it was who, +when we escaped from the Zulu Impi, had told me to steer north, because there +we should find the place of a white man who lived under the shadow of a great +peak that was full of baboons. Perhaps he could help in this extremity—at +any rate it was worth trying. +</p> + +<p> +“Indaba-zimbi,” I said, “you say that you can send your +spirit through the doors of space and see what we cannot see. At the least I +know that you can do strange things. Can you not help me now? If you can, and +will save her, I will give you half the cattle that we have here.” +</p> + +<p> +“I never said anything of the sort, Macumazahn,” he answered. +“I do things, I do not talk about them. Neither do I seek reward for what +I do like a common witch-doctor. It is well that you have asked me to use my +wisdom, Macumazahn, for I should not have used it again without being +asked—no, not even for the sake of the Star and yourself, whom I love, +for if so my Spirit would have been angry. In the other matters I had a part, +for my life was concerned as well as yours; but in this matter I have no part, +and therefore I might not use my wisdom unless you thought well to call upon my +Spirit. However, it would have been no good to ask me before, for I have only +just found the herb I want,” and he produced a handful of the leaves of a +plant that was unfamiliar to me. It had prickly leaves, shaped very much like +those of the common English nettle. +</p> + +<p> +“Now, Macumazahn,” he went on, “bid the men leave us alone, +and then follow me presently to the little glade down there by the +water.” +</p> + +<p> +I did so. When I reached the glade I found Indaba-zimbi kindling a small fire +under the shadow of a tree by the edge of the water. +</p> + +<p> +“Sit there, Macumazahn,” he said, pointing to a stone near the +fire, “and do not be surprised or frightened at anything you see. If you +move or call out we shall learn nothing.” +</p> + +<p> +I sat down and watched. When the fire was alight and burning brightly, the old +fellow stripped himself stark naked, and, going to the foot of the pool, dipped +himself in the water. Then he came back shivering with the cold, and, leaning +over the little fire, thrust leaves of the plant I have mentioned into his +mouth and began to chew them, muttering as he chewed. Most of the remaining +leaves he threw on to the fire. A dense smoke rose from them, but he held his +head in this smoke and drew it down his lungs till I saw that he was exhibiting +every sign of suffocation. The veins in his throat and chest swelled, he gasped +loudly, and his eyes, from which tears were streaming, seemed as though they +were going to start from his head. Presently he fell over on his side, and lay +senseless. I was terribly alarmed, and my first impulse was to run to his +assistance, but fortunately I remembered his caution, and sat quiet. +</p> + +<p> +Indaba-zimbi lay on the ground like a person quite dead. His limbs had all the +utter relaxation of death. But as I watched I saw them begin to stiffen, +exactly as though <i>rigor mortis</i> had set in. Then, to my astonishment, I +perceived them once more relax, and this time there appeared upon his chest the +stain of decomposition. It spread and spread; in three minutes the man, to all +appearance, was a livid corpse. +</p> + +<p> +I sat amazed watching this uncanny sight, and wondering if any further natural +process was about to be enacted. Perhaps Indaba-zimbi was going to fall to dust +before my eyes. As I watched I observed that the discoloration was beginning to +fade. First it vanished from the extremities, then from the larger limbs, and +lastly from the trunk. Then in turn came the third stage of relaxation, the +second stage of stiffness or <i>rigor</i>, and the first stage of after-death +collapse. When all these had rapidly succeeded each other, Indaba-zimbi quietly +woke up. +</p> + +<p> +I was too astonished to speak; I simply looked at him with my mouth open. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, Macumazahn,” he said, putting his head on one side like a +bird, and nodding his white lock in a comical fashion, “it is all right; +I have seen her.” +</p> + +<p> +“Seen who?” I said. +</p> + +<p> +“The Star, your wife, and the little maid. They are much frightened, but +unharmed. The Babyan-frau watches them. She is mad, but the baboons obey her, +and do not hurt them. The Star was sleeping from weariness, so I whispered in +her ear and told her not to be frightened, for you would soon rescue her, and +that meanwhile she must seem to be pleased to have Hendrika near her.” +</p> + +<p> +“You whispered in her ear?” I said. “How could you whisper in +her ear?” +</p> + +<p> +“Bah! Macumazahn. How could I seem to die and go rotten before your eyes? +You don’t know, do you? Well, I will tell you one thing. I had to die to +pass the doors of space, as you call them. I had to draw all the healthy +strength and life from my body in order to gather power to speak with the Star. +It was a dangerous business, Macumazahn, for if I had let things go a little +further they must have stopped so, and there would have been an end of +Indaba-zimbi. Ah, you white men, you know so much that you think you know +everything. But you don’t! You are always staring at the clouds and +can’t see the things that lie at your feet. You hardly believe me now, do +you, Macumazahn? Well, I will show you. Have you anything on you that the Star +has touched or worn?” +</p> + +<p> +I thought for a moment, and said that I had a lock of her hair in my +pocket-book. He told me to give it him. I did so. Going to the fire, he lit the +lock of hair in the flame, and let it burn to ashes, which he caught in his +left hand. These ashes he mixed up in a paste with the juice of one of the +leaves of the plant I have spoken of. +</p> + +<p> +“Now, Macumazahn, shut your eyes,” he said. +</p> + +<p> +I did so, and he rubbed his paste on to my eyelids. At first it burnt me, then +my head swam strangely. Presently this effect passed off, and my brain was +perfectly clear again, but I could not feel the ground with my feet. +Indaba-zimbi led me to the side of the stream. Beneath us was a pool of +beautifully clear water. +</p> + +<p> +“Look into the pool, Macumazahn,” said Indaba-zimbi, and his voice +sounded hollow and far away in my ears. +</p> + +<p> +I looked. The water grew dark; it cleared, and in it was a picture. I saw a +cave with a fire burning in it. Against the wall of the cave rested Stella. Her +dress was torn almost off her, she looked dreadfully pale and weary, and her +eyelids were red as though with weeping. But she slept, and I could almost +think that I saw her lips shape my name in her sleep. Close to her, her head +upon Stella’s breast, was little Tota; she had a skin thrown over her to +keep out the night cold. The child was awake, and appeared to be moaning with +fear. By the fire, and in such a position that the light fell full upon her +face, and engaged in cooking something in a rough pot shaped from wood, sat the +Baboon-woman, Hendrika. She was clothed in baboon skins, and her face had been +rubbed with some dark stain, which was, however, wearing off it. In the +intervals of her cooking she would turn on Stella her wild eyes, in which +glared visible madness, with an expression of tenderness that amounted to +worship. Then she would stare at the child and gnash her teeth as though with +hate. Clearly she was jealous of it. Round the entrance arch of the cave peeped +and peered the heads of many baboons. Presently Hendrika made a sign to one of +them; apparently she did not speak, or rather grunt, in order not to wake +Stella. The brute hopped forward, and she gave it a second rude wooden pot +which was lying by her. It took it and went. The last thing that I saw, as the +vision slowly vanished from the pool, was the dim shadow of the baboon +returning with the pot full of water. +</p> + +<p> +Presently everything had gone. I ceased to feel strange. There beneath me was +the pool, and at my side stood Indaba-zimbi, smiling. +</p> + +<p> +“You have seen things,” he said. +</p> + +<p> +“I have,” I answered, and made no further remark on the matter. +What was there to say?[*] “Do you know the path to the cave?” I +added. +</p> + +<p class="footnote"> +[*] For some almost equally remarkable instances of Kaffir magic the reader is +referred to a work named “Among the Zulus,” by David +Leslie.—Editor. +</p> + +<p> +He nodded his head. “I did not follow it all just now, because it +winds,” he said. “But I know it. We shall want the ropes.” +</p> + +<p> +“Then let us be starting; the men have eaten.” +</p> + +<p> +He nodded his head again, and going to the men I told them to make ready, +adding that Indaba-zimbi knew the way. They said that was all right, if +Indaba-zimbi had “smelt her out,” they should soon find the Star. +So we started cheerfully enough, and my spirits were so much improved that I +was able to eat a boiled mealie cob or two as we walked. +</p> + +<p> +We went up the valley, following the course of the stream for about a mile; +then Indaba-zimbi made a sudden turn to the right, along another kloof, of +which there were countless numbers in the base of the great hill. +</p> + +<p> +On we went through kloof after kloof. Indaba-zimbi, who led us, was never at a +loss, he turned up gulleys and struck across necks of hills with the certainty +of a hound on a hot scent. At length, after about three hours’ march, we +came to a big silent valley on the northern slope of the great peak. On one +side of this valley was a series of stony koppies, on the other rose a sheer +wall of rock. We marched along the wall for a distance of some two miles. Then +suddenly Indaba-zimbi halted. +</p> + +<p> +“There is the place,” he said, pointing to an opening in the cliff. +This opening was about forty feet from the ground, and ellipse-shaped. It +cannot have been more than twenty feet high by ten wide, and was partially +hidden by ferns and bushes that grew about it in the surface of the cliff. Keen +as my eyes were, I doubt if I should ever have noticed it, for there were many +such cracks and crannies in the rocky face of the great mountain. +</p> + +<p> +We drew near and looked carefully at the place. The first thing I noticed was +that the rock, which was not quite perpendicular, had been worn by the +continual passage of baboons; the second, that something white was hanging on a +bush near the top of the ascent. +</p> + +<p> +It was a pocket-handkerchief. +</p> + +<p> +Now there was no more doubt about the matter. With a beating heart I began the +ascent. For the first twenty feet it was comparatively easy, for the rock +shelved; the next ten feet was very difficult, but still possible to an active +man, and I achieved it, followed by Indaba-zimbi. But the last twelve or +fifteen feet could only be scaled by throwing a rope over the trunk of a +stunted tree, which grew at the bottom of the opening. This we accomplished +with some trouble, and the rest was easy. A foot or two above my head the +handkerchief fluttered in the wind. Hanging to the rope, I grasped it. It was +my wife’s. As I did so I noticed the face of a baboon peering at me over +the edge of the cleft, the first baboon we had seen that morning. The brute +gave a bark and vanished. Thrusting the handkerchief into my breast, I set my +feet against the cliff and scrambled up as hard as I could go. I knew that we +had no time to lose, for the baboon would quickly alarm the others. I gained +the cleft. It was a mere arched passage cut by water, ending in a gulley, which +led to a wide open space of some sort. I looked through the passage and saw +that the gulley was black with baboons. On they came by the hundred. I unslung +my elephant gun from my shoulders and waited, calling to the men below to come +up with all possible speed. The brutes streamed on down the gloomy gulf towards +me, barking, grunting, and showing their huge teeth. I waited till they were +within fifteen yards. Then I fired the elephant gun, which was loaded with +slugs, right into the thick of them. In that narrow place the report echoed +like a cannon shot, but its sound was quickly swallowed in the volley of +piercing human-sounding groans and screams that followed. The charge of heavy +slugs had ploughed through the host of baboons, of which at least a dozen lay +dead or dying in the passage. For a moment they hesitated, then they came on +again with a hideous clamour. Fortunately by this time Indaba-zimbi, who also +had a gun, was standing by my side, otherwise I should have been torn to pieces +before I could re-load. He fired both barrels into them, and again checked the +rush. But they came on again, and notwithstanding the appearance of two other +natives with guns, which they let off with more or less success, we should have +been overwhelmed by the great and ferocious apes had I not by this time +succeeded in re-loading the elephant gun. When they were right on us, I fired, +with even more deadly effect than before, for at that distance every slug told +on their long line. The howls and screams of pain and rage were now something +inconceivable. One might have thought that we were doing battle with a host of +demons; indeed in that light—for the overhanging arch of rock made it +very dark—the gnashing snouts and sombre glowing eyes of the apes looked +like those of devils as they are represented by monkish fancy. But the last +shot was too much for them; they withdrew, dragging some of their wounded with +them, and thus gave us time to get our men up the cliff. In a few minutes all +were there, and we advanced down the passage, which presently opened into a +rocky gulley with shelving sides. This gulley had a water-way at the bottom of +it; it was about a hundred yards long, and the slopes on either side were +topped by precipitous cliffs. I looked at these slopes; they literally swarmed +with baboons, grunting, barking, screaming, and beating their breasts with +their long arms, in fury. I looked up the water-way; along it, accompanied by a +mob, or, as it were, a guard of baboons, ran Hendrika, her long hair flying, +madness written on her face, and in her arms was the senseless form of little +Tota. +</p> + +<p> +She saw us, and a foam of rage burst from her lips. She screamed aloud. To me +the sound was a mere inarticulate cry, but the baboons clearly understood it, +for they began to roll rocks down on to us. One boulder leaped past me and +struck down a Kaffir behind; another fell from the roof of the arch on to a +man’s head and killed him. Indaba-zimbi lifted his gun to shoot Hendrika; +I knocked it up, so that the shot went over her, crying that he would kill the +child. Then I shouted to the men to open out and form a line from side to side +of the shelving gulley. Furious at the loss of their two comrades, they obeyed +me, and keeping in the water-way myself, together with Indaba-zimbi and the +other guns, I gave the word to charge. +</p> + +<p> +Then the real battle began. It is difficult to say who fought the most +fiercely, the natives or the baboons. The Kaffirs charged along the slopes, and +as they came, encouraged by the screams of Hendrika, who rushed to and fro +holding the wretched Tota before her as a shield, the apes bounded at them in +fury. Scores were killed by the assegais, and many more fell beneath our +gun-shots; but still they came on. Nor did we go scathless. Occasionally a man +would slip, or be pulled over in the grip of a baboon. Then the others would +fling themselves upon him like dogs on a rat, and worry him to death. We lost +five men in this way, and I myself received a bite through the fleshy part of +the left arm, but fortunately a native near me assegaied the animal before I +was pulled down. +</p> + +<p> +At length, and all of a sudden, the baboons gave up. A panic seemed to seize +them. Notwithstanding the cries of Hendrika they thought no more of fight, but +only of escape; some even did not attempt to get away from the assegais of the +Kaffirs, they simply hid their horrible faces in their paws, and, moaning +piteously, waited to be slain. +</p> + +<p> +Hendrika saw that the battle was lost. Dropping the child from her arms, she +rushed straight at us, a very picture of horrible insanity. I lifted my gun, +but could not bear to shoot. After all she was but a mad thing, half ape, half +woman. So I sprang to one side, and she landed full on Indaba-zimbi, knocking +him down. But she did not stay to do any more. Wailing terribly, she rushed +down the gulley and through the arch, followed by a few of the surviving +baboons, and vanished from our sight. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap13"></a>CHAPTER XIII.<br/> +WHAT HAPPENED TO STELLA</h2> + +<p> +The fight was over. In all we had lost seven men killed, and several more +severely bitten, while but few had escaped without some tokens whereby he might +remember what a baboon’s teeth and claws are like. How many of the brutes +we killed I never knew, because we did not count, but it was a vast number. I +should think that the stock must have been low about Babyan’s Peak for +many years afterwards. From that day to this, however, I have always avoided +baboons, feeling more afraid of them than any beast that lives. +</p> + +<p> +The path was clear, and we rushed forward along the water-course. But first we +picked up little Tota. The child was not in a swoon, as I had thought, but +paralyzed by terror, so that she could scarcely speak. Otherwise she was +unhurt, though it took her many a week to recover her nerve. Had she been +older, and had she not remembered Hendrika, I doubt if she would have recovered +it. She knew me again, and flung her little arms about my neck, clinging to me +so closely that I did not dare to give her to any one else to carry lest I +should add to her terrors. So I went on with her in my arms. The fears that +pierced my heart may well be imagined. Should I find Stella living or dead? +Should I find her at all? Well, we should soon know now. We stumbled on up the +stony watercourse; notwithstanding the weight of Tota I led the way, for +suspense lent me wings. Now we were through, and an extraordinary scene lay +before us. We were in a great natural amphitheatre, only it was three times the +size of any amphitheatre ever shaped by man, and the walls were formed of +precipitous cliffs, ranging from one to two hundred feet in height. For the +rest, the space thus enclosed was level, studded with park-like trees, +brilliant with flowers, and having a stream running through the centre of it, +that, as I afterwards discovered, welled up from the ground at the head of the +open space. +</p> + +<p> +We spread ourselves out in a line, searching everywhere, for Tota was too +overcome to be able to tell us where Stella was hidden away. For nearly half an +hour we searched and searched, scanning the walls of rock for any possible +openings to a cave. In vain, we could find none. I applied to old Indaba-zimbi, +but his foresight was at fault here. All he could say was that this was the +place, and that the “Star” was hidden somewhere in a cave, but +where the cave was he could not tell. At last we came to the top of the +amphitheatre. There before us was a wall of rock, of which the lower parts were +here and there clothed in grasses, lichens, and creepers. I walked along it, +calling at the top of my voice. +</p> + +<p> +Presently my heart stood still, for I thought I heard a faint answer. I drew +nearer to the place from which the sound seemed to come, and again called. Yes, +there was an answer in my wife’s voice. It seemed to come from the rock. +I went up to it and searched among the creepers, but still could find no +opening. +</p> + +<p> +“Move the stone,” cried Stella’s voice, “the cave is +shut with a stone.” +</p> + +<p> +I took a spear and prodded at the cliff whence the sound came. Suddenly the +spear sunk in through a mass of lichen. I swept the lichen aside, revealing a +boulder that had been rolled into the mouth of an opening in the rock, which it +fitted so accurately that, covered as it was by the overhanging lichen, it +might well have escaped the keenest eye. We dragged the boulder out; it was two +men’s work to do it. Beyond was a narrow, water-worn passage, which I +followed with a beating heart. Presently the passage opened into a small cave, +shaped like a pickle bottle, and coming to a neck at the top end. We passed +through and found ourselves in a second, much larger cave, that I at once +recognized as the one of which Indaba-zimbi had shown me a vision in the water. +Light reached it from above—how I know not—and by it I could see a +form half-sitting, half lying on some skins at the top end of the cave. I +rushed to it. It was Stella! Stella bound with strips of hide, bruised, torn, +but still Stella, and alive. +</p> + +<p> +She saw me, she gave one cry, then, as I caught her in my arms, she fainted. It +was happy indeed that she did not faint before, for had it not been for the +sound of her voice I do not believe we should ever have found that cunningly +hidden cave, unless, indeed, Indaba-zimbi’s magic (on which be blessings) +had come to our assistance. +</p> + +<p> +We bore her to the open air, laid her beneath the shade of a tree, and cut the +bonds loose from her ankles. As we went I glanced at the cave. It was exactly +as I had seen it in the vision. There burnt the fire, there were the rude +wooden vessels, one of them still half full of the water which I had seen the +baboon bring. I felt awed as I looked, and marvelled at the power wielded by a +savage who could not even read and write. +</p> + +<p> +Now I could see Stella clearly. Her face was scratched, and haggard with fear +and weeping, her clothes were almost torn off her, and her beautiful hair was +loose and tangled. I sent for water, and we sprinkled her face. Then I forced a +little of the brandy which we distilled from peaches at the kraals between her +lips, and she opened her eyes, and throwing her arms about me clung to me as +little Tota had done, sobbing, “Thank God! thank God!” +</p> + +<p> +After a while she grew quieter, and I made her and Tota eat some food from the +store that we had brought with us. I too ate and was thankful, for with the +exception of the mealie cobs I had tasted nothing for nearly four-and-twenty +hours. Then she washed her face and hands, and tidied her rags of dress as well +as she was able. As she did so by degrees I drew her story from her. +</p> + +<p> +It seemed that on the previous afternoon, being wearied with packing, she went +out to visit her father’s grave, taking Tota with her, and was followed +there by the two dogs. She wished to lay some flowers on the grave and take +farewell of the dust it covered, for as we had expected to trek early on the +morrow she did not know if she would find a later opportunity. They passed up +the garden, and gathering some flowers from the orange trees and elsewhere, +went on to the little graveyard. Here she laid them on the grave as we had +found them, and then sitting down, fell into a deep and sad reverie, such as +the occasion would naturally induce. While she sat thus, Tota, who was a lively +child and active as a kitten, strayed away without Stella observing it. With +her went the dogs, who also had grown tired of inaction; a while passed, and +suddenly she heard the dogs barking furiously about a hundred and fifty yards +away. Then she heard Tota scream, and the dogs also yelling with fear and pain. +She rose and ran as swiftly as she could towards the spot whence the sound +came. Presently she was there. Before her in the glade, holding the screaming +Tota in her arms, was a figure in which, notwithstanding the rough disguise of +baboon skins and colouring matter, she had no difficulty in recognizing +Hendrika, and all about her were numbers of baboons, rolling over and over in +two hideous heaps, of which the centres were the unfortunate dogs now in +process of being rent to fragments. +</p> + +<p> +“Hendrika,” Stella cried, “what does this mean? What are you +doing with Tota and those brutes?” +</p> + +<p> +The woman heard her and looked up. Then Stella saw that she was mad; madness +stared from her eyes. She dropped the child, which instantly flew to Stella for +protection. Stella clasped it, only to be herself clasped by Hendrika. She +struggled fiercely, but it was of no use—the Babyan-frau had the strength +of ten. She lifted her and Tota as though they were nothing, and ran off with +them, following the bed of the stream in order to avoid leaving a spoor. Only +the baboons who came with her, minus the one the dogs had killed, would not +take to the water, but kept pace with them on the bank. +</p> + +<p> +Stella said that the night which followed was more like a hideous nightmare +than a reality. She was never able to tell me all that occurred in it. She had +a vague recollection of being borne over rocks and along kloofs, while around +her echoed the horrible grunts and clicks of the baboons. She spoke to Hendrika +in English and Kaffir, imploring her to let them go; but the woman, if I may +call her so, seemed in her madness to have entirely forgotten these tongues. +When Stella spoke she would kiss her and stroke her hair, but she did not seem +to understand what it was she said. On the other hand, she could, and did, talk +to the baboons, that seemed to obey her implicitly. Moreover, she would not +allow them to touch either Stella or the child in her arms. Once one of them +tried to do so, and she seized a dead stick and struck it so heavily on the +head that it fell senseless. Thrice Stella made an attempt to escape, for +sometimes even Hendrika’s giant strength waned and she had to set them +down. But on each occasion she caught them, and it was in these struggles that +Stella’s clothes were so torn. At length before daylight they reached the +cliff, and with the first break of light the ascent began. Hendrika dragged +them up the first stages, but when they came to the precipitous place she tied +the strips of hide, of which she had a supply wound round her waist, beneath +Stella’s arms. Steep as the place was the baboons ascended it easily +enough, springing from a knob of rock to the trunk of the tree that grew on +the edge of the crevasse. Hendrika followed them, holding the end of the hide +reim in her teeth, one of the baboons hanging down from the tree to assist her +ascent. It was while she was ascending that Stella bethought of letting fall +her handkerchief in the faint hope that some searcher might see it. +</p> + +<p> +By this time Hendrika was on the tree, and grunting out orders to the baboons +which clustered about Stella below. Suddenly these seized her and little Tota +who was in her arms, and lifted her from the ground. Then Hendrika above, aided +by other baboons, put out all her great strength and pulled the two of them up +the rock. Twice Stella swung heavily against the cliff. After the second blow +she felt her senses going, and was consumed with terror lest she should drop +Tota. But she managed to cling to her, and together they reached the cleft. +</p> + +<p> +“From that time,” Stella went on, “I remember no more till I +woke to find myself in a gloomy cave resting on a bed of skins. My legs were +bound, and Hendrika sat near me watching me, while round the edge of the cave +peered the heads of those horrible baboons. Tota was still in my arms, and half +dead from terror; her moans were pitiful to hear. I spoke to Hendrika, +imploring her to release us; but either she has lost all understanding of human +speech, or she pretends to have done so. All she would do was to caress me, and +even kiss my hands and dress with extravagant signs of affection. As she did +so, Tota shrunk closer to me. This Hendrika saw and glared so savagely at the +child that I feared lest she was going to kill her. I diverted her attention by +making signs that I wanted water, and this she gave me in a wooden bowl. As you +saw, the cave was evidently Hendrika’s dwelling-place. There are stores +of fruit in it and some strips of dried flesh. She gave me some of the fruit +and Tota a little, and I made Tota eat some. You can never know what I went +through, Allan. I saw now that Hendrika was quite mad, and but little removed +from the brutes to which she is akin, and over which she has such unholy power. +The only trace of humanity left about her was her affection for me. Evidently +her idea was to keep me here with her, to keep me away from you, and to carry +out this idea she was capable of the exercise of every artifice and cunning. In +this way she was sane enough, but in every other way she was mad. Moreover, she +had not forgotten her horrible jealousy. Already I saw her glaring at Tota, and +knew that the child’s murder was only a matter of time. Probably within a +few hours she would be killed before my eyes. Of escape, even if I had the +strength, there was absolutely no chance, and little enough of our ever being +found. No, we should be kept here guarded by a mad thing, half ape, half woman, +till we perished miserably. Then I thought of you, dear, and of all that you +must be suffering, and my heart nearly broke. I could only pray to God that I +might either be rescued or die swiftly. +</p> + +<p> +“As I prayed I dropped into a kind of doze from utter weariness, and then +I had the strangest dream. I dreamed that Indaba-zimbi stood over me nodding +his white lock, and spoke to me in Kaffir, telling me not to be frightened, for +you would soon be with me, and that meanwhile I must humour Hendrika, +pretending to be pleased to have her near me. The dream was so vivid that I +actually seemed to see and hear him, as I see and hear him now.” +</p> + +<p> +Here I looked up and glanced at old Indaba-zimbi, who was sitting near. But it +was not till afterwards that I told Stella of how her vision was brought about. +</p> + +<p> +“At any rate,” she went on, “when I awoke I determined to act +on my dream. I took Hendrika’s hand, and pressed it. She actually laughed +in a wild kind of way with happiness, and laid her head upon my knee. Then I +made signs that I wanted food, and she threw wood on the fire, which I forgot +to tell you was burning in the cave, and began to make some of the broth that +she used to cook very well, and she did not seem to have forgotten all about +it. At any rate the broth was not bad, though neither Tota nor I could drink +much of it. Fright and weariness had taken away our appetites. +</p> + +<p> +“After the meal was done—and I prolonged it as much as +possible—I saw Hendrika was beginning to get jealous of Tota again. She +glared at her and then at the big knife which was tied round her own body. I +knew the knife again, it was the one with which she had tried to murder you, +dear. At last she went so far as to draw the knife. I was paralyzed with fear, +then suddenly I remembered that when she was our servant, and used to get out +of temper and sulk, I could always calm her by singing to her. So I began to +sing hymns. Instantly she forgot her jealousy and put the knife back into its +sheath. She knew the sound of the singing, and sat listening to it with a rapt +face; the baboons, too, crowded in at the entrance of the cave to listen. I +must have sung for an hour or more, all the hymns that I could remember. It was +so very strange and dreadful sitting there singing to mad Hendrika and those +hideous man-like apes that shut their eyes and nodded their great heads as I +sang. It was a horrible nightmare; but I believe that the baboons are almost as +human as the Bushmen. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, this went on for a long time till my voice was getting exhausted. +Then suddenly I heard the baboons outside raise a loud noise, as they do when +they are angry. Then, dear, I heard the boom of your elephant gun, and I think +it was the sweetest sound that ever came to my ears. Hendrika heard it too. She +sprang up, stood for a moment, then, to my horror, swept Tota into her arms and +rushed down the cave. Of course I could not stir to follow her, for my feet +were tied. Next instant I heard the sound of a rock being moved, and presently +the lessening of the light in the cave told me that I was shut in. Now the +sound even of the elephant gun only reached me very faintly, and presently I +could hear nothing more, straining my ears as I would. +</p> + +<p> +“At last I heard a faint shouting that reached me through the wall of +rock. I answered as loud as I could. You know the rest; and oh, my dear +husband, thank God! thank God!” and she fell weeping into my arms. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap14"></a>CHAPTER XIV.<br/> +FIFTEEN YEARS AFTER</h2> + +<p> +Both Stella and Tota were too weary to be moved, so we camped that night in the +baboons’ home, but were troubled by no baboons. Stella would not sleep in +the cave; she said the place terrified her, so I made her up a kind of bed +under a thorn-tree. As this rock-bound valley was one of the hottest places I +ever was in, I thought that this would not matter; but when at sunrise on the +following morning I saw a veil of miasmatic mist hanging over the surface of +the ground, I changed my opinion. However, neither Stella nor Tota seemed the +worse, so as soon as was practical we started homewards. I had already on the +previous day sent some of the men back to the kraals to fetch a ladder, and +when we reached the cliff we found them waiting for us beneath. With the help +of the ladder the descent was easy. Stella simply got out of her rough litter +at the top of the cliff, for we found it necessary to carry her, climbed down +the ladder, and got into it again at the bottom. +</p> + +<p> +Well, we reached the kraals safely enough, seeing nothing more of Hendrika, +and, were this a story, doubtless I should end it here with—“and +lived happily ever after.” But alas! it is not so. How am I to write it? +</p> + +<p> +My dearest wife’s vital energy seemed completely to fail her now that the +danger was past, and within twelve hours of our return I saw that her state was +such as to necessitate the abandonment of any idea of leaving Babyan Kraals at +present. The bodily exertion, the anguish of mind, and the terror which she had +endured during that dreadful night, combined with her delicate state of health, +had completely broken her down. To make matters worse, also, she was taken with +an attack of fever, contracted no doubt in the unhealthy atmosphere of that +accursed valley. In time she shook the fever off, but it left her dreadfully +weak, and quite unfit to face the trial before her. +</p> + +<p> +I think she knew that she was going to die; she always spoke of my future, +never of <i>our</i> future. It is impossible for me to tell how sweet she was; +how gentle, how patient and resigned. Nor, indeed, do I wish to tell it, it is +too sad. But this I will say, I believe that if ever a woman drew near to +perfection while yet living on the earth, Stella Quatermain did so. +</p> + +<p> +The fatal hour drew on. My boy Harry was born, and his mother lived to kiss and +bless him. Then she sank. We did what we could, but we had little skill, and +might not hold her back from death. All through one weary night I watched her +with a breaking heart. +</p> + +<p> +The dawn came, the sun rose in the east. His rays falling on the peak behind +were reflected in glory upon the bosom of the western sky. Stella awoke from +her swoon and saw the light. She whispered to me to open the door of the hut. I +did so, and she fixed her dying eyes on the splendour of the morning sky. She +looked on me and smiled as an angel might smile. Then with a last effort she +lifted her hand, and, pointing to the radiant heavens, whispered: +</p> + +<p> +“<i>There, Allan, there!</i>” +</p> + +<p> +It was done, and I was broken-hearted, and broken-hearted I must wander to the +end. Those who have endured my loss will know my sorrow; it cannot be written. +In such peace and at such an hour may I also die! +</p> + +<p> +Yes, it is a sad story, but wander where we will about the world we can never +go beyond the sound of the passing bell. For me, as for my father before me, +and for the millions who have been and who shall be, there is but one word of +comfort. “The Lord hath given, and the Lord hath taken away.” Let +us, then, bow our heads in hope, and add with a humble heart, “Blessed be +the name of the Lord.” +</p> + +<p> +I buried her by her father’s side, and the weeping of the people who had +loved her went up to heaven. Even Indaba-zimbi wept, but I could weep no more. +</p> + +<p> +On the second night from her burial I could not sleep. I rose, dressed myself, +and went out into the night. The moon was shining brightly, and by its rays I +shaped my course towards the graveyard. I drew near silently, and as I came I +thought that I heard a sound of moaning on the further side of the wall. I +looked over it. Crouched by Stella’s grave, and tearing at its sods with +her hands, as though she would unearth that which lay within, was +<i>Hendrika</i>. Her face was wild and haggard, her form was so emaciated that +when the pelts she wore slipped aside, the shoulder-blades seemed to project +almost through her skin. Suddenly she looked up and saw me. Laughing a dreadful +maniac laugh, she put her hand to her girdle and drew her great knife from it. +I thought that she was about to attack me, and prepared to defend myself as I +best could, for I was unarmed. But she made no effort to do so. Lifting the +knife on high, for a moment she held it glittering in the moonlight, then +plunged it into her own breast, and fell headlong to the ground. +</p> + +<p> +I sprang over the wall and ran to her. She was not yet dead. Presently she +opened her eyes, and I saw that the madness had gone out of them. +</p> + +<p> +“Macumazahn,” she said, speaking in English and in a thick +difficult voice like one who half forgot and half +remembered—“Macumazahn, I remember now. I have been mad. Is she +really dead, Macumazahn?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” I said, “she is dead, and you killed her.” +</p> + +<p> +“I killed her!” the dying woman faltered, “and I loved her. +Yes, yes, I know now. I became a brute again and dragged her to the brutes, and +now once more I am a woman, and she is dead, and I killed her—because I +loved her so. I killed her who saved me from the brutes. I am not dead yet, +Macumazahn. Take me and torture me to death, slowly, very slowly. It was +jealousy of you that drove me mad, and I have killed her, and now she never can +forgive me.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ask forgiveness from above,” I said, for Hendrika had been a +Christian, and the torment of her remorse touched me. +</p> + +<p> +“I ask no forgiveness,” she said. “May God torture me for +ever, because I killed her; may I become a brute for ever till she comes to +find me and forgives me! I only want her forgiveness.” And wailing in an +anguish of the heart so strong that her bodily suffering seemed to be +forgotten, Hendrika, the Baboon-woman, died. +</p> + +<p> +I went back to the kraals, and, waking Indaba-zimbi, told him what had +happened, asking him to send some one to watch the body, as I proposed to give +it burial. But next morning it was gone, and I found that the natives, hearing +of the event, had taken the corpse and thrown it to the vultures with every +mark of hate. Such, then, was the end of Hendrika. +</p> + +<p> +A week after Hendrika’s death I left Babyan Kraals. The place was hateful +to me now; it was a haunted place. I sent for old Indaba-zimbi and told him +that I was going. He answered that it was well. “The place has served +your turn,” he said; “here you have won that joy which it was fated +you should win, and have suffered those things that it was fated you should +suffer. Yes, and though you know it not now, the joy and the suffering, like +the sunshine and the storm, are the same thing, and will rest at last in the +same heaven, the heaven from which they came. Now go, Macumazahn.” +</p> + +<p> +I asked him if he was coming with me. +</p> + +<p> +“No,” he answered, “our paths lie apart henceforth, +Macumazahn. We met together for certain ends. Those ends are fulfilled. Now +each one goes his own way. You have still many years before you, Macumazahn; my +years are few. When we shake hands here it will be for the last time. Perhaps +we may meet again, but it will not be in this world. Henceforth we have each of +us a friend the less.” +</p> + +<p> +“Heavy words,” I said. +</p> + +<p> +“True words,” he answered. +</p> + +<p> +Well, I have little heart to write the rest of it. I went, leaving Indaba-zimbi +in charge of the place, and making him a present of such cattle and goods as I +did not want. +</p> + +<p> +Tota, I of course took with me. Fortunately by this time she had almost +recovered the shock to her nerves. The baby Harry, as he was afterwards named, +was a fine healthy child, and I was lucky in getting a respectable native +woman, whose husband had been killed in the fight with the baboons, to +accompany me as his nurse. +</p> + +<p> +Slowly, and followed for a distance by all the people, I trekked away from +Babyan Kraals. My route towards Natal was along the edge of the Bad Lands, and +my first night’s outspan was beneath that very tree where Stella, my lost +wife, had found us as we lay dying of thirst. +</p> + +<p> +I did not sleep much that night. And yet I was glad that I had not died in the +desert about eleven months before. I felt then, as from year to year I have +continued to feel while I wander through the lonely wilderness of life, that I +had been preserved to an end. I had won my darling’s love, and for a +little while we had been happy together. Our happiness was too perfect to +endure. She is lost to me now, but she is lost to be found again. +</p> + +<p> +Here on the following morning I bade farewell to Indaba-zimbi. +</p> + +<p> +“Good-bye, Macumazahn,” he said, nodding his white lock at me. +“Good-bye for a while. I am not a Christian; your father could not make +me that. But he was a wise man, and when he said that those who loved each +other shall meet again, he did not lie. And I too am a wise man in my way, +Macumazahn, and I say it is true that we shall meet again. All my prophecies to +you have come true, Macumazahn, and this one shall come true also. I tell you +that you shall return to Babyan Kraals and shall not find me. I tell you that +you shall journey to a further land than Babyan Kraals and shall find me. +Farewell!” and he took a pinch of snuff, turned, and went. +</p> + +<p> +Of my journey down to Natal there is little to tell. I met with many +adventures, but they were of an every-day kind, and in the end arrived safely +at Port Durban, which I now visited for the first time. Both Tota and my baby +boy bore the journey well. And here I may as well chronicle the destiny of +Tota. For a year she remained under my charge. Then she was adopted by a lady, +the wife of an English colonel, who was stationed at the Cape. She was taken by +her adopted parents to England, where she grew up a very charming and pretty +girl, and ultimately married a clergyman in Norfolk. But I never saw her again, +though we often wrote to each other. +</p> + +<p> +Before I returned to the country of my birth, she too had been gathered to the +land of shadows, leaving three children behind her. Ah me! all this took place +so long ago, when I was young who now am old. +</p> + +<p> +Perhaps it may interest the reader to know the fate of Mr. Carson’s +property, which should of course have gone to his grandson Harry. I wrote to +England to claim the estate on his behalf, but the lawyer to whom the matter +was submitted said that my marriage to Stella, not having been celebrated by an +ordained priest, was not legal according to English law, and therefore Harry +could not inherit. Foolishly enough I acquiesced in this, and the property +passed to a cousin of my father-in-law’s; but since I have come to live +in England I have been informed that this opinion is open to great suspicion, +and that there is every probability that the courts would have declared the +marriage perfectly binding as having been solemnly entered into in accordance +with the custom of the place where it was contracted. But I am now so rich that +it is not worth while to move in the matter. The cousin is dead, his son is in +possession, so let him keep it. +</p> + +<p> +Once, and once only, did I revisit Babyan Kraals. Some fifteen years after my +darling’s death, when I was a man in middle life, I undertook an +expedition to the Zambesi, and one night outspanned at the mouth of the +well-known valley beneath the shadow of the great peak. I mounted my horse, +and, quite alone, rode up the valley, noticing with a strange prescience of +evil that the road was overgrown, and, save for the music of the waterfalls, +the place silent as death. The kraals that used to be to the left of the road +by the river had vanished. I rode towards their site; the mealie fields were +choked with weeds, the paths were dumb with grass. Presently I reached the +place. There, overgrown with grass, were the burnt ashes of the kraals, and +there among the ashes, gleaming in the moonlight, lay the white bones of men. +Now it was clear to me. The settlement had been fallen on by some powerful foe, +and its inhabitants put to the assegai. The forebodings of the natives had come +true; Babyan Kraals were peopled by memories alone. +</p> + +<p> +I passed on up the terraces. There shone the roofs of the marble huts. They +would not burn, and were too strong to be easily pulled down. I entered one of +them—it had been our sleeping hut—and lit a candle which I had with +me. The huts had been sacked; leaves of books and broken mouldering fragments +of the familiar furniture lay about. Then I remembered that there was a secret +place hollowed in the floor and concealed by a stone, where Stella used to hide +her little treasures. I went to the stone and dragged it up. There was +something within wrapped in rotting native cloth. I undid it. It was the dress +my wife had been married in. In the centre of the dress were the withered +wreath and flowers she had worn, and with them a little paper packet. I opened +it; it contained a lock of my own hair! +</p> + +<p> +I remembered then that I had searched for this dress when I came away and could +not find it, for I had forgotten the secret recess in the floor. +</p> + +<p> +Taking the dress with me, I left the hut for the last time. Leaving my horse +tied to a tree, I walked to the graveyard, through the ruined garden. There it +was a mass of weeds, but over my darling’s grave grew a self-sown orange +bush, of which the scented petals fell in showers on to the mound beneath. As I +drew near, there was a crash and a rush. A great baboon leapt from the centre +of the graveyard and vanished into the trees. I could almost believe that it +was the wraith of Hendrika doomed to keep an eternal watch over the bones of +the woman her jealous rage had done to death. +</p> + +<p> +I tarried there a while, filled with such thoughts as may not be written. Then, +leaving my dead wife to her long sleep where the waters fall in melancholy +music beneath the shadow of the everlasting mountain, I turned and sought that +spot where first we had told our love. Now the orange grove was nothing but a +tangled thicket; many of the trees were dead, choked with creepers, but some +still flourished. There stood the one beneath which we had lingered, there was +the rock that had been our seat, and there on the rock sat the wraith of +<i>Stella</i>, the Stella whom I had wed! Ay! there she sat, and on her +upturned face was that same spiritual look which I saw upon it in the hour when +we first had kissed. The moonlight shone in her dark eyes, the breeze wavered +in her curling hair, her breast rose and fell, a gentle smile played about her +parted lips. I stood transfixed with awe and joy, gazing on that lost +loveliness which once was mine. I could not speak, and she spoke no word; she +did not even seem to see me. Now her eyes fell. For a moment they met mine, and +their message entered into me. +</p> + +<p> +Then she was gone. She was gone; nothing was left but the tremulous moonlight +falling where she had been, the melancholy music of the waters, the shadow of +the everlasting mountain, and, in my heart, the sorrow and the hope. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div style='display:block;margin-top:4em'>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ALLAN’S WIFE ***</div> +<div style='display:block;margin:1em 0;'>This file should be named 2727-h.htm or 2727-h.zip</div> +<div style='display:block;margin:1em 0;'>This and all associated files of various formats will be found in https://www.gutenberg.org/2/7/2/2727/</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> +Updated editions will replace the previous one—the old editions will +be renamed. +</div> + +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> +Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright +law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, +so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United +States without permission and without paying copyright +royalties. 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