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+The Project Gutenberg eBook of Black Heart and White Heart, by H. Rider Haggard
+
+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
+www.gutenberg.org. 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.
+
+Title: Black Heart and White Heart
+
+Author: H. Rider Haggard
+
+Release Date: October, 2001 [eBook #2842]
+[Most recently updated: May 26, 2021]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: UTF-8
+
+Produced by: John Bickers, Dagny and David Widger
+
+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BLACK HEART AND WHITE HEART ***
+
+
+
+
+Black Heart and White Heart
+
+by H. Rider Haggard
+
+
+Contents
+
+ DEDICATION
+ AUTHOR’S NOTE
+
+ CHAPTER I. PHILIP HADDEN AND KING CETYWAYO
+ CHAPTER II. THE BEE PROPHESIES
+ CHAPTER III. THE END OF THE HUNT
+ CHAPTER IV. NANEA
+ CHAPTER V. THE DOOM POOL
+ CHAPTER VI. THE GHOST OF THE DEAD
+
+
+
+
+DEDICATION
+
+
+To the Memory of the Child
+Nada Burnham,
+
+who “bound all to her” and, while her father cut his way through the
+hordes of the Ingobo Regiment, perished of the hardships of war at
+Buluwayo on 19th May, 1896, I dedicate these tales—and more
+particularly the last, that of a Faith which triumphed over savagery
+and death.
+
+H. Rider Haggard.
+
+Ditchingham.
+
+
+
+
+AUTHOR’S NOTE
+
+
+Of the three stories that comprise this volume[*], one, “The Wizard,” a
+tale of victorious faith, first appeared some years ago as a Christmas
+Annual. Another, “Elissa,” is an attempt, difficult enough owing to the
+scantiness of the material left to us by time, to recreate the life of
+the ancient Phoenician Zimbabwe, whose ruins still stand in Rhodesia,
+and, with the addition of the necessary love story, to suggest
+circumstances such as might have brought about or accompanied its fall
+at the hands of the surrounding savage tribes. The third, “Black Heart
+and White Heart,” is a story of the courtship, trials and final union
+of a pair of Zulu lovers in the time of King Cetywayo.
+
+[*] This text was prepared from a volume published in 1900 titled
+“Black Heart and White Heart, and Other Stories.”— JB.
+
+
+
+
+BLACK HEART AND WHITE HEART
+A ZULU IDYLL
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+PHILIP HADDEN AND KING CETYWAYO
+
+
+At the date of our introduction to him, Philip Hadden was a
+transport-rider and trader in “the Zulu.” Still on the right side of
+forty, in appearance he was singularly handsome; tall, dark, upright,
+with keen eyes, short-pointed beard, curling hair and clear-cut
+features. His life had been varied, and there were passages in it which
+he did not narrate even to his most intimate friends. He was of gentle
+birth, however, and it was said that he had received a public school
+and university education in England. At any rate he could quote the
+classics with aptitude on occasion, an accomplishment which, coupled
+with his refined voice and a bearing not altogether common in the wild
+places of the world, had earned for him among his rough companions the
+_soubriquet_ of “The Prince.”
+
+However these things may have been, it is certain that he had emigrated
+to Natal under a cloud, and equally certain that his relatives at home
+were content to take no further interest in his fortunes. During the
+fifteen or sixteen years which he had spent in or about the colony,
+Hadden followed many trades, and did no good at any of them. A clever
+man, of agreeable and prepossessing manner, he always found it easy to
+form friendships and to secure a fresh start in life. But, by degrees,
+the friends were seized with a vague distrust of him; and, after a
+period of more or less application, he himself would close the opening
+that he had made by a sudden disappearance from the locality, leaving
+behind him a doubtful reputation and some bad debts.
+
+Before the beginning of this story of the most remarkable episodes in
+his life, Philip Hadden was engaged for several years in
+transport-riding—that is, in carrying goods on ox waggons from Durban
+or Maritzburg to various points in the interior. A difficulty such as
+had more than once confronted him in the course of his career, led to
+his temporary abandonment of this means of earning a livelihood. On
+arriving at the little frontier town of Utrecht in the Transvaal, in
+charge of two waggon loads of mixed goods consigned to a storekeeper
+there, it was discovered that out of six cases of brandy five were
+missing from his waggon. Hadden explained the matter by throwing the
+blame upon his Kaffir “boys,” but the storekeeper, a rough-tongued man,
+openly called him a thief and refused to pay the freight on any of the
+load. From words the two men came to blows, knives were drawn, and
+before anybody could interfere the storekeeper received a nasty wound
+in his side. That night, without waiting till the matter could be
+inquired into by the landdrost or magistrate, Hadden slipped away, and
+trekked back into Natal as quickly as his oxen would travel. Feeling
+that even here he was not safe, he left one of his waggons at
+Newcastle, loaded up the other with Kaffir goods—such as blankets,
+calico, and hardware—and crossed into Zululand, where in those days no
+sheriff’s officer would be likely to follow him.
+
+Being well acquainted with the language and customs of the natives, he
+did good trade with them, and soon found himself possessed of some cash
+and a small herd of cattle, which he received in exchange for his
+wares. Meanwhile news reached him that the man whom he had injured
+still vowed vengeance against him, and was in communication with the
+authorities in Natal. These reasons making his return to civilisation
+undesirable for the moment, and further business being impossible until
+he could receive a fresh supply of trade stuff, Hadden like a wise man
+turned his thoughts to pleasure. Sending his cattle and waggon over the
+border to be left in charge of a native headman with whom he was
+friendly, he went on foot to Ulundi to obtain permission from the king,
+Cetywayo, to hunt game in his country. Somewhat to his surprise, the
+Indunas or headmen, received him courteously—for Hadden’s visit took
+place within a few months of the outbreak of the Zulu war in 1878, when
+Cetywayo was already showing unfriendliness to the English traders and
+others, though why the king did so they knew not.
+
+On the occasion of his first and last interview with Cetywayo, Hadden
+got a hint of the reason. It happened thus. On the second morning after
+his arrival at the royal kraal, a messenger came to inform him that
+“the Elephant whose tread shook the earth” had signified that it was
+his pleasure to see him. Accordingly he was led through the thousands
+of huts and across the Great Place to the little enclosure where
+Cetywayo, a royal-looking Zulu seated on a stool, and wearing a kaross
+of leopard skins, was holding an _indaba_, or conference, surrounded by
+his counsellors. The Induna who had conducted him to the august
+presence went down upon his hands and knees, and, uttering the royal
+salute of _Bayéte_, crawled forward to announce that the white man was
+waiting.
+
+“Let him wait,” said the king angrily; and, turning, he continued the
+discussion with his counsellors.
+
+Now, as has been said, Hadden thoroughly understood Zulu; and, when
+from time to time the king raised his voice, some of the words he spoke
+reached his ear.
+
+“What!” Cetywayo said, to a wizened and aged man who seemed to be
+pleading with him earnestly; “am I a dog that these white hyenas should
+hunt me thus? Is not the land mine, and was it not my father’s before
+me? Are not the people mine to save or to slay? I tell you that I will
+stamp out these little white men; my _impis_ shall eat them up. I have
+said!”
+
+Again the withered aged man interposed, evidently in the character of a
+peacemaker. Hadden could not hear his talk, but he rose and pointed
+towards the sea, while from his expressive gestures and sorrowful mien,
+he seemed to be prophesying disaster should a certain course of action
+be followed.
+
+For a while the king listened to him, then he sprang from his seat, his
+eyes literally ablaze with rage.
+
+“Hearken,” he cried to the counsellor; “I have guessed it for long, and
+now I am sure of it. You are a traitor. You are Sompseu’s[*] dog, and
+the dog of the Natal Government, and I will not keep another man’s dog
+to bite me in my own house. Take him away!”
+
+[*] Sir Theophilus Shepstone’s.
+
+
+A slight involuntary murmur rose from the ring of _indunas_, but the
+old man never flinched, not even when the soldiers, who presently would
+murder him, came and seized him roughly. For a few seconds, perhaps
+five, he covered his face with the corner of the kaross he wore, then
+he looked up and spoke to the king in a clear voice.
+
+“O King,” he said, “I am a very old man; as a youth I served under
+Chaka the Lion, and I heard his dying prophecy of the coming of the
+white man. Then the white men came, and I fought for Dingaan at the
+battle of the Blood River. They slew Dingaan, and for many years I was
+the counsellor of Panda, your father. I stood by you, O King, at the
+battle of the Tugela, when its grey waters were turned to red with the
+blood of Umbulazi your brother, and of the tens of thousands of his
+people. Afterwards I became your counsellor, O King, and I was with you
+when Sompseu set the crown upon your head and you made promises to
+Sompseu—promises that you have not kept. Now you are weary of me, and
+it is well; for I am very old, and doubtless my talk is foolish, as it
+chances to the old. Yet I think that the prophecy of Chaka, your
+great-uncle, will come true, and that the white men will prevail
+against you and that through them you shall find your death. I would
+that I might have stood in one more battle and fought for you, O King,
+since fight you will, but the end which you choose is for me the best
+end. Sleep in peace, O King, and farewell. _Bayéte!_”[*]
+
+[*] The royal salute of the Zulus.
+
+
+For a space there was silence, a silence of expectation while men
+waited to hear the tyrant reverse his judgment. But it did not please
+him to be merciful, or the needs of policy outweighed his pity.
+
+“Take him away,” he repeated. Then, with a slow smile on his face and
+one word, “Good-night,” upon his lips, supported by the arm of a
+soldier, the old warrior and statesman shuffled forth to the place of
+death.
+
+Hadden watched and listened in amazement not unmixed with fear. “If he
+treats his own servants like this, what will happen to me?” he
+reflected. “We English must have fallen out of favour since I left
+Natal. I wonder whether he means to make war on us or what? If so, this
+isn’t my place.”
+
+Just then the king, who had been gazing moodily at the ground, chanced
+to look up. “Bring the stranger here,” he said.
+
+Hadden heard him, and coming forward offered Cetywayo his hand in as
+cool and nonchalant a manner as he could command.
+
+Somewhat to his surprise it was accepted. “At least, White Man,” said
+the king, glancing at his visitor’s tall spare form and cleanly cut
+face, “you are no ‘_umfagozan_’ (low fellow); you are of the blood of
+chiefs.”
+
+“Yes, King,” answered Hadden, with a little sigh, “I am of the blood of
+chiefs.”
+
+“What do you want in my country, White Man?”
+
+“Very little, King. I have been trading here, as I daresay you have
+heard, and have sold all my goods. Now I ask your leave to hunt
+buffalo, and other big game, for a while before I return to Natal.”
+
+“I cannot grant it,” answered Cetywayo, “you are a spy sent by Sompseu,
+or by the Queen’s Induna in Natal. Get you gone.”
+
+“Indeed,” said Hadden, with a shrug of his shoulders; “then I hope that
+Sompseu, or the Queen’s Induna, or both of them, will pay me when I
+return to my own country. Meanwhile I will obey you because I must, but
+I should first like to make you a present.”
+
+“What present?” asked the king. “I want no presents. We are rich here,
+White Man.”
+
+“So be it, King. It was nothing worthy of your taking, only a rifle.”
+
+“A rifle, White Man? Where is it?”
+
+“Without. I would have brought it, but your servants told me that it is
+death to come armed before the ‘Elephant who shakes the Earth.’”
+
+Cetywayo frowned, for the note of sarcasm did not escape his quick ear.
+
+“Let this white man’s offering be brought; I will consider the thing.”
+
+Instantly the Induna who had accompanied Hadden darted to the gateway,
+running with his body bent so low that it seemed as though at every
+step he must fall upon his face. Presently he returned with the weapon
+in his hand and presented it to the king, holding it so that the muzzle
+was pointed straight at the royal breast.
+
+“I crave leave to say, O Elephant,” remarked Hadden in a drawling
+voice, “that it might be well to command your servant to lift the mouth
+of that gun from your heart.”
+
+“Why?” asked the king.
+
+“Only because it is loaded, and at full cock, O Elephant, who probably
+desires to continue to shake the Earth.”
+
+At these words the “Elephant” uttered a sharp exclamation, and rolled
+from his stool in a most unkingly manner, whilst the terrified Induna,
+springing backwards, contrived to touch the trigger of the rifle and
+discharge a bullet through the exact spot that a second before had been
+occupied by his monarch’s head.
+
+“Let him be taken away,” shouted the incensed king from the ground, but
+long before the words had passed his lips the Induna, with a cry that
+the gun was bewitched, had cast it down and fled at full speed through
+the gate.
+
+“He has already taken himself away,” suggested Hadden, while the
+audience tittered. “No, King, do not touch it rashly; it is a repeating
+rifle. Look——” and lifting the Winchester, he fired the four remaining
+shots in quick succession into the air, striking the top of a tree at
+which he aimed with every one of them.
+
+“_Wow_, it is wonderful!” said the company in astonishment.
+
+“Has the thing finished?” asked the king.
+
+“For the present it has,” answered Hadden. “Look at it.”
+
+Cetywayo took the repeater in his hand, and examined it with caution,
+swinging the muzzle horizontally in an exact line with the stomachs of
+some of his most eminent Indunas, who shrank to this side and that as
+the barrel was brought to bear on them.
+
+“See what cowards they are, White Man,” said the king with indignation;
+“they fear lest there should be another bullet in this gun.”
+
+“Yes,” answered Hadden, “they are cowards indeed. I believe that if
+they were seated on stools they would tumble off them just as it
+chanced to your Majesty to do just now.”
+
+“Do you understand the making of guns, White Man?” asked the king
+hastily, while the Indunas one and all turned their heads, and
+contemplated the fence behind them.
+
+“No, King, I cannot make guns, but I can mend them.”
+
+“If I paid you well, White Man, would you stop here at my kraal, and
+mend guns for me?” asked Cetywayo anxiously.
+
+“It might depend on the pay,” answered Hadden; “but for awhile I am
+tired of work, and wish to rest. If the king gives me the permission to
+hunt for which I asked, and men to go with me, then when I return
+perhaps we can bargain on the matter. If not, I will bid the king
+farewell, and journey to Natal.”
+
+“In order to make report of what he has seen and learned here,”
+muttered Cetywayo.
+
+At this moment the talk was interrupted, for the soldiers who had led
+away the old Induna returned at speed, and prostrated themselves before
+the king.
+
+“Is he dead?” he asked.
+
+“He has travelled the king’s bridge,” they answered grimly; “he died
+singing a song of praise of the king.”
+
+“Good,” said Cetywayo, “that stone shall hurt my feet no more. Go, tell
+the tale of its casting away to Sompseu and to the Queen’s Induna in
+Natal,” he added with bitter emphasis.
+
+“_Baba!_ Hear our Father speak. Listen to the rumbling of the
+Elephant,” said the Indunas taking the point, while one bolder than the
+rest added: “Soon we will tell them another tale, the white Talking
+Ones, a red tale, a tale of spears, and the regiments shall sing it in
+their ears.”
+
+At the words an enthusiasm caught hold of the listeners, as the sudden
+flame catches hold of dry grass. They sprang up, for the most of them
+were seated on their haunches, and stamping their feet upon the ground
+in unison, repeated:—
+
+_Indaba ibomwu—indaba ye mikonto
+Lizo dunyiswa nge impi ndhlebeni yaho._
+(A red tale! A red tale! A tale of spears,
+And the _impis_ shall sing it in their ears.)
+
+
+One of them, indeed, a great fierce-faced fellow, drew near to Hadden
+and shaking his fist before his eyes—fortunately being in the royal
+presence he had no assegai—shouted the sentences at him.
+
+The king saw that the fire he had lit was burning too fiercely.
+
+“Silence,” he thundered in the deep voice for which he was remarkable,
+and instantly each man became as if he were turned to stone, only the
+echoes still answered back: “And the _impis_ shall sing it in their
+ears—in their ears.”
+
+“I am growing certain that this is no place for me,” thought Hadden;
+“if that scoundrel had been armed he might have temporarily forgotten
+himself. Hullo! who’s this?”
+
+Just then there appeared through the gate of the fence a splendid
+specimen of the Zulu race. The man, who was about thirty-five years of
+age, was arrayed in a full war dress of a captain of the Umcityu
+regiment. From the circlet of otter skin on his brow rose his crest of
+plumes, round his middle, arms and knees hung the long fringes of black
+oxtails, and in one hand he bore a little dancing shield, also black in
+colour. The other was empty, since he might not appear before the king
+bearing arms. In countenance the man was handsome, and though just now
+they betrayed some anxiety, his eyes were genial and honest, and his
+mouth sensitive. In height he must have measured six foot two inches,
+yet he did not strike the observer as being tall, perhaps because of
+his width of chest and the solidity of his limbs, that were in curious
+contrast to the delicate and almost womanish hands and feet which so
+often mark the Zulu of noble blood. In short the man was what he seemed
+to be, a savage gentleman of birth, dignity and courage.
+
+In company with him was another man plainly dressed in a moocha and a
+blanket, whose grizzled hair showed him to be over fifty years of age.
+His face also was pleasant and even refined, but the eyes were
+timorous, and the mouth lacked character.
+
+“Who are these?” asked the king.
+
+The two men fell on their knees before him, and bowed till their
+foreheads touched the ground—the while giving him his _sibonga_ or
+titles of praise.
+
+“Speak,” he said impatiently.
+
+“O King,” said the young warrior, seating himself Zulu fashion, “I am
+Nahoon, the son of Zomba, a captain of the Umcityu, and this is my
+uncle Umgona, the brother of one of my mothers, my father’s youngest
+wife.”
+
+Cetywayo frowned. “What do you here away from your regiment, Nahoon?”
+
+“May it please the king, I have leave of absence from the head
+captains, and I come to ask a boon of the king’s bounty.”
+
+“Be swift, then, Nahoon.”
+
+“It is this, O King,” said the captain with some embarrassment: “A
+while ago the king was pleased to make a _keshla_ of me because of
+certain service that I did out yonder——” and he touched the black ring
+which he wore in the hair of his head. “Being now a ringed man and a
+captain, I crave the right of a man at the hands of the king—the right
+to marry.”
+
+“Right? Speak more humbly, son of Zomba; my soldiers and my cattle have
+no rights.”
+
+Nahoon bit his lip, for he had made a serious mistake.
+
+“Pardon, O King. The matter stands thus: My uncle Umgona here has a
+fair daughter named Nanea, whom I desire to wife, and who desires me to
+husband. Awaiting the king’s leave I am betrothed to her and in earnest
+of it I have paid to Umgona a _lobola_ of fifteen head of cattle, cows
+and calves together. But Umgona has a powerful neighbour, an old chief
+named Maputa, the warden of the Crocodile Drift, who doubtless is known
+to the king, and this chief also seeks Nanea in marriage and harries
+Umgona, threatening him with many evils if he will not give the girl to
+him. But Umgona’s heart is white towards me, and towards Maputa it is
+black, therefore together we come to crave this boon of the king.”
+
+“It is so; he speaks the truth,” said Umgona.
+
+“Cease,” answered Cetywayo angrily. “Is this a time that my soldiers
+should seek wives in marriage, wives to turn their hearts to water?
+Know that but yesterday for this crime I commanded that twenty girls
+who had dared without my leave to marry men of the Undi regiment,
+should be strangled and their bodies laid upon the cross-roads and with
+them the bodies of their fathers, that all might know their sin and be
+warned thereby. Ay, Umgona, it is well for you and for your daughter
+that you sought my word before she was given in marriage to this man.
+Now this is my award: I refuse your prayer, Nahoon, and since you,
+Umgona, are troubled with one whom you would not take as son-in-law,
+the old chief Maputa, I will free you from his importunity. The girl,
+says Nahoon, is fair—good, I myself will be gracious to her, and she
+shall be numbered among the wives of the royal house. Within thirty
+days from now, in the week of the next new moon, let her be delivered
+to the _Sigodhla_, the royal house of the women, and with her those
+cattle, the cows and the calves together, that Nahoon has given you, of
+which I fine him because he has dared to think of marriage without the
+leave of the king.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+THE BEE PROPHESIES
+
+
+“‘A Daniel come to judgment’ indeed,” reflected Hadden, who had been
+watching this savage comedy with interest; “our love-sick friend has
+got more than he bargained for. Well, that comes of appealing to
+Cæsar,” and he turned to look at the two suppliants.
+
+The old man, Umgona, merely started, then began to pour out sentences
+of conventional thanks and praise to the king for his goodness and
+condescension. Cetywayo listened to his talk in silence, and when he
+had done answered by reminding him tersely that if Nanea did not appear
+at the date named, both she and he, her father, would in due course
+certainly decorate a cross-road in their own immediate neighbourhood.
+
+The captain, Nahoon, afforded a more curious study. As the fatal words
+crossed the king’s lips, his face took an expression of absolute
+astonishment, which was presently replaced by one of fury—the just fury
+of a man who suddenly has suffered an unutterable wrong. His whole
+frame quivered, the veins stood out in knots on his neck and forehead,
+and his fingers closed convulsively as though they were grasping the
+handle of a spear. Presently the rage passed away—for as well might a
+man be wroth with fate as with a Zulu despot—to be succeeded by a look
+of the most hopeless misery. The proud dark eyes grew dull, the
+copper-coloured face sank in and turned ashen, the mouth drooped, and
+down one corner of it there trickled a little line of blood springing
+from the lip bitten through in the effort to keep silence. Lifting his
+hand in salute to the king, the great man rose and staggered rather
+than walked towards the gate.
+
+As he reached it, the voice of Cetywayo commanded him to stop. “Stay,”
+he said, “I have a service for you, Nahoon, that shall drive out of
+your head these thoughts of wives and marriage. You see this white man
+here; he is my guest, and would hunt buffalo and big game in the bush
+country. I put him in your charge; take men with you, and see that he
+comes to no hurt. See also that you bring him before me within a month,
+or your life shall answer for it. Let him be here at my royal kraal in
+the first week of the new moon—when Nanea comes—and then I will tell
+you whether or no I agree with you that she is fair. Go now, my child,
+and you, White Man, go also; those who are to accompany you shall be
+with you at the dawn. Farewell, but remember we meet again at the new
+moon, when we will settle what pay you shall receive as keeper of my
+guns. Do not fail me, White Man, or I shall send after you, and my
+messengers are sometimes rough.”
+
+“This means that I am a prisoner,” thought Hadden, “but it will go hard
+if I cannot manage to give them the slip somehow. I don’t intend to
+stay in this country if war is declared, to be pounded into _mouti_
+(medicine), or have my eyes put out, or any little joke of that sort.”
+
+
+Ten days had passed, and one evening Hadden and his escort were
+encamped in a wild stretch of mountainous country lying between the
+Blood and Unvunyana Rivers, not more than eight miles from that “Place
+of the Little Hand” which within a few weeks was to become famous
+throughout the world by its native name of Isandhlwana. For three days
+they had been tracking the spoor of a small herd of buffalo that still
+inhabited the district, but as yet they had not come up with them. The
+Zulu hunters had suggested that they should follow the Unvunyana down
+towards the sea where game was more plentiful, but this neither Hadden,
+nor the captain, Nahoon, had been anxious to do, for reasons which each
+of them kept secret to himself. Hadden’s object was to work gradually
+down to the Buffalo River across which he hoped to effect a retreat
+into Natal. That of Nahoon was to linger in the neighbourhood of the
+kraal of Umgona, which was situated not very far from their present
+camping place, in the vague hope that he might find an opportunity of
+speaking with or at least of seeing Nanea, the girl to whom he was
+affianced, who within a few weeks must be taken from him, and given
+over to the king.
+
+A more eerie-looking spot than that where they were encamped Hadden had
+never seen. Behind them lay a tract of land—half-swamp and half-bush—in
+which the buffalo were supposed to be hiding. Beyond, in lonely
+grandeur, rose the mountain of Isandhlwana, while in front was an
+amphitheatre of the most gloomy forest, ringed round in the distance by
+sheer-sided hills. Into this forest there ran a river which drained the
+swamp, placidly enough upon the level. But it was not always level, for
+within three hundred yards of them it dashed suddenly over a precipice,
+of no great height but very steep, falling into a boiling rock-bound
+pool that the light of the sun never seemed to reach.
+
+“What is the name of that forest, Nahoon?” asked Hadden.
+
+“It is named _Emagudu_, The Home of the Dead,” the Zulu replied
+absently, for he was looking towards the kraal of Nanea, which was
+situated at an hour’s walk away over the ridge to the right.
+
+“The Home of the Dead! Why?”
+
+“Because the dead live there, those whom we name the _Esemkofu_, the
+Speechless Ones, and with them other Spirits, the _Amahlosi_, from whom
+the breath of life has passed away, and who yet live on.”
+
+“Indeed,” said Hadden, “and have you ever seen these ghosts?”
+
+“Am I mad that I should go to look for them, White Man? Only the dead
+enter that forest, and it is on the borders of it that our people make
+offerings to the dead.”
+
+Followed by Nahoon, Hadden walked to the edge of the cliff and looked
+over it. To the left lay the deep and dreadful-looking pool, while
+close to the bank of it, placed upon a narrow strip of turf between the
+cliff and the commencement of the forest, was a hut.
+
+“Who lives there?” asked Hadden.
+
+“The great _Isanusi_—she who is named _Inyanga_ or Doctoress; she who
+is named Inyosi (the Bee), because she gathers wisdom from the dead who
+grow in the forest.”
+
+“Do you think that she could gather enough wisdom to tell me whether I
+am going to kill any buffalo, Nahoon?”
+
+“Mayhap, White Man, but,” he added with a little smile, “those who
+visit the Bee’s hive may hear nothing, or they may hear more than they
+wish for. The words of that Bee have a sting.”
+
+“Good; I will see if she can sting me.”
+
+“So be it,” said Nahoon; and turning, he led the way along the cliff
+till he reached a native path which zig-zagged down its face.
+
+By this path they climbed till they came to the sward at the foot of
+the descent, and walked up it to the hut which was surrounded by a low
+fence of reeds, enclosing a small court-yard paved with ant-heap earth
+beaten hard and polished. In this court-yard sat the Bee, her stool
+being placed almost at the mouth of the round opening that served as a
+doorway to the hut. At first all that Hadden could see of her, crouched
+as she was in the shadow, was a huddled shape wrapped round with a
+greasy and tattered catskin kaross, above the edge of which appeared
+two eyes, fierce and quick as those of a leopard. At her feet
+smouldered a little fire, and ranged around it in a semi-circle were a
+number of human skulls, placed in pairs as though they were talking
+together, whilst other bones, to all appearance also human, were
+festooned about the hut and the fence of the courtyard.
+
+“I see that the old lady is set up with the usual properties,” thought
+Hadden, but he said nothing.
+
+Nor did the witch-doctoress say anything; she only fixed her beady eyes
+upon his face. Hadden returned the compliment, staring at her with all
+his might, till suddenly he became aware that he was vanquished in this
+curious duel. His brain grew confused, and to his fancy it seemed that
+the woman before him had shifted shape into the likeness of a colossal
+and horrid spider sitting at the mouth of her trap, and that these
+bones were the relics of her victims.
+
+“Why do you not speak, White Man?” she said at last in a slow clear
+voice. “Well, there is no need, since I can read your thoughts. You are
+thinking that I who am called the Bee should be better named the
+Spider. Have no fear; I did not kill these men. What would it profit me
+when the dead are so many? I suck the souls of men, not their bodies,
+White Man. It is their living hearts I love to look on, for therein I
+read much and thereby I grow wise. Now what would you of the Bee, White
+Man, the Bee that labours in this Garden of Death, and—what brings
+_you_ here, son of Zomba? Why are you not with the Umcityu now that
+they doctor themselves for the great war—the last war—the war of the
+white and the black—or if you have no stomach for fighting, why are you
+not at the side of Nanea the tall, Nanea the fair?”
+
+Nahoon made no answer, but Hadden said:—
+
+“A small thing, mother. I would know if I shall prosper in my hunting.”
+
+“In your hunting, White Man; what hunting? The hunting of game, of
+money, or of women? Well, one of them, for a-hunting you must ever be;
+that is your nature, to hunt and be hunted. Tell me now, how goes the
+wound of that trader who tasted of your steel yonder in the town of the
+Maboon (Boers)? No need to answer, White Man, but what fee, Chief, for
+the poor witch-doctoress whose skill you seek,” she added in a whining
+voice. “Surely you would not that an old woman should work without a
+fee?”
+
+“I have none to offer you, mother, so I will be going,” said Hadden,
+who began to feel himself satisfied with this display of the Bee’s
+powers of observation and thought-reading.
+
+“Nay,” she answered with an unpleasant laugh, “would you ask a
+question, and not wait for the answer? I will take no fee from you at
+present, White Man; you shall pay me later on when we meet again,” and
+once more she laughed. “Let me look in your face, let me look in your
+face,” she continued, rising and standing before him.
+
+Then of a sudden Hadden felt something cold at the back of his neck,
+and the next instant the Bee had sprung from him, holding between her
+thumb and finger a curl of dark hair which she had cut from his head.
+The action was so instantaneous that he had neither time to avoid nor
+to resent it, but stood still staring at her stupidly.
+
+“That is all I need,” she cried, “for like my heart my magic is white.
+Stay—son of Zomba, give me also of your hair, for those who visit the
+Bee must listen to her humming.”
+
+Nahoon obeyed, cutting a little lock from his head with the sharp edge
+of his assegai, though it was very evident that he did this not because
+he wished to do so, but because he feared to refuse.
+
+Then the Bee slipped back her kaross, and stood bending over the fire
+before them, into which she threw herbs taken from a pouch that was
+bound about her middle. She was still a finely-shaped woman, and she
+wore none of the abominations which Hadden had been accustomed to see
+upon the persons of witch-doctoresses. About her neck, however, was a
+curious ornament, a small live snake, red and grey in hue, which her
+visitors recognised as one of the most deadly to be found in that part
+of the country. It is not unusual for Bantu witch-doctors thus to
+decorate themselves with snakes, though whether or not their fangs have
+first been extracted no one seems to know.
+
+Presently the herbs began to smoulder, and the smoke of them rose up in
+a thin, straight stream, that, striking upon the face of the Bee, clung
+about her head enveloping it as though with a strange blue veil. Then
+of a sudden she stretched out her hands, and let fall the two locks of
+hair upon the burning herbs, where they writhed themselves to ashes
+like things alive. Next she opened her mouth, and began to draw the
+fumes of the hair and herbs into her lungs in great gulps; while the
+snake, feeling the influence of the medicine, hissed and, uncoiling
+itself from about her neck, crept upwards and took refuge among the
+black _saccaboola_ feathers of her head-dress.
+
+Soon the vapours began to do their work; she swayed to and fro
+muttering, then sank back against the hut, upon the straw of which her
+head rested. Now the Bee’s face was turned upwards towards the light,
+and it was ghastly to behold, for it had become blue in colour, and the
+open eyes were sunken like the eyes of one dead, whilst above her
+forehead the red snake wavered and hissed, reminding Hadden of the
+Uraeus crest on the brow of statues of Egyptian kings. For ten seconds
+or more she remained thus, then she spoke in a hollow and unnatural
+voice:—
+
+“O Black Heart and body that is white and beautiful, I look into your
+heart, and it is black as blood, and it shall be black with blood.
+Beautiful white body with black heart, you shall find your game and
+hunt it, and it shall lead you into the House of the Homeless, into the
+Home of the Dead, and it shall be shaped as a bull, it shall be shaped
+as a tiger, it shall be shaped as a woman whom kings and waters cannot
+harm. Beautiful white body and black heart, you shall be paid your
+wages, money for money, and blow for blow. Think of my word when the
+spotted cat purrs above your breast; think of it when the battle roars
+about you; think of it when you grasp your great reward, and for the
+last time stand face to face with the ghost of the dead in the Home of
+the Dead.
+
+“O White Heart and black body, I look into your heart and it is white
+as milk, and the milk of innocence shall save it. Fool, why do you
+strike that blow? Let him be who is loved of the tiger, and whose love
+is as the love of a tiger. Ah! what face is that in the battle? Follow
+it, follow it, O swift of foot; but follow warily, for the tongue that
+has lied will never plead for mercy, and the hand that can betray is
+strong in war. White Heart, what is death? In death life lives, and
+among the dead you shall find the life you lost, for there awaits you
+she whom kings and waters cannot harm.”
+
+As the Bee spoke, by degrees her voice sank lower and lower till it was
+almost inaudible. Then it ceased altogether and she seemed to pass from
+trance to sleep. Hadden, who had been listening to her with an amused
+and cynical smile, now laughed aloud.
+
+“Why do you laugh, White Man?” asked Nahoon angrily.
+
+“I laugh at my own folly in wasting time listening to the nonsense of
+that lying fraud.”
+
+“It is no nonsense, White Man.”
+
+“Indeed? Then will you tell me what it means?”
+
+“I cannot tell you what it means yet, but her words have to do with a
+woman and a leopard, and with your fate and my fate.”
+
+Hadden shrugged his shoulders, not thinking the matter worth further
+argument, and at that moment the Bee woke up shivering, drew the red
+snake from her head-dress and coiling it about her throat wrapped
+herself again in the greasy kaross.
+
+“Are you satisfied with my wisdom, _Inkoos_?” she asked of Hadden.
+
+“I am satisfied that you are one of the cleverest cheats in Zululand,
+mother,” he answered coolly. “Now, what is there to pay?”
+
+The Bee took no offence at this rude speech, though for a second or two
+the look in her eyes grew strangely like that which they had seen in
+those of the snake when the fumes of the fire made it angry.
+
+“If the white lord says I am a cheat, it must be so,” she answered,
+“for he of all men should be able to discern a cheat. I have said that
+I ask no fee;—yes, give me a little tobacco from your pouch.”
+
+Hadden opened the bag of antelope hide and drawing some tobacco from
+it, gave it to her. In taking it she clasped his hand and examined the
+gold ring that was upon the third finger, a ring fashioned like a snake
+with two little rubies set in the head to represent the eyes.
+
+“I wear a snake about my neck, and you wear one upon your hand,
+_Inkoos_. I should like to have this ring to wear upon my hand, so that
+the snake about my neck may be less lonely there.”
+
+“Then I am afraid you will have to wait till I am dead,” said Hadden.
+
+“Yes, yes,” she answered in a pleased voice, “it is a good word. I will
+wait till you are dead and then I will take the ring, and none can say
+that I have stolen it, for Nahoon there will bear me witness that you
+gave me permission to do so.”
+
+For the first time Hadden started, since there was something about the
+Bee’s tone that jarred upon him. Had she addressed him in her
+professional manner, he would have thought nothing of it; but in her
+cupidity she had become natural, and it was evident that she spoke from
+conviction, believing her own words.
+
+She saw him start, and instantly changed her note.
+
+“Let the white lord forgive the jest of a poor old witch-doctoress,”
+she said in a whining voice. “I have so much to do with Death that his
+name leaps to my lips,” and she glanced first at the circle of skulls
+about her, then towards the waterfall that fed the gloomy pool upon
+whose banks her hut was placed.
+
+“Look,” she said simply.
+
+Following the line of her outstretched hand Hadden’s eyes fell upon two
+withered mimosa trees which grew over the fall almost at right angles
+to its rocky edge. These trees were joined together by a rude platform
+made of logs of wood lashed down with _riems_ of hide. Upon this
+platform stood three figures; notwithstanding the distance and the
+spray of the fall, he could see that they were those of two men and a
+girl, for their shapes stood out distinctly against the fiery red of
+the sunset sky. One instant there were three, the next there were
+two—for the girl had gone, and something dark rushing down the face of
+the fall, struck the surface of the pool with a heavy thud, while a
+faint and piteous cry broke upon his ear.
+
+“What is the meaning of that?” he asked, horrified and amazed.
+
+“Nothing,” answered the Bee with a laugh. “Do you not know, then, that
+this is the place where faithless women, or girls who have loved
+without the leave of the king, are brought to meet their death, and
+with them their accomplices. Oh! they die here thus each day, and I
+watch them die and keep the count of the number of them,” and drawing a
+tally-stick from the thatch of the hut, she took a knife and added a
+notch to the many that appeared upon it, looking at Nahoon the while
+with a half-questioning, half-warning gaze.
+
+“Yes, yes, it is a place of death,” she muttered. “Up yonder the quick
+die day by day and down there”—and she pointed along the course of the
+river beyond the pool to where the forest began some two hundred yards
+from her hut—“the ghosts of them have their home. Listen!”
+
+As she spoke, a sound reached their ears that seemed to swell from the
+dim skirts of the forests, a peculiar and unholy sound which it is
+impossible to define more accurately than by saying that it seemed
+beastlike, and almost inarticulate.
+
+“Listen,” repeated the Bee, “they are merry yonder.”
+
+“Who?” asked Hadden; “the baboons?”
+
+“No, _Inkoos_, the _Amatongo_—the ghosts that welcome her who has just
+become of their number.”
+
+“Ghosts,” said Hadden roughly, for he was angry at his own tremors, “I
+should like to see those ghosts. Do you think that I have never heard a
+troop of monkeys in the bush before, mother? Come, Nahoon, let us be
+going while there is light to climb the cliff. Farewell.”
+
+“Farewell _Inkoos_, and doubt not that your wish will be fulfilled. Go
+in peace _Inkoos_—to sleep in peace.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+THE END OF THE HUNT
+
+
+The prayer of the Bee notwithstanding, Philip Hadden slept ill that
+night. He felt in the best of health, and his conscience was not
+troubling him more than usual, but rest he could not. Whenever he
+closed his eyes, his mind conjured up a picture of the grim
+witch-doctoress, so strangely named the Bee, and the sound of her
+evil-omened words as he had heard them that afternoon. He was neither a
+superstitious nor a timid man, and any supernatural beliefs that might
+linger in his mind were, to say the least of it, dormant. But do what
+he might, he could not shake off a certain eerie sensation of fear,
+lest there should be some grains of truth in the prophesyings of this
+hag. What if it were a fact that he was near his death, and that the
+heart which beat so strongly in his breast must soon be still for
+ever—no, he would not think of it. This gloomy place, and the dreadful
+sight which he saw that day, had upset his nerves. The domestic customs
+of these Zulus were not pleasant, and for his part he was determined to
+be clear of them so soon as he was able to escape the country.
+
+In fact, if he could in any way manage it, it was his intention to make
+a dash for the border on the following night. To do this with a good
+prospect of success, however, it was necessary that he should kill a
+buffalo, or some other head of game. Then, as he knew well, the hunters
+with him would feast upon meat until they could scarcely stir, and that
+would be his opportunity. Nahoon, however, might not succumb to this
+temptation; therefore he must trust to luck to be rid of him. If it
+came to the worst, he could put a bullet through him, which he
+considered he would be justified in doing, seeing that in reality the
+man was his jailor. Should this necessity arise, he felt indeed that he
+could face it without undue compunction, for in truth he disliked
+Nahoon; at times he even hated him. Their natures were antagonistic,
+and he knew that the great Zulu distrusted and looked down upon him,
+and to be looked down upon by a savage “nigger” was more than his pride
+could stomach.
+
+At the first break of dawn Hadden rose and roused his escort, who were
+still stretched in sleep around the dying fire, each man wrapped in his
+kaross or blanket. Nahoon stood up and shook himself, looking gigantic
+in the shadows of the morning.
+
+“What is your will, _Umlungu_ (white man), that you are up before the
+sun?”
+
+“My will, _Muntumpofu_ (yellow man), is to hunt buffalo,” answered
+Hadden coolly. It irritated him that this savage should give him no
+title of any sort.
+
+“Your pardon,” said the Zulu reading his thoughts, “but I cannot call
+you _Inkoos_ because you are not my chief, or any man’s; still if the
+title ‘white man’ offends you, we will give you a name.”
+
+“As you wish,” answered Hadden briefly.
+
+Accordingly they gave him a name, _Inhlizin-mgama_, by which he was
+known among them thereafter, but Hadden was not best pleased when he
+found that the meaning of those soft-sounding syllables was “Black
+Heart.” That was how the _inyanga_ had addressed him—only she used
+different words.
+
+An hour later, and they were in the swampy bush country that lay behind
+the encampment searching for their game. Within a very little while
+Nahoon held up his hand, then pointed to the ground. Hadden looked;
+there, pressed deep in the marshy soil, and to all appearance not ten
+minutes old, was the spoor of a small herd of buffalo.
+
+“I knew that we should find game to-day,” whispered Nahoon, “because
+the Bee said so.”
+
+“Curse the Bee,” answered Hadden below his breath. “Come on.”
+
+For a quarter of an hour or more they followed the spoor through thick
+reeds, till suddenly Nahoon whistled very softly and touched Hadden’s
+arm. He looked up, and there, about two hundred yards away, feeding on
+some higher ground among a patch of mimosa trees, were the
+buffaloes—six of them—an old bull with a splendid head, three cows, a
+heifer and a calf about four months old. Neither the wind nor the
+nature of the veldt were favourable for them to stalk the game from
+their present position, so they made a detour of half a mile and very
+carefully crept towards them up the wind, slipping from trunk to trunk
+of the mimosas and when these failed them, crawling on their stomachs
+under cover of the tall _tambuti_ grass. At last they were within forty
+yards, and a further advance seemed impracticable; for although he
+could not smell them, it was evident from his movements that the old
+bull heard some unusual sound and was growing suspicious. Nearest to
+Hadden, who alone of the party had a rifle, stood the heifer broadside
+on—a beautiful shot. Remembering that she would make the best beef, he
+lifted his Martini, and aiming at her immediately behind the shoulder,
+gently squeezed the trigger. The rifle exploded, and the heifer fell
+dead, shot through the heart. Strangely enough the other buffaloes did
+not at once run away. On the contrary, they seemed puzzled to account
+for the sudden noise; and, not being able to wind anything, lifted
+their heads and stared round them.
+
+The pause gave Hadden space to get in a fresh cartridge and to aim
+again, this time at the old bull. The bullet struck him somewhere in
+the neck or shoulder, for he came to his knees, but in another second
+was up and having caught sight of the cloud of smoke he charged
+straight at it. Because of this smoke, or for some other reason, Hadden
+did not see him coming, and in consequence would most certainly have
+been trampled or gored, had not Nahoon sprung forward, at the imminent
+risk of his own life, and dragged him down behind an ant-heap. A moment
+more and the great beast had thundered by, taking no further notice of
+them.
+
+“Forward,” said Hadden, and leaving most of the men to cut up the
+heifer and carry the best of her meat to camp, they started on the
+blood spoor.
+
+For some hours they followed the bull, till at last they lost the trail
+on a patch of stony ground thickly covered with bush, and exhausted by
+the heat, sat down to rest and to eat some _biltong_ or sun-dried flesh
+which they had with them. They finished their meal, and were preparing
+to return to the camp, when one of the four Zulus who were with them
+went to drink at a little stream that ran at a distance of not more
+than ten paces away. Half a minute later they heard a hideous grunting
+noise and a splashing of water, and saw the Zulu fly into the air. All
+the while that they were eating, the wounded buffalo had been lying in
+wait for them under a thick bush on the banks of the streamlet,
+knowing—cunning brute that he was—that sooner or later his turn would
+come. With a shout of consternation they rushed forward to see the bull
+vanish over the rise before Hadden could get a chance of firing at him,
+and to find their companion dying, for the great horn had pierced his
+lung.
+
+“It is not a buffalo, it is a devil,” the poor fellow gasped, and
+expired.
+
+“Devil or not, I mean to kill it,” exclaimed Hadden. So leaving the
+others to carry the body of their comrade to camp, he started on
+accompanied by Nahoon only. Now the ground was more open and the chase
+easier, for they sighted their quarry frequently, though they could not
+come near enough to fire. Presently they travelled down a steep cliff.
+
+“Do you know where we are?” asked Nahoon, pointing to a belt of forest
+opposite. “That is _Emagudu_, the Home of the Dead—and look, the bull
+heads thither.”
+
+Hadden glanced round him. It was true; yonder to the left were the
+Fall, the Pool of Doom, and the hut of the Bee.
+
+“Very well,” he answered; “then we must head for it too.”
+
+Nahoon halted. “Surely you would not enter there,” he exclaimed.
+
+“Surely I will,” replied Hadden, “but there is no need for you to do so
+if you are afraid.”
+
+“I am afraid—of ghosts,” said the Zulu, “but I will come.”
+
+So they crossed the strip of turf, and entered the haunted wood. It was
+a gloomy place indeed; the great wide-topped trees grew thick there
+shutting out the sight of the sky; moreover, the air in it which no
+breeze stirred, was heavy with the exhalations of rotting foliage.
+There seemed to be no life here and no sound—only now and again a
+loathsome spotted snake would uncoil itself and glide away, and now and
+again a heavy rotten bough fell with a crash.
+
+Hadden was too intent upon the buffalo, however, to be much impressed
+by his surroundings. He only remarked that the light would be bad for
+shooting, and went on.
+
+They must have penetrated a mile or more into the forest when the
+sudden increase of blood upon the spoor told them that the bull’s wound
+was proving fatal to him.
+
+“Run now,” said Hadden cheerfully.
+
+“Nay, _hamba gachle_—go softly—” answered Nahoon, “the devil is dying,
+but he will try to play us another trick before he dies.” And he went
+on peering ahead of him cautiously.
+
+“It is all right here, anyway,” said Hadden, pointing to the spoor that
+ran straight forward printed deep in the marshy ground.
+
+Nahoon did not answer, but stared steadily at the trunks of two trees a
+few paces in front of them and to their right. “Look,” he whispered.
+
+Hadden did so, and at length made out the outline of something brown
+that was crouched behind the trees.
+
+“He is dead,” he exclaimed.
+
+“No,” answered Nahoon, “he has come back on his own path and is waiting
+for us. He knows that we are following his spoor. Now if you stand
+there, I think that you can shoot him through the back between the tree
+trunks.”
+
+Hadden knelt down, and aiming very carefully at a point just below the
+bull’s spine, he fired. There was an awful bellow, and the next instant
+the brute was up and at them. Nahoon flung his broad spear, which sank
+deep into its chest, then they fled this way and that. The buffalo
+stood still for a moment, its fore legs straddled wide and its head
+down, looking first after the one and then the other, till of a sudden
+it uttered a low moaning sound and rolled over dead, smashing Nahoon’s
+assegai to fragments as it fell.
+
+“There! he’s finished,” said Hadden, “and I believe it was your assegai
+that killed him. Hullo! what’s that noise?”
+
+Nahoon listened. In several quarters of the forest, but from how far
+away it was impossible to tell, there rose a curious sound, as of
+people calling to each other in fear but in no articulate language.
+Nahoon shivered.
+
+“It is the _Esemkofu_,” he said, “the ghosts who have no tongue, and
+who can only wail like infants. Let us be going; this place is bad for
+mortals.”
+
+“And worse for buffaloes,” said Hadden, giving the dead bull a kick,
+“but I suppose that we must leave him here for your friends, the
+_Esemkofu_, as we have got meat enough, and can’t carry his head.”
+
+So they started back towards the open country. As they threaded their
+way slowly through the tree trunks, a new idea came into Hadden’s head.
+Once out of this forest, he was within an hour’s run of the Zulu
+border, and once over the Zulu border, he would feel a happier man than
+he did at that moment. As has been said, he had intended to attempt to
+escape in the darkness, but the plan was risky. All the Zulus might not
+over-eat themselves and go to sleep, especially after the death of
+their comrade; Nahoon, who watched him day and night, certainly would
+not. This was his opportunity—there remained the question of Nahoon.
+
+Well, if it came to the worst, Nahoon must die: it would be easy—he had
+a loaded rifle, and now that his assegai was gone, Nahoon had only a
+kerry. He did not wish to kill the man, though it was clear to him,
+seeing that his own safety was at stake, that he would be amply
+justified in so doing. Why should he not put it to him—and then be
+guided by circumstances?
+
+Nahoon was walking across a little open space about ten paces ahead of
+him where Hadden could see him very well, whilst he himself was under
+the shadow of a large tree with low horizontal branches running out
+from the trunk.
+
+“Nahoon,” he said.
+
+The Zulu turned round, and took a step towards him.
+
+“No, do not move, I pray. Stand where you are, or I shall be obliged to
+shoot you. Listen now: do not be afraid for I shall not fire without
+warning. I am your prisoner, and you are charged to take me back to the
+king to be his servant. But I believe that a war is going to break out
+between your people and mine; and this being so, you will understand
+that I do not wish to go to Cetywayo’s kraal, because I should either
+come to a violent death there, or my own brothers will believe that I
+am a traitor and treat me accordingly. The Zulu border is not much more
+than an hour’s journey away—let us say an hour and a half’s: I mean to
+be across it before the moon is up. Now, Nahoon, will you lose me in
+the forest and give me this hour and a half’s start—or will you stop
+here with that ghost people of whom you talk? Do you understand? No,
+please do not move.”
+
+“I understand you,” answered the Zulu, in a perfectly composed voice,
+“and I think that was a good name which we gave you this morning,
+though, Black Heart, there is some justice in your words and more
+wisdom. Your opportunity is good, and one which a man named as you are
+should not let fall.”
+
+“I am glad to find that you take this view of the matter, Nahoon. And
+now will you be so kind as to lose me, and to promise not to look for
+me till the moon is up?”
+
+“What do you mean, Black Heart?”
+
+“What I say. Come, I have no time to spare.”
+
+“You are a strange man,” said the Zulu reflectively. “You heard the
+king’s order to me: would you have me disobey the order of the king?”
+
+“Certainly, I would. You have no reason to love Cetywayo, and it does
+not matter to you whether or no I return to his kraal to mend guns
+there. If you think that he will be angry because I am missing, you had
+better cross the border also; we can go together.”
+
+“And leave my father and all my brethren to his vengeance? Black Heart,
+you do not understand. How can you, being so named? I am a soldier, and
+the king’s word is the king’s word. I hoped to have died fighting, but
+I am the bird in your noose. Come, shoot, or you will not reach the
+border before moonrise,” and he opened his arms and smiled.
+
+“If it must be, so let it be. Farewell, Nahoon, at least you are a
+brave man, but every one of us must cherish his own life,” answered
+Hadden calmly.
+
+Then with much deliberation he raised his rifle and covered the Zulu’s
+breast.
+
+Already—whilst his victim stood there still smiling, although a
+twitching of his lips betrayed the natural terrors that no bravery can
+banish—already his finger was contracting on the trigger, when of a
+sudden, as instantly as though he had been struck by lightning, Hadden
+went down backwards, and behold! there stood upon him a great spotted
+beast that waved its long tail to and fro and glared down into his
+eyes.
+
+It was a leopard—a tiger as they call it in Africa—which, crouched upon
+a bough of the tree above, had been unable to resist the temptation of
+satisfying its savage appetite on the man below. For a second or two
+there was silence, broken only by the purring, or rather the snoring
+sound made by the leopard. In those seconds, strangely enough, there
+sprang up before Hadden’s mental vision a picture of the _inyanga_
+called _Inyosi_ or the Bee, her death-like head resting against the
+thatch of the hut, and her death-like lips muttering “think of my word
+when the great cat purrs above your face.”
+
+Then the brute put out its strength. The claws of one paw it drove deep
+into the muscles of his left thigh, while with another it scratched at
+his breast, tearing the clothes from it and furrowing the flesh
+beneath. The sight of the white skin seemed to madden it, and in its
+fierce desire for blood it drooped its square muzzle and buried its
+fangs in its victim’s shoulder. Next moment there was a sound of
+running feet and of a club falling heavily. Up reared the leopard with
+an angry snarl, up till it stood as high as the attacking Zulu. At him
+it came, striking out savagely and tearing the black man as it had torn
+the white. Again the kerry fell full on its jaws, and down it went
+backwards. Before it could rise again, or rather as it was in the act
+of rising, the heavy knob-stick struck it once more, and with fearful
+force, this time as it chanced, full on the nape of the neck, and
+paralysing the brute. It writhed and bit and twisted, throwing up the
+earth and leaves, while blow after blow was rained upon it, till at
+length with a convulsive struggle and a stifled roar it lay still—the
+brains oozing from its shattered skull.
+
+Hadden sat up, the blood running from his wounds.
+
+“You have saved my life, Nahoon,” he said faintly, “and I thank you.”
+
+“Do not thank me, Black Heart,” answered the Zulu, “it was the king’s
+word that I should keep you safely. Still this tiger has been hardly
+dealt with, for certainly _he_ has saved _my_ life,” and lifting the
+Martini he unloaded the rifle.
+
+At this juncture Hadden swooned away.
+
+
+Twenty-four hours had gone by when, after what seemed to him to be but
+a little time of troubled and dreamful sleep, through which he could
+hear voices without understanding what they said, and feel himself
+borne he knew not whither, Hadden awoke to find himself lying upon a
+kaross in a large and beautifully clean Kaffir hut with a bundle of
+furs for a pillow. There was a bowl of milk at his side and tortured as
+he was by thirst, he tried to stretch out his arm to lift it to his
+lips, only to find to his astonishment that his hand fell back to his
+side like that of a dead man. Looking round the hut impatiently, he
+found that there was nobody in it to assist him, so he did the only
+thing which remained for him to do—he lay still. He did not fall
+asleep, but his eyes closed, and a kind of gentle torpor crept over
+him, half obscuring his recovered senses. Presently he heard a soft
+voice speaking; it seemed far away, but he could clearly distinguish
+the words.
+
+“Black Heart still sleeps,” the voice said, “but there is colour in his
+face; I think that he will wake soon, and find his thoughts again.”
+
+“Have no fear, Nanea, he will surely wake, his hurts are not
+dangerous,” answered another voice, that of Nahoon. “He fell heavily
+with the weight of the tiger on top of him, and that is why his senses
+have been shaken for so long. He went near to death, but certainly he
+will not die.”
+
+“It would have been a pity if he had died,” answered the soft voice,
+“he is so beautiful; never have I seen a white man who was so
+beautiful.”
+
+“I did not think him beautiful when he stood with his rifle pointed at
+my heart,” answered Nahoon sulkily.
+
+“Well, there is this to be said,” she replied, “he wished to escape
+from Cetywayo, and that is not to be wondered at,” and she sighed.
+“Moreover he asked you to come with him, and it might have been well if
+you had done so, that is, if you would have taken me with you!”
+
+“How could I have done it, girl?” he asked angrily. “Would you have me
+set at nothing the order of the king?”
+
+“The king!” she replied raising her voice. “What do you owe to this
+king? You have served him faithfully, and your reward is that within a
+few days he will take me from you—me, who should have been your wife,
+and I must—I must——” And she began to weep softly, adding between her
+sobs, “if you loved me truly, you would think more of me and of
+yourself, and less of the Black One and his orders. Oh! let us fly,
+Nahoon, let us fly to Natal before this spear pierces me.”
+
+“Weep not, Nanea,” he said; “why do you tear my heart in two between my
+duty and my love? You know that I am a soldier, and that I must walk
+the path whereon the king has set my feet. Soon I think I shall be
+dead, for I seek death, and then it will matter nothing.”
+
+“Nothing to you, Nahoon, who are at peace, but to me? Yet, you are
+right, and I know it, therefore forgive me, who am no warrior, but a
+woman who must also obey—the will of the king.” And she cast her arms
+about his neck, sobbing her fill upon his breast.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+NANEA
+
+
+Presently, muttering something that the listener could not catch,
+Nahoon left Nanea, and crept out of the hut by its bee-hole entrance.
+Then Hadden opened his eyes and looked round him. The sun was sinking
+and a ray of its red light streaming through the little opening filled
+the place with a soft and crimson glow. In the centre of the
+hut—supporting it—stood a thorn-wood roof-tree coloured black by the
+smoke of the fire; and against this, the rich light falling full upon
+her, leaned the girl Nanea—a very picture of gentle despair.
+
+As is occasionally the case among Zulu women, she was beautiful—so
+beautiful that the sight of her went straight to the white man’s heart,
+for a moment causing the breath to catch in his throat. Her dress was
+very simple. On her shoulders, hanging open in front, lay a mantle of
+soft white stuff edged with blue beads, about her middle was a
+buck-skin moocha, also embroidered with blue beads, while round her
+forehead and left knee were strips of grey fur, and on her right wrist
+a shining bangle of copper. Her naked bronze-hued figure was tall and
+perfect in its proportions; while her face had little in common with
+that of the ordinary native girl, showing as it did strong traces of
+the ancestral Arabian or Semitic blood. It was oval in shape, with
+delicate aquiline features, arched eyebrows, a full mouth, that drooped
+a little at the corners, tiny ears, behind which the wavy coal-black
+hair hung down to the shoulders, and the very loveliest pair of dark
+and liquid eyes that it is possible to imagine.
+
+For a minute or more Nanea stood thus, her sweet face bathed in the
+sunbeam, while Hadden feasted his eyes upon its beauty. Then sighing
+heavily, she turned, and seeing that he was awake, started, drew her
+mantle over her breast and came, or rather glided, towards him.
+
+“The chief is awake,” she said in her soft Zulu accents. “Does he need
+aught?”
+
+“Yes, Lady,” he answered; “I need to drink, but alas! I am too weak.”
+
+She knelt down beside him, and supporting him with her left arm, with
+her right held the gourd to his lips.
+
+How it came about Hadden never knew, but before that draught was
+finished a change passed over him. Whether it was the savage girl’s
+touch, or her strange and fawn-like loveliness, or the tender pity in
+her eyes, matters not—the issue was the same. She struck some cord in
+his turbulent uncurbed nature, and of a sudden it was filled full with
+passion for her—a passion which if, not elevated, at least was real. He
+did not for a moment mistake the significance of the flood of feeling
+that surged through his veins. Hadden never shirked facts.
+
+“By Heaven!” he said to himself, “I have fallen in love with a black
+beauty at first sight—more in love than I have ever been before. It’s
+awkward, but there will be compensations. So much the worse for Nahoon,
+or for Cetywayo, or for both of them. After all, I can always get rid
+of her if she becomes a nuisance.”
+
+Then, in a fit of renewed weakness, brought about by the turmoil of his
+blood, he lay back upon the pillow of furs, watching Nanea’s face while
+with a native salve of pounded leaves she busied herself dressing the
+wounds that the leopard had made.
+
+It almost seemed as though something of what was passing in his mind
+communicated itself to that of the girl. At least, her hand shook a
+little at her task, and getting done with it as quickly as she could,
+she rose from her knees with a courteous “It is finished, _Inkoos_,”
+and once more took up her position by the roof-tree.
+
+“I thank you, Lady,” he said; “your hand is kind.”
+
+“You must not call me lady, _Inkoos_,” she answered, “I am no
+chieftainess, but only the daughter of a headman, Umgona.”
+
+“And named Nanea,” he said. “Nay, do not be surprised, I have heard of
+you. Well, Nanea, perhaps you will soon become a chieftainess—up at the
+king’s kraal yonder.”
+
+“Alas! and alas!” she said, covering her face with her hands.
+
+“Do not grieve, Nanea, a hedge is never so tall and thick but that it
+cannot be climbed or crept through.”
+
+She let fall her hands and looked at him eagerly, but he did not pursue
+the subject.
+
+“Tell me, how did I come here, Nanea?”
+
+“Nahoon and his companions carried you, _Inkoos_.”
+
+“Indeed, I begin to be thankful to the leopard that struck me down.
+Well, Nahoon is a brave man, and he has done me a great service. I
+trust that I may be able to repay it—to you, Nanea.”
+
+
+This was the first meeting of Nanea and Hadden; but, although she did
+not seek them, the necessities of his sickness and of the situation
+brought about many another. Never for a moment did the white man waver
+in his determination to get into his keeping the native girl who had
+captivated him, and to attain his end he brought to bear all his powers
+and charm to detach her from Nahoon, and win her affections for
+himself. He was no rough wooer, however, but proceeded warily, weaving
+her about with a web of flattery and attention that must, he thought,
+produce the desired effect upon her mind. Without a doubt, indeed, it
+would have done so—for she was but a woman, and an untutored one—had it
+not been for a simple fact which dominated her whole nature. She loved
+Nahoon, and there was no room in her heart for any other man, white or
+black. To Hadden she was courteous and kindly but no more, nor did she
+appear to notice any of the subtle advances by which he attempted to
+win a foothold in her heart. For a while this puzzled him, but he
+remembered that the Zulu women do not usually permit themselves to show
+feeling towards an undeclared suitor. Therefore it became necessary
+that he should speak out.
+
+His mind once made up, he had not to wait long for an opportunity. He
+was now quite recovered from his hurts, and accustomed to walk in the
+neighbourhood of the kraal. About two hundred yards from Umgona’s huts
+rose a spring, and thither it was Nanea’s habit to resort in the
+evening to bring back drinking-water for the use of her father’s
+household. The path between this spring and the kraal ran through a
+patch of bush, where on a certain afternoon towards sundown Hadden took
+his seat under a tree, having first seen Nanea go down to the little
+stream as was her custom. A quarter of an hour later she reappeared
+carrying a large gourd upon her head. She wore no garment now except
+her moocha, for she had but one mantle and was afraid lest the water
+should splash it. He watched her advancing along the path, her hands
+resting on her hips, her splendid naked figure outlined against the
+westering sun, and wondered what excuse he could make to talk with her.
+As it chanced fortune favoured him, for when she was near him a snake
+glided across the path in front of the girl’s feet, causing her to
+spring backwards in alarm and overset the gourd of water. He came
+forward, and picked it up.
+
+“Wait here,” he said laughing; “I will bring it to you full.”
+
+“Nay, _Inkoos_,” she remonstrated, “that is a woman’s work.”
+
+“Among my people,” he said, “the men love to work for the women,” and
+he started for the spring, leaving her wondering.
+
+Before he reached her again, he regretted his gallantry, for it was
+necessary to carry the handleless gourd upon his shoulder, and the
+contents of it spilling over the edge soaked him. Of this, however, he
+said nothing to Nanea.
+
+“There is your water, Nanea, shall I carry it for you to the kraal?”
+
+“Nay, _Inkoos_, I thank you, but give it to me, you are weary with its
+weight.”
+
+“Stay awhile, and I will accompany you. Ah! Nanea, I am still weak, and
+had it not been for you I think that I should be dead.”
+
+“It was Nahoon who saved you—not I, _Inkoos_.”
+
+“Nahoon saved my body, but you, Nanea, you alone can save my heart.”
+
+“You talk darkly, _Inkoos_.”
+
+“Then I must make my meaning clear, Nanea. I love you.”
+
+She opened her brown eyes wide.
+
+“You, a white lord, love me, a Zulu girl? How can that be?”
+
+“I do not know, Nanea, but it is so, and were you not blind you would
+have seen it. I love you, and I wish to take you to wife.”
+
+“Nay, _Inkoos_, it is impossible. I am already betrothed.”
+
+“Ay,” he answered, “betrothed to the king.”
+
+“No, betrothed to Nahoon.”
+
+“But it is the king who will take you within a week; is it not so? And
+would you not rather that I should take you than the king?”
+
+“It seems to be so, _Inkoos_, and I would rather go with you than with
+the king, but most of all I desire to marry Nahoon. It may be that I
+shall not be able to marry him, but if that is so, at least I will
+never become one of the king’s women.”
+
+“How will you prevent it, Nanea?”
+
+“There are waters in which a maid may drown, and trees upon which she
+can hang,” she answered with a quick setting of the mouth.
+
+“That were a pity, Nanea, you are too fair to die.”
+
+“Fair or foul, yet I die, _Inkoos_.”
+
+“No, no, come with me—I will find a way—and be my wife,” and he put his
+arm about her waist, and strove to draw her to him.
+
+Without any violence of movement, and with the most perfect dignity,
+the girl disengaged herself from his embrace.
+
+“You have honoured me, and I thank you, _Inkoos_,” she said quietly,
+“but you do not understand. I am the wife of Nahoon—I belong to Nahoon;
+therefore, I cannot look on any other man while Nahoon lives. It is not
+our custom, _Inkoos_, for we are not as the white women, but ignorant
+and simple, and when we vow ourselves to a man, we abide by that vow
+till death.”
+
+“Indeed,” said Hadden; “and so now you go to tell Nahoon that I have
+offered to make you my wife.”
+
+“No, _Inkoos_, why should I tell Nahoon your secrets? I have said ‘nay’
+to you, not ‘yea,’ therefore he has no right to know,” and she stooped
+to lift the gourd of water.
+
+Hadden considered the situation rapidly, for his repulse only made him
+the more determined to succeed. Of a sudden under the emergency he
+conceived a scheme, or rather its rough outline. It was not a nice
+scheme, and some men might have shrunk from it, but as he had no
+intention of suffering himself to be defeated by a Zulu girl, he
+decided—with regret, it is true—that having failed to attain his ends
+by means which he considered fair, he must resort to others of more
+doubtful character.
+
+“Nanea,” he said, “you are a good and honest woman, and I respect you.
+As I have told you, I love you also, but if you refuse to listen to me
+there is nothing more to be said, and after all, perhaps it would be
+better that you should marry one of your own people. But, Nanea, you
+will never marry him, for the king will take you; and, if he does not
+give you to some other man, either you will become one of his
+‘sisters,’ or to be free of him, as you say, you will die. Now hear me,
+for it is because I love you and wish your welfare that I speak thus.
+Why do you not escape into Natal, taking Nahoon with you, for there as
+you know you may live in peace out of reach of the arm of Cetywayo?”
+
+“That is my desire, _Inkoos_, but Nahoon will not consent. He says that
+there is to be war between us and you white men, and he will not break
+the command of the king and desert from his army.”
+
+“Then he cannot love you much, Nanea, and at least you have to think of
+yourself. Whisper into the ear of your father and fly together, for be
+sure that Nahoon will soon follow you. Ay! and I myself with fly with
+you, for I too believe that there must be war, and then a white man in
+this country will be as a lamb among the eagles.”
+
+“If Nahoon will come, I will go, _Inkoos_, but I cannot fly without
+Nahoon; it is better I should stay here and kill myself.”
+
+“Surely then being so fair and loving him so well, you can teach him to
+forget his folly and to escape with you. In four days’ time we must
+start for the king’s kraal, and if you win over Nahoon, it will be easy
+for us to turn our faces southwards and across the river that lies
+between the land of the Amazulu and Natal. For the sake of all of us,
+but most of all for your own sake, try to do this, Nanea, whom I have
+loved and whom I now would save. See him and plead with him as you know
+how, but as yet do not tell him that I dream of flight, for then I
+should be watched.”
+
+“In truth, I will, _Inkoos_,” she answered earnestly, “and oh! I thank
+you for your goodness. Fear not that I will betray you—first would I
+die. Farewell.”
+
+“Farewell, Nanea,” and taking her hand he raised it to his lips.
+
+
+Late that night, just as Hadden was beginning to prepare himself for
+sleep, he heard a gentle tapping at the board which closed the entrance
+to his hut.
+
+“Enter,” he said, unfastening the door, and presently by the light of
+the little lantern that he had with him, he saw Nanea creep into the
+hut, followed by the great form of Nahoon.
+
+“_Inkoos_,” she said in a whisper when the door was closed again, “I
+have pleaded with Nahoon, and he has consented to fly; moreover, my
+father will come also.”
+
+“Is it so, Nahoon?” asked Hadden.
+
+“It is so,” answered the Zulu, looking down shamefacedly; “to save this
+girl from the king, and because the love of her eats out my heart, I
+have bartered away my honour. But I tell you, Nanea, and you, White
+Man, as I told Umgona just now, that I think no good will come of this
+flight, and if we are caught or betrayed, we shall be killed every one
+of us.”
+
+“Caught we can scarcely be,” broke in Nanea anxiously, “for who could
+betray us, except the _Inkoos_ here——”
+
+“Which he is not likely to do,” said Hadden quietly, “seeing that he
+desires to escape with you, and that his life is also at stake.”
+
+“That is so, Black Heart,” said Nahoon, “otherwise I tell you that I
+should not have trusted you.”
+
+Hadden took no notice of this outspoken saying, but until very late
+that night they sat there together making their plans.
+
+
+On the following morning Hadden was awakened by sounds of violent
+altercation. Going out of his hut he found that the disputants were
+Umgona and a fat and evil-looking Kaffir chief who had arrived at the
+kraal on a pony. This chief, he soon discovered, was named Maputa,
+being none other than the man who had sought Nanea in marriage and
+brought about Nahoon’s and Umgona’s unfortunate appeal to the king. At
+present he was engaged in abusing Umgona furiously, charging him with
+having stolen certain of his oxen and bewitched his cows so that they
+would not give milk. The alleged theft it was comparatively easy to
+disprove, but the wizardry remained a matter of argument.
+
+“You are a dog, and a son of a dog,” shouted Maputa, shaking his fat
+fist in the face of the trembling but indignant Umgona. “You promised
+me your daughter in marriage, then having vowed her to that
+_umfagozan_—that low lout of a soldier, Nahoon, the son of Zomba—you
+went, the two of you, and poisoned the king’s ear against me, bringing
+me into trouble with the king, and now you have bewitched my cattle.
+Well, wait, I will be even with you, Wizard; wait till you wake up in
+the cold morning to find your fence red with fire, and the slayers
+standing outside your gates to eat up you and yours with spears——”
+
+At this juncture Nahoon, who till now had been listening in silence,
+intervened with effect.
+
+“Good,” he said, “we will wait, but not in your company, Chief Maputa.
+_Hamba!_ (go)——” and seizing the fat old ruffian by the scruff of his
+neck, he flung him backwards with such violence that he rolled over and
+over down the little slope.
+
+Hadden laughed, and passed on towards the stream where he proposed to
+bathe. Just as he reached it, he caught sight of Maputa riding along
+the footpath, his head-ring covered with mud, his lips purple and his
+black face livid with rage.
+
+“There goes an angry man,” he said to himself. “Now, how would it be——”
+and he looked upwards like one seeking an inspiration. It seemed to
+come; perhaps the devil finding it open whispered in his ear, at any
+rate—in a few seconds his plan was formed, and he was walking through
+the bush to meet Maputa.
+
+“Go in peace, Chief,” he said; “they seem to have treated you roughly
+up yonder. Having no power to interfere, I came away for I could not
+bear the sight. It is indeed shameful that an old and venerable man of
+rank should be struck into the dirt, and beaten by a soldier drunk with
+beer.”
+
+“Shameful, White Man!” gasped Maputa; “your words are true indeed. But
+wait a while. I, Maputa, will roll that stone over, I will throw that
+bull upon its back. When next the harvest ripens, this I promise, that
+neither Nahoon nor Umgona, nor any of his kraal shall be left to gather
+it.”
+
+“And how will you manage that, Maputa?”
+
+“I do not know, but I will find a way. Oh! I tell you, a way shall be
+found.”
+
+Hadden patted the pony’s neck meditatively, then leaning forward, he
+looked the chief in the eyes and said:—
+
+“What will you give me, Maputa, if I show you that way, a sure and
+certain one, whereby you may be avenged to the death upon Nahoon, whose
+violence I also have seen, and upon Umgona, whose witchcraft brought
+sore sickness upon me?”
+
+“What reward do you seek, White Man?” asked Maputa eagerly.
+
+“A little thing, Chief, a thing of no account, only the girl Nanea, to
+whom as it chances I have taken a fancy.”
+
+“I wanted her for myself, White Man, but he who sits at Ulundi has laid
+his hand upon her.”
+
+“That is nothing, Chief; I can arrange with him who ‘sits at Ulundi.’
+It is with you who are great here that I wish to come to terms. Listen:
+if you grant my desire, not only will I fulfil yours upon your foes,
+but when the girl is delivered into my hands I will give you this rifle
+and a hundred rounds of cartridges.”
+
+Maputa looked at the sporting Martini, and his eyes glistened.
+
+“It is good,” he said; “it is very good. Often have I wished for such a
+gun that will enable me to shoot game, and to talk with my enemies from
+far away. Promise it to me, White Man, and you shall take the girl if I
+can give her to you.”
+
+“You swear it, Maputa?”
+
+“I swear it by the head of Chaka, and the spirits of my fathers.”
+
+“Good. At dawn on the fourth day from now it is the purpose of Umgona,
+his daughter Nanea, and Nahoon, to cross the river into Natal by the
+drift that is called Crocodile Drift, taking their cattle with them and
+flying from the king. I also shall be of their company, for they know
+that I have learned their secret, and would murder me if I tried to
+leave them. Now you who are chief of the border and guardian of that
+drift, must hide at night with some men among the rocks in the shallows
+of the drift and await our coming. First Nanea will cross driving the
+cows and calves, for so it is arranged, and I shall help her; then will
+follow Umgona and Nahoon with the oxen and heifers. On these two you
+must fall, killing them and capturing the cattle, and afterwards I will
+give you the rifle.”
+
+“What if the king should ask for the girl, White Man?”
+
+“Then you shall answer that in the uncertain light you did not
+recognise her and so she slipped away from you; moreover, that at first
+you feared to seize the girl lest her cries should alarm the men and
+they should escape you.”
+
+“Good, but how can I be sure that you will give me the gun once you are
+across the river?”
+
+“Thus: before I enter the ford I will lay the rifle and cartridges upon
+a stone by the bank, telling Nanea that I shall return to fetch them
+when I have driven over the cattle.”
+
+“It is well, White Man; I will not fail you.”
+
+So the plot was made, and after some further conversation upon points
+of detail, the two conspirators shook hands and parted.
+
+“That ought to come off all right,” reflected Hadden to himself as he
+plunged and floated in the waters of the stream, “but somehow I don’t
+quite trust our friend Maputa. It would have been better if I could
+have relied upon myself to get rid of Nahoon and his respected uncle—a
+couple of shots would do it in the water. But then that would be murder
+and murder is unpleasant; whereas the other thing is only the delivery
+to justice of two base deserters, a laudable action in a military
+country. Also personal interference upon my part might turn the girl
+against me; while after Umgona and Nahoon have been wiped out by
+Maputa, she _must_ accept my escort. Of course there is a risk, but in
+every walk of life the most cautious have to take risks at times.”
+
+As it chanced, Philip Hadden was correct in his suspicions of his
+coadjutor, Maputa. Even before that worthy chief reached his own kraal,
+he had come to the conclusion that the white man’s plan, though
+attractive in some ways, was too dangerous, since it was certain that
+if the girl Nanea escaped, the king would be indignant. Moreover, the
+men he took with him to do the killing in the drift would suspect
+something and talk. On the other hand he would earn much credit with
+his majesty by revealing the plot, saying that he had learned it from
+the lips of the white hunter, whom Umgona and Nahoon had forced to
+participate in it, and of whose coveted rifle he must trust to chance
+to possess himself.
+
+
+An hour later two discreet messengers were bounding across the plains,
+bearing words from the Chief Maputa, the Warden of the Border, to the
+“great Black Elephant” at Ulundi.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+THE DOOM POOL
+
+
+Fortune showed itself strangely favourable to the plans of Nahoon and
+Nanea. One of the Zulu captain’s perplexities was as to how he should
+lull the suspicions and evade the vigilance of his own companions, who
+together with himself had been detailed by the king to assist Hadden in
+his hunting and to guard against his escape. As it chanced, however, on
+the day after the incident of the visit of Maputa, a messenger arrived
+from no less a person than the great military Induna, Tvingwayo ka
+Marolo, who afterwards commanded the Zulu army at Isandhlwana, ordering
+these men to return to their regiment, the Umcityu Corps, which was to
+be placed upon full war footing. Accordingly Nahoon sent them, saying
+that he himself would follow with Black Heart in the course of a few
+days, as at present the white man was not sufficiently recovered from
+his hurts to allow of his travelling fast and far. So the soldiers
+went, doubting nothing.
+
+Then Umgona gave it out that in obedience to the command of the king he
+was about to start for Ulundi, taking with him his daughter Nanea to be
+delivered over into the _Sigodhla_, and also those fifteen head of
+cattle that had been _lobola’d_ by Nahoon in consideration of his
+forthcoming marriage, whereof he had been fined by Cetywayo. Under
+pretence that they required a change of veldt, the rest of his cattle
+he sent away in charge of a Basuto herd who knew nothing of their
+plans, telling him to keep them by the Crocodile Drift, as there the
+grass was good and sweet.
+
+All preparations being completed, on the third day the party started,
+heading straight for Ulundi. After they had travelled some miles,
+however, they left the road and turning sharp to the right, passed
+unobserved of any through a great stretch of uninhabited bush. Their
+path now lay not far from the Pool of Doom, which, indeed, was close to
+Umgona’s kraal, and the forest that was called Home of the Dead, but
+out of sight of these. It was their plan to travel by night, reaching
+the broken country near the Crocodile Drift on the following morning.
+Here they proposed to lie hid that day and through the night; then,
+having first collected the cattle which had preceded them, to cross the
+river at the break of dawn and escape into Natal. At least this was the
+plan of his companions; but, as we know, Hadden had another programme,
+whereon after one last appearance two of the party would play no part.
+
+During that long afternoon’s journey Umgona, who knew every inch of the
+country, walked ahead driving the fifteen cattle and carrying in his
+hand a long travelling stick of black and white _umzimbeet_ wood, for
+in truth the old man was in a hurry to reach his journey’s end. Next
+came Nahoon, armed with a broad assegai, but naked except for his
+moocha and necklet of baboon’s teeth, and with him Nanea in her white
+bead-bordered mantle. Hadden, who brought up the rear, noticed that the
+girl seemed to be under the spell of an imminent apprehension, for from
+time to time she clasped her lover’s arm, and looking up into his face,
+addressed him with vehemence, almost with passion.
+
+Curiously enough, the sight touched Hadden, and once or twice he was
+shaken by so sharp a pang of remorse at the thought of his share in
+this tragedy, that he cast about in his mind seeking a means to unravel
+the web of death which he himself had woven. But ever that evil voice
+was whispering at his ear. It reminded him that he, the white _Inkoos_,
+had been refused by this dusky beauty, and that if he found a way to
+save him, within some few hours she would be the wife of the savage
+gentleman at her side, the man who had named him Black Heart and who
+despised him, the man whom he had meant to murder and who immediately
+repaid his treachery by rescuing him from the jaws of the leopard at
+the risk of his own life. Moreover, it was a law of Hadden’s existence
+never to deny himself of anything that he desired if it lay within his
+power to take it—a law which had led him always deeper into sin. In
+other respects, indeed, it had not carried him far, for in the past he
+had not desired much, and he had won little; but this particular flower
+was to his hand, and he would pluck it. If Nahoon stood between him and
+the flower, so much the worse for Nahoon, and if it should wither in
+his grasp, so much the worse for the flower; it could always be thrown
+away. Thus it came about that, not for the first time in his life,
+Philip Hadden discarded the somewhat spasmodic prickings of conscience
+and listened to that evil whispering at his ear.
+
+About half-past five o’clock in the afternoon the four refugees passed
+the stream that a mile or so down fell over the little precipice into
+the Doom Pool; and, entering a patch of thorn trees on the further
+side, walked straight into the midst of two-and-twenty soldiers, who
+were beguiling the tedium of expectancy by the taking of snuff and the
+smoking of _dakka_ or native hemp. With these soldiers, seated on his
+pony, for he was too fat to walk, waited the Chief Maputa.
+
+Observing that their expected guests had arrived, the men knocked out
+the _dakka_ pipe, replaced the snuff boxes in the slits made in the
+lobes of their ears, and secured the four of them.
+
+“What is the meaning of this, O King’s soldiers?” asked Umgona in a
+quavering voice. “We journey to the kraal of U’Cetywayo; why do you
+molest us?”
+
+“Indeed. Wherefore then are your faces set towards the south? Does the
+Black One live in the south? Well, you will journey to another kraal
+presently,” answered the jovial-looking captain of the party with a
+callous laugh.
+
+“I do not understand,” stammered Umgona.
+
+“Then I will explain while you rest,” said the captain. “The Chief
+Maputa yonder sent word to the Black One at Ulundi that he had learned
+of your intended flight to Natal from the lips of this white man, who
+had warned him of it. The Black One was angry, and despatched us to
+catch you and make an end of you. That is all. Come on now, quietly,
+and let us finish the matter. As the Doom Pool is near, your deaths
+will be easy.”
+
+Nahoon heard the words, and sprang straight at the throat of Hadden;
+but he did not reach it, for the soldiers pulled him down. Nanea heard
+them also, and turning, looked the traitor in the eyes; she said
+nothing, she only looked, but he could never forget that look. The
+white man for his part was filled with a fiery indignation against
+Maputa.
+
+“You wicked villain,” he gasped, whereat the chief smiled in a sickly
+fashion, and turned away.
+
+Then they were marched along the banks of the stream till they reached
+the waterfall that fell into the Pool of Doom.
+
+Hadden was a brave man after his fashion, but his heart quailed as he
+gazed into that abyss.
+
+“Are you going to throw me in there?” he asked of the Zulu captain in a
+thick voice.
+
+“You, White Man?” replied the soldier unconcernedly. “No, our orders
+are to take you to the king, but what he will do with you I do not
+know. There is to be war between your people and ours, so perhaps he
+means to pound you into medicine for the use of the witch-doctors, or
+to peg you over an ant-heap as a warning to other white men.”
+
+Hadden received this information in silence, but its effect upon his
+brain was bracing, for instantly he began to search out some means of
+escape.
+
+By now the party had halted near the two thorn trees that hung over the
+waters of the pool.
+
+“Who dives first,” asked the captain of the Chief Maputa.
+
+“The old wizard,” he replied, nodding at Umgona; “then his daughter
+after him, and last of all this fellow,” and he struck Nahoon in the
+face with his open hand.
+
+“Come on, Wizard,” said the captain, grasping Umgona by the arm, “and
+let us see how you can swim.”
+
+At the words of doom Umgona seemed to recover his self-command, after
+the fashion of his race.
+
+“No need to lead me, soldier,” he said, shaking himself loose, “who am
+old and ready to die.” Then he kissed his daughter at his side, wrung
+Nahoon by the hand, and turning from Hadden with a gesture of contempt
+walked out upon the platform that joined the two thorn trunks. Here he
+stood for a moment looking at the setting sun, then suddenly, and
+without a sound, he hurled himself into the abyss below and vanished.
+
+“That was a brave one,” said the captain with admiration. “Can you
+spring too, girl, or must we throw you?”
+
+“I can walk my father’s path,” Nanea answered faintly, “but first I
+crave leave to say one word. It is true that we were escaping from the
+king, and therefore by the law we must die; but it was Black Heart here
+who made the plot, and he who has betrayed us. Would you know why he
+has betrayed us? Because he sought my favour, and I refused him, and
+this is the vengeance that he takes—a white man’s vengeance.”
+
+“_Wow!_” broke in the chief Maputa, “this pretty one speaks truth, for
+the white man would have made a bargain with me under which Umgona, the
+wizard, and Nahoon, the soldier, were to be killed at the Crocodile
+Drift, and he himself suffered to escape with the girl. I spoke him
+softly and said ‘yes,’ and then like a loyal man I reported to the
+king.”
+
+“You hear,” sighed Nanea. “Nahoon, fare you well, though presently
+perhaps we shall be together again. It was I who tempted you from your
+duty. For my sake you forgot your honour, and I am repaid. Farewell, my
+husband, it is better to die with you than to enter the house of the
+king’s women,” and Nanea stepped on to the platform.
+
+Here, holding to a bough of one of the thorn trees, she turned and
+addressed Hadden, saying:—
+
+“Black Heart, you seem to have won the day, but me at least you lose
+and—the sun is not yet set. After sunset comes the night, Black Heart,
+and in that night I pray that you may wander eternally, and be given to
+drink of my blood and the blood of Umgona my father, and the blood of
+Nahoon my husband, who saved your life, and whom you have murdered.
+Perchance, Black Heart, we may yet meet yonder—in the House of the
+Dead.”
+
+Then uttering a low cry Nanea clasped her hands and sprang upwards and
+outwards from the platform. The watchers bent their heads forward to
+look. They saw her rush headlong down the face of the fall to strike
+the water fifty feet below. A few seconds, and for the last time, they
+caught sight of her white garment glimmering on the surface of the
+gloomy pool. Then the shadows and mist-wreaths hid it, and she was
+gone.
+
+“Now, husband,” cried the cheerful voice of the captain, “yonder is
+your marriage bed, so be swift to follow a bride who is so ready to
+lead the way. _Wow!_ but you are good people to kill; never have I had
+to do with any who gave less trouble. You——” and he stopped, for mental
+agony had done its work, and suddenly Nahoon went mad before his eyes.
+
+With a roar like that of a lion the great man cast off those who held
+him and seizing one of them round the waist and thigh, he put out all
+his terrible strength. Lifting him as though he had been an infant, he
+hurled him over the edge of the cliff to find his death on the rocks of
+the Pool of Doom. Then crying:—
+
+“Black Heart! your turn, Black Heart the traitor!” he rushed at Hadden,
+his eyes rolling and foam flying from his lips, as he passed striking
+the chief Maputa from his horse with a backward blow of his hand. Ill
+would it have gone with the white man if Nahoon had caught him. But he
+could not come at him, for the soldiers sprang upon him and
+notwithstanding his fearful struggles they pulled him to the ground, as
+at certain festivals the Zulu regiments with their naked hands pull
+down a bull in the presence of the king.
+
+“Cast him over before he can work more mischief,” said a voice. But the
+captain cried out, “Nay, nay, he is sacred; the fire from Heaven has
+fallen on his brain, and we may not harm him, else evil would overtake
+us all. Bind him hand and foot, and bear him tenderly to where he can
+be cared for. Surely I thought that these evil-doers were giving us too
+little trouble, and thus it has proved.”
+
+So they set themselves to make fast Nahoon’s hands and wrists, using as
+much gentleness as they might, for among the Zulus a lunatic is
+accounted holy. It was no easy task, and it took time.
+
+Hadden glanced around him, and saw his opportunity. On the ground close
+beside him lay his rifle, where one of the soldiers had placed it, and
+about a dozen yards away Maputa’s pony was grazing. With a swift
+movement, he seized the Martini and five seconds later he was on the
+back of the pony, heading for the Crocodile Drift at a gallop. So
+quickly indeed did he execute this masterly retreat, that occupied as
+they all were in binding Nahoon, for half a minute or more none of the
+soldiers noticed what had happened. Then Maputa chanced to see, and
+waddled after him to the top of the rise, screaming:—
+
+“The white thief, he has stolen my horse, and the gun too, the gun that
+he promised to give me.”
+
+Hadden, who by this time was a hundred yards away, heard him clearly,
+and a rage filled his heart. This man had made an open murderer of him;
+more, he had been the means of robbing him of the girl for whose sake
+he had dipped his hands in these iniquities. He glanced over his
+shoulder; Maputa was still running, and alone. Yes, there was time; at
+any rate he would risk it.
+
+Pulling up the pony with a jerk, he leapt from its back, slipping his
+arm through the rein with an almost simultaneous movement. As it
+chanced, and as he had hoped would be the case, the animal was a
+trained shooting horse, and stood still. Hadden planted his feet firmly
+on the ground and drawing a deep breath, he cocked the rifle and
+covered the advancing chief. Now Maputa saw his purpose and with a yell
+of terror turned to fly. Hadden waited a second to get the sight fair
+on his broad back, then just as the soldiers appeared above the rise he
+pressed the trigger. He was a noted shot, and in this instance his
+skill did not fail him; for, before he heard the bullet tell, Maputa
+flung his arms wide and plunged to the ground dead.
+
+Three seconds more, and with a savage curse, Hadden had remounted the
+pony and was riding for his life towards the river, which a while later
+he crossed in safety.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+THE GHOST OF THE DEAD
+
+
+When Nanea leapt from the dizzy platform that overhung the Pool of
+Doom, a strange fortune befell her. Close in to the precipice were many
+jagged rocks, and on these the waters of the fall fell and thundered,
+bounding from them in spouts of spray into the troubled depths of the
+foss beyond. It was on these stones that the life was dashed out from
+the bodies of the wretched victims who were hurled from above. But
+Nanea, it will be remembered, had not waited to be treated thus, and as
+it chanced the strong spring with which she had leapt to death carried
+her clear of the rocks. By a very little she missed the edge of them
+and striking the deep water head first like some practised diver, she
+sank down and down till she thought that she would never rise again.
+Yet she did rise, at the end of the pool in the mouth of the rapid,
+along which she sped swiftly, carried down by the rush of the water.
+Fortunately there were no rocks here; and, since she was a skilful
+swimmer, she escaped the danger of being thrown against the banks.
+
+For a long distance she was borne thus till at length she saw that she
+was in a forest, for trees cut off the light from the water, and their
+drooping branches swept its surface. One of these Nanea caught with her
+hand, and by the help of it she dragged herself from the River of Death
+whence none had escaped before. Now she stood upon the bank gasping but
+quite unharmed; there was not a scratch on her body; even her white
+garment was still fast about her neck.
+
+But though she had suffered no hurt in her terrible voyage, so
+exhausted was Nanea that she could scarcely stand. Here the gloom was
+that of night, and shivering with cold she looked helplessly to find
+some refuge. Close to the water’s edge grew an enormous yellow-wood
+tree, and to this she staggered—thinking to climb it, and seek shelter
+in its boughs where, as she hoped, she would be safe from wild beasts.
+Again fortune befriended her, for at a distance of a few feet from the
+ground there was a great hole in the tree which, she discovered, was
+hollow. Into this hole she crept, taking her chance of its being the
+home of snakes or other evil creatures, to find that the interior was
+wide and warm. It was dry also, for at the bottom of the cavity lay a
+foot or more of rotten tinder and moss brought there by rats or birds.
+Upon this tinder she lay down, and covering herself with the moss and
+leaves soon sank into sleep or stupor.
+
+How long Nanea slept she did not know, but at length she was awakened
+by a sound as of guttural human voices talking in a language that she
+could not understand. Rising to her knees she peered out of the hole in
+the tree. It was night, but the stars shone brilliantly, and their
+light fell upon an open circle of ground close by the edge of the
+river. In this circle there burned a great fire, and at a little
+distance from the fire were gathered eight or ten horrible-looking
+beings, who appeared to be rejoicing over something that lay upon the
+ground. They were small in stature, men and women together, but no
+children, and all of them were nearly naked. Their hair was long and
+thin, growing down almost to the eyes, their jaws and teeth protruded
+and the girth of their black bodies was out of all proportion to their
+height. In their hands they held sticks with sharp stones lashed on to
+them, or rude hatchet-like knives of the same material.
+
+Now Nanea’s heart shrank within her, and she nearly fainted with fear,
+for she knew that she was in the haunted forest, and without a doubt
+these were the _Esemkofu_, the evil ghosts that dwelt therein. Yes,
+that was what they were, and yet she could not take her eyes off
+them—the sight of them held her with a horrible fascination. But if
+they were ghosts, why did they sing and dance like men? Why did they
+wave those sharp stones aloft, and quarrel and strike each other? And
+why did they make a fire as men do when they wish to cook food? More,
+what was it that they rejoiced over, that long dark thing which lay so
+quiet upon the ground? It did not look like a head of game, and it
+could scarcely be a crocodile, yet clearly it was food of some sort,
+for they were sharpening the stone knives in order to cut it up.
+
+While she wondered thus, one of the dreadful-looking little creatures
+advanced to the fire, and taking from it a burning bough, held it over
+the thing that lay upon the ground, to give light to a companion who
+was about to do something to it with the stone knife. Next instant
+Nanea drew back her head from the hole, a stifled shriek upon her lips.
+She saw what it was now—it was the body of a man. Yes, and these were
+no ghosts; they were cannibals of whom when she was little, her mother
+had told her tales to keep her from wandering away from home.
+
+But who was the man they were about to eat? It could not be one of
+themselves, for his stature was much greater. Oh! now she knew; it must
+be Nahoon, who had been killed up yonder, and whose dead body the
+waters had brought down to the haunted forest as they had brought her
+alive. Yes, it must be Nahoon, and she would be forced to see her
+husband devoured before her eyes. The thought of it overwhelmed her.
+That he should die by order of the king was natural, but that he should
+be buried thus! Yet what could she do to prevent it? Well, if it cost
+her her life, it should be prevented. At the worst they could only kill
+and eat her also, and now that Nahoon and her father were gone, being
+untroubled by any religious or spiritual hopes and fears, she was not
+greatly concerned to keep her own breath in her.
+
+Slipping through the hole in the tree, Nanea walked quietly towards the
+cannibals—not knowing in the least what she should do when she reached
+them. As she arrived in line with the fire this lack of programme came
+home to her mind forcibly, and she paused to reflect. Just then one of
+the cannibals looked up to see a tall and stately figure wrapped in a
+white garment which, as the flame-light flickered on it, seemed now to
+advance from the dense background of shadow, and now to recede into it.
+The poor savage wretch was holding a stone knife in his teeth when he
+beheld her, but it did not remain there long, for opening his great
+jaws he uttered the most terrified and piercing yell that Nanea had
+ever heard. Then the others saw her also, and presently the forest was
+ringing with shrieks of fear. For a few seconds the outcasts stood and
+gazed, then they were gone this way and that, bursting their path
+through the undergrowth like startled jackals. The _Esemkofu_ of Zulu
+tradition had been routed in their own haunted home by what they took
+to be a spirit.
+
+Poor _Esemkofu!_ they were but miserable and starving bushmen who,
+driven into that place of ill omen many years ago, had adopted this
+means, the only one open to them, to keep the life in their wretched
+bodies. Here at least they were unmolested, and as there was little
+other food to be found amid that wilderness of trees, they took what
+the river brought them. When executions were few in the Pool of Doom,
+times were hard for them indeed—for then they were driven to eat each
+other. That is why there were no children.
+
+As their inarticulate outcry died away in the distance, Nanea ran
+forward to look at the body that lay on the ground, and staggered back
+with a sigh of relief. It was not Nahoon, but she recognised the face
+for that of one of the party of executioners. How did he come here? Had
+Nahoon killed him? Had Nahoon escaped? She could not tell, and at the
+best it was improbable, but still the sight of this dead soldier lit
+her heart with a faint ray of hope, for how did he come to be dead if
+Nahoon had no hand in his death? She could not bear to leave him lying
+so near her hiding-place, however; therefore, with no small toil, she
+rolled the corpse back into the water, which carried it swiftly away.
+Then she returned to the tree, having first replenished the fire, and
+awaited the light.
+
+At last it came—so much of it as ever penetrated this darksome den—and
+Nanea, becoming aware that she was hungry, descended from the tree to
+search for food. All day long she searched, finding nothing, till
+towards sunset she remembered that on the outskirts of the forest there
+was a flat rock where it was the custom of those who had been in any
+way afflicted, or who considered themselves or their belongings to be
+bewitched, to place propitiatory offerings of food wherewith the
+_Esemkofu_ and _Amalhosi_ were supposed to satisfy their spiritual
+cravings. Urged by the pinch of starvation, to this spot Nanea
+journeyed rapidly, and found to her joy that some neighbouring kraal
+had evidently been in recent trouble, for the Rock of Offering was
+laden with cobs of corn, gourds of milk, porridge and even meat.
+Helping herself to as much as she could carry, she returned to her
+lair, where she drank of the milk and cooked meat and mealies at the
+fire. Then she crept back into the tree, and slept.
+
+For nearly two months Nanea lived thus in the forest, since she could
+not venture out of it—fearing lest she should be seized, and for a
+second time taste of the judgment of the king. In the forest at least
+she was safe, for none dared enter there, nor did the _Esemkofu_ give
+her further trouble. Once or twice she saw them, but on each occasion
+they fled from her presence—seeking some distant retreat, where they
+hid themselves or perished. Nor did food fail her, for finding that it
+was taken, the pious givers brought it in plenty to the Rock of
+Offering.
+
+But, oh! the life was dreadful, and the gloom and loneliness coupled
+with her sorrows at times drove her almost to insanity. Still she lived
+on, though often she desired to die, for if her father was dead, the
+corpse she had found was not the corpse of Nahoon, and in her heart
+there still shone that spark of hope. Yet what she hoped for she could
+not tell.
+
+
+When Philip Hadden reached civilised regions, he found that war was
+about to be declared between the Queen and Cetywayo, King of the
+Amazulu; also that in the prevailing excitement his little adventure
+with the Utrecht store-keeper had been overlooked or forgotten. He was
+the owner of two good buck-waggons with spans of salted oxen, and at
+that time vehicles were much in request to carry military stores for
+the columns which were to advance into Zululand; indeed the transport
+authorities were glad to pay £90 a month for the hire of each waggon
+and to guarantee the owners against all loss of cattle. Although he was
+not desirous of returning to Zululand, this bait proved too much for
+Hadden, who accordingly leased out his waggons to the Commissariat,
+together with his own services as conductor and interpreter.
+
+He was attached to No. 3 column of the invading force, which it may be
+remembered was under the immediate command of Lord Chelmsford, and on
+the 20th of January, 1879, he marched with it by the road that runs
+from Rorke’s Drift to the Indeni forest, and encamped that night
+beneath the shadow of the steep and desolate mountain known as
+Isandhlwana.
+
+That day also a great army of King Cetywayo’s, numbering twenty
+thousand men and more, moved down from the Upindo Hill and camped upon
+the stony plain that lies a mile and a half to the east of Isandhlwana.
+No fires were lit, and it lay there in utter silence, for the warriors
+were “sleeping on their spears.”
+
+With that _impi_ was the Umcityu regiment, three thousand five hundred
+strong. At the first break of dawn the Induna in command of the Umcityu
+looked up from beneath the shelter of the black shield with which he
+had covered his body, and through the thick mist he saw a great man
+standing before him, clothed only in a moocha, a gaunt wild-eyed man
+who held a rough club in his hand. When he was spoken to, the man made
+no answer; he only leaned upon his club looking from left to right
+along the dense array of innumerable shields.
+
+“Who is this _Silwana_ (wild creature)?” asked the Induna of his
+captains wondering.
+
+The captains stared at the wanderer, and one of them replied, “This is
+Nahoon-ka-Zomba, it is the son of Zomba who not long ago held rank in
+this regiment of the Umcityu. His betrothed, Nanea, daughter of Umgona,
+was killed together with her father by order of the Black One, and
+Nahoon went mad with grief at the sight of it, for the fire of Heaven
+entered his brain, and mad he has wandered ever since.”
+
+“What would you here, Nahoon-ka-Zomba?” asked the Induna.
+
+Then Nahoon spoke slowly. “My regiment goes down to war against the
+white men; give me a shield and a spear, O Captain of the king, that I
+may fight with my regiment, for I seek a face in the battle.”
+
+So they gave him a shield and a spear, for they dared not turn away one
+whose brain was alight with the fire of Heaven.
+
+
+When the sun was high that day, bullets began to fall among the ranks
+of the Umcityu. Then the black-shielded, black-plumed Umcityu arose,
+company by company, and after them arose the whole vast Zulu army,
+breast and horns together, and swept down in silence upon the doomed
+British camp, a moving sheen of spears. The bullets pattered on the
+shields, the shells tore long lines through their array, but they never
+halted or wavered. Forward on either side shot out the horns of armed
+men, clasping the camp in an embrace of steel. Then as these began to
+close, out burst the war cry of the Zulus, and with the roar of a
+torrent and the rush of a storm, with a sound like the humming of a
+billion bees, wave after wave the deep breast of the _impi_ rolled down
+upon the white men. With it went the black-shielded Umcityu and with
+them went Nahoon, the son of Zomba. A bullet struck him in the side,
+glancing from his ribs, he did not heed; a white man fell from his
+horse before him, he did not stab, for he sought but one face in the
+battle.
+
+He sought—and at last he found. There, among the waggons where the
+spears were busiest, there standing by his horse and firing rapidly was
+Black Heart, he who had given Nanea his betrothed to death. Three
+soldiers stood between them, one of them Nahoon stabbed, and two he
+brushed aside; then he rushed straight at Hadden.
+
+But the white man saw him come, and even through the mask of his
+madness he knew Nahoon again, and terror took hold of him. Throwing
+away his empty rifle, for his ammunition was spent, he leaped upon his
+horse and drove his spurs into its flanks. Away it went among the
+carnage, springing over the dead and bursting through the lines of
+shields, and after it came Nahoon, running long and low with head
+stretched forward and trailing spear, running as a hound runs when the
+buck is at view.
+
+Hadden’s first plan was to head for Rorke’s Drift, but a glance to the
+left showed him that the masses of the Undi barred that way, so he fled
+straight on, leaving his path to fortune. In five minutes he was over a
+ridge, and there was nothing of the battle to be seen, in ten all
+sounds of it had died away, for few guns were fired in the dread race
+to Fugitive’s Drift, and the assegai makes no noise. In some strange
+fashion, even at this moment, the contrast between the dreadful scene
+of blood and turmoil that he had left, and the peaceful face of Nature
+over which he was passing, came home to his brain vividly. Here birds
+sang and cattle grazed; here the sun shone undimmed by the smoke of
+cannon, only high up in the blue and silent air long streams of
+vultures could be seen winging their way to the Plain of Isandhlwana.
+
+The ground was very rough, and Hadden’s horse began to tire. He looked
+over his shoulder—there some two hundred yards behind came the Zulu,
+grim as Death, unswerving as Fate. He examined the pistol in his belt;
+there was but one undischarged cartridge left, all the rest had been
+fired and the pouch was empty. Well, one bullet should be enough for
+one savage: the question was should he stop and use it now? No, he
+might miss or fail to kill the man; he was on horseback and his foe on
+foot, surely he could tire him out.
+
+A while passed, and they dashed through a little stream. It seemed
+familiar to Hadden. Yes, that was the pool where he used to bathe when
+he was the guest of Umgona, the father of Nanea; and there on the knoll
+to his right were the huts, or rather the remains of them, for they had
+been burnt with fire. What chance had brought him to this place, he
+wondered; then again he looked behind him at Nahoon, who seemed to read
+his thoughts, for he shook his spear and pointed to the ruined kraal.
+
+On he went at speed for here the land was level, and to his joy he lost
+sight of his pursuer. But presently there came a mile of rocky ground,
+and when it was past, glancing back he saw that Nahoon was once more in
+his old place. His horse’s strength was almost spent, but Hadden
+spurred it forward blindly, whither he knew not. Now he was travelling
+along a strip of turf and ahead of him he heard the music of a river,
+while to his left rose a high bank. Presently the turf bent inwards and
+there, not twenty yards away from him, was a Kaffir hut standing on the
+brink of a river. He looked at it, yes, it was the hut of that accursed
+_inyanga_, the Bee, and standing by the fence of it was none other than
+the Bee herself. At the sight of her the exhausted horse swerved
+violently, stumbled and came to the ground, where it lay panting.
+Hadden was thrown from the saddle but sprang to his feet unhurt.
+
+“Ah! Black Heart, is it you? What news of the battle, Black Heart?”
+cried the Bee in a mocking voice.
+
+“Help me, mother, I am pursued,” he gasped.
+
+“What of it, Black Heart, it is but by one tired man. Stand then and
+face him, for now Black Heart and White Heart are together again. You
+will not? Then away to the forest and seek shelter among the dead who
+await you there. Tell me, tell me, was it the face of Nanea that I saw
+beneath the waters a while ago? Good! bear my greetings to her when you
+two meet in the House of the Dead.”
+
+Hadden looked at the stream; it was in flood. He could not swim it, so
+followed by the evil laugh of the prophetess, he sped towards the
+forest. After him came Nahoon, his tongue hanging from his jaws like
+the tongue of a wolf.
+
+Now he was in the shadow of the forest, but still he sped on following
+the course of the river, till at length his breath failed, and he
+halted on the further side of a little glade, beyond which a great tree
+grew. Nahoon was more than a spear’s throw behind him; therefore he had
+time to draw his pistol and make ready.
+
+“Halt, Nahoon,” he cried, as once before he had cried; “I would speak
+with you.”
+
+The Zulu heard his voice, and obeyed.
+
+“Listen,” said Hadden. “We have run a long race and fought a long
+fight, you and I, and we are still alive both of us. Very soon, if you
+come on, one of us must be dead, and it will be you, Nahoon, for I am
+armed and as you know I can shoot straight. What do you say?”
+
+Nahoon made no answer, but stood still at the edge of the glade, his
+wild and glowering eyes fixed on the white man’s face and his breath
+coming in short gasps.
+
+“Will you let me go, if _I_ let _you_ go?” Hadden asked once more. “I
+know why you hate me, but the past cannot be undone, nor can the dead
+be brought to earth again.”
+
+Still Nahoon made no answer, and his silence seemed more fateful and
+more crushing than any speech; no spoken accusation would have been so
+terrible in Hadden’s ear. He made no answer, but lifting his assegai he
+stalked grimly toward his foe.
+
+When he was within five paces Hadden covered him and fired. Nahoon
+sprang aside, but the bullet struck him somewhere, for his right arm
+dropped, and the stabbing spear that he held was jerked from it
+harmlessly over the white man’s head. But still making no sound, the
+Zulu came on and gripped him by the throat with his left hand. For a
+space they struggled terribly, swaying to and fro, but Hadden was
+unhurt and fought with the fury of despair, while Nahoon had been twice
+wounded, and there remained to him but one sound arm wherewith to
+strike. Presently forced to earth by the white man’s iron strength, the
+soldier was down, nor could he rise again.
+
+“Now we will make an end,” muttered Hadden savagely, and he turned to
+seek the assegai, then staggered slowly back with starting eyes and
+reeling gait. For there before him, still clad in her white robe, a
+spear in her hand, stood the spirit of Nanea!
+
+“Think of it,” he said to himself, dimly remembering the words of the
+_inyanga_, “when you stand face to face with the ghost of the dead in
+the Home of the Dead.”
+
+There was a cry and a flash of steel; the broad spear leapt towards him
+to bury itself in his breast. He swayed, he fell, and presently Black
+Heart clasped that great reward which the word of the Bee had promised
+Him.
+
+
+“Nahoon! Nahoon!” murmured a soft voice, “awake, it is no ghost, but
+I—Nanea—I, your living wife, to whom my _Ehlose_[*] has given it me to
+save you.”
+
+[*] Guardian Spirit.
+
+
+Nahoon heard and opened his eyes to look and his madness left him.
+
+“Welcome, wife,” he said faintly, “now I will live since Death has
+brought you back to me in the House of the Dead.”
+
+
+To-day Nahoon is one of the Indunas of the English Government in
+Zululand, and there are children about his kraal. It was from the lips
+of none other than Nanea his wife that the teller of this tale heard
+its substance.
+
+The Bee also lives and practises as much magic as she dares under the
+white man’s rule. On her black hand shines a golden ring shaped like a
+snake with ruby eyes, and of this trinket the Bee is very proud.
+
+
+
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BLACK HEART AND WHITE HEART ***
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