Bertram Mitford (continued 2)

For, seeing that their chief had not returned the angry mutterings of his incensed followers had risen to a threatening hubbub. All the savage was now aroused within them, and they crowded up to the store, clamouring for the man who had insulted their father’s head-ring. Assegais were flourished, dogs were adding their howls and yaps to the general racket, and altogether matters were taking a decidedly serious turn.

“What is this, children of Tyingoza?” I said, as I came up behind them—incidentally kicking away a large cur which had come for me open-mouthed. “The last words of the chief as he left me were—‘I have sent them to hunt with your friends—they will do so.’ But now I find you ready to spring upon them instead. What does it mean?”

“This, Iqalaqala. We want the ‘idiot’.”

The speaker was Ivuzamanzi. He had been out of the way during the incident, which was uncommonly lucky for Falkner Sewin. Now he was foremost in the agitation.

“But you cannot hold an ‘idiot’ responsible,” I urged, catching at a straw.

“Ah—ah! But this is not a real one,” answered the young warrior. “He must be beaten.”

“Not so. The chief is satisfied. He bade me tell you to go on with the hunt. Who are ye to shut your ears to his ‘word’?”

This told, for the clamour dropped into sullen mutterings as they consulted together. The while I walked through them and gained the store.

The Major was standing in the doorway, and I could see the faces of the two girls at the window light up with relief as I approached. They had thought I should be murdered in the midst of the excited and gesticulating group, but as a matter of fact I ran not the slightest danger, and this I hastened to assure them. I was glad to notice that Falkner had had the sense to keep himself out of sight, or, what was more likely, somebody else had had it for him.

“Ah, now we shall be all right,” said Mrs Sewin, who was seated on a pile of goods for want of a chair. “I must say these savages are rather alarming.”

“They’ll go home directly, Mrs Sewin. I’ve talked them into a better frame of mind.”

“Go home?” echoed Falkner. “But, confound it all—what about our hunt?”

“You won’t get one of them to stir in that now,” I said, “and if they did you wouldn’t be well advised to go with them.”

“Well, I think there’s considerable overweight of fuss being made because a silly old nigger puts his back up and walks off in a huff,” answered Falkner, sullenly.

“Look here, Sewin,” I said, fast beginning to lose my temper. “That ‘silly old nigger’ is one of the most influential chiefs in Natal. Added to which he’s a Zulu of high breeding, that is to say one of the proudest of men—and you’ve put upon him the biggest insult you could have thought out, and that in the presence of a number of his people—who moreover were sent up here by his orders to help your day’s amusement I say nothing of it having been done on my place—but, incidentally, your monkeyish and schoolboy prank has been the means of frightening the ladies somewhat.”

“Here, I say, Glanton. I don’t take that sort of talk, you know,” he answered, colouring up.

“Glanton’s quite right,” struck in the Major decisively, and with some sternness. “You’ve made an ass of yourself, and got us into a nice mess—which we don’t seem out of yet,” he added, as again the voices outside rose high.

I went out again. Ivuzamanzi came forward.

“We will not hunt with your friends, Iqalaqala. We are going home. As for the igcwane—let him look well on all sides of him.”

“For the first I think you are right son of Tyingoza,” I answered. “For the second—gahle! It is not wise to threaten men on the Queen’s side of the river—for such might lead to visits from the Amapolise.”

But he replied that he cared nothing for the police, and the others laughed sneeringly and agreed.

“See now,” said Ivuzamanzi, shaking his stick. “Will he, the igcwane, come out and fight? He looks big enough, and strong enough, for all that he is a fool.”

I found myself wishing the matter might be cleared up in this rough and ready manner; but for one thing the ladies were with us, for another I didn’t see how the two could fight on anything like even terms. Falkner couldn’t fight with native weapons, and Ivuzamanzi, like any other Zulu, of course had not the remotest idea how to use his fists. So it wouldn’t do.

“How can that be?” I put it. “He does not understand fighting in your way, and you do not understand fighting in his. You would both be ridiculous. Go home, son of Tyingoza, and talk with your father. You will find he has forgotten all about the affair and so must you. A mistake has been made and we all regret it.”

“Ou!” he grunted, and turned away. I thought enough had been said, to these young ones at any rate, so forbore to give them anything more in the way of entertainment lest they should think we were afraid of them. And soon, somewhat to my relief, and very much to the relief of my guests, they picked up their weapons, and with their curs at their heels moved away in groups as they had come.

“Well, we seem to have put you to no end of bother, Glanton, for which I can’t tell you how sorry we are,” said the Major. “And now we mustn’t put you to any more—so, as there is to be no hunt I propose that we saddle up, and go home.”

“Not until after lunch at any rate, Major,” I said. “I can’t allow that for a moment. As for bother it has been nothing but a pleasure to me, except this last tiresome business.”

I thought Miss Sewin’s face expressed unmistakable approval as I caught her glance.

“How well you seem to manage these people, Mr Glanton,” she said. “I—we—were beginning to feel rather nervous until you came up. Then we were sure it would all come right. And it has.”

Inwardly I thought it had done anything but that, but under the circumstances my confounded conceit was considerably tickled by her approval, and I felt disposed to purr. However I answered that talking over natives was an everyday affair with me, in fact part of my trade, and by the time we sat down to lunch—which was not long, for the morning was well on by then—good humour seemed generally restored. Even Falkner had got over his sulks.

“I say, Sewin,” I said to him as I passed him the bottle. “You were talking about going on a trading trip with me. It wouldn’t do to get chipping bits out of the chiefs’ head-rings on the other side of the river, you know. They take that sort of thing much more seriously over there.”

“Oh hang it, Glanton, let a fellow alone, can’t you,” he answered, grinning rather foolishly.

“By the way, Major, has anything more been heard about Hensley?” I said.

“Hensley? Who’s he? Ah, I remember. He’s been over at our place a couple of times. Why? Is he ill?”

“Nobody knows—or where he is. He has disappeared.”

“Disappeared?”

“Yes. Nobody seems to have the slightest clue as to what has become of him. He went to bed as usual, and in the morning—well, he wasn’t there. He couldn’t have gone away anywhere, for his horses were all on the place, and his boys say they had never heard him express any intention of leaving home.”

“Good gracious, no. We hadn’t heard of it,” said Mrs Sewin. “But—when was it?”

“About a fortnight ago. I didn’t hear of it till the other day—and then through native sources.”

“Oh, some nigger yarn I suppose,” said Falkner in his superior manner, which always ruffled me.

“Would you be surprised to hear that I obtain a good deal of astonishingly accurate information through the same source, Sewin?” I answered. “In fact there is more than one person to whom it relates, who would be more than a little uncomfortable did they guess how much I knew about them.”

“Oh, then you run a nigger gossip shop as well as a nigger trading shop,” he retorted, nastily.

“But what a very unpleasant thing,” hastily struck in his aunt, anxious to cover his rudeness. “Does that sort of thing happen here often?”

“I never heard of a case before.”

“Probably the niggers murdered him and stowed him away somewhere,” pronounced the irrepressible Falkner.

“Even ‘niggers’ don’t do that sort of thing without a motive, and here there was none. Less by a long way than had it been your case,” I was tempted to add, but didn’t. “No, I own it puzzles me. I shall take a ride over there in a day or two, and make a few enquiries on the spot, just as a matter of curiosity.”

“All the same it looks dashed fishy,” said the Major. “D’you know, Glanton, I’m inclined to think Falkner may have hit it.”

“Nothing’s absolutely impossible,” I answered. “Still, I don’t think that’s the solution.”

“But the police—what do they think of it?”

“So far they are stumped utterly and completely—nor can their native detectives rout out anything.”

“How very dreadful,” said Mrs Sewin. “Really it makes one feel quite uncomfortable.”

“He lived alone, remember, Mrs Sewin, and there are plenty of you,” I laughed, meaning to be reassuring. But I could see that a decidedly uncomfortable feeling had taken hold upon her mind, and tried to turn the conversation, blaming myself for a fool in having started such a subject at all on the top of the alarm the ladies had already been subjected to that morning. But they say there are compensations for everything, and mine came when just as they were preparing to start Mrs Sewin said to me:

“I have a very great favour to ask you, Mr Glanton, and I hardly like doing so after all your kindness to us since yesterday and what has come of it. But—would you mind riding home with us this afternoon. After what has just happened we should feel so much safer if you would.”

I tried to put all the sincerity I could into my reassurances that no one would interfere with them, but apart from my own inclinations a certain anxious look on Aïda Sewin’s face as they waited for my answer decided me.

“Why of course I will if it will be any help to you, Mrs Sewin,” I said, and then again a quick grateful look from the same quarter caused me to tread on air, as I went round to see to the saddling up of the horses—my own among them.

As we took our way down the well worn bush path I could see that the incident of the morning had not been entirely cleared off from the minds of the party. The ladies were inclined to be nervous, and if a horse started and shied at a tortoise or a white snail shell beside the path I believe they more than half expected a crowd of revengeful savages to rush out and massacre them on the spot. However, of course, nothing happened, and we got to the Major’s farm by sundown.

Then I had my reward.

“Will you come and help me water some of the flowers, Mr Glanton?” said Miss Sewin, after we had offsaddled and generally settled ourselves. “No—don’t say you are going back. Mother is very nervous to-night, and I know you are going to add to your kindness to us by sleeping here.”

Again I trod on air—and yet—and yet—I felt that I was acting like a fool. What on earth could come of it—at any rate to my advantage? Yet, again—why not?

“I want you to promise me something, Mr Glanton, will you?” Miss Sewin said, when dusk and the lateness of the hour had put an end to what was to me one of the most delightful half hours I ever remember spending, for we had spent it alone, she chatting in that free and natural manner of hers, I agreeing with everything, as the entrancement of listening to her voice and watching her grace of movement wound itself more and more around me.

“I think I may safely promise you anything, Miss Sewin,” I answered. “Well? What is it?”

“I want you to promise me not to quarrel with my cousin—no matter how rude and provoking he may be.”

“Is that all? Why of course I will.”

“Ah but—you may not find it so easy,” she went on, speaking earnestly, and her wide open glance full on my face. “I have been noticing his behaviour towards you of late, and admiring your forbearance. But as a personal favour to myself, don’t quarrel with him.”

“Oh, I still think that’ll be an easy promise to keep,” I said; and yet, the very fact that she was so anxious on the subject seemed to make the other way. Why was she?

She shook her head slightly and smiled, as though reading my thoughts.

“You see, we are all so friendly together, are we not?” she said. “And a man of your experience and good sense can afford to put up with a good deal from a mere boy who hasn’t much of either.”

“Why of course,” I answered easily, and reassured by her tactful explanation. Yet—was Falkner such “a mere boy” after all?

Chapter Nine.

Hensley’s next-of-kin.

It is a strange, and I suppose a wholesomely-humiliating thing that we are appointed to go through life learning how little we know ourselves. Here was I, a man no longer young, with considerable experience of the ways of the world, rough and smooth, and under the fixed impression that if there was one man in the said wide and wicked world whom I knew thoroughly, in and out, from the crown of his hat to the soles of his boots—or velschoenen, as the case might be—that man was Godfrey Glanton, trader in the Zulu. And yet I had lived to learn that I didn’t know him at all.

For instance the happy-go-lucky, free-and-easy, semi-lonely life that had satisfied me for so many years seemed no longer satisfying; yet why not, seeing that all its conditions prevailed as before? I had enough for my needs, and if I didn’t make a fortune out of my trade, whether stationary or from time to time peripatetic, I had always made a steady profit. Now, however, it came home to me that this was a state of things hardly the best for a man to live and die in.

Again why not? I had seen contemporaries of my own—men circumstanced like myself who had come to the same conclusion. They had left it—only to come to grief in unfamiliar undertakings. Or they had married; only to find that they had better have elected to go through the rest of life with a chain and ball hung round their necks, than strapped to some nagging woman full of affectations and ailments—and raising a brood of progeny far more likely to prove a curse to them than anything else; thanks to the holy and gentle maternal influence aforesaid. All this I had seen, and yet, here I was, feeling restless and unsatisfied because for several days the recollection of a certain sweet and refined face, lit up by a pair of large, appealing eyes, had haunted my solitary hours.

It was that time since I had seen my neighbours. I had heard of them through my usual sources of information, and they seemed to me to be getting along all right; wherefore I had forborne to pay another visit lest it might have the appearance of “hanging around.” And by way of combating an inclination to do so now, I made up my mind to carry out a deferred intention, viz., pay a visit to Hensley’s place.

Tyingoza had been over to see me a couple of times, but made no allusion whatever to Falkner Sewin’s act of boyish idiocy: presumably rating it at its proper standard. But, I noticed that he wore a new head-ring. However, I hoped that was an incident forgotten; and as I heard nothing to the contrary, and my trade ran on as usual, I made no further reference to it either to Tyingoza or anybody else.

I arrived at the scene of Hensley’s disappearance about mid-day. The homestead stood in a long, narrow valley, thickly bushed. Behind, and almost overhanging it, was a great krantz whose smooth ironstone wall glowed like a vast slab of red-hot metal. The place was wild and picturesque to a degree, but—oh so hot!

Two men in shirts and trousers were playing quoits as I came up. I didn’t know either of them by sight.

“Good day,” said one of them, knocking off his play, and coming up. “Off-saddle won’t you? Dashed hot, isn’t it?”

“Thanks. I’m Glanton, from Isipanga,” I said in answer to his look of enquiry.

“Oh. Glad to know you, Glanton. I’m Kendrew, from nowhere in particular, at least not just now, price of transport being too sleg for anything.”

“Oh, you ride transport then? How many waggons?”

“Three in good times—one in bad; none in worse—as in the present case. This is Sergeant Simcox, of the N.M.P.,” introducing the other man, whom I noticed wore uniform trousers and boots. “He’s been helping me to look for my poor old uncle, you know.”

“Oh, Hensley was your uncle, was he?”

“Rather. But I’m next-of-kin—so if he’s not found I take. See?” with a comprehensive wink and jerk of the head which took in the surroundings.

I couldn’t help laughing at his coolness. He was a tall, rather good-looking young fellow, all wire and whipcord, with a chronically whimsical expression. The police sergeant was a hard bitten looking customer, typical of his line in life.

“Now what do you think of the affair?” I said. “Did you know Hensley well?”

“Hanged if I did. He didn’t like me. Did you?”

“Not very. I used to ride over and look him up now and again. But I can’t imagine him doing anything mysterious. In fact I should say he’d be the last man in the world to do it.”

“Ja. I don’t know what to think of it. I’ve been running the place since I heard of the affair—luckily I wasn’t on the road just then so was able to. You’ll stop and have some scoff of course—you too, sergeant?”

“Wish I could,” said the latter, “but it’s against rules. Must get back to my camp.”

“Hang rules. Who’s to know? Glanton here won’t split.”

He was right, wherefore I forbear to say whether Sergeant Simcox made the third at that festive board or not.

We talked of trade and transport-riding and frontier matters generally, but surprisingly little of the matter that had brought me there. In fact Kendrew rather seemed to shirk the subject; not in any sort of suspicious manner let me explain, but rather as if he thought the whole thing a bore, and a very great one at that.

“You see, Glanton,” he explained, presumably detecting a surprised look on my face, called there by the exceedingly light way in which he was taking things. “You see it isn’t as if we had had a lot to do with each other. Of course I don’t for a moment hope that the poor old boy has come to grief, in fact I can’t help feeling that he may turn up any moment and want to know what the devil I’ve taken up my quarters at his place for, in this free and easy way.”

After a good dinner, washed down with a glass or so of grog, we went to look at the place where the missing man had slept. This didn’t help towards any theory. If there had been foul play, whoever had been concerned in it had removed all traces long ago.

“A good hound, requisitioned at first, would have done something towards clearing up the mystery,” I said.

“Yes, but you might as well have requisitioned a good elephant, for all you’d get either round here,” laughed Kendrew. “Well, I shall just give it up as a bad job and leave it to Simcox. That’s what he draws his pay for. I’ll just sit tight and boss up things so long. That’s my job.”

“I’d like to have a word or two with the boy who saw him last,” I said. “Alone I mean.”

“Think you can get him to talk, eh? Well perhaps you may—I’ve heard of you, Glanton, and what a chap you are for managing Kafirs. All right, stop on till this evening, the boy’s out herding now. Then you can indaba him to your heart’s content after supper. You’ll stay the night of course.”

But I urged that such was not in my programme, and in fact I had some business to attend to next day irrespective of mere retail trade in the store. So we compromised by my consenting to remain till evening. There was sufficient moon for me to ride home by even if it rose somewhat late. I suggested that we should ride out into the veldt in the afternoon and I could interview the boy there. He would talk more freely that way, and Kendrew agreed.

The boy was a quiet, decent looking youngster, and was herding his flock in most exemplary fashion. I asked him his name.

“Pecamane, ’Nkose!”

“Have I seen you before?”

“More than once, Nkose. At Isipanga, at the store. Then again, when we danced and ate beef.”

“Ah. You were there then? Who is your chief?”

“Tyingoza, Nkose.”

Kendrew had ridden on, leaving me alone with the boy.

“Well then,” I said, “if Tyingoza is your chief you will be safe in telling me the story of your master’s ‘who is no longer here.’”

“Ou! Nkose. The only story I have to tell is what I told to the Amapolise, and he who now sits here”—meaning Kendrew. “But it is no story.”

He was right there, in that like the tale of the empty bottle there was nothing in it. His master had given him some final orders after supper, and he had gone over to the huts for the night. He was employed in the stable then.

And no one had opened the stable?

No, it was locked, and his master had the key. They had been obliged to break open the door in the morning to get at the horses.

There you see, there was nothing in this story, but then I had never expected there would be. What I wanted was to watch the face and note the manner of its narrator. This I had done, and keenly, with the result that I felt convinced that the boy knew no more about Hensley’s disappearance than I did myself. Upon this the police sergeant subsequently waxed somewhat superior. He resented the idea that what had baffled the wit of the police and native detectives combined might stand the slightest chance of being cleared up by me. However I didn’t take offence, although my opinion of the abilities of his force was but medium, and that of the native detectives nowhere, though this applied more to their morality than ingenuity. It happened that I was in a position to know something of the methods of the latter in “getting up” cases.

“Well good-bye, Glanton,” said Kendrew, as we shook hands. “Devilish glad you came over in a friendly way. And, I say—mind you repeat the operation and that often. I like a jolly, good sort of neighbourly neighbour.”

I promised him I would, as I climbed into the saddle—and the great krantz seemed to echo back our cheery good-bye in ghostly refrain.

I liked Kendrew, I decided as I rode along. He struck me as a lively, cheery sort of fellow with lots of fun in him, and not an atom of harm. Decidedly as a neighbour he would be an improvement on his poor old relative, who although a good chap enough had always been a bit of a fossil. That’s one of the advantages of the up-country or frontier life, you take a man as you find him and no make believe, or stiffness or ceremony. If he’s a good fellow he is, and all the better. If he isn’t why then he isn’t, and you needn’t have any more to do with him than you want, or make any pretence about it.

In the solitude as I took my way through the thorns the recollection of Hensley came upon me again, and I confess, as I thought upon it there, under the midnight moon—for I had started back rather later than I had intended—a sort of creepy feeling came over me. What the deuce had become of the man? If he had got a fit of mental aberration, and taken himself off, he would have left some spoor, yet no sign of any had been lighted upon by those who had again and again made diligent search. I looked around. The bush sprays seemed to take on all manner of weird shapes; and once my horse, shying and snorting at a big hare, squatting up on its haunches like a big idiot, bang in the middle of the path, gave me quite an unpleasant start. The black brow of the krantz cut the misty, star-speckled skyline now receding on my left behind—and then—my horse gave forth another snort and at the same time shied so violently as to have unseated me, but that my nerves were—again I confess it—at something of an abnormal tension.

A figure was stealing along in the not very distinct moonlight; a human figure or—was it? Suddenly it stopped, half in shadow.

“Hi! Hallo! Who’s that,” I sung out.

There was no answer. Then I remembered that with my mind running upon Hensley I had used English. Yet the figure was that of a native. It wanted not the blackness of it in the uncertain light; the stealthy, sinuous movement of it was enough to show that. Yet, this certainty only enhanced the mystery. Natives are not wont to prowl about after dark with no apparent object, especially alone. In the first place they have a very whole-hearted dread of the night side of Nature—in the next such a proceeding is apt to gain for them more than a suspicion of practising the arts of witchcraft—a fatal reputation to set up yonder beyond the river, and, I hesitate not to assert, a very dangerous one to gain even here on the Queen’s side.

The figure straightened up, causing my fool of a horse to snort and describe further antics. Then a voice:

“Inkose! Iqalaqala. Be not afraid. It is only Ukozi, who watches over the world while the world sleeps—ah—ah! while the world sleeps.”

I must own to feeling something of a thrill at the name. This Ukozi was a diviner, or witch doctor, whose reputation was second to none among the Natal border tribes—ay and a great deal wider—and that is saying a good deal. Now of course the very mention of a witch doctor should arouse nothing but contemptuous merriment; yet the pretentions of the class are not all humbug by any means, indeed I have known a good few white men—hard bitten, up-country going men with no nonsense or superstition about them—who never fail to treat a genuine native witch doctor with very real consideration indeed.

“Greeting, father of mystery,” I answered, with some vague idea that the meeting all so unexpected and somewhat weird, might yet be not without its bearings on the fate of Hensley. “You are bent upon múti indeed, when the world is half through its dark time and the moon is low.”

“M-m!” he hummed. “The moon is low. Just so, Iqalaqala. You will not go home to-night.”

“Not go home!” I echoed, meaning to humour him, and yet, in my innermost self, conscious that there was a very real note of curiosity that could only come of whole, or partial, belief in the question. “And why should I not go home to-night?”

He shrugged his shoulders impressively. Then he said:

“Who may tell? But—you will not.”

I tried to laugh good-humouredly, but it was not genuine. Yet was not the thing absurd? Here was I, letting myself be humbugged—almost scared—by an old charlatan of a witch doctor, a fellow who made a comfortable living out of his credulous countrymen by fooling them with charms and spells and omens, and all sorts of similar quackery—I, a white man, with—I haven’t mentioned it before—an English public school education.

“Here, my father,” I said, producing a goodly twist of roll tobacco. “This is good—always good—whether by a comfortable fire, or searching for múti materials under the moon.”

He received it, in the hollow of both hands, as the native way is. I saw before me in the moonlight what was not at all the popular conception of the witch doctor—a little shrivelled being with furtive, cunning looks, and snaky eyes. No. This was a middle-aged man of fine stature, and broadly and strongly built: destitute too of charms or amulets in the way of adornments. His head-ring glistened in the moonlight, and for all clothing he wore the usual mútya. In fact the only peculiarity about him was that he had but one eye.

“What has become of Nyamaki?” I said, filling and lighting my pipe.

“U’ Nyamaki? Has he gone then?” was the answer which, of course, was a bit of assumed ignorance.

“Now how can the father of wisdom ask such a question?” I said. “He—to whom nothing is dark!”

Ukozi’s face was as a mask. He uttered a single grunt—that was all.

“The whites will offer large reward to the man who finds him,” I went on.

“Will he who sits yonder”—meaning my recent entertainer—“offer large reward?” was the answer, a sudden whimsical flash illuminating the dark, impassive face.

“That I cannot say. But I should think it probable. And now you are seeking midnight múti so as to obtain such reward. Take care,” I went on, chaffing him. “To wander at midnight would not be safe la pa,” pointing in the direction of the Zulu country. “But here we are under the Queen.”

“The Queen! Au! Even the Queen cannot do everything.”

“She just about can though,” I answered decisively.

“Can she find Nyamaki?” he said, putting his head on one side.

This was a facer. I didn’t know what the deuce to answer. While I was hesitating he went on:

“Au! Well, Iqalaqala, turn back and make your bed with him yonder, for you will not go home to-night Hamba gahle.”

“Hlala gahle, father of mystery,” I answered lightly touching my horse with the spur.

You will think it strange I should make so light of his warning, yet as I resumed my way up the valley, no thought of material danger came into my mind as I pondered over it. I would show him that wise as he was, and great his reputation, yet he did not know everything. I would have the crow of him next time we met, when—

My horse had suddenly cocked his ears, then uttering a loud snort he stopped dead—so suddenly indeed that I as nearly as possible pitched over his head. Yet, there was nothing in sight.

The path, here rather steep, narrowed between high thick bush, just over which on either hand, rose two straight but entirely insignificant krantzes.

“He has seen a snake, a big mamba perhaps,” I decided. “Well, let the brute crawl away, as he’s sure to do if alarmed. Then we’ll get on again.”

But we didn’t. I shouted a little, and swished at the bushes with my whip. Then I spurred my horse forward again. The confounded animal wouldn’t budge.

“Here, this won’t do,” I said to myself feeling angry. Then I got off. If the fool wouldn’t go in the ordinary way perhaps he would lead. Would he? Not a bit of it; on the contrary he rucked back at his bridle so violently as nearly to tear it out of my hand. I got into the saddle again.

“Now you’ve got to go, damn it!” I growled, letting him have both rowels till I thought I could hear the bones squeak.

In response he first plunged violently, then kicked, then reared, finally slewing round so quickly as nearly to unseat me. And now I became aware of a strange sickly scent, almost like that of a drug—yet how could it be? Then, as it grew stronger, it took on a vile effluvium as of something dead. Yet; I had passed over that very spot but a few hours back, and nothing of the kind had been there then. The horse was now standing quite still, his head towards the way we had come, all in a sweat and trembling violently.

And now I own that some of his scare began to take hold of me. What did it mean—what the very deuce did it mean? What infernal witchcraft was this that could hold me up here on a path I had ridden several times before, on this identical horse too? Yet, here in the still ghostly midnight hour alone, the affair began to grow dashed creepy. I made one more attempt, and that a half-hearted one—then giving the horse the rein let him take his own way, and that way was straight back to Kendrew’s.

Some thought of making a détour, and passing the bewitched point by taking a wide sweep, came into my mind, but that would have involved some infernally rough travelling, besides the moon wouldn’t last much longer, and who could say whether the result might not turn out the same, for by now the witch doctor’s declaration had carried its full weight. So I was soon knocking Kendrew out of his first sleep, with literally a lame excuse to the effect that my steed had gone lame, and it was no use trying to get over two hours of rough road with him that night.

“All right, old chap,” sung out Kendrew, in a jolly voice, as he let me in. “Have a glass of grog first, and then we’ll take him round to the stable. You can turn in in any room you like.”

I hoped he wouldn’t notice that neither then nor on the following morning did my horse show the slightest sign of lameness. But I had made up my mind to say no word to him of what had occurred—and didn’t.

Chapter Ten.

Falkner Pugnacious.

“Well but—who are you? What’s your name? Ain’t ashamed of it, are you?”

“Ashamed of it? I’ll darned soon let you know if I am or not, and teach you to keep a civil tongue in your head into the bargain.”

Such was the dialogue that came to my ears very early on the morning following the events just recorded. The voices were right in front of my window and I chuckled, for I knew them both—knew one for that of my present host, the other for that of no less a personage than Falkner Sewin.

I repeat, I chuckled, for there was a side of the situation which appealed to my sense of humour. Falkner Sewin’s temper and dignity alike were ruffled. There was going to be a row. Falkner had long wanted taking down a peg. It was highly probable that the said lowering process would now be effected.

In about a moment I was at the window. The contending parties, by neither of whom was I observed, were drawn up in battle array. Falkner, who had apparently just arrived on horseback, had dismounted, and was advancing upon Kendrew in a sort of prize ring attitude. The latter for his part, simply stood and waited, his face wearing an expression of indifference that might be extremely provoking. No, I was not going to interfere—not yet. A little bloodletting would do Falkner no harm—or, for the matter of that, either of them.

“Come on,” sung out the latter. “Come on, can’t you. Not afraid, are you?”

“Not much. I’m waiting for you.”

Then they went at it—hammer and tongs. Falkner had science—I could see that—but Kendrew was as hard as nails, and a precious tough customer to handle, and made up for his lack of science by consummate coolness; and with an eye keen as a hawk’s whenever he saw his chance, he confined himself so far to standing his ground, the while Falkner waltzed round him, for all the world like a dog on the seashore when yapping round some big crab which he doesn’t feel quite equal to closing in upon. For a little while I watched these manoeuvres in a state of semi-choke for stifled laughter, till they got to work in earnest, and then, by Jingo, it was no child’s play.

“Time!” I sung out stentoriously. “Haven’t you two fellows pummelled each other enough?” I went on, appearing before the combatants. “What’s it all about, any way?”

“Glanton—by the Lord!” ejaculated Falkner, startled, and, I fancied, looking a trifle ashamed of himself.

“What’s it all about?” repeated Kendrew. “Well, you see, Glanton, I ain’t naturally a quarrelsome chap, but when a man comes onto my place, and begins upon me in a God Almighty ‘haw-haw’ sort of tone as ‘my good fellow’ and doesn’t even condescend to tell me who he is when asked, why it’s enough to get my back up, isn’t it?”

I thought it was, but I wasn’t going to say so, and his allusion to “my place” made me smile.

“Look here,” I said decisively. “This is all a misunderstanding. You didn’t know each other, now I’ll introduce you. Sewin, this is Kendrew, a very good fellow when you get to know him—Kendrew, this is Sewin, a very good fellow when you get to know him. Now shake hands.”

And they did, but the expression upon each face was so comical that I could hardly keep from roaring, which would have upset the whole understanding; in that each would have felt more savage at being made ridiculous.

“Well, if I’ve been uncivil I’ll not be above owning it,” said Kendrew. “So come inside Mr—Sewin, and we’ll have a drink and think no more about it.”

“So we will,” growled Falkner, partly through his handkerchief, for he had undergone the bloodletting which I had told myself would be salutary in his case. However there was no harm done, and having roared for a boy to off-saddle, Kendrew led the way inside, on conviviality intent.

“You’re early here, Sewin,” I said. “Where did you sleep?”

“Sleep. In the blessed veldt. I called in at your place, but as far as I could make out your nigger said you’d gone to Helpmakaar. So I thought I’d go down to the river bank and try that place you pointed out to us for a buck, then call back later and have a shakedown with you when you come back.”

Here Kendrew interrupted us by bellowing to his boy to put on a great deal of beefsteak to fry, and to hurry up with it. “After a night in the veldt you’ll be ready for breakfast, I should think,” he explained heartily.

While we were at breakfast Falkner gave us a further outline of his doings. A mist had come up along the river bank, and in the result he had completely lost his bearings. Instead of taking his way back to my place he had wandered on in the opposite direction, tiring his horse and exasperating himself, as every high ridge surmounted only revealed a further one with a deep, rugged, bushy valley intervening. At last his horse had refused to go any further, and he had to make up his mind to lie by in the veldt and wait till morning.

“The rum part of it was,” he went on, “I couldn’t have been very far from here—and you’d think a horse would have known by instinct there was a stable in front of him. Well, I, for one, am choked off belief in the marvellous instinct of horses, and all that sort of rot. This brute wasn’t tired either—he simply and flatly refused to go on.”

“Where was that?” I said, now roused to considerable interest. “At least, I mean—was it far from here?”

“No. I just said it wasn’t,” he answered, a little testily. “It was just where the path dives through a pile of red rocks—you would know it, Glanton. It’s like a sort of natural gateway. Well nothing on earth would induce that silly beast to go through there, and, d’you know, upon my soul I began to feel a bit creepy—remembering how the niggers have likely got a sort of grudge against me. So I thought after all, I’d better stay where I was and wait till morning—and—here I am.”

“Well, it wouldn’t have been anybody laying for you, Sewin. You may make your mind easy on that point,” I said. “Possibly though, there may have been a snake, a big mamba perhaps, lying in the path just at that point—and your horse knew it. That’d be sufficient to hold him back.”

“By Jove! I shouldn’t wonder,” he said. “Wish I could have glimpsed him though. A full charge of treble A would have rid this country of one snake at any rate.”

Falkner’s experience had so exactly corresponded with my own as to impress me. While I had been held up in this eerie and mysterious manner on one side of the pile of rocks, the same thing had happened to him on the other, and, so far as I could make out, at just about the same time. Well, we would see if anything of the sort should befall us presently when we passed the spot in the broad light of day. The while the two late combatants had been discussing the disappearance of Hensley.

“Rum thing to happen,” commented Falkner. “Ain’t you rather—well, uncomfortable, at times, here, all alone?”

“Not me. You see my theory is that the poor old boy went off his nut and quietly wandered away somewhere and got into some hole, if not into the river. Now I’ve no idea of going off my nut, so I don’t feel in the least uncomfortable. In fact decidedly the reverse.”

“Well but—what of the niggers?”

Kendrew let go a jolly laugh.

“They’re all right,” he said. “Let’s go and look at your gee, Glanton. Hope he’s still lame, so you can’t get on, then we’ll all three have a jolly day of it.”

I, for one, knew we were destined to have nothing of the kind—not in the sense intended by Kendrew, that is—and I wanted to get home. Needless to say when my steed was led forth he walked with his usual elasticity, manifesting not the smallest sign of lameness.

“That’s dashed odd,” commented Kendrew, after carefully examining the inside of every hoof and feeling each pastern. “Oh, well, he’s sure to begin limping directly you start, so you’d better give him another day to make sure.”

But this I resisted, having my own reasons for making a start Falkner apparently had his too, for he was proof against the other’s pressing invitation to remain and make a day of it.

“Well after all, you might get to punching each other’s heads again, and I not there to prevent it,” I said, jocularly. “Good-bye, Kendrew.”

“Not half a bad chap that, after all,” said Falkner, as we rode along together.

“No. And if you’d wait to find that out before going for people you’d get along much better in these parts,” I answered. And then I improved upon the occasion to read him a considerable lecture. To do him justice he took it very well.

“Look,” he broke in. “It must have been just the other side of this that I got stuck last night.”

I had not needed my attention to be drawn to the spot, for already, as we were approaching it I had been noting the behaviour of my horse. It was normal. Beyond a slight cocking of the ears we might as well have been traversing any other section of our path; indeed it was as though the strange interruption of last night had been a matter of sheer imagination, but for one consideration. Of the extraordinary and overwhelming effluvium which had poisoned the air then, there was now no longer a trace, and this disposed of the theory that anything dead had been lying thereabouts. Had such a cause been responsible for it, the air would not have cleared so quickly. No—Ukozi had played some trick upon me for some reason of his own, but—what was that reason? Even a witch doctor does not play the fool without some motive.

“I believe your theory is the correct one, after all, Glanton,” interrupted my companion. “Depend upon it some big black beast of a mamba was stopping the way. Look. Here’s where I gave up.”

“So I see,” I answered, for we had now got through to the other side of the ridge of rocks.

“See? How?”

“Spoor. Look. The dust is all disturbed and kicked about. Here’s where your gee refused.”

“So it is. I see it now myself. What a cute chap you are, Glanton. Oh, and I say, Glanton—” after a momentary hesitation, “don’t let on to them at home about that little breeze I had with Kendrew down there, that’s a good chap.”

I promised. This was his motive, then, in resolving to return with me? But it was not.

“When are you going on that trading trip—into the Zulu country?” he went on.

“In two or three weeks’ time,” I answered.

“By Jove, but I would like to go with you. I’d like to make a little for myself. I want it all, I can tell you. But even that’s not the first consideration. I’d like to see those parts and gain some experience. You wouldn’t find me in the way, I promise you. I’d do every mortal thing you said—and keep out of ructions, if that’s what you’re afraid of.”

“What about the farm?” I answered. “Your uncle isn’t equal to looking after it single handed.”

“Oh, that might be arranged. That chap you sent us—Ivondwe—is worth his weight in gold—in fact I never would have believed such a thing as a trustworthy nigger existed, before he came.”

Now I have already put on record that the last thing on earth I desired was Falkner’s company on the expedition I was planning—and the same still held good—and yet—and yet—he was Aïda Sewin’s relative and she seemed to take a great interest in him. Perhaps it was with an idea of pleasing her—or I wonder if it was a certain anxiety as to leaving this young man at her side while I was away myself, goodness knows, but the fact remains that before we reached my place he had extracted from me what was more than half a promise that I would entertain the idea.

And this I knew, even then, was tantamount to an entire promise.

Chapter Eleven.

A Farewell Visit.

“Nyamaki has not returned?” queried Tyingoza, who, seated, in his accustomed place under the window of the store, had been taking snuff and chatting about things in general.

“Not that I have heard of,” I answered. “I was at his place but a day or two back. Will he return, Tyingoza?”

“And the young one—he who sits in Nyamaki’s place—does he think he will return?”

What was the object of this answer turned into another question? What was in Tyingoza’s mind? However I replied:

“He is inclined to think not. He thinks his relation has wandered away somewhere—perhaps into the river, and will never be heard of again.”

“Ah! Into the river! Well, that might be, Iqalaqala. Into the river! The ways of you white people are strange, impela!”

Tyingoza, you see, was enigmatical, but then he often was, especially if he thought I was trying to get behind his mind—as he put it. Clearly he was not going to commit himself to any definite opinion regarding the disappearing Hensley.

“Ukozi is in these parts,” I went on.

“Ukozi? Ha! I have not seen him. Did he visit you here?”

“Not here,” I answered, with intent to be as enigmatical as himself.

“Ukozi is a very lion among izanusi. Why do not the white people get him to find Nyamaki?”

“And the practice of an isanusi is not allowed by the white people. How then can they make use of such?” I said.

The chief shrugged his shoulders slightly, and there was a humorous twinkle in his eyes.

“It is as you say, Iqalaqala. Yet their Amapolise cannot find him. You white people know a great deal, but you do not know everything.”

“Now, Tyingoza, I would ask: What people does?”

Then he laughed and so did I, and this was all I got out of my attempt at “pumping” Tyingoza. Yet, not quite all. That suggestion of his as to employing the witch doctor was destined to stick. Afterwards it was destined to come back to me with very great force indeed.

Now I began to shut up the store, early in the day as it was, for I meant to go over to the Sewins. It would be almost my last visit: for the preparations for my trip were nearly complete and in two or three days I proposed to start. Moreover I had received a note from the old Major, couched in a reproachful vein on behalf of his family, to the effect that I was becoming quite a stranger of late, and so forth; all of which went to show that my plan of not giving them more of my company than I thought they could do with—had answered.

“So you are going kwa Zulu directly?” said Tyingoza, as he took his leave. “And not alone. That is a pity.”

He had never referred to Falkner’s practical joke. Now, of course, I thought he was referring to it.

“Well, the boy is only a boy,” I answered. “I will keep him in order once over there, that I promise.”

Again his eyes twinkled, as he bade me farewell with all his usual cordiality.

Not much of this remark did I think, as I took my way down the now well worn bush path, but I own that the idea of employing Ukozi to throw light on the disappearance of Hensley, gave me something to think of—for as I have said before, I had reason to respect the powers claimed—and undoubtedly possessed—by many of his craft. I would put it to Kendrew. It was his affair not mine, and if anyone moved in the matter it should be he.

There was an ominous stillness about the Sewins’ homestead as I approached, and I own to a feeling of considerable disappointment as the thought crossed my mind that the family was away, but reassurance succeeded in the shape of a large white dog, which came rushing furiously down the path, barking in right threatening fashion—only to change into little whines of delight and greeting as it recognised me. This was a factor in the Sewin household which I have hitherto omitted to introduce. He was one of the Campagna breed of sheep herding dogs, and was Aïda’s especial property, she having discovered him as a puppy during a tour in Italy. He was a remarkably handsome beast, pure white, and was of the size and strength of a wolf, to which he bore a strong family likeness. He had honoured me with his friendship from the very first—a mark of favour which he was by no means wont to bestow upon everybody, as his mistress was careful to point out.

“Well, Arlo, old chap. Where are they all?” I said, as the dog trotted before my horse, turning to look back with an occasional friendly whine. As I drew rein in front of the stoep Falkner came forth, looking very handsome and athletic in his snowy linen suit, for it was hot.

“Hallo Glanton, glad to see you,” he said, quite cordially, but in rather a subdued tone for him. “Come round and off-saddle. They’ll be out in a minute, they’re having prayers, you know. I slipped out when I heard your horse.”

It was Sunday, and the Major, I remembered, made a point of reading the church service on that day: in the middle of which I had arrived.

“Tell you what, old chap,” he went on. “I’m rather glad of the excuse. Beastly bore that sort of thing, don’t you know, but the old people wouldn’t like it if I were to cut.”

“Only the old people?” I said.

“No, the whole bilin’ of ’em. Life wouldn’t be worth living for the rest of the day if I didn’t cut in. So I do—just to please them all. See? Well, we’ll go and smoke a pipe till they come out.”

Falkner had pulled out quite a genial stop to play upon for my benefit—but then, I had agreed to take him with me on the trip. On the subject of which he now waxed eloquent. Would we certainly be on the road by Wednesday, and was there anything he could do, and so forth? I was able to reassure him abundantly on these points, and his exuberant delight was like that of a schoolboy on the eve of the holidays, causing me to think to myself rather sadly, that were I in his shoes, with a home like this, and the society of sweet, refined English ladies for my daily portion, I would not be in the least eager to exchange it for the roughness and ups and downs of a trading trip and the kraals of savages. But then after all, there was a considerable difference in our years, and my experience was a good deal behind me, whereas his was not.

Soon the family came out, and I was received with all the accustomed cordiality, and rather more. Why had I not been near them for so long, especially as I was about to go away for quite a considerable time, and so forth? I began to feel self-reproachful, as I thought of my motive, but it was not easy to find an excuse, the usual “rather busy,” and when I tried I could see Aïda Sewin’s clear eyes reading my face, and there was the faintest glimmer of a smile about her lips that seemed to say plainly: “I don’t believe a word of it.”

“So you’re going to take this fellow with you after all, Glanton,” said the Major as we sat down to lunch. “Well, you’ll have a handful, by Jove you will! I hope you’ll keep him in order, that’s all.”

“Oh he’ll be all right, Major,” I said. “And the experience won’t do him any harm either.”

“Don’t you go trying any more experiments at the expense of the chiefs’ head-rings up there, Falkner,” said Edith, the younger girl.

“Oh shut up,” growled Falkner. “That joke’s a precious stale one. I seem to be getting ‘jam and judicious advice’ all round, by Jove!”

“Well, and you want it—at any rate the advice—only you never take it,” was the retort.

“Nobody ever does, Miss Edith,” I said, coming to his rescue. “Advice is one of those commodities people estimate at its own cost—nothing to wit; and set the same value upon it.”

“Now you’re cynical, Mr Glanton,” she answered, “and I don’t like cynical people.”

“That’s a calamity, but believe me, I’m not naturally so. Why I rather set up for being a philanthropist,” I said.

“You certainly are one, as we have every reason to know,” interposed her sister.

I felt grateful but foolish, having no mind to be taken seriously. But before I could stutter forth any reply, which was bound to have been an idiotic one, she went on, tactfully:

“For instance that boy you sent us—Ivondwe. Why he’s a treasure. Everything has gone right since he came. He can talk English, for one thing.”

“Can he? That’s an accomplishment I should never have given him credit for, and I don’t know that it’s altogether a recommendation. You know, we don’t care for English-speaking natives. But you mustn’t talk it to him, Miss Sewin. You must talk to him in the vernacular. How are you getting on, by the way?”

“Oh, indifferently. You might have given me a little more help, you know.”

The reproach carried its own sting. Of course I might. What an ass I was to have thrown away such an opportunity.

“Yes, he’s a first-rate boy, Glanton,” said the Major. “I don’t know what we should do without him now.”

“You haven’t started in to punch his head yet, eh Falkner?” I said, banteringly, rather with the object of turning attention from my share in this acquisition.

“The curious part of it is that Arlo won’t take to him,” went on Miss Sewin. “He’s on perfectly good terms with the other boys but he seems to hate this one. Not that Ivondwe isn’t kind to him. He tries all he can to make friends with him but it’s no good. Arlo won’t even take food from him. Now why is this?”

“I’m afraid that’s beyond me,” I answered, “unless it is that the instinct of a dog, like that of a horse, isn’t quite so supernaturally accurate as we accustom ourselves to think.”

This was a subject that was bound to start discussion, and animated at that—and soon I found myself in somewhat of a corner, the ladies, especially, waxing warm over the heretical insinuation I had made. Then the Major, drawing on his experiences as a cavalry officer, took my side on the subject of equine intelligence, or lack of it, and Falkner took up the impartial advocate line, and we were all very jolly and merry through it all, and certainly conversation did not lag.

Lunch over, the Major announced his intention of having forty winks, and the rest of us adjourned to the stoep, and roomy cane chairs.

“One thing I like about this country,” pronounced Falkner, when he had got a cigar in full blast, and was lounging luxuriously in a hammock—a form of recumbency I detest—“and that is that provided you’re in the shade you can always sit out of doors. Now in India you can’t. It’s a case of shaded rooms, and chiks, and a black beast swinging a punkah—whom you have to get up and kick every half-hour when he forgets to go on—till about sundown. Here it’s glorious.”

I was inclined to share his opinion, and said so. At the same time there came into my mind the full consciousness that the glorification here lay in the peculiar circumstances of the case—to wit the presence and companionship of these two sweet and refined girls. The elder was in creamy white, relieved by a flower or two, which set off her soft dark beauty to perfection; the other was garbed in some light blue gossamer sort of arrangement which matched her eyes and went wonderfully with her golden hair, and ladies, if you want anything more definitely descriptive I’m afraid you’ll be disappointed, for what do I, Godfrey Glanton, trader in the Zulu, know about such awesome and wondrous mysteries? I only know—and that I do know—when anything appeals to me as perfect and not to be improved upon—and the picture which these two presented certainly did so appeal.

Outside, the blaze of sunlight—rich, full, and golden, without being oppressive or overpowering—lay slumbrous upon the sheeny roll of foliage. Here and there the red face of a krantz gleamed like bronze, and away on a distant spur the dark ring of a native kraal sent upward its spiral of blue smoke. Bright winged little sugar birds flitted familiarly in and out among the passion flower creeper which helped to shade the stoep, quite unaffected by our presence and conversation—though half scared temporarily as a laugh would escape Falkner or myself. Striped butterflies hovered among the sunflowers in front, and the booming hum of large bees mingled with the shriller whizz of long-waisted hornets sailing in and out of their paper-like nests under the roof—and at these if they ventured too low, Arlo, whose graceful white form lay curled up beside his mistress’ chair, would now and again fling up his head with a vicious snap. The scene, the hour, was one of the most perfect and restful peace: little did we think, we who sat there, enjoying it to the full, what of horror and dread lay before us ere we should look upon such another.

Chapter Twelve.

The Mystery of the Waterhole.

Suddenly Arlo sprang up, barking furiously.

“Shut up, you brute,” growled Falkner, for this sudden interruption had, as he put it, made him jump. But the dog heeded him not, as he sprang up and rushed down the steps still giving vehement tongue.

“Be quiet, Arlo, do you hear!” ordered his mistress. “It’s only Ivondwe.”

The calm clear voice commanded obedience where Falkner’s bluster did not. To the furious barking succeeded a series of threatening growls, not loud but deep. In the midst of which the innocent cause of the disturbance appeared, smiling, and as little perturbed by this sudden and rather formidable onslaught, as though it were a matter of an ordinary kraal cur.

To the physiognomist this Ivondwe was a remarkably prepossessing native—rather handsome in the good-looking style of his race. He had a pleasant, open countenance, good-humoured withal, and when he smiled it would be hard to equal his display of magnificent white teeth. Though somewhat past his first youth and the owner of a couple of wives he did not wear the head-ring; for he was fond of earning money in doing spells of work for white men, such as waggon driving, or the sort of job on which he was now engaged: and this being so he held, and perhaps rightly, that the ring would not be exactly in keeping. I had known him well for some time and had always had a high opinion of him.

Now he saluted, and addressing himself to Falkner, in very fair English, asked leave to go over to a neighbouring kraal after the cattle were in. There was a merrymaking there, on the strength of the wedding of someone or other of his numerous kinsfolk.

“So, Ivondwe,” I said, in the vernacular, when he had got his answer. “So you speak with the tongue of the Amangisi, and I knew it not?”

He laughed.

“That is so, Iqalaqala,” he answered. “Yet it is well for Umsindo, who is long since tired of talking to deaf ones. Au! How shall he talk yonder—kwa Majendwa?”

Umsindo, meaning a man who is given to swagger, was Falkner’s native name, though he didn’t know it.

“That we shall see,” I said. “It may be that by then his tongue will have become loosened. But now, while he is away you must do well by these here. They treat you well, and their hands are very open—so open that soon you will be for building a new hut.”

He laughed, and owned that such might indeed be the case. All the while the great white dog was walking up and down behind him, eyeing his calves and snarling malevolently.

“The dog,” I went on. “He is very unfriendly towards you. Why?”

“Who may say? The dogs of the white people are seldom friendly to us, and our dogs are seldom friendly to the whites. And this dog is very white.”

I got out a large native snuff tube I always carried, and gave him some.

“Come up to Isipanga before we start,” I said. “I have a present there for him who should serve these faithfully.”

“You are my father, Iqalaqala,” and with this formula of thanks, he once more saluted and went his way.

“What have you been talking about all this time?” said Edith Sewin. “By the way isn’t it extraordinary that Arlo won’t take to Ivondwe? Such a good boy as he is, too.”

“Perhaps he’s a thundering great scoundrel at bottom,” said Falkner, “and Arlo’s instinct gets below the surface.”

“Who’s a thundering great scoundrel at bottom, Falkner?” said Mrs Sewin’s voice in the doorway.

“Eh. Oh come now, aunt. You mustn’t use these slang terms you know. Look, you’re shocking Glanton like anything.”

“You’ll shock him more for an abominably rude boy who pokes fun at his elders,” laughed the old lady. “But come in now and have tea. What a lovely afternoon it is—but a trifle drowsy.”

“Meaning that somebody’s been asleep,” rejoined Falkner mischievously, climbing out of his hammock. “Oh well. So it is. Let’s go for a stroll presently or we shall all be going to sleep. Might take the fishing lines and see what we can get out of the waterhole.”

“Fishing lines? And it’s Sunday,” said Mrs Sewin, who was old fashioned.

“Oh I forgot. Never mind the lines. We can souse Arlo in and teach him to dive.”

“We can do nothing of the kind,” said Arlo’s owner, decisively. “He came within an ace of splitting his poor dear head the last time you threw him in, and from such a height too. What do you think of that, Mr Glanton?” turning to me. And then she gave me the story of how Falkner had taken advantage of the too obedient and confiding Arlo—and of course I sympathised.

When we got fairly under way for our stroll—I had some difficulty by the bye in out-manoeuvring the Major’s efforts to keep me pottering about listening to his schemes as to his hobby—the garden to wit—the heat of the day had given place to the most perfect part of the same, the glow of the waning afternoon, when the sun is but one hour or so off his disappearance. We sauntered along a winding bush path, perforce in single file, and soon, when this widened, I don’t know how, but I found myself walking beside Miss Sewin.

I believe I was rather silent. The fact is, reason myself out of it as I would, I was not in the least anxious to leave home, and now that it had come to the point would have welcomed any excuse to have thrown up the trip. Yet I was not a millionaire—very far from it—consequently money had to be made somehow, and here was a chance of making quite a tidy bit—making it too, in a way that to myself was easy, and absolutely congenial. Yet I would have shirked it. Why?

“What is preoccupying your thoughts to such an alarming extent,” said my companion, flashing at me a smile in which lurked a spice of mischief. “Is it the cares and perils of your expedition—or what?”

“By Jove—I must apologise. You must find me very dull, Miss Sewin,” I answered, throwing off my preoccupation as with an effort. “The fact is I believe I was thinking of something of the kind—ruling out the ‘perils.’ Do you know, I believe you’ve all been rather spoiling me here—spoiling me, I mean, for—well, for my ordinary life. But—anyhow, the memory of the times I have known lately—of days like this for instance—will be something to have with one, wherever one is.”

I was stopped by a surprised look in her face. Her eyes had opened somewhat, as I had delivered myself of the above rather lame declamation. Yet I had spoken with quite an unwonted degree of warmth, when contrasted with my ordinary laconic way of expressing myself. “Good Lord!” I thought, “I seem to be getting sentimental. No wonder she thinks I’ve got softening of the brain.”

But if she thought so she gave no sign of anything of the sort. On the contrary her tone was kind and sympathetic, as she said:

“Strange how little we can enter into the lives of others. Now yours, I suppose, is lonely enough at times.”

“Oh, I’ve nothing to complain of,” I answered with a laugh, anxious to dispel any impression of sentimentality which my former words and tone might have set up. “I started on this sort of life young, and have been at it in one way or another ever since. It hasn’t used me badly, either.”

She looked at me, with that straight, clear glance, and again a little smile that was rather enigmatical, hovered around her lips. But before she could say anything, even if she had intended to, Falkner’s voice was raised in front.

“Wake up, Aïda, and come along. I’m just going to heave Arlo in.”

“No. You’re not to,” she cried hurrying forward.

The others had already reached the waterhole, and there was Falkner, on the rock brink, holding on to Arlo, grinning mischievously. The dog was licking his hands, and whining softly, his tail agitating in deprecatory wags. He wasn’t in the least anxious for the plunge—and speaking personally I should have been uncommonly sorry to have undertaken to make him take it against his will, but then Falkner was one of the family. Now there was a half playful scrimmage between him and his cousin, in the result of which Arlo was rescued from taking what really was rather a high leap, and frisked and gambolled around us in delight.

This waterhole or pool, was rather a curious one. It filled a cup-like basin about twenty-five yards across, surrounded by precipitous rocks save at the lower end, and here, overflowing, it trickled down to join the Tugela, about half a mile distant. It was fed from a spring from above, which flowed down a gully thickly festooned with maidenhair fern. Where we now stood, viz. at the highest point, there was a sheer drop of about twenty feet to the surface of the water—a high leap for a dog, though this one had done it two or three times and had come to no harm. The hole was of considerable depth, and right in the centre rose a flat-headed rock. It was a curious waterhole, as I said, and quite unique, and I more than suspected, though I could never get anything definite out of them, that the natives honoured it with some sort of superstitious regard. Incidentally it held plenty of coarse fish, of no great size, likewise stupendous eels—item of course mud-turtles galore.

“Hie in, old dog! Hie in!” cried Falkner.

But Arlo had no intention whatever of “hie-ing in,” being in that sense very much of an “old dog.” He barked in response and frisked and wagged his tail, the while keeping well beyond reach of Falkners treacherous grasp.

“Rum place this, Glanton,” said the latter. “I wonder there ain’t any crocs in it.”

“How do you know there are not?” I said.

“Oh hang it, what d’you mean? Why we’ve swum here often enough, haven’t we?”

“Not very. Still—it’s jolly deep you know. There may be underground tunnels, connecting it with anywhere?”

“Oh hang it. I never thought of that. What a chap you are for putting one off a thing, Glanton.”

“I never said there were, mind. I only suggested the possibility.”

He raised himself on one elbow, and his then occupation—shying stones at every mud-turtle that showed an unwary head—was suspended.

“By Jove! Are there any holes like this round Hensley’s place?” he said earnestly.

“Not any,” I answered. “This one is unique; hence its curiosity.”

“Because, if there were, that might account for where the old chap’s got to. Underground tunnels! I never thought of that, by Jove. What d’you think of that, Edith? Supposing you were having a quiet swim here, and some jolly croc grabbed you by the leg and lugged you into one of those underground tunnels Glanton says there are. Eh?” grinned Falkner, who was fond of teasing his cousins.

“I wouldn’t be having a quiet swim in it, for one thing. I think it’s a horrid place,” answered the girl, while I for my part, mildly disclaimed having made any such statement as that which he had attributed to me.

“Bosh!” he declared. “Why you can take splendid headers from the middle rock there. Oh—good Lord!”

The exclamation was forcible, and to it was appended a sort of amazed gasp from all who saw. And in truth I was not the least amazed of the lot. For there was a disturbance in the depths of the pool. One glimpse of something smooth, and sinuous, and shiny—something huge, and certainly horrible—was all we obtained, as not even breaking the surface to which it rose, the thing, whatever it might be—sank away from sight.

“What was it?”

“Can’t say for certain,” I said, replying to the general query. “It didn’t come up high enough to take any shape at all. It might have been a big python lying at the bottom of the hole, and concluding it had lain there long enough came up, when the sight of us scared it down again. I’m pretty sure it wasn’t a crocodile.”

“Tell you what, Glanton. You don’t catch me taking any more headers in there again in a hurry,” said Falkner. “Ugh! If we’d only known!”

“There is prestige in the unknown,” I said. “It may be something quite harmless—some big lizard, or a harmless snake.”

“Well it’s dashed odd we should just have been talking of that very sort of thing,” said the Major. “Let’s keep quiet now and watch, and see if it comes up again.”

We did, but nothing came of it. Indeed if I alone had seen the thing I should have distrusted my senses, should have thought my imagination was playing me false. But they had all seen it.

“I shall come down here again with the rifle and watch for an hour or two a day,” said Falkner. “Or how would it be to try bait for the beast, whatever it is—eh, Glanton?”

“Well you might try to-morrow. Otherwise there isn’t much time,” I answered. “We trek on Wednesday, remember.”

Now all hands having grown tired of sitting there, on the watch for what didn’t appear, a homeward move was suggested, and duly carried out. We had covered a good part of the distance when Miss Sewin made a discovery, and an unpleasant one. A gold coin which was wont to hang on her watch chain had disappeared.

“I must go back,” she said. “I wouldn’t lose that coin for anything. You know, Mr Glanton, I have a superstition about it.”

She went on to explain that she had it at the time we had seen the disturbance in the waterhole so that it must have come off on the way down, even if not actually while we were on the rocks up there. Of course I offered to go back and find it for her, but she would not hear of it. She must go herself, and equally of course I couldn’t let her go alone. Would I if I could? Well, my only fear was that Falkner would offer his escort. But he did not, only suggesting that as it was late it was not worth while bothering about the thing to-night. He would be sure to find it in the morning when he came up with a rifle to try and investigate the mystery of the pool. But she would not hear of this. She insisted on going back, and—I was jubilant.

I knew the coin well by sight. It was of heavy unalloyed gold, thickly stamped with an inscription in Arabic characters. But, as we took our way along the bush path, expecting every moment to catch the gleam of it amid the dust and stones, nothing of the sort rewarded our search, and finally we came to the rocks at the head of the pool.

“This is extraordinary and more than disappointing,” she said, as a hurried glance around showed no sign of the missing coin. “I know I had it on here because I was fingering it while we were looking at the water. I wouldn’t have lost it for anything. What can have become of it, Mr Glanton? Do you think it can have fallen into the water?”

“That, of course, isn’t impossible,” I said. “But—let’s have another search.”

I was bending down with a view to commencing this, when a cry from Aïda arrested me.

“Oh, there it is. Look.”

She was standing on the brink of the rocks where they were at their highest above water, peering over. Quickly I was at her side, and following her glance could make out something that glittered. It was in a crevice about five feet below, but as for being able to make it out for certain, why we could not. The crevice was narrow and dark.

“I think I can get at that,” I said, having taken in the potentialities of hand and foothold.

“No—no,” she answered. “I won’t have it. What if you were to fall into the water—after what we have just seen? No. Leave it till to-morrow, and bring a rope.”

This was absolutely sound sense, but I’ll own to a sort of swagger, show-off, inclination coming into my mind. The climb down was undoubtedly risky, but it would be on her account.

“As to that,” I answered with a laugh, “even if I were to tumble in, I should make such an almighty splash as to scare the father of all crocodiles, or whatever it is down there. By the time he’d recovered I should be out again on the other side.”

“Don’t risk it,” she repeated earnestly. “Leave it till to-morrow. With a long reim you can easily get down.”

But I was already partly over the rock. In another moment I should have been completely so, with the almost certain result, as I now began to realise, of tumbling headlong into the pool below, when a diversion occurred. Arlo, who had been lying at his mistress’ feet, now sprang up, and charged furiously at the nearest line of bush, barking and growling like mad.

Chapter Thirteen.

The Incident of the Lost Coin.

The dog stopped short, hackles erect, and fangs bared, emitting a series of deep-toned growls which to the object of his hostility should have been disconcerting, to put it mildly. But, somehow, he seemed disinclined to pursue his investigations to the bitter end. This was strange.

“What can it be?” was the thought in my own mind simultaneous with the voiced query of my companion.

Natives—Ivondwe excepted—were wont to hold Arlo in respect, not to say awe, upon first acquaintance. The one who now made his appearance, betrayed no sign of any such feeling, as he came towards us. Yet he was armed with nothing more reliable than a slender redwood stick. He came forward, deliberately, with firm step, as though no aroused and formidable beast were threatening him with a very sharp and gleaming pair of jaws, the sun glinting upon his head-ring and shining bronze frame, came forward and saluted. Then I noticed—we both noticed—that he had only one eye.

“Ha—Ukozi. I see you—see you again,” I observed, in greeting.

“Inkosikazi!” he uttered, saluting my companion.

What struck me at that moment was the behaviour of the dog. Instead of rushing in upon the new arrival, and putting him vigorously on the defensive until called off, as was his way, he seemed concerned to keep his distance, and while still growling and snarling in deep-toned mutter I could detect in his tone an unmistakable note of fear. This too was strange.

“Who is he?” said Miss Sewin, as the newcomer placidly squatted himself. “Is he a chief?”

“Something bigger perhaps,” I answered. “He’s a witch doctor.”

“What? A witch doctor?” her eyes brightening with interest. “I thought witch doctors were horrid shrivelled old creatures who wore all sorts of disgusting things as charms and amulets.”

“Most of them do, and so would this one when he’s plying his trade in earnest. Yet he’s about the biggest witch doctor along this border, and his fame extends to Zululand as well.”

“Ah!” as an idea struck her. “Now here’s a chance for him to keep up his reputation. I wonder if he could find my coin.”

As we both knew where it was—or indeed in any case—the opportunity seemed not a bad one. But I said:

“You must remember, Miss Sewin, that native doctors, like white ones, don’t practice for nothing, and often on the same terms. What if this one should ask as the price of his services—no—professional attendance, shouldn’t it be?—a great deal more than the lost article’s worth?”

“Don’t let him. But in any case I don’t believe he has the ghost of a chance of finding it.”

“Don’t you be too sure,” I said. And then, before I could open upon him on the subject Ukozi opened on me on another.

“Nyamaki is not home again, Iqalaqala?”

I was beginning to get sick of the disappearing Hensley by that time, so I answered shortly:

“Not yet.”

“Ha! The Queen cannot do everything, then. You did not go home that night, Iqalaqala?”

“I did not. Your múti is great, Ukozi—great enough to stop a horse.”

“Múti! Who talks of múti? I did but foresee. And Umsindo? He, too, did not reach Nyamaki’s house that night?”

“No.”

“What is in the water yonder?” he went on, bending over to look into the pool, for he had squatted himself very near its brink. “It moves.”

Both of us followed his gaze, instinctively, eagerly. And by Jove! as we looked, there arose the same disturbance, the same unwinding of what seemed like a shining sinuous coil, yet taking no definite shape. Again it sank, as it had risen, and a hiss of seething bubbles, and the circling rings radiating to the sides, alone bore witness to what had happened.

“I declare it’s rather uncanny,” said my companion. “Does he know what it is? Ask him.”

I put it to Ukozi. We had swum there several times, dived deep down too, nearly to the bottom, deep as it was, yet we had never been disturbed by anything. Only to-day, before his arrival, had we seen this thing for the first time—and that only once. He echoed my words, or part of them.

“Nearly to the bottom! But this place has no bottom.”

“Now you forget, father of mystery,” I said, knowingly. “It has, for we have sounded it, with a piece of lead at the end of a line.”

He looked amused, shaking his head softly.

“Yet, it is as I say,” he answered. “It has no bottom.”

Rapidly I gave Miss Sewin the burden of our conversation, and she looked puzzled. The while, Arlo, crouching a few yards off, was eyeing the witch doctor strangely, uttering low growls which deepened every time he made a movement, and still, beneath the sound I could always detect that same note of fear.

“What is in the water down there, Ukozi?” I said. “Not a crocodile. What then?”

He was in no hurry to reply. He took snuff.

“Who may tell?” he answered, having completed that important operation. “Yet, Iqalaqala, are you still inclined—you and Umsindo—to continue swimming there, and diving nearly to the bottom—ah-ah! nearly to the bottom?”

He had put his head on one side and was gazing at me with that expression of good-humoured mockery which a native knows so well how to assume. I, for my part, was owning to myself that it would take a very strong motive indeed to induce me to adventure my carcase again within the alluring depths of that confounded tagati pool, for so it now seemed. Moreover I knew I should get no definite enlightenment from him—at any rate that day—so thought I might just as well try him on the subject of Miss Sewin’s loss. But as I was about to put it to him he began:

“That which you seek is not down there.”

“Not down there?” I echoed. “But, what do we seek, father of the wise?”

“It shines.”

The thing was simple. He had found it and planted it somewhere, with a view to acquiring additional repute, and—incidentally—remuneration.

“I think we shall recover your coin, Miss Sewin,” I said.

“Ah. He can find it for us then? If he does I shall become quite a convert to witch doctorism, for want of a better word.”

“You will see. Now, Ukozi. Where is that which we seek?”

“Au! It shines—like the sun. To find it something else that shines will be necessary. Something that shines—like the moon.”

I laughed to myself over this “dark” saying, and produced a half-crown—a new one.

“Here is what shines like the moon at full,” I said.

He held out both hands, looked at it for a moment as it lay in the hollow thus formed, then said:

“Halfway between this and where you left the other white people is a redwood tree—of which two sticks point over the path. From the path on the other side, a slope of smooth rock falls away. Just below this—resting upright between two stones—one pointed, the other round—is that which you seek.”

Briefly I translated this to my companion. Her reception of it showed a practical mind.

“What if he wants to send us off on a fool’s errand while he climbs down to the crevice there and gets hold of the real coin?” she said.

“Well, of course, nothing’s impossible. But, do you know, I believe him. I would in fact risk a considerable bet on it.”

“Well, I am in your hands, Mr Glanton,” she said. “You know these people thoroughly. I, not at all.”

To tell the truth, I believed Ukozi’s statement completely, so much so as not to think it worth while bothering about any thought of the responsibility I might be incurring. Otherwise I might have foreseen a reproachful manner, and a sinking in her estimation, if we found nothing. So I poured the contents of my snuff tube into Ukozi’s hands and bade him farewell.

“I declare I feel quite excited over this,” Aïda Sewin said, as we rapidly retraced our steps. “Look. Here is where we left the others—and—there’s the slab of rock.”

“Yes. It won’t be a difficult scramble. Now Miss Sewin, you shall have the opportunity of verifying Ukozi’s dictum yourself. So—you go first.”

In a moment we were below the rock—a matter of ten yards’ descent—and, in a small dry watercourse beneath we descried the glint of something. A cry of delight escaped her.

“Why, here it is. Just exactly as he described. Come and look, Mr Glanton.”

Sure enough at our feet, leaning almost upright between the two stones—the pointed one and the round—was the lost coin.

“But what was it we saw in the crevice?” she said, when the first astonishment was over. “That seemed to shine, too.”

“Probably a point of rock worn smooth. Well, Ukozi has again borne out his reputation.”

“Again? Why? Have you tried him before?”

Her eyes seemed to search my face. There was—or seemed to be—no prevaricating.

“Well, perhaps. Once. Or rather, he tried me. I’ll tell you about it some day. By Jingo, it’s getting dark, and I don’t like the look of the sky. The sooner we’re in the better.”

Great solid masses of cloud were banking up beyond the further ridge of the Tugela valley, and a low boom of thunder shivered the still air. A storm was coming up; probably a heavy one.

“How do you account for this kind of thing?” she said as we regained the path. “Could he have been passing here at the time I dropped the coin, and deliberately planned a sort of coup de theâtre?”

“In that case Arlo would have warned us of his presence. Yet he gave no sign.”

“Of course. And talking about Arlo, wasn’t it strange how he seemed not to mind that man’s presence? Why he can hardly be held in when a strange native comes about.”

“Yes. I noticed it. I suppose his instinct must have told him Ukozi was about to do us a good turn.”

She turned towards me, then shook her head.

“You are turning it off, Mr Glanton, I can see that. Yet there is something rather weird and inexplicable about the whole thing. You know, I was watching the witch doctor when the reptile or whatever it was came up in the pool, and it looked just as if he had raised it by some incantation. It is interesting very—but—rather eerie.”

“Oh they have their tricks of the trade, which they don’t divulge, you may be sure. The coin finding was really cleverly worked, however it was done; for, mind you, he came from quite the contrary direction, and, as a sheer matter of time, could have been nowhere near the place we found it in when we turned back.”

“It’s wonderful certainly, and I’m very glad indeed to have found my coin again. You must have seen some strange things in the course of your experience among these people, Mr Glanton? Tell me—what is the strangest of them?”

“If I were to tell you you wouldn’t believe me. Hallo! We’d better quicken our pace. I suppose you don’t want to arrive home wet through.”

The thundercloud had spread with amazing speed and blackness. The soft evening air had become hot and oppressive. Some self-denial was involved on my part in thus hurrying her, for I would fain have drawn out this walk alone with her, having now become, as you will say, Godfrey Glanton complete fool. Yet not such a fool as not to be blessed with a glimmer of common-sense, and this told me that, woman-like, she would not thank me for bringing her home in a state of draggled skirt and dripping, streaming hair, which would inevitably be the case did we fail to reach the house before the downpour should burst.

We did however so reach it, and there a surprise awaited, to me, I may as well own, not altogether a pleasant one, for it took the shape of Kendrew. Now Kendrew, as I have said, was a good fellow enough, yet this was the last evening I should spend here for some time. Kendrew was all very well at his own place or at mine—but somehow I didn’t want him here, at any rate not to-day, added to which he was a good-looking chap, and lively—a novelty too. There, you see—I am not above owning to my own small meannesses. It transpired moreover that I was the indirect agency through which he was there, for the first thing he said on seeing me was:

“There you are, Glanton. Thought I’d ride up and see how you were getting on, and when I got to your place they told me you had come down here. So I thought I’d come on and find you, and take the opportunity of making Major Sewin’s acquaintance at the same time. Nothing like getting to know one’s neighbours, and there ain’t so many of them, eh?”

“Glad you did,” I answered, shaking hands with him as heartily as ever. Yet at bottom, that “neighbour” idea struck unpleasantly. Kendrew as a neighbour was all very well, and I nailed him as such—for myself, but confound it, I didn’t want him getting too “neighbourly” here; and that, too, just as I was going away myself for a time. And then I realised, more fully than ever, what it meant to me to be fulfilling the rôle of a sort of little Providence to these people. Now Kendrew would lay himself out to do that during my absence, and in short, on my return I might find, to use a vulgar syllogism, that my own nose had been most effectually put out of joint.

They had taken to him already, and were on the best of terms—I could see that. Kendrew was one of those jolly, happy-go-lucky souls that people do take to on sight, and he had youth on his side. Moreover my misgivings were in no wise dispelled by the look of surprised whole-hearted admiration which came into his face at sight of Aïda Sewin. There was no mistaking this, for if there is one thing I pride myself on it is a faculty for reading every expression of the human countenance no matter how swift and fleeting such may be. Perhaps it is that constant intercourse with savages has endowed me with one of their most unfailing characteristics, but, at any rate, there it is.

“We’re going to have a storm,” said the Major, looking upward. “Aïda—Glanton—you’re only just in time. You too, Mr Kendrew. You’ll stay the night of course?”

Kendrew answered that he’d be delighted, and forthwith began to make himself at home in his free and easy fashion. He was not in the least afflicted with shyness, and had no objection whatever to being drawn on the subject of his experiences. He had plenty of stories to tell, and told them well too, only perhaps it was rather mean of me to think that he need not so uniformly have made himself the hero of each and all of them. I don’t know that I can plead in extenuation that when we sat down to table the fellow by some means or other contrived to manoeuvre himself into the chair next to Miss Sewin, a seat I had especially marked out for myself, and in fact usually filled. Added to which, once there, he must needs fill up the intervals between blowing his own trumpet by talking to her in a confoundedly confidential, appropriating sort of style; which I entirely though secretly resented. And I was on the eve of an absence! Decidedly events tended to sour me that evening—and it was the last.

“What’s the matter? Did the old witch doctor tell you something momentous that you forgot to pass on to me? You are very silent to-night.”

It was her voice. We had risen from table and I had gone out on to the stoep, “to see if the storm was passing off,” as I put it carelessly. There was a chorus of voices and laughter within, Kendrew having turned the tables on Falkner in the course of some idiotic chaff.

“Am I?” I answered. “I get that way sometimes. Result of living alone, I suppose. No, Ukozi did not tell me anything stupendous. Amusing chap, Kendrew, isn’t he?” as another chorus of laughter went up from within.

“He seems a nice sort of boy. And now—you start on Wednesday? Shall we see you again between this and then?”

“I’m afraid not, Miss Sewin. Tyingoza’s nephew has disappointed me over the span of oxen he was going to hire me, and I shall have to spend to-morrow and the day after riding Heaven knows where in search of another span. Oxen—at any rate reliable ones—are precious scarce just now everywhere.”