Part 26 (2/2)

”Wished well and acted well towards us?” echoed one of these. ”_Au_!

And our cattle--whose hand was it that destroyed them daily?”

This was applying the match with a vengeance.

”Yea--whose?” they shouted. ”That of Jonemi.”

Their mood was rapidly growing more ugly, their demeanour threatening.

Those who had been inclined to good humour before, now looked black.

Several, darting out from the rest, began to go through the performance of ”gwaza,” throwing themselves into every conceivable contortion of attack or defence, then, rus.h.i.+ng at their prisoner, would make a lightning-like stab at him, just arresting the a.s.segai blade within a foot of his body, or the same sort of performance would be gone through with a battle-axe. It was horribly trying to the nerves, dangerous, too, and John Ames was very sick of it.

”Keep the gun, then, if you will,” he said. ”But now I must go on my way again. _Hlalani-gahle 'madoda_.” And he made as if he would depart. But they barred his way.

”Now, nay, Jonemi. Now, nay,” they cried, ”Madula, our father, would fain see _his_ father again, and he is at hand. Come now with us, Jonemi, for it will be good for him to look upon thy face again.”

The words were spoken jeeringly, and he knew it. But he pretended not to. Boldness alone would serve his course. Yet his heart was like water within him at the thought of Nidia, how she would be waiting his coming, hour after hour--but no--he must not think of it, if he wanted to keep his mind. Madula, too, owed him a bitter grudge as the actual instrument for carrying out the cattle destroying edict, and was sure to order him to be put to death. Such an opportunity of revenge was not likely to be foregone by a savage, who, moreover, was already responsible for more than one wholesale and treacherous murder.

”Yes,” he answered, ”Madula was my friend. I would fain see him again-- also Samvu.”

”_Hau_! Samvu? There is no Samvu,” said one, with a constrained air.

”The whites have shot him.”

”In battle?” said John Ames, quickly.

”Not so. They found him and another man sitting still at home. They declared that he had helped kill 'Ingerfiel,' and they shot them both.”

”I am sorry,” John Ames said. ”Samvu was also my friend. I will never believe he did this.”

A hum, which might have been expressive of anything, rose from the listeners. But this news had filled John Ames with the gravest forebodings. If the chief's brother had been slain in battle, it would have been bad enough; but the fact that he had been shot down in cold blood out of sheer revenge by a band of whites, with or without the figment of a trial, would probably exasperate Madula and his clan to a most perilous extent, and seemed to aggravate the situation as regarded himself, well-nigh to the point of hopelessness.

They had been travelling all this while, and John Ames noticed they were taking very much the direction by which he had come. If only it would grow dark he might manage to give them the slip. But it was some way before sundown yet.

Turning into a lateral valley, numerous smokes were rising up above the rocks and trees. Fires? Yes, and men came crowding around the newcomers. Why, the place was swarming with rebels; and again bitterly did John Ames curse his fancied and foolish security.

He glanced at the eager, chattering faces which crowded up to stare at him, and recognised several. Might not there be among these some who would befriend him, even as Pukele had done before? He looked for Pukele, but looked in vain.

He strode up to Madula's camp to all outward appearance as unconcernedly as when he used to visit the chief's kraal before the outbreak. His line was to seem to ignore the fact of there being an outbreak, or at any rate that these here present had anything to do with it.

He found Madula seated against a rock smoking a pipe, and tricked out in war-gear. With him sat Zazwe, and another induna named Mayisela. And then, as if his position were not already critical enough, a new idea came to John Ames. These men had been seen by him under arms, in overt rebellion. Was it likely they would suffer him to depart, in order hereafter to bear testimony against them? Indeed, their method of returning his greeting augured the worst Madula was gruff even to rudeness, Mayisela sneeringly polite, while Zazwe condescended not to reply at all. Of this behaviour, however, he took no notice, and sitting down opposite them, began to talk. Why were they all under arms in this way? He was glad to have found Madula. He had wanted to find Madula to induce him to return to his former location. The police officer and his wife had been murdered, but that had been done by policemen. It was impossible that Madula could have countenanced that.

Why then had he fled? Why not return?

A scornful murmur from the three chiefs greeted these remarks. Madula with great deliberation knocked his pipe empty on a stone, and stretched out his hand for tobacco, which John Ames promptly gave him. Then he replied that they had not ”fled.” He knew nothing of Inglefield, and did not care. If his _Amapolise_ were tired of him they were quite right to get rid of him. They had not fled. The time had come for them to take their own land again. There were no whites left by this time, except a few who were shut up in Bulawayo, and even for these a road was left open out of the country. If they failed to take it they would soon be starved out.

This was news. Bulawayo, at any rate, had not been surprised. It was probably strongly laagered. But they would give no detail. All the whites in the country had been killed, save only these few, they declared. Yet he did not believe this statement in its entirety.

John Ames, as he sat there, talking, to all outward appearance as though no rebellion had taken place, knew that his life hung upon a hair.

There was a s.h.i.+fty sullenness about the manner of the indunas that was not lost upon him. And groups of their followers would continually saunter up to observe him, some swaggering and talking loud, though in deference to the chiefs, not coming very near, others quiet, but all scowling and hostile. Nothing escaped him. He read the general demeanour of the savages like an open book. Short of a miracle he was destined not to leave this place alive.

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