at these words. A dark form had glided silently in among them all. It was only one of their camp servants, but – a native of the country. What if he had heard – had understood? He knew some English too!
“Even if you got through the pickets of majara, Blachland,” struck in Sybrandt, when this man had retired; “you’d have another factor to reckon with. The King’s Snake.”
“Eh?”
“The King’s Snake.”
Blachland spluttered. “See here, Sybrandt,” he said. “Are you seriously trying to fill me up? Me, mind? No, it can’t be.”
“Well, the Matabele say there’s a big snake mounting guard over Umzilikazi’s remains. It is the King’s spirit which has passed into the snake. That is why the snake comes in such a lot when they go periodically and give the sibonga at his grave.”
“And you believe that?”
“They say so.”
“What sort of a snake is it?”
“A black imamba. Mind you, I’ve never seen it.”
“Don’t you be so cocksure about everything, Blachland,” grunted Pemberton, who was fast dropping asleep. “Luck or no luck, there’s mighty rum things happen you can’t explain, nor scare up any sort of reason for.”
“Won’t do – no, not for half a minute,” returned the other, briskly and decisively. “You can explain everything; and as for luck, and all that sort of thing – why, it’s only fit for old women, and the lower orders.”
Pemberton grunted again, and more sleepily still. His pipe at that moment fell out of his mouth, and he lurched over, fast asleep. Sybrandt, too, was nodding, but through his drowsiness he noticed that the native, a low-class Matabele, Hlangulu by name, was moving about, as though trying to sidle up near enough to catch some of the conversation. He was drowsy, however, and soon dropped off.
Blachland, sitting there, felt anything but inclined for sleep. This new idea had caught on to his mind with a powerful hold. It was full of risk, and the object to be attained nil. The snake story he dismissed as sheer savage legend, childish and poor even as such. The luck theory, propounded by Pemberton, smacked of the turnip-fed lore of the average chaw-bacon in rural England. No, the risk lay in the picket-guard. That, to his mind, constituted the real peril, and the only one. It, however, might be avoided; and, the more he thought about it, the more resolved was Hilary Blachland to penetrate the forbidden recess, to explore the tomb of the warrior King, and that at any risk.
Strangely wakeful, he lounged there, filling and lighting pipe after pipe of good Magaliesberg. The stars gleamed forth from the dark vault, so bright and clear and lamp-like in the glow of night in those high, subtropical latitudes, that it seemed as though the hand had but to be stretched forth to grasp them. Away over the veldt, jackals yelped; and the glimmer of the camp fire, dying low, emboldened the hungry little beasts to come nearer and nearer, attracted by the fresh meat brought in during that afternoon. The native followers, their heads in their blankets, had ceased their sonorous hum of gossip, and were mingling their snores with the somewhat discomforting sounds emitted by the nostrils of Pemberton. Away on the northern sky-line, a faint glow still hung, and from time to time a muffled snatch of far-away song. A dance of some sort was in late progress at the King’s kraal, but such had no novelty for Blachland. The exploration of the King’s grave, however, had; and he could think upon nothing else. Yet, could he have foreseen, his companions had uttered words of sound wisdom. He had better have left Umzilikazi’s sepulchre severely alone.
Chapter Two.
Before the King
“Tumble out, Blachland. We’ve got to go up and interview the King.” Thus Sybrandt at an early hour on the following morning. “And,” he added in a low voice, “I hope the indaba will end satisfactorily, that’s all.”
“Why shouldn’t it?” was the rather sleepy rejoinder. And the speaker kicked off his blanket, and, sitting up, yawned and stretched himself.
Three savage-looking Matabele were squatted on the ground just within the camp. They were majara, and were arrayed in full regimentals, i.e. fantastic bedizenments of cowhair and monkey-skin, and their heads crowned with the isiqoba, or ball of feathers; one long plume from the wing of a crested crane stuck into this, pointing aloft like a horn. The expression of their faces was that of truculent contempt, as their glance roamed scornfully from the camp servants, moving about their divers occupations, to the white men, to whom they were bearers of a peremptory summons. It was significant of the ominous character of the latter, no less than of the temper of arrogant hostility felt towards the whites by the younger men of the nation, that these sat there, toying with the blades of their assegais and battle-axes; for a remonstrance from Sybrandt against so gross a violation of etiquette as to enter a friendly camp with weapons in their hands had been met by a curt refusal to disarm, on the ground that they were King’s warriors, and, further, that they were of the King’s bodyguard, and, as such, were armed, even in the presence of the Great Great One himself.
“I only hope no inkling of what we were talking about yesterday has got wind, Blachland,” explained Sybrandt, seriously. “If Lo Ben got such a notion into his head – why then, good night. As to which, do you happen to notice that one of our fellows is missing? No, no; don’t say his name. Those three jokers have got their ears wide open, and are smart at putting two and two together.”
Thoroughly awake now, Blachland, looking around, became aware of the significance of the other’s statement. One of the “boys” was missing, and that the one who had seemed to be overhearing when they had talked on that dangerous topic – Hlangulu, the Matabele.
“Hurry now, Amakiwa,” growled one of the messengers. “Is not the Great Great One waiting?”
“He can wait a little longer, umfane,” rejoined Pemberton, tranquilly sipping his coffee, which was hot.
“Ah! Who but a madman would provoke the wrath of the Black Bull?” growled the savage.
Pemberton nodded. “The Black Bull in this case is no longer a calf,” he replied. “Therefore he will know that everything cannot be done in a hurry.”
The three savages scowled and muttered. In their heart of hearts they had an immense respect for these cool, imperturbable white men, so entirely but unobtrusively fearless.
At last the latter arose, and, buckling on their bandoliers and taking their rifles, declared that they were ready.
“Put those down. The Great Great One has sent for you. You cannot go before him armed,” said one of the envoys insolently, pointing with his knob stick. But for all the effect the injunction had upon those to whom it was addressed, it might just as well not have been uttered. The slightest possible raising of an eyebrow alone showed that they had so much as heard it. The horses were brought round saddled, and, mounting, they started, a kind of instinct moving them to outmanoeuvre each attempt of their truculent summoners to bring up the rear. But as they moved out of camp the idea was the same in all four minds – whether they were destined ever to re-enter it.
Lo Bengula was, at that time, friendly to the English. Sick of haggling with rival concession-mongers, he had finally concluded terms for the occupation of adjacent Mashunaland, and, having made the best of a bad job, felt relieved that his lines were henceforth cast in peaceful and pleasant places. But he reckoned without the nation which produced Drake and Hawkins, Raleigh and Clive, and – Cecil Rhodes.
He
