The Luck of Gerard Ridgeley Part 26

"Sicalu," was the rather sullen reply.

"Well, Sicalu, you shall go with my driver, Fulani, and help to bring them in. When you return this little looking-gla.s.s shall be yours. But you will carry the 'word' of your father, Sonkwana, the _induna_ of the chief, that those who guard the oxen may know I require them."

The lad stared, as well he might. So, too, did Sonkwana. Indeed, it was hard to say which was the more amazed of the two. As for the trader's own people, such thorough confidence had they in him, that they were astonished at nothing, in which spirit Fulani no sooner heard the above order than he stood prepared to carry it out.

"Will you not ride out yourself and look at your cattle Jandosi, as you have ever done before?" said the councillor.

"Not so, Sonkwana. This time they shall be brought to me. Give the boy the 'word,' _induna_ of the chief."

Sonkwana cast a sidelong glance toward the kraal, then looked slyly at the speaker. What did it matter! Let him be humoured this once.

"Go," he said to the boy.

The hours of the afternoon crept on, and still Dawes sat there, outwardly calm, inwardly in a state of indescribable suspense. By this time, he was sure Gerard had got through, otherwise he would have been brought back. Sonkwana, too, sat wondering. He would fain have departed, but that his involuntary "host" never left him out of his sight, and to undertake to cross several hundred yards of open ground contrary to the wishes of a man who could hit a small pebble at almost any distance with the rifle ever ready in his hand, was not in Zulu human nature, at any rate, in cold blood. So in outward tranquillity Sonkwana vied with his "host" aforesaid, and sat and took a great deal of snuff.

More surprise, however, was awaiting both him and his clansmen. Towards sundown, the trader's outspan became alive with the lowing of cattle and the shout and whistle of those in charge. Then in the most matter-of-fact way, John Dawes gave orders to inspan.

Prompt, intelligent, and as we have said, having every confidence in their employer, the two drivers, Sintoba and Fulani, and their well-trained subordinates, were quick to act. In an incredibly short s.p.a.ce of time, the waggons were ready for the road. But during the process, Dawes had never left the side of the hostage.

The latter, for his part, looked with a kind of contemptuous amus.e.m.e.nt upon the whole affair. Did this fool think he was going to walk off in any such free and easy sort of fas.h.i.+on without the "word" of the chief.

He glanced towards the kraal.

So too, we may be sure, did Dawes, with well-concealed, but infinitely greater anxiety. Heads could be seen cl.u.s.tering at the palisades, but still no armed force issued from the gates. What could it mean?

"Trek!" he cried, when the inspanning was completed.

"Trek--trek!" echoed the drivers, and the whips cracked to the accompaniment of a running gamut of the names of the horned members of the span. The oxen plunged forward to the yokes, and the great vehicles rolled heavily from their standing place of many weeks.

"_Whau_, Jandosi!" said Sonkwana. "If you are leaving us, had I not better carry your word of farewell to the chief?"

"Not so, Sonkwana. The road is not very familiar to me; besides, it is fitting that a councillor of the chief should start me in safety on my journey. There is safety on the road, but off it there is death," he added darkly.

No shade of his meaning was lost upon his hearer, who made a virtue of necessity, and accepted the position in such wise as though it had been himself who had suggested it. Besides, the guard on the ridge was strong. That had yet to be pa.s.sed.

On moved the waggons; on moved the whole trek; deliberately making for the exit of the hollow, the leader and driver of each in their places, the three Swazis driving the cattle, for the sheep and goats had been bartered away for cows and oxen; John Dawes walking beside the first waggon, with Sonkwana. On--past the kraal with its great circle of domed huts, but still no opposition. What did it mean? This silence, this pa.s.siveness on the part of their hitherto aggressive and turbulent gaolers was portentous.

It was a critical time for Dawes. Each moment he expected the air to be rent with the ferocious war-cry, to hear the ground rumble beneath the advance of running feet. How came it that he was allowed to march out thus with colours flying and drums beating, to march out with all the honours of war? The chief's councillor was in his power.

No sooner had he arrived at this conclusion than his sense of security was rudely interrupted. They had gained the ridge, and now, with loud and threatening shouts, the guards rushed down upon them.

"Order them back, Sonkwana. Order them back," said Dawes, in a quick low tone. "To hesitate is death," he added.

The _induna_ glanced at Dawes. The latter's att.i.tude, though apparently careless, he well knew was not really so. He himself would receive a bullet in the brain without being able to lift a finger, and save for a short stick he was unarmed. Reluctantly, therefore, he obeyed.

But even his authority hardly seemed to avail here. The guards, some two score of stalwart and boisterous savages, continued to advance, but with less demonstration of hostility, with less fell intent of purpose.

Finally, in compliance with the energetic signalling of the councillor, they halted and began to parley.

The while the trek had not halted, and the two waggons already over the ridge were proceeding down the rugged hillside with the utmost care and deliberation. Suddenly Dawes beheld a quick, cunning expression of triumph flit across the face of the hostage, and following the glance of the latter, the curtain of despair descended in black folds once more upon his heart.

For the _veldt_ was alive with warriors, swarming down from the ridge, charging forward in silence, swift in deadly fixity of purpose. They had already pa.s.sed the cattle herds, and were making straight for himself.

"Order them back, Sonkwana! Order them back!" cried Dawes again, this time drawing his revolver and pointing it straight at the head of the hostage.

But the latter saw his chance, or thought he did. Ducking his head suddenly, he made a rapid plunge to the side, intending, so near were his tribesmen, to fling himself into their ranks. The trader in his flurry and dismay would be certain to miss his aim, he reckoned.

He reckoned without his host, however. Instead of the ball whistling through empty air where his head had been but a moment before, Dawes's eye, keen as a razor, quick as lightning, had marked the move. By a sort of backward throw of the hand he covered the fleeing form of the foolhardy Sonkwana, and pressed the trigger. The chief's councillor toppled heavily forward on his face, and lay with outstretched arms. He was stone dead.

What followed was appalling. The report of the pistol was completely drowned in the wild roar of rage that went up. The first life had been taken, and that life a valuable one.

"Stand back!" cried Dawes, his eyes flas.h.i.+ng fire.

He might as well have tried to make his voice heard amid the thunder of an Atlantic gale beating among the rocks of the Lizard, or have tried to force back the power of its gigantic surges. His double gun levelled low, he poured the contents of the smooth barrel, loaded heavily with _loepers_--a large variety of buck shot--into the dense crowd. The result was terrible.

It was all he had time to do, though. The wild, shrill yells of pain were drowned in the thunderous din, as the resistless volume of the charge poured over him. He had a vague recollection of once again raking the closely packed a.s.sailants with his other barrel ere he was swept from his feet, and hurled half-stunned to the earth, and of a fierce, grim feeling of satisfaction that he had sold his life pretty dearly. Then the gleaming blades of spears flashed before, his eyes, and he knew his last hour had come.

Still their points did not pierce him. Half-stunned, half-dazed, he became aware that some one was standing over him, averting the threatened blows. Collecting his scattered senses, he stared and stared again at this unexpected preserver. He recognised Vunawayo.

He was seized and held fast, and amid many a brutal kick and blow, his hands and feet were securely bound, and he was flung into the waggon like a log of wood. Then with wild yells and shouting, the Igazipuza forced round the oxen, and compelling the terrified servants to obey their behests, and lead and drive the spans, they started upon their triumphant return amid an indescribable scene of tumultuous rejoicing.

At the first onset Sintoba had drawn the a.s.segai which he carried concealed about his person, and had leaped to the a.s.sistance of his master. Had tried to, that is, for he, too, had been overwhelmed and borne down by the impetuous fury of the rush. The same fate had overtaken those in charge of the hindmost waggon, except one of the young leaders whom the savages had slaughtered in the first fierce caprice of their blood-l.u.s.t, and whose corpse, ripped up and otherwise hideously hacked, lay by the wayside as they returned. The other servants, as we have said, they compelled to engineer the waggons.

Battered, bruised, his bones nearly broken, his joints racked well-nigh to dislocation point by the terrific jolting, poor Dawes lay where they had thrown him, grinding his teeth in his impotent rage and pain.

Better to have been killed outright, he thought. He was only spared for some lingering torture--the hideous stake of impalement, most likely.

Many had fallen at his hand in that brief moment--their spirits would be satisfied by no less a sacrifice.

The savages, running beside the waggons, jeered at his sufferings.

"Does it hurt--does it hurt, Jandosi?" they cried, as an extra big jolt would nearly brain the unfortunate man. "Ah! ah! there are some things that hurt far more--far more!"

Thus in wild and riotous shouting the whole crowd arrived once more at the gate of the Igazipuza kraal--and here the terrible confusion of the tumult beggars description--the shrill nasal singing of the women who turned out to meet them, the yelping clamour of dogs, the howling of those whose relatives were slain, and the sonorous rhythm of the war-song, all mingled together in the most ear-splitting, brain-stunning din.

Sintoba and his fellows, having outspanned in compliance with the peremptory orders of their captors, were seized and unceremoniously bound. Then poor Dawes was hauled out of the waggon and brutally dragged through the kraal, amid kicks and cuffs, to where the chief was sitting. Then he was flung roughly and anyhow upon the ground.

For some moments did Ingonyama contemplate the helpless form of his captive in silence, and in his ma.s.sive countenance was a gleam of ruthless, vengeful ferocity. He had sat in fear, here on this very spot, the last time this white man occupied it with him--in fear of his life, be, Ingonyama, the chief of the redoubted Igazipuza. Now the tables were turned. This miserable captive, bruised, helpless, lying there half-stunned, should taste what it meant to tread on the paw of the lion.

"Well, Jandosi?" he began sneeringly. "You are a bird whose song is over loud; yet now surely are your wings cut."

If John Dawes's bodily att.i.tude was abject, it was only through force of circ.u.mstances. His mental one was very far from having attained that state. With a painful effort he succeeded, amid the jeering laughter of the spectators, in raising himself to an upright sitting posture.

"You are right, Ingonyama," he replied. "My song is over loud--for you.

It is even how being sung at Undini, in ears in which it is bad for you that it shall be poured. Did I not tell you my 'tongue' was a long one and spoke far? Even now it speaks."

"_Hi_! And did I not tell you that we have a Tooth here which can bite it short? You and your 'tongue' shall be bitten on The Tooth, Jandosi!"

"_Ehe! E-he_!" roared the listeners. "To The Tooth, to The Tooth with him!"

It was the hour of sunset, and the sweet golden glow fell upon a wild sea of ferocious figures, of hideous mouthing faces and gleaming spear-blades. The whole population had mustered within the kraal, and were crowding up, striving to obtain a view of the chief and his councillors and the white prisoner; and again and again from the savage roaring throats went up the fiendish shout.