“There is, further, a good milch cow for the Umlimo,” spake Madúla, “and for his child a heifer.”
“It is well. There will soon be no more,” repeated the wizard.
“And three fat-tailed sheep, and for Umlimo a young bull,” said Samvu.
“That, too, is good,” was the cold acknowledgment of Shiminya, “for there will soon be no more.”
Now, cattle constitute the very life of all the South African tribes, wherefore the three chiefs felt their hearts sink as they realised the gist of this doleful prophecy. The rinderpest had not as yet made its appearance in their midst, but was very soon destined to do so, and the sorcerers of the nation, having gained secret information that the terrible scourge was, in the ordinary course of things, bound to be upon them soon from further north, used their knowledge as a most powerful lever towards promoting the uprising they were straining every nerve to bring about. In this they found willing aid from many of the chiefs, who saw their power and influence waning day by day; themselves forced to be the subservient vassals of a few – from their point of view – upstart and arrogant whites.
“Why, then, should Makiwa (Matabele term for the white man) wish to bewitch all the cattle?” said Madúla, who at present was in the vacillating stage, though the high-handed action we have recorded, on the part of the native police, had gone far towards settling him in the wrong direction. “They will suffer equally with ourselves.”
“Our cattle are our life. Their life is in other things,” pronounced Shiminya, who never looked at his interlocutors when he spoke, thus giving his answers an oracular air, as though inspired by the magic stuff into whose black depth he was gazing. “We die. They live.”
“Hau!” cried the listeners, fully comprehending the hint.
“Not many times will the moon be at full before this death is upon us,” went on the wizard, still without looking up. “If there are no whites left in the land, then will it be averted.”
Again that hollow groan proceeded from the hut. Their feelings worked up to an artificial pitch, the superstitious savages felt something like a shudder run through their frames. But the imperturbable Shiminya went on:
“There are two who must die – Pukele, the son of Mambane.”
“He who is servant to Jonemi?” queried Madúla.
“The same.”
“Has he done wrong?” said Samvu, for the man named was one of Madúla’s people, and neither of the brothers liked this edict.
“He knows too much,” was the remorseless reply. “The other is Ntatu, formerly wife of Makani.”
A measure of relief came into the countenances of the two chiefs. A woman more or less mattered nothing, but they did not like to sacrifice one of their men.
“It is the ‘word’ of Umlimo,” pursued Shiminya, decisively. “This must be.” And for the first time he raised his eyes, and fixed them upon the two chiefs with cruel, snake-like stare.
“What is the life of a man, more or less, when Umlimo has spoken?” said Zazwe, thus throwing in the weight of his influence with the dictum of the sorcerer. “A man, too, who is faithful to one of these whites set over us! Au! Umlimo is wise.”
This carried the day; and after some more talk, mostly “dark,” and consisting of hints, the three chiefs, gathering up their assegais, withdrew.
Left alone, Shiminya still sat there, satisfied that his sanguinary edict would be carried out. A dead silence reigned over the great thorn thicket, and as though the satanic influence which seemed to brood upon the place imparted itself to wild Nature, even the very birds forbore to flutter and chirp in its immediate vicinity. The sun sank to the western horizon, shedding its arrows of golden light upon the myriad sharp points of the sea of thorns, then dipped below the rim of the world, and still the grim wizard squatted, like a crafty, cruel, bloodthirsty spider, in the midst of his vast web, though indeed the comparison is a libel on the insect, who slays to appease hunger, whereas this human spider was wont to doom his victims out of a sheer diabolical lust of cruelty and the power which he could sway through that agency. This day, indeed, he might feel content, for it had not been wasted. But the day was not over yet – oh no – not quite yet. Still, would it be possible for this satanic being to commit further deeds of atrocity and of blood? Well, is there not the wretched sufferer lying bound and helpless within the hut?
Again that low, vibrating hum sounded forth. It seemed to come from the thick of the thorn palisade. The deeply plotting brain of the wizard was again on the alert, but its owner evinced no eagerness, not even looking up from what he was doing. Some person or persons had unawares touched the hidden communication wire which, situated at the entrance of the narrow labyrinthine passage leading to the kraal, signalled such approach.
Shiminya’s discernment was consummate in every sense he possessed; indeed, this faculty had not a little to do with the ascendency he had gained. In the very footsteps of the new comer, shod with the amanyatelo– a kind of raw-hide sandal used as protection in thorny country – his keen ear could gather a whole volume of information. They were, in fact, to him an open index of the new comer’s mind. While distant they indicated a mind made up, yet not altogether removed from, the verge of wavering; the possession of a purpose, yet not altogether a whole-heartedness in its carrying out. Nearer they revealed the vulgar trepidation attendant upon the mere fact of approaching a place so sinister and redoubtable as the múti den of a renowned sorcerer, and that in the dim hours of night.
For the brief twilight had long since passed, and now a golden moon, in its third quarter, hung lamplike in the sky, and, save in the shadows, its soft brilliance revealed every detail almost as clear as in the day. It fell on the form of a tall, powerfully built savage, standing there in the gateway, naked save for the mútya, unarmed save for a short, heavy knobstick. This he laid down as he drew near the wizard.
“Greeting, my father,” he uttered.
“Greeting, Nanzicele,” replied the sorcerer, without looking up.
Divested of his civilised and official trappings, the ex-sergeant of police looked what he was – a barbarian pure and simple, no whit less of a one, in fact, than those over whom he was vested with a little brief authority. Whether this visit was made in the interests of loyalty to his superiors or not may hereinafter appear.
“Hast thou brought what I desired of thee, Nanzicele?” said the wizard, coming direct to the point.
Nanzicele, who had squatted himself on the ground opposite the other, now fumbled in a skin bag which was hung around him, and produced a packet. It was small, but solid and heavy.
“What is this?” said Shiminya, counting out ten Martini-Henry cartridges. “Ten? Only ten! Au! When I promised thee vengeance it was not for such poor reward as this.”
“They are not easily obtained, my father. The men from whom I got these will be punished to-morrow for not having them; but I care not. Be content with a few, for few are better than none. And – this vengeance?”
“Thou knowest Pukele – the servant of Jonemi?”
“The son of Mambane?”
“The son of Mambane, who helped hoot thee out of his kraal when thou wouldst not offer enough lobola for Nompiza. He is to die.”
Nanzicele leaped with delight. “When? How?” he cried. “Now will my eyes have a feast indeed.”
“At thy hand. The manner and the time are of thine own choosing. To thee has Umlimo left it.”
Nanzicele’s glee was dashed. His jaw fell.
“Au! I have no wish to dance in the air at the end of a long rope,” he growled; “and such would assuredly be my fate if I slew Pukele, even as it was that of Fondosa, the son of Mbai, who was an innyanga even as thyself, my father. Whau! I saw