Kitabı oku: «The White Hand and the Black: A Story of the Natal Rising», sayfa 12
Chapter Twenty Two.
The War-Dance at Tongwana’s
Elvesdon was seated at a table within an open tent, together with his clerk – a table littered with official books and documents. He rose quickly at the sound of horse-hoofs and went forth to welcome the party.
“Thornhill – how are you? Miss Carden – you are taking on a fine healthy sunburn – and as for Diane chasseresse– why words fail.”
He had taken to so nicknaming Edala since the bushbuck hunt and she seemed rather to like it. They laughed, and after a little more banter Thornhill said:
“Had any bother with the people, Elvesdon?”
“Not a grain. They’ve all paid up right willingly. It’s when we get to Babatyana’s place that we may find trouble.”
“Where is the dance to be held, Mr Elvesdon?” said Evelyn. “Here?”
“Why not? It’s as good a place as any. I’ll ask Tongwana.”
He called to the old chief, who was seated on the ground among a small group a little way off. Tongwana came forward, and saluted Thornhill, and there was a lot of talk and banter.
“I have not seen thee since the day of the ‘king of serpents’ my father,” the latter was saying.
“Whau! that was a great day, and a great snake,” chuckled the old man.
“So that’s the big chief?” commented Evelyn. “He doesn’t look particularly dignified.”
“He’s very old,” explained Elvesdon. “But whatever he looks he’s all right. He and Zavula are the best men in authority we’ve got.” Then turning again to the old chief, “What has become of Zavula, my father? Three times have I sent for him, and it is said that he is lying sick.”
“I had not heard that, Nkose. But I am growing old. The young men toss the news about from one to the other; but we old ones —au! It is good night.”
“It’s rather a rum thing, Thornhill, but I’m not quite easy in my mind about old Zavula. He came to the office to tell me a very queer story the last time I saw him, and every time I ask after him they say he is sick.”
“H’m!” said Thornhill, drily.
“He’s such a straight old chap too. Now I think we can shut up shop – you ladies would like tea, I know, before the fun begins.”
It was the middle of the afternoon, blue and cloudless. The camp was pitched upon a slight eminence, the ground falling away, grassy and open, on either side. Crowning another eminence less than a mile away stood Tongwana’s kraal – its numerous huts forming a circle after the Zulu fashion, though not surrounded by a ring fence, and near it, along a bushy ridge, stood several lesser kraals. In the clear stillness of the air the voices of their denizens and the occasional barking of dogs is distinctly borne hither.
“You’ll see something now, Evelyn,” said Edala. “A Kafir dance is no end exciting. I always long to join in.”
“How many will take part in it?”
“Oh I daresay Tongwana can turn us out a couple of hundred at a pinch,” said Elvesdon. “Perhaps more.”
Already dark forms converging in groups upon the chief’s kraal seemed, by their numbers, to give colour to the last statement.
“More, I hope,” pronounced Edala.
The police escort, who, with Prior, were to convey back the proceeds of the collecting, had saddled up and were all ready to march, when one trooper stepped forward, and saluting Elvesdon begged to be allowed to remain and witness the dancing. He was a fresh-faced intelligent looking young fellow, probably not long out from home. The magistrate could see at a glance that he was a ‘gentleman ranker.’ He seemed so eager and earnest about it that Elvesdon said:
“Very well, Parry. You can stay. Any objection, sergeant?”
“No, sir.”
The boy’s face flushed with delight. He had read plentifully about this sort of thing – in fact such reading had had largely to do with bringing him out to the country at all. Now he was going to see it – to see the real thing.
Soon arose from Tongwana’s kraal a weird, long-drawn cry. By this time the chief and every native in the immediate neighbourhood of the camp – except Elvesdon’s servants – had disappeared. The cry was echoed, then taken up by many voices till it tailed off into a kind of strophe-like chant. Then from the distant kraal a broad dark stream was issuing, its blackness relieved as it drew nearer, by many a patch of white. Suddenly the chant changed to a lower key, and its sombre thunder-notes harmonised to the measured tread of the marching warriors.
These, for their parts, offered a perfect spectacle of wild picturesqueness. Each and all had discarded any article of European clothing, and were arrayed in the fantastic, if spare adornments of native apparel; the mútya of cat-tails and cow-hide, beads and bangles, jackal teeth necklaces, flowing tufts of cow-hair, and other gimcrackery of the kind. Then too, the points of bright assegais gleamed wickedly in the sunshine, and the variegated faces of broad shields, lent colour to the wild array.
The column advanced, marching four deep. The rapping of assegai hafts against shield sticks, beat a weird accompaniment to the war-song, which, now risen to a deafening roar, ceased, with a suddenness that was almost startling, as the whole array spreading out into crescent formation, halted, and flinging the right hand aloft, shouted, as one man:
“Amakosi!” (“Chiefs!”)
“They ought to have given the Bayéte, to a representative of Government – confound their cheek!” murmured Elvesdon, who was filling his pipe. “That’s the salute royal, you know, Miss Carden.”
“Oh, it doesn’t matter,” was the answer. “They look grand – grand, but a little alarming. Still I’m so glad we came.”
“Don’t know about a couple of hundred,” remarked Thornhill. “More like six or seven.”
Now again the song and dance was renewed. So catching was the latter that the European spectators found themselves beating time with their feet. The stamping of the excited warriors shook the earth, sending up long streams of yellow dust into the sunlit air. Young warriors would dart from the ranks, and leaping nearly their own height from the ground volley forth a torrent of words as they went through an imaginary pantomime of their prowess, their eyeballs white and rolling, seeming to burst from their faces, the flash of their bright blades like zig-zagged lightning. Then, with an appalling roar, the crescent extended itself on either side, and charged full speed up to the spectators hemming them now in a complete circle. Evelyn Carden gave a little cry of alarm and she felt herself growing pale.
“It’s all right. It’s part of the show,” said Elvesdon reassuringly, puffing at his pipe.
“Is it? Well, it’s rather startling,” she answered, reassured however, by the fact that the rest of the party, including Edala, remained unmoved.
There certainly was something horribly real about it. Six or seven hundred frantic savages, worked up to the wildest stage of excitement, hemming you in in a dense impenetrable circle of dark musky bodies and waving blades, roaring like wild beasts and vociferating that the said blades should shine white no longer, but red – red, may easily become a situation somewhat trying to the nerves, especially to those of the other sex. Then, suddenly, as if by magic, the uproar ceased. The warriors saluted again, then crooning a low toned, rather plaintive sounding chant, dropped back to their original position. Here they were harangued by an orator, his periods being greeted by an expressive hum. When he ceased, the whole body gathered up its weapons, and moved swiftly away over the veldt – this time in silence.
“Curtain on Act One,” said Elvesdon. “We’ll stroll up now to yonder ridge. We are going to see a sham fight, or rather a surprise. They are about to attack and capture somebody’s kraal – I couldn’t catch his name – over the other side, and make it as much like the real thing as possible. I and old Tongwana arranged it all this morning. The last harangue was with the object of bucking up the fighting men. So let’s get on.”
“It’s a splendid sight, sir,” said the young police trooper diffidently, as they walked. “I’m no end grateful to you for letting me see it.”
Elvesdon turned to him good naturedly.
“Yes, it’s an interesting show, isn’t it, Parry? By the way, you might add to your pay by knocking up a description of it for one of the home magazines – or even two. The native question is likely to come very prominently before the British public soon.”
The young fellow flushed.
“I had thought of doing something of the kind,” he said.
“All right. And if you want any information in addition I’ll give it you – of course if it’s a kind I can give,” added Elvesdon, with a meaning laugh.
On reaching the ridge they looked down upon another kraal in front of them. Its inhabitants were loafing about over their usual avocations or lack of such, in apparent ignorance of the black destruction that was about to overwhelm them. But of the assailants there was as yet no sign.
Elvesdon who had been chatting a little further with the young Police trooper was somewhat behind the party. Then he became aware of the presence of a native – an old man – who, squatted under a bush, was apparently hailing him. He stopped. The old man with shaking fingers, was fumbling in his bag, to produce therefrom – a letter.
Such a letter, dirty, greasy, enclosed in a common looking envelope, addressed moreover, to himself, in a sprawling, uneducated hand.
“Who gave you this?” he asked.
“That I know not, Nkose. One of the people.”
Elvesdon was about to open it – but just then there were signs of renewed activity below. The attacking impi was getting into position. He thrust the envelope into his pocket. It would keep. It was only some ill-spelt scrawl written by some half – educated native making excuses for not coming to pay his taxes. He was often the recipient of such. Of course it would keep. Then he rejoined the party.
“Come along, Mr Elvesdon,” cried Edala, excitedly. “They are going to begin.”
“They won’t really kill each other, will they, Mr Elvesdon?” asked Evelyn, with some real anxiety.
“They seem to get so carried away, you know. What if they should come to blows in real earnest? No, but that could not be, could it?”
He hastened to reassure her on that point. The whole programme was that of a wonderfully dramatic and realistic show got up for their entertainment. If she chose to let her imagination go, why that would only add to the excitement – to her – he appended, with an easy laugh.
He stole a glance at Edala. She was standing a little apart eagerly watching the manoeuvres beneath, a slight flush of excitement in her cheeks, and the expressive eyes wide and interested. He had deliberately come to the conclusion that it would be a difficult and dreary thing to go on living without her, and yet how would she look at it? He knew that she liked him, but he wanted her to do a great deal more than that. In all probability however, she in the brightness of her youth looked upon him as quite an old fogey. Well, he must make some opportunity of putting it to the test. Why not do so this evening, on the way home? Yes, he would; yet it was with some sinking of the heart that he realised that the test would probably break down.
“What can you be thinking about? You look quite worried.”
Edala had turned to him as he joined her, with wonder in her eyes. Here was his chance had they been alone together.
“I am, rather,” he answered in an undertone. For a moment her glance rested full upon him, then turned away.
“They are beginning down there,” she said.
The impi beneath was on the march, and they could trace its course, pouring upward through grass and bushes towards the doomed kraal. Then suddenly its stealthy advance changed into a swift charge, the while its lines extended, throwing out the terrible outflanking ‘horns,’ and with a mighty roar it hurled itself upon its objective.
The kraal was in a state of indescribable confusion; men, women and children pouring forth helter-skelter from the only side left open. In vain. Here, too, those terrible horns closed up, and there ensued a scene of discriminate massacre, to the accompaniment of the most diabolical shouts and hisses. The spectators could scarcely believe it was not real. Evelyn Carden’s face had gone quite white, and even that of Edala looked disturbed.
“What awful creatures!” said the former. “Mr Elvesdon, are you sure it isn’t real? I can hardly believe it.”
“No – no. It’s not real. But it’s marvellously well counterfeited.”
“It’s too dreadful. I don’t think I care to look at it any more.”
“Well, look at this. They are retiring now.”
The impi had formed up, and, raising a mighty song of victory was moving away from the scene of the mock massacre. Down through the valley it poured, with a movement that was partly a march and partly a dance, and the deep-toned thunder-notes of the triumph song rose to a pitch of fell ferocity that was rather terrifying, so realistic had the whole thing been.
Elvesdon suddenly remembered the letter which had been given him; and now that the show was over he thought he might as well investigate it.
But the first glance at the scrawl which he unfolded made him start. This is how it ran:
“Mr Elvesdon, resident Magistrate.
“Sir,
“You are a good man. I not want to see you hurt. I not want to see Christian ladies hurt. I am Christian too. Get your party away so soon as you ever can.
“I not give my name – but – do.
“Remember Mr Hope.”
Chapter Twenty Three.
After the Warning
Just as he had thought, decided Elvesdon. Clearly the letter was from some half – educated native, but how different its import to that which he had expected. Was it a hoax, he wondered? Anyway its substance was sufficiently disquieting. Surely so tried and trusted a chief as old Tongwana could not be guilty of any such ghastly act of treachery as that hinted at. His people, too, had paid up their taxes without a murmur. The thing looked like a hoax.
It might be well to be on the safe side; to get his party away at once. But then his official prestige and influence would be irretrievably wrecked. He would be showing distrust – fear – of those over whom he held authority. But the sting of the whole communication lay in the concluding words, “Remember Mr Hope.”
These referred to a tragedy, which had befallen a little over a quarter of a century back. The victim had been a magistrate in Pondoland, and had been treacherously set upon and murdered, together with his two clerks, while witnessing just such an entertainment as had been provided here to-day.
Elvesdon was a boy at the time but he had since served in Pondoland – as we heard him tell Thornhill – and there at that time the event was still sufficiently fresh. But for those concluding words he would have felt inclined to set the communication down as a practical joke.
Rapidly his clear mind reviewed the position. His camp was quite a mile away; they had strolled that distance in order to gain the point whence they could overlook the mimic attack upon the kraal. The horses were knee-haltered, and grazing under the charge of his two boys, and they were a little beyond, on the other side of the camp. The impi was marching down the valley in a direction which should take it rather away from the camp than towards it. Tongwana’s kraal seemed deserted; even the women had hurried out to see the sham fight.
“We may as well get back to camp now,” he said carelessly. “The show’s about over, and we shan’t be home much before dark as it is.”
But there were two upon whom his carelessness did not altogether impose – Edala and her father. The girl, naturally sharp-witted as she was, had not failed to note the ever so slight involuntary start which had escaped him on the perusal of the missive, while Thornhill took in by instinct that something was wrong. Both, however, forebore to take any outward notice of the fact: for which he was devoutly thankful, for at all costs he must avoid alarming the weaker ones of the party. He would have given much for an opportunity of taking Thornhill into counsel, but this would have had the very effect he was anxious to avoid.
“There’s an official matter I want to get home and look into as soon as I can,” he explained carelessly. “Here, Parry. You can ride on and say I’m coming.”
He took the young Police trooper apart, as they walked.
“Look here,” he said, “and attend carefully. Go down to the camp as fast as you can walk – can walk, mind, not run – and get the horses saddled up as soon as you possibly can; ours first, you understand, not the boys’: and see that the girths are tight enough. Then all of you bring them out here to meet us; and every minute you save in doing it is a minute gained. You understand?”
“Yes, sir.”
“If anything happens use your own judgment, but we must have the horses as soon as ever we can, yet you must not run or show any sign of hurry. It’ll mean good for you my lad, very good. Now go.”
The young fellow saluted, and started off down the slope at a brisk springy walk which represented nearly four and a half miles an hour. He was radiant with pride. Naturally sharp, he had to a certain extent grasped the situation, and here, after a few months in the force, he found himself entrusted with a real and critical mission, with the promise of the good word of his superior. Visions of unheard of promotion floated upon his mental sight, as he paced downward to the camp, with rapid, elastic step.
Elvesdon strove to talk cheerfully, as they took their way down at a perforce slower pace than that of the young Police trooper – but it was difficult. The ridge was well between them and the impi now, but the latter might at any moment appear over it, or where it ended farther down. Had he been alone, or alone with Thornhill, he would not have felt overmuch concerned. He was as brave a man as ever lived, and endowed with his full share of nerve. He would, if the worst came to the worst, have chanced the moral effect of a display of the confidence of authority and absolute fearlessness. But now, with these two women dependent on them for protection, why it was dreadful. He reproached himself bitterly for having brought them into this peril; for, in the disturbed and simmering state of the native locations, who could be trusted? More bitterly still, perhaps, did he reproach himself for his neglect to open the communication handed to him by the old man. Then there would have been time for them to have acted upon the warning conveyed therein, and to have withdrawn while the attention of the savages was engaged by the mimic surprise of the kraal. Now it was in all probability too late.
Now he began to revolve in his mind what should be done in the event of Parry being unable to fulfil his instructions in time. He had a fight revolver in his pocket, and he suspected Thornhill was not unarmed. But of what use were they against an overwhelming crowd, all heavily armed, and right out in the open? They might shoot down a few, but would not this exasperate the savages into murdering the girls as well? Of course it would.
The wide landscape slept in the golden sunshine, the rolling plains unfolding out into misty dimness, on the one hand; on the other the outlines of distant heights softened against the clear blue. From Tongwana’s kraal, crowning the adjacent eminence, a smoke reek rose lazily upon the still air. An idea suggested itself to Elvesdon. Why not take the bull by the horns and go straight to Tongwana’s kraal? Surely there, under, figuratively speaking, the roof of the old chief, they would be safe. But just then he could see his emissary in the act of faithfully fulfilling the duty laid upon him. Down at the camp the horses were being led in. They might find safety at Tongwana’s kraal, but the Police trooper, caught alone, would certainly be murdered, if things were as desperate as the warning embodied in the letter seemed to convey. But – if only Parry would hurry up!
Now some inkling of danger seemed to have come over the weaker side of the party. Elvesdon’s silence had told – it was impossible for him to keep up his attempts at manufactured conversation under the weight of responsibility which lay upon him. They, too, were reduced to silence, and, he became aware, were looking at him curiously and furtively.
“I don’t know that I want to see one of these native performances again,” said Evelyn Carden. “Don’t think me unappreciative, Mr Elvesdon, but really this has given me the creeps. It all seemed so fearfully natural.”
“Ah, well. It isn’t musical comedy, you know,” he answered with forced lightness.
“Old Tongwana ought to have figured in a swallow-tailed coat and a top hat and a mútya” said Thornhill. “That might have given a Gilbert and Sullivan smack to it.”
The laugh that greeted this was feeble. But now Elvesdon noted with intense relief that the horses had been saddled up at last – they themselves had more than halved the distance to the camp by that time, and of coarse could see everything that was going on there all the way.
Too late.
A burst of voices on the right front, and then the impi appeared, pouring over the ridge, forming a dense black line between them and the camp and, of course the horses. Then, extending, the warriors executed the surround manoeuvre and having thus completely hemmed in their guests – or their victims – they recommenced the war-dance.
“Oh for Heaven’s sake, Mr Elvesdon, tell them to stop and go away,” said Evelyn Carden. “This is horrible, hateful.”
Elvesdon called out to more than one whom he knew by name but if they heard him they pretended not to. If the first performance had been terrifying to the uninitiated this one was infinitely more so: the roaring and the stamping, the sea of dreadful faces and gleaming bared teeth, the forest of waving blades, and the animal-like musky odour – as the frenzied circle tightened, its dense ranks drawing nearer and nearer. It was of no use for both men to shout at the top of their voices that they had had enough of the show, and that the ladies were getting frightened. The roaring only increased and the foremost of the frenzied performers shook their blades right in their faces. Elvesdon was convinced that his last moment had come. This was exactly the Hope programme repeated. It was hard to be butchered unresisting, but any resistance would certainly involve the massacre of the girls as well.
A sort of gasp from Evelyn made him turn. She was sinking to the ground.
“I feel rather faint,” she murmured.
Elvesdon bent down to help her, and as he did so he was suddenly seized from behind by several powerful hands, most effectively pinioning him. At the same time half a dozen assegai blades were held against his chest. And precisely the same thing had happened to Thornhill.
“Resist not, either of you,” said an authoritative voice. “Any resistance and all shall die – all, all of you.”
“What does it mean?” asked Elvesdon, shortly.
“This, Ntwezi. For you two we have a use. For your women we have none. They may go home. But, only if you make no resistance.”
“We agree,” said Thornhill. “But let us see them – see them with our own eyes, depart in safety. There are their horses.”
Parry, although he was going into certain death, had ridden as near as he could to the tumult. With some difficulty he was leading two horses, and both of these were under side saddles.
“Kill him – kill him,” began to be cried. “He is Only a common policeman. He is of no use.”
“But he is of use,” shouted Elvesdon, who began now to see his way, hearing this. “No common man is he. He is only playing at police.”
This was effective. Three hostages were better than two. Parry’s life was saved – for the present, but he was ordered to dismount, and by the advice of his superior he complied. His revolver was taken from him – Thornhill and Elvesdon had been similarly disarmed – and he was immediately hemmed in by a ring of blades.
“Now tell your women to go,” said the man who appeared to be exercising chief authority. “I will send men with them to see them safe to their home.”
“May I not bid my daughter farewell?” said Thornhill, with something of a tremor in his voice, and instinctively taking a step forward. Instantly a line of blades barred his way.
“Be content, be content,” answered the chief. “You are still alive, and your women are safe. Now walk.”
“To Tongwana?”
No reply was made to this, but there was no help for it. Hemmed closely in by the huge armed force, they were marched along over the very ground which they had traversed so light-heartedly barely an hour before. No indignity was offered them, but they knew that escape was as impossible as though they had been bound with thongs – at any rate just then.
They had this consolation however. The chief had kept his word. Looking backward just before they plunged over the ridge they could make out the mounted figures of the two girls away over the plain, the armed escort, keeping pace, distributed on either side – and they were making for home, not for Kwabulazi.
