I was not dead, _Nkose_; or, indeed, how should I be here telling you my
story? Or, if I were--well, at any rate, the magic which had been
powerful enough to draw me through the abode of those who had become
ghosts was powerful enough to bring me back to life and to the world
again--and yet I know not. It is a terrible thing to look upon the
faces of those who have long been dead; and how shall a man--being a
man--do this unless he join their number? Such faces, however, had I
looked upon, for, as I opened my eyes once more to the light of the sun,
no dim recollection of one who has slept and dreamed was mine. No; the
mysterious cave, the magic fire, the fearsome sights I had beheld--all
was real--as real as the trees and rocks upon which I now looked--as
real as the sky above and the sun shining from it.
Yes; I was in the outer air once more. I rose and stood up. My limbs
were firm and strong as before, my hand still grasped the broad spear--
the white shield lay at my feet. Before me was the smooth rock wall,
there the exact spot where it had opened to receive me. But there it
might remain, closed for ever, for all I cared. I had no wish to look
further into its dark and evil mysteries. But now, again, the voice
came back to my ears, faint and far away this time, but without the
mocking mirth which had lured me before to what might have been my doom.
"Ho, Untuswa!" it cried; "wouldst thou see more of the unseen? Wouldst
thou look further into the future?"
"I think not, my father," I answered. "To those who deal in magic be
the ways of magic, to warriors the ways of war--and I am a warrior."
"And thine _inkosikazi_, Untuswa, what of her?"
"Help me to slay the ghost-bull who deals forth the Red Death, my
father!" I pleaded eagerly.
There was no answer to this for long. Then, weary of waiting, I was
about to turn away, when once more the voice spake from within the
rock--faint, as before.
"Great is the House of Matyobane; great is the House of Senzangakona;
Umzilikazi is ruler of the world to-day--but Dingane is greater. Yet
to-morrow, where now are the many nations they have stamped flat there
shall _they_ be. Dust--all dust! Gasitye sees it."
"Ha! And shall I see it too, my father?"
"Thou shalt see it, Untuswa. Thou, too, shalt see it."
Now, when I heard the name of Gasitye, I knew it as the name of a great
seer and prophet who dwelt alone among the mountains, and who was held
in wide repute among all tribes and peoples, near and far. His own
tribe nobody knew exactly, but it was supposed that his age was three
times that of the oldest man known. Even Umzilikazi himself had more
than once sent secretly to consult him, with gifts; for the rest, nobody
cared to interfere with him, for even the most powerful of kings does
not desire the enmity of a great and dreaded sorcerer, whose magic,
moreover, is real, and not as that of the tribal _izanusi_--a cheat to
encompass the death of men. And now I had encountered this world-famed
wizard; had beheld him alone in the heart of the rock, whose face he had
the power to open and shut at will.
"Help me to slay the ghost-bull, my father," I entreated again.
"And when thou hast slain it--what then?"
"Then it shall be well with me and mine."
"Well with thee and thine? Will it then--with thee and thine! Ha, ha!"
repeated the voice within the cliff, in the same tone of mockery as
before. "Go now and slay it, Untuswa, thou valiant one. Go!"
I waited some little time, but no further answer could I obtain, though
I spoke both loud and softly. Then I turned away.
As I did so a strange feeling came over me, a feeling as of the
faintness caused by starvation. The fumes of the wizard fire had worn
off in the clear open air, and I felt as though I could spend the rest
of my life eating, so hungry was I. So, losing no time, I started back
to where I had left Jambula.
Then upon my mind came the recollection of the death-yell I had heard
when within the vault. Ha! I must proceed with care. I glanced
upward. The sun was well up when I entered the rock; now it was at its
highest overhead. I had not been as long in that vault of fear as it
seemed.
Now there struck upon my nostrils a most horrible stench as of death and
putrefaction. What did it mean? I had passed this spot this very
morning and the air was pure and clear. Death might have taken place--
but putrefaction?--_au_, there was not time for that. Yet this was a
place of witchcraft, where everything was possible. And, thus thinking,
I came right upon a human body.
It was in a horrible state, _Nkose_, in the state of one who has been
dead eight or ten days. Yet here such could not have been the case, for
in the swollen, half-decayed features, as well as by articles of
clothing, I recognised the second of the two slaves, whom I had left
alive and well that same morning, but a very few hours before. Yet,
there it lay, beneath a tree, with upturned face, and across the
decaying ribs the rending gash left by the horn of the ghost-bull.
Now I heard a voice in salute, behind me--a voice I knew. Looking up, I
beheld my slave, Jambula.
He was looking strangely at me. Then he broke forth into extravagant
words of welcome, and it seemed to me he had been badly frightened, and
was glad enough to behold me once more. That was it, of course; so
giving no further thought to the matter at all, I bade him find food.
He had a number of speckled pigeons, which he had knocked over with his
kerries; and having kindled a fire on the flat top of a high rock for
safety's sake--_whau, Nkose_!--there was soon nothing left of those
birds. The while Jambula eyed me strangely.
Now this Jambula--although my slave--was a man I held in great favour.
He was not of any of the races we had conquered, but came of a tribe
further to the southward than even the Zulu arms had ever reached. Him
I had captured while storming the fortress of a mountain tribe, and the
King had allotted him to me: He was a tall, strong man, and knew not
fear, and was faithful and devoted to me as any dog. Now he said:
"I think _this_ night must this thing of _tagati_ be slain, my father."
"We think the same, Jambula," I answered. "But what I cannot quite
think out is _how_. But that will come."
"Nevertheless, let it be this night, father. I have a plan."
This plan he then unfolded to me, and by the time we had talked it out
and around it was nearly dark--nearly time to set it working.
Never had any spot struck upon my mind as more ghostly and even
terrifying than that haunted valley when night drew fairly down; and,
_Nkose_, what I had seen and gone through in the wizard cave that
morning seemed to have sapped my former fearlessness. A low-lying mist
wreathed around the tree-stems and bushes, thick to near the height of a
man, then thinning out dimly just enough to show out the twinkle of a
star or two. But there was light enough for our purpose.
Hard by the place where Suru, the first slave, had been killed was an
open space, thickly studded with rocks embedded in the earth, and one
side of this open was overhung with mimosas of a good height and
strength. Clambering up one of these, I lay out upon the spreading
branches. Jambula remained below.
The night watch wore on--even the night side of life seemed hushed in
this abode of wizardry and fear. Suddenly all the blood within me
tingled and burned. Something was moving. And then above the ghostly
wreathings of the white mist I could see the gigantic head--the huge
horns curving upwards--of the ghost-beast.
Only the head was visible as, tilted upwards, nose in air, it moved
above the sea of vapour, to and fro, as though seeking for something or
somebody--for a fresh victim, perhaps--and I thought it might indeed
soon find one. And as I looked the mist suddenly rolled away, revealing
the dark form of Jambula, standing upright against a small rock.
For the moment the beast did not see him. It continued to run hither
and thither in the moonlight, and as I marked its gigantic proportions,
my heart sank, for I knew that to kill such a thing as this
single-handed was very nearly the hardest task ever entrusted to me.
It was huge in the dim light--black as night, and as large as an
elephant almost. There was that in the very size of the thing no less
than in the glaring ferocity of its eyes--which was enough to turn a
man's heart to water--for it could not be a thing of this earth. How,
then, could it be slain?
Now it began to mutter, like the growlings of a heavy thunderstorm, as
it ran to and fro, shaking its horrible head, and its dark, shaggy
frontlet of hair. _Whau_! That was a fearful sight as the thing drew
nearer. What of Jambula! He had not moved, beyond half turning his
head to get a better view of the horror. Would his heart fail him? I
almost expected it would.
Ha! It had seen him. It dropped into a sort of stealthy crouch, more
like that of a leopard or a lion than the movement of any horned animal;
and thus it came up swiftly behind him.
But Jambula was not asleep--oh no! There was no lack of wakefulness in
him. In a moment he whirled behind a rock, as the ghost-bull, uttering
a roar that shook the world, came at him with the swiftness of a
lightning flash.
Then began a scene indeed. Jambula, watching his opportunity, flitted
from rock to rock, but not less swiftly did the monster come after him--
seeming to fly through the air as it leaped over some of the lower rocks
which were in its way. _Hau_! Could this last? Would not Jambula, out
of breath, falter for one instant? Would not his foot stumble in the
tortuous rapidity of his flight? _Au_! Did that happen he were lost--
we both were lost.
Hither and thither he sped, the horrible beast ever behind him, roaring
in a fashion to turn a man's heart to water--the foam flying from its
mouth, the points of its huge horns tossing wildly, its savage eyes
seeming indeed to flash flame. Would they never come beneath the tree
where I--the great assegai gripped and ready--lay out along the bough
waiting my chance?
This came. Jambula, who had been drawing the thing nearer and nearer to
my side of the ground, now broke from his shelter, and ran with all the
swiftness of which he was capable beneath my place of ambush. After him
came the ghost-beast, right under me.
This was my chance, _Nkose_, and my only one. Swift as the movements of
the horror itself, I dropped down upon the thing's back, and clinging
fast with the one hand, with the other I drove the point of my great
assegai into the joint of the spinal bone behind the skull.
_Whau, Nkose_! That was a moment. I know not quite what I expected to
happen. I felt the point of the great horn, thrown backward, narrowly
graze my side; then I was hurled through the air, as the huge body,
arrested in mid course, turned right over, falling with its head twisted
under its own enormous weight.
I was on my feet in a moment--not daring to think I had slain the
monster--although I had felt the blade of my noble spear bite deep into
the marrow. But there it lay, a huge black mass in the moonlight.
While I stood contemplating it, still panting after my exertions and the
fall, I heard the voice of Jambula:
"That was well done, my father. Those horns will deal out the Red Death
no more."
"I know not whether a headless ghost may come to life again, Jambula," I
said, "but anyhow we will cut off the head of this one. But, first of
all, this"--and I buried the blade of my great spear in the thing's
heart.
We were both strong men, Jambula and I, yet it was with a vast deal of
labour we at last succeeded in cutting off the head, which was twisted
under the huge body.
"_Whau_!" exclaimed Jambula, gazing upon the great deluge of blood which
poured forth upon the ground. "It is as though the blood of all those
slain by the Red Death were flowing there. But now, father, suffer me
to ran to Maqandi's kraal and fetch slaves to carry this, and indeed,
the skin and hoofs, to lay before the King, for we have no time to
lose."
"No time to lose!" I repeated. "What mean you?"
He pointed upward with his blood-smeared assegai.
"The moon," he said.
Then, indeed, _Nkose_, amazement was my lot--amazement and dismay. And
well it might be. For last night the moon had not quite passed its
first quarter. _To-night it was nearly full_.
Like one in a dream I gazed. Anything might be possible in this abode
of _tagati_, but that the moon should change in one day from half to
nearly full--_au_! that was too much.
"What does it mean, Jambula?" I said at length. "Last night the moon
was less than half, and now--?"
"_Au_!" muttered Jambula, bringing his hand to his mouth with a strange
sort of laugh. "Who am I that I should contradict you, my father? But
last night the moon was nearly as it is now. But the night you left us
it was but at half."
"And was not that last night, O fool? In truth the wizardry of this
place has eaten into thy brain. And yet--!"
There was the moon, _Nkose_, within a day or two of full. It could not
lie, even though Jambula could. Stupidly I gazed at it, then at him.
"And how long ago is it that I left you, Jambula?"
"Six days, father."
Ha! Now I saw. Now everything was clear. The wizard, and the _muti_
fire--the green, choking vapour that had filled my lungs and brain,
causing me to see strange and fearful things--had kept me in a state of
slumber. For six days I had lain within the heart of the rock, and I
had thought it but the short part of one day. My hunger on my
recovery--the state of putrefaction of the body of the slave whom I had
supposed to have been slain only that morning--the change of the moon--
all, indeed, stood clear enough now.
But whatever Jambula may have imagined, it was not in my mind to tell
him, or anybody, what had really happened, for it is not good among us
for a man to have a name for dealings with _abatagati_. So I sent him
off there and then to Maqandi's kraal, with orders to bring back a
number of men immediately to flay the great ghost-bull and carry the
hide, with the head and hoofs, before the King, without loss of time.
After he had gone, and while I sat alone in the haunted place, I watched
by the great black mass lying so still and quiet; and, _Nkose_, I
believe I should have felt little surprise had the thing come to life
again, head and all, so great was the awe it had set up among us. I am
not even sure that I did not once or twice hear the voice of old
Gasitye, and behold his spidery old form shambling among the trees. The
dawn came at last, however, but before it came Jambula, with a number of
the iron-working slaves. These were in great delight over the slain
monster who had destroyed so many of them, yet no time did I allow them
to give way to their joy over dancing and such. It behoved us to return
to the Great Great One with all speed, for on the next night the moon
would be at full.