The darksome cave they enter, where they find
That cursed man, low sitting on the ground,
Musing full sadly in his sullen mind.
_The Faerie Queene._
When Corporal Francis Dollond and Trooper James Franks, of the Natal
Mounted Police, overstayed their ten days’ leave of absence from the
camp on the Upper Tugela, in the early part of 1883, everybody was much
surprised; they being two of the best conducted and most methodical men
in the force. But the weeks and then the months went by without anything
whatever being heard of them, so they were officially recorded as
deserters. Nevertheless none of their comrades really believed that
these men had deserted; each one felt there was something mysterious
about the circumstances of their disappearance. They had applied for
leave for the alleged purpose of visiting Pietermaritzburg. They started
on foot, stating their intention of walking to Estcourt, hiring horses
from natives there, and proceeding on horseback. They had evidently
never reached Estcourt, as nothing could be heard of them at that
village. They were both young men--colonists by birth. Dollond had an
especially youthful appearance. Franks was older. He had joined the
force later in life. He and Dollond, who had only very recently before
his disappearance been promoted, were chums.
Some months later in the same year, when Troopers George Langley and
Hiram Whitson also applied for ten days’ leave of absence,--likewise to
proceed to Pietermaritzburg,--the leave was granted; but the officer in
charge of the detachment laughingly remarked that he hoped they were not
going to follow Dollond and Franks.
Now, neither Langley nor Whitson had the remotest idea of visiting
Pietermaritzburg. It is necessary, of course, for the reader to know
where they did intend going to, and how the intention arose; but before
doing this we must deal with some antecedent circumstances.
Langley was most certainly the most boyish-looking man in the force. He
had a perfectly smooth face, ruddy complexion, and fair hair. He was of
middle height, and was rather inclined to stoutness. He was so fond of
talking that his comrades nicknamed him “Magpie.” A colonist by birth,
he could speak the Kaffir language like a native.
Whitson was a sallow-faced, spare-built man of short stature, with
dark-brown beard and hair, and piercing black eyes. His age was about
forty. He had a wiry and terrier-like appearance. A “down-East” Yankee,
he had spent some years in Mexico, and then drifted to South Africa
during the war period, which, it will be remembered, lasted from 1877 to
1882. He had served in the Zulu war as a non-commissioned officer in one
of the irregular cavalry corps, with some credit. The fact of his being
a man of extremely few words was enough to account for the friendship
which existed between him and the garrulous Langley. Whitson was known
to be a dead shot with the revolver.
This is how they came to apply for leave: One day Langley was strolling
about just outside the lines, looking for somebody to talk to, when he
noticed an apparently very old native man sitting on an ant-heap and
regarding him somewhat intently. This old native had been several times
seen in the vicinity of the camp, but he never seemed to speak to any
one, and he looked so harmless that the police did not even trouble to
ask him for the written pass which all natives are obliged by law to
carry when they move about the country. The old man saluted Langley
and asked in his own language for a pipeful of tobacco. Langley always
carried some loose leaves broken up in his pocket, so he at once pulled
some of these out and half filled the claw-like hand outstretched to
receive them. The old native was voluble in his thanks. There was a
large ant-heap close to the one on which he had been sitting, and on
which he reseated himself while filling his pipe. Against this Langley
leaned and took a good look at his companion. The man had a most
extraordinary face. His lower jaw and cheek-bones were largely
developed, but Langley hardly noticed this, so struck was he with
the strange formation of the upper jaw. That portion of the superior
maxillary bone which lies between the sockets of the eye-teeth
protruded, with the sockets, to a remarkable degree, and instead of
being curved appeared to be quite straight. The incisor teeth were very
large and white, but it was the development of the eye-teeth that was
most startling. These, besides being very massive, were produced below
the level of the incisors to a depth of nearly a quarter of an inch.
They distinctly suggested to Langley the tusks of a baboon.
As is not very unusual with natives, the man was perfectly bald. His
back was bent, and his limbs were somewhat shrunken, but he did not
appear in the least degree decrepit. His eyelids were very red, and his
eyes, though dim, had a deep and intent look. Ugly as was the man--or
perhaps by virtue of his ugliness--he exercised a strange fascination
over Langley.
The old man, whose name turned out to be Ghamba, proved himself a talker
after Langley’s own heart. They discussed all sorts of things. Ghamba
startled his hearer by his breadth of experience and his shrewdness. He
said he was a “Hlubi” Kaffir from Qumbu, in the territory of Griqualand
East, but that he had for some time past been living in Basutoland,
which is situated just behind the frowning wall of the Drakensberg, to
the southwest of where they were speaking, and not twenty miles distant.
They talked until it was time for Langley to return to camp. He was so
pleased at the entertainment afforded by Ghamba that all the tobacco
he had with him found its way into the claw-like hand of that
strange-looking man of many experiences and quaint ideas. So Langley
asked him to come to the ant-heap again on the following day, and have
another talk at the same hour. This Ghamba, with a wide and prolonged
exposure of his teeth, readily agreed to do.
Langley was extremely voluble to Whitson that night over his new
acquaintance. Whitson listened with his usual impassiveness, and then
asked Langley how it was that “an old loafing nigger,” as he expressed
it, had impressed him so remarkably. Langley replied that he did not
quite know, but he thought the effect was largely due to the man’s
teeth. But all the same he was “a very entertaining old buffer.”
Next afternoon Langley was so impatient to resume conversation with his
new friend that he repaired to the ant-heap quite half an hour before
the appointed time. He had not, however, long to wait, as Ghamba soon
appeared, emerging from a donga a couple of hundred yards away.
Langley was more impressed than ever. Ghamba told him all about the
Basutos, among whom he had lived; about the old days in Natal, before
even the Dutch occupation, when Tshaka’s impis wiped whole tribes out of
existence; of the recent wars in Zululand and the Cape Colony, and as
to the probability of future disturbances. Charmed as was Langley by the
old man’s conversation, he felt that on this occasion there was a little
too much of it; that Ghamba was not nearly so good a listener as he had
been on the previous day; so when the latter at length put a question
to him, thus affording an opportunity for the exercise of his own pentup
loquacity, Langley felt elated, more especially as several inquiries
were grouped together in the one asking. Ghamba asked whether anything
had been heard of Umhlonhlo; whether the capture of that fugitive rebel
was considered likely, and whether it was true that a reward of five
hundred pounds had been offered by the government for his capture, dead
or alive.
Umhlonhlo, it will be remembered, was the Pondomise chief who rebelled
in 1880, treacherously murdered Mr. Hope, the magistrate of Qumbu, and
his two companions, and who has since been an outlaw with a price on his
head.
Langley replied to the effect that it was quite true such a reward had
been offered as to Umhlonhlo’s whereabouts, but that the government
believed him to be in Pondoland; that he was sure to be captured
eventually; that he, Langley, only wished he knew where Umhlonhlo was,
so as to have the chance of making five hundred pounds with which to buy
a certain nice little farm he knew of; and that should he ever succeed
in obtaining the reward, and consequently in taking his discharge and
purchasing the farm, he would be jolly glad if old Ghamba would come and
live with him. This is only some of what he said; when Langley’s tongue
got into motion, he seemed to have some difficulty in stopping it.
However, he paused at last, and then Ghamba, looking very intently at
him, said:
“Look here, can you keep a secret?”
Here was a mystery.
“Rather!” said Langley.
“Will you swear by the name of God that you will not reveal what I have
to tell you?”
Langley swore.
Ghamba drew near until his teeth were within a few inches of Langley’s
cheek, and said in a whisper:
“I know where Umhlonhlo is.”
Langley started, and said in an awed voice:
“Where is he?”
“Wait a bit,” said Ghamba; “perhaps I will tell you, and perhaps I
won’t. I like you; you have given me tobacco, and you are not too proud
to come and talk to a poor old man. Now, you say you would like to make
five hundred pounds and buy a farm?”
“Rather!”
“And that you would let me go and live on the farm with you and end my
days in peace?”
“I would, gladly.”
“Well then, if I take you to where Umhlonhlo is, and you will kill him
and get the money, will you give me twenty-five pounds, and let me keep
a few goats, and grow a few mealies on your land?”
“I should think I would. But how could one man take or kill Umhlonhlo?
They say he is well armed and that he has a lot of followers with him.”
“Umhlonhlo,” said Ghamba, glancing anxiously round as if he feared the
very ant-heaps were listening, “is hiding in a cave in the mountain,
not three days’ walk from here. He has not got a single man with him,
because he fears being given up. He is really in hiding from his own
followers now. My sister is one of his wives, and that is how I know all
about it. I passed the cave where he lives four nights ago, and saw him
sitting by the fire. He has only a few women with him.”
“And how do you think I should take him?”
“Take him? you should kill him. I will guide you to the cave by night,
and then you can shoot him as he sits by the fire.”
Langley, although no coward, was not particularly brave. He did not much
relish the idea of alone tackling the redoubtable Umhlonhlo, a savage of
muscle, who was reported to be always armed to the teeth. Moreover,
he had no gun, and was but an indifferent shot with a revolver. So he
thought over the matter for a few moments and then said:
“Look here, Ghamba; I do not care to tackle this job alone, but if I can
take another man with me, I am on.”
“Then you will only get half of the five hundred pounds, and will not be
able to buy the farm. You need not be afraid; you can shoot him without
his seeing you.”
“No,” said Langley, after a pause; “I will not go alone, but if you
will let me take another man with me it can be managed. It will make no
difference to you; you will get your twenty-five pounds.”
“And how about my going to live on the farm with you?”
“Well, I could not buy the farm for two hundred and fifty pounds. Come,
we will give you fifty pounds instead of twenty-five.”
Ghamba thought for a while and then said:
“Very well, I consent. But there need be only one other man, and you
will write down on a piece of paper that you will give me fifty pounds.
When can we start?”
“I must speak to the other man, and then we will apply for leave. We had
better start soon, or else Umhlonhlo may have gone to some other place
of hiding.”
“Yes, we must lose no time.”
“All right! Meet me here to-morrow and I will bring my friend. We will
then settle all about it.”
“You must not mention this matter to any one else, and you must make
your friend promise to keep the secret.”
“Oh, that’s all right!” said Langley. “Meet me here to-morrow, just
after dinner.”
Langley went back to camp, Ghamba looking after his retreating figure
with a smile that revealed his teeth in a very striking manner. Langley
was intensely excited, and exacted (quite unnecessarily) the most solemn
promises from Whitson not to divulge the great secret which he confided
to him. Whitson agreed at once to join in the enterprise, which was one
after his own heart.
Next day the three met at the big ant-heap, and Whitson was very
much impressed by Ghamba’s teeth. He told Langley afterward that they
reminded him of a picture of the devil which he had seen in a copy of
“Pilgrim’s Progress.” The old man’s story appeared, however, consistent
enough, in spite of his peculiar dentition.
So, after a short conversation, Langley and Whitson returned to camp,
having made an appointment to meet Ghamba again on the following morning
at sunrise, so as to finally arrange as to time of starting, etc. They
went at once to the officer in charge of the detachment and applied
for ten days’ leave of absence for the purpose of proceeding to
Pietermaritzburg, which was at once granted.
Next morning they met Ghamba again, and agreed to start on their
expedition that evening. He explained that they must do all their
traveling by night, and lie by during the day; because it would never
do for him, Ghamba, to run the risk of being recognised by persons whom
they might meet. For the sake of his Hlubi relations who were living
among the Pondomise at Qumbu, it was absolutely necessary that he should
not appear in the transaction at all. Were it ever to be even suspected
that he had betrayed the chief, not alone would he be certainly killed,
but all his relations would be shunned by the other natives. He was an
old man, so for him, personally, nothing mattered very much, but a man
is bound to consider the interests of his family. Travelling only
by night, and lying still and hidden during the day, were therefore
absolutely necessary stipulations, and Langley and Whitson agreed to
them as intelligible and reasonable. All being settled, the latter
started for the camp, Ghamba baring his teeth excessively as they walked
away.
At dusk on the evening of the same day, Langley and Whitson met Ghamba
once more at the large ant-heap, and the three at once proceeded on
their course. The only arms taken were revolvers of the government
regulation pattern (breech-loading central fire). They carried
provisions calculated to last eight days, but took no blankets on
account of having to travel at night. When Ghamba volunteered to relieve
them of a considerable share of their respective loads, Langley and
Whitson were filled with grateful surprise.
The plan was as follows: Whitson was to shoot Umhlonhlo, and then remain
in the cave while Langley returned to the camp to report what had been
done, and cause persons who could identify the body to be sent for. They
seem to have had no scruples as to the deed they meant to do; certainly
Umhlonhlo deserved no more mercy than a beast of prey. Nor does it seem
to have struck them that possibly they might shoot the wrong man. But
there was an air of conviction about the manner in which Ghamba showed
his teeth when asked whether he was positive as to the identity of the
man in the cave, that would have dissipated the doubts of most men.
Besides this, he drew out the written undertaking which they had
delivered to him, and said, with a profoundly businesslike look:
“Do I not want the money? Should I take all this trouble if I did not
know what I were doing?”
They walked all night, only resting once or twice for a few minutes.
It was found that Ghamba, in spite of his age, was an extremely good
walker; and when they halted at daylight, Langley was so done up that
he could not have held out for another half-hour. Whitson, the wiry, had
not yet felt the least fatigue.
This march had taken them to the very foot of the Drakensberg range,
and they rested in a valley between two of its main spurs. Here they
remained all day, comfortably located in a sheltered nook where there
was plenty of dry grass. Their resting-place was encircled by immense
rocks. Although the surrounding country was desolate to a degree, and
neither a human being nor an animal was to be seen, Ghamba would not
hear of their lighting a fire nor leaving the spot where they rested.
The weather was clear, and neither too warm nor too cold. They slept at
intervals during the day, and at evening felt quite recovered from their
fatigue.
At nightfall they again started, their course leading steeply up the
gorge in which they had rested. Although the pathway became more and
more indistinct, Ghamba appeared never to be at a loss. Langley several
times shuddered, when they passed by the very edge of some immense
precipice, or clambered along some steep mountain-side, where a false
step would have meant destruction. He began to show signs of fatigue
soon after midnight, so at Ghamba’s suggestion a considerable portion of
his load was transferred to the shoulders of Whitson, who seemed to be
as tireless as Ghamba himself.
At daybreak they halted in the depths of another tremendous gorge
with precipitous sides. The scenery in this particular area of the
Drakensberg range, the neighbourhood of the Mont aux Sources, is
indescribably grand and impressive, and is quite unlike anything else
in South Africa. Enormous and fantastically shaped mountains are here
huddled together indiscriminately, and between them wind and double deep
gloomy gorges, along the bottoms of which mighty boulders are thickly
strewn. On dizzy ledge and steep slope dense thickets of wild bamboo
grow, and a few stunted trees fill some of the less deep clefts,
wherever the sunshine can penetrate. Splendid as is the scenery, its
gloom, its stillness, its naked crags and peaks, its dark depths that
seem to cleave to the very vitals of the earth, become so oppressive
that, after a few days spent among them, the traveller is filled with
repulsion and almost horror. Few living things have their home there.
You might meet an occasional “klipspringer” (an antelope, in habits and
appearance somewhat like the chamois), a wandering troop of baboons, and
now and then a herd of eland in the more grassy areas. There are said to
be a few Bushmen still haunting the caves, but they are seldom or never
seen.
In the afternoon the sun shone into the gorge in which the travellers
were resting, and for a few hours the heat was very oppressive. Whitson
examined his revolver, removing the cartridges and replacing them by
others. He then lay down to sleep, asking Langley to remain awake and
keep a lookout. He had a vague feeling of uneasiness which he could not
overcome. Langley promised to keep awake, but he was too tired to do so.
He sat with his back against a rock, and, after some futile efforts to
keep his eyes open, fell fast asleep. By-and-by Ghamba woke him gently,
and, pointing to Whitson, whose revolver lay in the leather case close
to his hand, whispered:
“Did he not tell you to keep awake?”
Langley was grateful for this evidence of consideration, but he could
not quite make out how Ghamba had been able to understand what Whitson
had said. However, when the latter awoke, Langley said nothing to him
about having disobeyed instructions.
Ghamba said that about two hours’ walk would now bring them to
Umhlonhlo’s cave, so they started off briskly at dusk. Their course now
led for some distance along a mountain ledge covered with wild bamboo,
through which the pathway wound. Then they crossed a steep saddle
between two enormous peaks, after which they plunged into another deep
and winding gorge. This they followed until they reached a part where
it was so narrow that the sides seemed almost to touch over their heads.
Beyond the cliffs fell apart, and then apparently curved toward each
other again, thus forming an immense amphitheatre. At the entrance to
this Ghamba stopped, and said in a whisper that they were now close to
the cave.
They now held a consultation, in terms of which it was decided that
Ghamba should go forward and reconnoitre. So Whitson and Langley sat
down close together and waited, conversing in low tones.
Whitson felt very uneasy, but Langley tried to argue him out of
his fears. The more Whitson saw of Ghamba, the more he disliked and
distrusted him and his teeth. The instinct which detects danger in the
absence of any apparent evidence of its existence is a faculty developed
in some men by an adventurous life. This faculty Whitson possessed in a
high degree.
“Did you keep awake all the time I slept this afternoon?” he asked.
Langley feared Whitson and felt inclined to lie, but something impelled
him, almost against his will, to speak the truth now.
“No,” he replied; “I slept for a few minutes.”
Whitson drew his revolver and opened the breech.
“By God!” he said, “the cartridges are gone!”
Langley took his weapon out of the leather case and opened it. He found
the cartridges were there right enough.
“Have you any spare cartridges?” asked Whitson.
Whitson had already loaded his revolver with the five cartridges
which he had removed in the afternoon, but he again took these out and
replaced them in his waistcoat pocket, and then he reloaded with some
which Langley passed over to him with a trembling hand.
“Look here,” he said, in a hoarse whisper, “we are in a trap of some
kind. When that old scoundrel comes back, do not let him know that we
have found out anything. We will walk on with him for a short distance,
at all events, and then be guided by circumstances. Stand by when you
see me collar him, and slip a sack over his head.”
“Can we not go back now?” said Langley.
“Certainly not; we would never find our way at night. I guess we must
see this circus out. If you have to shoot, aim low.”
In a few minutes Ghamba returned.
“Come on,” he said. “He is sitting at the fire in front of the cave. I
have just seen him.”
“Where is the cave?” asked Whitson. “Is it far from here?”
“We will reach it very soon; you can see the light of the fire from a
few paces ahead.”
They walked on for about fifty yards, and there, sure enough, over a
rocky slope to their left, and at the foot of a crag about three hundred
yards away, could be seen the bright and fitful glow from a fire which
was hidden from their view by a low ridge of piled-up rocks.
Whitson stood still and questioned Ghamba:
“Now tell me,” he asked, through Langley as interpreter, “how we are to
approach.”
“The pathway leads up on the left side,” replied Ghamba. “We will walk
close up to the crag, where there is a narrow passage between it and
that big black rock which you see against the light. You two can lead,
and I will be close behind. I have just seen him. He is sitting at the
fire, eating, and only the women are with him.”
The last words were hardly out of the speaker’s mouth before Whitson had
seized him by the throat with a vice-like grasp.
“Seize his hands and hold them,” he hissed to Langley.
Ghamba struggled desperately, but could not release himself. Whitson
compressed his throat until he became unconscious, and then gagged him
with a pocket-handkerchief. Ghamba’s hands were then tied tightly behind
his back with another pocket-handkerchief, and his feet were firmly
secured with a belt. An empty sack (from which they had removed their
provisions) was then drawn over his head and shoulders, and secured
round the waist.
“Come on now, quickly,” whispered Whitson, and he and Langley started
off in the direction of the fire, after first taking off their boots.
They did not approach by the course which Ghamba had indicated, but made
their way quietly up the slope, straight against the face of the crag.
They reached the heap of rocks, and crept in among them by means of
another narrow passage, close to the inner end of which the fire was;
and this is what they saw through the twigs of a scrubby bush which
effectually concealed them:
A large cave opened into the side of the mountain, and just before the
mouth was an open space about twenty yards in diameter, surrounded on
all sides, except that of the mountain itself, by a wall of loosely
piled rocks, through which passages led out in different directions.
Just in front of the cave burned a bright fire, around which crouched
four most hideous and filthy-looking old hags, and against which were
propped several large earthenware pots of native make, full of water.
Standing behind rocks, one at each side of the inner entrance to
the passage, which was evidently that communicating with the pathway
indicated by Ghamba as the one they were to approach by, were two
powerful-looking men, stark naked, and as black as ebony, their skins
shining in the light of the fire. Each man held a coiled thong in his
hands, after the manner of a sailor about to heave a line. While they
were looking, a woman, somewhat younger in appearance than any of those
who sat by the fire, came out of the cave carrying a strong club about
three feet long. She crouched down close to the man standing on the
left-side of the passage, who, as well as his companion, stood as still
as a marble statue, and in an expectant attitude.
Whitson and Langley, with their revolvers drawn, suddenly stepped out
of their concealment, and walked toward the fire. This evidently
disconcerted the men with the thongs, who apparently did not expect
their intended prey to approach by any course except the passage near
which they were standing; but after a slight pause of hesitancy the
thongs were whirling in the air, and descending, lasso-fashion, upon
the shoulders of the intruders. The noose caught Langley over his
arms, which were instantly drawn close against his body as the thong
tightened, so he was thus rendered completely powerless; but Whitson
sprang, quick as lightning, to one side, and escaped. Three shots
from his revolver rang out in as many seconds, and the two men and the
woman--who was in the act of lifting her club to brain Langley--lay
rolling on the ground, each with a bullet through the head.
The four old hags at the fire began to mow and scream, and got up and
hobbled into the cave. Whitson drew his knife and cut the thong with
which Langley was vainly struggling, and then the two men, pale as
death, looked silently at each other with staring eyes.
Whitson replaced his revolver, and then made a sort of torch out of dry
reeds, a pile of which lay close at hand. He then, leaving Langley to
guard the cave, carefully examined all the passages and spaces between
the rocks, but he could find no trace of any one. The two men thereupon
entered the cave, Whitson holding the torch high over his head. They
found that it ran straight in for about fifteen paces, and then curved
sharply to the left.
It was about four paces in width, and about eight feet high, the roof
being roughly arched. The walls and roof were covered with thick black
greasy soot; and an indescribably horrible stench, which increased the
farther they advanced, made them almost vomit. They found that where the
cave curved to the left it ended in a circular chamber about eight paces
in diameter, and at one side of this crouched the four old hags, huddled
together, and mowing and chattering horribly.
Across a cleft about two feet wide, in the right-hand wall of the cave,
a stick was fixed transversely, and hanging to this were some lumps of
half-dried and smoked flesh. Whitson went up close and examined these
carefully. He drew back with a shudder, and his face changed from pale
to ashen gray.
He and Langley then went outside and stood for a while in the fresh air.
They could endure, just then, no more of the fetid atmosphere inside.
After a short time they gathered up some dry twigs and reeds, and set
several little heaps alight at different spots inside. This had the
effect of making the atmosphere more bearable in the course of a few
minutes. They then made a larger fire in the middle of the cave, and
proceeded to examine it more closely.
They found several old iron picks, such as are used by natives
in cultivating their fields, some very filthy skins, a number of
earthenware pots, a few knives, and an axe; but nothing more.
The floor of the cave was of clay, and at one spot it appeared to have
been recently disturbed. Here Langley began to dig with a pick, which,
just below the surface, struck against some hard substance. This, when
uncovered, proved to be a bone. He threw it to one side and dug deeper,
uncovering more bones--some old, and others comparatively fresh, but
emitting a horrible smell. He stooped and picked one up, but dropped it
immediately, as if it burned him. It was the lower jawbone of a human
being.
“Great God!” he gasped. “What is the meaning of this?”
“It means,” said Whitson, “that we are in a nest of bloody cannibals!”
Langley dropped like a stone, in a dead faint; so Whitson dragged him
outside, and, leaving him to recover in the open air, returned to the
cave. He then seized the pick and began digging, unearthing some new
horror at every stroke. A glittering object caught his eye; he picked
this up and found it to be the steel buckle of a woman’s belt. He
glanced toward the cleft in the rock where the lumps of flesh were
hanging, and caught his breath short. Going outside he made another
torch, which he lit; and then he returned and carefully examined the
loosened surface. Another glittering object caught his eye. This, when
examined, proved to be an old silver watch, the appearance of which
seemed familiar. He forced open the case, and saw, roughly scratched
on the inside, the letter D. He now recognised it; he remembered having
once fixed a glass in this very watch for Dollond, about a month before
the latter’s disappearance. Continuing his search Whitson found the iron
heel-plate of a boot, and a small bunch of keys.
Whitson drew his revolver, and picking up the torch went into the
terminal chamber. Four shots, fired in quick succession, reverberated
immediately afterward through the cavern.
Whitson then went outside to Langley, whom he found sitting down near
the fire, looking if possible, more ghastly than before. The presence of
Whitson seemed, however, to act on him as a kind of tonic, and he soon
pulled himself together sufficiently to assist in piling a quantity of
fuel upon the already sinking fire, which soon blazed brightly, lighting
up the mouth of the cavern and the space in front of it. One of the
bodies of the men who had been shot was lying on its side, with the face
toward the fire. Whitson examined the mouth, pushing back the upper
lip with a piece of stick. He found that the shape of the mouth and the
development of the teeth were the same as Ghamba’s. The other bodies
were lying on their faces, so he did not trouble to examine them.
Whitson then told Langley to follow him, and the two walked down the
foot-path toward where they had left Ghamba. Him they found lying
motionless in the position in which he had been left about an hour
previously. They removed the sack and the gag and untied his feet, first
taking the precaution to fasten the belt by one end to his bound hands,
Whitson holding the other. They then signed to him to proceed toward the
cave, and this he silently did, without making any resistance. He looked
calmly at the three dead bodies, but said not a word. Langley held him,
while Whitson again tied his feet together with the belt, and then they
placed him with his back against a rock, facing the fire, which
was still blazing brightly. His lips were drawn back in a ghastly,
mirthless, grin, and the tusks were revealed from point to insertion.
Langley questioned Ghamba, but he would not speak. After several
attempts to force him to answer had been vainly made, Whitson said:
“Now tell him that if he speaks and tells the whole truth he will only
be shot, but if he does not speak he will be burned alive.”
This was interpreted, but the threat had no apparent effect. So Whitson
seized Ghamba and dragged him to the fire, where he flung him down on
the very edge of the glowing embers.
“Now,” said Whitson, holding him down with his foot, so that he got
severely scorched, “for the last time, will you speak?”
“Take me away from the fire, and I will speak,” said Ghamba, in English.
So they lifted him, and set him again with his back to the rock.
“Now,” said Whitson, “go ahead, and no nonsense!”
“If I tell the whole truth,” said Ghamba, still speaking English, and
with a fair accent, “will you swear not to burn me, but to shoot me, so
that I shall die at once?”
“I will,” said Whitson.
“You too must swear,” said Ghamba, looking at Langley.
“Yes, I swear.”
“Very well,” said Ghamba, “I will tell you everything, but you must both
remember what you have sworn to.”
“Yes, all right,” said Whitson. Ghamba then looked at Langley, who
repeated the words.
“I will tell you,” said Ghamba, “all I can remember, and you can ask
questions, which I shall answer truly. You have heard of Umdava, who
used to eat men in Natal long ago, after the wars of Tshaka--well, he
was my uncle. After Umdava had been killed and his people scattered, my
father, with a few followers, came to live among these mountains. But we
found that after having eaten human flesh we could enjoy no other food,
so we caught people and ate them. These two men lying dead are my sons,
and that woman is my daughter. My four wives were here to-night. They
are very old women. Have you not seen them?” he asked, looking at
Whitson.
“They are in there; I shot them,” said Whitson, pointing to the cave.
“I had other children,” continued Ghamba, quite unmoved, “but we ate
them when food was scarce.”
“Have you always lived, all these years, on human flesh?” asked Whitson.
“No, not always; but whenever we could obtain it we did so. There is
other food in these mountains--honey, ants’ eggs, roots, and fruit;
besides game, which is, however, not very easy to catch. But we have
often all had to go away and work when times have been bad. Besides, I
have a herd of cattle at a Basuto kraal, and I have been in the habit of
taking some of these now and then, and exchanging them for corn, which
the women then went to fetch. But we have always tried to get people to
eat, because we could enjoy no other kind of food. Sometimes we got them
easily; and when we were very fortunate we used to dry part of the meat
by hanging it up and lighting a fire underneath, with green wood, so as
to make plenty of smoke.”
“Have you killed many white people?” asked Whitson.
“Yes, a good number; but not, of course, as many as black. Lately we
have always tried to catch whites, because when you have eaten white
flesh for some time, the flesh of a native no longer satisfies you.”
“Why not?”
“The flavour is not so strong.”
“Did you induce the other two policemen to come up by means of the story
about Umhlonhlo?”
“Yes, they came up just as you did, and my sons caught them with the
thongs. Umhlonhlo has brought us plenty of food.”
“Were you able to take the cartridges out of their revolvers as you did
out of mine?”
“No, I had no opportunity; but it was not necessary, because my sons
were so expert at throwing the thongs that they could always catch
people over the arms, and thus render them unable to shoot.”
“How did they manage to become so expert?”
“By continued practice. I used to walk up the path over and over again,
and let them throw the thong over me. Then the woman was always there
with the club, so that, if one of the thongs missed, she was ready to
strike. I, also, was usually ready to help, in case of necessity.”
“Why did you think it necessary to take the cartridges out of my
revolver?”
“Because I feared you from the first, and were it not that he”--baring
his teeth and glancing at Langley, who shuddered--“looked so nice, and
that we wanted fresh meat so badly, I would not have risked bringing
you. But it would have been all right if I had only let your revolver
alone.”
“You say Umhlonhlo has brought you plenty of food; did you ever get any
one besides ourselves and the other two policemen to come up here by
telling them that story?”
“Yes, two others--one a man who was searching for gold on the Free State
side of the mountains, and the other a trader whom I met at Maseru. But
these each came alone.”
“I see the buckle of a woman’s belt in there. Whom did that belong to?
You surely never got a white woman up here?”
“Yes, we did,” said Ghamba, with a horrible half-smile which bared the
gums high above the sockets of his tusks. “She was a young girl who had
strayed from a waggon passing over the mountain by the Ladysmith road,
only a day’s walk from here. I pretended to show her the shortest way
to her waggon, and thus brought her as far as she could walk in this
direction. I then killed her, and came up here and fetched my sons. We
carried her up in the night. She was very young and plump, and I have
never eaten anything that I enjoyed so much.” (Whitson turned cold
with horror. He remembered the girl’s mysterious disappearance, and the
fruitless searches undertaken in consequence.) “His flesh”--glancing
again at Langley--“looks something like hers did, and I am sure it would
taste just as nice. There was still a little of her left when I went
away last week. If you will go in there and look where the rock is split
on the right-hand side, you will--” But he did not finish the sentence,
for a bullet from Whitson’s revolver crushed through his brain, and he
tumbled forward on his face into the fire.
It was only after tremendous difficulty that Whitson and Langley
succeeded in escaping from the mountains. However, on the evening of the
third day after their adventure in the cave, they came in sight of the
police camp. Whitson sat down on a stone, and motioned his companion to
do the same.
“See here, sonny,” he said, “I want to have a short talk with you. I am
a bit cross with you as the cause of my having been sucked in by that
d--d murdering old walrus. You ought to know the inhabitants of this
country better than a simple stranger like me, and so I took your lead.
Now, another thing: you nearly bust us both by your blasted foolishness
in going to sleep that day; but let that pass, because perhaps it would
have been worse if we had not been put on our guard; not but that it
would take a d--d smart cannibal to eat Hiram Whitson. But this is what
I am coming to: you, my boy, are a darned sight too fond of hearing your
own tongue clack. Now, take a warning from me, and don’t let a word
of what has happened since we left camp for Pietermaritzburg pass your
lips. I did all the shooting, and I’m not a bit ashamed of it; but, by
the eternal God, if you open your lips to a soul, I’ll shoot you like
a dog or a cannibal! Remember that, sonny, and say it quietly over
to yourself the first time you feel that you want to blab. Now, shake
hands.”
This was probably the longest speech that Whitson had ever made.
About two years after the events narrated, Whitson took his discharge
and returned to America. He left behind him a sealed packet addressed
to his commanding officer, and which was not to be delivered for twelve
months after his departure.
Owing, however, to a strange combination of fortuitous circumstances,
this packet never reached its proper destination; its wrapper, bearing
the address, having been scorched off in a fire which took place in the
house where it was left.