It is a strange, and I suppose a wholesomely-humiliating thing that we
are appointed to go through life learning how little we know ourselves.
Here was I, a man no longer young, with considerable experience of the
ways of the world, rough and smooth, and under the fixed impression that
if there was one man in the said wide and wicked world whom I knew
thoroughly, in and out, from the crown of his hat to the soles of his
boots--or _velschoenen_, as the case might be--that man was Godfrey
Glanton, trader in the Zulu. And yet I had lived to learn that I didn't
know him at all.
For instance the happy-go-lucky, free-and-easy, semi-lonely life that
had satisfied me for so many years seemed no longer satisfying; yet why
not, seeing that all its conditions prevailed as before? I had enough
for my needs, and if I didn't make a fortune out of my trade, whether
stationary or from time to time peripatetic, I had always made a steady
profit. Now, however, it came home to me that this was a state of
things hardly the best for a man to live and die in.
Again why not? I had seen contemporaries of my own--men circumstanced
like myself who had come to the same conclusion. They had left it--only
to come to grief in unfamiliar undertakings. Or they had married; only
to find that they had better have elected to go through the rest of life
with a chain and ball hung round their necks, than strapped to some
nagging woman full of affectations and ailments--and raising a brood of
progeny far more likely to prove a curse to them than anything else;
thanks to the holy and gentle maternal influence aforesaid. All this I
had seen, and yet, here I was, feeling restless and unsatisfied because
for several days the recollection of a certain sweet and refined face,
lit up by a pair of large, appealing eyes, had haunted my solitary
hours.
It was that time since I had seen my neighbours. I had heard of them
through my usual sources of information, and they seemed to me to be
getting along all right; wherefore I had forborne to pay another visit
lest it might have the appearance of "hanging around." And by way of
combating an inclination to do so now, I made up my mind to carry out a
deferred intention, viz., pay a visit to Hensley's place.
Tyingoza had been over to see me a couple of times, but made no allusion
whatever to Falkner Sewin's act of boyish idiocy: presumably rating it
at its proper standard. But, I noticed that he wore a new head-ring.
However, I hoped that was an incident forgotten; and as I heard nothing
to the contrary, and my trade ran on as usual, I made no further
reference to it either to Tyingoza or anybody else.
I arrived at the scene of Hensley's disappearance about mid-day. The
homestead stood in a long, narrow valley, thickly bushed. Behind, and
almost overhanging it, was a great krantz whose smooth ironstone wall
glowed like a vast slab of red-hot metal. The place was wild and
picturesque to a degree, but--oh so hot!
Two men in shirts and trousers were playing quoits as I came up. I
didn't know either of them by sight.
"Good day," said one of them, knocking off his play, and coming up.
"Off-saddle won't you? Dashed hot, isn't it?"
"Thanks. I'm Glanton, from Isipanga," I said in answer to his look of
enquiry.
"Oh. Glad to know you, Glanton. I'm Kendrew, from nowhere in
particular, at least not just now, price of transport being too _sleg_
for anything."
"Oh, you ride transport then? How many waggons?"
"Three in good times--one in bad; none in worse--as in the present case.
This is Sergeant Simcox, of the N.M.P.," introducing the other man,
whom I noticed wore uniform trousers and boots. "He's been helping me
to look for my poor old uncle, you know."
"Oh, Hensley was your uncle, was he?"
"Rather. But I'm next-of-kin--so if he's not found I take. See?" with
a comprehensive wink and jerk of the head which took in the
surroundings.
I couldn't help laughing at his coolness. He was a tall, rather
good-looking young fellow, all wire and whipcord, with a chronically
whimsical expression. The police sergeant was a hard bitten looking
customer, typical of his line in life.
"Now what do you think of the affair?" I said. "Did you know Hensley
well?"
"Hanged if I did. He didn't like me. Did you?"
"Not very. I used to ride over and look him up now and again. But I
can't imagine him doing anything mysterious. In fact I should say he'd
be the last man in the world to do it."
"_Ja_. I don't know what to think of it. I've been running the place
since I heard of the affair--luckily I wasn't on the road just then so
was able to. You'll stop and have some scoff of course--you too,
sergeant?"
"Wish I could," said the latter, "but it's against rules. Must get back
to my camp."
"Hang rules. Who's to know? Glanton here won't split."
He was right, wherefore I forbear to say whether Sergeant Simcox made
the third at that festive board or not.
We talked of trade and transport-riding and frontier matters generally,
but surprisingly little of the matter that had brought me there. In
fact Kendrew rather seemed to shirk the subject; not in any sort of
suspicious manner let me explain, but rather as if he thought the whole
thing a bore, and a very great one at that.
"You see, Glanton," he explained, presumably detecting a surprised look
on my face, called there by the exceedingly light way in which he was
taking things. "You see it isn't as if we had had a lot to do with each
other. Of course I don't for a moment hope that the poor old boy has
come to grief, in fact I can't help feeling that he may turn up any
moment and want to know what the devil I've taken up my quarters at his
place for, in this free and easy way."
After a good dinner, washed down with a glass or so of grog, we went to
look at the place where the missing man had slept. This didn't help
towards any theory. If there had been foul play, whoever had been
concerned in it had removed all traces long ago.
"A good hound, requisitioned at first, would have done something towards
clearing up the mystery," I said.
"Yes, but you might as well have requisitioned a good elephant, for all
you'd get either round here," laughed Kendrew. "Well, I shall just give
it up as a bad job and leave it to Simcox. That's what he draws his pay
for. I'll just sit tight and boss up things so long. That's my job."
"I'd like to have a word or two with the boy who saw him last," I said.
"Alone I mean."
"Think you can get him to talk, eh? Well perhaps you may--I've heard of
you, Glanton, and what a chap you are for managing Kafirs. All right,
stop on till this evening, the boy's out herding now. Then you can
_indaba_ him to your heart's content after supper. You'll stay the
night of course."
But I urged that such was not in my programme, and in fact I had some
business to attend to next day irrespective of mere retail trade in the
store. So we compromised by my consenting to remain till evening.
There was sufficient moon for me to ride home by even if it rose
somewhat late. I suggested that we should ride out into the veldt in
the afternoon and I could interview the boy there. He would talk more
freely that way, and Kendrew agreed.
The boy was a quiet, decent looking youngster, and was herding his flock
in most exemplary fashion. I asked him his name.
"Pecamane, 'Nkose!"
"Have I seen you before?"
"More than once, _Nkose_. At Isipanga, at the store. Then again, when
we danced and ate beef."
"Ah. You were there then? Who is your chief?"
"Tyingoza, _Nkose_."
Kendrew had ridden on, leaving me alone with the boy.
"Well then," I said, "if Tyingoza is your chief you will be safe in
telling _me_ the story of your master's `who is no longer here.'"
"_Ou_! _Nkose_. The only story I have to tell is what I told to the
_Amapolise_, and he who now sits here"--meaning Kendrew. "But it is no
story."
He was right there, in that like the tale of the empty bottle there was
nothing in it. His master had given him some final orders after supper,
and he had gone over to the huts for the night. He was employed in the
stable then.
And no one had opened the stable?
No, it was locked, and his master had the key. They had been obliged to
break open the door in the morning to get at the horses.
There you see, there was nothing in this story, but then I had never
expected there would be. What I wanted was to watch the face and note
the manner of its narrator. This I had done, and keenly, with the
result that I felt convinced that the boy knew no more about Hensley's
disappearance than I did myself. Upon this the police sergeant
subsequently waxed somewhat superior. He resented the idea that what
had baffled the wit of the police and native detectives combined might
stand the slightest chance of being cleared up by me. However I didn't
take offence, although my opinion of the abilities of his force was but
medium, and that of the native detectives nowhere, though this applied
more to their morality than ingenuity. It happened that I was in a
position to know something of the methods of the latter in "getting up"
cases.
"Well good-bye, Glanton," said Kendrew, as we shook hands. "Devilish
glad you came over in a friendly way. And, I say--mind you repeat the
operation and that often. I like a jolly, good sort of neighbourly
neighbour."
I promised him I would, as I climbed into the saddle--and the great
krantz seemed to echo back our cheery good-bye in ghostly refrain.
I liked Kendrew, I decided as I rode along. He struck me as a lively,
cheery sort of fellow with lots of fun in him, and not an atom of harm.
Decidedly as a neighbour he would be an improvement on his poor old
relative, who although a good chap enough had always been a bit of a
fossil. That's one of the advantages of the up-country or frontier
life, you take a man as you find him and no make believe, or stiffness
or ceremony. If he's a good fellow he is, and all the better. If he
isn't why then he isn't, and you needn't have any more to do with him
than you want, or make any pretence about it.
In the solitude as I took my way through the thorns the recollection of
Hensley came upon me again, and I confess, as I thought upon it there,
under the midnight moon--for I had started back rather later than I had
intended--a sort of creepy feeling came over me. What the deuce had
become of the man? If he had got a fit of mental aberration, and taken
himself off, he would have left some spoor, yet no sign of any had been
lighted upon by those who had again and again made diligent search. I
looked around. The bush sprays seemed to take on all manner of weird
shapes; and once my horse, shying and snorting at a big hare, squatting
up on its haunches like a big idiot, bang in the middle of the path,
gave me quite an unpleasant start. The black brow of the krantz cut the
misty, star-speckled skyline now receding on my left behind--and then--
my horse gave forth another snort and at the same time shied so
violently as to have unseated me, but that my nerves were--again I
confess it--at something of an abnormal tension.
A figure was stealing along in the not very distinct moonlight; a human
figure or--was it? Suddenly it stopped, half in shadow.
"Hi! Hallo! Who's that," I sung out.
There was no answer. Then I remembered that with my mind running upon
Hensley I had used English. Yet the figure was that of a native. It
wanted not the blackness of it in the uncertain light; the stealthy,
sinuous movement of it was enough to show that. Yet, this certainty
only enhanced the mystery. Natives are not wont to prowl about after
dark with no apparent object, especially alone. In the first place they
have a very whole-hearted dread of the night side of Nature--in the next
such a proceeding is apt to gain for them more than a suspicion of
practising the arts of witchcraft--a fatal reputation to set up yonder
beyond the river, and, I hesitate not to assert, a very dangerous one to
gain even here on the Queen's side.
The figure straightened up, causing my fool of a horse to snort and
describe further antics. Then a voice:
"Inkose! Iqalaqala. Be not afraid. It is only Ukozi, who watches over
the world while the world sleeps--ah--ah! while the world sleeps."
I must own to feeling something of a thrill at the name. This Ukozi was
a diviner, or witch doctor, whose reputation was second to none among
the Natal border tribes--ay and a great deal wider--and that is saying a
good deal. Now of course the very mention of a witch doctor should
arouse nothing but contemptuous merriment; yet the pretentions of the
class are not all humbug by any means, indeed I have known a good few
white men--hard bitten, up-country going men with no nonsense or
superstition about them--who never fail to treat a genuine native witch
doctor with very real consideration indeed.
"Greeting, father of mystery," I answered, with some vague idea that the
meeting all so unexpected and somewhat weird, might yet be not without
its bearings on the fate of Hensley. "You are bent upon _muti_ indeed,
when the world is half through its dark time and the moon is low."
"M-m!" he hummed. "The moon is low. Just so, Iqalaqala. You will not
go home to-night."
"Not go home!" I echoed, meaning to humour him, and yet, in my
innermost self, conscious that there was a very real note of curiosity
that could only come of whole, or partial, belief in the question. "And
why should I not go home to-night?"
He shrugged his shoulders impressively. Then he said:
"Who may tell? But--you will not."
I tried to laugh good-humouredly, but it was not genuine. Yet was not
the thing absurd? Here was I, letting myself be humbugged--almost
scared--by an old charlatan of a witch doctor, a fellow who made a
comfortable living out of his credulous countrymen by fooling them with
charms and spells and omens, and all sorts of similar quackery--I, a
white man, with--I haven't mentioned it before--an English public school
education.
"Here, my father," I said, producing a goodly twist of roll tobacco.
"This is good--always good--whether by a comfortable fire, or searching
for _muti_ materials under the moon."
He received it, in the hollow of both hands, as the native way is. I
saw before me in the moonlight what was not at all the popular
conception of the witch doctor--a little shrivelled being with furtive,
cunning looks, and snaky eyes. No. This was a middle-aged man of fine
stature, and broadly and strongly built: destitute too of charms or
amulets in the way of adornments. His head-ring glistened in the
moonlight, and for all clothing he wore the usual _mutya_. In fact the
only peculiarity about him was that he had but one eye.
"What has become of Nyamaki?" I said, filling and lighting my pipe.
"U' Nyamaki? Has he gone then?" was the answer which, of course, was a
bit of assumed ignorance.
"Now how can the father of wisdom ask such a question?" I said. "He--
to whom nothing is dark!"
Ukozi's face was as a mask. He uttered a single grunt--that was all.
"The whites will offer large reward to the man who finds him," I went
on.
"Will he who sits yonder"--meaning my recent entertainer--"offer large
reward?" was the answer, a sudden whimsical flash illuminating the dark,
impassive face.
"That I cannot say. But I should think it probable. And now you are
seeking midnight _muti_ so as to obtain such reward. Take care," I went
on, chaffing him. "To wander at midnight would not be safe _la pa_,"
pointing in the direction of the Zulu country. "But here we are under
the Queen."
"The Queen! _Au_! Even the Queen cannot do everything."
"She just about can though," I answered decisively.
"Can she find Nyamaki?" he said, putting his head on one side.
This was a facer. I didn't know what the deuce to answer. While I was
hesitating he went on:
"_Au_! Well, Iqalaqala, turn back and make your bed with him yonder,
for you will not go home to-night _Hamba gahle_."
"_Hlala gahle_, father of mystery," I answered lightly touching my horse
with the spur.
You will think it strange I should make so light of his warning, yet as
I resumed my way up the valley, no thought of material danger came into
my mind as I pondered over it. I would show him that wise as he was,
and great his reputation, yet he did not know everything. I would have
the crow of him next time we met, when--
My horse had suddenly cocked his ears, then uttering a loud snort he
stopped dead--so suddenly indeed that I as nearly as possible pitched
over his head. Yet, there was nothing in sight.
The path, here rather steep, narrowed between high thick bush, just over
which on either hand, rose two straight but entirely insignificant
krantzes.
"He has seen a snake, a big mamba perhaps," I decided. "Well, let the
brute crawl away, as he's sure to do if alarmed. Then we'll get on
again."
But we didn't. I shouted a little, and swished at the bushes with my
whip. Then I spurred my horse forward again. The confounded animal
wouldn't budge.
"Here, this won't do," I said to myself feeling angry. Then I got off.
If the fool wouldn't go in the ordinary way perhaps he would lead.
Would he? Not a bit of it; on the contrary he rucked back at his bridle
so violently as nearly to tear it out of my hand. I got into the saddle
again.
"Now you've got to go, damn it!" I growled, letting him have both
rowels till I thought I could hear the bones squeak.
In response he first plunged violently, then kicked, then reared,
finally slewing round so quickly as nearly to unseat me. And now I
became aware of a strange sickly scent, almost like that of a drug--yet
how could it be? Then, as it grew stronger, it took on a vile effluvium
as of something dead. Yet; I had passed over that very spot but a few
hours back, and nothing of the kind had been there then. The horse was
now standing quite still, his head towards the way we had come, all in a
sweat and trembling violently.
And now I own that some of his scare began to take hold of me. What did
it mean--what the very deuce did it mean? What infernal witchcraft was
this that could hold me up here on a path I had ridden several times
before, on this identical horse too? Yet, here in the still ghostly
midnight hour alone, the affair began to grow dashed creepy. I made one
more attempt, and that a half-hearted one--then giving the horse the
rein let him take his own way, and that way was straight back to
Kendrew's.
Some thought of making a _detour_, and passing the bewitched point by
taking a wide sweep, came into my mind, but that would have involved
some infernally rough travelling, besides the moon wouldn't last much
longer, and who could say whether the result might not turn out the
same, for by now the witch doctor's declaration had carried its full
weight. So I was soon knocking Kendrew out of his first sleep, with
literally a lame excuse to the effect that my steed had gone lame, and
it was no use trying to get over two hours of rough road with him that
night.
"All right, old chap," sung out Kendrew, in a jolly voice, as he let me
in. "Have a glass of grog first, and then we'll take him round to the
stable. You can turn in in any room you like."
I hoped he wouldn't notice that neither then nor on the following
morning did my horse show the slightest sign of lameness. But I had
made up my mind to say no word to him of what had occurred--and didn't.