The dog stopped short, hackles erect, and fangs bared, emitting a series
of deep-toned growls which to the object of his hostility should have
been disconcerting, to put it mildly. But, somehow, he seemed
disinclined to pursue his investigations to the bitter end. This was
strange.
"What can it be?" was the thought in my own mind simultaneous with the
voiced query of my companion.
Natives--Ivondwe excepted--were wont to hold Arlo in respect, not to say
awe, upon first acquaintance. The one who now made his appearance,
betrayed no sign of any such feeling, as he came towards us. Yet he was
armed with nothing more reliable than a slender redwood stick. He came
forward, deliberately, with firm step, as though no aroused and
formidable beast were threatening him with a very sharp and gleaming
pair of jaws, the sun glinting upon his head-ring and shining bronze
frame, came forward and saluted. Then I noticed--we both noticed--that
he had only one eye.
"Ha--Ukozi. I see you--see you again," I observed, in greeting.
"_Inkosikazi_!" he uttered, saluting my companion.
What struck me at that moment was the behaviour of the dog. Instead of
rushing in upon the new arrival, and putting him vigorously on the
defensive until called off, as was his way, he seemed concerned to keep
his distance, and while still growling and snarling in deep-toned mutter
I could detect in his tone an unmistakable note of fear. This too was
strange.
"Who is he?" said Miss Sewin, as the newcomer placidly squatted himself.
"Is he a chief?"
"Something bigger perhaps," I answered. "He's a witch doctor."
"What? A witch doctor?" her eyes brightening with interest. "I thought
witch doctors were horrid shrivelled old creatures who wore all sorts of
disgusting things as charms and amulets."
"Most of them do, and so would this one when he's plying his trade in
earnest. Yet he's about the biggest witch doctor along this border, and
his fame extends to Zululand as well."
"Ah!" as an idea struck her. "Now here's a chance for him to keep up
his reputation. I wonder if he could find my coin."
As we both knew where it was--or indeed in any case--the opportunity
seemed not a bad one. But I said:
"You must remember, Miss Sewin, that native doctors, like white ones,
don't practice for nothing, and often on the same terms. What if this
one should ask as the price of his services--no--professional
attendance, shouldn't it be?--a great deal more than the lost article's
worth?"
"Don't let him. But in any case I don't believe he has the ghost of a
chance of finding it."
"Don't you be too sure," I said. And then, before I could open upon him
on the subject Ukozi opened on me on another.
"Nyamaki is not home again, Iqalaqala?"
I was beginning to get sick of the disappearing Hensley by that time, so
I answered shortly:
"Not yet."
"Ha! The Queen cannot do everything, then. You did not go home that
night, Iqalaqala?"
"I did not. Your _muti_ is great, Ukozi--great enough to stop a horse."
"_Muti_! Who talks of _muti_? I did but foresee. And Umsindo? He,
too, did not reach Nyamaki's house that night?"
"No."
"What is in the water yonder?" he went on, bending over to look into the
pool, for he had squatted himself very near its brink. "It moves."
Both of us followed his gaze, instinctively, eagerly. And by Jove! as
we looked, there arose the same disturbance, the same unwinding of what
seemed like a shining sinuous coil, yet taking no definite shape. Again
it sank, as it had risen, and a hiss of seething bubbles, and the
circling rings radiating to the sides, alone bore witness to what had
happened.
"I declare it's rather uncanny," said my companion. "Does he know what
it is? Ask him."
I put it to Ukozi. We had swum there several times, dived deep down
too, nearly to the bottom, deep as it was, yet we had never been
disturbed by anything. Only to-day, before his arrival, had we seen
this thing for the first time--and that only once. He echoed my words,
or part of them.
"Nearly to the bottom! But this place has no bottom."
"Now you forget, father of mystery," I said, knowingly. "It has, for we
have sounded it, with a piece of lead at the end of a line."
He looked amused, shaking his head softly.
"Yet, it is as I say," he answered. "It has no bottom."
Rapidly I gave Miss Sewin the burden of our conversation, and she looked
puzzled. The while, Arlo, crouching a few yards off, was eyeing the
witch doctor strangely, uttering low growls which deepened every time he
made a movement, and still, beneath the sound I could always detect that
same note of fear.
"What is in the water down there, Ukozi?" I said. "Not a crocodile.
What then?"
He was in no hurry to reply. He took snuff.
"Who may tell?" he answered, having completed that important operation.
"Yet, Iqalaqala, are you still inclined--you and Umsindo--to continue
swimming there, and diving nearly to the bottom--ah-ah! nearly to the
bottom?"
He had put his head on one side and was gazing at me with that
expression of good-humoured mockery which a native knows so well how to
assume. I, for my part, was owning to myself that it would take a very
strong motive indeed to induce me to adventure my carcase again within
the alluring depths of that confounded _tagati_ pool, for so it now
seemed. Moreover I knew I should get no definite enlightenment from
him--at any rate that day--so thought I might just as well try him on
the subject of Miss Sewin's loss. But as I was about to put it to him
he began:
"That which you seek is not down there."
"Not down there?" I echoed. "But, what do we seek, father of the
wise?"
"It shines."
The thing was simple. He had found it and planted it somewhere, with a
view to acquiring additional repute, and--incidentally--remuneration.
"I think we shall recover your coin, Miss Sewin," I said.
"Ah. He can find it for us then? If he does I shall become quite a
convert to witch doctorism, for want of a better word."
"You will see. Now, Ukozi. Where is that which we seek?"
"_Au_! It shines--like the sun. To find it something else that shines
will be necessary. Something that shines--like the moon."
I laughed to myself over this "dark" saying, and produced a half-crown--
a new one.
"Here is what shines like the moon at full," I said.
He held out both hands, looked at it for a moment as it lay in the
hollow thus formed, then said:
"Halfway between this and where you left the other white people is a
redwood tree--of which two sticks point over the path. From the path on
the other side, a slope of smooth rock falls away. Just below this--
resting upright between two stones--one pointed, the other round--is
that which you seek."
Briefly I translated this to my companion. Her reception of it showed a
practical mind.
"What if he wants to send us off on a fool's errand while he climbs down
to the crevice there and gets hold of the real coin?" she said.
"Well, of course, nothing's impossible. But, do you know, I believe
him. I would in fact risk a considerable bet on it."
"Well, I am in your hands, Mr Glanton," she said. "You know these
people thoroughly. I, not at all."
To tell the truth, I believed Ukozi's statement completely, so much so
as not to think it worth while bothering about any thought of the
responsibility I might be incurring. Otherwise I might have foreseen a
reproachful manner, and a sinking in her estimation, if we found
nothing. So I poured the contents of my snuff tube into Ukozi's hands
and bade him farewell.
"I declare I feel quite excited over this," Aida Sewin said, as we
rapidly retraced our steps. "Look. Here is where we left the others--
and--there's the slab of rock."
"Yes. It won't be a difficult scramble. Now Miss Sewin, you shall have
the opportunity of verifying Ukozi's dictum yourself. So--you go
first."
In a moment we were below the rock--a matter of ten yards' descent--and,
in a small dry watercourse beneath we descried the glint of something.
A cry of delight escaped her.
"Why, here it is. Just exactly as he described. Come and look, Mr
Glanton."
Sure enough at our feet, leaning almost upright between the two stones--
the pointed one and the round--was the lost coin.
"But what was it we saw in the crevice?" she said, when the first
astonishment was over. "That seemed to shine, too."
"Probably a point of rock worn smooth. Well, Ukozi has again borne out
his reputation."
"Again? Why? Have you tried him before?"
Her eyes seemed to search my face. There was--or seemed to be--no
prevaricating.
"Well, perhaps. Once. Or rather, he tried me. I'll tell you about it
some day. By Jingo, it's getting dark, and I don't like the look of the
sky. The sooner we're in the better."
Great solid masses of cloud were banking up beyond the further ridge of
the Tugela valley, and a low boom of thunder shivered the still air. A
storm was coming up; probably a heavy one.
"How do you account for this kind of thing?" she said as we regained the
path. "Could he have been passing here at the time I dropped the coin,
and deliberately planned a sort of _coup de theatre_?"
"In that case Arlo would have warned us of his presence. Yet he gave no
sign."
"Of course. And talking about Arlo, wasn't it strange how he seemed not
to mind that man's presence? Why he can hardly be held in when a
strange native comes about."
"Yes. I noticed it. I suppose his instinct must have told him Ukozi
was about to do us a good turn."
She turned towards me, then shook her head.
"You are turning it off, Mr Glanton, I can see that. Yet there is
something rather weird and inexplicable about the whole thing. You
know, I was watching the witch doctor when the reptile or whatever it
was came up in the pool, and it looked just as if he had raised it by
some incantation. It is interesting very--but--rather eerie."
"Oh they have their tricks of the trade, which they don't divulge, you
may be sure. The coin finding was really cleverly worked, however it
was done; for, mind you, he came from quite the contrary direction, and,
as a sheer matter of time, could have been nowhere near the place we
found it in when we turned back."
"It's wonderful certainly, and I'm very glad indeed to have found my
coin again. You must have seen some strange things in the course of
your experience among these people, Mr Glanton? Tell me--what is the
strangest of them?"
"If I were to tell you you wouldn't believe me. Hallo! We'd better
quicken our pace. I suppose you don't want to arrive home wet through."
The thundercloud had spread with amazing speed and blackness. The soft
evening air had become hot and oppressive. Some self-denial was
involved on my part in thus hurrying her, for I would fain have drawn
out this walk alone with her, having now become, as you will say,
Godfrey Glanton complete fool. Yet not such a fool as not to be blessed
with a glimmer of common-sense, and this told me that, woman-like, she
would not thank me for bringing her home in a state of draggled skirt
and dripping, streaming hair, which would inevitably be the case did we
fail to reach the house before the downpour should burst.
We did however so reach it, and there a surprise awaited, to me, I may
as well own, not altogether a pleasant one, for it took the shape of
Kendrew. Now Kendrew, as I have said, was a good fellow enough, yet
this was the last evening I should spend here for some time. Kendrew
was all very well at his own place or at mine--but somehow I didn't want
him here, at any rate not to-day, added to which he was a good-looking
chap, and lively--a novelty too. There, you see--I am not above owning
to my own small meannesses. It transpired moreover that I was the
indirect agency through which he was there, for the first thing he said
on seeing me was:
"There you are, Glanton. Thought I'd ride up and see how you were
getting on, and when I got to your place they told me you had come down
here. So I thought I'd come on and find you, and take the opportunity
of making Major Sewin's acquaintance at the same time. Nothing like
getting to know one's neighbours, and there ain't so many of them, eh?"
"Glad you did," I answered, shaking hands with him as heartily as ever.
Yet at bottom, that "neighbour" idea struck unpleasantly. Kendrew as a
neighbour was all very well, and I nailed him as such--for myself, but
confound it, I didn't want him getting too "neighbourly" here; and that,
too, just as I was going away myself for a time. And then I realised,
more fully than ever, what it meant to me to be fulfilling the role of a
sort of little Providence to these people. Now Kendrew would lay
himself out to do that during my absence, and in short, on my return I
might find, to use a vulgar syllogism, that my own nose had been most
effectually put out of joint.
They had taken to him already, and were on the best of terms--I could
see that. Kendrew was one of those jolly, happy-go-lucky souls that
people do take to on sight, and he had youth on his side. Moreover my
misgivings were in no wise dispelled by the look of surprised
whole-hearted admiration which came into his face at sight of Aida
Sewin. There was no mistaking this, for if there is one thing I pride
myself on it is a faculty for reading every expression of the human
countenance no matter how swift and fleeting such may be. Perhaps it is
that constant intercourse with savages has endowed me with one of their
most unfailing characteristics, but, at any rate, there it is.
"We're going to have a storm," said the Major, looking upward. "Aida--
Glanton--you're only just in time. You too, Mr Kendrew. You'll stay
the night of course?"
Kendrew answered that he'd be delighted, and forthwith began to make
himself at home in his free and easy fashion. He was not in the least
afflicted with shyness, and had no objection whatever to being drawn on
the subject of his experiences. He had plenty of stories to tell, and
told them well too, only perhaps it was rather mean of me to think that
he need not so uniformly have made himself the hero of each and all of
them. I don't know that I can plead in extenuation that when we sat
down to table the fellow by some means or other contrived to manoeuvre
himself into the chair next to Miss Sewin, a seat I had especially
marked out for myself, and in fact usually filled. Added to which, once
there, he must needs fill up the intervals between blowing his own
trumpet by talking to her in a confoundedly confidential, appropriating
sort of style; which I entirely though secretly resented. And I was on
the eve of an absence! Decidedly events tended to sour me that
evening--and it was the last.
"What's the matter? Did the old witch doctor tell you something
momentous that you forgot to pass on to me? You are very silent
to-night."
It was her voice. We had risen from table and I had gone out on to the
stoep, "to see if the storm was passing off," as I put it carelessly.
There was a chorus of voices and laughter within, Kendrew having turned
the tables on Falkner in the course of some idiotic chaff.
"Am I?" I answered. "I get that way sometimes. Result of living
alone, I suppose. No, Ukozi did not tell me anything stupendous.
Amusing chap, Kendrew, isn't he?" as another chorus of laughter went up
from within.
"He seems a nice sort of boy. And now--you start on Wednesday? Shall
we see you again between this and then?"
"I'm afraid not, Miss Sewin. Tyingoza's nephew has disappointed me over
the span of oxen he was going to hire me, and I shall have to spend
to-morrow and the day after riding Heaven knows where in search of
another span. Oxen--at any rate reliable ones--are precious scarce just
now everywhere."
"I'm sorry. I--we--shall miss you so much, Mr Glanton--and you have
been so kind to us--"
"That all?" I thought to myself bitterly. "Sort of `make myself
generally useful' blank that will create." Her next words made me feel
ashamed of myself.
"But you will come and see us directly you return, won't you? I shall
look forward to it, mind--and--I hate being disappointed."
Good Heavens! The voice, the gleam of white teeth in the little smile,
the softening of eyes in the starlight! Had we been alone I believe I
should have lost my head, and uttered I don't know what. But you can't
say anything of that sort with a lot of people jabbering and laughing,
and nothing between you and them but an open door and ditto window.
"You shall not be disappointed in that very unimportant particular at
any rate," I answered. "And you are good enough to say you will look
forward to it. Why I shall look forward to it every day until it
comes."
This was pretty plain-speaking and no mistake, but I had been surprised
out of myself. What she might have answered I can't even conjecture,
for at that moment through a lull in the racket within, was raised a
voice.
"Glanton? Yes. He's a good old buffer, Glanton. Why, what's become of
him?"
Aida Sewin's eyes met mine and I could see that she was bubbling over
with the humour of the situation. We broke into a hearty laugh, yet not
loud enough to reach those within.
"There. Now I hope you're duly flattered," she said. "A fresh
unconsidered outburst like that must be genuine. We don't often hear so
much good of ourselves even without being listeners."
"But consider the qualifying adjective. That, you know, is rather
rough."
"Not necessarily. Only a term of good fellowship, I expect. No. You
ought to feel brotherly towards him after that."
Somehow the whimsicality of it did avail to restore my good humour, or
the words and tone of her utterances that went before may have had
something to do with it. Had she been reading my thoughts as I sat
silent among the rest? Well, what if she had?
The storm had passed us by and a haze of continuous lightning in the
loom of a receding cloud together with an occasional mutter away over
the further ridge of the Tugela valley was all that remained of it. She
had moved towards the end of the stoep as though to obtain a nearer view
of this.
"I have something on my mind, Miss Sewin," I began, "and it is this.
You are good enough to say I have been of use to you all, needless to
say how delighted I am to have been able to be. Well now, I shall be
right out of the way for a time, and I am trying to puzzle out a plan of
letting me know in case you might urgently want me."
I don't know what on earth moved me to say this. Why should they want
me--urgently or otherwise? To my surprise she answered:
"It would be a great relief to my mind if you could. I don't know what
you'll think of me, Mr Glanton, but there are times when our isolation
frightens me, and then I think we never ought to have come here. And
now you are going away, and Falkner, too. And--do you know, I have an
uneasy feeling that I couldn't account for to save my life, but it's
there, unfortunately. I believe it has something to do with the witch
doctor, and that eerie affair down at the pool."
"As to that don't let it affect you. Ukozi is a clever specimen of a
witch doctor but not a malevolent one. For the rest you are as safe
here as you would be in any country part of England, and a good deal
safer than in some."
The words "we never ought to have come here" alarmed me. What if when I
returned I should find them gone? Oh, but--that wouldn't bear thinking
of. So I did my best to reassure her, and to all appearances succeeded.
Yet if I had known then--or had the faintest inkling of--what I
afterwards knew--Well when I did it was too late.