Forging the Blades Part 33

"N-no," he answered thoughtfully. "I don't see how any natives could have been concealed within sight or even earshot. The horses would have winded them and have got restive, whereas they were perfectly quiet."

"I can't make out that part of it at all," said Verna. "I must think.

He knew about that other snake-charming incident. I could see that.

The question is--if he knew, how did he know? Some one must have seen it, and if they saw the one thing they'd have seen the other."

"Yes; they must have. Verna, I have an instinct," he went on somewhat gloomily, "a sure and certain instinct that this net will close round me. Everything in life looked too bright since I succeeded in ridding myself of this incubus, and, then I found _you_. After that everything was positively radiant. Of course it couldn't last."

"But it can last, and it shall. Dear one, you said just now that you were placing your life in my hands, and that precious life I shall guard with a jealous care. I have means of hearing things from outside which you would hardly believe, and shall set them working at once. No, it would take a great deal more to part us now--Do you remember the day we first met," she broke off, "and they were talking of this very affair in the hotel? Well, I volunteered the remark that you had just come through the Makanya, but n.o.body heard. They were all talking at once, but I didn't repeat it. Some instinct warned me not to."

"Ah, that first day! We little thought what we were going to be to each other then."

Verna shook her head. "I'm by no means so sure of that," she said.

"No more am I, now I come to think of it."

After this Denham threw off his depression as though by magic. As the days went by and no news came from outside, he was almost dazzled in the sunshine of happiness that flooded his heart. He had dreaded the effect of the revelation upon Verna, and now that he had made it, so far from her love for him lessening it had, if possible, deepened tenfold.

Then fell the bolt from the clear sky.

CHAPTER TWENTY FOUR.

VERNA'S DILEMMA.

Alaric Denham had disappeared.

He had gone out by himself early in the afternoon on foot, taking with him his collector's gun. At sunset he had not returned; then night fell and still no sign of him.

Verna's anxiety deepened. She could hardly be persuaded to go into the house at all. Her eyes strove to pierce the gathering gloom, her ears were open to every sound that could tell of his approach. Yet no such sound rewarded them. Her father was disposed to make light of her fears.

"Denham's no kind of a Johnny Raw, girlie," he said. "He knows his way about by this time. Likely he's wandered further than he intended, after some 'specimen' maybe, and got lost. He'll have turned in at some kraal for the night, and be round again in the morning."

But morning came and still no sign, then midday. By that time the trader himself came to the conclusion that it might be as well to inst.i.tute a search.

The missing man had left an idea as to where he was going. But, starting from that point, an exploration of hours failed to elicit the slightest trace. Inquiries among natives, too, proved equally futile.

None had so much as glimpsed any solitary white man. They had called at Sapazani's kraal, but the chief was absent. It was in this direction that Denham had announced his intention of wandering. Undhlawafa, however, promised to turn out a party of searchers. Night fell again, and Denham was still missing.

Strong, feverishly energetic, Verna had taken an active part in the search; but for any trace they could find, or clue they could grasp, the missing man might have disappeared into empty air. Even her father now looked gloomy, and shook a despondent head. There were perilous clefts about those wild mountain-tops half concealed in the gra.s.s, into which a man might easily fall and thus effectually perform his own funeral.

That this one might have done so was now her father's belief, but to Verna herself another alternative held itself out. What if he had been secretly followed and arrested for that which he had done? Or what if he had detected such danger in time and felt moved to go into hiding?

Somehow neither of these alternatives seemed convincing. The heartsick, despairing agony of the girl was beyond words.

Four days thus went by, Verna was despairing, her father gloomy. To the latter she had now confided Denham's story; they had arranged between them that this should be done in the event of certain contingencies.

Ben Halse came to the conclusion that this rather tied his hands, for to advertise the disappearance would be to draw too much attention to a man who had every reason for avoiding it.

It was night. Verna stood in the open door looking forth. A faint snore now and again from another room told that her father had subsided into obliviousness, but to-night she herself could not sleep; indeed, but for the sheer physical exhaustion of the day she would never have been able to sleep at all. The soft velvet of the sky was afire with stars, and above the dismal howl of prowling hyenas would now and again rise the distant song and roar of savage revelry from some kraal far out on the plain beneath. Back in the sombre recesses of the mountains weird, indescribable sounds, disguised by echo, the voices of bird or beast would ring forth, or a falling star dart, in trailing spark, through the zenith. Suddenly another sound fell upon her ear. Somebody was approaching the house.

All the blood ran tingling through her frame. She listened--listened hard. Footsteps! Alaric had returned. He should find her there, waiting. But the glow of intense thankfulness sank in her heart. But for the one obsessing idea she would have recognised that those soft-padded footfalls were not those of any white man.

She advanced a few steps out into the gloom and called softly. A figure came into sight indistinctly. Even then her heart throbbed to bursting.

This nocturnal visitor must be the bearer of news. But he had halted.

She must go towards him.

"And the news?" she said, speaking quickly.

"If the _Nkosazana_ would hear of him who was missing," was the answer, "she must go to the chief's kraal alone. This movement must be known to n.o.body, not even to U' Ben. Otherwise she would never see or hear of the missing one again."

All further attempts at questioning the nocturnal visitant met with no reply. He had delivered the 'word' of the chief, and had nothing to add to it. Only--the _Nkosazana_ would do well to lose no time. If she could start at daylight it would be highly advisable. But no one must know. It was in the conditions.

To say that Verna was suddenly lifted from darkness to daylight would be to say too little. The condition certainly struck her as strange, but then--the stake at issue! Alaric was not dead, but had perhaps been obliged to go into hiding, was the solution that occurred to her. That was it. Sapazani was their friend, and had warned him, and aided in his concealment. He would get him away out of the country later on, and she--why, she would go to him, go with him, to the uttermost ends of the earth, as she had more than once declared when they had been discussing just such a contingency.

How she got through the night Verna hardly knew. Before dawn she was astir. She woke her father, and told him she was going to start off on another search on her own account, and Ben Halse, himself thoroughly tired out after days spent in the saddle on this bootless quest, had answered that it was quite useless, but that she had better be doing something than nothing, and hail turned over again to sleep the sleep of thorough exhaustion.

As the day dawned, and she was well on her way, Verna became aware that she was being followed, or rather kept up with, by one man. The path was steep and rocky, and she could seldom ride out of a foots.p.a.ce; yet at every turn this man would show himself, either in front or coming on behind with long, swinging strides. Him, however, with an effort of patience and a knowledge of native ways, she forbore to question, though she strongly suspected him of being her visitant of the night before.

The sun was up by the time she reached her objective. The kraal lay peaceful in the early morning; the great double ring fence, and from some of the yellow, domed huts blue smoke was rising. Yet it seemed to her that the place was deserted. It was the hour of milking, yet no cattle were to be seen, and there were few people about. What did it mean? What could it mean?

And now, for the first time, an instinct came upon her, an instinct as of some harm pending. Had she done right to come? Was this part of some sinister plan? and were those who distrusted Sapazani more completely "in the know" than they two? She paused, irresolute. But it was too late to turn back now. The man who had kept pace with her all the way had grasped her bridle rein and was inviting her to dismount.

"Yonder. The chief," he said, when she had done so.

The s.p.a.ce immediately surrounding the kraal was open save for a small clump of spreading mimosas. In the shade of this Sapazani was seated, with three or four other ringed men in attendance. That her arrival was expected was obvious, for a wooden pillow, covered with a clean, new rug, to serve as a seat, had been placed for her. Knowing their ways, she greeted Sapazani in the usual pleasant and cordial style and sat down to talk--outwardly as careless as when they last met, inwardly her whole soul raging with eager impatience.

"And he who is lost?" she said at last. "He is found?"

"He is found."

Her joy and thankfulness knew no bounds, and she was hardly conscious of the withdrawal of those around the chief.

"What is for two ears is not for eight," went on the latter. "I have a word to you, Izibu."

"That is why I am here," she answered, with a smile. "And him of whom I came to learn tidings?"

"Of him we will presently talk," answered Sapazani. "Talk we now of myself. I am in need of a new _inkosikazi_ [princ.i.p.al wife], and her I shall take from among the daughters of the white people."

Verna stared.

"That will not be easy, will it?" she answered, striving not to smile.

"Easy? That I know not. But my new _inkosikazi_ [princ.i.p.al wife] will be thyself, child of U' Ben, and the _lobola_ [Price paid in cattle to the father or guardian of a girl asked in marriage] which I shall send will be the life of him whom thou seekest."

Verna half started from her seat, flushing crimson with anger and outraged pride. Then she subsided again.

"Is this a joke on the part of the chief?" she said. "Because I like not such jokes."

"No joke is it," answered the other, in a tone of firm a.s.surance. "My new _inkosikazi_ shall be thyself, Izibu."