Forging the Blades Part 36

"So it will be with every one who defies the Government, no matter who he may be," concluded Downes, magisterially, as though clinching the argument.

"_Nkose_," replied Sapazani, outwardly polite, though subtly sneering, "I would ask why the Great King has withdrawn all his soldiers from here. Is it because he is angry with the white people here?"

Murmurs of a.s.sent ran through the attendant group. Downes thought to detect the cloven foot. Those infernal Ethiopian preachers had been around disseminating that very idea, he remembered.

"It is not," he answered decisively. "It is because he trusts all his subjects--black as well as white. But should any such show themselves unworthy of his trust their punishment will be swift and terrible."

"But, _Nkose_, it will take a long time to bring soldiers from across the sea," persisted Sapazani, speaking softly.

"There are enough on this side of the sea to do it all," said Downes.

"More than enough. Now take warning, Sapazani. You are not loyal. I, your magistrate, can see that, have seen it for some time past. You are sheltering these disaffected men--Pandulu and Babatyana." Here Sapazani smiled to himself as he thought of the "shelter" he had afforded to the first named. "If this is done it will mean but one thing, that you are thoroughly disloyal to the Government. Well, the fate of a disloyal chief is banishment or death; at any rate, banishment, never to return."

Here Sapazani smiled again to himself as he thought of the head of the royal house, who had been banished but had long since returned. That smile exasperated Downes still further.

"You will appear here within half-a-moon's time," he went on, "with one or both of these men. At any rate, you will appear to--"

"_Hau_! Appear here in half-a-moon's time? _Hau_! But I will not, O little-dog of the King's little-dog Government. Have I nothing else to do than to wear out the road to Esifeni! I will _not_ appear in half-a-moon's time, _impela_!"

The interruption was startling. The chief had leaped to his feet, and, his tall form straightened and his arm thrown forward, was glaring at the magistrate, with murder in his eyes, as his voice rose to a sullen roar of defiance.

"For every trivial thing," he went on, "I am summoned to appear at Esifeni. If a calf is sick I am summoned to Esifeni to explain it. If a baby dies I am summoned to Esifeni to explain it. _Hau_! I will come no more--no more. Let the Government do what it will. I, too, have men. I, too, have men."

His voice had now risen to a perfect roar. The group had uneasily sprung to its feet. Undhlawafa in vain tried to whisper words of soothing counsel to the exasperated chief, but they fell on deaf ears.

The ears of the outside attendants were by no means deaf, however, and now they came crowding up around the scene of the _indaba_. Their att.i.tude was silent, waiting, ominous.

Now the best of Downes came out. He did not believe he had many moments more to live, nor did one of those four white men; they marked the way in which the _right_ hand of each composing that crowd was concealed within its owner's clothing. The hot fit of temper had left him, and he sat there confronting the enraged chief with the dignity of one who felt as an upholder of the Great British Empire at all risks to himself.

Above and beyond the threatening half-circle he could see the flag of the Empire drooping limply over the roof which sheltered his dear ones, and it flashed through his mind that these might, perhaps, be left uninjured. Then he rose to his feet.

"Go," he said. "I talk not with a chief who talks to me in that way. I am here alone, and these are all who are with me. But I am strong with the strength of the whole Empire which that flag represents. Go, and return not to talk in this way to the representative of the King."

For one tense moment they looked each other in the eyes. Then Sapazani spoke--

"I go," he said. "When I return it will not be in this way."

He turned and, without a word of farewell, strode away. His followers were puzzled, therefore subdued. But the bright blades concealed beneath their clothing remained there, still bright, still undimmed.

CHAPTER TWENTY SIX.

CONCERNING BATTLE.

Skerry Hill was the absurdly-named trading store of a man named Minton, and at present it was in a state of siege. Ben Halse was there, and Verna and Denham, and half-a-dozen or so of prospectors and miners, including Harry Stride and Robson. The place was laagered up with waggons and carts, old packing-cases, tins--anything that came in. A strand or two of barbed wire had been rummaged out, and ringed in with this additional defence the inmates, numbering about a dozen rifles, felt fairly secure, at any rate until relief should come.

For mighty events had been maturing. Babatyana had raised the tribes in the north of Natal, then crossing the border had put the torch to those in the south of Zululand. It was war, pure and simple, and a large force had been mobilised to quell it. But what touched them here more nearly was the report, well confirmed, that Sapazani had defied and threatened his magistrate, had come within an ace of murdering him and ma.s.sacring the whole township of Esifeni, and had then taken to the bush with his whole tribe in order to effect a junction with the rebels in the south. All the spa.r.s.e white population of the district had either fled or gone into laager.

Now all this scare would not have troubled Ben Halse overmuch, but for the revelation which Verna had made to him. He was very angry, but he kept his head. He questioned her minutely as to the reason of Sapazani's sudden change of front, but beyond that he had been suddenly called away and had not appeared again she was in the dark. He, however, took a serious view of it. Such a thing as any native acting in this manner was absolutely unheard of, absolutely without precedent.

It was so preposterous even as to look like a practical joke, but natives of this one's age and standing are not given to such. It was certainly time to get out of Sapazani's country, even apart from the existing state of things. So he had buried everything that it was possible thus to hide, and incontinently trekked.

Denham was left in the dark as to the real reason of his brief captivity. To him Verna felt a natural shrinking and repulsion even from mentioning a loathsome matter of the kind. So they got up some story of the times being troubled, and that his capture was probably done with the object of holding him as a hostage.

They had not been long upon the road before they met with some Zulus who were well-known to them. These warned them not to follow the way they were going. It skirted the Lumisana forest for hours, and Sapazani's tribe was ambushing the whole of that road. So Ben Halse decided to alter his plans, and turning off to Skerry Hill, join the laager there for the present. Needless to say, the acquisition of a man of his record and resource was enthusiastically hailed by the occupants. And Denham, too. Another "rifle," and the more of such the better.

Minton was a rough and tumble sort of man, of no particular characteristic except that when he had had a couple of gla.s.ses too many he became a quite phenomenal bore; when he had had three, he wanted to fight, but as no one thought it worthwhile taking him seriously he went to sleep instead. He had a limp wife and several small children, all given to howling vehemently on any or no provocation.

"h.e.l.lo, Ben," cried Minton. "What's the news up your way? Must be hot if _you've_ decided to clear. Well, Miss Verna, hope you've brought your .303. We may want it. And you, sir; glad to meet you. Had heard of you being with our friends here. Come in; I've still got a boy left who can look after your horses."

Verna did not like the allusion to her shooting powers. She had never quite thrown off that misgiving she had lest in Denham's sight she should always be the fighting, hunting Amazon. Minton's well-intentioned jocularity grated upon her ears. But it need not have.

Then the limp wife and the children came forward, and were duly made acquainted with Denham, who won golden opinions from the minor parent of the latter on the spots by stroking their sticky little paws within his, and insisting upon making them stickier still with the contents of certain gla.s.s bottles of bull's-eyes which stood upon one of the shelves within the store.

"What's yours, Mr Denham?" said Minton, going, in business-like fashion, behind the bar end of the store counter. "Ben's form of poison never varies. It's square face in this country, and 'dop' down in Natal--when he can get it. Cheer, oh!"

Now the prospectors dropped in. All knew Ben Halse; then they were introduced to Denham, and of course another round was set up.

"h.e.l.lo, Robson," sung out Minton, when this was accomplished. "Where's your pal?"

"Don't know. He says it's too hot."

"Too hot?" rejoined Minton derisively. "I like that. He's hot stuff himself. Bring him in. It's my round."

Thus Harry Stride and Denham met again. The latter showed no trace of resentment with regard to their last meeting. He greeted Stride with an open, pleasant cordiality that rather astonished that youth. But Stride was not responsive. He avoided showing his antipathy, and was conscious of feeling galled that his partner, Robson, was behind the secret of it.

Yet he need not have been, for the tactful North-countryman never by word or wink let drop that he possessed the slightest knowledge of the same even to him.

The accommodation was somewhat crowded, of necessity. Verna declined an invitation to use one of the rooms within the house. The perpetual yowling of the Minton nursery, heard through part.i.tions of paper-like thinness, might as well have been in the same room. So she elected to sleep in the spider, on the ground that it was cooler. The men sat smoking in a group, with an occasional adjournment to the bar, then turned in anywhere and at any time as they felt sleepy. The horses were all brought within the enclosure and securely made fast.

"What have you been doing about sentry-go, Minton, up till now?" said Ben Halse, after every one was pretty well asleep.

"Oh, I don't know we've thought much about it," was the devil-may-care answer. "I've got a couple of pups here--them rough-haired curs you see yonder at the back. They'll raise Cain enough before any one's within two miles of us, you bet. Come and have a last nightcap--what d'you say, Mr Denham?"

"Oh, I don't know. Done well enough already. However, one more."

Both Denham and his host were hard-headed men, moreover, they knew that the said "one more" wouldn't hurt them, in view of the scheme which each and both were mutually, though tacitly, hatching.

"This is a pretty silly way of running a laager, Denham," said Ben Halse, with infinite contempt, when the two were alone together. "Why, on the tack these b.o.o.bies are going the whole of this show is in Sapazani's hand, and _we_ don't want that, eh?" significantly, forgetting for the moment that the owner was outside what he and Verna were not. "I propose that we take a turn at watching outside, one each side of the _scherm_."

"I was thinking just about the same thing myself," was the answer.

Hour followed hour. Both men, wide enough awake, had taken up their positions. Occasionally they would meet, and exchange a word or two.

In the strong starlight the loom of the hills and the dark hang of forest were distinguishable, then towards morning a pale fragment of moon rose. Denham, sitting among the low thorn-bushes, the magazine of his .303 fully charged, enjoyed the silent beauty of the night, and his naturalist ear took in every cry of beast or bird away out on the otherwise silent waste. Intertwined, too, were thoughts of Verna and of his own position. As to the latter, in a way, the outbreak of war had been distinctly advantageous. No one, least of all the police, would have time to bother about the remains of some unknown Jew, or as to how he came to grief, now quite some time ago. Then the moon came over the distant ridge of forest, and it grew lighter and lighter. Even beneath his heavy overcoat Denham shivered.

Suddenly he grasped his rifle. No, it was only Ben Halse.

"Come round here," whispered the latter. "Something's moving."

Denham's nerves tingled. In a moment they were round at the point indicated. Several plover were circling overhead, uttering shrill cries.

"Look here," whispered Halse earnestly. "When I fire there'll likely be a rush. If there is, don't be content with one shot. Pump about six into them one after another, as quick as ever you can. It'll stop the lot for the moment, and rouse up those boozy idiots inside the fence.

Then we'll run like h.e.l.l, but--look out for the barbed wire."