“We’re well out of that,” went on Wyvern, as they gained the shelter of the house. “By George, if one had come in for it in an open camp, it would have been a case of covering one’s head with one’s saddle. The stones are as big as hens’ eggs. I’ve only seen it like that once before. Look.”
Outside, the enormous hailstones lay like a fall of ice; and as the blue spectral gleams of lightning fell upon the scene the effect was one of marvellous beauty. It was as though a rain of gigantic diamonds was cleaving and illuminating the darkness, while the layer which overspread the ground flashed out a million points of incandescence. Then, with receding roar, the hail cloud whirled on its course, and there was stillness as of death, save for an intermittent roll of thunder.
Lalanté had found herself drawn to a window – the others were crowding the doorway – and as she pressed to her side the arm that encircled her, she gazed forth upon the weird scene of storm and terror with a kind of ecstasy, and, in her heart, blessing it. But for it she would now be alone – alone and heart-wrung. The evil hour was only postponed – but it was postponed – and they stood thus, close together in the darkness, silent in their sweet, sad happiness.
“We’ll be able to ice our grog to-night, Le Sage,” said Warren presently in his breezy way.
“Why, yes. We’d better have some too – and we may as well have some light upon the scene. See to it, Lalanté.”
“All right, father,” said the girl, cheerfully, but inwardly furiously anathematising Warren for breaking up her last solitude à deux. For she instinctively realised there would be no further opportunity of its renewal – either to-night or to-morrow.
Nor – was there.
Chapter Thirteen.
Bully Rawson – General Ruffian
Bully Rawson lay in his camp in the Lumisana Forest in north-eastern Zululand. He was playing cards with himself, and as he played he cursed.
Primarily he cursed because he could not quite bring off a move in the game which, with a real adversary, would inevitably give him an advantage – profitable but wholly illicit. Secondarily he cursed merely by way of something to say. Thirdly and generally, he cursed from sheer force of habit; but whichever way he did it, and from whatever motive, Bully Rawson’s language was entirely unprintable, and, in its relation to the higher Powers, rather bloodcurdling even to those who were by no means straight-laced.
Now, blowing off a fine stream of such expletive, he rose to his feet, and flung the whole pack of cards high in the air. Naturally they would descend in a wide and scattered shower, then he would make his Swazi boy pick them up again, and kick him for not doing it quick enough. This would relieve his feelings some; and would be consistent with the methods he usually adopted to justify his sobriquet.
Seen erect he was a heavy, thick-set man, with a countenance that was forbidding to the last degree. His nose had at one time been broken, and his eyes rolled fiercely beneath shaggy black eyebrows. He wore a long black beard, just turning grey in parts, and plentifully anointed with tobacco juice; and his hands, knotted and gnarled, seemed to point to enormous muscular strength. He looked round upon the sunlit forest, cursed again, then turned to enter a circular thorn enclosure within which rose the yellow domes of half a dozen grass huts.
Two native girls – well-formed as to frame, and with faces that would have been pleasing only that the bare sight of Bully Rawson was not calculated to bring a pleasant expression into any human countenance – were squatted on the ground. Both wore the impiti, or reddened cone of hair rising from the scalp, together with the apron-like mútya which denotes the married state. They were, in fact, his two wives.
“Where is Pakisa?” he said.
“He? Away at the wood-cutting,” answered one.
“You two then, go and pick up the ‘pictures’ I have scattered.”
“And the meat I am roasting – what of it?” said the one who had answered.
“You, Nompai,” turning to the other, “You go —au! tyetya!”
This one got up and went out without a word – taking care not to pass this manly specimen any nearer than she could help. As she rose she slung an infant on to her back – an infant far lighter in colour than the lightest native.
“You, Nkombazana, you are rising to the heavens,” he sneered. “You are growing too tall for me. Now I think some hard stick laid about thy bones will keep thee from growing so over fast.”
The woman’s eyes glittered, and a sort of snarl just revealed the fine white teeth. But she did not move. She only said:
“The Snake-doctor —whau! his múti is great and subtle.”
The white man, in the voice of a wild beast’s growl, fired off a storm of expletives, mixing up Anglo-Saxon where the Zulu fell short of lurid enough blasphemy. But Nkombazana answered nothing, and still did not move.
He made a step towards her, then stopped short. The allusion was one he perfectly understood, and it seemed – yes, it seemed almost to cow him. With her he knew well it would not do to go too far. She was a Zulu, and the daughter of a fairly influential chief; the other, Nompai, was a Swazi and the daughter of nobody in particular, wherefore Nompai came in for her own share of kicks, and most – not all – of Nkombazana’s too. He had a lively recollection of a sudden and unaccountable illness – an internal illness – which had seized upon him on a fairly recent occasion, and which for hours had put him through the torments of the damned. This had followed – it might have been a coincidence – right upon a terrific thrashing he had administered to Nkombazana, and his awful convulsions had only been allayed by the treatment of a certain isanusi– known to the natives as the Snake-doctor – treatment for which he had to pay pretty heavily lest worse should befall him. But though he frequently abused and snarled at her, he had never laid hand – or stick – upon his principal wife since. Indeed he would gladly have been rid of her at any cost now. He would not have hesitated to make away with her, but that he dared not. He would willingly have sent her back to her people, but it would never do to arouse their hostility by the slur upon her that such a course would imply, and have we not said above that her father was an influential chief? So to that extent Nkombazana remained mistress of the situation.
Bully Rawson went into a large hut, which he used as a trading store, and reaching down a square bottle filled an enamelled iron cup. No “trade” gin was this – liquor trading by the way was not allowed in the Zulu country at that time, but plenty of it was done for all that. No. This was excellent Hollands, and having poured the liberal libation down his throat he went forth again. There was not much trade doing just then, but he had entered into a contract for the cutting of poles, to be taken to the coast and shipped; for which he had obtained a concession from the local chief. Now, having lighted his pipe, he strolled leisurely through the forest to where the sound of saw and axe told that such work was going on.
Several natives were more or less busily engaged. These were not Zulus, for at that time no Zulu had yet learned “the dignity of labour” – not in his own country at any rate. They were for the most part. Tonga boys from the coast, and, as ill-luck would have it, just as Rawson emerged from the trees, one of them happened to be squatting on the ground taking snuff. His back was towards his fate, nor did any of the others dare to warn him. Suddenly he felt as though a tree had fallen upon him, and the next few moments were spent by his employer in savagely kicking him round and round the clearing, till at last the luckless wretch fell on the ground and bowled for mercy. This he might not have got but that his afflictor became aware of the presence of three tall Zulus, who stood watching the proceedings, a gleam of mingled amusement and contempt upon their fine faces.
“Greeting, Inxele!” said one.
Bully Rawson scowled. He resented the familiar use of his native name, instead of the respectful “’Nkose.” He further resented the sheaf of assegais and small shield which each carried, and which should have been dropped before coming into his camp, or at any rate, while addressing himself. But the Zulu is quick to recognise a blackguard and loth to show him deference, and that this white man was an egregious blackguard as white men went, these were perfectly well aware.
“I see you, amadoda,” he answered shortly.
“He, there, has a message,” said the first who had spoken, indicating the only one of the three who was not head-ringed. “It has travelled from Tegwini.” (Durban.)
“Well, what is it?” rejoined the white man, shortly.
“It is here,” said the unringed native, producing a small packet, which he carried tied on to the end of a stick. Rawson snatched it eagerly. It was a sort of oilskin enclosure.
“Now, what the devil can this be?” he said to himself, fairly puzzled. But the mystery was soon solved. The wrappings being undone, revealed nothing less commonplace that a mere letter – addressed to himself. Yet why should the bronze hue of his forbidding countenance dull to a dirty white as he stared at the envelope? It might have been because he knew that writing well, and had cherished the fond delusion that the writer hadn’t the ghost of an idea as to his own whereabouts. What then? Well, the writer of that letter had power to hang him.
He remembered to give the Zulus snuff out of a large box which he always carried, then while they sat down leisurely to enjoy the same, he tore open the envelope, and that with hands which trembled somewhat. The communication, however, was brevity itself. Thus it ran:
“A friend of mine – name Wyvern – is going into your part, even if he is not already there. Take care of him. Do you hear? Take care of him.
“Warren.”
Rawson stared at the words while he read them again and again, “Take care of him.” Oh, yes, he would do that, he thought to himself with a hideous laugh. Then he fell to wondering what sort of a man this object of Warren’s solicitude might be – whether, in fact, he would prove an easy one to “take care of.” Well, that, of course, events would show. Anyway, what was certain was that Warren’s wishes had to be attended to by him, Bully Rawson.
Turning to the Zulus he asked about news. Was there any?
Not any, they said. The country was getting more and more disturbed because the English Government could not make up its mind. It made one arrangement to-day, and another took its place to-morrow, and now nobody in Zululand knew who was his chief or whether he had any chief at all. There had been some fighting, they had heard, in Umlandela’s country, but even about that there was no certain news.
After a little similar talk they got up and took their leave. Rawson, his mind filled with the untoward turn events had taken, quite forgot to kick or thrash any more of his labourers.
The sun’s rays were lengthening, and with a few parting curses to those ill-starred mortals he took his way homeward. The cool shaded forest gloom was pleasant, but his thoughts were not. What he was chiefly concerned about was not the task that Warren had set him to perform. Oh, dear no. That, indeed, was, if anything, rather a congenial one to a born cut-throat such as Bully Rawson. What concerned him, and that mightily, was that Warren should have located so exactly his whereabouts, for he knew that thenceforward he was that astute practitioner’s unquestionable and blindly obedient slave; and the part of obedient anything, in no wise appealed to the temperament of Bully Rawson. If only he could, on some pretext, inveigle Warren himself up to that part; and with the idea came a conviction of its utter futility. Warren was one of the sharpest customers this world ever contained, and none knew this better than he did.
Thus engrossed it is hardly surprising that even such a wide-awake bird as himself should remain ignorant of the fact that he was being followed. Yet he was, and that from the time he had started from the wood-cutting camp. Half a dozen lithe, wiry Zulus – all young men – were on his track, moving with cat-like silence and readiness. They were not armed, save with sticks, and these not even the short-handled, formidable knob-kerrie; but their errand to the white man was of unmistakable import; and fell withal – to the white man.
Suddenly the latter became aware of their presence, and turned. They were upon him; like hounds upon a quarry. But Bully Rawson, though unarmed, and the while cursing his folly at being found in that helpless state, was no easy victim. He shot out his enormous fist with the power of a battering-ram, and landing the foremost fair on the jaw, then and there dropped him. The second fared no better. But, with the cat-like agility of their race, the others, springing around him on all sides at once – here, there, everywhere – kept outside the range of that terrible fist, until able to get in a telling blow. This was done – and the powerful ruffian dropped in his turn, more than half-stunned, the blood pouring from a wound in the temple. Did that satisfy them? Not a bit of it. They then and there set to work and belaboured his prostrate form with their sticks, uttering a strident hiss with each resounding thud. In short, they very nearly and literally beat him to a jelly – a chastisement, indeed, which would probably have spelt death to the ordinary man, and was destined to leave this one in a very sore state for some time to come. Then, helping up their injured comrades, they departed, leaving their victim to get himself round as best he could, or not at all.
You will ask what was the motive for this savage act of retribution. Some outrage on his part committed upon one of their womenkind? Or, these were relatives of his own wives who had chosen to avenge his ill-treatment of them? Neither.
In this instance Bully Rawson was destined to suffer for an offence of which he was wholly innocent; to wit, the bursting of a gun which he had traded to a petty chief who hailed from a distant part of the country – for he did a bit of gun-running when opportunity offered. But the old fool had rammed in a double charge – result – his arm blown off; and these six were his sons resolved upon revenge. They dared not kill him – he was necessary to far too powerful a chief for that – though they would otherwise cheerfully have done so; wherefore they had brought with them no deadly weapons, lest they should be carried away, and effectually finish him off. Wherein lay one of life’s little ironies. For his many acts of villainy Bully Rawson was destined to escape. For one casualty for which he was in no sense of the word responsible, he got hammered within an inch of his life.
It must not be taken for granted that this ruffian was a fair specimen or sample of the Zulu trader or up-country going man in general, for such was by no means the case. But, on the principle of “black sheep in every flock,” it may be stated at once that in this particular flock Bully Rawson was about the blackest of the black.
Chapter Fourteen.
What Hlabulana Revealed
In the quadrangle, or courtyard, known as Ulundi Square, in the Royal Hotel at Durban, two men sat talking. One we already know, the other, a wiry, bronzed, and dark-bearded man of medium height, was known to his acquaintance as Joe Fleetwood, and among the natives as “U’ Joe,” and he was an up-country trader.
“You did the right thing, Wyvern, when you decided to come up here,” the latter was saying, “and in a few months’ time” – lowering his voice – “if we pull off this jaunt all right, we need neither of us ever take our jackets off again for the rest of our natural lives.”
“Not, eh? Didn’t know you could make such a rapid fortune in the native trade.”
The other smiled drily.
“Look here, Wyvern. You only landed last night – and a most infernal bucketing you seem to have got on that poisonous bar in doing so. So that we’ve had no opportunity of having a straight, square talk. We won’t have it here – too many doors and windows about for that I propose, therefore, that we get on a tram and run down to the back beach – we’ll have it all to ourselves there. First of all, though, we’ll have these glasses refilled. I don’t believe in starting dry. Boy!”
A turbaned Indian waiter glided up, and reappeared in a moment with two long tumblers.
“That’s good,” exclaimed Fleetwood, having poured down more than half of the sparkling contents of his. “Durban is one of the thirstiest places I’ve ever struck.”
Not much was said as they took their way through the bustle of the streets, bright with the gaudy clothes worn by the Indian population, whose thin, chattering voices formed as great a contrast to the deep, sonorous tones of the manly natives of the land as did their respective owners in aspect and physique.
“By Jove! it brings back old times, seeing these head-ringed chaps about again,” said Wyvern, turning to look at a particularly fine specimen of them that had just stalked past. “I wonder if I’d like to go over all our campaigning ground again.”
“Our jaunt this time will take us rather off it. I say – that time we ran the gauntlet through to Kambula, from that infernal mountain. It was something to remember, eh?”
Wyvern looked grave.
“One might run as narrow a shave as that again, but it’s a dead cert we couldn’t run a narrower one,” he said.
“Not much. I say, though. You’ve seen some rather different times since then. Let on, old chap – is that her portrait you’ve got stuck up in Number 3 Ulundi Square? Because, if so, you’re in luck’s way, by jingo you are.”
“You’re quite right, Fleetwood, as to both ventures. Only a third ingredient is unfortunately needed to render the luck complete, and that is a sufficiency of means.”
“That all? Well, then, buck up, old chap, because I’d lay a very considerable bet you’ll find that difficulty got over by the time you next set foot in hot – and particularly thirsty – Durban.”
Wyvern looked up keenly. Something in the other’s tone struck him as strange.
“What card have you got up your sleeve, Joe?” he said. “You let out something about ‘a few months’ a little while ago. Well now, I may not know much about the native trade, but I have a devilish shrewd idea that a man doesn’t scare up a fortune at it in that time.”
“You’re right there – quite right – and that’s the very thing we’ve come out to chat about – and sniff the ozone at the same time. It’ll keep till we get there. Here’s our tram.”
These two were great friends. Fleetwood, indeed, was prone to declare that he owed his life to the other’s deftness and coolness on one occasion when they had been campaigning together; a statement, however, which Wyvern unhesitatingly and consistently pooh-poohed. Anyhow, there was nothing that Fleetwood would not have done for him; and having lit upon the marvellous discovery which was behind his sanguine predictions of immediate wealth, he had written at once to Wyvern to come up and share it.
A fresh breeze stirred the blue of the waves, as the milky surf came tumbling up the pebbly beach with thunderous roar. Out in the roadstead vessels were riding to their anchors, prominent among them the blue-white hull and red funnel of the big mail steamer which had brought Wyvern round the day before. On the right, as they faced seaward, beyond the white boil of surf on the bar, rose the bush-clad Bluff, capped by its lighthouse, and behind, and stretching away on the other hand, the line of scrub-grown sandhills, beyond which rose the wooded slopes of the Berea.
“Now we’re all right,” pronounced Fleetwood, leading the way along the beach. “We’ve got the whole show to ourselves and we know it. Not a soul can get within earshot of us and we not know it, which is important if you’ve got anything important to talk about.”
“Yes,” assented Wyvern, lighting his pipe. “Now – drive ahead. Found a gold mine, eh?”
“That’s just about what it is; only it’s not a gold mine in the ordinary sense of the word. It’s buried gold.”
“The deuce it is. Where?”
“That’s what I’m coming to. Now listen. There exists a certain Zulu of my acquaintance, a head-ringed man named Hlabulana. I have known him a long while, some time before the war, in fact, and he’s a wonderfully straight and reliable man. Well, a good many years ago a strange thing came within his experience. Off the coast of Zululand, about where the Umfolosi river runs out at Saint Lucia Bay, there arrived a ship – a small ship, I gathered from his account, probably a brig or schooner. Now this in itself was an event, because there was absolutely no trade done with Zululand by sea in those days, any more than there is now. But where this craft undertook to anchor was off one of the most rotten, swampy and uninhabited parts of the whole coast. A boat put off from her and came ashore, and in it were four men. They landed, and no sooner had they done so than the vessel, which appears to have been lying a good way out, was seen suddenly to disappear. She had, in fact, gone to the bottom.”
“One minute, Fleetwood,” interrupted Wyvern. “When was this – have you any sort of idea?”
“Yes, I have as it happens. It can’t have been many months before the big fight between Cetywayo and Umbulazi for the succession. Now that came off at the end of 1856, which locates this earlier in the same year. Good while back, isn’t it? Close upon thirty years.”
“Right. Go on.”
“Well, then, they took some packages out of the boat; not very large ones, but still, it seems, about as much as they could manage. They hid the boat under bushes and started inland. All this, of course, was seen, because although that part of the country is poorly populated, still there were, and are, people there, and such an unusual occurrence was not likely to go unspotted. But the Zulus didn’t show themselves. They kept out of sight, and shadowed the four.”
“What sort of fellows were the said four?” asked Wyvern. “Nationality, for instance. English?”
“I don’t think so. From the account they were dark-skinned, black-bearded chaps, and wore large rings in their ears. I should say – though I’ve no personal experience of either – Italians or Spaniards – or, maybe, Portuguese.”
“Ah! very likely. The latter most probably.”
“Well, they held along, inland, keeping the course of the Umfolosi river not far on their left – that is, travelling north-west. They seemed to have their own stores, for they avoided the kraals, and now and then shot game; for they were well armed. When they came to where the Black Umfolosi forks more northward they didn’t hesitate but struck up it, which showed that at least one among them had some previous knowledge of the country, and this, in fact, was the case.”
“How is it they weren’t all captured and marched off to the king?”
“Yes. That’s one of the very first questions that occurred to me. Wyvern, and I put it at once. Mpande was king then. The answer was that the country was in such a disturbed state just then, and the people so unsettled, that the few living in those parts were extremely unwilling to go to Nodwengu, for fear they should be obliged to take sides in the row brewing between Cetywayo and his brother. You see, the coast-dwelling Zulus are by no meant the flower of the nation, and these didn’t want to be drawn into any fighting at all. They preferred to sit tight at home. They knew, too, that there was little chance of them being hauled over the coals for it, because things were so excessively sultry at and around the seat of government of the Zulu nation, that the high authorities had no time to bother their heads about anything further afield.
“Well, things went on so for a time, and their march progressed. The people inhabiting the coast country took for granted these chaps had been shipwrecked, and were making their way to the nearest settlements of other whites, and it was not till they got in among the passes of the Lebombo range that they were in any way interfered with, and then not until they had reached the western side.
“This is where Hlabulana comes into the story. He was a young ’un then – an umfane. Two of them surprised him while stealthily watching the other two, and he says he has been no nearer death, even in the thickest part of the late war, than he was on that occasion. One of them could talk some Zulu, and they only spared him on condition he should go with them and help carry the loads; and this he agreed to do, partly out of scare and partly out of curiosity. Then the time came when they quarrelled among themselves, the upshot of which was that two of them knifed the other two in their sleep.
“Now came a deadlock. The two who were left were unable to carry all the plunder, besides they were a good deal weakened and exhausted by their long tramp. They had to hide most of their stuff, presumably intending to return for it at some future time. They buried it accordingly in a cave on the western side of the Lebombo, but Hlabulana wasn’t allowed to see the exact spot.”
“Then how does he know that they buried it?” asked Wyvern. “They may have just shoved it into some cleft.”
“There was earth on their knives, moist earth such as you’d get in a damp cool place where the sun never struck. But he can take us to the spot; there are several holes and caves around, but I don’t think we’ll find much difficulty in hitting off the right one.”
“And then? What makes you think there’ll be anything worth finding if we do, for I suppose the two jokers never came back to dig it up again?”
“They didn’t, because to cut a long yarn short, the Zulu-speaking chap knifed his mate directly after – and he himself was killed by a sort of outlaw tribe that hung out on the Swazi border. So there the stuff is, waiting for us to dig out, and it’ll mean a tidy fortune apiece.”
“Yes, but what of the stuff being worth finding?” urged Wyvern, again. He was beginning to feel less sanguine than at first.
“It is – for these reasons. First of all, the comparatively small compass of the loads, points to proportionate value. Then that ruffian murdered his remaining pal so as to get the benefit of the whole lot – but, more important still, Hlabulana more than once caught sight of shining stones, some white, some red and green, in fact, he thinks there were other colours. He remembers it perfectly because once he saw them sorting these into different bags I believe, too, one of the boxes contained bar gold, for he says it was as heavy as a stone of the same size. After the third chap had been knifed Hlabulana thought it about time to make himself scarce and he accordingly did.”
“You believe his yarn then, absolutely?”
“Absolutely.”
“Well, but – ” went on Wyvern, “why didn’t he prospect for the stuff himself, and get all the benefit of it?”
“The untrousered savage is a queer devil, Wyvern; at least as he is represented in this country. The fact is Hlabulana is afraid to meddle with this himself – Zulus are a superstitious crowd you know. As he puts it – white people can do anything, no matter how ‘tagati.’ Wherefore we are to unearth the stuff and give him a share of the plunder according to its value.”
“Confiding of him, very. Do you find them often that way?”
“Oftener than you’d think. When a Zulu has made up his mind you’re to be trusted, he’ll trust you almost to an unlimited extent.”
“Well now, Fleetwood, where is this Golconda?”
“In one of the wildest and most remote tracts of the Zulu country, the Lumisana forest. I’ve been into it once, but never explored it. There’s no trade there to speak of, or anything to take a white man into it. This find, however, is to be made in a sort of amphitheatre, or hollow, known to the Zulus as Ukohlo. Now, listen, Wyvern. We haven’t got to talk about this even between ourselves, unless we’re out like this. You never know who the deuce may be within earshot.”
“That’s so. I’m all safe. I may be a damn fool at money making, or rather, money losing, but I do know how to keep my head shut. But look here, Joe. Have you got any theory of your own with regard to this yarn; for I take it those four beauties didn’t come up out of the sea and lug a few bags of valuable stones up to a remote corner of the Zulu country and plant them there for the future emolument of you and me?”
“Rather. I have a theory. I believe the whole thing spells a big robbery in some other part of the world, what of or who from is a mystery and always will be, for you bet these jokers didn’t leave any clue with the stuff they planted. The fact that the one of them, who for convenience sake we’ll call the leading rip, could talk some Zulu points to the fact that he at any rate had been there before, that the Zululand coast was their deliberate objective, and they couldn’t well have struck a better one. Whether they stole the ship as well is another question, or whether there were more on board her, and these four managed to scuttle her so as to destroy all trace and then clear out with the only boat, is a mystery too. But obviously they reckoned on getting through into Transvaal territory and that way to Europe, thus completely hiding their trail, which was an ingenious idea.”
Wyvern puffed at his pipe for a minute or two. Then seriously:
“What about this, Joe? This stuff – if it is the proceeds of a robbery – what right have we to benefit by it?”
Fleetwood started, stared, then threw back his head and roared.
“Good Lord, Wyvern, you ought to have been a parson. I wouldn’t do a shot on anyone unfairly, as you know. Man alive, but I was only giving you one of my theories – I may have others. Here’s one. You know from time to time yarns crop up in the papers about buried treasure in the West Indies and all sorts of those old piratical romps. Well, this may be a case in point, and these oily-looking, cut-throat scoundrels may have struck upon just one of these finds. To save awkward questions, and the possibility of awkward claims as to ‘treasure trove,’ and all that, they may have hit upon the dodge of bringing it across the sea right out of the ordinary course. Well, now, that theory is just as good as the other. It may be hundreds of years since the swag had a lawful owner or owners. Eh?”