Chapter Thirty Four.
Sirayo’s Mission.
After climbing through the hole, Sirayo found himself in a passage so narrow that his broad shoulders jammed, and he was obliged to edge along sideways, and so dark that he had to feel his way with his toes. It bent sharply to the left, and after he had shuffled on about twenty paces he found an opening above, and mounting on projecting stones, reached the top of the wall, from which he dropped into the open passage. This coiled round and round in widening circles until at last he stood on the outermost fringe, from which he saw the light of Zulu fires about two hundred yards distant. Creeping round the wall to the opposite side, he saw, far off, the gleam of camp fires straight ahead in the direction of the Golden Rock, and then to the left, towards the river, the lights of still another encampment.
The stars shone brilliantly out of the black sky, the air was cool and refreshing. He drew a long breath, looked back at the dark pile, so much like a mound of the dead that he almost shuddered, then sprang lightly to the ground, paused awhile, listening, and silently slipped away in the direction of the river, straight towards the Zulu fires.
He heard the distant lowing of cattle complaining at being hurriedly driven in the night, the sharp yelping of dogs, the angry muttering of a war-song chanted by deep throats. They were sounds familiar to his ear. They told of war and victory, of premeditated riot in the morning, of a frightened people deserting their kraals in the night with such of their goods and their cattle as they could hastily collect, of terrified children and wailing women, of men who had lost heart. He knew them well. Often in his daring youth and stormy manhood he had burst upon some peaceful village slumbering amid waving fields of maize, and seen the scattered survivors flying to the woods or rocky retreats in a neighbouring krantz. Like a hurricane he had swept over the land, leaving desolation in his track; and the wailing of innumerable women widowed by his terrible regiment, the quavering cry of children made fatherless by him, seemed to mingle with that tremulous cry that came on the night air from beyond the river. His iron soul stirred under these blood-stained memories at the thought that now, in his grim age, the last of his band, an outcast, without authority or possessions beyond the assegai in his hand, he was hurrying to the relief of the helpless. He strode on faster over the level plain, his nostrils expanding, his tireless sinews stiffening until his gait was as clean and springy almost as in his youth, when he led his victorious warriors to the fight.
The reflection before him shone in a ring of fire, then as he rapidly advanced this split up into separate flames, and he slackened his speed to approach stealthily. There were ten fires, and in a circle about each there squatted ten warriors, some of them chattering as they ate, others flinging their war-cry across the river, telling what they would do in the morning. Little did they dream in their confidence of the dreaded enemy whose fierce eyes took note of their numbers, and who, slipping away to the right, turned his steps to the river.
He stood on the high bank, listening to its soft, mysterious murmur, trying to pierce the gloom on the further bank, and unshaken by the eye-like reflections of the brighter stars, through which Icanti, the spirit of the river, looks out upon the venturous mortal, seeking to draw him into the clutch of the waters. At a spot where the bank was low he went down to the water, felt the depth with his assegai, then gently slipping in, so that he made no sound to disturb a lurking crocodile, he waded until the cold waters mounted to his chin, when he fixed his assegai in his waistband, and struck out with his right arm. A few strokes he made, until with his toe he touched the bottom again, then struggled on to the bank, reached the top, and all wet as he was ran in the direction of a confused noise.
His way was soon barred by the thorn fences to the cultivated lands, in which he could hear some stray cattle munching at the forbidden food, but with unerring instinct he found a footpath, and passed through several kraals, deserted by everything save a few curs, which yelped at his heels before returning to forage in the abandoned huts. Then he came up with a string of old people, feebly struggling along, who stood still to look after him with bleared eyes, and next upon a band of women, swinging along under great bundles borne on their heads. At the sight of this glistening figure at their side, that had come without warning, and of his head-ring, sign of the dreaded Zulu, they threw down their bundles and ran shrieking away, while at the noise young children ahead cried out shrilly, communicating the alarm to the men who were in advance driving the cattle.
The men called to each other, and the rush of their feet could be heard.
“What is it?” they shouted.
“We know not,” said a boy’s clear voice; “but our mothers cried that the Zulus were upon us. Give me an assegai. I will fight, too.”
“Run, my child, run!” called out a woman’s voice.
“Stand where you are, and I will do you no harm;” and as the deep voice rolled above the noise there was immediate silence. “Soh! Let your chief Induna come forward; I have a message.”
“Do not heed him,” cried the woman; “he will slay you.”
“There is but one,” cried another, “kill him; nay, let us tear him to pieces.”
“Stop, or by the bones of Chaka I will beat you till you cry for mercy. Let the boy who spoke advance. Come.”
“My son, my son, do not heed.”
“Nay, I will go, since I am chief;” and there came to the great Zulu a stripling, with his eyes gleaming, and the hand that held the assegai thrown back. “You speak to us as though we were dogs! Who are you?”
Sirayo’s eyes rested on the boy, then glanced around.
“Tell your men to keep back. I hear them stealing through the grass like snakes.”
The boy turned, and called to the men to keep back.
“Good! You will be a chief some day.”
“I am a chief now,” said the boy proudly, “since my father is killed.”
A strange light leapt from Sirayo’s eyes. “Take that, O chief, and tell me what it is!” and he held out something, after sticking the point of his assegai in the ground.
The boy looked at the gigantic figure before him, then snatched the thing, and held it close to his eyes.
“It is the war-plume of my father—Umkomaas.”
“Yebo. He lives; but he is in danger, and if you would save him you must obey me. Say that to the people.”
The boy turned instantly and shouted the message, whereupon the women came forward, while the men talked.
“How do we know this is true?” asked an old man suspiciously.
“You know by the plume, by the word that your chief lies in the old place of stones, by the wound I received in his defence, by the sign of the snakeskin round my arm. I have said enough. Let those who obey the chief Umkomaas stand on this side.”
Sirayo, beginning suavely, ended by ringing out in a stern command, and, quelled by the authority in his tone, a few of the young men ranged up behind him.
“What means this, son of Umkomaas? are your warriors quicker to run than to obey?”
There was a threatening murmur from the dark mass of men who had gathered opposite to Sirayo and his small party.
“Who are you that we should obey?”
“Who am I? Well do you ask, for never yet have you seen a warrior like me. I am he who was the first war chief of the Zulus of the south. I have led, I have fought, I have conquered since I was a boy like this son of Umkomaas: I am Sirayo!”
They fell back before this name, and the women fled again; for the fame of the great chief, spreading from tribe to tribe, had entered their remote valley.
“Yes, I am Sirayo, and there never was a warrior yet who would not have left all to follow him at his command. You have heard; now, without more words, will you obey?”
“Bayate!” they cried, and thundered on their shields—all but a few Indunas, who would feign probe their suspicions by prolonged discussion.
“It is well. Let there be no more thought of flight. Your women will return to their kraals. The men will take their weapons and meet in the great kraal. Every man will take his place in his own regiment, and the Indunas will take their proper positions. Advance!”
Under the spell of this born leader the courage of the people returned; the men poured on in one direction, talking excitedly, and Sirayo followed with the young chief by his side, whose head was thrown back, while his eyes continually turned upon his formidable companion.
In a vast semicircle within the great kraal the men drew up in something like order, regiment on regiment, to the number of two thousand, each regiment with shields differing in colour from those carried by the others.
Sirayo marched through the lines, towering a head above them, and the rows of gleaming eyes followed him, trying in the dark to decipher the features of their new leader. It was an impressive scene—this large body of men, silent and waiting, drawn up under the stars within the wide circle of huts.
Sirayo smiled grimly on returning to the head of the column, after judging the number, to think that so large a body should dream of flying before the small band of Zulus.
“Your enemies are few,” he said; “you are many. Why did you think of flight?”
“They had killed our fetich, and the witch-doctors said we were doomed,” came the response.
“They lied; they were in league with the enemy. Which of the regiments suffered most in the fight?”
“We of the Rock,” said a young Induna proudly; “nearly half of our brothers lie beyond, and they fell facing the foe. I, Inyame, say it.”
“The Regiment of the Rock will draw up on my right.”
There was a movement, and from the mass, with active steps, a body of about three hundred drew up. Sirayo recognised the red and white shields of the men who had first sided with him.
“The regiment of tried fighting men will now draw up on my left.”
“It is the Regiment of the Snake,” said a deep voice, and at the command a body of about five hundred fine warriors marched to the left, giving a booming shout as they fell into columns.
“Who leads the Regiment of the Snake?”
“I, Chanda.”
“Chanda, listen! You will at once lead your men down the river towards the place of stones. On the further bank you will see the fires of a band of Zulus. Camp over against them, singing your war-song. In the morning, when they retire, you will cross the river and attack them in the rear.”
“Will they retire?”
“I have said it. Heed my words. When they retreat you must cross and follow. Depart, and make much noise.”
Chanda gave his orders, and the regiment, accompanied by a shrill whistling from those who remained, filed out of the gates and went chanting into the night, and as they sang they struck the hafts of their assegais against their shields.
“Chanda has done well. Let the others obey as promptly. I want, now, picked men from the regiments in the centre to make good the Regiment of the Rock. Inyami, select your men.”
The young Induna advanced and touched, with his assegai, the men he wanted, ticking them off on his fingers, until two hundred stood out and fell in with the Regiment of the Rock.
“Son of Umkomaas, little chief with the big heart, I place you over the men who remain in the centre. You will sleep here, but when the sun is up you will march quickly to the old stones where your father lies.”
“Shall I not go at once, O chief?”
“Nay, do as I say. Inyami, listen. The largest body of Zulus lie at the place of the shining Rock. Is it not so?”
“It is so, great chief.”
“You will lead on to the nearest drift. We will cross the river to-night with your regiment, and draw up before the Zulus. There must be no noise. We steal like panthers on the prey—silent and hungry. If any man speaks so much as one word it will be his last. Do you heed?”
“Eweh, O chief!”
“Come, then;” and placing himself beside Inyami, he led the regiment towards the river. The war-song of Chanda’s regiment on the march came plainly on the wind, and in response they heard the deep booming of the Zulu chant. The enemy recognised that some movement was afoot, though in their confidence they never expected that their defeated foes would dare to attack them.