In pursuance of the policy which had decreed that the execution should be public, the natives were allowed to come forward in batches and view the bodies if they wished. Many did so come forward, and the sight of the three hanging there, still and motionless, with the white caps drawn over their heads and faces, seemed to impress them deeply, judging from the remarks they made as they went away. Moreover I have reason to believe the effect was salutary and lasting. The pomp and awe and mystery of it appealed to them powerfully.
I had a reason for answering Ivuzamanzi, otherwise I would not have seemed to wrangle with a man on the very steps of the scaffold. For, be it remembered, he was the son of a powerful chief, and his words might be in the highest degree dangerous to myself, and I had no hankering to be marked out as the object of a vendetta. But I knew that natives have a strong sense of justice, and the fact that I had once saved his life being made known, would go far towards taking the sting out of his denunciation.
“He feared,” said a native voice at my elbow.
I turned quickly, though I knew the voice. It was that of Jan Boom.
“He feared,” repeated the Xosa. “He feared death. His heart melted to water within him. Silungile! Now am I avenged.”
Chapter Thirty Three.
Conclusion.
For all the brave way in which Aïda had taken her grisly experience—and the full gruesomeness of her peril and narrow escape had been borne in upon her, especially during the trial and the revelations it had evolved—an impression had been left upon her mind which rendered the life to which she had been looking forward, and its associations, distasteful to her for the present. So after our marriage, which took place a month later than the dark and tragical circumstances I have just recorded, we decided to start for a prolonged tour of a year or more in Europe.