Chapter Seventeen.
Retributive.
The rumble of unrest was rolling like the wave of an earthquake. It was hard to say where it began, but the tribes throughout the northern half of Natal were saturated with its spirit, and it was widespread in Zulu land. The authorities watched it with more anxiety than they cared to disclose, but even they had not fathomed the extent of its ramifications. They knew, for instance, that Sapazani was disaffected, but they did not know that Malemba the assegai-maker was kept busy day and night, and that a bevy of young men was ever present at his kraal, to bear off, under cover of darkness, the bundles of weapons barely cool from the forge. They did not know, either, of the weighty and mysterious loads delivered stealthily at another kraal of Sapazani’s, a small one, in the most inaccessible recesses of the Lumisana forest. These had been delivered independently of the agency of Ben Halse, who on this occasion had held out firmly against the tempting offer. In fact, Ben Halse did not know himself, he only suspected.
The said authorities were fully alive to the desirability of arresting Sapazani, but between desirability and advisability there is something of a gulf fixed. For such a course would be tantamount to firing the train. That chief and his powerful following up in arms—for it was certain that he would not submit to arrest tamely—would simply mean that other plotting tribes would throw off all disguise and join him without reserve. The position was growing acute.
In the small kraal just mentioned sat Sapazani at night, and others with him. Before him, on the ground, were several of the loads referred to, and as their wrappings were undone the chief’s eye glistened as they fell on the contents. The young men who had brought them in were squatting in the background, drinking large draughts of tywala. A fire burning in the centre of the open space illuminated the domed huts, and the broad face of the full moon threw an additional light upon the dark group. Not a soul could have surprised the place, for armed pickets were stationed all round at out lying distances.
“This is good, Mandevu,” Sapazani was saying. “Now when we get them among the trees and rocks will these do their work? For my part I like not such way of fighting, but did not Opondo tell us of that nation in the north—that which went forth under Umzilikazi? When they fought the whites in the old way they were shot down before they could get near enough to strike a blow, but when they waited for their enemy to come to them in the mountains, instead of going to him first, then they killed many with such as these. Ah, ah! and so it will be again.”
“And when we have fought enough, and each killed our white man, there are those across the seas who will give us peace,” said Mandevu. “Opondo has said it, and others.”
“The White King is angry with the people of this land,” went on Sapazani. “He has withdrawn his soldiers, and there are only Nongqai left. Those we shall easily eat up. They are scattered about in threes and fours.”