“Oh yes. A dry camp is better than a wet one. Do you talk the Sindabele?”
“A little. Enough to make myself understood for the ordinary purposes. But I am learning it. You seem to have got it well, though.”
“I wish I had it better. You see I am a bit interested in these people. They—and their history—appeal to me. Poor devils! I can’t help sympathising with them to a certain extent. It must be rotten hard luck for a lot of these older ones, like Zwabeka for instance, who have been big-wigs in their time, having to knuckle down to a new and strange form of government in which they come out very under-dog indeed. Still, it’s the universal law and there’s no help for it. But—I’m sorry for them for all that.”
Could he have seen what was in Zwabeka’s mind,—Zwabeka, nominally asleep in one of the huts a few yards away,—could he have heard what was on Zwabeka’s tongue, yea, at that very moment, where would his sympathy have been? The course of but a few days was destined to change it, like that of many another who desired to treat the conquered race with fairness and consideration, and who like himself were sitting on the brink of the hitherto quiescent vent of a raging volcano.
Chapter Eight.
Zwabeka’s Kraal.
“Isn’t that a perfect picture of savage life, set in a savage surrounding?” said Lamont, as he stood with his travelling companion before the door of the hut allotted to them. “It is artistically complete.”
“It is indeed,” was the answer.