“Kwa Jonémi.”
“Jonémi?” she repeated, with a start. “You know him?”
The warrior laughed.
“Oh, yes, missis. I know him. I Pukele. Jonémi his boy.”
“Ah; now I see. You were his servant? You are the man who saved his life, when the others were all murdered?” For Nidia had, of course, heard the whole story of the tragedy in Inglefield’s quarters.
“I dat man, missie,” said the other, with a grin that showed a magnificent set of teeth. “Umlimo he say kill all Amakiwa—white people. Pukele say, No kill Jonémi. Amapolise dey kill Ingerfiel, and missis, and strange white man. I not help. I go wit amapolise. I save Jonémi. See,” lifting his foot off the sword-bayonet, “I give him dis.”
“And for that you will never be sorry, I promise you,” said Nidia. “Listen, Pukele. For that, and that alone, you shall have what will buy twenty cows. I will give it you when we are safe again. Only—you must never tell Jonémi.”
The man broke into extravagant expressions of delight, in his own tongue, once he had begun to grasp the burden of this promise, declaring that Jonémi had always been his “father,” and he was not going to let his “father” be killed, even at the bidding of ten Umlimos—looking round rather furtively however, as he gave utterance to this sacrilegious sentiment.
“You said you had seen me at Jonémi’s,” went on Nidia; “but I have never been there. It must have been somewhere else.”
“No somewhere else. I see missie on bit of paper, hang on de wall. Jonémi he have it in hut where he sleep. He often stand, look at it for long time.”