“Ha—ha! I told you so, didn’t I? How do you like that, Lenzimbi—how do you like that?” continued the savage, striking him twice on the head with the shaft of his assegai. “Yesterday, you—to-day, I. Haow!”
“What has come over the warriors of the Amaxosa that they keep such a cur in their midst?” said Claverton, looking straight before him, and steadily ignoring his persecutor. “Only a cur bites and worries a helpless man, but if one even looks at a stone he runs away with his tail between his legs, as this cur called Mopela would do if my hands were for a moment free—even as he has done twice already.”
With a yell of rage, and foaming at the mouth, Mopela flourished his assegai within an inch of Claverton’s face, but the prisoner never flinched. It seemed that the savage was working himself up to such a pitch that in a moment he would plunge the weapon into the body of his helpless enemy, when his arm was seized in a firm grasp, and Nxabahlana said, coldly:
“Stop, Mopela. You must not kill the prisoner. He belongs to the Great Chief, Sandili.”
“Yes, yes,” chimed in the others, “he belongs to Sandili; he is not ours!” And favouring Claverton with a frightful glare of disappointed hate, Mopela fell back sullenly among the rest.
“Yes, the white man belongs to Sandili. He is not ours—he is not ours!” repeated the Kafir whose suspicions had been awakened, with a significant glance at his leader’s face.
The latter, who, by the way, was Mopela’s half-brother, ignored the hint, and gave orders to resume the march.
“Aow!” exclaimed one of the Kafirs, suddenly stopping. “This is not the way to Sandili.”
“No, no. It isn’t?” agreed several of the others.
“It takes us dangerously near the white man’s camp,” said the suspicious one, stopping short with a determined air.