Then stepped forward the suspicious one, and narrated how his leader had been in close confabulation with the captive, whom he—Senhlu—had heard him agree to release, on condition of receiving five hundred head of cattle (exaggeration Number 1); further stipulating that, when the whites were victorious, Sandili and Matanzima should be slain, and he, Nxabahlana, put into their place (exaggeration Number 2). He told how anxious his leader had been to go dangerously near the white men’s camp, and how he and Mopela had stirred up the others to resist this plan, feeling sure that their said leader intended to desert and betray them.
As he concluded, the ominous murmur had risen to angry shouts, and every eye was bent upon the accused with a glare of vengeful wrath. But the object of it never quailed. He stood cold, erect, and disdainful—his tall, herculean frame looking quite majestic, as with a sneer on his face he listened unmoved to the shouts of execration around him. And Claverton, for the time, forgot his own position in the vivid interest which this unlooked-for turn of affairs afforded him. He could see that the whole thing was a plot, and he felt quite sympathetic towards his captor and would-be deliverer, who he saw was doomed, otherwise no common fellow like Senhlu would dare raise his voice against a kinsman of the Great Chief.
“It is a lie!” shouted the accused, waving his hand in the air. “It is a lie. Give this lying sorcerer a weapon and let us meet hand to hand. I will kill him and then whip Senhlu like a dog—my dog that turns to bite me. Listen, Ama Nqgika. Who has been in the front rank whenever we fought the whites? Nxabahlana. Who has shot three of them with his own hand, and seven dogs of Fingoes besides? Nxabahlana. Who has lost the whole of his possessions—cattle, wives, even his very dogs—in the cause of his people? Nxabahlana. Even now,” he went on, working himself up into a pitch of fervid eloquence, “even now, look at me. Am I afraid? Am I afraid of any man living? Who remained on the watch all night and captured this white man, when all the rest were afraid of him and had given up the search? Nxabahlana. Well, then—is it likely I should wish to let him escape? Is it, I say? Surely none but a fool would do this. None but a child like Senhlu. None but a covetous, jackal-faced impostor like Nomadudwana. None but a wolf who devours his own flesh and blood, like Mopela. None but these. Certainly not a warrior. Certainly not Nxabahlana—a warrior, a man of the house of Nqgika. Is the Great Chief, Sandili, a child? Are the amapakati children that they should have their ears filled with such childish tales? It is absurd, I say—absurd.”
He ceased, and a hum of mingled doubt and anger greeted his words.
“Nxabahlana talks well,” said Matanzima, with a gleam of malice in his eyes. “But we know that the whites are very liberal towards traitors. We know that if we are conquered the man who stood the white man’s friend will be well rewarded. When a prisoner is in our hands we do not go and look in at the enemy’s camp on our way home for nothing. Nxabahlana talks of children. Who but a child would do such a thing as this?” concluded he, in a tone of significant cunning.
“A traitor! A traitor!” howled the wizard. “How shall we hold our own with a traitor in our midst?”
And the crowd answered with yells of execration, even the women in the background screaming and brandishing sticks.
“Ha! Matanzima is a boy,” replied the accused in scornful accents. “Let him be silent when he is by his father’s side. Now listen. Here is the white prisoner himself. Let the Great Chief—let the amapakati ask him. Ask him whether I agreed to release him.”
It was a bold stroke. A brief glance at Claverton’s face had inspired the Gaika warrior that here might lie his chance of safety. It was, indeed, a bold stroke, thus throwing himself upon the mercy of the captive. As for Claverton, the unbounded courage of the man filled him with admiration, and on that account alone he would willingly have saved his life, apart from any other consideration.
“Ask him, I say,” repeated Nxabahlana. “Ask the prisoner whether anything passed between us.”