“Ha! Who is that?” he said. Then, recognising me, he cried furiously, “Ha, Untúswa! Thou dog, daring to invade my privacy. Are we threatened from without, or why art thou here?”
“Thou art threatened from within,” I answered jeeringly. “I have come to slay thee, son of Matyobane.” And I sprang upon him.
But not so easily was my purpose of vengeance to be fulfilled. Umzilikazi, the warrior and leader of warriors while I was yet a boy, the founder and strong ruler of a new nation, was not so easily to be overcome, although surprised in the midst of sleep. Avoiding the stroke I aimed at him with my assegai, he seized my right wrist and held it in a grasp of iron, and for a moment thus in the half darkness we grappled. Indeed, I know not why he refrained from shouting aloud for assistance, knowing my bodily strength and prowess as a fighter, unless it were that his old warrior instincts moved him to add to the terror of his name by overthrowing so formidable a foe in single strife. And then it was too late, for with my left hand I seized his throat and gripped it until his very eyes protruded, choking back any sound he might then fain have uttered.
“Thy life shall pay for thy breach of faith with me,” I snarled. “Ha, ha! Where is Lalusini?” And my grasp on his throat tightened.
But then I saw another form rise from the heap of blankets and disappear swiftly through the door of the hut. I had not reckoned on the presence of any of the King’s wives; and I knew that I was lost, even before I heard the loud, shrill cry for help that rang out upon the night.
At that moment the sides of the doorway were nearly rent asunder, as the armed guard swarmed in. But, as this happened, Umzilikazi’s grasp upon my wrists relaxed, and he fell heavily to the ground. At the same time a strange, sweet odour filled the air, half stupefying me.
“Slay him, the traitorous dog!” I cried, imitating, as well as I knew how, the voice of the King. “Slay him where he lies.”
In another moment half a dozen spears would have transfixed the prostrate form, but just then, either by chance or design, one of the armed guard kicked the red embers into a momentary glow. The light fell full upon the face of Umzilikazi.
“Whau!” cried the guards, leaping in alarm, their assegais arrested in mid air. “It is the King!”
Then I saw that my plot had failed. Swift—swift as the lightning flash—I stabbed the warrior nearest the door, and, gliding through the latter, but a very few steps brought me to the thorn fence. No time had I to seek the hole by which I had entered. Gathering my legs under me I leaped. Right over the high stockade I flew like a buck, and once on the further side, I ran—ran as I had never ran in my younger days when I was the King’s messenger.