“‘Au!’ he cried, springing up from the rock against which he had been leaning, his eyes flashing with anger. ‘Is it in that tone thou talkest to me, thou jackal-whelp—to me, dog-cub?’
“‘Spare me, father,’ I answered in mock fear, for I had a design in deceiving him, ‘spare me! My head has had a hard knock. It may be that.’
“‘In truth, thou speakest only just in time to save thy head from a far harder knock, umfane, for the knobsticks of the King’s executioners come down hard upon the skulls of rebellious soldiers who disobey and insult their commanders.’
“Now, Nkose, my blood boiled within me. The sneering ‘umfane’ to me, who, although not ringed, was yet an inceku, was too much. Gungana should pay for that sneer. Moreover, self-preservation called out loudly within me. For nothing less than my death would satisfy this chief, the deadly import of whose words struck full upon my mind. A charge of mutiny and disobedience brought against me by a commander of Gungana’s standing, the King, reproaching me as he often did with rashness and lack of judgment, could hardly discredit, and would certainly not pardon. It was my death or that of Gungana. But I answered with deference:
“‘How is it you are all alone here, my father? Have all men gone away and left their chief?’
“‘They have, but they shall mourn for it,’ he answered. ‘I followed those abatagati dogs up here alone, but so many and so perilous are the holes that I know not by which one of them we came up nor by which we shall go down.’
“‘By none of them shall we go down, my father,’ I shouted. ‘By none of them shall we go down, for one of us shall remain up here for ever!’
“‘Truly that knock on the head was a hard one,’ he said. ‘The umfane has gone mad, quite mad!’
“‘Not so, induna of the King,’ I answered. ‘It is your death or mine. Now—stand ready!’
“I could have rushed upon and killed him in his first surprise, Nkose, and this was my original intention, yet, much as I hated him, he was a brave man, and had led me to battle almost ever since I was able to fight. Nor, though I have slain many, did I ever like to strike a man unprepared. Wherefore I called upon him to stand to his defence.