“As my eyes became accustomed to the gloom, I made out little slanting rays of light penetrating from somewhere. I could see a vaulted rock wall above, around. But beneath?
“The black darkness of another pit, wherein voices were murmuring, shapes were moving. Ha! the vision of the wizard’s múti! And as I looked, claws shot upward to seize me. All the old horror which had overwhelmed me in Masuka’s hut came back to me now—the vision of the living creatures; shadowy, shapeless, hideous; mouthing and gnashing to draw me down. That frightful grip was again upon my legs, and, struggling, gasping, amid a cloud of dust and falling shingle, I was dragged down with a violent crash to the bottom of the pit.
“And now I could see I was beset by a number of the most grisly and horrible shapes the eyes of man ever beheld, for it was not quite dark in this evil hole. Frightful heads, with flattened skulls, and huge, champing jaws and horn-like ears, were wagging over me as I lay, and a bony claw put forth gripped me by the throat in the iron grip of strangulation, and with a growling, worrying snarl more than one pair of teeth seized me in different parts of the body.
“Then, desperate at the prospect of being torn in pieces and devoured by these foul and loathsome creatures, with the very despair of terror I put forth all my strength, and whirling my knobstick, it met and crashed against what felt like a head. There was a most blood-chilling yell of wild dismay; then these hideous ghosts flung themselves from me and fled shrieking.
“As I leaped to my feet, shivering with the horror of this awful fate, my eyes becoming more accustomed to the darkness, I made out that I was in a great square chamber, on the floor of which lay several skulls.
“The odour which rose up from this was unspeakably fearful, and as the shafts of light came in stronger I could make out six or eight shapes—human shapes, I was going to say; but they were as the skeletons of baboons with dry bags of skin hung around them, and they had huge heads. They were huddled together on the opposite side of the hole, staring, pointing at me with their bony claws, moving to and fro their hideous heads, while whispering together in a hoarse and uncouth tongue of which I could gather not a word. Then, while some still watched me, others bent down, and there was a sound as of tearing of meat, of cracking of bones; but what they had got before them I could not at first discern, for the ground was almost in darkness. But while I watched I heard a loud crack, and then two of them raised something from the ground—something large and heavy—each holding one end in his claws and teeth, tearing and growling like a beast. Then, Nkose, those unheard-of terrors predicted by the witch doctor were upon me; for the thing they held up and were thus devouring was the arm of a man, and I could see the fingers of the dead hand as though about to clutch their faces. What were these who haunted this gloomy hole of death? Were they indeed evil spirits, or were they Izímu, or man-eaters, such as in times past had been said to inhabit the country whence we had come out? Some, indeed, were said still to live there, hiding away in holes and caves; and such, you must know, Nkose, were held by us Zulus in the utmost detestation, as practising the vilest form of tagati.
“While I was thus gazing upon them in horror and disgust, one of the creatures, giving a frightful croak, as though to draw my attention, held up something towards me. It was against the light, and was round and shiny. I had not to look at it twice, for I knew it at a glance. It was a Zulu head-ring.
“But whence had it come? Had these vultures been hovering over the scene of the battle in order to drag away our brave dead to glut their own foul and loathsome carcases with? In my fury and loathing at the sight, I gripped my knobstick—for while falling I had not once lost hold of my weapons—and was about to spring upon them and batter out their miserable lives, when in the rapidly-increasing light I beheld that which caused me once more to sicken and all my blood to turn to ice. For in the torn and mangled body these carrion ghosts were devouring, the battered skull and swollen features, I recognised what had once been Gungana. This, then, was the very hole he had fallen into! What sort of omen was it that had caused me to fall into it likewise? In truth, his prediction that my death should be a worse one than his had nearly been fulfilled, might even yet be fulfilled.
“Things looked plainer now. One unexpected meal had come down to these wizards through the pit into which we had both fallen. On hearing the noise of my descent, in their eagerness for that which should yield another, they must have climbed up to drag me down. Au! it was fearful, the thought of such a fate; and, lest fear should again overpower me, I resolved to act. So with a shout I leaped across the floor of the pit. It crackled with bones.
“Those abatagati did not rise; they sat there and screamed. Au! that was a scream—one to come back to a man in his sleep, and cause him to start up trembling! It rang through that frightful den as though to pierce the very rocks. Something was hurled at me, but I stepped aside, and it shivered against the rock behind. It was the skull of a man. Another flung a weighty object which struck me full in the chest, nearly overturning me. Whau, Nkose! Then was horror indeed! That which had so nearly overthrown me was a human leg freshly torn off, and was that of Gungana himself. What an omen, that the man whom I had killed should even in death continue to fight against me!