"Too late!" growled Hazon. "We have been seen! Look."
Several women were running stealthily and in alarm towards the gate, and immediately a frightful uproar arose from within. Armed with sticks and spears, the warriors came pouring forth, and in a moment had surrounded the two—a howling, infuriated, threatening mob.
Although expecting nothing less than instant death, with the emergency Hazon's coolness had returned. He stood in the midst of the appalling uproar, apparently unmoved. Holmes, on the other hand, looked wildly around, but less in fear than in desperation. He was calculating his chances of being able to snatch a weapon from one of them, and to lay about him in the last fierce battle for life. "Anything for a little excitement!" he had said. In very truth his aspiration was realized. There was excitement enough in the brandished spears and blazing eyeballs, in the infuriated demoniacal faces, in the deafening, roaring clamour.
"This is no matter for you," cried Hazon in firm, ringing tones. "Take us to the king. We can explain. The affair was an accident."
At this the ferocious tumult redoubled. An accident! They had lifted their hand against the great tutelary Spider that guarded Nondwana's house! An accident!
"Hold! To the king let them be taken!" interposed a strong, deep voice. And extending his hands, as though to arrest the uplifted weapons, Nondwana himself stalked into the circle.
There was no gainsaying the mandate of one so great. Weapons were lowered, but still vociferating horrible threats, the crowd, with the two offenders in its midst, moved in the direction of Imvungayo.
But it seemed as though the wild, pealing shouts of rage and consternation were a very tocsin; for now from every kraal, near and far, the inhabitants came surging forth, streaming down the hillsides over the face of the plain like swarming ants—and before they reached Imvungayo the two whites seemed to move in the midst of a huge sea of gibing, infuriated faces, as the dark crowd, gathering volume, poured onward, rending the air with deafening shouts of execration and menace. But the royal guards barred the gate, suffering no entrance save on the part of the two white men, together with Nondwana and a few of the greater among the people.
"This is the tightest place we have been in yet," murmured Hazon. "To tread on the superstitions of any race is to thrust one's head into the jaws of a starved lion."