The patrol was resting. Thick bush surrounded the position, with long grass and boulders. But the ground had been well scouted in advance: and in rear—well, the strength of the command was distributed in that direction. There were granite kopjes, too, which could be turned to good account.
“Whau!” grunted Ziboza, the fighting induna of the Ingubu regiment. “I think we have them now. They have no more waggons to hide behind, and the izikwakwa are broken down, for did we not find their wheels? These are they who would have captured the Great Great One. We shall see, ah—ah! Now we shall see.”
Squirming like snakes through the long grass and bush, the Matabele advance, stopping every now and again to reconnoitre. They can hear the subdued hum of voices in the sorry camp of the whites—and on each face raised to peer forward, there is a ferocious grin of anticipation. In obedience to the signalled orders of their leaders they spread their ranks, so as to be in a position to surround that sorry command with the first order issued. More and more are pressing on from behind—and the bush is alive with swarming savages, creeping, crawling onward. The dreaded izikwakwa are broken now. They have only to fear the ordinary fire of that handful of whites, to surround them, rush in and make an end.
Of a truth the agency that supplied Lo Bengula with firearms was a far-seeing benefactor to its countrymen. For those warriors now in the front line of attack who have rifles, no power on earth can restrain from using them. They now open fire, hot and heavy but wild. No more surprise now, no wild rush of overwhelming numbers with the deadly assegai. The coup-de-main has failed. Like magic the whites are in position, replying with sparing, but deadly and well-directed fire—as the plunge and fall of more than one warrior flitting from bush to bush, testifies. But the forward rush has carried some right among the remaining horses of the patrol, and the assegai is plied with deadly effect, as the savages slash right and left, burying their reeking blades within the vitals of the poor animals. It is something to kill at any rate, and besides, goes for towards crippling the movements of their human enemies. “Jjí-jjí! Jjí-jjí!” the ferocious death-hiss vibrates amid the trampling and squealing and the fall of the slaughtered animals. And then—what is this? Through and above the discharge of rifles, the sharp, staccato, barking sound so known to them, so dreaded by them—as the Maxims speak. Is there no doing anything with these invulnerable whites? They have left the wheels behind, even as brave Ziboza has just said, but—they have mounted the izikwakwa on sticks, each on three sticks, and the deadly muzzles are sweeping round as usual, pouring in their leaden hail.
“Percy—Spence! Up here, quick!” says Blachland—and in a moment they are within the sheltering boulders of a kopje. Two other men are already there.
“Au! Isipau!” cry some of the Matabele, who have seen and recognised him. And a sharp discharge follows, at least two of the missiles humming unpleasantly near.
“Watch that point!” says Blachland grimly, designating a spot where a bit of bare rock surface, the length of a man, showed out in the bush beneath. And almost with the words his piece went off. A brown, writhing body rolled forward from the cover, the flung away shield and assegais falling with a rattle.
“That scalp yours, Blachland,” observed one of the American scouts who was up there with them. “Oh, snakes!”
The last ejaculation is evoked by an uncomfortably near missile, which grazing the granite slab immediately behind the speaker, hums away at a tangent into space. It is followed by another and another: in fact a settled determination to make it hot for the holders of that particular kopje upon the part of the enemy seems to have followed upon the recognition of Blachland.