Chapter 30
Forty-eight hours later, the furious drumming, chanting and screaming heralded the return of the victorious troops of Zalu Zako. Birnier from his gaol on the hill watched the bronze flood pour like a stream of lava out of the plantation and flood the village, spears flashing silver points in the slanting rays of the sun. But what had happened to zu Pfeiffer and the white sergeants? No sign of them could he see. Waves of sound lapped continuously around the temple.
The long mauve shadow of the hill ate up the village. Fires began to flicker amid the huts and away in the recesses of the plantation. The lowing of cattle added to the general clamour. As the western sky was still ablaze with incandescent colour stole the cold green of the advancing moon in the east.
“Mungongo, what are thy brethren about to do?”
“It is the Festival of the Harvest, as I have told thee, O son of the Lord-of-many-Lands.”
“But they have not the Bride?”
“Nay.” Mungongo glanced apprehensively towards the temple where in what was to have been a bathroom, was Bakuma hidden. “He-who-may-not-be-mentioned demands but blood. The Bride is the food of the wizards. But to each warrior is every woman his bride this night.”
“Why didst thou not tell me this thing before?” [pg 308] demanded Birnier, who knew that such was one of the customs of primitive tribes in all parts of the world and in all ages.
“Thou didst not ask me,” retorted Mungongo, to whom the affair was such a matter of course that it was not worth mentioning.
“Do they make sacrifice?”