Waving them aside impatiently, Juanna asked the men if anything had been seen or heard of her father. They answered, “No.” Some of their number had started up the river to search for him on the same day when she was captured, but they had not returned, and no tidings had come from them or him.
“Do not be alarmed,” said Leonard, seeing the distress and anxiety written on her face; “doubtless he has gone further than he anticipated, and the men have not been able to find him.”
“I fear that something has happened to him,” she answered; “he should have been back by now: he promised to return within the fortnight.”
By this time the story of the capture and destruction of the slave camp was spread abroad among the people by the rescued men, and the excitement rose to its height. Otter, seeing a favourable opportunity to trumpet his master’s fame, swaggered to and fro through the crowd shaking a spear and chanting Leonard’s praises after the Zulu fashion.
“Wow!” he said, “wow! Look at him, ye people, and be astonished.
“Look at him, the White Elephant, and hear his deeds.
“In the night he fell upon them.
“He fell upon them, the armed men in a fenced place.
“He did it alone: no one helped him but a black monkey and a woman with a shaking hand.
“He beguiled them with a tongue of honey, he smote them with a spear of iron.