“One word, Mazimba, my father, and I will trouble thine ears no more, since for thee my voice shall be silent for ever. When the time has come for thee to die, and thou dost pass, as the white men say, up ‘into the heavens above,’ and thy sight dawns again, and thou art once more a man eager for battle, then turn thee and cry with a loud voice: ‘Mazooku, son of Ingoluvu, of the tribe of the Maquilisini, where art thou, O my dog? Come thou and serve me!’ And surely, if I still live, then shall I hear thy voice, and groan and die, that I may pass to thee; and if I be already dead, then shall I be there at thy side even as thou callest. This thou wilt do for me, O Mazimba, my father and my chief, because, lo! I have loved thee as the child loves her who suckled it, and I would look upon thy face again, O my father from the olden time, my chief from generation to generation!”
“If it be in my power, this I will do, Mazooku.”
The great Zulu drew himself up, raised his spear, and for the first and last time in his life gave Ernest the royal salute—to which, by the way, he had no right at all—“Bayte, Bayte!” Then he turned and ran swiftly thence, nor would he see Ernest again before he went. “The pain of death was over,” he said.
As the sound of his footsteps grew faint, Ernest sighed.
“There goes our last link with South Africa, Jeremy, my boy. It is a good thing, for he was growing too fond of the bottle; they all do here. But it makes me very sad, and sometimes I think that, as Mazooku says, it is a pity we did not go under with Alston and the others. It would all have been over now.”
“Thank you,” said Jeremy, after reflecting; “on the whole, I am pretty comfortable as I am.”
CHAPTER VIII.
MR. CARDUS ACCOMPLISHES HIS REVENGE
Mr. de Talor owed his great wealth not to his own talents, but to a lucky secret in the manufacture of the grease used on railways discovered by his father. Talor pre had been a railway-guard till his discovery brought him wealth. He was a shrewd man, however, and on his sudden accession of fortune did his best to make a gentleman of his only son, at that date a lad of fifteen. But it was too late; the associations and habits of childhood are not easily overcome, and no earthly power or education could accomplish the desired object. When his son was twenty years of age, old Jack Talor died, and his son succeeded to his large fortune and a railway-grease business which supplied the principal markets of the world.
This son had inherited a good deal of his father’s shrewdness, and set himself to make the best of his advantages. First he placed a “de” before his name, and assumed a canting crest. Next he bought the Ceswick Ness estates, and bloomed into a country gentleman. It was shortly after this latter event that he made a mistake, and fell in love with the beauty of the neighbourhood, Mary Atterleigh. But Mary Atterleigh would have none of him, being at the time secretly engaged to Mr. Cardus. In vain did he resort to every possible means to shake her resolution, even going so far as to try to bribe her father to put pressure upon her; but at this time old Atterleigh, “Hard-riding Atterleigh,” as he was called, was well off, and resisted his advances, whereupon De Talor, in a fit of pique, married another woman, who was only too glad to put up with his vulgarity in consideration of his wealth and position as a county magnate.
Shortly afterwards three events occurred almost simultaneously. “Hard-riding Atterleigh” got into money difficulties through over-gratification of his passion for hounds and horses; Mr. Cardus was taken abroad for the best part of a year in connection with a business matter and a man named Jones, a friend of Mr. de Talor’s staying in his house at the time, fell in love with Mary Atterleigh. Herein De Talor saw an opportunity of revenge upon his rival, Mr. Cardus. He urged upon Jones that his real road to the possession of the lady lay through the pocket of her father, and even went so far as to advance him the necessary funds to bribe Atterleigh; for though Jones was well off, he could not at such short notice lay hands upon a sufficient sum in cash to serve his ends.