reducing his pace to a hand-gallop, continued his advance alone.
“All right, old chap, come along,” exclaimed Grosvenor; “those fellows mean us no harm, I am sure. I expect it is a detachment sent out by the king to bid us welcome on our approach to his village.”
“Very possibly,” assented Dick. “But, having halted, we must now remain where we are until that fellow approaches and delivers his message. To resume our journey at this moment would be tantamount to an admission of distrust on our part, which would never do. No, no; let the man come to us, not we go to him. Among savages, you know, first impressions count for a good deal, and it would never do to let those fellow think that we halted because we were nervous.”
“No, of course; you are quite right, it would not,” agreed Grosvenor; and sitting straight up in their saddles, and assuming an air of absolute confidence which somewhat belied their inward feelings, they patiently awaited the arrival of the solitary horseman.
In less than a minute he had arrived—a fine, stalwart man, of about middle age, clean-limbed, broad chested, upright as a dart, of dauntless aspect; his limbs and body showing many scars of battle. As he reached a point some ten feet from where the two white travellers awaited him he abruptly reined his horse to a standstill, and threw up his right hand in salute.
“’Nkosi,” he cried, in a full, deep, resonant tone of voice, “Lobelalatutu, the King of the Makolo, salutes you by the mouth of me, ’Mpandula, and bids you welcome to his royal village. Behold a squadron of his royal guard, which he has dispatched, under my command, to conduct you in all honour to his presence. He awaits you now in his palace. Does it please my lords that the squadron, approach to give them the salute?”
Now, this speech was only very imperfectly understood by those to whom it was addressed; a word or two here and there they comprehended because of their similarity to those in the language spoken by Mafuta; the name of the king also they recognised; and ’Mpandula’s gestures and the tones of his voice also told them a little. Thus in one way and another they contrived to gain a sort of hazy general notion of the gist of the chiefs speech. But how were they to reply to it, and what were they to say? So early a summons to the king’s presence was rather unexpected, and, in the absence of Mafuta, who was behind, with the wagon, would be rather embarrassing; for how were they to converse with the king without the assistance of an interpreter? There was but one thing to be done, and that was to reply to the best of their ability, which Dick undertook to do in the only native tongue with which he was familiar, explaining as well as he could the difficulty in which the pair found themselves.
It was evident at once, by the puzzled expression on the chiefs face, that he understood Dick as little as Dick understood him; and for a moment there seemed to be the possibility of a deadlock. But suddenly ’Mpandula’s brow cleared, he turned on his horse and shouted a name, in response to which one of the guards drove his heels into his horse’s flanks, and dashed forward to his chiefs assistance. The latter appeared to explain the position in a few terse words, and when he had finished, the newcomer, at ’Mpandula’s dictation, repeated the message of the king, word for wood, in the language with which Dick was familiar.
“What do you say, Phil,” questioned Dick, when the message was concluded; “shall we go? Or shall we excuse ourselves for the present, upon the plea that we would prefer to wait until the wagon comes up, in order that we may take with us the gifts that we have brought for His Majesty? I am not quite sure that I altogether like this escort business. It may be all right, of course. The king’s message sounds all right; but if the chap means treachery it will be exceedingly awkward for us, will it not?”