“But he could tell nothing. None of these wizards that have charms to subdue the beasts can tell you anything about it. A Hottentot will smell the air and say what cattle are near, but if you bid him tell you how he does it, he giggles like a fool and is ashamed.
“‘I do not know if anything can be done,’ the yellow man repeated. ‘I cannot promise the baas, but I can try.’
“‘Well, try, then,’ ordered Shadrach, and went away to make the necessary arrangements to have the young Kafirs in the fields that night.
“They did as he bade, and the noise was loathsome—enough to frighten anything with an ear in its head. The Kafirs did not relish the watch in the dark at first, but when they found that their work was only to thump buckets and howl, they came to do it with zest, and roared and banged till you would have thought a judgment must descend on them. The baboons heard it, sure enough, and came down, after a while, to see what was going on. They sat on their rumps outside the circle of Kafirs, as quiet as people in a church, and watched the niggers drumming and capering as though it were a show for their amusement. Then they went back, leaving the crops untouched, but pulling all the huts in one kraal to pieces as they passed. It was the kraal of the old white-tufted Shangaan, as Shadrach learned afterwards.
“Shadrach was pleased that the row had saved his corn, and next day he gave the twisted man a lump of tobacco. The man tucked it into his cheek and smiled, wrinkling his nose and looking at the ground.
“‘Did you get speech of the baboons last night among the rocks?’ Shadrach asked.
“The other shook his head, grinning. ‘I am old,’ he said. ‘They pay no attention to me, but I will try again. Perhaps, before long, they will listen.’
“‘When they do that,’ said Shadrach, ‘you shall have five pounds of tobacco and five bottles of dop.’
“The man was squatting on his heels all this time at Shadrach’s feet, and his hard fingers, like claws, were picking at the ground. Now he put out a hand and began fingering the laces of the farmer’s shoes with a quick, fluttering movement that Shadrach saw with a spasm of terror. It was so exactly the trick of a baboon, so entirely a thing animal and unhuman.
“‘You are more than a baboon yourself,’ he said. ‘Let go of my leg. Let go, I say! Curse you, get away—get away from me!’