Читать книгу A Frontier Mystery - Mitford Bertram - Страница 5

“What is this about Nyakami?”

“U’ Nyakami? Is he dead?” answered Tyingoza, pausing with his snuff-spoon in mid air.

“That is what some would like to know,” I went on. “But they have not found him yet.”

I had named, by his native name, a neighbour of mine, who farmed some way down the river. Though in actual fact he was rather too far off to be termed exactly a neighbour. His real and British name was Hensley, and he had disappeared.

Sounds strange, doesn’t it, and it certainly was. People don’t disappear in Natal like they do in London, or any other large and civilised city, least of all highly respectable and fairly substantial colonists, of which Hensley was one. But this man had, and the strangest part of it was that he had not only disappeared but had done so leaving no trace. Not only that, but no one could be found who could swear to having been the last to see him.

He lived alone, and was an ordinary type of the frontier stock farmer. He was fairly prosperous and there was no reason on earth why he should have taken himself out of the way. No reason on earth was there either why he should have been put out of the way. He was on good terms with the natives, could always get plenty of servants, and so on. No, there was no reason in the world for his disappearance, yet he had disappeared – how and when nobody seemed to have the faintest idea.

The news had reached me through native sources, as a large portion of my news did. Indeed it is hardly credible the quantity I used to learn about my neighbours in this way; some of whom would have been mightily disconcerted could they have guessed that I, or anybody else, had an inkling of anything of the sort. The Natal Mounted Police had been investigating, but neither they nor their native detectives had been able to lay hand on the slightest clue. The man might have been caught up to heaven at midnight for all there was to show what had become of him.

“Not found him yet?” echoed Tyingoza, when he had absorbed his snuff. “Au! he will find himself. Men are strange, Iqalaqala, especially white men. And this one – if he wants to disappear why should he not?”

“Wants to disappear? But this one has no reason to want anything of the kind. Some men might, but this one not. You know him, Tyingoza, as well as I. What do you think?”

There was a comical twinkle in the chief’s eyes. He merely answered:

“Who can think in such a case?”

Obviously there was nothing to be got out of Tyingoza – as yet – so I left the subject. In fact I had a far more interesting subject on my mind just then, for this was the day the Sewins had fixed upon for their visit to me, and so I fell to discussing with the chief the arrangements which were to be made for their entertainment. He had promised that a goodly number of his people should muster, and I had promised them cattle to kill in proportion to the number that would require feasting. This ought to ensure a very good roll up indeed. The disappearance of Hensley was to me a very secondary matter to-day.

By the way, I was in a state of fidget absolutely unwonted with me; and my “boy” Tom simply gaped with astonishment at the thorough turn-out I made him give my hut; and when I fetched a roll of Salampore cloth to hang around the walls so as to conceal the grass thatching I could see that he was entertaining considerable doubts as to his master’s sanity.

He would have entertained even graver doubts could he have witnessed a still further stage of imbecility into which I lapsed. I found myself looking in the glass – not for ordinary purposes of toilet, be it noted, and I have set out upon this narrative determined to spare none of my own weaknesses, but because I was anxious to see what sort of fellow I looked – and I don’t know that I felt particularly flattered by the result; for, confound it, I was no longer in my first youth, and a face bronzed and roughened by twenty years of knocking about, struck me as nothing particularly attractive to the other sex. Yet it was only the roughness of weather and more or less hard times that had told upon it, for I had always been rather abstemious and had set my face like a flint against the wild roaring sprees that some of my friends in the same line were prone to indulge in. If I had not the “clean run” look of Falkner Sewin, my eye was every whit as clear and I had a trifle the advantage of him in height, and held myself quite as straight. No, it was absurd to try and start comparisons with Sewin, who was quite ten years younger, and had never known any hardening experiences, so I turned from the looking-glass imprecating one Godfrey Glanton as a silly ass, who had much better trek away right up-country and stay there altogether. And this idea was the first intimation that I had returned to sanity again.

My guests arrived earlier than I had expected, somewhere in the middle of the afternoon to wit, and the first thing they did was to reproach me for having put myself out for them so as they called it.

“I warned you there was nothing particular to see, didn’t I?” I said, as I showed them the inside of the store.

“But I think there is,” declared Miss Sewin, gazing around at the various “notions” disposed along the shelves or hanging about from the beams. “And how tidy you keep it all. Ah – ” as an idea struck her, “I believe you have had it all put ship-shape for the occasion. Confess now, Mr Glanton, haven’t you?”

“Well, you know, it’s a sort of general holiday, so of course things are a little more ship-shape than usual,” I answered.

“Ah, but the fun would have been to have taken you by surprise, when you were in the thick of it. How is it there are no natives here to-day?”

“They’ll roll up directly for the fun this evening. I expect quite a lot of them.”

“Are they hard at a deal?” she went on, still gazing with interest at the trade goods. “Do they haggle much?”

“Haggle? Rather! Haggle like any Italian. Only they’re much more difficult to bring down. But, won’t you come round now and have tea? I’ve had a waggon sail rigged up for shade because I thought you’d prefer it outside.”

The ladies were delighted, and I will own in candour that there didn’t seem to be anything wanting, if about four kinds of biscuits; and rolls, white and fresh, done on a gridiron; some very excellent tinned jam; butter and potted meats; tea and coffee, and for us men a decanter of first-rate Boer brandy – contributed a sufficient afternoon tea.

“So this is the ‘roughing it’ you warned us against, Mr Glanton?” laughed Mrs Sewin, who was pouring out. “Why, it is luxury, positive luxury.”

“But it’s a great occasion,” I answered. “Major, have a glass of grog after your ride.”

“Well, that’s no bad idea. Capital stuff this,” holding up his glass.

“So it is,” pronounced Falkner, tossing off his. “Here’s luck, Glanton. By Jove, you’ve got an uncommonly snug crib up here. Hanged if it don’t feel like turning Zulu trader myself.”

“And if Tyingoza came here rather often, and stuck here a little longer than you wanted, how long would it be before you started to kick him off the place?”

“Oh, not long, I expect,” answered Falkner equably, amid the general laugh at his expense.

“Quite so. Then from that, moment you might as well shut up shop.”

“Isn’t this Tyingoza the chief of the location?” asked Miss Sewin.

“Yes. He was here this morning.”

“Oh, I should like to see him.”

“You shall,” I answered. “He’s sure to be here to-night. If not I’ll send over for him the first thing in the morning. He’s a great friend of mine.”

Falkner guffawed. “Friend of yours! Oh, I say now, Glanton. A nigger!”

“All serene, Sewin. I’ve known quite as fine fellows in their way among ‘niggers’ as you call them – as among white men. Strange, isn’t it? But, fact, for all that.”

“Now I come to think of it,” said the Major, “I’ve noticed that the men I’ve met over here, who have large experience of natives, invariably speak well of them.”

I rejoiced that the old man was coming to his senses on that point, because there was less likelihood of him getting disgusted with and leaving the neighbourhood.

“You have a perfectly lovely view from here, at any rate,” said Miss Sewin, when he had debated the oft-threshed-out question a little further. “How black and jagged the Drakensberg peaks look over there. And so that is Zululand?” turning to the expanse beyond the Tugela.

“By Jove!” said the Major. “It strikes me we are pretty much at Cetywayo’s mercy, right on the border as we are.”

“If you’re never at the mercy of anybody worse, you won’t have cause for uneasiness, Major,” I said. “As long as he’s let alone he’ll let us alone. There isn’t a native chief in the whole of Africa who is less likely to molest us in any way.”

“And are these people round you Zulus, Mr Glanton?” went on Miss Sewin, her beautiful eyes wide open as she gazed forth upon the country that had awakened her interest.

“Yes. Those on the immediate border here, Tyingoza’s people, and two or three more of the large locations along the river. Further in they are made up of all sorts of the tribes originally inhabiting what is now Natal. Ah! Do you hear that? Here come some of them at any rate.”

“Yes. They are singing, and quite well too.”

I looked at her as she stood listening; her beautiful face lit up with animation, and, I must admit, I was enjoying the position of host and entertainer to her.

“But now, if there was a war with Cetywayo,” struck in the Major, “would these people go over to him or stand by us?”

“Well that would depend on how our forces behaved at first. Sentimentally their sympathies would be with him, but then a savage is pre-eminently a practical animal, Major, with a hard keen eye to the side on which his bread is buttered, and that would tell. Look now, here they come.”

All eyes were turned with interest, as a body of natives emerged from the bush about a quarter of a mile from my store. They were a good bit got up, and wore feather adornments and tufts of cow-tails round leg and arm. They carried the isihlangu, or large war shield, instead of the small irau, or dancing shield, they usually moved about with, and the quiver of assegai hafts kept time with the tread of feet and the deep sonorous thunder of their marching song. In number they were about a hundred.

“That’s all right,” I said gleefully. “I told Tyingoza to turn them out in good form, and he has.”

“Why, they’re splendid,” pronounced Miss Sewin, as they drew near, making a brave show with their multi-coloured shields, and the gleam of assegais in the afternoon sun, and I delighted to watch her animated face and kindling eyes, as the whole body marched up to where we stood, and halting suddenly with weapons lowered and right hand uplifted, chorussed forth one deep-voiced word of salute:

“Amakosi!” (Chiefs.)

I went forward and spoke to them. Most of them I knew personally or by sight. They were all young men and unringed, and in high glee at the prospect of an abundant beef feast. And it would be an abundant one, for were it to run to half my herd, I was determined to stint nothing to render the entertainment complete on this occasion.

Hardly had they withdrawn to the place I had pointed out and squatted themselves upon the ground than a sound of singing was heard from another quarter and soon a second company came in sight likewise bravely got up, and then another, till I reckoned there must be something over three hundred of them. The ladies were delighted, and pronounced it well worth coming to see: so was I, because they were.

“I say though,” said Falkner, “to be serious, isn’t this rather – well, injudicious, Glanton? These fellows are all fully armed you know, and we – ”

I laughed.

“Look here, Sewin,” I said. “Supposing you were taken to a review, in France or Germany say – would you feel any misgivings because the troops were fully armed?”

“That’s all very well, but these are savages you know. And the ladies – ”

” – Have no misgiving at all, Falkner,” struck in Miss Sewin serenely. “If all the savages in Zululand were here, I, for one, would feel perfectly safe with Mr Glanton.”

“Hullo, Glanton. Bow your acknowledgments,” cried Falkner, in a tone whose would-be geniality could not disguise a sneer. “Well, I was not speaking on my own account.”

“Of course you weren’t, Sewin,” I answered, anxious to avert any unpleasant feeling. “And now, if the ladies will excuse me for a little I must go and look out some cows for these fellows to kill. For the next hour they will exchange their picturesqueness for the decidedly reverse of the slaughter yard. By the way you might like to come along, Sewin.”

He jumped at the suggestion, but the Major preferred to remain where he was. Mrs Sewin said they would get through the time getting out their things and arranging their quarters for the night.

“I should think it’ll make a hole in your cattle kraal,” he said as we strolled over.

“Not a big one. I sha’n’t give them the pick of the herd of course.”

We strolled round to the kraal. My cattle herd was there and we proceeded to turn out the half dozen beasts I had selected for slaughter. A number of my guests had crowded up. They had discarded their shields, but were handling assegais in a manner that was highly anticipatory.

“Stand back,” I cried noting a desire to crowd up. “A few will be sufficient.”

But all were anxious to make one of that few, and by the time the doomed animals had reached the appointed place, chosen for being well out of sight – and scent – of the house, a rush was made upon them. Half the number were down at once, deftly assegaied; the remaining three however careered away, two wounded, and streaming with blood – the other untouched. Then ensued something akin to a buffalo hunt. With yells and whoops the excited savages bounded in pursuit, but even their speed and agility was not enough to turn the terrified and maddened animals, and had not a fresh crowd raced forward to head them they would have got away into the bush. Now two were promptly transfixed with half a dozen deftly hurled assegais in each, but the last, hardly touched, charged like lightning through its encompassing destroyers, and came straight back to the kraal, and, incidentally, for Falkner Sewin, who had left me to follow on and see the racket.

“Look out!” I roared. “Look out, Sewin! Run, man, for your life!”

If he had taken my warning in time, all would have been well; but for some reason or other – I suspect cussedness – he did not. The cow, a red one, with sharp needle-like horns, now thoroughly maddened by the riot and the blood, and the sharp dig of more than one badly aimed spear, put down her head, and charged straight for Falkner. I snatched an assegai from a young Zulu who was standing by me watching the fun, and rushed forward, and none too soon, for now Falkner was in full flight; the savage animal, head lowered, and throwing the foam from her mouth, and “twilling” hideously, was gaining upon him at the rate of two steps to one. It was now or never. As she shot past me I let go the assegai. It was a tense moment that – between when the long shaft left my hand and half buried itself in the side of the cow. But the throw was a right true one. The keen, tapering blade had bitten right into the heart, and the maddened beast plunged heavily forward to lie in a moment, dead and still, and at the sight a great roar of applause went up from the excited savages, who while trooping back from their unsuccessful chase had been delightedly watching this its termination.