at they must die? It seemed unreasonable.

Certainly the Zulu Kaffirs have a queer way of looking at things.

"Hans," I whispered, "is your fire among those that burn yonder?"

"Not so, Baas," he wheezed back into my ear. "Does the Baas think me a
fool? If I must die, I must die; if I am to live, I shall live. Why
then should I pay a shilling to learn what time will declare? Moreover,
yonder Mavovo takes the shillings and frightens everybody, but tells
nobody anything. _I_ call it cheating. But, Baas, do you and the Baas
Wazela have no fear. You did not pay shillings, and therefore Mavovo,
though without doubt he is a great _Inyanga_, cannot really prophesy
concerning you, since his Snake will not work without a fee."

The argument seems remarkably absurd. Yet it must be common, for now
that I come to think of it, no gipsy will tell a "true fortune" unless
her hand is crossed with silver.

"I say, Quatermain," said Stephen idly, "since our friend Mavovo seems
to know so much, ask him what has become of Brother John, as Hans
suggested. Tell me what he says afterwards, for I want to see
something."

So I went through the little gate in the wall in a natural kind of way,
as though I had seen nothing, and appeared to be struck by the sight of
the little fires.

"Well, Mavovo," I said, "are you doing doctor's work? I thought that it
had brought you into enough trouble in Zululand."

"That is so, _Baba_," replied Mavovo, who had a habit of calling me
"father," though he was older than I. "It cost me my chieftainship and
my cattle and my two wives and my son. It made of me a wanderer who
is glad to accompany a certain Macumazana to strange lands where many
things may befall me, yes," he added with meaning, "even the last of all
things. And yet a gift is a gift and must be used. You, _Baba_, have a
gift of shooting and do you cease to shoot? You have a gift of wandering
and can you cease to wander?"

He picked up one of the burnt feathers from the little pile by his side
and looked at it attentively. "Perhaps, _Baba_, you have been told--my
ears are very sharp, and I thought I heard some such words floating
through the air just now--that we poor Kaffir _Inyangas_ can prophesy
nothing true unless we are paid, and perhaps that is a fact so far
as something of the moment is concerned. And yet the Snake in the
_Inyanga_, jumping over the little rock which hides the present from it,
may see the path that winds far and far