looked at him till he grew quiet. Then he asked why I had
played him this trick, but I answered that it was no trick of mine who
had no right to keep you and your father prisoners against your will,
and that I thought you had gone away because you were afraid of him,
which was not wonderful if that was how he talked to you. I told him,
too, I who am a doctor, that unless he was careful he would go mad; that
already I saw madness in his eye; after which he became quiet, for my
words frightened him. Then he asked what could be done, and I said--that
night, nothing, since you must be far away, so that it would be useless
to follow you, but better to go to meet you when you came back. He asked
what I meant by your coming back, and I answered that I meant what I
said, that you would come back in great haste and peril--although you
would not believe me when I told you so--for I had it from the Munwali
whose child you are.

"So I sent out my spies, and that night went by, and the next day and
night went by, and we sat still and did nothing, though the Black One
wished to wander out alone after you. But on the following morning, at
the dawn, a messenger came in who reported that it had been called to
him by his brethren who were hidden upon hilltops and in other places
for miles and miles, that the Matabele impi, having destroyed another
family of the Makalanga far down the Zambesi, was advancing to destroy
us also. And in the afternoon came a second spy, who reported that you
two had been surrounded by the impi, but had broken through them, and
were riding hitherward for your lives. Then I took fifty of the best
of our people and put them under the command of Tamas, my son, and sent
them to ambush the pass, for against the Matabele warriors on the plain
we, who are not warlike, do not dare to fight.

"The Black One went with them, and when he saw how sore was your strait,
wished to run down to meet the Matabele, for he is a brave man. But I
had said to Tamas--'No, do not try to fight them in the open, for there
they will certainly kill you.' Moreover, Lady, I was sure that you would
reach the top of the poort. Well, you reached it, though but by the
breadth of a blade of grass, and my children shot with the new rifles,
and the place being narrow so that they could not miss, killed many of
those hyenas of Amandabele. But to kill Matabele is like catching fleas
on a dog's back: there are always more. Still it served its turn, yo