of her face seemed to relax. Then the
recollection of what had happened, of what we had just looked upon, came
back and I mastered the impulse. Assuredly if there was a time for all
things this was not a time for some things--yet I read a meaning into a
strange weary sigh that escaped her, as she gave the word to resume our
way.

The Ndhlambe huts, beehive-shaped, yellow-thatched, lay clustering in
the moonlight, spreading over the veldt far and wide. Innumerable they
seemed, and from the dark, mimosa-stockaded enclosures came now and then
a bleat, or the trumpet-like sneeze of a goat, and the sweet night air
was unfragrant with the mingled odour of kine and wood smoke, and the
musty reek of ochre-smeared Kafir humanity.

Most of the merrymakers had departed to their own kraals, but here and
there, in that of the chief, dark groups still stood around. These
gazed, with muttered wonder, upon this strange apparition of two white
people riding into their midst at such a time of night, and one of those
whites a woman. Formidable, too, they looked, those astonished and
staring savages, many of them tall, well-nigh gigantic of frame, and you
could see the rolling white of their distended eyeballs as they stood
and gazed.

"Where is Kuliso? Where is the chief?"

The tone was firm, clear, audible to all. The Kafirs looked at each
other.

"_Au_! That is his house, _Umlungase_," [white woman] and the speaker
pointed to a large hut standing among a group. "But--it is night."

"Request him to come forth. I would talk with him," went on Beryl,
speaking fluently in the vernacular, of which I, as I have before
mentioned, had by this time picked up a very fair knowledge.

There was hesitation, muttered dissatisfaction, among the men, as we
turned and headed straight for the hut they had pointed out, they
following a short distance behind. The chief did not care to see
visitors at such a time, was the not unnatural burden of their
objections.

But just then two Kafirs emerged from one of the huts, and stood in
front of us. One of them I recognised, and even were it otherwise the
murmur of astonishment and profound deference which greeted his
appearance would have been sufficient to identify him. The tall, fine
form, the strong, bearded face, the lofty forehead with its air of
command, I was not likely to forget. Now the expression of that face
was divided between wonder and a scowl of resentment. Then Beryl spo