elp of
Zikali, who hates the House of Senzangacona, though me, who am of its
blood, he does not hate, because ever I have striven against that House.
But it seems from his message and those words spoken by an angry woman,
that I have been betrayed, and that to-night or to-morrow night, or
by the next moon, the slayers will be upon me, smiting me before I can
smite, at which I cannot grumble."

"By whom have you been betrayed, Umslopogaas?"

"By that wife of mine, as I think, Macumazahn. Also by Lousta, my
blood-brother, over whom she has cast her net and made false to me,
so that he hopes to win her whom he has always loved and with her the
Chieftainship of the Axe. Now what shall I do?--Tell me, you whose eyes
can see in the dark."

I thought a moment and answered, "I think that if I were you, I would
leave this Lousta to sit in my place for a while as Chief of the People
of the Axe, and take a journey north, Umslopogaas. Then if trouble comes
from the Great House where a king sits, it will come to Lousta who can
show that the People of the Axe are innocent and that you are far away."

"That is cunning, Macumazahn. There speaks the Great Medicine. If I go
north, who can say that I have plotted, and if I leave my betrayer in my
place, who can say that I was a traitor, who have set him where I used
to sit and left the land upon a private matter? And now tell me of this
journey of yours."

So I told him everything, although until that moment I had not made up
my mind to go upon this journey, I who had come here to his kraal
by accident, or so it seemed, and by accident had delivered to him a
certain message.

"You wish to consult a white witch-doctoress, Macumazahn, who according
to Zikali lives far to the north, as to the dead. Now I too, though
perchance you will not think it of a black man, desire to learn of the
dead; yes, of a certain wife of my youth who was sister and friend as
well as wife, whom too I loved better than all the world. Also I desire
to learn of a brother of mine whose name I never speak, who ruled the
wolves with me and who died at my side on yonder Witch-Mountain, having
made him a mat of men to lie on in a great and glorious fight. For of
him as of the woman I think all day and dream all night, and I would
know if they still live anywhere and I may look to see them again when
I have died as a warrior should and as I hope to do. Do you understand,
Watcher-by-Night?"

I answered that I unde