John Ames, Native Commissioner: A Romance of the Matabele Rising

by Bertram Mitford

  CHAPTER FOUR.

  A HUMAN SPIDER.

  Shiminya resumed his seat upon the ground, with the _muti_ bowl in hishands. The wolf he had already secured in one of the huts. The grimbeast was in truth his familiar spirit, and as such not to be gazed uponby profane eyes, and in broad daylight. And now footsteps were heardapproaching the _scherm_, together with the rattle of assegai hafts.Three men entered by the narrow gateway. Shiminya looked up.

  "Greeting, _Izinduna_," he said.

  "Greeting to thee, Umtwana 'Mlimo," came the reply in a deep-voiced hum,as the newcomers deposited their assegais just within the gate, andadvanced a few steps nearer in. With two of these we are alreadyacquainted, they being, in fact, Madula and his brother Samvu. Thethird was another influential chief by name Zazwe.

  Shiminya seemed to take no further notice of their presence, continuingto sway the _muti_ bowl from side to side, muttering the while. Thefaces of the three indunas wore an expression of scarcely to beconcealed disgust; that of Zazwe in addition showed unutterablecontempt. He was an unprepossessing looking man, lean, and of middleheight, with a cold, cruel countenance. At bottom he loathed anddespised the whole Umlimo hierarchy as a pack of rank impostors, but itsuited him now to cultivate them, for he was an arrant schemer, andwould fain see every white man in the country cut to pieces.

  "There are three goats in thy kraal beyond the river, Shiminya," hebegan presently, tired of the silence.

  "That is good, my father," the sorcerer condescended to reply. "Theyare for Umlimo?"

  "Nay; for his child."

  "And--for Umlimo?"

  "There is a young heifer."

  "_Au_! Of such there will soon be no more," replied Shiminya.

  "No more?" echoed the trio.

  "No more. The whites are bewitching all the cattle in the land. Soonyou will see great things. The land will stink with their rottingcarcases."

  A murmur went up from the three listeners. They all bent eagerlyforward. Shiminya, who knew his dupes, was in no hurry. He continuedto shake his bowl of abomination and mutter; then he went on:

  "The last time you heard the Great Voice, what did it say? Were not thewords thereof as mine are now--I, its child? _Whau_! I fear there weresome who heard that voice and laughed, Izinduna--who heard that voiceand did not believe."

  At this juncture there came a subdued wail, inexpressibly doleful, fromone of the huts. It was answered by a snarl from another. Two of thethree chiefs, listening, felt perturbed, the countenance of Zazwe alonepreserving its hard, sceptical expression; though, to tell the truth,even he--so rooted is the innate superstition of savages--did not feelentirely at ease in his surroundings.

  "There is, further, a good milch cow for the Umlimo," spake Madula, "andfor his child a heifer."

  "It is well. There will soon be no more," repeated the wizard.

  "And three fat-tailed sheep, and for Umlimo a young bull," said Samvu.

  "That, too, is good," was the cold acknowledgment of Shiminya, "forthere will soon be no more."

  Now, cattle constitute the very life of all the South African tribes,wherefore the three chiefs felt their hearts sink as they realised thegist of this doleful prophecy. The rinderpest had not as yet made itsappearance in their midst, but was very soon destined to do so, and thesorcerers of the nation, having gained secret information that theterrible scourge was, in the ordinary course of things, bound to be uponthem soon from further north, used their knowledge as a most powerfullever towards promoting the uprising they were straining every nerve tobring about. In this they found willing aid from many of the chiefs,who saw their power and influence waning day by day; themselves forcedto be the subservient vassals of a few--from their point of view--upstart and arrogant whites.

  "Why, then, should Makiwa [Matabele term for the white man] wish tobewitch all the cattle?" said Madula, who at present was in thevacillating stage, though the high-handed action we have recorded, onthe part of the native police, had gone far towards settling him in thewrong direction. "They will suffer equally with ourselves."

  "_Our_ cattle are our life. _Their_ life is in other things,"pronounced Shiminya, who never looked at his interlocutors when hespoke, thus giving his answers an oracular air, as though inspired bythe magic stuff into whose black depth he was gazing. "We die. Theylive."

  "_Hau_!" cried the listeners, fully comprehending the hint.

  "Not many times will the moon be at full before this death is upon us,"went on the wizard, still without looking up. "If there are no whitesleft in the land, then will it be averted."

  Again that hollow groan proceeded from the hut. Their feelings workedup to an artificial pitch, the superstitious savages felt something likea shudder run through their frames. But the imperturbable Shiminya wenton:

  "There are two who must die--Pukele, the son of Mambane."

  "He who is servant to Jonemi?" queried Madula.

  "The same."

  "Has he done wrong?" said Samvu, for the man named was one of Madula'speople, and neither of the brothers liked this edict.

  "He knows too much," was the remorseless reply. "The other is Ntatu,formerly wife of Makani."

  A measure of relief came into the countenances of the two chiefs. Awoman more or less mattered nothing, but they did not like to sacrificeone of their men.

  "It is the `word' of Umlimo," pursued Shiminya, decisively. "This mustbe." And for the first time he raised his eyes, and fixed them upon thetwo chiefs with cruel, snake-like stare.

  "What is the life of a man, more or less, when Umlimo has spoken?" saidZazwe, thus throwing in the weight of his influence with the dictum ofthe sorcerer. "A man, too, who is faithful to one of these whites setover us! _Au_! Umlimo is wise."

  This carried the day; and after some more talk, mostly "dark," andconsisting of hints, the three chiefs, gathering up their assegais,withdrew.

  Left alone, Shiminya still sat there, satisfied that his sanguinaryedict would be carried out. A dead silence reigned over the great thornthicket, and as though the satanic influence which seemed to brood uponthe place imparted itself to wild Nature, even the very birds forbore toflutter and chirp in its immediate vicinity. The sun sank to thewestern horizon, shedding its arrows of golden light upon the myriadsharp points of the sea of thorns, then dipped below the rim of theworld, and still the grim wizard squatted, like a crafty, cruel,bloodthirsty spider, in the midst of his vast web, though indeed thecomparison is a libel on the insect, who slays to appease hunger,whereas this human spider was wont to doom his victims out of a sheerdiabolical lust of cruelty and the power which he could sway throughthat agency. This day, indeed, he might feel content, for it had notbeen wasted. But the day was not over yet--oh no--not quite yet.Still, would it be possible for this satanic being to commit furtherdeeds of atrocity and of blood? Well, is there not the wretchedsufferer lying bound and helpless within the hut?

  Again that low, vibrating hum sounded forth. It seemed to come from thethick of the thorn palisade. The deeply plotting brain of the wizardwas again on the alert, but its owner evinced no eagerness, not evenlooking up from what he was doing. Some person or persons had unawarestouched the hidden communication wire which, situated at the entrance ofthe narrow labyrinthine passage leading to the kraal, signalled suchapproach.

  Shiminya's discernment was consummate in every sense he possessed;indeed, this faculty had not a little to do with the ascendency he hadgained. In the very footsteps of the new comer, shod with the_amanyatelo_--a kind of raw-hide sandal used as protection in thornycountry--his keen ear could gather a whole volume of information. Theywere, in fact, to him an open index of the new comer's mind. Whiledistant they indicated a mind made up, yet not altogether removed from,the verge of wavering; the possession of a purpose, yet not altogether awhole-heartedness in its carrying out. Nearer they revealed the vulgartrepidation attendant upon the mere fact of approaching a place sosinister and redoubtable as the _muti_ den of a
renowned sorcerer, andthat in the dim hours of night.

  For the brief twilight had long since passed, and now a golden moon, inits third quarter, hung lamplike in the sky, and, save in the shadows,its soft brilliance revealed every detail almost as clear as in the day.It fell on the form of a tall, powerfully built savage, standing therein the gateway, naked save for the _mutya_, unarmed save for a short,heavy knobstick. This he laid down as he drew near the wizard.

  "Greeting, my father," he uttered.

  "Greeting, Nanzicele," replied the sorcerer, without looking up.

  Divested of his civilised and official trappings, the ex-sergeant ofpolice looked what he was--a barbarian pure and simple, no whit less ofa one, in fact, than those over whom he was vested with a little briefauthority. Whether this visit was made in the interests of loyalty tohis superiors or not may hereinafter appear.

  "Hast thou brought what I desired of thee, Nanzicele?" said the wizard,coming direct to the point.

  Nanzicele, who had squatted himself on the ground opposite the other,now fumbled in a skin bag which was hung around him, and produced apacket. It was small, but solid and heavy.

  "What is this?" said Shiminya, counting out ten Martini-Henrycartridges. "Ten? Only ten! _Au_! When I promised thee vengeance itwas not for such poor reward as this."

  "They are not easily obtained, my father. The men from whom I got thesewill be punished to-morrow for not having them; but I care not. Becontent with a few, for few are better than none. And--this vengeance?"

  "Thou knowest Pukele--the servant of Jonemi?"

  "The son of Mambane?"

  "The son of Mambane, who helped hoot thee out of his kraal when thouwouldst not offer enough _lobola_ for Nompiza. He is to die."

  Nanzicele leaped with delight. "When? How?" he cried. "Now will myeyes have a feast indeed."

  "At thy hand. The manner and the time are of thine own choosing. Tothee has Umlimo left it."

  Nanzicele's glee was dashed. His jaw fell.

  "_Au_! I have no wish to dance in the air at the end of a long rope,"he growled; "and such would assuredly be my fate if I slew Pukele, evenas it was that of Fondosa, the son of Mbai, who was an _innyanga_ evenas thyself, my father. _Whau_! I saw it with these eyes. AllFondosa's _muti_ did not save him there, my father, and the whiteshanged him dead the same as any rotten Maholi."

  "Didst thou glance over one shoulder on the way hither, Nanzicele?Didst thou see Lupiswana following thee, yea, even running at thy side?I traced thy course from here. I saw thee from the time of leavingJonemi's. He was waiting for thee was Lupiswana. It is not good for aman when such is the case," said Shiminya, whose _esprit de corps_resented the sneering, contemptuous tone which the other had used inspeaking of a member of his "cloth."

  For the event referred to was the execution of a Mashuna witch-doctorfor the murder of a whole family, whose death he had ordered.

  The snake-like stare of Shiminya, the appeal to his superstitions, thesinister associations of the place he was in, a stealthy, mysterioussound even then becoming audible--all told, Nanzicele looked somewhatcowed, remembering, too, how his return journey had to be effected aloneand by night.

  Having, in vulgar and civilised parlance, taken down his man a peg ortwo, Shiminya could afford to let the matter of Pukele stand over. Nowhe said softly--

  "And the other ten cartridges, those in thy bag, Nanzicele? Give themto me, for I have a better revenge, here, ready at thy hand, and a saferone."

  "_Au_! They were to have been thine, my father; I was but keeping themto the last," replied the ex-police sergeant, shamefacedly and utterlymendaciously, as he placed the packet in the wizard's outstretched hand."And now, what is this vengeance?"

  Shiminya rose, and, beckoning the other to follow, opened and creptthrough the door of the hut behind him. A hollow groan rose from theinside. Nanzicele, halfway in, made an instinctive move to draw back.Then he recovered himself. "It is not a good omen to draw back whenhalf through a doorway," said Shiminya, as they both stood upright inthe darkness. "Yet--look."

  He had struck a match, and lighted a piece of candle. Nanzicele lookeddown, and a start of surprise leapt through his frame.

  "_Whau_!" he cried. "It is Nompiza!"

  "And--thy vengeance," murmured the wizard at his side.

  But the sufferer heard it, and began to wail aloud--

  "Thy promise, Great _Innyanga_! Thy promise. Give me not over to thisman, for I fear him. Thou didst swear I should be allowed to departhence; on the head of Umzilikazi thou didst swear it. Thy promise, OGreat _Innyanga_!"

  "It shall be kept, sister," said Shiminya, softly, his eyes fairlyscintillating with devilish glee. "I swore to thee that thou shouldstbe _taken_ hence, and thou shalt, for this man and I will take thee."

  The wretched creature broke into fresh outcries, which were partlydrowned, for already they were dragging her, still lashed to the pole,outside.

  "Ha, Nompiza!" jeered Nanzicele, bending down and peering into her faceas she lay in the moonlight. "Dost remember how I was driven from thyfather's kraal with jeers? Ha! Whose jeers were the loudest? Whosemockeries the most biting? Thine. And now Kulula will have to buyanother wife. Thou hadst better have been the wife of Nanzicele than ofdeath. Of death, is it not, my father?" turning to Shiminya, who glareda mirthless smile.

  Wrought up to a pitch of frenzy by the recollection of the insults hehad then received, the vindictive savage continued to taunt and terrifythe wretched creature as she lay. Then he went over to pick up hisgreat knobstick.

  "Not thus, blunderer; not thus," said Shiminya, arresting his arm. "Seenow. Take that end of the pole while I take the other. Go thou first."

  Lifting the pole with its helpless human burden, these bloodthirstymiscreants passed out of the kraal. Down the narrow way they hurried,for Shiminya though small was surprisingly wiry, and the powerful frameof the other felt it not, although their burden was no light one. Downthrough a steep winding path, and soon the thorns thinned out, givingway to forest trees.

  "Well, sister, I predicted that Lupiswana would come for thee to-night,"said Shiminya, as they set their burden down to rest themselves. "And--there he is already."

  A stealthy shape, which had been following close upon their steps,glided into view for a moment and disappeared. The wretched victim sawit too, and uttered such a wild ringing shriek of despair that Nanzicelefairly shuddered.

  "_Au_! I like not this," he growled. "It is a deed of _tagati_."

  "Yet thou must do it, brother, or worse will befall thyself," saidShiminya, quietly. Then they resumed their burden.

  Through the trees now came a glint of silver light, then a broadshimmer. It was the glint of the moon upon water. The Umgwane River,in the dry season, consists of a series of holes. One of these they hadreached.

  "And now, sister," began the wizard, as they set down their burden uponits brink, "thou seest what is the result of an unquiet tongue. But forthat thou wouldst not now be here, and thy brother Pukele and thy sisterNtatu would have yet longer to live. But you all know too much, thethree of you. Look! Yonder is Lupiswana waiting for thee, even as Ipredicted," said this human devil, who could not refrain from addingacute mental torture to the dying moments of his victim. And as hespoke a low whine rose upon the night air, where a dark sinister shapelay silhouetted against the white stones of the broad river-bed somelittle distance away.

  The victim heard it and wailed, in a manner that resembled the whine ofthe gruesome beast. Shiminya laughed triumphantly.

  "Even the voice she has already," he exclaimed. "She will howl bravelywhen Lupiswana hunts her."

  "Have done," growled Nanzicele. Brutal barbarian as he was, even hissavagery stopped short at this; besides, his superstitious nature wasriven to the core. "Get it over; get it over!"

  They raised the pole once more, and, by a concerted movement, swung itand its human burden over the brink, where the pool was deepest.
Onewild, appalling shriek, then a splash, and a turmoil of eddies andbubbles rolling and scintillating on the surface, and the coldremorseless face of the brilliant moon looked down, impassive, upon ahuman creature thus horribly done to death.

  "_Hlala-gahle_!" cried Shiminya, with a fiend-like laugh, watching theuprising of the stream of bubbles. Then, turning to his fellowmiscreant, "And now, Nanzicele, whom Makiwa made a chief, and thenunmade, the people at Madula's can hardly speak for laughing at thee,remembering thy last appearance there, bragging that thou wert a chief.Makiwa has done this, but soon there may not be any Makiwa, for so Iread the fates. Go now. When I want thee I will send for thee again."

  And the two murderers separated--Nanzicele, dejected and feeling asthough his freedom had gone from him for ever; Shiminya, chuckling andelate, for the day had been a red letter one, and the human spider wasgorged full of human prey.