"And always shall be, _Hau_!" echoed his listeners. "And always shall be. My father, I think not."

"I am old, my sons, and I shall end my life peacefully," answered the a.s.segai-maker--"shall end my life as the white man's dog. There are those among you who will end your lives in blood."

"Ha! And what then?" cried the man who had worked at the Rand. "We fight for our father and chief, and for--" and here he suddenly stopped.

He would name no names, but all knew what was in his mind, and the same thought was in theirs. "I would I had lived in the time when we were a nation indeed, when our a.s.segais bit deep and drank blood. My father lost his life in blood at Nodwengu, but he had washed his spear in the blood of the whites twice before that. And I, his son, I have to turn out and work at mending the white man's roads. _Hau_!"

"You will get all your chances of a death in blood--a glorious death in blood--presently, my sons," said the old a.s.segai-maker, his face puckered up quizzically. "The whites will take care of that."

"_Au_! I like not this talk," growled one of the group, a much older man. "It is as if our father were putting bad _muti_ upon the weapons he is making."

"No _muti_, good or bad, put I on them, Sekun-ya," returned the old man tranquilly. "The _muti_ is for those who use them."

There was a laugh at this, and then the group fell to talking, and their topic was the former one--the capture of the white women in the coming rising. It was not a pleasant conversation. The man who had worked at the Rand was giving voluble impressions and even experiences of the great gold town, and his hearers listened delightedly. Such experiences, however, were not calculated to deepen their respect for the white man, or for his womenkind. The while the old a.s.segai-maker worked on. At last he deposited the last blade to cool.

"There, my sons. You will have as many as you can carry--when darkness falls," he said. "Sapazani has an open hand, yet I would like to have what comes out of it before these are used, for thereafter nothing may there be to have. Say that unto the chief."

This they promised to do, amid much merriment. But the old sceptic did not controvert them; he merely reiterated--

"Say it."

Suddenly a change came over the att.i.tude of the group. They were suddenly silent, and sat tense and listening.

"_O' Nongqai_!" exclaimed more than one simultaneously.

For to their keen ears was borne the far-away sound of horse-hoofs, and it was that of several horses. The inference was clear. A police patrol.

The a.s.segai-maker's kraal was situated in a hollow on a densely bushed and rugged hillside. Even the smoke of his fire would hardly show above the tree-tops, yet it was just possible that the secret of its existence and of its whereabouts might have leaked out. But such a contingency had been provided against, and Malemba would have had ample time to conceal all traces of his craft by the time horses could make their way up that rugged hillside. Quickly the group had melted away and were speeding for a point whence they could overlook the country beneath.

Three hors.e.m.e.n were advancing along the rough track down on the level, over two miles distant. The ordinary civilised gaze would have required gla.s.ses to make out their ident.i.ty, but to the telescopic eyes of these savages that was plain enough. So plain that they could even distinguish the sergeant from the two troopers.

One man was dispatched to warn Malemba, and the rest crouched there, and watched--watched with some anxiety. Were they coming up the hill? No, they held straight on, heading away in the direction of Ben Halse's store. And the watchers laughed and chuckled among themselves.

"_O' Nongqai_! Three out of five here. Four there; ten elsewhere.

_Whau_! We shall eat them up easily."

Nevertheless they continued to watch, even after the patrol was out of sight.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN.

THE FIRST DAY.

They were inspecting the great koodoo head in Ben Halse's yard. Denham was delighted.

"Why, it's perfect," he declared. "Perfect, simply perfect."

"Yes, I believe it's an absolute record. But we'll have to be a bit careful how we get it away; however, there's no hurry about that."

"There's an old saying, you know, Mr Halse," said Denham: "'short accounts make long friends.' So you won't mind taking over this now,"

and he handed the other a folded cheque.

Ben Halse opened it, and started. Then he handed it back.

"It's too much," he said. "The head's worth a good deal, but not as much as that. No."

"It's worth it all to me," was the answer. "Well, then, name your own figure."

Ben did so.

"Right," said Denham, "you shall have your way. But I'd rather have had mine," he laughed.

"A very common complaint," answered his host. "What would you like to do this morning? In the afternoon Verna could take you down into the forest, or anywhere else you like. She's busy this morning, and I have things to see to."

Denham declared that that would be a delightful programme. He could get through the morning easily enough, he said. They must on no account make a stranger of him, or put themselves out in any way. The while he had been keeping one ear open for Verna's voice, which came to them, raised in s.n.a.t.c.hes of song, from the other side of the house.

It was the day after his arrival at the store. They had all travelled up together, having borrowed some extra harness and inspanned Denham's horse as "unicorn," so that the extra weight didn't count so much, and he was conscious of having thoroughly enjoyed the journey. Nor would he try to disguise to himself the fact that this result was largely due to the presence of Ben Halse's daughter.

It had taken all of three days; two nights being got through in such scanty accommodation as could be obtained at lonely wayside stores similar to that of Ben himself, though infinitely rougher, and the third night camping in the veldt; during which, by the bye, Denham had started out of his sleep declaring that a whacking big spider had just run over his face, which was more than likely the case. But through heat and dust and discomfort Verna's spirits never flagged, and her cheerfulness remained unruffled. Now a three days' journey under such circ.u.mstances is a pretty good test of character, and her att.i.tude throughout was thoroughly appreciated by her fellow-traveller and guest. She was unique, he decided, unique and splendid.

He found her now engaged upon exactly the same homely occupation as that on which she was engaged on the occasion of our first making her acquaintance--bread-making, to wit.

"Useful as always, Miss Halse," he remarked. "Why, I don't know how we should have got on coming along but for you."

She flashed a smile up at him.

"How did you get on without me when you came along through the Makanya bush?" she said mischievously.

If there was that in the allusion that brought a change into Denham's face it was only momentary.

"I had to then, worse luck," he laughed. "But I managed it somehow."

Then they both laughed--easily, happily.

Denham, looking down at her as she sat there, came to the conclusion that she was more charming than ever. The sheen of her abundant brown hair, carelessly but becomingly coiled, the dark semicircle of the eyelashes on the cheek, the strong, supple figure so splendidly outlined, the movement of the shapely arms as she kneaded the dough-- why, this homely performance was a poem in itself. Then the staging-- the fall of wooded slope to a deep down vista of plain below--dim in the noontide haze where on the right a darker line in contrast to the open green showed part of the great mysterious forest tract. Even the utterly unaesthetic dwelling-house hardly seemed to spoil the picture.

"Well, and what is the subject of all this profound thought?" she asked suddenly, with a quick, bright, upward glance.

He started, looked at her straight, and told her. Yet, somehow, he did it in such a way as to avoid ba.n.a.lity, possibly because so naturally.

"What did I tell you once before?" she said, but she changed colour ever so slightly. "That you must not pay me compliments. They don't come well from you--I mean they are too petty."

It might have been his turn to answer with a "_tu quoque_." But he did not. What he said was--

"I was answering your question. I was describing the picture I had seen in my own mind. How could I have left out the princ.i.p.al figure in it?"

Again she glanced up at him, was about to speak, then seemed to change her mind. If her personality had struck Denham as unique, the very same thing seemed to have struck her as regarded himself. The intellectual face, the tall, fine frame, the easy, cultured manner, half-a-score other things about him--all these rendered him a personality clean outside her own experience. Whereby it will be seen that the atmosphere around Ben Halse's remote and primitive dwelling was, even at this early stage, charged with abundant potentialities.

"And 'the princ.i.p.al figure' in it is all floury and generally dishevelled," she said at last, with a light laugh.