Child of Storm

At length he looked up, tossing back his grey locks, and said: "I see many things in the dust. Oh, yes, it is alive, it is alive, and

tells me many things. Show that you are alive, O Dust. Look!"

As he spoke, throwing his hands upwards, there arose at his very feet

one of those tiny and incomprehensible whirlwinds with which all who

know South Africa will be familiar. It drove the dust together; it

lifted it in a tall, spiral column that rose and rose to a height of

fifty feet or more. Then it died away as suddenly as it had come, so

that the dust fell down again over Zikali, over the King, and over three

of his sons who sat behind him. Those three sons, I remember, were named

Tshonkweni, Dabulesinye, and Mantantashiya. As it chanced, by a strange

coincidence all of these were killed at the great battle of the Tugela

of which I have to tell.

Now again an exclamation of fear and wonder rose from the audience, who

set down this lifting of the dust at Zikali's very feet not to natural

causes, but to the power of his magic. Moreover, those on whom it had

fallen, including the King, rose hurriedly and shook and brushed it

from their persons with a zeal that was not, I think, inspired by a mere

desire for cleanliness. But Zikali only laughed again in his terrible

fashion and let it lie on his fresh-oiled body, which it turned to the

dull, dead hue of a grey adder.

He rose and, stepping here and there, examined the new-fallen dust. Then

he put his hand into a pouch he wore and produced from it a dried human

finger, whereof the nail was so pink that I think it must have been

coloured--a sight at which the circle shuddered.

"Be clever," he said, "O Finger of her I loved best; be clever and write

in the dust as yonder Macumazana can write, and as some of the Dwandwe

used to write before we became slaves and bowed ourselves down before

the Great Heavens." (By this he meant the Zulus, whose name means

the Heavens.) "Be clever, dear Finger which caressed me once, me, the

'Thing-that-should-not-have-been-born,' as more will think before I die,

and write those matters that it pleases the House of Senzangakona to

know this day."

Then he bent down, and with the dead finger at three separate spots made

certain markings in the fallen dust, which to me seemed to consist of

circles and dots; and a strange and horrid sight it was to see him do

it.

"I thank you, dear Finger. Now sleep, sleep, your work is done," and

slowly he wrapped the relic up in some soft material and restored it to

his pouch.