To this remark Panda made no answer, perhaps because it was

unanswerable, even in a land where it was customary to kill the supposed

wizard first and inquire as to his actual guilt afterwards, or not at

all. Or perhaps he thought it politic to ignore the suggestion that he

had been inspired by personal enmity. Only, he looked at his daughter,

Nandie, who rose and said: "Have I leave to call a witness on this matter of the poison, my

Father?"

Panda nodded, whereon Nandie said to one of the councillors: "Be pleased to summon my woman, Nahana, who waits without."

The man went, and presently returned with an elderly female who, it

appeared, had been Nandie's nurse, and, never having married, owing to

some physical defect, had always remained in her service, a person well

known and much respected in her humble walk of life.

"Nahana," said Nandie, "you are brought here that you may repeat to the

King and his council a tale which you told to me as to the coming of

a certain woman into my hut before the death of my first-born son, and

what she did there. Say first, is this woman present here?"

"Aye, Inkosazana," answered Nahana, "yonder she sits. Who could mistake

her?" and she pointed to Mameena, who was listening to every word

intently, as a dog listens at the mouth of an ant-bear hole when the

beast is stirring beneath.

"Then what of the woman and her deeds?" asked Panda.

"Only this, O King. Two nights before the child that is dead was taken

ill, I saw Mameena creep into the hut of the lady Nandie, I who was

asleep alone in a corner of the big hut out of reach of the light of the

fire. At the time the lady Nandie was away from the hut with her son.

Knowing the woman for Mameena, the wife of Masapo, who was on friendly

terms with the Inkosazana, whom I supposed she had come to visit, I did

not declare myself; nor did I take any particular note when I saw her

sprinkle a little mat upon which the babe, Saduko's son, was wont to

be laid, with some medicine, because I had heard her promise to the

Inkosazana a powder which she said would drive away insects. Only, when

I saw her throw some of this powder into the vessel of warm water that

stood by the fire, to be used for the washing of the child, and place

something, muttering certain words that I could not catch, in the straw

of the doorway, I thought it strange, and was about to question her when

she left the hut. As it happened, O King, but a little while afterwards,

before one could count ten tens indeed, a messenger came to the hut to

tell me that my old mother lay dying at her kraal four days' journey

from Nodwengu, and prayed to see me before she died. Then I forgot all

about Mameena and the powder, and, running out to seek the Princess

Nandie, I craved her leave to go with the messenger to my mother's

kraal, which she granted to me, saying that I need not return until my

mother was buried.




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