So I rose to go, but as I went some impulse seemed to take him and he
called me back and made me sit down again.
"Macumazahn," he said, "I would add a word. When you were quite a lad
you came into this country with Retief, did you not?"
"Yes," I answered slowly, for this matter of the massacre of Retief is
one of which I have seldom cared to speak, for sundry reasons, although
I have made a record of it in writing.[*] Even my friends Sir Henry
Curtis and Captain Good have heard little of the part I played in that
tragedy. "But what do you know of that business, Zikali?"
[*--Published under the title of "Marie."--EDITOR.] "All that there is to know, I think, Macumazahn, seeing that I was at
the bottom of it, and that Dingaan killed those Boers on my advice--just
as he killed Chaka and Umhlangana."
"You cold-blooded old murderer--" I began, but he interrupted me at
once.
"Why do you throw evil names at me, Macumazahn, as I threw the stone of
your fate at you just now? Why am I a murderer because I brought about
the death of some white men that chanced to be your friends, who had
come here to cheat us black folk of our country?"
"Was it for this reason that you brought about their deaths, Zikali?"
I asked, staring him in the face, for I felt that he was lying to me.
"Not altogether, Macumazahn," he answered, letting his eyes, those
strange eyes that could look at the sun without blinking, fall before
my gaze. "Have I not told you that I hate the House of Senzangakona?
And when Retief and his companions were killed, did not the spilling of
their blood mean war to the end between the Zulus and the White Men? Did
it not mean the death of Dingaan and of thousands of his people, which
is but a beginning of deaths? Now do you understand?"
"I understand that you are a very wicked man," I answered with
indignation.
"At least you should not say so, Macumazahn," he replied in a new
voice, one with the ring of truth in it.
"Why not?"
"Because I saved your life on that day. You escaped alone of the White
Men, did you not? And you never could understand why, could you?"
"No, I could not, Zikali. I put it down to what you would call 'the
spirits.'"
"Well, I will tell you. Those spirits of yours wore my kaross," and
he laughed. "I saw you with the Boers, and saw, too, that you were of
another people--the people of the English. You may have heard at the
time that I was doctoring at the Great Place, although I kept out of the
way and we did not meet, or at least you never knew that we met, for you
were--asleep. Also I pitied your youth, for, although you do not believe
it, I had a little bit of heart left in those days. Also I knew that we
should come together again in the after years, as you see we have done
to-day and shall often do until the end. So I told Dingaan that whoever
died you must be spared, or he would bring up the 'people of George'
[i.e. the English] to avenge you, and your ghost would enter into him
and pour out a curse upon him. He believed me who did not understand
that already so many curses were gathered about his head that one more
or less made no matter. So you see you were spared, Macumazahn, and
afterwards you helped to pour out a curse upon Dingaan without becoming
a ghost, which is the reason why Panda likes you so well to-day, Panda,
the enemy of Dingaan, his brother. You remember the woman who helped
you? Well, I made her do so. How did it go with you afterwards,
Macumazahn, with you and the Boer maiden across the Buffalo River, to
whom you were making love in those days?"