At the bidding of the King, guards sprang forward to seize Richard, but the old Councillor, Mopo, shrunk away behind him hiding his eyes with his withered hand. They sprang forward, and yet they laid no finger on him, but fell oft to right and left, saying: "Kill us, if thou wilt, Black One, we cannot!"
"The wizard has bewitched them," said Dingaan angrily. "Here, you Doctors, you whose trade it is to catch wizards, take this white fellow and bind him."
Unwillingly enough the Doctors, of whom there were eight or ten sitting apart, rose to do the King's bidding. They came on towards Richard, some of them singing songs, and some muttering charms, and as they came he laughed and said: "Beware! you Abangoma, the Dream is looking at you very angrily." Then they too broke away to right and left, crying out that this was a wizard against whom they had no power.
Now Dingaan grew mad with wrath, and shouted to his soldiers to seize the white man, and if he resisted them to kill him with their sticks, for of witchcraft they had known enough in Zululand of late.
So thick as bees the regiment formed up in front of him, shouting and waving their kerries, for here in the King's Place they bore no spears.
"Make way there," said Richard, "I can stay no longer, I must to the north."
The soldiers did not stir, only a captain stepped out bidding him give up his spear and yield himself, or be killed. Richard walked forward and at a sign from the captain, men sprang at him, lifting their kerries, to dash out his brains. Then suddenly in front of Richard there appeared something faint and white, something that walked before him. The soldiers saw it, and the kerries fell from their hands. The regiment behind saw it, and turning, burst away like a scared herd of cattle. They did not wait to seek the gates, they burst through the fence of the enclosure, and were gone, leaving it flat behind them. The King and his Councillors saw it also, and more clearly than the rest.
"The Inkosazana!" they cried. "It is the Inkosazana who walks before him that she loved!" and they fell upon their faces. Only Dingaan remained seated on his stool.
"Go," he said hoarsely to Richard, "go, thou wizard, north or south or east or west, if only thou wilt take that Spirit with thee, for she bodes evil to my land."
So Richard, who had seen nothing, marched away from the kraal Umgugundhlovu, and once more set his face towards the north, the north that drew him as it draws the needle of a compass.