Haviland's Chum Part 23

"Heat of two suns!"

"Scorcher up of the world!"

These and other extravagant attributes were thundered forth from the excited and adoring mult.i.tude, and Haviland, who understood a little about that sort of thing, was quick to observe that these attributes mostly referred to fire. A few others were uttered, such as "Swallower up of Rumaliza!" "Thou who makest dust of Mushad!" and so forth, but the _sibonga_ was always brought back again to the attribute of fire.

It interested him, and he made up his mind to ask k.u.mbelwa about it by and by.

But now the King had reached his chair of state and was seated thereon.

It was a genuine throne, of very old and quaint workmans.h.i.+p, beautifully carved, with couchant lions on the arms, and guarding the steps, and had probably been obtained from some slaver who traded in the north. This chair was placed on a kind of raised verandah with a wide gra.s.s roof, and was well sheltered from the sun. The indunas squatted on the floor of the verandah on either side of the throne.

"Come forward, ye white men," said the King, and they noticed that his voice was extraordinarily full and deep.

Our two friends advanced to the throne, and as they did so it was not rea.s.suring to notice ten or a dozen men standing rather conspicuously at hand, armed with wicked-looking scimitars, also thongs and raw-hide whips--all most uncomfortably suggestive of their grim vocation.

"You who speak with our tongue," said the King, pointing at Haviland, "how know you it?"

"In the land of Cetywayo, Great Great One."

"Now thou liest, for Cetywayo is there no more. Your people have upset his throne long since."

Haviland wondered how on earth that news should have travelled to this remote, hardly heard-of tribe, but he answered:

"That is true, Ndabezita [A term of honour addressed to royalty]. But his people still exist."

"Ha! How came ye here, ye two?"

Then, beginning, Haviland narrated all that had befallen them up to their battle with and capture by Mushad. The King and all within earshot listened attentively.

"Somala? Where is he?" said the King.

The Arab was pushed forward and stood before the throne. A fell and menacing scowl overclouded the royal countenance.

"Another of these dogs of Rumaliza's," said the King. "Take him, ye Black Ones."

The executioners sprang forward to seize the Arab. But, before they could reach him, Haviland had stepped between.

"Spare him, Burner of the Sun," he said. "He is not of Rumaliza's tribe. He is no enemy to the people of Inswani."

A great groan went up from the a.s.sembly. Men held their breath. Had such a thing ever before been known, that a man should stand before another that the King had doomed to die? As for the despot himself, he had risen from his seat. His towering form seemed to dilate, and the scowl on his enraged countenance was terrible to behold.

"Thou hast thy head in the lion's mouth," he said, "and dost still dare to tickle the lion's jaws. Are all white men mad?"

"He is my tried and faithful servant, Ndabezita," pleaded Haviland. "He is not the enemy of this people--indeed, very much the reverse, for who delivered him--delivered all of us--out of the hand of Mushad?"

"Ha! Mushad!" exclaimed the King, whom an idea seemed to strike-- perhaps also a little impressed by the absolute fearlessness evinced by Haviland, and which decided him to spare Somala for the present. "Bring forward Mushad and his other dogs."

A ferocious murmur of delight hummed through the whole a.s.sembly. The hated slavers were about to suffer. Many willing hands dragged them forward into the presence of the King.

His iron frame wasted with exhaustion and ill-treatment, Mushad's spirit was still unbent.

He met the fierce scowl of the despot with a scowl every whit as savage and defiant.

"Ho! Mushad!" cried the King, mockingly. "But a short while since thou didst swear to seize me and make a slave of me. How now? I think thou didst swear thine oath upside down."

"G.o.d is G.o.d, and Mohammed is the Prophet of G.o.d. He shall turn the foul unbeliever into worse than a dog. It matters not who is his instrument in doing so," answered the Arab, defiantly.

"_Whau_!" cried the King. "If Mohammed comes near the land of Inswani he shall taste what you are about to taste. But you--you have made slaves of certain of my people. Slaves of the people of Inswani! Hear you it, my children?"

Even our two friends, tried, intrepid adventurers as they were, could not help a sense of heart-failing as they heard the terrific roar of hate and vengeance which was hurled from every throat as these words of the King fell upon their ears: "Warriors of Inswani, slaves beneath the lash of this Arab dog!" Well, he was at their mercy at last.

"Let him taste the las.h.!.+" they roared.

The King nodded to the executioners. Mushad was seized and the clothing rent from his back, revealing the weals of former scourgings. But no cry for mercy escaped him as the cruel whips of raw-hide fell upon his emaciated form, striping it until the blood spurted. The two white men felt perfectly sick, but to display signs of any such weakness would be as impolitic as any display of weakness in the presence of these fierce and truculent savages. Even the effort made to remind themselves of Mushad's own barbarities was not sufficient to reconcile them to the horrid sight. But with every cruel whistling blow, the Inswani roared with delight.

"Hold!" cried the King at last. "He has had enough. Take him away and give him plenty of food. He must be made quite strong for what he has to undergo. We have only begun upon thee as yet, Mushad. And now, bring forward yon other dogs, and let them taste of what they have dared to inflict upon my children--the warriors of the Inswani. For them, too, it is only a foretaste of what is to come."

The other slave-hunters, to the number of nearly three score, were then dragged forth. There were not enough of the regular lictors, but willing hands were only too ready to take their place, so intense and rancorous was the hatred borne towards them, and soon the whole ground in front of the King was converted into a hideous and writhing torture-chamber. Yet it was not that the Inswani held these people's trade in especial abhorrence; far from it, for they took a hand at it themselves upon occasion. But what they could not pardon was the fact of the Arab raiders seizing and enslaving their own men, and towards Mushad and his followers their vengeful hatred was now kindled to white heat, and they gloated over the anguish of these whose power had hitherto been able to rival their own.

"Hold!" cried the King at last. "They, too, have had enough. Take yonder ten," designating those who looked the lowest in standing of the party, "and impale them on the stockade. The rest will follow in due time."

A roar of delight greeted these words. The miserable wretches were seized and dragged off, and presently were writhing each on a hard stake, pointing outward from the stockade, crowds of the savages dancing round and taunting them. Indeed, it seemed as though the whole nation had gone mad in its l.u.s.t for blood. The expression of even the King's countenance had grown indescribably cruel and ferocious, and beholding it, our two friends felt that their peril was hardly less than it had been when they were in the hands of Mushad.

"Go ye," he said, pointing at them. "Go, lest my mind changes. Let them be given a house for the present. Hold! Who is this?"

He had for the first time remembered the presence of k.u.mbelwa, who sufficiently resembled the Inswani to escape notice.

"_Inkose! Nkulu'nkulu, Inyoka 'mninimandhla_!" began the Zulu, crouching low, and breaking forth into the _sibonga_ of his race. "The servant of the Royal House of Inswani is a Zulu of the tribe of Umtetwa."

"Of Umtetwa!" echoed the King. "That which the House of Senzangakona swallowed. Thou shouldst be a great fighter," running his eyes appreciatively over k.u.mbelwa's fine stature.

"I wielded a spear in the ranks of the Umbonambi, father, when we fought the English, although now we are friends."

"Good," said the King. "Thou hast the look of a warrior indeed, and thou shalt wield thy spear in the ranks of my army now. See now, k.u.mbelwa. Take charge of these two white men, whose servant thou wouldst seem to be. I will talk with thee later. Go."

Thus dismissed, Haviland and Oakley breathed more freely. It was a respite at any rate. Yet with the scenes of horror and vengeance weighing heavy upon them, their minds were full of foreboding as to what was to come, as they took up their quarters in the large square hut a.s.signed to them. And even yet, the stakes with their writhing victims seemed to haunt them, and in the mind of each was the unspoken thought that they themselves might be the next.

CHAPTER TWENTY SIX.

THE END OF MUSHAD.

After this they saw nothing of the King. The days went by, growing into weeks, and still there seemed no prospect of their perilous and irksome captivity drawing to its end. Though outwardly treated as guests, there were not wanting downright intimations that they could not come and go as they pleased, and they received a significant hint that the country was very unhealthy did they venture out of sight of the stockade. At first they strove to take an interest in the novelty of their position, and in the conditions of life of this strange race; but the people were very reserved, and seemed afraid to say much; so that except through k.u.mbelwa they could learn but little about them--and not a great deal through him. The King's name, they gathered, was Umnovunovu; and yet it was in reality only a t.i.tle, like that of the Pharaohs of Egypt, for the kings of the Inswani had no name, and their former one became very much _hlonipa_, i.e. not to be uttered.

"You see, Oakley," Haviland said, "there's no end to the curious twists and turns of native etiquette--and the unformulated, or what would be to us the unwritten laws, are the strangest of all. In Zululand, for instance, white men who have had the country and people at their fingers' ends all their lives have told me that the more certain they were they knew everything, the more certain something was to occur to show them they didn't."

"Well, this is a mighty ugly crowd, anyway," answered Oakley, "and, like Pharaoh of old, Mr Umnovunovu doesn't intend to let us go in a hurry."

They were growing very dejected under their enforced detention. The climate was not bad, and a great improvement on the steamy heat of the lower country; indeed, the nights were at times distinctly sharp. But everything tended to depress them. They had nothing on earth to do, and, as Oakley said, all their time to do it in. For another thing, the atmosphere of continuous slaughter and death got very much upon their nerves. Besides the slaver captives, who were done to death under varying circ.u.mstances of barbarity, at the rate of several a day, and whose tortured shrieks it was impossible to keep out of their ears, several of the Inswani were taken out and put to death, as they were informed, by order of the King. This young savage seemed positively to wallow in blood and torture; yet, so far from the feet undermining the loyalty of his subjects, it seemed rather to cement their adherence.