There were only two white women present, for Robyn had flatly refused to bring her daughters from Khami for the smelling-out ceremony, and Lobengula had relented and made an exception for them.
The king had given permission for the two women to be seated. Robyn sat beside the entrance to the stockade, and Clinton stood over her protectively while the members of Mr Rhodes’ deputation flanked her. Mr Rudd, red-faced and whiskered, with his Derby hat set four square on his head, and Jordan Ballantyne, bare-headed and golden-haired at Robyn’s other hand.
Further down the line of guests, Louise St John sat on a stool of leather thongs. Her thick sable plaits hung to the waist of her simple white dress, and the eyes of the men around her kept returning surreptitiously to her exotic high-cheeked beauty. Behind her stood Mungo St John, one eye hidden by the black patch, leaning easily on his cane and smiling to himself as he saw the direction of the eyes of the men about him.
The nation surged like a slumbering black sea struck by a sudden gale of wind, and the plumes tossed like spume. There was a single clap of sound like the volley of massed cannon as every right leg was lifted shoulder high and brought down to stamp the hard earth, and every throat corded and strained to the royal salute.
‘Bayete!’
The Great Black Elephant of Matabele came through the gateway, and behind him his wives led by Ningi swayed and shuffled and sang his praises.
With the toy spear of kingship in his hand, Lobengula paced towards the mound of packed clay on which the bath chair, which had been his father’s throne, was set, and Gandang and Babiaan, his brothers, came forward to help him ascend the steps.
From his platform, Lobengula looked upon his people, and those closest to him saw the terrible sorrow in his eyes.
‘Let it begin,’ he said, and slumped into his chair.
There was a ragged chorus of shrieks and whines and maniacal laughter from beyond the stockade walls, and through the gateway came a horrid procession of beldams and crones, of prancing hell-hags and gibbering necromancers.
At their throats and waists were hung the trappings of their wizardry, skull of baboon and infant, skin of reptile, of python and iguana, carapace of tortoise, and stoppered horns, rattles of lucky bean pods and bones, and other grisly relics of man and animal and bird.
Wailing and hooting they assembled before Lobengula’s throne.
‘Dark sisters, can you smell the evil ones?’
‘We smell their breaths – they are here! They are here!’
One of the witches collapsed in the dust, with froth bubbling over her toothless gums; her eyes rolled back into her skull and her limbs twitched spasmodically. One of her sisters dashed the red powder from a snuff-horn in her face, and she shrieked and leaped into the air.
‘Dark sisters, will you bring forth the evil-doers?’ Lobengula asked.
‘We will bring them to you, Great Bull of Kumalo. We will deliver them up, son of Mzilikazi.’
‘Go!’ ordered Lobengula. ‘Do what must be done!’
Some of them went whirling and cavorting, brandishing their divining rods, one the tail of a giraffe, another the inflated bladder of a jackal on a staff of red tambooti wood, still another the stretched and sun-dried penis of a black-maned lion, the rods with which they would point out the evil ones.
Others crept away, slinking and sly as the night-prowling hyena. Others again crawled on all fours, snuffling the earth like hunting hounds quartering for the scent as they spread out amongst the rows of waiting people.
One of the witches came down the line of white guests, hopping like an ancient baboon, her empty teats flapping against her withered belly, her skin crusty grey with filth and her charms clattering and jangling; and she stopped in front of Mungo St John and lifted her nose to sniff the air, then she howled like a bitch in season.
Mungo St John took the long black hand-rolled cheroot of native tobacco from between his lips and inspected the ash on its tip. The crone hopped closer and looked up into his face, and he returned the cheroot to his lips and returned her stare without interest.
She leapt up to thrust her face inches from his and noisily sniff the breath of his nostrils, and then she danced away – until she faced him again, lifted the long giraffe tail above her head, shrieked like a stooping owl and rushed at Mungo, the tail raised to strike into his face.
In front of him she froze in the act of striking, and Mungo St John took the cheroot from his mouth and he blew a perfect smoke ring, that spun upon itself until it broke in the witch’s face and blew away in soft wisps.
She cackled, wildly, madly, and passed on down the line to pause in front of Robyn Codrington.
‘You stink like the hyena that spawned you,’ Robyn told her evenly in perfect Matabele, and the witch whirled and raced away to where Juba stood in the front line of noble matrons; she raised the switch to strike and looked back at Robyn, gloating loathsomely.
Robyn had gone white as bone, and came to her feet clutching her own bosom.
‘No,’ she whispered. ‘Please, fair sister, let her be.’
The witch dropped her arm and came back to strut and preen in front of Robyn; then again she shrieked, whirled and rushed at Juba, this time she struck, and the tail hissed and snapped on black flesh – but at the very last second the witch had diverted her aim, and the blow flew into the startled face of the young woman who stood beside Juba.
‘I smell evil,’ shrieked the witch, and the woman fell to her knees. ‘I smell blood.’
The witch struck again and again, the tail cutting stingingly into the woman’s unprotected face until the tears started and ran down her cheeks.
The executioners came forward and pulled her to her feet. The woman’s legs were paralysed, so they dragged her unprotesting before Lobengula, and he looked down on her, saddened and helplessly compassionate, before he lifted the forefinger of his right hand.
One of the executioners swung his war club, a full blow that stove in the back of the woman’s skull. The bone crunched like a footstep in loose gravel, and the woman’s eyes were driven from their sockets like overripe grapes by the force of it. When she fell face forward in the dust there was a bloodless depression in the back of her head into which a man could have placed his fist. The witch scurried away to continue the hunt, and Juba looked across at Robyn. Robyn had fallen back on her chair, trembling and pale, while Clinton put an arm around her shoulders to steady her.
In the packed ranks there was another triumphant shriek, and the executioners dragged a fine-looking young warrior from his place. He threw off their hands and strode to drop on one knee before Lobengula’s throne.
‘Father of the nation, hear my praises. Great Thunderer, Black Bull, let me die with your name on my lips. Oh Lobengula who drives like the wind—’
The king lifted his finger and the club fell with the flute of a goose’s wing.
The chorus of howls and shrieks was unending now as the sisters warmed to their work, and the victims were dragged out and slaughtered – until their corpses were a high mound before the king’s throne, a tangle of black limbs and shattered heads, that grew and grew.
A hundred, two hundred, were added to the pile, while the sun reached its zenith and the dust and heat and terror formed a suffocating miasma, and the blue metallic flies swarmed in the staring eyes and open mouths of the dead, and the witches cavorted and giggled and struck with their rods.
Here and there a maiden, overcome with the fear and the blazing heat, fell swooning from her place and the witches pounced upon this irrefutable evidence of guilt and rained blows upon her bare back or glossy breasts, and the executioners hurried to keep pace with their dreadful task.
The sun began its slow descent towards the western horizon, and at last one at a time the witches crept back to the mountain of death they had created. They staggered with exhaustion – the dust had caked on their running sweat, but they bayed and whined like dogs as they pored over the corpses, selecting those they
would take with them – back to their caves and secret places – a sliver of the womb of a virgin was a powerful fertility charm, a slice of the heart of a blooded warrior was a wonderful talisman in battle.
‘Is the work done?’ Lobengula asked.
‘It is done, oh king.’
‘Are all the evil ones dead?’
‘They are all dead, son of Mzilikazi.’
‘Go then – and go in peace,’ Lobengula said wearily.
‘Stay in peace, Great King.’ They chuckled and hooted and, bearing their gruesome plunder with them, they shuffled away through the gateway of the stockade.
Three times in as many weeks Mungo St John petitioned the king – asking him to ‘give the road’ to the south – but each time the king chatted affably for an hour and then waved him away. ‘I will think on it, One Bright Eye, but are you unhappy here? Does the beef and beer I send you not fill your belly? Perhaps you would like to go once again on the hunt?’
‘I want to go south, oh King.’
‘Perhaps in the next full moon, One Bright Eye, and then again perhaps after the rain has passed, or after the Chawala Ceremony, who knows? We will see in good season.’
Then one morning Louise rode out early, as had become her custom – but after she had been gone some hours Mungo realized that this time she had the rifle and bandolier of ammunition, her blanket roll and the gallon water-bottle with her.
He puzzled over her behaviour for the rest of that day, but he was not alarmed until night fell and she had not returned. He sat up beside the fire all that night, and at first light he took the second mule and crossed the river to where Rudd’s party was camped in grand style in a pleasant glade of the forest. They had six wagons and as many tents made of best quality waterproof canvas, each with sun flysheets.
The horses on the picket line were all blood Arabs, one of which would carry Mungo and his small bag of precious stones to the Shashi river in six days or less. He was eyeing them hungrily, when Robyn Codrington stooped out of one of the tents. She saw him and would have gone in again, but he called to her and jumped down from the mule.
‘Dr Codrington, please, it is a matter of extreme urgency.’
Reluctantly she turned back.
‘My wife is missing, she did not come in last night.’
Immediately her distant expression changed to one of concern.
‘Did she say where she was going?’
He shook his head. ‘I can only think that she might have ridden back to Khami – you know she was becoming friendly with your elder daughter—’
‘I shall send a servant to the mission.’
‘Can you not ask the king to let me go?’
‘The king has gone in to his wives – nobody, not even I, dare disturb him until he comes out from the women’s quarters.’
‘How long will that be?’
‘A day, a week – there is no way of telling. I shall send word to you as soon as I have news.’
That night Mungo waited again, and then in the dawn as he crouched, haggard and bleary-eyed, over the smoky fire, listening for the hoof beats of the mule or the sound of Louise’s voice out of the darkness – he was struck instead by a thought that chilled his blood and made his guts slide with dread.
He leapt up from the fire, ran into the hut and scrabbled frantically under the mattress. With a blessed soaring relief his fingers closed on the bag, and he pulled it out and fumbled the drawstring open. He poured the bright stones into the palm of his hand. They were all there, but with them was something that had not been there before. It was a folded sheet of paper – and he took it to the fire and held it to catch the light.
When you find this you will know why I have gone. Even as I write this the memory of those poor wretches who died in their hundreds to pay for your greed rises before me to torment me. With them died the last of my love for you.
I leave you those blood-spattered stones in the certain knowledge that they are accursed.
Do not follow me. Do not send after me. Do not think of me again.
She had not signed it.
Rudd’s party was at breakfast under the open-sided dining-tent.
It was a fresh and cool morning. The conversation around the table was intelligent, informed and yet quick and witty, Robyn revelled in it.
She sat at the head of the trestle table and the gentlemen deferred to her. Mr Rudd had been very obviously taken with her from their first meeting, and addressed all his remarks to her directly.
Jordan had supervised the preparation of a gargantuan English breakfast, fresh eggs and grilled gammon, salted kippers and tinned pork sausage, potted shrimps and bloater paste, with freshly-churned yellow butter and hot scones.
Mr Rudd, quite carried away with the spontaneous festive mood, called for a bottle of champagne that had been hung overnight in a wet sack to cool.
‘Well,’ he lifted his glass to Robyn, ‘I am sure we shall be able to survive this rough life and rude fare until the good king makes up his mind.’
Despite Robyn’s intercession, Lobengula had not yet ratified the concession that they sought. His senior indunas had been in secret conclave for weeks, but could not reach a consensus of agreement – while Lobengula vacillated and reacted to Mr Rudd’s insistence by retiring to his women’s quarters where nobody could reach him.
‘It may take months yet.’ Robyn lifted her own glass and returned Rudd’s salute. ‘I would not expect Lobengula to make a decision on such an important matter without going into the Matopos Hills to consult the oracle, the Umlimo.’
Suddenly Clinton looked down towards the river, frowned and whispered to Robyn. ‘It’s that scoundrel St John, what does he want coming here?’
Mungo St John had dismounted at the periphery of the camp, but he did not approach the company under the open-sided marquee.
Robyn stood up quickly. ‘Please excuse me, gentlemen. General St John’s wife is missing, and he is naturally worried.’
‘Thank you for coming,’ Mungo said, as she hurried to him. ‘I have nobody else to turn to, Robyn.’
She tried to ignore the intimacy of his appeal, and the little jolt that his use of her given name always gave her.
‘Do you have news?’ she asked.
‘I have discovered a note that Louise left for me.’
‘Let me see it.’ Robyn held out her hand.
‘I am sorry. It contains most personal and, I fear, embarrassing, references,’ Mungo told her. ‘But what is important is that Louise is trying to leave Matabeleland by the southern road.’
‘That is madness,’ Robyn whispered. ‘Without the king’s permission, without an escort. The road is obscure, the country wild and infested with lions, she cannot hope to pass the border impis – and they have orders to kill all who do not have the road from Lobengula.’
‘She knows all this,’ Mungo said.
‘Then what possessed her to make the attempt?’
‘We argued. She resented the feeling which she knows that I still have – for you.’
Robyn fell back a pace, her cheeks paling and her breath catching in her throat.
‘General St John, I forbid you to talk in that fashion.’
‘You asked me, Robyn, and once, long ago, I told you that I would never forget that night aboard Huron—’
‘Stop it! Stop it, this instant! How can you speak like this when your wife is in dire danger?’
‘Louise was never my wife,’ he said quietly, staring into her green eyes with that single penetrating gaze. ‘She was my travelling companion, never my wife.’
Robyn faltered, colour rushed back into her cheeks, and with it came a strange unaccountable pagan joy.
‘You told me – once – that you were married.’
‘I was, Robyn. Not to Louise. That other lady died many years ago in Navarre in France.’
Robyn confounded herself. She was married to a brave, kind man – in his own way a saintly man – while before her stood the embodiment
of evil, the veritable serpent of Eden; and yet she could not suppress this wicked unconscionable elation at the knowledge that he was free – free for she knew not what, or could not bring herself to think on it.
‘I shall go to the king,’ she said, painfully aware of the quaver in her voice. ‘I shall ask him to send men after your – after the lady. I shall ask him also to give you the road, General, and I would consider it full repayment if you would take it immediately, and never return to Matabeleland.’
‘What is between us can never be denied, Robyn, as long as we both live.’
‘I do not wish to see you again.’ With an effort of all her will she steadied her voice and met his eye.
‘Robyn—’
‘I shall send a messenger to you with the king’s reply.’
‘Robyn—’
‘Please.’ Her voice cracked again. ‘In God’s holy name, please leave me alone.’
However, it was two more days before Robyn sent Jordan Ballantyne to Mungo’s camp.
‘Dr Codrington bids me tell you, sir, that the king has already sent one of his trusted indunas with a picked body of warriors after your wife. They have orders to protect her from the border guards and to escort her to the Shashi river.’
‘Thank you, young man.’
‘Furthermore, she asked me to tell you that the king has given you the road. You may follow your wife immediately.’
‘Again my thanks to Dr Codrington.’
‘General St John, you do not remember me—’
‘I am afraid—’ Mungo frowned up at Jordan on the back of the dancing Arab mare.
‘Jordan – Zouga Ballantyne’s son. We met in Kimberley some years ago.’
‘Ah! Of course, forgive me. You have changed.’