CHAPTER XXI
HOKOSA IS LIFTED UP
"What would you?" asked Hokosa of the herald as he halted a short
spear-cast from the wall.
"My master, the Prince Hafela, desires to treat with your master,
Nodwengo. Many men have fallen on either side, and if this war goes
on, though victory must be his at last, many more will fall.
Therefore, if any plan can be found, he desires to spare their lives."
Now Hokosa spoke with the king, and answered:--
"Then let Hafela come beneath the wall and we will talk with him."
"Not so," answered the herald. "Does a buck walk into an open pit?
Were the prince to come here it might chance that your spears would
talk with him. Let Nodwengo follow me to the camp yonder, where we
promise him safe conduct."
"Not so," answered Hokosa. "'Does a buck walk into an open pit?' Set
out your message, and we will consider it."
"Nay, I am but a common man without authority; but I am charged to
make you another offer, and if you will not hear it then there is an
end. Let Hokosa advance alone to that flat rock you see yonder, and
there he shall be met, also alone, by one having power to talk with
him, namely, by the Lady Noma, who was once his wife. Thus they can
confer together midway between the camps and in full sight of both of
them, nor, no man being near, can he find cause to be afraid of an
unarmed girl. What say you?"
Hokosa turned and talked with the king.
"I think it well that you should not go," said Nodwengo. "The offer
seems fair, and the stone is out of reach of their spears; still,
behind it may lurk a scheme to kill or capture you, for Hafela is very
cunning."
"It may be so, King," answered Hokosa; "still, my heart tells me it is
wisest that I should do this thing, for our case is desperate, and if
I do it not, that may be the cause of the death of all of us
to-morrow. At the worst, I am but one man, and it matters little what
may chance to me; nor shall I come to any harm unless it is the will
of Heaven that it should be so; and be sure of this, that out of the
harm will arise good, for where I go there the spirit of the Messenger
goes with me. Remember that he bade you listen to my counsel while I
remain with you, seeing that I do not speak of my own wisdom.
Therefore let me go, and if it should chance that I am taken, trouble
not about the matter, for thus it will be fated to some great end.
Above all, though often enough I have been a traitor in the past, do
not dream that I betray you, keeping in mind that so to do would be to
betray my own soul, which very soon must render its account on high."
"As you will, Hokosa," answered the king. "And now tell those rebel
dogs that on these terms only will I make peace with them--that they
withdraw across the mountains by the path which their women and
children have taken, leaving this land for ever without lifting
another spear against us. If they will do this, notwithstanding all
the wickedness and slaughter that they have worked, I will send
command to my /impi/ to let them go unharmed. If they will not do
this, I put my trust in the God I worship and will fight this fray out
to the end, knowing that if I and my people perish, they shall perish
also."
Now Nodwengo himself spoke to the herald who was waiting beyond the
wall.
"Go back to him you serve," he said, "and say that Hokosa will meet
her who was his wife upon the flat stone and talk with her in the
sight of both armies, bearing my word with him. At the sound of the
blowing of a horn shall each of them advance unarmed and alone from
either camp. Say to my brother also that it will indeed be ill for him
if he attempts treachery upon Hokosa, for the man who causes his blood
to flow will surely die, and after death shall be accursed for ever."
The herald went, and presently a horn was blown.
"Now it comes into my mind that we part for the last time," said
Nodwengo in a troubled voice as he took the hand of Hokosa.
"It may be so, King; in my heart I think that it is so; yet I do not
altogether grieve thereat, for the burden of my past sins crushes me,
and I am weary and seek for rest. Yet we do not part for the last
time, because whatever chances, in the end I shall make my report to
you yonder"--and he pointed upwards. "Reign on for long years, King--
reign well and wisely, clinging to the Faith, for thus at the last
shall you reap your reward. Farewell!"
Now again the horn blew, and in the bright moonlight the slight figure
of Noma could be seen advancing towards the stone.
Then Hokosa sprang from the wall and advanced also, till at the same
moment they climbed upon the stone.
"Greeting, Hokosa," said Noma, and she stretched out her hand to him.
By way of answer he placed his own behind his back, saying: "To your
business, woman." Yet his eyes searched her face--the face which in
his folly he still loved; and thus it came about that he never saw
sundry of the dead bodies, which lay in the shadow of the stone, begin
to quicken into life, and inch by inch to arise, first to their knees
and next to their feet. He never saw or heard them, yet, as the words
left his lips, they sprang upon him from every side, holding him so
that he could not move.
"Away with him!" cried Noma with a laugh of triumph; and at her
command he was half-dragged and half-carried across the open space and
thrust violently over a stone wall into the camp of Hafela.
Now Nodwengo and his soldiers saw what had happened, and with a shout
of "Treachery!" some hundreds of them leapt into the plain and began
to run towards the koppie to rescue their envoy.
Hokosa heard the shout, and wrenching himself round, beheld them.
"Back!" he cried in a clear, shrill voice. "Back! children of
Nodwengo, and leave me to my fate, for the foe waits for you by
thousands behind the wall!"
A soldier struck him across the mouth, bidding him be silent; but his
warning had come to the ears of Nodwengo, causing him and his warriors
to halt and begin a retreat. It was well that they did so, for seeing
that they would not come on, from under the shelter of the wall and of
every rock and stone soldiers jumped up by companies and charged,
driving them back to their own schanse. But the king's men had the
start of them, and had taken shelter behind it, whence they greeted
them with a volley of spears, killing ten and wounding twice as many
more.
Now it was Hokosa's turn to laugh, and laugh he did, saying:--
"My taking is well paid for already, Prince. A score of your best
warriors is a heavy price to give for the carcase of one weary and
aging man. But since I am here among you, captured with so much pain
and loss, tell me of your courtesy why I have been brought."
Then the prince shook his spear at him and cursed him.
"Would you learn, wizard and traitor?" he cried. "We have caught you
because we know well that while you stay yonder your magic counsel
will prevail against our might; whereas, when once we hold you fast,
Nodwengo will wander to his ruin like a blind and moonstruck man, for
you were to him both eyes and brain."
"I understand," said Hokosa calmly. "But, Prince, how if I left my
wisdom behind me?"
"That may not be," answered Hafela, "since even a wizard cannot throw
his thoughts into the heart of another from afar."
"Ah! you think so, Prince. Well, ask Noma yonder if I cannot throw my
thoughts into her heart from afar: though of late I have not chosen to
do so, having put aside such spells. But let it pass, and tell me,
having taken me, what is it you propose to do with me? First, however,
I will give you for nothing some of that wisdom which you grudge to
Nodwengo the king. Be advised by me, Prince, and take the terms that
he offers to you--namely, to turn this very night and begone from the
land without harm or hindrance. Will you receive my gift, Hafela?"
"What will happen if I refuse it?" asked the prince slowly.
Now Hokosa looked at the dust at his feet, then he gazed upwards
searching the heavens, and answered:--
"Did not I tell you yesterday? I think that this will happen. I think
--but who can be quite sure of the future, Hafela?--that you and the
most of your army by this hour to-morrow night will be lying fast
asleep about this place, with jackals for your bedfellows."
The prince heard and trembled at his words, for he believed that if he
willed it, Hokosa could prophesy the truth.
"Accursed dog!" he said. "I am minded to be guided by your saying; but
be sure of this, that if I follow it, you shall stay here to sleep
with jackals, yes, this very night."
Then Noma broke in.
"Be not mad, Hafela!" she said. "Will you listen to the lies that this
renegade tells to work upon your fears? Will you abandon victory when
it lies within your grasp, and in place of a great king become a
fugitive whom all men mock at, an outcast to be hunted down at leisure
by that brother against whom you dared to rebel, but on whom you did
not dare to shut your hand when he lay in its hollow? Silence the
tongue of this captive rogue for ever and become a man again, with the
heart of a man."
"Now," said Hokosa gently; "many would find it hard to believe that I
reared this woman from childhood, nursing her with my own hands when
she was sick and giving her of the best I had; that afterwards, when
you stole her from me, Prince, I sinned deeply to win her back. That I
married her and sinned yet more deeply to give her the greatness she
desired; and at last, of my own will, I loosed the bonds by which I
held her, although I could not thrust her memory from my heart. Yet I
have earned it all, for I made her the tool of my witchcraft, and
therefore it is just that she should turn and rend me. Well, if you
like it, take her counsel, Prince, and let mine go, for I care nothing
which you take; only, forgive me if I prophesy once more and for the
last time--I am sure that Nodwengo yonder spoke truth when he bade
your herald tell me that he who causes my blood to flow shall surely
die and for it be called to a strict account. Prince, I am a Christian
now, and believe me, whatever you may do, I seek no revenge upon you;
having been myself forgiven so much, in my turn I have learned to
forgive. Yet it may be ill for that man who causes my blood to flow."
"Let him be strangled," said a captain who stood near by, "and then
there will be no blood in the matter."
"Friend," answered Hokosa, "you should have been not a soldier but a
pleader of causes. True it is then that the prince will only cause my
life to fly, but whether that is a smaller sin I leave you to judge."
"Keep him prisoner," said another, "till we learn how these matters
end."
"Nay," answered Hafela, "for then he will surely outwit us and escape.
Noma, what shall we do with this man who was your husband? Tell us,
for you should know best how to deal with him."
"Let me think," she answered, and she looked first at the ground
beneath her, next around her, then upwards toward the skies.
Now they stood at the foot of the koppie, on the flat top of which
grew the great Tree of Doom, that for generations had served the
People of Fire as a place of execution of their criminals, or of those
who fell under the ban of the king or of the witch-doctors. Among and
above the finger-like fronds of this strange and dreadful-looking tree
towered that white dead limb shaped like a cross, which Owen had
pointed out to his disciple John, taking it to be a sign and a
promise. This cross stood out clear against the sinking moon. It
caught Noma's eye, and a devilish thought entered into her heart.
"You would keep this fellow alive?" she said, "and yet you would not
suffer him to escape. See, there above you is a cross such as he
worships. Bind him to it as he says the Man whom he worships was
bound, and let that dead Man help him if he may."
The prince and those about Noma shrank back a little in horror. They
were cruel men rendered more cruel by their superstitious fear of one
whom they believed to be uncanny; one to whom they attributed inhuman
powers which he was exercising to their destruction, but still this
doom seemed dreadful to them. Noma read their minds and went on
passionately:--
"You deem me unmerciful, but you do not know what I have suffered at
this wizard's hands. For his sake and because of him I am haunted. For
his own purposes he opened the gates of Distance, he sent me down
among the dwellers in Death, causing me to interpret their words for
him. I did so, but the dwellers came back out of Death with me, and
from that hour they have not left me, nor will they ever leave me; for
night by night they sojourn at my side, tormenting me with terrors. He
has told me that through my mouth that spirit whom he drew into my
body prophesied that he should be 'lifted up above the people.' Let
the prophecy be fulfilled, let him be lifted up, for then perchance
the ghosts will depart from me and I shall win peace and sleep. Also,
thus alone can you hold him safe and yet shed no blood."
"Be it so," said the prince. "When we plotted together of the death of
the king, and as your price, Hokosa, you bargained for the girl whom I
had chosen to wife, did I not warn you that this witch of many spells,
who holds both our hearts in her little hands, should yet hound you to
death and mock you while you perished by an end of shame? What did I
tell you, Hokosa?"
Now when he heard his fate, Hokosa bowed his head and trembled a
little. Then he lifted it, and exclaimed in a clear voice:--
"It is true, Prince, but I will add to your words. She shall bring
/both/ of us to death. For me, I am honoured indeed in that there has
been allotted to me that same end which my Master chose. To that cross
let my sins be fastened and with them my body."
Now the moon sank, but in the darkness men were found who dared to
climb the tree, taking with them strips of raw hide. They reached the
top of it, four of them, and seating themselves upon the arms of the
cross, they let down a rope, the noose of which was placed about the
body of Hokosa. As it tightened upon him, he turned his calm and
dreadful eyes on to the eyes of Noma and said to her:--
"Woman, I do not reproach you; but I lay this fate upon you, that you
shall watch me die. Thereafter, let God deal with you as He may
choose."
Now, when she heard these words Noma shrieked aloud, for of a sudden
she felt that the power of the will of Hokosa, from which she had been
freed by him, had once more fallen upon her, and that come what might
she was doomed to obey his last commands.
Little by little the soldiers drew him up and in the darkness they
bound him fast there upon the lofty cross. Then they descended and
left him, and would have led Noma with them from the tree. But this
they could not do, for always she broke from them screaming, and fled
back to its shadow.
Then, seeing that she was bewitched, Hafela commanded that they should
bind a cloth about her mouth and leave her there till her senses
returned to her in the sunlight--for none of them dared to stop with
her in the shadow of that tree, since the odours of it were poisonous
to man. Also they believed the place to be haunted by evil spirits.
