CHAPTER II
THE FIRE-FIGHT
When I had buried my father, and seen a successor installed in his
place--for the station was the property of the Society--I set to work
to carry out a plan which I had long cherished, but been unable to
execute because it would have involved separation from my father. Put
shortly, it was to undertake a trading journey of exploration right
through the countries now known as the Free State and the Transvaal,
and as much further North as I could go. It was an adventurous scheme,
for though the emigrant Boers had begun to occupy positions in these
territories, they were still to all practical purposes unexplored. But
I was now alone in the world, and it mattered little what became of
me; so, driven on by the overmastering love of adventure, which, old
as I am, will perhaps still be the cause of my death, I determined to
undertake the journey.
Accordingly I sold such stock and goods as we had upon the station,
reserving only the two best waggons and two spans of oxen. The
proceeds I invested in such goods as were then in fashion, for trading
purposes, and in guns and ammunition. The guns would have moved any
modern explorer to merriment; but such as they were I managed to do a
good deal of execution with them. One of them was a single-barrelled,
smooth bore, fitted for percussion caps--a roer we called it--which
threw a three-ounce ball, and was charged with a handful of coarse
black powder. Many is the elephant that I killed with that roer,
although it generally knocked me backwards when I fired it, which I
only did under compulsion. The best of the lot, perhaps, was a double-
barrelled No. 12 shot-gun, but it had flint locks. Also there were
some old tower muskets, which might or might not throw straight at
seventy yards. I took six Kaffirs with me, and three good horses,
which were supposed to be salted--that is, proof against the sickness.
Among the Kaffirs was an old fellow named Indaba-zimbi, which, being
translated, means "tongue of iron." I suppose he got this name from
his strident voice and exhaustless eloquence. This man was a great
character in his way. He had been a noted witch-doctor among a
neighbouring tribe, and came to the station under the following
circumstances, which, as he plays a considerable part in this history,
are perhaps worth recording.
Two years before my father's death I had occasion to search the
country round for some lost oxen. After a long and useless quest it
occurred to me that I had better go to the place where the oxen were
bred by a Kaffir chief, whose name I forget, but whose kraal was about
fifty miles from our station. There I journeyed, and found the oxen
safe at home. The chief entertained me handsomely, and on the
following morning I went to pay my respects to him before leaving, and
was somewhat surprised to find a collection of some hundreds of men
and women sitting round him anxiously watching the sky in which the
thunder-clouds were banking up in a very ominous way.
"You had better wait, white man," said the chief, "and see the rain-
doctors fight the lightning."
I inquired what he meant, and learned that this man, Indaba-zimbi, had
for some years occupied the position of wizard-in-chief to the tribe,
although he was not a member of it, having been born in the country
now known as Zululand. But a son of the chief's, a man of about
thirty, had lately set up as a rival in supernatural powers. This
irritated Indaba-zimbi beyond measure, and a quarrel ensued between
the two witch-doctors that resulted in a challenge to trial by
lightning being given and accepted. These were the conditions. The
rivals must await the coming of a serious thunderstorm, no ordinary
tempest would serve their turn. Then, carrying assegais in their
hands, they must take their stand within fifty paces of each other
upon a certain patch of ground where the big thunderbolts were
observed to strike continually, and by the exercise of their occult
powers and invocations to the lightning, must strive to avert death
from themselves and bring it on their rival. The terms of this
singular match had been arranged a month previously, but no storm
worthy of the occasion had arisen. Now the local weather-prophets
believed it to be brewing.
I inquired what would happen if neither of the men were struck, and
was told that they must then wait for another storm. If they escaped
the second time, however, they would be held to be equal in power, and
be jointly consulted by the tribe upon occasions of importance.
The prospect of being a spectator of so unusual a sight overcame my
desire to be gone, and I accepted the chief's invitation to see it
out. Before mid-day I regretted it, for though the western heavens
grew darker and darker, and the still air heralded the coming of the
storm, yet it did not come. By four o'clock, however, it became
obvious that it must burst soon--at sunset, the old chief said, and in
the company of the whole assembly I moved down to the place of combat.
The kraal was built on the top of a hill, and below it the land sloped
gently to the banks of a river about half a mile away. On the hither
side of the bank was the piece of land that was, the natives said,
"loved of the lightning." Here the magicians took up their stand,
while the spectators grouped themselves on the hillside about two
hundred yards away--which was, I thought, rather too near to be
pleasant. When we had sat there for a while my curiosity overcame me,
and I asked leave of the chief to go down and inspect the arena. He
said I might do so at my own risk. I told him that the fire from above
would not hurt white men, and went to find that the spot was a bed of
iron ore, thinly covered with grass, which of course accounted for its
attracting the lightning from the storms as they travelled along the
line of the river. At each end of this iron-stone area were placed the
combatants, Indaba-zimbi facing the east, and his rival the west, and
before each there burned a little fire made of some scented root.
Moreover they were dressed in all the paraphernalia of their craft,
snakeskins, fish-bladders, and I know not what beside, while round
their necks hung circlets of baboons' teeth and bones from human
hands. First I went to the western end where the chief's son stood. He
was pointing with his assegai towards the advancing storm, and
invoking it in a voice of great excitement.
"Come, fire, and lick up Indaba-zimbi!
"Hear me, Storm Devil, and lick Indaba-zimbi with your red tongue!
"Spit on him with your rain!
"Whirl him away in your breath!
"Make him as nothing--melt the marrow in his bones!
"Run into his heart and burn away the lies!
"Show all the people who is the true Witch Finder!
"Let me not be put to shame in the eyes of this white man!"
Thus he spoke, or rather chanted, and all the while rubbed his broad
chest--for he was a very fine man--with some filthy compound of
medicine or /mouti/.
After a while, getting tired of his song, I walked across the iron-
stone, to where Indaba-zimbi sat by his fire. He was not chanting at
all, but his performance was much more impressive. It consisted in
staring at the eastern sky, which was perfectly clear of cloud, and
every now and again beckoning at it with his finger, then turning
round to point with the assegai towards his rival. For a while I
looked at him in silence. He was a curious wizened man, apparently
over fifty years of age, with thin hands that looked as tough as wire.
His nose was much sharper than is usual among these races, and he had
a queer habit of holding his head sideways like a bird when he spoke,
which, in addition to the humour that lurked in his eye, gave him a
most comical appearance. Another strange thing about him was that he
had a single white lock of hair among his black wool. At last I spoke
to him:
"Indaba-zimbi, my friend," I said, "you may be a good witch-doctor,
but you are certainly a fool. It is no good beckoning at the blue sky
while your enemy is getting a start with the storm."
"You may be clever, but don't think you know everything, white man,"
the old fellow answered, in a high, cracked voice, and with something
like a grin.
"They call you Iron-tongue," I went on; "you had better use it, or the
Storm Devil won't hear you."
"The fire from above runs down iron," he answered, "so I keep my
tongue quiet. Oh, yes, let him curse away, I'll put him out presently.
Look now, white man."
I looked, and in the eastern sky there grew a cloud. At first it was
small, though very black, but it gathered with extraordinary rapidity.
This was odd enough, but as I had seen the same thing happen before it
did not particularly astonish me. It is by no means unusual in Africa
for two thunderstorms to come up at the same time from different
points of the compass.
"You had better get on, Indaba-zimbi," I said, "the big storm is
coming along fast, and will soon eat up that baby of yours," and I
pointed to the west.
"Babies sometimes grow to giants, white man," said Indaba-zimbi,
beckoning away vigorously. "Look now at my cloud-child."
I looked; the eastern storm was spreading itself from earth to sky,
and in shape resembled an enormous man. There was its head, its
shoulders, and its legs; yes, it was like a huge giant travelling
across the heavens. The light of the setting sun escaping from beneath
the lower edge of the western storm shot across the intervening space
in a sheet of splendour, and, lighting upon the advancing figure of
cloud, wrapped its middle in hues of glory too wonderful to be
described; but beneath and above this glowing belt his feet and head
were black as jet. Presently, as I watched, an awful flash of light
shot from the head of the cloud, circled it about as though with a
crown of living fire, and vanished.
"Aha," chuckled old Indaba-zimbi, "my little boy is putting on his
man's ring," and he tapped the gum ring on his own head, which natives
assume when they reach a certain age and dignity. "Now, white man,
unless you are a bigger wizard than either of us you had better clear
off, for the fire-fight is about to begin."
I thought this sound advice.
"Good luck go with you, my black uncle," I said. "I hope you don't
feel the iniquities of a mis-spent life weighing on you at the last."
"You look after yourself, and think of your own sins, young man," he
answered, with a grim smile, and taking a pinch of snuff, while at
that very moment a flash of lightning, I don't know from which storm,
struck the ground within thirty paces of me. That was enough for me, I
took to my heels, and as I went I heard old Indaba-zimbi's dry chuckle
of amusement.
I climbed the hill till I came to where the chief was sitting with his
indunas, or headmen, and sat down near to him. I looked at the man's
face and saw that he was intensely anxious for his son's safety, and
by no means confident of the young man's powers to resist the magic of
Indaba-zimbi. He was talking in a low voice to the induna next to him.
I affected to take no notice and to be concentrating my attention on
the novel scene before me; but in those days I had very quick ears,
and caught the drift of the conversation.
"Hearken!" the chief was saying, "if the magic of Indaba-zimbi
prevails against my son I will endure him no more. Of this I am sure,
that when he has slain my son he will slay me, me also, and make
himself chief in my place. I fear Indaba-zimbi. /Ou!/"
"Black One," answered the induna, "wizards die as dogs die, and, once
dead, dogs bark no more."
"And once dead," said the chiefs, "wizards work no more spells," and
he bent and whispered in the induna's ear, looking at the assegai in
his hand as he whispered.
"Good, my father, good!" said the induna, presently. "It shall be done
to-night, if the lightning does not do it first."
"A bad look-out for old Indaba-zimbi," I said to myself. "They mean to
kill him." Then I thought no more of the matter for a while, the scene
before me was too tremendous.
The two storms were rapidly rushing together. Between them was a gulf
of blue sky, and from time to time flashes of blinding light passed
across this gulf, leaping from cloud to cloud. I remember that they
reminded me of the story of the heathen god Jove and his thunderbolts.
The storm that was shaped like a giant and ringed with the glory of
the sinking sun made an excellent Jove, and I am sure that the bolts
which leapt from it could not have been surpassed even in mythological
times. Oddly enough, as yet the flashes were not followed by thunder.
A deadly stillness lay upon the place, the cattle stood silently on
the hillside, even the natives were awed to silence. Dark shadows
crept along the bosom of the hills, the river to the right and left
was hidden in wreaths of cloud, but before us and beyond the
combatants it shone like a line of silver beneath the narrowing space
of open sky. Now the western tempest was scrawled all over with lines
of intolerable light, while the inky head of the cloud-giant to the
east was continually suffused with a white and deadly glow that came
and went in pulses, as though a blood of flame was being pumped into
it from the heart of the storm.
The silence deepened and deepened, the shadows grew blacker and
blacker, then suddenly all nature began to moan beneath the breath of
an icy wind. On sped the wind; the smooth surface of the river was
ruffled by it into little waves, the tall grass bowed low before it,
and in its wake came the hissing sound of furious rain.
Ah! the storms had met. From each there burst an awful blaze of
dazzling flame, and now the hill on which we sat rocked at the noise
of the following thunder. The light went out of the sky, darkness fell
suddenly on the land, but not for long. Presently the whole landscape
grew vivid in the flashes, it appeared and disappeared, now everything
was visible for miles, now even the men at my side vanished in the
blackness. The thunder rolled and cracked and pealed like the trump of
doom, whirlwinds tore round, lifting dust and even stones high into
the air, and in a low, continuous undertone rose the hiss of the
rushing rain.
I put my hand before my eyes to shield them from the terrible glare,
and looked beneath it towards the lists of iron-stone. As flash
followed flash, from time to time I caught sight of the two wizards.
They were slowly advancing towards one another, each pointing at his
foe with the assegai in his hand. I could see their every movement,
and it seemed to me that the chain lightning was striking the iron-
stone all round them.
Suddenly the thunder and lightning ceased for a minute, everything
grew black, and, except for the rain, silent.
"It is over one way or the other, chief," I called out into the
darkness.
"Wait, white man, wait!" answered the chief, in a voice thick with
anxiety and fear.
Hardly were the words out of his mouth when the heavens were lit up
again till they literally seemed to flame. There were the men, not ten
paces apart. A great flash fell between them, I saw them stagger
beneath the shock. Indaba-zimbi recovered himself first--at any rate
when the next flash came he was standing bolt upright, pointing with
his assegai towards his enemy. The chief's son was still on his legs,
but he was staggering like a drunken man, and the assegai had fallen
from his hand.
Darkness! then again a flash, more fearful, if possible, than any that
had gone before. To me it seemed to come from the east, right over the
head of Indaba-zimbi. At that instant I saw the chief's son wrapped,
as it were, in the heart of it. Then the thunder pealed, the rain
burst over us like a torrent, and I saw no more.
The worst of the storm was done, but for a while the darkness was so
dense that we could not move, nor, indeed, was I inclined to leave the
safety of the hillside where the lightning was never known to strike,
and venture down to the iron-stone. Occasionally there still came
flashes, but, search as we would, we could see no trace of either of
the wizards. For my part, I believed that they were both dead. Now the
clouds slowly rolled away down the course of the river, and with them
went the rain; and now the stars shone in their wake.
"Let us go and see," said the old chief, rising and shaking the water
from his hair. "The fire-fight is ended, let us go and see who has
conquered."
I rose and followed him, dripping as though I had swum a hundred yards
with my clothes on, and after me came all the people of the kraal.
We reached the spot; even in that light I could see where the iron-
stone had been split and fused by the thunderbolts. While I was
staring about me, I suddenly heard the chief, who was on my right,
give a low moan, and saw the people cluster round him. I went up and
looked. There, on the ground, lay the body of his son. It was a
dreadful sight. The hair was burnt off his head, the copper rings upon
his arms were fused, the assegai handle which lay near was literally
shivered into threads, and, when I took hold of his arm, it seemed to
me that every bone of it was broken.
The men with the chief stood gazing silently, while the women wailed.
"Great is the magic of Indaba-zimbi!" said a man, at length. The chief
turned and struck him a heavy blow with the kerrie in his hand.
"Great or not, thou dog, he shall die," he cried, "and so shalt thou
if thou singest his praises so loudly."
I said nothing, but thinking it probable that Indaba-zimbi had shared
the fate of his enemy, I went to look. But I could see nothing of him,
and at length, being thoroughly chilled with the wet, started back to
my waggon to change my clothes. On reaching it, I was rather surprised
to see a strange Kaffir seated on the driving-box wrapped up in a
blanket.
"Hullo! come out of that," I said.
The figure on the box slowly unrolled the blanket, and with great
deliberation took a pinch of snuff.
"It was a good fire-fight, white man, was it not?" said Indaba-zimbi,
in his high, cracked voice. "But he never had a chance against me,
poor boy. He knew nothing about it. See, white man, what becomes of
presumption in the young. It is sad, very sad, but I made the flashes
fly, didn't I?"
"You old humbug," I said, "unless you are careful you will soon learn
what comes of presumption in the old, for your chief is after you with
an assegai, and it will take all your magic to dodge that."
"Now you don't say so," said Indaba-zimbi, clambering off the waggon
with rapidity; "and all because of this wretched upstart. There's
gratitude for you, white man. I expose him, and they want to kill me.
Well, thank you for the hint. We shall meet again before long," and he
was gone like a shot, and not too soon, for just then some of the
chief's men came up to the waggon.
On the following morning I started homewards. The first face I saw on
arriving at the station was that of Indaba-zimbi.
"How do you do, Macumazahn?" he said, holding his head on one side and
nodding his white lock. "I hear you are Christians here, and I want to
try a new religion. Mine must be a bad one seeing that my people
wanted to kill me for exposing an impostor."
