Meanwhile Sabeela was looking her extremely handsome lover up and down; up and down she looked him, and never a word did she say—at least, to him. Presently, however, she spoke to the crowd in a commanding voice, thus:
"Take notice that my father being dead, I am now the Walloo, and one to be obeyed. Go about your tasks fearing nothing, since Heu–Heu is no more and the most of the Hairy Folk are slain. I depart to rest, taking with me these, my guests and deliverers," and she pointed to me and Hans. "Afterwards I will talk with you, and with you also, my lord Issicore. Bear the late Walloo, my father, to the burial place of the Walloos."
Then she turned and, followed by us and the members of her household, went to her home.
Here she bade us farewell for a while, since we were all half dead with fatigue and sorely needed rest. As we parted, she took my hand and kissed it, thanking me with tears welling from her beautiful eyes for all that I had done, and Dramana did likewise.
"How comes it, Baas," said Hans as we ate food and drank of the native beer before we lay down to sleep, "that those ladies did not kiss my hand, seeing that I too have done something to help them?"
"Because they were too tired, Hans," I answered, "and made one kiss serve for both of us."
"I see, Baas, but I expect that to–morrow they will still be too tired to kiss poor old Hans."
Then he filled the cup out of which he had been drinking with the last of the liquor from the jar and emptied it at a swallow. "There, Baas," he said; "that's only right; you may take all the kisses, so long as I get the beer."
Exhausted as I was I could not help laughing, although to tell the truth, I should have liked another glass myself. Then I tumbled on to the couch and instantly went to sleep.
It is a fact that we slept all the rest of that day and all the following night, waking only when the first rays of the sun shone into our room through the window place. At least, I did, for when I opened my eyes, feeling a different creature and blessing Heaven for its gift of sleep to man, Hans was already up and engaged in cleaning the rifles and revolvers.
I looked at the ugly little Hottentot, reflecting how wonderful it was that so much courage, cunning, and fidelity should be packed away within his yellow skin and projecting skull. Had it not been for Hans, without a doubt I should now be dead, and the women also. It was he who had conceived the idea of letting down the sluice gate by exploding gunpowder beneath the pin of the lever. I had racked my brain for expedients, but this, the only one possible, escaped me. How tremendous had been the results of that inspiration—all of them due to Hans.
Although certain ideas had occurred to me, the most that I had hoped to do was to flood the low–lying lands, and perhaps the cave, in order to divert the attention of the priests while we were attempting escape. As it was we had loosed the forces of nature with the most fearful results. The water had run down the vent–holes of the eternal fires and into the bowels of the volcano, there to generate steam in enormous volumes, of which the imprisoned strength had been so great that it had rent the mountain like a rotten rag and destroyed the home of Heu–Heu for ever, and with it all his votaries.
It was a fearful event in which I thought I saw the mind of Providence acting through Hans. Yes, the cunning of the Hottentot had been used by the Powers above to sweep from the earth a vile tyranny and to destroy a blood–soaked idol and its worshippers.
Without a doubt—or so I believe in my simple faith—this had been designed from the beginning. When some escaped follower of Heu–Heu painted the picture in the Bushmen's cave, probably hundreds of years ago, it was already designed. So was Zikali's desire for a certain medicine, or his insatiable thirst for knowledge, or whatever it was that caused him to persuade me to undertake this mission, and so was all the rest of the story.
Again, with what wonderful judgment Hans had acted after his brave swim to the canoe!
Had he tried to force those fetish–ridden cravens to come to our rescue at once, as I directed him to do, the probability was that, fearing to break their silly law, they would have resisted, or perhaps have rowed right away, leaving us to our fate, after knocking him on the head with a paddle. But he had the patience to wait, although, as he told me afterwards, his heart was torn in two with anxiety for my sake. Balancing everything in his artful and experienced mind he had found patience to wait until the conditions of their "law" were fulfilled, when they came willingly enough.
From Hans my thoughts turned to Issicore. How was it that this man's character had changed so completely since he arrived in his native country? His journey to seek aid made alone over hundreds of miles, was a really remarkable performance, showing great courage and determination. Also as a guide, although silent and abstracted, he had never lacked for resource or energy. But from the day that he arrived home, morally he had gone to pieces. It was with the greatest difficulty that he could be persuaded to row us to the island, where at the first sign of danger he had left us to our fate and fled away.
Again, he had meekly helped to conduct Sabeela, whom, when he was at the Black Kloof evidently he loved to desperation, to her doom without lifting a finger to save her from a hideous destiny. Lastly, only a few hours ago, he had made a pusillanimous and contemptible speech, which I could see shocked and disgusted his betrothed, who, for her part, after her rescue and the death of her father, seemed to have gained the courage that he had lost, and more.
It was inexplicable, at any rate to me, and in my bewilderment I referred the problem to Hans.
He listened while I set out the case as it appeared to me, then answered,
"The Baas does not keep his eyes open—at any rate, in the daytime, when he thinks everything is safe. If he did, he would understand why Issicore has become soft as a heated bar of iron. What makes men soft, Baas?"
"Love," I suggested.
"Yes. At times love makes some men soft—I mean men like the Baas. And what else, Baas?"
"Drink," I answered savagely, getting it back on Hans.
"Yes, at times drink makes some men soft. Men like me, Baas, who know that now and again it is wise to cease from being wise, lest Heaven should grow jealous of our wisdom and want to share it. But what makes all men soft?"
"I don't know."
"Then once more I must teach the Baas, as his Reverend Father, the Predikant, told me to do when I saw that the Baas had used up all his wits, saying to me before he died, 'Hans, whenever you perceive that my son Allan, who does not always look where he is going, walks into water and gets out of his depth, swim in and pull him out, Hans.'"
"You little liar!" I ejaculated, but taking no notice, Hans went on,
"Baas, it is fear that makes all men soft. Issicore is bending about like a heated ramrod because within him burns the fire of fear."
"Fear of what, Hans?"
"As I have said, if the Baas had kept his eyes open, he would know. Did not the Baas notice a tall, dark–faced priest before whom the crowd parted, who came up to Issicore when first we landed on the quay here?"
"Yes, I saw such a man. He bowed politely and I thought was greeting Issicore and making him some present."
"And did the Baas see what kind of a present he made him and hear his words of wisdom? The Baas shakes his head. Well, I did. The present he gave to Issicore was a little skull carved out of black ivory or shell, or it may have been of polished lava rock. And the words of welcome were, 'The gift of Heu–Heu to the lord Issicore, that gift which Heu–Heu sends to all who break the law and dare to leave the Land of the Walloos.' Those were the words, for standing near by, I heard them, though I kept them from the Baas, waiting to see what would happen afterwards.