Marie: An Episode in the Life of the Late Allan QuatermainHaggard, H. Rider (Henry Rider)
General
Marie: An Episode in the Life of the Late Allan Quatermain
Haggard, H. Rider (Henry Rider)
Quatermain, Allan (Fictitious character) -- Fiction
Then came the worst of all. He said that while he was engaged in
mending some guns for Dingaan in one of his private huts, he overheard
a conversation between myself and Dingaan which took place outside the
hut, I, of course, not knowing that he was within. The substance of
this conversation was that I again urged Dingaan to kill the Boers and
afterwards to send an impi to massacre their wives and families. Only I
asked him to give me time to get away a girl whom I had married from
among them, and with her a few of my own friends whom I wished should
be spared, as I intended to become a kind of chief over them, and if he
would grant it me, to hold all the land of Natal under his rule and the
protection of the English. To these proposals Dingaan answered that
“they seemed wise and good, and that he would think them over very
carefully.”
Pereira said further that coming out of the hut after Dingaan had gone
away he reproached me bitterly for my wickedness, and announced that he
would warn the Boers, which he did subsequently by word of mouth and in
writing. That thereon I caused him to be detained by the Zulus while I
went to Retief and told him some false story about him, Pereira, which
caused Retief to drive him out of his camp and give orders that none of
the Boers should so much as speak to him. That then he did the only
thing he could. Going to his uncle, Henri Marais, he told him, not all
the truth, but that he had learnt for certain that his daughter Marie
was in dreadful danger of her life because of some intended attack of
the Zulus, and that all the Boers among whom she dwelt were also in
danger of their lives.
Therefore he suggested to Henri Marais that as the General Retief was
besotted and would not listen to his story, the best thing they could
do was to ride away and warn the Boers. This then they did secretly,
without the knowledge of Retief, but being delayed upon their journey
by one accident and another, which he set out in detail, they only
reached the Bushman’s River too late, after the massacre had taken
place. Subsequently, as the commandant knew, hearing a rumour that
Marie Marais and other Boers had trekked to this place before the
slaughter, they came here and learned that they had done so upon a
warning sent to them by Allan Quatermain, whereon they returned and
communicated the news to the surviving Boers at Bushman’s River.
That was all he had to say.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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