"You ask secrets," said the old fellow, peering about him into the gathering gloom. "Still, 'a spear for a spear and a shield for a shield,' as our saying runs. I have spoken no lie. The king _does_ mean to fight, not because he wants to, but because the regiments swear that they will wash their assegais, they who have never seen blood since that battle of the Tugela in which we two played a part; and if he will not suffer it, well, there are more of his race! Also he means to fight thus," and he gave me some very useful information; that is, information which would have been useful if those in authority had deigned to pay any attention to it when I passed it on. Just as he finished speaking I thought that I heard a sound in the dense green bush behind us. It reminded me of the noise a man makes when he tries to stifle a cough, and frightened me. For if we had been overheard by a spy, Magepa was as good as dead, and the sooner I was across the river the better. "What's that?" I asked. "A bush buck, Macumazahn. There are lots of them about here." Not being satisfied, though it is true that buck do cough like this, I turned my horse to the bush, seeking an opening. Thereon something crashed away and vanished into the long grass. In those shadows, of course, I could not see what it was, but such light as remained glinted on what might have been the polished tip of the horn of an antelope or--an assegai. "I told you it was a buck, Macumazahn," said Magepa. "Still, if you smell danger, let us come away from the bush, though the orders are that no white man is to be touched as yet." Then, while we walked on towards the ford, he set out with great detail, as Kaffirs do, the exact arrangements that he proposed to make for the handing over of his daughter and her child into my care. I remember that I asked him why he would not send her on the following morning, instead of two mornings later. He answered because he expected an outpost of scouts from one of the regiments at his kraal that night, who would probably remain there over the morrow and perhaps longer. While they were in the place it would be difficult for him to send away Gita and her son without exciting suspicion. [Illustration] Near the drift we parted, and I returned to our provisional camp and wrote a beautiful report of all that I had learned, of which report, I may add, no one took the slightest notice. I think it was the morning before that whereon I had arranged to meet Gita and the little boy at the drift that just about dawn I went down to the river for a wash. Having taken my dip I climbed on to a flat rock to dress myself, and looked at the billows of beautiful, pearly mist which hid the face of the water, and considered--I almost said listened to--the great silence, for as yet no live thing was stirring.