“Alas! sister,” answered Sihamba sadly, “an hour ago we might have gone, or rather you might have gone, mounted on the great _schimmel_, but now—look,” and she pointed to where the Zulus clustered like bees along the banks of the river by which the path ran. “See,” she added, “there is but one road out of this stronghold, for nowhere else can the surest-footed climber in the world descend its cliffs, no, not with a rope to help him, and that road is thick with Zulu spears; moreover, a certain man whom you do not wish to see waits for you upon it.” Suzanne looked. “Too late,” she moaned. “Oh! surely my God has forsaken me! Within six hours of safety and doomed to perish here; oh! surely my God has forsaken me!” and she burst out weeping in the bitterness of her disappointed hope. “Say not so,” answered Sihamba gently, “for I think that the Great one whom you worship will save you yet.” As she spoke a messenger arrived saying that the Zulus had sent forward heralds who desired to speak with her, and that these heralds waited within earshot of the first wall. “I will come,” said Sihamba, and she passed down the cleft and through the man hole into the fortifications which were built about the source of the river. But she would not allow Suzanne to accompany her. When she reached the outer wall she climbed it and stood upon it, for Sihamba was a woman who knew no fear, and there, about forty paces away, she saw three great Zulus standing, and with them him whom she dreaded more than all the Zulus on the earth—Piet Van Vooren himself. When the Zulu captains caught sight of her upon the wall, they jeered aloud and asked whether this was indeed Sihamba Ngenyanga, or if a she-monkey had been sent to talk with them. “I am Sihamba,” she answered quietly, “or I am a monkey, as it may please you, though the white man with you can tell you what I am.” “I can,” said Piet with a laugh. “You are a witch and a thief, and the fate that I promised you long ago is with you at last.” “Murderer,” mocked Sihamba in answer, “I see Death standing behind you, and with him shadows of the Fear to come. But I would speak with these chiefs and not with an outcast half-breed. Tell me, chiefs, why do you come up against my stronghold with so great a force?” “Because that ‘Elephant whose tread shakes the earth,’ our master, Dingaan the king, has sent us,” answered the spokesman of the captains. “Say, now, on what errand, chief?” “On this errand; to take your stronghold and cattle, to burn your kraal, and to kill your people, all of them save the marriageable girls and such children as are old enough to travel, who must be brought with the cattle to Dingaan. But you yourself and the white woman who is called Swallow who rules with you are to be handed over to Bull-Head here to do with as he will, for that is the bargain between him and the king.” “And why are these things to come upon us who have done no wrong?” asked Sihamba.