CHAPTER X. NOZIAH AT BLAKEWAY’S FARM--BECOMES A FAVOURITE WITH THE MEN--WISHES TO RECONCILE ME TO HER BROTHER SANDILLI--EXPEDITION SENT OUT TO FIND SANDILLI AND ARRANGE FOR AN INTERVIEW--RETURNS AFTER TWENTY-THREE DAYS’ ABSENCE--I GO WITH NOZIAH TO MEET HER BROTHER--SANDILLI’S WAR-COUNCIL--ANGRY RECEPTION--I OBTAIN A HEARING--SANDILLI’S REPLY--OFFERS TO MEET GENERAL CATHCART AND MAKE AN EXPLANATION TO HIM--DEMORALISING EFFECT OF EXPOSING LIFE IN FIGHTING. Meanwhile Noziah had made herself very comfortable at Blakeway’s Farm, and had picked up enough Dutch and English words to make her wishes known to me on most subjects. There was a certain charm about the dusky maiden, who possessed all the subtle graces of her tribe. She soon became the presiding deity of our camp. To her all appealed in time of sickness or want; none could refuse a request that came from her lips, and none was more willing than myself to submit to her winning guidance. I thought thereby I was acknowledging the influence of a power best calculated to bring all races under British sway. As our intimacy increased, she became possessed of the fixed desire to make me the friend of her brother Sandilli. She was so persistent and persuading in this matter that I finally arranged that a party under the guidance of Johnny Fingo should proceed to that chief’s quarter, and that Noziah should be my delegate on this embassy, to arrange an interview between her brother and me. This was not exactly in keeping with the etiquette that prevails between belligerents, and I have no doubt that legal authority could easily prove I was in the wrong. But General Cathcart was in Basutoland, and his last words before leaving had been an injunction to keep matters quiet round the Water-kloof in any way I thought most advisable. This left me a wide margin, which I used in sending the above-named party out in an unknown direction and with a somewhat visionary object in view; for, after all, no one knew where Sandilli was, or the mood in which he might be, if found at all. So, half hesitatingly, I sent them on their way. Dix, who was a passionate admirer of the gentle sex, of all shades and shapes (always excepting his frail better-half at Cape Town), had become a devoted follower of one of Noziah’s attendants, and was to have been leader of the band; his heart, however, failed him at the last moment, and he contented himself with a passionate embrace of this his latest flame, vowing, in high Kaffir-Dutch, that time or distance could never extinguish the fire that burnt in his breast. Johnny Fingo was thus left in full command. He had heard that Sandilli lay somewhere concealed in the Ama Ponda Mountains, behind Fort Alice. In that direction they accordingly wended their way; and after an absence of three-and-twenty days, Noziah returned with the news that Sandilli was in the Water-kloof, not six miles off, and there awaited my coming.