n mute wonder.

"_Whau_, Nyonyoba, why do you not _lobola_ for some of these?" said
Silawayo one day, coming upon him thus engaged. "Then you could dwell
among us as one of ourselves."

"One might do worse, induna of the king," he returned tranquilly, with a
glance at the group of bright-faced, merry, and extremely well-shaped
damsels, whom he had been convulsing with laughter.

"_Yau!_ Listen to our father," they cried. "He is joking, indeed. _Yau!_
Farewell, Nyonyoba. Fare thee well." And they sped away, still screaming
with laughter.

The old induna looked quizzically after them, then at Laurence. Then he
took snuff.

"One might do worse, Silawayo," repeated Laurence. "I have known worse
times than those I have already undergone here. But all I possess I have
lost. My slaves your people have killed, and my ivory and goods the king
has taken, leaving me nothing but my arms and ammunition. Tell me, then,
do the Ba-gcatya give their daughters for nothing, or how shall a man
who is so poor think to set up a kraal of his own?"

The induna laughed dryly.

"We are all poor that way, for all we own belongs to the king. Yet the
Great Great One is open handed. He might return some of your goods,
Nyonyoba."

This, by the way, was Laurence's sobriquet among these people, bestowed
upon him by reason of his skill and craft in stalking wild game.

It was even as he had said. This raid had gone far towards undoing the
results of their lawless and perilous enterprise--a portion of his gains
were safe, but this last blow was of crippling force. And only a day or
so prior to it he had been revelling in the prospect of a speedy return
to civilized life, to the enjoyment of wealth for the remainder of his
allotted span. He recalled the misgivings uttered by Holmes, that wealth
thus gained would bring them no good, for the curse of blood that lay
upon it. Poor Holmes! The prophecy seemed to have come true as regarded
the prophet--but for himself? well, the loss reconciled him still more
to his life among the Ba-gcatya.

Of Tyisandhlu he had seen but little. Now and then the king would send
for him and talk for a time upon things in general, and all the while
Laurence would feel that the shrewd, keen eyes of this barbarian ruler
were reading him like a book. Tyisandhlu, moreover, had expressed a wish
that a body of picked men should be armed with the rifles taken from the
slavers, and instructed in their use; and to this Lauren