“Treachery!” I said. “Who is it?”
“Saduko, with the Amakoba and Amangwane soldiers and others. I know them by their head-dresses,” answered Maputa in a cold voice.
“Do you mean that Saduko has gone over to Cetewayo with all his following?” I asked excitedly.
“What else, Macumazahn? Saduko is a traitor: Umbelazi is finished,” and he passed his hand swiftly across his mouth–a gesture that has only one meaning among the Zulus.
As for me, I sat down upon a stone and groaned, for now I understood everything.
Presently the Usutu raised fierce, triumphant shouts, and once again their impi, swelled with Saduko’s power, began to advance up the slope. Umbelazi, and those of the Isigqosa party who clung to him–now, I should judge, not more than eight thousand men–never stayed to wait the onslaught. They broke! They fled in a hideous rout, crashing through the thin, left horn of the Usutu by mere weight of numbers, and passing behind us obliquely on their road to the banks of the Tugela. A messenger rushed up to us, panting.
“These are the words of Umbelazi,” he gasped. “O Watcher-by-Night and O Maputa, Indhlovu-ene-sihlonti prays that you will hold back the Usutu, as the King bade you do in case of need, and so give to him and those who cling to him time to escape with the women and children into Natal. His general, Saduko, has betrayed him, and gone over with three regiments to Cetewayo, and therefore we can no longer stand against the thousands of the Usutu.”
“Go tell the prince that Macumazahn, Maputa, and the Amawombe regiment will do their best,” answered Maputa calmly. “Still, this is our advice to him, that he should cross the Tugela swiftly with the women and the children, seeing that we are few and Cetewayo is many.”
The messenger leapt away, but, as I heard afterwards, he never found Umbelazi, since the poor man was killed within five hundred yards of where we stood.
Then Maputa gave an order, and the Amawombe formed themselves into a triple line, thirteen hundred men in the first line, thirteen hundred men in the second line, and about a thousand in the third, behind whom were the carrier boys, three or four hundred of them. The place assigned to me was in the exact centre of the second line, where, being mounted on a horse, it was thought, as I gathered, that I should serve as a convenient rallying-point.
In this formation we advanced a few hundred yards to our left, evidently with the object of interposing ourselves between the routed impi and the pursuing Usutu, or, if the latter should elect to go round us, with that of threatening their flank. Cetewayo’s generals did not leave us long in doubt as to what they would do. The main body of their army bore away to the right in pursuit of the flying foe, but three regiments, each of about two thousand five hundred spears, halted. Five minutes passed perhaps while they marshalled, with a distance of some six hundred yards between them. Each regiment was in a triple line like our own.
To me that seemed a very long five minutes, but, reflecting that it was probably my last on earth, I tried to make the best of it in a fashion that can be guessed. Strange to say, however, I found it impossible to keep my mind fixed upon those matters with which it ought to have been filled. My eyes and thoughts would roam. I looked at the ranks of the veteran Amawombe, and noted that they were still and solemn as men about to die should be, although they showed no sign of fear. Indeed, I saw some of those near me passing their snuffboxes to each other. Two grey-haired men also, who evidently were old friends, shook hands as people do who are parting before a journey, while two others discussed in a low voice the possibility of our wiping out most of the Usutu before we were wiped out ourselves.
“It depends,” said one of them, “whether they attack us regiment by regiment or all together, as they will do if they are wise.”