Kafir Stories | Page 4

at the door looking with pride on their progeny.
Sibi, the dog, gave a low growl, and then rushed along the footpath barking furiously. A man emerged from the darkness, keeping the dog at bay with his kerrie. Maliwe, seeing nothing suspicious about the stranger, called off the dog, which retired still growling into the hut. The man approached.
"Greeting, Maliwe," he cried. "Do you not know me?"
"Greeting," replied Maliwe, "but I do not know you. Where are you thinking of?" [A native idiom. It means "Where are you going to?"]
"Hear him," cried the visitor. "He does not know me. He does not know Kalaza, the only Fingo his father Zangalele ever made a friend of. He does not know the man who used to cut sticks for him when he was a little boy."
"Sit down, Kalaza," replied Maliwe, "I meant no offence. I do not remember you, but if you were my father's friend, you are mine."
So they went into the hut, and they refreshed the fire, and they talked, and they put some dry mealies to roast with fat in the three-legged pot, and they talked of Maliwe's relations, of old Dalisile, and of his daughter Nalai whom Maliwe was going to marry.
Kalaza said that he lived in Kwala's location beyond the Keiskamma, that he was a very rich man with a large herd of cattle, and that he was now seeking two cows lately received as lobola for one of his daughters from a man in the Albany district, and which were supposed to have strayed homewards. He also said, that although a Fingo, he always preferred the society of Kafirs, and that for this reason he had come to spend the night with Maliwe instead of with the Fingoes in the village location.
By and by the mealies began to "pop" in the pot, so guest and host began to chew them. "It is sad to be old and have such bad teeth," said Kalaza, as he paused in his chewing. "Have you not got a little meat?"
Maliwe stood up, and reaching to the roof of the hut, handed down the emaciated ribs of the goat. Kalaza took the meat, turned it over critically, and handed it back.
"That is the meat of an old, tough goat," he said, "I could no more chew that than the mealies."
"I am very sorry," replied Maliwe, "but I have none other."
At this Kalaza sighed, said he was an old man, and he supposed times had changed since he was young, but in his day no old man would be so treated by the son of his best friend. Maliwe remained silent for some time, and then said politely that he was a servant, and had to be content with what food his master gave him. Breaking up some tobacco in his hand, he reached it over to Kalaza, asking if he cared, to smoke. Kalaza refused the offer, saying that since becoming old he had been unable to enjoy tobacco on an empty stomach. He then sighed heavily, and sat looking at the fire until the silence became oppressive.
By and by Maliwe asked if he would not go to sleep, and then Kalaza began to wax indignant.
"You call yourself a man," he said, "and you let your father's best friend die of hunger. Did I not know you had been circumcised, I should think you were still a boy."
"Friend of my father," replied Maliwe, "I have given you all I have. Do you want to eat my dog?"
"Given me all you have? What are those animals that I hear bleating outside?"
"My master's sheep."
"Your master's sheep? Ho! ho! When hungry men are about, sheep have no master. Would your father have let me die rather than take a hamel from the flock of a rich, lazy boer, who never counts his sheep. Many a sheep your father and I have lifted in the old days. We never wanted meat. If my son were to let your father hunger, I would break his head."
In the foregoing remarks the tempter had accidentally hit upon a fact. Gert Botha, after a three years' experience of Maliwe's honesty and carefulness, very seldom took the trouble to count his sheep.
"Friend of my father," said Maliwe, "I have never yet taken what belonged to another. If you say my father stole, it may be so--but such must have happened when he was young. He is now dead. When I was a lad he told me he would kill me if I stole."
"Just as you say, when he was young," rejoined Kalaza. "And are you, then, old? I wonder does old Dalisile know what a coward he is giving his daughter to. In the good old days he would have sent you to show that you could steal like a man--a