The Wizard | Page 8

but a few months, and from the rectory in a
quiet English village we pass to a scene in Central, or South Central,
Africa.
On the brow of a grassy slope dotted over with mimosa thorns, and
close to a gushing stream of water, stands a house, or rather a hut, built
of green brick and thatched with grass. Behind this hut is a fence of
thorns, rough but strong, designed to protect all within it from the
attacks of lions and other beasts of prey. At present, save for a solitary
mule eating its provender by the wheel of a tented ox- waggon, it is
untenanted, for the cattle have not yet been kraaled for the night.
Presently Thomas Owen enters this enclosure by the back door of the
hut, and having attended to the mule, which whinnies at the sight of

him, goes to the gate and watches there till he sees his native boys
driving the cattle up the slope of the hill. At length they arrive, and
when he has counted them to make sure that none are missing, and in a
few kind words commended the herds for their watchfulness, he walks
to the front of the house and, seating himself upon a wooden stool set
under a mimosa tree that grows near the door, he looks earnestly
towards the west.
The man has changed somewhat since last we saw him. To begin with,
he has grown a beard, and although the hot African sun has bronzed it
into an appearance of health, his face is even thinner than it was, and
therein the great spiritual eyes shine still more strangely.
At the foot of the slope runs a wide river, just here broken into rapids
where the waters make an angry music. Beyond this river stretches a
vast plain bounded on the horizon by mountain ranges, each line of
them rising higher than the other till their topmost and more distant
peaks melt imperceptibly into the tender blue of the heavens. This is
the land of the Sons of Fire, and yonder amid the slopes of the nearest
hills is the great kraal of their king, Umsuka, whose name, being
interpreted, means The Thunderbolt.
In the very midst of the foaming rapids, and about a thousand yards
from the house lies a space of rippling shallow water, where, unless it
chances to be in flood, the river can be forded. It is this ford that Owen
watches so intently.
"John should have been back twelve hours ago," he mutters to himself.
"I pray that no harm has befallen him at the Great Place yonder."
Just then a tiny speck appears far away on the plain. It is a man
travelling towards the water at a swinging trot. Going into the hut,
Owen returns with a pair of field-glasses, and through them scrutinises
the figure of the man.
"Heaven be praised! It is John," he mutters, with a sigh of relief. "Now,
I wonder what answer he brings?"

Half an hour later John stands before him, a stalwart native of the tribe
of the Amasuka, the People of Fire, and with uplifted hand salutes him,
giving him titles of honour.
"Praise me not, John," said Owen; "praise God only, as I have taught
you to do. Tell me, have you seen the king, and what is his word?"
"Father," he answered, "I journeyed to the great town, as you bade me,
and I was admitted before the majesty of the king; yes, he received me
in the courtyard of the House of Women. With his guards, who stood at
a distance out of hearing, there were present three only; but oh! those
three were great, the greatest in all the land after the king. They were
Hafela, the king that is to come, the prince Nodwengo, his brother, and
Hokosa the terrible, the chief of the wizards; and I tell you, father, that
my blood dried up and my heart shrivelled when they turned their eyes
upon me, reading the thoughts of my heart."
"Have I not told you, John, to trust in God, and fear nothing at the
hands of man?"
"You told me, father, but still I feared," answered the messenger
humbly. "Yet, being bidden to it, I lifted my forehead from the dust and
stood upon my feet before the king, and delivered to him the message
which you set between my lips."
"Repeat the message, John."
"'O King,' I said, 'beneath those footfall the whole earth shakes, whose
arms stretch round the world and whose breath is the storm, I, whose
name is John, am sent by the white man whose name is Messenger'
--for by that title you bade me make you known--'who for a year has
dwelt in the land that