The rear of the column was out of sight ahead of them amongst the dripping mopani trees. The two of them had soon learned to loiter at the back away from the scrutiny of the officers, so that they would not be ordered into the thigh-deep mud when the Maxim carts bogged down and had to be man-handled through one of the glutinous Imopani holes'.
'Look out, Will!' Jim Thorn yelled suddenly, and his oilskins flapped like the wings of a startled rooster as he tried to draw his rifle from its scabbard. 'Look out, bloody savages!'
A Matabele had stepped silently out of the thick bush alongside the cart tracks, and now he stood directly in front of the horses and held up his empty hands to show the white men that he was unarmed.
'Wait, jimmo@' Will Daniel called. 'Let's see what the bastard wants.'
'I don't like it, man. It's a trap.' Jim searched the bush around them nervously. 'Let's shoot the black bugger and get out of it.'
'I come in peace!' the Matabele called in English. He wore only a fur kilt, without armlets and leg tassels, and the rain shone on his smoothly muscled torso. On his head was the headring of an induna.
The two mounted men both had their rifles out now, and were aiming from the hip, covering Kamuza at pointblank range.
'I have a message from the king.'
'Well, spit it out then,' Will snapped.
'Lobengula says take my gold, and go back to Gubulawayo.'
'Gold?' demanded Jim Thorn. 'What gold?'
Kamuza stepped back into the scrub, picked up the leather grain bag, and carried it to them.
Will Daniel was laughing excitedly as he pulled out the little canvas bags. They jingled softly in his hands.
'By God, that's the sweetest music I ever heard!'
'What will you do, white men?' Kamuza demanded.
'Will you take the gold to your chief?'
'Don't fret yourself, my friend.' Will Daniel clapped him delightedly on the shoulder. 'It will go to the right person, you have the word of William Daniel hisself on it.'
Jim Thorn was unbuckling his saddle-bags and stuffing the canvas sacks into it.
'Christmas and my birthday all in one,' he winked at Will.
'White men, will you turn and go back to Gubulawayo, now?' Kamuza called anxiously.
'Don't worry about it another minute,' Will assured him, and ferreted a loaf of hard bread out of his own saddle-bag. 'Here's a present for you, bonsela, present, you understand?' Then to Jim. 'Come on, mister Thorn, it's Mister I'll be calling you now that you are rich.'
'Lead on, mister Daniel,' Jim grinned at him, and they spurred past Kamuza, leaving him standing in the muddy pathway with the mouldy loaf of bread in his hands.
Clinton Codrington came slipping and sloshing along the bank of the Shangani river. The lowering clouds were bringing on the night prematurely, and the forests on the far bank were dank and gloomy.
The thunder rumbled sullenly, as though boulders were being rolled across the roof of the sky, and for a few seconds the rain spurted down thickly and then sank once more to a fine drizzle. Clinton shivered and pulled up the collar of his sheepskin coat as he hurried on to where the Maxim carts stood at the head of the column.
There was a tarpaulin draped between the two carts and beneath it squatted a small group of officers. Mungo, Sint John looked up as Clinton approached.
'Ah, parson!' he greeted him. Mungo had learned that this address irritated Clinton inordinately. 'You took your time.' Clinton did not reply; he stood hunched in the rain and none of the officers made room for him beneath the canvas.
'Major Wilson is going to make a reconnaissance across the river with a dozen men. I want you to go with him to translate, if he meets any of the enemy.'
'It will be dark in less than two hours,' Clinton pointed out stolidly.
'Then you had best hurry.'
'The rains will break at any minute,' Clinton persisted.
'Your forces could be split 'Parson, you bother about brimstone and salvation let us do the soldiering.' Mungo turned back to his officers. 'Are you ready to go, Wilson?'
Allan Wilson was a bluff Scot, with long, dark moustaches and an accent that burred with the tang of heather and highlands.
'You'll be giving me detailed orders then, sir?' he demanded stiffly. There had been ill-feeling between him and Sint John ever since they had left Gubulawayo.
'I want you to use your common sense, man,' Sint John snapped. 'If you can catch Lobengula, then grab him, put him on a horse, and get back here. If you are attacked, fall back immediately. If you let yourself be cut off, I will not be able to cross the river to support you with the Maxims until first light, do you understand that?'
'I do, General.' Wilson touched the brim of his slouch hat. 'Come on, Reverend,' he said to Clinton. 'We do not have much time.'
Burnham and Ingram, the two American scouts, led the patrol down the steep bank of the Shangani. Wilson and Clinton followed immediately behind.
Clinton's lanky, stooped frame, in the scuffed sheepskin jacket and with a shapeless stained hat pulled down
