“Ah! ah!  O Macumazana,” he said, “you have something to do with this matter,” a saying at which all that audience pricked their ears.

Then I rose up in wrath and fear, knowing my position to be one of some danger.

“Wizard, or Smeller-out of Wizards, whichever you name yourself,” I called in a loud voice, “if you mean that I killed Nandie’s child, you lie!”

“No, no, Macumazahn,” he answered, “but you tried to save it, and therefore you had something to do with the matter, had you not?  Moreover, I think that you, who are wise like me, know who did kill it.  Won’t you tell me, Macumazahn?  No?  Then I must find out for myself.  Be at peace.  Does not all the land know that your hands are white as your heart?”

Then, to my great relief, he passed on, amidst a murmur of approbation, for, as I have said, the Zulus liked me.  Round and round he wandered, to my surprise passing both Mameena and Masapo without taking any particular note of them, although he scanned them both, and I thought that I saw a swift glance of recognition pass between him and Mameena.  It was curious to watch his progress, for as he went those in front of him swayed in their terror like corn before a puff of wind, and when he had passed they straightened themselves as the corn does when the wind has gone by.

At length he had finished his journey and returned to his starting-point, to all appearance completely puzzled.

“You keep so many wizards at your kraal, King,” he said, addressing Panda, “that it is hard to say which of them wrought this deed.  It would have been easier to tell you of greater matters.  Yet I have taken your fee, and I must earn it—­I must earn it.  Dust, you are dumb.  Now, my Idhlozi, my Spirit, do you speak?” and, holding his head sideways, he turned his left ear up towards the sky, then said presently, in a curious, matter-of-fact voice: 

“Ah!  I thank you, Spirit.  Well, King, your grandchild was killed by the House of Masapo, your enemy, chief of the Amasomi.”

Now a roar of approbation went up from the audience, among whom Masapo’s guilt was a foregone conclusion.

When this had died down Panda spoke, saying: 

“The House of Masapo is a large house; I believe that he has several wives and many children.  It is not enough to smell out the House, since I am not as those who went before me were, nor will I slay the innocent with the guilty.  Tell us, O Opener-of-Roads, who among the House of Masapo has wrought this deed?”

“That’s just the question,” grumbled Zikali in a deep voice.  “All that I know is that it was done by poisoning, and I smell the poison.  It is here.”

Then he walked to where Mameena sat and cried out: 

“Seize that woman and search her hair.”

Executioners who were in waiting sprang forward, but Mameena waved them away.

“Friends,” she said, with a little laugh, “there is no need to touch me,” and, rising, she stepped forward to the centre of the ring.  Here, with a few swift motions of her hands, she flung off first the cloak she wore, then the moocha about her middle, and lastly the fillet that bound her long hair, and stood before that audience in all her naked beauty—­a wondrous and a lovely sight.