Instantly I remembered the story that Miss Holmes had told me at dinner and looked at her covertly, to see that she had turned quite pale and was trembling a little.  I do not think that anyone else noticed this, however, as all were staring at the strangers.  Moreover she recovered herself in a moment, and, catching my eye, laid her finger on her lips in token of silence.

The men were clothed in thick, fur-lined cloaks, which they took off and, folding them neatly, laid upon the floor, standing revealed in robes of a beautiful whiteness and in large plain turbans, also white.

“High-class Somali Arabs,” thought I to myself, noting the while that as they arranged the robes they were taking in every one of us with their quick eyes.  One of them shut the door, leaving Savage on this side of it as though they meant him to be present.  Then they walked towards us, each of them carrying an ornamental basket made apparently of split reeds, that contained doubtless their conjuring outfit and probably the snake which Savage had found in his pocket.  To my surprise they came straight to me, and, having set down the baskets, lifted their hands above their heads, as a person about to dive might do, and bowed till the points of their fingers touched the floor.  Next they spoke, not in Arabic as I had expected that they would, but in Bantu, which of course I understood perfectly well.

“I, Harut, head priest and doctor of the White Kendah People, greet you, O Macumazana,” said the elder man.

“I, Marut, a priest and doctor of the People of the White Kendah, greet you, O Watcher-by-night, whom we have travelled far to find,” said the younger man.  Then together,

“We both greet you, O Lord, who seem small but are great, O Chief with a troubled past and with a mighty future, O Beloved of Mameena who has ‘gone down’ but still speaks from beneath, Mameena who was and is of our company.”

At this point it was my turn to shiver and become pale, as any may guess who may have chanced to read the history of Mameena, and the turn of Miss Holmes to watch me with animated interest.

“O Slayer of evil men and beasts!” they went on, in their rich-voiced, monotonous chant, “who, as our magic tells us, are destined to deliver our land from the terrible scourge, we greet you, we bow before you, we acknowledge you as our lord and brother, to whom we vow safety among us and in the desert, to whom we promise a great reward.”

Again they bowed, once, twice, thrice; then stood silent before me with folded arms.

“What on earth are they saying?” asked Scroope.  “I could catch a few words”—­he knew a little kitchen Zulu—­“but not much.”

I told him briefly while the others listened.

“What does Mameena mean?” asked Miss Holmes, with a horrible acuteness.  “Is it a woman’s name?”

Hearing her, Harut and Marut bowed as though doing reverence to that name.  I am sorry to say that at this point I grew confused, though really there was no reason why I should, and muttered something about a native girl who had made trouble in her day.