He spun a half-crown into the air.  It fell and rolled under a great, yellow-wood chest full of curiosities that I had collected, which it took all our united strength to move.  We dragged it aside and not without some excitement, for really a good deal hung upon the chance, I lit a match and peered into the shadow.  There in the dust lay the coin.

“What is it?” I asked of Somers, who was stretched on his stomach on the chest.

“Orchid—­I mean head,” he answered.  “Well, that’s settled, so we needn’t bother any more.”

The next fortnight was a busy time for me.  As it happened there was a schooner in the bay of about one hundred tons burden which belonged to a Portuguese trader named Delgado, who dealt in goods that he carried to the various East African ports and Madagascar.  He was a villainous-looking person whom I suspected of having dealings with the slave traders, who were very numerous and a great power in those days, if indeed he were not one himself.  But as he was going to Kilwa whence we proposed to start inland, I arranged to make use of him to carry our party and the baggage.  The bargain was not altogether easy to strike for two reasons.  First, he did not appear to be anxious that we should hunt in the districts at the back of Kilwa, where he assured me there was no game, and secondly, he said that he wanted to sail at once.  However, I overcame his objections with an argument he could not resist—­namely, money, and in the end he agreed to postpone his departure for fourteen days.

Then I set about collecting our men, of whom I had made up my mind there must not be less than twenty.  Already I had sent messengers summoning to Durban from Zululand and the upper districts of Natal various hunters who had accompanied me on other expeditions.  To the number of a dozen or so they arrived in due course.  I have always had the good fortune to be on the best of terms with my Kaffirs, and where I went they were ready to go without asking any questions.  The man whom I had selected to be their captain under me was a Zulu of the name of Mavovo.  He was a short fellow, past middle age, with an enormous chest.  His strength was proverbial; indeed, it was said that he could throw an ox by the horns, and myself I have seen him hold down the head of a wounded buffalo that had fallen, until I could come up and shoot it.

When I first knew Mavovo he was a petty chief and witch doctor in Zululand.  Like myself, he had fought for the Prince Umbelazi in the great battle of the Tugela, a crime which Cetewayo never forgave him.  About a year afterwards he got warning that he had been smelt out as a wizard and was going to be killed.  He fled with two of his wives and a child.  The slayers overtook them before he could reach the Natal border, and stabbed the elder wife and the child of the second wife.  They were four men, but, made mad by the sight, Mavovo turned on them and killed them all.  Then, with the remaining