"
I mention this conversation because by some strange chance it
happened at Isandhlwana that I killed this man, who was named
Simpofu.
During all those days of trudging through hot suns and
thunderstorms, for I had to give up the mare to Kaatje who was
too fat to walk, or said she was, I was literally haunted by
thoughts of my murdered friends. Heaven knows how bitterly I
reproached myself for having brought them into Zululand. It
seemed so terribly sad that these young people who loved each
other and had so bright a future before them, should have escaped
from a tragic past merely to be overwhelmed by such a fate.
Again and again I questioned that lump Kaatje as to the details
of their end and of all that went before and followed after the
murder.
But it was quite useless; indeed, as time went on she seemed to
become more nebulous on the point as though a picture were fading
from her mind. But as to one thing she was always quite clear,
that she had seen them dead and had seen their new-made grave.
This she swore "by God in Heaven," completing the oath with an
outburst of tears in a way that would have carried conviction to
any jury, as it did to me.
And after all, what was more likely in the circumstances? Zikali
had killed them, or caused them to be killed; or possibly they
were killed in spite of him in obedience to the express, or
general, order of the king, if the deed was not done by the
Basutos.
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