Adventure Magazine Cover — page 95: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

Kos, the Witch-Doctor a yafa. Num xelele ndi yeza. Amanzi a lungile.” (You think about the king? Hear the messenger. The king is ill. Tell him I am coming tonight. The water is sweet.) And with that Kos sprang up and darted through the door. The boy stared into the fire while a slow smile spread over his face. The sound of the wail outside in the dis- tance reminded him of Kos’ instructions. He got to his feet; went out of the cave. Night had fallen, and the night-prowling beasts were making themselves heard. _ The boy followed a short path that would bring him out quite a distance behind the messenger. A tall, dark figure loomed out of the night as the boy came up behind him. The messenger was a stalwart young war- rior who was still shouting. The boy waited until the messenger stopped for breath, then in a thundering young voice he spoke— “Ewe.” (Yes.) The warrior jumped nervously, turned round and started to deliver his message. The boy cut him short with— “Ndi ya yast nkosi 1 yafa a yeza li yeza.” (I know the king is ill; the medicine is com- ing.) The messenger started as the portent of his message seemed to have been delivered even before he had arrived. His feelings were hurt, as he was accounted and rated as being the most fleet of foot of all the Vkosv’s impis. However, the boy’s imperious “‘Ham- bal” (go!) brought him to his immediate duty, and without another word the mes- senger vanished into the night at a smash- ing pace; but had hardly gone three hun- dred yards when he came to a dead stop, his hair rising and almost standing on end. For the glorious, full tropic moon is rising to the top of the many hills with the reflections of its light thrown up against the vast spaces of the night, when from out of the shadows a form of darker impress detaches itself from the shadows and lounges away from the wall of darkness into an open space. A glimpse of it as it trundles past here, and an imagery of a mythologi- cal being is brought to mind. Listen! A groaning, rhythmical chant comes frora this being of the night. Another glimpse, longer this time—what is this? A beast—a being that goes on all fours. . His head is thrust forward near the ground as he toils up the hillside, with a long shaggy beard on his chin. The other part of him faces back, with the head of a man, shoul- 89 ders hunched up as if in meditation on all the evils of the night. For an instant the whole form is silhouetted against the rim of the rising moon. The beast gives a short barking cough and then sinks out of sight on the other side of the hill. But there comes floating back the chant that blends with the night and the hour, with the promise of the dreaded unknown in it, and on the soft clear air the last words are heard as the chant dies away: Ya ndi tata apa U ndi mheke paya. _Ndo suka paya— Ndi zemeya. — * Nxama!l Nxamat! Hamba!. Hamba! (You take me here And put me there. I go away from here— In this way. Hurry! Hurry! Go! Go!) The terrified messenger stood rooted to the spot, his body steaming with sweat: He turned back toward the path leading to the witch-doctor’s cave, and in running blindly in the dark collided with the boy, who had been watching the apparition as it showed up against the background made by the moon. Both went sprawling to the ground at the sudden impact. The mes- senger scrambled to his feet and without waiting to see what he had run against van- ished into the night. Stones rattled and _ pinged as he flew over the ground. There was a sudden and terrible roar of a lion landing on the back of its prey. A man’s scream, then short, wheezy sobs as of a breathing through punctured lungs. The grinding of strong teeth, and bones crackling and breaking in the dark. A sound of soft padding of feet and something dragging swiftly along the ground and then . this died away. The messenger never re- turned to the village; but his head was found near the witch-doctor’s pathway a few days later by some tntombis (girls) as they came back from fetching wood. No sooner had the messenger scrambled to his feet than the boy also scrambled to his feet and fled toward the cave, though he knew that it was Kos whom he had seen sil- houetted against the moon, riding a baboon going on all fours with Kos chanting the sweet-water gathering-chant and riding backward. But the tone was so weird and the night so lent itself to the haunting COMMICLOOOkKsS (C@