MARIE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLVIII, Issue 14836, 13 November 1911, Page 4

MARIE.

i PUBLISHED BT SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT.

BY H t KIDER HAGGARD. AN EPISODE IN THE LIFE OF THE LATE ALLAN QUATERMAIN. COPYRIGHT. CHAPTER XX.—(Continued.) Paroles and Johannes accepted the invitation, and from them we heard much news, all of it terrible enough to learn, especially the details of the massacre in that district, which, because of this fearful event, is now and always will be known is Weenen, or the Place of Weeping. "Suffice it to say that they were quite enough to take away all our appetite, ilthough Carolus and Johannes, who by this time had recovered somewhat from the shock of that night, of blood and terror, ato in a fashion which might have filled Dans himself with envy. Shortly after wo had' finished our meal Hans, who, by the way, seemed to have quite recovered from his fatigues, came to remove the dishes. He informed us that all the Boers were having a great "talk," "Mid that they were about to send for me. Sure enough, a few minutes later two armed men 1 rived and ordered me. to follow them. I turned to say, some words of farewell to Marie, but she said :

"I go where you do, husband." and. as no objection was made by the guard, she tame.

About two hundred yards away, sitting under the shade of one of the waggons. we found the Boers. Six of them were seated in a semicircle upon stools or whatever they could find, the black-browed Commandant being in the centre and having in front of him a rough table on which were writing materials-

To the left of these six were the Prinsloos and Meyers, being those folk whom 1 had rescued from Delagoa. and to the right the other Boers who had ridden into the camp that morning. I saw at a glance that a court-martial had been arranged, arid that the six elders wort' the judges, the commandant being the president of the court. . -,

I do not give their names purposely, since I have no wish that, the actual perjpeirators of the terrible blunder that I am about- to describe should be known to posterity. After all. they acted honestly according to their lights!" and were but tools in the hand of that villain'Hernan Pereira-

"Allan Qr.iit-ermain." said the commandant, •you are brought here to be tried by a court-martial duly constituted according to the law published in the camps of the emigrant Boers. Do you acknowledge that, law?"

"I know that there is such a law, commandant," 1 answered, "but I do not ncknowledge the authority of your courtmartial to try a man who i* no Boer, but a •subject of the Queen of Great Britain."

"We have considered that point. Allan Quatermain." said the commandant, and we disallow it. , You will remember that in the camp at Bushman's River, before ,\ou rod? with the late Pieter Retief to the chief Sikonyela. when you were given com- - mand of the Zulus who went with him. ;, you took an oath to interpret truly and to toe faithful in all things to the "General f'etief. to his companions, and to his cause, a hat oath, we hold, gives this court jurisdiction ; over you.*" "I deny your jurisdiction.*' I answered, /'.although it is true that I took an oath lb interpret' faithfully, and I request that -l» note of my denial may be made in writing." ; ;■ ■ 'v ( . "It shall be done," said the comman~*«lant, and laboriously he made the note on ♦he paper before him. •'. - When he had finished he looked up and *aid: "The charge against you, Allan fEJuatermain, is that, being one of the commission who recently visited the Zulu king Dingaan, under command of the late Governor | and General Pieter Retief, you did falsely and wickedly urge the said Dingaan to murder the said Pieter Retief and his companions, and especially Henri iMarais, your father-in-law, and Hernando Percira. his nephew, with both of whom you had a quarrel. Further, that afterwards you brought about the said murder, , having first arranged with the king of the Zulus that you should be removed to "a ! place of safety while it was done-/ Do you {plead Guilty or Not Guilty?" "' - * Now »when I heard "this false and i ;, abominable charge my rage and indigna- [ tion caused me to laugh aloud. • "Are you mad, commandant," I ex-'. * claimed, "that yon should say such things? " On what evidence is this wicked lie advanced against me?" - * "'" ! "No, Allan Quatermain. I am not mad," ..she replied, " although it is true that through your evil doings I, who have lost •my wife and three children by the Zulu •je pears, have suffered enough to make me ttnad. As for the evidence against you, "you shall hear it. But first 1 will write mown that you plead 'Not guilty.' * He did so, then said: •" "If, you will acknowledge certain things 'it will save us all much time, of which at present we have little to spare. Those things are that, knowing what was going 'ito. happen to the commission, you tried to >void accompanying it. Is that true?" ', "No," I answered. "I knew nothing of Srhat was going to happen to the communion, though i feared something, having but just saved my friends there— I jointed to the Prinsloos—" from death at the hands,of Dingaan. • I did not wish to '■accompany it for mother reason:; that I had "/been mirriwl on the day of its starting to "Marie Marais. Still, I went after ail because the General Relief, who was my • friend, asked mo to come to interpret for. ■'' h'm." .■ .','■••'>. ..- v''. Now some of the Boeis present eaid:; ( "That is true, 'Wo remember." * • : But the commandant continued, 'taking raj heed of my answer or these interrup-, ti<ms, ; ■' '■'. v . i}% , ■ " "Do you acknowledge that you woro 0:1 hid terms with Henri llarais and with I {Hemnjx l'ereira? " ' • ' "Yes," I answered; "because Henri 3larais did all in his power to prevent my "niarriago with his daughter .Marie, behaving very ill to me who had .saved his life and that of his people who remained to him up by Delagoa, and afterwards .-it Umcungimcllitpvu. Because, 100, Hernan Pereira strove, to rob me of Marie, who loved me Moreover, although J had saved him when JlO lay sick to death, he afterwards tried to murder me by shooting me down in a lonely place. Here is the mark of it."'ami 1 touched the little scar upon the side 0 lny forehead. That is true: ho did so, the slinkcat," shouted the Vrouw Prinsloo, and was ordered to be silent.

"Do you acknowledge," went on the commandant, " that you sent to warn your '"•wife and those with her to depart from tins tamp on the Bushman's River, because it wis going to bo attacked, charging them to keep the matter secret, and that afterwards both you and your Hottentot servant alone returned safely from Zululand, where all those who went with you lie dead'/" "I acknowledge," 1 answered, "that I wrote- to tell my wife to come to this place where I had been building houses, as you ?ee, and to bring with her any of our companions who cared to trek here, or, failing that, to go alone. This I did because Dingaan bad told me, whether in jest or in earnest I did not know, that he. had given orders that my said wife should be kidnapped, as he desired to make her one of .his women, having thought hoi beautiful ■when he eaw her. Also what I did was done with the knowledge and by the wish if the late Governor Relief, as can be Miown by his writing on my letter f acknowledge that 1 escaped when all "my brothers were killed, as did the. Hottentot Hans, and if you wish to know I will tell you how we escaped and why." ' . The commandant made a further note iihen ho said:

' "Let the witness* Hernan Poreira be called and # sworn." 'This? was done, and ho was ordered to •tell his tale. , J ' Ae may be imagined, it was a long tale, Jmd one that had evidently been prepared with great care. I will only set down its blackest falsehoods. He assured the court that he. had no enmity against me, and iidd never attempted .to kill me or do mo

any harm, although it was true that his heart felt sore because, against her father's will, I had stolen away the affection of his betrothed, who was now mv wife. Ha said that he had stopped in Zululand because he knew that I should marry her as soon as she came of age, and it was too great pain for him to see this done. Ho said .that while he was there, before the arrival of the commission, Dingaan and some of his captains had told him that I had again and again urged him, Dingaan, to kill the Boers because they were traitors to the Sovereign of England, but that he, Dingaan, had refused to do so. He said that when Retief came up with Aecommission lie tried to warn him against me, but that Retief would not listen, being infatuated with me. as many others were, and he looked towards the Prinsloos. »

Then came the worst of all. He said that while he was engaged in mending some guns for Dingaan in oho of his private huts he overheard a conversation between myself and Dingaan, which took place outside the hut, I. of course, not knowing that lie was within. The substance of this conversation ,was that 1 again urged Dingaan to kill the Boers and afterwards to send an impi to massacre their wives and families. Only 1 asked him to give me time to get away a girl whom I had marlied from among them, and with her a few ; of my own friends whom I wished should be spared, m I intended to become a kind of chief over them, and if he would grant it me, to hold all the land of Natal under his rule and the protection of the English. To these proposals Dingaan answered that "they seemed wise and good, and that he would think them over very carefully.'' Pereira said further that coming out of tho hut after Dingaan had gone away ho reproached me bitterly for my wickedness and announced that he would warn the Boers, which ho did subsequently by word of mouth and in writing. That thereon I caused him to be detained by the Zulus while i went to Retief and told him some false story about him, Pereira, which caused Retief to drive him out of his camp and give orders that none of the Boers should so much as speak to him. That then ho did the only thing he could. Going to his uncle, Henri Marais, lie told him, not all the truth, but that he had learnt for certain that his daughter Marie was in dreadful danger of her life because of some intended attack of tho Zulus, and that all the Boers among whom she dwelt were also ill danger of their lives. Therefore he suggested to Henri Marais that as the General Retief was besotted and would not listen to his story the best thing he could do was to ride away and warn the Boers. This then they did secretly, without the knowledge of 'Retief, but being delayed upon their journey by one accident and another, which ho set "out in detail, they only reached the Bushman's River too late, after the massacre had taken place. Subsequently, as tho commandant • knew, hearing a rumour that Marie Marais And other Boers had trekked to this place hefore the slaughter/ they came here and learned that, they had done so upon a warning sent to them by Allan Quatermain, whereon they returned and communicated the news to the surviving Boers at Bushman's River.

That was all he had to say. Then, as I-reserved mv cross-examination until I heard all the evidence against me, Henri Marais was sworn and corroborated his nephew's testimony on many points as to my relations to his" daughter, his objection to my marriage to her because I was an Englishman whom he disliked and mistrusted, and so forth. He added further that it- was true Pereira had told him he had sure information that Marie and the Boers were in danger from an attack upon them which had been arranged between Allan Quatermain and Dingaan; that he also had written to Retief and tried to speak to him but was refused a hearing. Thereon he had ridden away from Urngungundhlovu to try to save his daughter and warn the Boers. That was all he had to any. As there were no further witnesses for the prosecution I cross-examined these two at full length, but absolutely without results, since every vital question that 1 asked was met with a direct negative. • (To be continued daily.)