"
But I, Mopo, ran into the hut before her, and when she entered she
found me sitting by the fire.
"Now, here, my brother," said Nada, pointing at me with her finger,
"here is that old umfagozan, that low fellow, who, unless I dream, but
a very little while ago brought shame upon me--ay, my brother, he
struck me, a maid, with his kerrie, and that only because I said that
I would stab him for his insolence, and he did worse: he swore that he
would drag me to some old chief of his to be a gift to him, and this
he was about to do, had you not come. Will you suffer these things to
go unpunished, my brother?"
Now Umslopogaas smiled grimly, and I answered:--
"What was it that you called me just now, Nada, when you prayed me to
protect you? Father, was it not?" and I turned my face towards the
blaze of the fire, so that the full light fell upon it.
"Yes, I called you father, old man. It is not strange, for a homeless
wanderer must find fathers where she can--and yet! no, it cannot be--
so changed--and that white hand? And yet, oh! who are you? Once there
was a man named Mopo, and he had a little daughter, and she was called
Nada--Oh! my father, my father, I know you now!"
"Ay, Nada, and I knew you from the first; through all your man's
wrappings I knew you after these many years.
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