"I did," I answered in a hollow voice, for in truth her eyes held me as
they had held Saduko.
"Then come now, Macumazahn, and give me that farewell kiss. The King
will permit it, and since I have now no husband, who take Death to
husband, there is none to say you nay."
I rose. It seemed to me that I could not help myself. I went to her,
this woman surrounded by implacable enemies, this woman who had played
for great stakes and lost them, and who knew so well how to lose. I
stood before her, ashamed and yet not ashamed, for something of her
greatness, evil though it might be, drove out my shame, and I knew that
my foolishness was lost in a vast tragedy.
Slowly she lifted her languid arm and threw it about my neck; slowly she
bent her red lips to mine and kissed me, once upon the mouth and once
upon the forehead. But between those two kisses she did a thing so
swiftly that my eyes could scarcely follow what she did. It seemed to
me that she brushed her left hand across her lips, and that I saw her
throat rise as though she swallowed something. Then she thrust me from
her, saying: "Farewell, O Macumazana, you will never forget this kiss of mine; and
when we meet again we shall have much to talk of, for between now and
then your story will be long. Farewell, Zikali. I pray that all your
plannings may succeed, since those you hate are those I hate, and I
bear you no grudge because you told the truth at last. Farewell, Prince
Cetewayo. You will never be the man your brother would have been, and
your lot is very evil, you who are doomed to pull down a House built
by One who was great. Farewell, Saduko the fool, who threw away your
fortune for a woman's eyes, as though the world were not full of women.
Nandie the Sweet and the Forgiving will nurse you well until your
haunted end. Oh! why does Umbelazi lean over your shoulder, Saduko, and
look at me so strangely? Farewell, Panda the Shadow. Now let loose your
slayers. Oh! let them loose swiftly, lest they should be balked of my
blood!"
Panda lifted his hand and the executioners leapt forward, but ere
ever they reached her, Mameena shivered, threw wide her arms and fell
back--dead. The poisonous drug she had taken worked well and swiftly.
Such was the end of Mameena, Child of Storm.
A deep silence followed, a silence of awe and wonderment, till suddenly
it was broken by a sound of dreadful laughter. It came from the lips
of Zikali the Ancient, Zikali, the "Thing-that-should-never-have-been-born."