But the Council interpreted it in the latter and worse sense, for I saw a quiver of fear go through them.
"Why should I not choose it," went on Zikali, "seeing also that this place is holy to me?
Here it was, O Son of Panda, that Chaka brought my children to be killed and forced me, sitting where you sit, to watch their deaths.

There on the rock above me they were killed, four of them, three sons and a daughter, and the slayers--they came to an evil end, those slayers, as did Chaka--laughed and cast them down from the rock before me.

Yes, and Chaka laughed, and I too laughed, for had not the king the right to kill my children and to steal their mothers, and was I not glad that they should be taken from the world and gathered to that of Spirits whence they always talk to me, yes, even now?
That is why I did not hear you at first, King, because they were talking to me." He paused, turning one ear upwards, then continued in a new and tender voice, "What is it you say to me, Noma, my dear little Noma?
Oh! I hear you, I hear you." Now he shifted himself along the ground on his haunches some paces to the right, and began to search about, groping with his long fingers.

"Where, where ?" he muttered.

"Oh, I understand, further under the root, a jackal buried it, did it?
Pah! how hard is this soil.