'You opened the entrance for me to go down. A little more, and they can squeeze in.'

'What use could we men have of them if they came home exhausted from laboring underground? Tell me that.'

'When you have the hunger for them, let them rest a day or two.'

'I tell you, sir, our women would refuse to work as miners. You must bring me people from outside.'

Sternly Nxumalo said, 'I shall return next season, and I will expect to see this mine operating at capacity. We must have gold.'

This ultimatum would be met, for as Nxumalo marched back toward Zimbabwe, the mine overseer, who loved his five fat wives, was relieved to see a band of his warriors returning from the desert with nine small brown people. They would fit nicely into the mine; they would eat what was tossed down to them; and never again would they see daylight.

As Nxumalo visited the distant mines he often recalled that moment when he first saw the Limpopo and when he first climbed down into a mine: It was a premonition. I spend my life crossing rivers and descending shafts. Wherever he traveled through the vast domains of Zimbabwe he came upon the old treasured mines, and in time learned how to predict where new ones might be found, and although nine out of his ten guesses proved barren, that tenth repaid all efforts. Each new find, each old mine that increased its output enhanced his reputation.

Although he had made himself familiar with thousands of square miles of the kingdom, there remained one place he had not visited: the citadel atop the Hill of Spirits at Zimbabwe itself, but now as he returned from his latest trip he was summoned to the king's residence to deliver his report in person to the ruler and his councillors. He was guarded about what he said concerning the enslavement of the small brown people at that frontier mine, but he spoke boldly of the problems in the north, and when he finished, the senior councillor indicated that the king wished to speak with him alone.

After the a.s.sembly left, this councillor led Nxumalo through a maze of pa.s.sages to the inner court, where, in a small roofless enclosure, he waited for his private audience. Soon the king appeared in his austere white robes, hastened directly to Nxumalo and said, 'Son of Ngalo from the lands my people do not know, I have never seen you at the citadel.'

'To go so high is not permitted, sir.'

'It is permitted,' the king said. 'Let us go there now and ask the spirits.' And under palm umbrellas the king and his inspector of mines walked down the main pa.s.sageway through the city, past the area where the joiners and the masons dwelt, past the site where workmen brought stones for the walls. It seemed a lifetime since Nxumalo had helped repair those walls, and it was like a dream to be walking beneath them with the king himself.

They moved swiftly along the royal path that led to the rock-encircled citadel, and now the way became little more than a track, four feet across, but twice each day forty women swept it so that not a blade of gra.s.s or a pebble marred its surface. To attain the steep trail that led up to the summit, they had to pa.s.s the pits from which women dug wet clay used for plastering walls; and as the king went by, they all bowed their heads against the moist ground, but he ignored them.

The winding path climbed through a grove of trees, then traversed bare, rocky slopes, and reached at last an extremely narrow pa.s.sageway between boulders. The king betrayed that he was out of breath, and although Nxumalo was well trained because of his distant journeys, he deemed it prudent to make believe that his chest heaved too, lest he appear disrespectful. At last they broke into a free and level s.p.a.ce, and Nxumalo saw a grandeur he had not even vaguely antic.i.p.ated when staring at the citadel from below.

He was in the midst of a great a.s.sembly of walls and courtyards twined among the immense granite boulders which gave the place its magnificence; those ma.s.sive rocks determined where the walls must run, where the gracefully molded huts could stand. Rulers came from far distances to negotiate with the king, and so long as the meetings were held down below in the city, these foreign rulers, often as rich as the king, were apt to be slightly contemptuous of his soft-spoken arguments, but once they had been forced to climb that difficult path to see the citadel, they had to acknowledge that they were dealing with a true monarch.

Nxumalo was startled by the vivid colors that decorated the walls, the sculptures that marked the parapets and the symbolism that abounded. But what interested him most were the little furnaces at which metallurgists worked the gold ingots he sent from his mines, and he watched with admiration as they fashioned delicate jewelry by processes so secret they were never spoken of outside the citadel.

Despite his interest in the gold, Nxumalo was led away to the eastern flank of the citadel, and again he walked with that inner fear that had marked his first meeting with the king, for he knew that he was heading for the quarters of the great Mhondoro, the one through whom the spirits spoke and the ancestors ruled. By accident he caught a glimpse of the king's face and saw that he, too, had a.s.sumed a solemn mien.

The Mhondoro's enclosure seemed deserted when Nxumalo entered, but soon a shadowy figure could be seen moving in the dark recesses of a hut that filled one corner of the area. The main feature was a platform, waist-high, from which rose four soapstone pedestals, each topped by a sculptured bird which appeared to hover above the sacred place. Another wall contained a lower platform on which stood a collection of monoliths and other sacred objects of great beauty. Each related to some climactic experience of the race, so that in this enclosure stood the full history and mythology of Zimbabwe, a meaningful record of the past that could be read by the Mhondoro and his king as easily as European monks unraveled the writings of their historians.

The king was permitted by custom to walk to the meeting platform, but Nxumalo had to crawl on his knees, and as he did so he saw that when the discussions began he would be sitting among skull-like carvings, clay animals decorated with ostrich feathers, elaborate collections of medicated beads and pebbles, and tangled clumps of precious herbs. But no single item arrested his attention like the crocodile six feet long, carved from hard wood in such reality that it seemed capable of devouring the holy man; when Nxumalo took his seat beside this monster, he found that its scales were made from hundreds of wafer-thin gold plates that moved and glistened when he disturbed the air.

Now from the interior of his hut the Mhondoro appeared, wearing a yellow cloak and a headdress of animal furs. It was the king who paid homage: 'I see you, Mhondoro of my fathers.'

'I see you, Powerful King.'

'This is the one who was sent,' the king said.

The Mhondoro indicated that Nxumalo must keep his gaze forward, lest his eyes fall upon the symbols of kings long dead and anger their spirits, who would be watching. The young man scarcely dared breathe, but at last the Mhondoro addressed him: 'What news from the mines?'

'The gold from the west declines.'

'It used to be copious.'

'It still is, to the north, but our men are afraid to go there.'

'Trouble, trouble,' the spirit-medium said, and he turned to the king, speaking softly of the problems overtaking their city.

Nxumalo appreciated their concern, for at times on his recent journeys he had felt as if the entire Zimbabwe hegemony were held together by frail threads of dissolving interests. He sensed the restlessness and suspected that certain provincial chiefs were entertaining ideas of independence, but he was afraid to mention these fears in the presence of the city's two most powerful men. There were other irritations too: wood, grazing rights, the lack of salt. And there was even talk that the Arabs might open their own trade links in areas beyond Zimbabwe's control.

The painful afternoon pa.s.sed, and when fires appeared in the city below, the Mhondoro began chanting in a dreamy voice: 'Generations ago our brave forebears erected this citadel. Mhlanga, son of Notape, son of Chuda . . .' He recited genealogies back to the year 1250 when Zimbabwe's walls were first erected. 'It was the king's great-grandfather who caused that big tower down there to be built, not long ago, and it grieves my heart to think that one day we may have to give this n.o.ble place back to the vines and the trees.'

In the silence that followed, Nxumalo became aware that he was supposed to respond: 'Why would you say that, Revered One?'

'Because the land is worn out. Because our spirits flag. Because others are rising in the north. Because I see strange ships coming to Sofala.'

It was in that solemn moment that Nxumalo first glimpsed the fact that his destiny might be to remain always in Zimbabwe, helping it to survive, but even as he framed this thought he looked at these two men sitting beneath the beautiful carved birds and he could not conceive that these leaders and this city could be in actual danger.

When he accompanied the king down from the citadel, servants with flares led the way and stayed with them on their progress through the city. Out of deference to the king, Nxumalo volunteered to attend him to the gateway of the royal enclosure, but the king halted midway in the city and said, 'It's time you visited the Old Seeker.'

'I see him often, sir.'

'But tonight, I believe, he has special messages.' So Nxumalo broke away and went to his mentor's house beyond the marketplace, and there he found that the old man did indeed have special information: 'Son of Ngalo, it's time you took the next cargo of gold and rhino horns to Sofala.'

This was a journey of importance which only the most trusted citizens were permitted to undertake. It required courage to descend the steep paths lined with leopards and lions; it required sound health to survive the pestilential swamps; and it required sound judgment to protect one's property against the Arabs who bartered there.

'The Arabs who climb the mountain trails to visit Zimbabwe have to be good men,' the wise old fellow warned. 'But those who slip into a seaport and remain there, they can be ugly.'

'How do I protect myself?'

'Integrity is a good shield.' He paused. 'Did I ever come armed to your father's kraal? Couldn't he have killed me in a moment if he wished? Why didn't he? Because he knew that if he killed a man of honor, he'd soon have on his hands men with none. And then the whole thing falls apart.'

'You know, I'm sure, that my father used to laugh at your stories. The miracles you spoke of, the lies.'

'A man cannot travel great distances without developing ideas. And now I have one of the very best to bring before you.'

He clapped his hands, and when the servant appeared, he gave a signal. Soon the curtains that closed off the living quarters parted and a young girl of fourteen, black as rubbed ebony and radiant, came dutifully into the room. Lowering her eyes, she stood inanimate, like one of the carved statues the Arabs had presented to the king; she was being presented to Nxumalo, the king's inspector of mines, and after a long time she raised her eyes and looked into his.

'My granddaughter,' the old man said.

The two young people continued gazing at each other as the Old Seeker confessed: 'From the first day I saw you at the lake, Nxumalo, I knew you were intended for this girl. Everything I did thereafter was calculated to bring you here for her to see. The rhino horns? I had all I needed waiting in the warehouse. You were the treasure I sought.'

Because of the pain that comes with all living, Nxumalo could not speak. He was acutely aware of this girl's beauty, but he could also remember Zeolani and his promise to her. Finally he blurted out: 'Treasured Father, I am betrothed to Zeolani.'

The old man took a deep breath and said, 'Young men make promises, and they go off to build their fortunes, and the antelope at the lake see them no more. My granddaughter's name is Hlenga. Show him the garden, Hlenga.'

It was in 1458 that Nxumalo a.s.sembled a file of sixty-seven porters for the perilous journey to the coast. The route to Sofala was horrendous, with swamps, fever-ridden flats, precipitous descents and swollen rivers barring the way. As he listened to accounts of the journey from men who had made earlier trips, he comprehended what Old Seeker had meant when he said, 'A wise man goes to Sofala only once.' And yet Arab traders appeared at Zimbabwe regularly, and they had to traverse that formidable route.

This contradiction was resolved by the Old Seeker: 'The Arabs have no problems. They start from Sofala with fifty carriers and arrive here with thirty.'

'How is it they're always the ones that arrive?'

'White men protect themselves,' the old councillor said. 'I went down with the father of the man who gave you that disk. At every river he said, "You go first and see how deep it is." So at one crossing I said, "This time you go first," and he said, "It's your task to go. It's my task to protect the gold." '

Nxumalo laughed. 'That's what one of our mine overseers says when tossing a catch of little brown men down the shaft: "It's your task to go down there. It's my task to guard the gold when you send it up." '

'One more thing, Nxumalo. Arabs in a caravan will be your staunchest friends. Share their food with you, their sleeping places. But when you reach Sofala, be aware. Never go aboard ship with an Arab.'

Nxumalo coughed in some embarra.s.sment. 'Tell me, Old Seeker, what is a ship? The king spoke of it and I was ashamed to ask.'

'A rondavel that moves across the water.' While the young man contemplated this improbability, the old man added, 'Because if you step aboard his ship, the Arab will sell you as a slave and you will sit chained to a bench and never see your friends again.'

This almost casual mention of friends saddened Nxumalo, for the friend he cherished most was Zeolani, and the possibility of never seeing her again distressed him. At the same time he recognized that all things happening in Zimbabwe were conspiring to prevent him from ever returning to his village, and he supposed that if he succeeded with the forthcoming expedition to Sofala, his position at Zimbabwe would be enhanced. Yet memories of Zeolani and their impa.s.sioned love-making behind the twin hills haunted him, and he longed to see her. 'I want to return home,' he said resolutely, but Old Seeker laughed.

'You're like all young men in the world. Remembering a lovely girl who is far away while being tormented by another just as lovely, who is close at hand . . . like Hlenga.'

'On your next trip to my village . . .'

'I doubt I shall ever wander so far again.'

'You will. You're like me. You love baobabs and lions prowling your camp at night.'

The old man laughed again. 'Perhaps I am like you. But you're like me. You love rivers that must be forded and paths through dark forests. I never went back, and neither will you.'

On the morrow, with a kiss from Hlenga on his lips, this young man, twenty-one years old, set forth with his porters to deliver a collection of gold, ivory tusks and other trading goods to the waiting ships, and so heavy was the burden that progress under any circ.u.mstances would have been tedious; through the forests and swamps which separated them from the sea it was punishing. Nxumalo, as personal representative of the king, headed the file, but he was guided by a man who had made the difficult traverse once before. They covered only ten miles a day, because they were so often forced by turbulent rivers or steep declivities to abandon established trails. They were tormented by insects and had to keep watch against snakes, but they were never short of water or food, for rain was plentiful and animals abounded.

At the end of the sixth day everyone had subsided into a kind of grudging resignation; hour after hour would pa.s.s with no speech, no relief from the heat, the sweat and the muddy footing. It was travel at its worst, infinitely more demanding than a trip of many miles through the western savanna or southward into baobab country. This was liana land, where vines hung down from every tree, tormenting and ensnaring, where one could rarely move unimpeded for ten feet in any direction.

But always there lay ahead the fascinating lure of Sofala, with its ships, and Chinese strangers, and the glories of India and Persia. Like a tantalizing magnet it drew the men on, and at night, when the insects were at their worst, the men would talk in whispers of women who frequented the port and of Arabs who stole any black who tried to visit with these women. The travelers had an imperfect understanding of the slave trade; they knew that men of foreign cast traveled the Zambezi capturing any who strayed, but these invaders had never dared invade Zimbabwe and risk a disruption of the gold supply, so their habits were not known. Nor did the murmuring blacks have any concept of where they might be taken if they were captured; Arabia they knew only for its carvings, India for its silks.

When the great escarpments were descended and the level lowlands reached, the travelers still had more than a hundred miles of swampy flat country with swollen rivers to negotiate, and again progress was minimal. It was now that young Nxumalo a.s.serted his leadership, dismissing his guide to the rear and forcing his men into areas they preferred to avoid. He had come upon a well-marked trail which must lead to the sea, and as his men straggled behind, unable to keep the pace he was setting with his lighter burden, they began to meet other porters coming home from Sofala or were overtaken by swifter-moving files heading for the port, and a lively excitement spread through the group.

'We must not step inside a ship,' the guide repeated on the last night, 'and all bargaining is to be done by Nxumalo, for he knows what the king requires.'

'We will wait,' Nxumalo said, 'until the Arabs make us good offers, and they must be better than what they offer us at home, for this time we have done the hauling, not they.' He was prepared to linger at Sofala for months, selling his goods carefully and obtaining only those things his community most needed.

'What we really seek,' he reminded them, 'is salt.' Even his gold bars would be bartered if he could find the proper amount of salt.

When his porters took up their burdens next morning, pa.s.sers-by confirmed that Sofala would be reached by noon, and they quickened their pace; and when salt could be smelled in the air, they began to run until the man in the lead shouted, 'Sofala! Sofala!' and all cl.u.s.tered about him to stare at the port and the great sea beyond. In awe one man whispered, 'That is a river no man can cross.'

The bustling seaport did not disappoint, for it contained features which astonished; the sheds in which the Arabs conducted their business were of a size the Zimbabwe men had never imagined, and the dhows that rolled in the tides of the Indian Ocean were an amazement. The men were delighted with the orderliness of the sh.o.r.e, where casuarina trees intermingled with palms and where the waves ran up to touch the feet and then ran back. How immense the sea was! When the men saw children swimming they were enchanted and sought to run into the water themselves, except that Nxumalo, himself perplexed by this mult.i.tude of new experiences, forbade it. He felt that he must face one problem at a time, and the first that he encountered proved how correct he was in moving prudently, for when he inquired about a market for his goods, and traders heard that he had twoscore elephant tusks, everyone doing business with China, where ivory was appreciated, wanted to acquire them, and he was made some dazzling offers, but since he had not intended selling immediately, he resisted. He did allow himself to be taken to an Arab ship, which, however, he refused to board; from the wharf he could see inside, and there, chained to benches, sat a dozen men of varied ages, doing nothing, making hardly a movement.

'Who are they?' he asked, and the trader explained that these men helped move the ship.

'How long do they wait like that?'

'Until they die,' the trader said, and when Nxumalo winced, he added, 'They were captured in war. This is their fate.' They were, Nxumalo reflected, much like the small brown men who were thrown down mines to work until they died. They, too, were captured in war; that, too, was their fate.

Wherever he moved in Sofala he saw things that bewildered, but constantly he was enticed by the dhows, those floating rondavels whose pa.s.sage across the sea he could not comprehend but whose magic was apparent. One afternoon as he stared at a three-masted vessel with tall sails he saw to his delight that the white man who seemed to be in charge was the same tall Arab who had traded at Zimbabwe.

'Ho!' he shouted, and when the Arab turned slowly to identify the disturbance, Nxumalo shouted in Zimbabwe language, 'It's me. The one you gave the disk.' The Arab moved to the railing, peered at the young black, and said finally, 'Of course! The man with the gold mines.'

For some hours they stood on the wharf, talking, and the Arab said, 'You should carry your goods to my brother at Kilwa. He'll appreciate them.'

'Where is the trail to this Kilwa?'

The Arab laughed, the first time Nxumalo had seen him do so. 'There is no trail. It couldn't cross the rivers and swamps. To walk would require more than a year.'

'Then why tell me to go?'

'You don't march your men along a trail. You sail ... in a dhow.' Nxumalo instantly recognized this as a trick to enslave him, but he also knew that he yearned achingly to know what a dhow was like, and where China lay, and who wove silk. So after a night's tormented judging he sought the Arab and said simply, 'I shall deposit all my goods here, with my servants. I'll sail with you to Kilwa, and if your brother really wants my gold . . .'

'He'll be hungry for your ivory.'

'He can have it, if he brings me back here to get it.'

It was arranged, but when his men heard of his daring they protested. They, too, had seen the slaves chained to the benches and they predicted that this would be his fate, but he wanted to believe the Arab trader; even more, he wanted to see Kilwa and discover the nature of shipping.

Toward the end of 1458 he boarded the dhow at Sofala for the eleven-hundred-mile pa.s.sage to Kilwa, and when the lateen sails were raised and the vessel felt the wind he experienced the joy that young men know when they set forth upon the oceans. The rolling of the dhow, the leaping of the dolphins that followed the wake, and the glorious settings of the sun behind the coast of Africa enchanted him, and when after many days the sailors cried, 'Kilwa, the golden mosque!' he ran forward to catch his first sight of that notable harbor to which ships came from all cities of the eastern world.

He was overwhelmed by the varied craft that came to Kilwa, by the towering reach of the masts and the variety of men who climbed them. He found the Arab equally moved, and as the dhow crept through the harbor to find a mooring place, the trader pointed to the sh.o.r.e where buildings of stone glittered and he said with deep feeling, 'My grandfather's grandfather's father. We lived in Arabia then, and he sailed his trading dhow to Kilwa. On that beach he would spread his wares. What wonderful beads and cloths he brought. Then he and all his men would retire to his boat, and when the beach was empty of our people, the black-skinned traders would come down to inspect the goods, and after a long while they would leave little piles of gold and ivory. Then they would retire, and my father would go ash.o.r.e and judge the offer, and if it was miserly he would touch nothing, but return to his dhow. So the men would come again and add to their offer, and after many exchanges, without a word being spoken, the trade would be consummated. Look at Kilwa now!'

Nxumalo succ.u.mbed to its spell, and for nine days did not even bother to barter his treasures. When he visited the mosque, lately rebuilt and one of the n.o.blest in Africa, he thought: That tower they call the minaret. It resembles the tower I worked on at Zimbabwe. But ours was built much differently. Perhaps someone like me came here to Kilwa, and saw this fine city and went home to do his building.

He visited all the ships then in harbor and the trading points on the mainland, and after a while he began to comprehend the intricate world in which black men and yellow and honey-tan like the Arabs met and traded to mutual advantage, each having something precious to the others. Because he had gold and ivory, he could deal on a basis of equality with Egyptians and Arabians and Persians and Indians and the soft, quick people from Java.

He would have sailed with any of them to the far side of the sea; he would have been a willing pa.s.senger on any ship going anywhere; but in the end he arranged for the Arab's brother to sail him back to Sofala for his entire cache of goods. He might have bargained for a slightly more advantageous trade with other merchants, but to do so would have been undignified for an officer of the court of Zimbabwe.

It was a long, drifting trip back to Sofala, and during such a protracted voyage anything might have happened, but the pa.s.sage was calm and uneventful, with Nxumalo talking at great length with the Arab traders and learning from them of the vast changes occurring in the world. The significance of Constantinople was explained; although he knew nothing of the name, he deduced that the Arabs must now enjoy an enormous advantage. What was of greater interest were tales the Arabs told of changes along the Zambezi: 'Many villages have new masters. Salt has been discovered and tribes are on the move.'

When their ship neared the mouth of that great river the captain pointed out the little trading post of Chinde, and Nxumalo began to recite the melodious names of this enchanted coast: Sofala, Chinde, Quelimane, Mozambique, Zanzibar, Mombasa. And the sailors told him of the distant ports with which they dealt: Jidda, Calicut, Mogadiscio, Malacca.

While these narcotic names infected him with their sweet poison he stayed on deck and watched the moon tiptoe across the waves of an ocean he still could not comprehend, and grudgingly he admitted that he was so enamored of this new worldthe towers of Zimbabwe, his register of mines across the country, the fleet of ships at Kilwa and Sofala, the grand mystery of the oceanhe could never again be satisfied with his father's village and its naked men plotting to snare a rhinoceros. His commitment lay with the city, not to any grandiose concept of its destiny but to the honorable task of doing better whatever limited a.s.signment he was given. He would supervise his mines with extra attention and trade their gold to maximum advantage. He would work to strengthen Zimbabwe and help it maintain itself against the new hegemonies forming along the Zambezi. To undertake such tasks would mean that he could never go south to claim Zeolani, and as night faded, the moon sinking into the western sea seemed like the slow vanishing of that beautiful girl. At the moment when the golden disk plunged into the waves it looked much like the Nepalese disk he had sent her, and he could think only of their love-making and of the sorrow that would never completely leave him.

At dawn he sought his Arab mentor and said, 'I must buy one special thing ... to send south ... to a girl in my village.'

'You will not take it to her yourself?'

'Never.'

'Then make it something precious, for long remembrance,' and the Arab put before him a selection of items, and from them Nxumalo started to choose his gift, but as he looked past the trinkets he saw the slaves, chained forever to their benches, and he was in confusion.

When Nxumalo led his porters back to Zimbabwe at the close of 1459, he brought with him goods from distant lands and much intelligence regarding developments on the Zambezi, where Sena and Tete were becoming important trading towns. He brought rumors of areas farther up the river where salt was available and the land not exhausted. And he secreted in his bundle a jade necklace from China, which he sent south with the Old Seeker on the trip which that fellow again averred was his last.

For many days he met in the citadel with the king and the Mhondoro, discussing the Zambezi developments. He reported on all that the Arabs had told him, and he started an impa.s.sioned description of what steps must be taken to protect and augment Zimbabwe, but he did not get far, because the king cut him short with an astonishing statement: 'We have decided to abandon this city.'

Nxumalo gasped. 'But it's a n.o.ble city,' he pleaded. 'Even better than Kilwa.'

'It was. It is. But it can no longer be.' The king was adamant in his decision that Great Zimbabwe, as it was called then and forever, must be surrendered to the jungle, since further occupancy was impractical.

As he reiterated this doleful verdict the three men looked down upon the fairest city south of Egypt, a subtle combination of granite-walled enclosures and adobe rondavels, a city in which eleven thousand workers enjoyed a good and differentiated life. It was a place of constant peace, of great enrichment for the few and modest well-being for all; its faults were that it had spent its energy searching for gold, its resultant income on ostentation. It had ignored clear signs that the press of people in the capital city had impaired the environment; the delicate balance between man and nature which had endured for so long was upset. Its economic stability and a.s.sured gold had pleased distant Arabs and Indian princes, but as its natural resources dwindled, its existence was doomed. Those long lines of slaves carrying in precious goods had done nothing to nourish the real city, so at the very apex of its glory it had to be abandoned.

On no one did the decision fall with harsher force than on Nxumalo, for on the dhow that night he had committed himself to the perpetuation of this city, yet on the day he returned to put his promise into action he was informed that the city would no longer exist. For two weeks he was disconsolate, and then it occurred to him that a worthy man dedicates himself not to one particular thing which attracts him, but to all tasks; and he vowed that when the time came to move this city to its new site, he would devote all his powers to that endeavor and, with Hlenga's help, make the new city superior to the old.