"Aye," answered the jolly old Umbezi, "but what her father has not said
is that Saduko is her lover, or, rather, would like to be. Wow!
Saduko," he went on, shaking his fat finger at him, "are you mad, man,
that you think a girl like that is for you? Give me a hundred cattle,
not one less, and I will begin to think of it. Why, you have not ten,
and Mameena is my eldest daughter, and must marry a rich man."

"She loves me, O Umbezi," answered Saduko, looking down, "and that is
more than cattle."

"For you, perhaps, Saduko, but not for me who am poor and want cows.
Also," he added, glancing at him shrewdly, "are you so sure that Mameena
loves you though you be such a fine man? Now, I should have thought
that whatever her eyes may say, her heart loves no one but herself, and
that in the end she will follow her heart and not her eyes. Mameena the
beautiful does not seek to be a poor man's wife and do all the hoeing.
But bring me the hundred cattle and we will see, for, speaking truth
from my heart, if you were a big chief there is no one I should like
better as a son-in-law, unless it were Macumazahn here," he said,
digging me in the ribs with his elbow, "who would lift up my House on
his white back."

Now, at this speech Saduko shifted his feet uneasily; it seemed to me as
though he felt there was truth in Umbezi's estimate of his daughter's
character. But he only said:

"Cattle can be acquired."

"Or stolen," suggested Umbezi.