"Heu-Heu, or the Monster"
Allan Quatermain, with his Hottentot servant Hans, are trekking through the slopes of the Drakensberg mountains when they are caught in a fierce thunderstorm. They take shelter in a large cave which Hans recalled having lived in for several months in his boyhood. As they they, with their two Zulu ox-herds, are benighted in the cave - indeed it would be to court death to venture out into the hail and lightning - Hans tells Quatermain about the fossils in the cave (which has been home to bushmen for centuries), and of an horrific rock painting of a gorilla-like monster known as Heu-Heu.
Access to the painting is across a ledge bordering a bottomless pit. Rather than be shamed in front of the Zulu servants, and laughted at by Hans, Quatermain makes the journey. Although he loses a lanten and a loose front tooth, Quatermain sees the ancient painting, which resembles a man-ape of hideous and diabolical aspect, in the act of twisting the head off a man.
Quatermain went on into Zululand, where he hoped to acquire two new oxen to replace those killed by lightning in the storm, and because he was inquisitive about Heu-Heu. He wanted to ask Zikali, the wizard of the Black Kloof, the Thing-that-should-never-have-been-born, the Opener of Road, about it. Zikali, an aged witch-doctor of great renown, was an old friend of Quatermain, if indeed he was a friend who used Quatermain, as he used all others, for his own ends.
They meet a party of slayers (soldiers sent out by the King to do his bidding - which in those days almost invariably meant to "eat-up" some rival or disobedient subject. They have just put to death two of King Panda's daughters by throwing them off a precipice (after they have been blinded "because they had looked where they should not" - sought to marry men whom their uncle Prinnce Cetywayo disapproved). Quatermain is cordially welcomed, and escorted to Zikali's kraal.
Zikali evidently expects Quatermain, and indeed suggests that he has arranged for his arrival. He conjures up an image of the Heu-Heu in a fire, and asks Quatermain to travel to the land where Heu-Heu is to be found, there to recover a drug which he, Zikali, needs, from the Tree of Illusions. Zikali tells Quatermain that Heu-Heu was the ruler of a white tribe in the north, which fled south where the ruler was killed but returned in the form of a monstrous man-ape. He has terrorised the people - the Walloo - from that day to this. A vollcanic erruption on their island home in a lake destroyed their city, and only the Heu-Heu, his priests, and half-human Hairy Folk (Heuheua, said to be Heu-Heu's children), live there now. The people live on the margins of the lake, and make annual sacrifices of a maiden, who is left chained up for Heu-Heu to claim, just like Andromeda.
The land of the Walloo's lies 300 miles north, across the Zambezi, another 300 miles west, the north-west to some hills, after which a desert must be crossed. On the margins of the desert lies a swarm, and then the lake.
Zikali now introduces Issicore, a messenger from the Walloo, who resembles an ancient Egyptian in appearance and dress. He greets Quatermain, and even Hans, respectfully, calling the former "Great Lord Macumazahn, whose fame and prowess echo across the earth". He asks Quatermain to kill the Heu-Heu (for none of his people can do so). In return he will have as many diamonds as he wishes. Issicore explains that his fiance, Sabeela, daughter of the chief, Walloo (named after the tribe) is doomed to be the next sacrifice. Quatermain reluctantly agrees to accompany him, taking Hans, his two Zulu servants, and two of Zikali's men.
The Zulus are left in a village on the edge of the desert, where they must abandon their wagon (now pulled by a fresh team of oxen lent by Zikali). They reach the marsh just as a sandstorm envelopes the desert, and are met on the edge of the lake by a large canoe. They travel by river (killing one of the Hairy folk on the way, when they attack the canoe) to Walloo city, where they meet the elderly and fearful chief, and his daughter. They learn that the priests are led by Dacha, a cousin of the chief, who coverts the crown and Sabeela, and plots to get both. The people show signs of being the remnants of a civilised people well on the road to barbarism.
They are rowed to the island by Issicore and his men, though to do so is sacrilege. They drop Quatermain and Hans off to explore, and the canoe has to flee when the priests canoes arrive to investigate. Quatermain and Hans explore the ruins of the city, which has evidently been inundated like Pompeii, even down to the petrified people and animals. Since the canoe is gone, they decide to walk to the home of the priests, which is on the other side of the island - which had not suffered from the volcanism.
They meet the priests and their wives and servants. Quatermain flatters Dacha, but at the same time claims that he and Hans are mighty magicians in their own right. Quatermain, or "Blowing Wind" (who blows where he will) as he calls himself, explains that Hans ("Lord of the Fire", and "Light in Darkness" - this time genuine titles) is priest of the instant fire - and proves it with a box of matches, and when Hans shoots an aggressive dog with his revolver hidden in his trousers.
The priests treat Quatermain and Hans politely, partly because they fear them, and partly because Dacha hopes to use them. They attend a banquest, at which they meet Dramana, Sabeela's elder sister, who was a sacrifice seven years earlier, and is now one of Dacha's wives (the fate of those supposedly sacrificed to the god). The banquet concludes with a draught, called the "Cup of Illusions", being ceremonially quaffed by all present. This leads to bacchanallian behaviour, and thn to a certain clarity of perception. It is evidently a concoction from the Tree of which Zikali is so keen to get a sample. They are introduced to Heu-Heu, which is nothing more than a large painted stone statue.
Last year's bride (sacrifice to Heu-Heu) is to be sacrificed in earnest, because she will have nothing of Dacha, who is the real Heu-Heu. She kills herself before she can be sacrificed, calling a curse down upon Heu-Heu and his priests and votaries.
Dramana tells Quatermain that she wants to escape - though to try to do so is punishable with death. Meanwhile, Quatermain and Hans are free to explore the town of the priests, which includes a building which contains a sluice gate which prevents the low-lying farmland from being flooded by the waters of the lake. There are unusually heavy rains at the moment, and the lake level is already at its highest ever height. The sluice gate is secured in a closed position, and held in place by a stone bar. If this were to be released the whole of the low-lying part of the island would flood.
Sabeela arrives and is tied to the post of sacrifice. The Walloo's canoe waits out in the lake, as it is required to do until the dawn, when Heu-Heu will claim his sacrifice. But Quatermain and Hans rescue Sabeela, and place a dead women in her place on the post. This woman's body had lain in the sluice-gate building, where she had been killed in an accident, since it was not lawful to touch a body between the evening the new Bride was bound on the rock, to the dawn when she would be taken. Quatermain returns to the sluice-gate building, where he fires the gunpowder (they had a small amount with them) which they have placed on the lever. He then return to the sacrifice rock - or rather an adjacent high rock. As has been arranged, Hans swims out to the canoe, to get them to come in to pick them up.
The sluice gate is released, and floodwaters start to cover the land. The Heu-Heu, who is evidently Dacha on stilts, comes out of his cave at the appointed time, attended by his priests, the Hairy Folk, and votaries. They discover the switch, and see the waters at the same time. Water begins to cascade into the cave in which "Heu-Heu" is kept, which apparently leads into the heart of the volcano. This drowns most of the devotees, and causes the volcano to start to erupt. Dacha is borne away on a wave. A large hot stone fell on the Walloo's head, which "squashed him like a beetle", as Hans observed. Sabeela is now Walloo, and takes charge. They manage to get back to the city, and most of the Hairy folk drown.
Issicore dies of the curse of Heu-Heu (or because he was poisoned by the priests before their own destruction). He wants Quatermain to marry Sabeela, as does the council. Sabeela prefers to stay single, but defers to the wishes of her people - officially. However, Quatermain doesn't want to be a prisoner in a gilded cage. He is given permission to visit the island, in fact a ruse to allow them to escape, since their rowers are spies of the priests, who also must flee to save themselves. Dramana asks to come too, but is refused and somewhat hurt. They are pursued but manage to reach the swamp, beyond which the Walloo will not come.
This is an interesting updating of the story of Andromeda, though Alan Quatermain makes an improbably Ulysseus. Sabeela, the black Andromeda, is rescued from the monster Heu-Heu. Again Haggard alludes to the people being a remnant of a higher race - in this case possibly with Greek influence, hence the mythology. However the monster is no merely insubstantial legend; it exists as an effigy controlled by the priests. The drowing of the temple is remiscent of the flooding of the City of Gold in "Heart of the World", but also has similarities to events in "When the World Shook". Few of the characters are particularly interesting, though Hans is good value as usual, and the ancient Zikali an unpleasant fellow.
There are hints that Heu-Heu might originally have been a cave-man of Neanderthal, though this remains speculative, as indeed does the background histories of most of the ancient peoples Haggard portrays - except indeed, for the Atlanteans in "When the World Shook", for there alone the ancient (literally predeluvian) King Oro and his daughter Yva still lived to give an account of the earliest times.