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\hyphenation{Tar-zan}

\hyphenation{Grey-stoke}

\hyphenation{pith-e-can-thro-p-us}

\pagestyle{empty}


\title{Tarzan the Terrible}


\author{Edgar Rice Burroughs}

\maketitle
\vspace*{\stretch{1}}

\noindent This public-domain (U.S.) text was prepared by Judy Boss,
Omaha, NE. The Project Gutenberg edition ({}``tzntr10'') was subsequently
converted to \LaTeX{} using \textbf{GutenMark} software and then re-edited
(for formatting only) by Ron Burkey. Report problems to info@sandroid.org.
Revision B1 differs from B0 in that {}``----'' has everywhere been
replaced by {}``---''.

\begin{center}Revision: B1, 01/27/2008\end{center}

\vspace{\stretch{1}}

\frontmatter

\pagestyle{myheadings} \tableofcontents{}\newpage

\mainmatter


\chapter{The Pithecanthropus}

\markboth{Tarzan the Terrible}{The Pithecanthropus}

Silent as the shadows through which he moved, the great beast slunk
through the midnight jungle, his yellow-green eyes round and staring,
his sinewy tail undulating behind him, his head lowered and flattened,
and every muscle vibrant to the thrill of the hunt. The jungle moon
dappled an occasional clearing which the great cat was always careful
to avoid. Though he moved through thick verdure across a carpet of
innumerable twigs, broken branches, and leaves, his passing gave forth
no sound that might have been apprehended by dull human ears.

Apparently less cautious was the hunted thing moving even as silently
as the lion a hundred paces ahead of the tawny carnivore, for instead
of skirting the moon-splashed natural clearings it passed directly
across them, and by the tortuous record of its spoor it might indeed
be guessed that it sought these avenues of least resistance, as well
it might, since, unlike its grim stalker, it walked erect upon two
feet\mbox{---}it walked upon two feet and was hairless except for
a black thatch upon its head; its arms were well shaped and muscular;
its hands powerful and slender with long tapering fingers and thumbs
reaching almost to the first joint of the index fingers. Its legs
too were shapely but its feet departed from the standards of all races
of men, except possibly a few of the lowest races, in that the great
toes protruded at right angles from the foot.

Pausing momentarily in the full light of the gorgeous African moon
the creature turned an attentive ear to the rear and then, his head
lifted, his features might readily have been discerned in the moonlight.
They were strong, clean cut, and regular\mbox{---}features that
would have attracted attention for their masculine beauty in any of
the great capitals of the world. But was this thing a man? It would
have been hard for a watcher in the trees to have decided as the lion's
prey resumed its way across the silver tapestry that Luna had laid
upon the floor of the dismal jungle, for from beneath the loin cloth
of black fur that girdled its thighs there depended a long hairless,
white tail.

In one hand the creature carried a stout club, and suspended at its
left side from a shoulder belt was a short, sheathed knife, while
a cross belt supported a pouch at its right hip. Confining these straps
to the body and also apparently supporting the loin cloth was a broad
girdle which glittered in the moonlight as though encrusted with virgin
gold, and was clasped in the center of the belly with a huge buckle
of ornate design that scintillated as with precious stones.

Closer and closer crept Numa, the lion, to his intended victim, and
that the latter was not entirely unaware of his danger was evidenced
by the increasing frequency with which he turned his ear and his sharp
black eyes in the direction of the cat upon his trail. He did not
greatly increase his speed, a long swinging walk where the open places
permitted, but he loosened the knife in its scabbard and at all times
kept his club in readiness for instant action.

Forging at last through a narrow strip of dense jungle vegetation
the man-thing broke through into an almost treeless area of considerable
extent. For an instant he hesitated, glancing quickly behind him and
then up at the security of the branches of the great trees waving
overhead, but some greater urge than fear or caution influenced his
decision apparently, for he moved off again across the little plain
leaving the safety of the trees behind him. At greater or less intervals
leafy sanctuaries dotted the grassy expanse ahead of him and the route
he took, leading from one to another, indicated that he had not entirely
cast discretion to the winds. But after the second tree had been left
behind the distance to the next was considerable, and it was then
that Numa walked from the concealing cover of the jungle and, seeing
his quarry apparently helpless before him, raised his tail stiffly
erect and charged.

Two months\mbox{---}two long, weary months filled with hunger, with
thirst, with hardships, with disappointment, and, greater than all,
with gnawing pain\mbox{---}had passed since Tarzan of the Apes learned
from the diary of the dead German captain that his wife still lived.
A brief investigation in which he was enthusiastically aided by the
Intelligence Department of the British East African Expedition revealed
the fact that an attempt had been made to keep Lady Jane in hiding
in the interior, for reasons of which only the German High Command
might be cognizant.

In charge of Lieutenant Obergatz and a detachment of native German
troops she had been sent across the border into the Congo Free State.

Starting out alone in search of her, Tarzan had succeeded in finding
the village in which she had been incarcerated only to learn that
she had escaped months before, and that the German officer had disappeared
at the same time. From there on the stories of the chiefs and the
warriors whom he quizzed, were vague and often contradictory. Even
the direction that the fugitives had taken Tarzan could only guess
at by piecing together bits of fragmentary evidence gleaned from various
sources.

Sinister conjectures were forced upon him by various observations
which he made in the village. One was incontrovertible proof that
these people were man-eaters; the other, the presence in the village
of various articles of native German uniforms and equipment. At great
risk and in the face of surly objection on the part of the chief,
the ape-man made a careful inspection of every hut in the village
from which at least a little ray of hope resulted from the fact that
he found no article that might have belonged to his wife.

Leaving the village he had made his way toward the southwest, crossing,
after the most appalling hardships, a vast waterless steppe covered
for the most part with dense thorn, coming at last into a district
that had probably never been previously entered by any white man and
which was known only in the legends of the tribes whose country bordered
it. Here were precipitous mountains, well-watered plateaus, wide plains,
and vast swampy morasses, but neither the plains, nor the plateaus,
nor the mountains were accessible to him until after weeks of arduous
effort he succeeded in finding a spot where he might cross the morasses\mbox{---}a
hideous stretch infested by venomous snakes and other larger dangerous
reptiles. On several occasions he glimpsed at distances or by night
what might have been titanic reptilian monsters, but as there were
hippopotami, rhinoceri, and elephants in great numbers in and about
the marsh he was never positive that the forms he saw were not of
these.

When at last he stood upon firm ground after crossing the morasses
he realized why it was that for perhaps countless ages this territory
had defied the courage and hardihood of the heroic races of the outer
world that had, after innumerable reverses and unbelievable suffering
penetrated to practically every other region, from pole to pole.

From the abundance and diversity of the game it might have appeared
that every known species of bird and beast and reptile had sought
here a refuge wherein they might take their last stand against the
encroaching multitudes of men that had steadily spread themselves
over the surface of the earth, wresting the hunting grounds from the
lower orders, from the moment that the first ape shed his hair and
ceased to walk upon his knuckles. Even the species with which Tarzan
was familiar showed here either the results of a divergent line of
evolution or an unaltered form that had been transmitted without variation
for countless ages.

Too, there were many hybrid strains, not the least interesting of
which to Tarzan was a yellow and black striped lion. Smaller than
the species with which Tarzan was familiar, but still a most formidable
beast, since it possessed in addition to sharp saber-like canines
the disposition of a devil. To Tarzan it presented evidence that tigers
had once roamed the jungles of Africa, possibly giant saber-tooths
of another epoch, and these apparently had crossed with lions with
the resultant terrors that he occasionally encountered at the present
day.

The true lions of this new, Old World differed but little from those
with which he was familiar; in size and conformation they were almost
identical, but instead of shedding the leopard spots of cubhood, they
retained them through life as definitely marked as those of the leopard.

Two months of effort had revealed no slightest evidence that she he
sought had entered this beautiful yet forbidding land. His investigation,
however, of the cannibal village and his questioning of other tribes
in the neighborhood had convinced him that if Lady Jane still lived
it must be in this direction that he seek her, since by a process
of elimination he had reduced the direction of her flight to only
this possibility. How she had crossed the morass he could not guess
and yet something within seemed to urge upon him belief that she had
crossed it, and that if she still lived it was here that she must
be sought. But this unknown, untraversed wild was of vast extent;
grim, forbidding mountains blocked his way, torrents tumbling from
rocky fastnesses impeded his progress, and at every turn he was forced
to match wits and muscles with the great carnivora that he might procure
sustenance.

Time and again Tarzan and Numa stalked the same quarry and now one,
now the other bore off the prize. Seldom however did the ape-man go
hungry for the country was rich in game animals and birds and fish,
in fruit and the countless other forms of vegetable life upon which
the jungle-bred man may subsist.

Tarzan often wondered why in so rich a country he found no evidences
of man and had at last come to the conclusion that the parched, thorn-covered
steppe and the hideous morasses had formed a sufficient barrier to
protect this country effectively from the inroads of mankind.

After days of searching he had succeeded finally in discovering a
pass through the mountains and, coming down upon the opposite side,
had found himself in a country practically identical with that which
he had left. The hunting was good and at a water hole in the mouth
of a canon where it debouched upon a tree-covered plain Bara, the
deer, fell an easy victim to the ape-man's cunning.

It was just at dusk. The voices of great four-footed hunters rose
now and again from various directions, and as the canon afforded among
its trees no comfortable retreat the ape-man shouldered the carcass
of the deer and started downward onto the plain. At its opposite side
rose lofty trees\mbox{---}a great forest which suggested to his
practiced eye a mighty jungle. Toward this the ape-man bent his step,
but when midway of the plain he discovered standing alone such a tree
as best suited him for a night's abode, swung lightly to its branches
and, presently, a comfortable resting place.

Here he ate the flesh of Bara and when satisfied carried the balance
of the carcass to the opposite side of the tree where he deposited
it far above the ground in a secure place. Returning to his crotch
he settled himself for sleep and in another moment the roars of the
lions and the howlings of the lesser cats fell upon deaf ears.

The usual noises of the jungle composed rather than disturbed the
ape-man but an unusual sound, however imperceptible to the awakened
ear of civilized man, seldom failed to impinge upon the consciousness
of Tarzan, however deep his slumber, and so it was that when the moon
was high a sudden rush of feet across the grassy carpet in the vicinity
of his tree brought him to alert and ready activity. Tarzan does not
awaken as you and I with the weight of slumber still upon his eyes
and brain, for did the creatures of the wild awaken thus, their awakenings
would be few. As his eyes snapped open, clear and bright, so, clear
and bright upon the nerve centers of his brain, were registered the
various perceptions of all his senses.

Almost beneath him, racing toward his tree was what at first glance
appeared to be an almost naked white man, yet even at the first instant
of discovery the long, white tail projecting rearward did not escape
the ape-man. Behind the fleeing figure, escaping, came Numa, the lion,
in full charge. Voiceless the prey, voiceless the killer; as two spirits
in a dead world the two moved in silent swiftness toward the culminating
tragedy of this grim race.

Even as his eyes opened and took in the scene beneath him\mbox{---}even
in that brief instant of perception, followed reason, judgment, and
decision, so rapidly one upon the heels of the other that almost simultaneously
the ape-man was in mid-air, for he had seen a white-skinned creature
cast in a mold similar to his own, pursued by Tarzan's hereditary
enemy. So close was the lion to the fleeing man-thing that Tarzan
had no time carefully to choose the method of his attack. As a diver
leaps from the springboard headforemost into the waters beneath, so
Tarzan of the Apes dove straight for Numa, the lion; naked in his
right hand the blade of his father that so many times before had tasted
the blood of lions.

A raking talon caught Tarzan on the side, inflicting a long, deep
wound and then the ape-man was on Numa's back and the blade was sinking
again and again into the savage side. Nor was the man-thing either
longer fleeing, or idle. He too, creature of the wild, had sensed
on the instant the truth of the miracle of his saving, and turning
in his tracks, had leaped forward with raised bludgeon to Tarzan's
assistance and Numa's undoing. A single terrific blow upon the flattened
skull of the beast laid him insensible and then as Tarzan's knife
found the wild heart a few convulsive shudders and a sudden relaxation
marked the passing of the carnivore.

Leaping to his feet the ape-man placed his foot upon the carcass of
his kill and, raising his face to Goro, the moon, voiced the savage
victory cry that had so often awakened the echoes of his native jungle.

As the hideous scream burst from the ape-man's lips the man-thing
stepped quickly back as in sudden awe, but when Tarzan returned his
hunting knife to its sheath and turned toward him the other saw in
the quiet dignity of his demeanor no cause for apprehension.

For a moment the two stood appraising each other, and then the man-thing
spoke. Tarzan realized that the creature before him was uttering articulate
sounds which expressed in speech, though in a language with which
Tarzan was unfamiliar, the thoughts of a man possessing to a greater
or less extent the same powers of reason that he possessed. In other
words, that though the creature before him had the tail and thumbs
and great toes of a monkey, it was, in all other respects, quite evidently
a man.

The blood, which was now flowing down Tarzan's side, caught the creature's
attention. From the pocket-pouch at his side he took a small bag and
approaching Tarzan indicated by signs that he wished the ape-man to
lie down that he might treat the wound, whereupon, spreading the edges
of the cut apart, he sprinkled the raw flesh with powder from the
little bag. The pain of the wound was as nothing to the exquisite
torture of the remedy but, accustomed to physical suffering, the ape-man
withstood it stoically and in a few moments not only had the bleeding
ceased but the pain as well.

In reply to the soft and far from unpleasant modulations of the other's
voice, Tarzan spoke in various tribal dialects of the interior as
well as in the language of the great apes, but it was evident that
the man understood none of these. Seeing that they could not make
each other understood, the pithecanthropus advanced toward Tarzan
and placing his left hand over his own heart laid the palm of his
right hand over the heart of the ape-man. To the latter the action
appeared as a form of friendly greeting and, being versed in the ways
of uncivilized races, he responded in kind as he realized it was doubtless
intended that he should. His action seemed to satisfy and please his
new-found acquaintance, who immediately fell to talking again and
finally, with his head tipped back, sniffed the air in the direction
of the tree above them and then suddenly pointing toward the carcass
of Bara, the deer, he touched his stomach in a sign language which
even the densest might interpret. With a wave of his hand Tarzan invited
his guest to partake of the remains of his savage repast, and the
other, leaping nimbly as a little monkey to the lower branches of
the tree, made his way quickly to the flesh, assisted always by his
long, strong sinuous tail.

The pithecanthropus ate in silence, cutting small strips from the
deer's loin with his keen knife. From his crotch in the tree Tarzan
watched his companion, noting the preponderance of human attributes
which were doubtless accentuated by the paradoxical thumbs, great
toes, and tail.

He wondered if this creature was representative of some strange race
or if, what seemed more likely, but an atavism. Either supposition
would have seemed preposterous enough did he not have before him the
evidence of the creature's existence. There he was, however, a tailed
man with distinctly arboreal hands and feet. His trappings, gold encrusted
and jewel studded, could have been wrought only by skilled artisans;
but whether they were the work of this individual or of others like
him, or of an entirely different race, Tarzan could not, of course,
determine.

His meal finished, the guest wiped his fingers and lips with leaves
broken from a nearby branch, looked up at Tarzan with a pleasant smile
that revealed a row of strong white teeth, the canines of which were
no longer than Tarzan's own, spoke a few words which Tarzan judged
were a polite expression of thanks and then sought a comfortable place
in the tree for the night.

The earth was shadowed in the darkness which precedes the dawn when
Tarzan was awakened by a violent shaking of the tree in which he had
found shelter. As he opened his eyes he saw that his companion was
also astir, and glancing around quickly to apprehend the cause of
the disturbance, the ape-man was astounded at the sight which met
his eyes.

The dim shadow of a colossal form reared close beside the tree and
he saw that it was the scraping of the giant body against the branches
that had awakened him. That such a tremendous creature could have
approached so closely without disturbing him filled Tarzan with both
wonderment and chagrin. In the gloom the ape-man at first conceived
the intruder to be an elephant; yet, if so, one of greater proportions
than any he had ever before seen, but as the dim outlines became less
indistinct he saw on a line with his eyes and twenty feet above the
ground the dim silhouette of a grotesquely serrated back that gave
the impression of a creature whose each and every spinal vertebra
grew a thick, heavy horn. Only a portion of the back was visible to
the ape-man, the rest of the body being lost in the dense shadows
beneath the tree, from whence there now arose the sound of giant jaws
powerfully crunching flesh and bones. From the odors that rose to
the ape-man's sensitive nostrils he presently realized that beneath
him was some huge reptile feeding upon the carcass of the lion that
had been slain there earlier in the night.

As Tarzan's eyes, straining with curiosity, bored futilely into the
dark shadows he felt a light touch upon his shoulder, and, turning,
saw that his companion was attempting to attract his attention. The
creature, pressing a forefinger to his own lips as to enjoin silence,
attempted by pulling on Tarzan's arm to indicate that they should
leave at once.

Realizing that he was in a strange country, evidently infested by
creatures of titanic size, with the habits and powers of which he
was entirely unfamiliar, the ape-man permitted himself to be drawn
away. With the utmost caution the pithecanthropus descended the tree
upon the opposite side from the great nocturnal prowler, and, closely
followed by Tarzan, moved silently away through the night across the
plain.

The ape-man was rather loath thus to relinquish an opportunity to
inspect a creature which he realized was probably entirely different
from anything in his past experience; yet he was wise enough to know
when discretion was the better part of valor and now, as in the past,
he yielded to that law which dominates the kindred of the wild, preventing
them from courting danger uselessly, whose lives are sufficiently
filled with danger in their ordinary routine of feeding and mating.

As the rising sun dispelled the shadows of the night, Tarzan found
himself again upon the verge of a great forest into which his guide
plunged, taking nimbly to the branches of the trees through which
he made his way with the celerity of long habitude and hereditary
instinct, but though aided by a prehensile tail, fingers, and toes,
the man-thing moved through the forest with no greater ease or surety
than did the giant ape-man.

It was during this journey that Tarzan recalled the wound in his side
inflicted upon him the previous night by the raking talons of Numa,
the lion, and examining it was surprised to discover that not only
was it painless but along its edges were no indications of inflammation,
the results doubtless of the antiseptic powder his strange companion
had sprinkled upon it.

They had proceeded for a mile or two when Tarzan's companion came
to earth upon a grassy slope beneath a great tree whose branches overhung
a clear brook. Here they drank and Tarzan discovered the water to
be not only deliciously pure and fresh but of an icy temperature that
indicated its rapid descent from the lofty mountains of its origin.

Casting aside his loin cloth and weapons Tarzan entered the little
pool beneath the tree and after a moment emerged, greatly refreshed
and filled with a keen desire to breakfast. As he came out of the
pool he noticed his companion examining him with a puzzled expression
upon his face. Taking the ape-man by the shoulder he turned him around
so that Tarzan's back was toward him and then, touching the end of
Tarzan's spine with his forefinger, he curled his own tail up over
his shoulder and, wheeling the ape-man about again, pointed first
at Tarzan and then at his own caudal appendage, a look of puzzlement
upon his face, the while he jabbered excitedly in his strange tongue.

The ape-man realized that probably for the first time his companion
had discovered that he was tailless by nature rather than by accident,
and so he called attention to his own great toes and thumbs to further
impress upon the creature that they were of different species.

The fellow shook his head dubiously as though entirely unable to comprehend
why Tarzan should differ so from him but at last, apparently giving
the problem up with a shrug, he laid aside his own harness, skin,
and weapons and entered the pool.

His ablutions completed and his meager apparel redonned he seated
himself at the foot of the tree and motioning Tarzan to a place beside
him, opened the pouch that hung at his right side taking from it strips
of dried flesh and a couple of handfuls of thin-shelled nuts with
which Tarzan was unfamiliar. Seeing the other break them with his
teeth and eat the kernel, Tarzan followed the example thus set him,
discovering the meat to be rich and well flavored. The dried flesh
also was far from unpalatable, though it had evidently been jerked
without salt, a commodity which Tarzan imagined might be rather difficult
to obtain in this locality.

As they ate Tarzan's companion pointed to the nuts, the dried meat,
and various other nearby objects, in each instance repeating what
Tarzan readily discovered must be the names of these things in the
creature's native language. The ape-man could but smile at this evident
desire upon the part of his new-found acquaintance to impart to him
instructions that eventually might lead to an exchange of thoughts
between them. Having already mastered several languages and a multitude
of dialects the ape-man felt that he could readily assimilate another
even though this appeared one entirely unrelated to any with which
he was familiar.

So occupied were they with their breakfast and the lesson that neither
was aware of the beady eyes glittering down upon them from above;
nor was Tarzan cognizant of any impending danger until the instant
that a huge, hairy body leaped full upon his companion from the branches
above them.


\chapter{{}``To the Death!''}

\markboth{Tarzan the Terrible}{{}``To the Death!''}

In the moment of discovery Tarzan saw that the creature was almost
a counterpart of his companion in size and conformation, with the
exception that his body was entirely clothed with a coat of shaggy
black hair which almost concealed his features, while his harness
and weapons were similar to those of the creature he had attacked.
Ere Tarzan could prevent the creature had struck the ape-man's companion
a blow upon the head with his knotted club that felled him, unconscious,
to the earth; but before he could inflict further injury upon his
defenseless prey the ape-man had closed with him.

Instantly Tarzan realized that he was locked with a creature of almost
superhuman strength. The sinewy fingers of a powerful hand sought
his throat while the other lifted the bludgeon above his head. But
if the strength of the hairy attacker was great, great too was that
of his smooth-skinned antagonist. Swinging a single terrific blow
with clenched fist to the point of the other's chin, Tarzan momentarily
staggered his assailant and then his own fingers closed upon the shaggy
throat, as with the other hand he seized the wrist of the arm that
swung the club. With equal celerity he shot his right leg behind the
shaggy brute and throwing his weight forward hurled the thing over
his hip heavily to the ground, at the same time precipitating his
own body upon the other's chest.

With the shock of the impact the club fell from the brute's hand and
Tarzan's hold was wrenched from its throat. Instantly the two were
locked in a deathlike embrace. Though the creature bit at Tarzan the
latter was quickly aware that this was not a particularly formidable
method of offense or defense, since its canines were scarcely more
developed than his own. The thing that he had principally to guard
against was the sinuous tail which sought steadily to wrap itself
about his throat and against which experience had afforded him no
defense.

Struggling and snarling the two rolled growling about the sward at
the foot of the tree, first one on top and then the other but each
more occupied at present in defending his throat from the other's
choking grasp than in aggressive, offensive tactics. But presently
the ape-man saw his opportunity and as they rolled about he forced
the creature closer and closer to the pool, upon the banks of which
the battle was progressing. At last they lay upon the very verge of
the water and now it remained for Tarzan to precipitate them both
beneath the surface but in such a way that he might remain on top.

At the same instant there came within range of Tarzan's vision, just
behind the prostrate form of his companion, the crouching, devil-faced
figure of the striped saber-tooth hybrid, eyeing him with snarling,
malevolent face.

Almost simultaneously Tarzan's shaggy antagonist discovered the menacing
figure of the great cat. Immediately he ceased his belligerent activities
against Tarzan and, jabbering and chattering to the ape-man, he tried
to disengage himself from Tarzan's hold but in such a way that indicated
that as far as he was concerned their battle was over. Appreciating
the danger to his unconscious companion and being anxious to protect
him from the saber-tooth the ape-man relinquished his hold upon his
adversary and together the two rose to their feet.

Drawing his knife Tarzan moved slowly toward the body of his companion,
expecting that his recent antagonist would grasp the opportunity for
escape. To his surprise, however, the beast, after regaining its club,
advanced at his side.

The great cat, flattened upon its belly, remained motionless except
for twitching tail and snarling lips where it lay perhaps fifty feet
beyond the body of the pithecanthropus. As Tarzan stepped over the
body of the latter he saw the eyelids quiver and open, and in his
heart he felt a strange sense of relief that the creature was not
dead and a realization that without his suspecting it there had arisen
within his savage bosom a bond of attachment for this strange new
friend.

Tarzan continued to approach the saber-tooth, nor did the shaggy beast
at his right lag behind. Closer and closer they came until at a distance
of about twenty feet the hybrid charged. Its rush was directed toward
the shaggy manlike ape who halted in his tracks with upraised bludgeon
to meet the assault. Tarzan, on the contrary, leaped forward and with
a celerity second not even to that of the swift-moving cat, he threw
himself headlong upon him as might a Rugby tackler on an American
gridiron. His right arm circled the beast's neck in front of the right
shoulder, his left behind the left foreleg, and so great was the force
of the impact that the two rolled over and over several times upon
the ground, the cat screaming and clawing to liberate itself that
it might turn upon its attacker, the man clinging desperately to his
hold.

Seemingly the attack was one of mad, senseless ferocity unguided by
either reason or skill. Nothing, however, could have been farther
from the truth than such an assumption since every muscle in the ape-man's
giant frame obeyed the dictates of the cunning mind that long experience
had trained to meet every exigency of such an encounter. The long,
powerful legs, though seemingly inextricably entangled with the hind
feet of the clawing cat, ever as by a miracle, escaped the raking
talons and yet at just the proper instant in the midst of all the
rolling and tossing they were where they should be to carry out the
ape-man's plan of offense. So that on the instant that the cat believed
it had won the mastery of its antagonist it was jerked suddenly upward
as the ape-man rose to his feet, holding the striped back close against
his body as he rose and forcing it backward until it could but claw
the air helplessly.

Instantly the shaggy black rushed in with drawn knife which it buried
in the beast's heart. For a few moments Tarzan retained his hold but
when the body had relaxed in final dissolution he pushed it from him
and the two who had formerly been locked in mortal combat stood facing
each other across the body of the common foe.

Tarzan waited, ready either for peace or war. Presently two shaggy
black hands were raised; the left was laid upon its own heart and
the right extended until the palm touched Tarzan's breast. It was
the same form of friendly salutation with which the pithecanthropus
had sealed his alliance with the ape-man and Tarzan, glad of every
ally he could win in this strange and savage world, quickly accepted
the proffered friendship.

At the conclusion of the brief ceremony Tarzan, glancing in the direction
of the hairless pithecanthropus, discovered that the latter had recovered
consciousness and was sitting erect watching them intently. He now
rose slowly and at the same time the shaggy black turned in his direction
and addressed him in what evidently was their common language. The
hairless one replied and the two approached each other slowly. Tarzan
watched interestedly the outcome of their meeting. They halted a few
paces apart, first one and then the other speaking rapidly but without
apparent excitement, each occasionally glancing or nodding toward
Tarzan, indicating that he was to some extent the subject of their
conversation.

Presently they advanced again until they met, whereupon was repeated
the brief ceremony of alliance which had previously marked the cessation
of hostilities between Tarzan and the black. They then advanced toward
the ape-man addressing him earnestly as though endeavoring to convey
to him some important information. Presently, however, they gave it
up as an unprofitable job and, resorting to sign language, conveyed
to Tarzan that they were proceeding upon their way together and were
urging him to accompany them.

As the direction they indicated was a route which Tarzan had not previously
traversed he was extremely willing to accede to their request, as
he had determined thoroughly to explore this unknown land before definitely
abandoning search for Lady Jane therein.

For several days their way led through the foothills parallel to the
lofty range towering above. Often were they menaced by the savage
denizens of this remote fastness, and occasionally Tarzan glimpsed
weird forms of gigantic proportions amidst the shadows of the nights.

On the third day they came upon a large natural cave in the face of
a low cliff at the foot of which tumbled one of the numerous mountain
brooks that watered the plain below and fed the morasses in the lowlands
at the country's edge. Here the three took up their temporary abode
where Tarzan's instruction in the language of his companions progressed
more rapidly than while on the march.

The cave gave evidence of having harbored other manlike forms in the
past. Remnants of a crude, rock fireplace remained and the walls and
ceiling were blackened with the smoke of many fires. Scratched in
the soot, and sometimes deeply into the rock beneath, were strange
hieroglyphics and the outlines of beasts and birds and reptiles, some
of the latter of weird form suggesting the extinct creatures of Jurassic
times. Some of the more recently made hieroglyphics Tarzan's companions
read with interest and commented upon, and then with the points of
their knives they too added to the possibly age-old record of the
blackened walls.

Tarzan's curiosity was aroused, but the only explanation at which
he could arrive was that he was looking upon possibly the world's
most primitive hotel register. At least it gave him a further insight
into the development of the strange creatures with which Fate had
thrown him. Here were men with the tails of monkeys, one of them as
hair covered as any fur-bearing brute of the lower orders, and yet
it was evident that they possessed not only a spoken, but a written
language. The former he was slowly mastering and at this new evidence
of unlooked-for civilization in creatures possessing so many of the
physical attributes of beasts, Tarzan's curiosity was still further
piqued and his desire quickly to master their tongue strengthened,
with the result that he fell to with even greater assiduity to the
task he had set himself. Already he knew the names of his companions
and the common names of the fauna and flora with which they had most
often come in contact.

Ta-den, he of the hairless, white skin, having assumed the role of
tutor, prosecuted his task with a singleness of purpose that was reflected
in his pupil's rapid mastery of Ta-den's mother tongue. Om-at, the
hairy black, also seemed to feel that there rested upon his broad
shoulders a portion of the burden of responsibility for Tarzan's education,
with the result that either one or the other of them was almost constantly
coaching the ape-man during his waking hours. The result was only
what might have been expected\mbox{---}a rapid assimilation of the
teachings to the end that before any of them realized it, communication
by word of mouth became an accomplished fact.

Tarzan explained to his companions the purpose of his mission but
neither could give him any slightest thread of hope to weave into
the fabric of his longing. Never had there been in their country a
woman such as he described, nor any tailless man other than himself
that they ever had seen.

{}``I have been gone from A-lur while Bu, the moon, has eaten seven
times,'' said Ta-den. {}``Many things may happen in seven times
twenty-eight days; but I doubt that your woman could have entered
our country across the terrible morasses which even you found an almost
insurmountable obstacle, and if she had, could she have survived the
perils that you already have encountered beside those of which you
have yet to learn? Not even our own women venture into the savage
lands beyond the cities.''

{}```A-lur,' Light-city, City of Light,'' mused Tarzan, translating
the word into his own tongue. {}``And where is A-lur?''\ he asked.
{}``Is it your city, Ta-den, and Om-at's?''\ 

{}``It is mine,'' replied the hairless one; {}``but not Om-at's.
The Waz-don have no cities\mbox{---}they live in the trees of the
forests and the caves of the hills\mbox{---}is it not so, black
man?''\ he concluded, turning toward the hairy giant beside him.

{}``Yes,'' replied Om-at, {}``We Waz-don are free\mbox{---}only
the Hodon imprison themselves in cities. I would not be a white man!''\ 

Tarzan smiled. Even here was the rac\-i\-al distinction between
white man and black man\mbox{---}Ho-don and Waz-don. Not even the
fact that they appeared to be equals in the matter of intelligence
made any dif\-f\-er\-ence\mbox{---}one was white and one was
black, and it was easy to see that the white considered himself superior
to the other\mbox{---}one could see it in his quiet smile.

{}``Where is A-lur?''\ Tarzan asked again. {}``You are returning
to it?''\ 

{}``It is beyond the mountains,'' replied Ta-den. {}``I do not
return to it\mbox{---}not yet. Not until Ko-tan is no more.''

{}``Ko-tan?''\ queried Tarzan.

{}``Ko-tan is king,'' explained the pithecanthropus. {}``He rules
this land. I was one of his warriors. I lived in the palace of Ko-tan
and there I met O-lo-a, his daughter. We loved, Likestar-light, and
I; but Ko-tan would have none of me. He sent me away to fight with
the men of the village of Dak-at, who had refused to pay his tribute
to the king, thinking that I would be killed, for Dak-at is famous
for his many fine warriors. And I was not killed. Instead I returned
victorious with the tribute and with Dak-at himself my prisoner; but
Ko-tan was not pleased because he saw that O-lo-a loved me even more
than before, her love being strengthened and fortified by pride in
my achievement.

{}``Powerful is my father, Ja-don, the Lion-man, chief of the largest
village outside of A-lur. Him Ko-tan hesitated to affront and so he
could not but praise me for my success, though he did it with half
a smile. But you do not understand! It is what we call a smile that
moves only the muscles of the face and affects not the light of the
eyes\mbox{---}it means hypocrisy and duplicity. I must be praised
and rewarded. What better than that he reward me with the hand of
O-lo-a, his daughter? But no, he saves O-lo-a for Bu-lot, son of Mo-sar,
the chief whose great-grandfather was king and who thinks that he
should be king. Thus would Ko-tan appease the wrath of Mo-sar and
win the friendship of those who think with Mo-sar that Mo-sar should
be king.

{}``But what reward shall repay the faithful Ta-den? Greatly do we
honor our priests. Within the temples even the chiefs and the king
himself bow down to them. No greater honor could Ko-tan confer upon
a subject\mbox{---}who wished to be a priest, but I did not so wish.
Priests other than the high priest must become eunuchs for they may
never marry.

{}``It was O-lo-a herself who brought word to me that her father
had given the commands that would set in motion the machinery of the
temple. A messenger was on his way in search of me to summon me to
Ko-tan's presence. To have refused the priesthood once it was offered
me by the king would have been to have affronted the temple and the
gods\mbox{---}that would have meant death; but if I did not appear
before Ko-tan I would not have to refuse anything. O-lo-a and I decided
that I must not appear. It was better to fly, carrying in my bosom
a shred of hope, than to remain and, with my priesthood, abandon hope
forever.

{}``Beneath the shadows of the great trees that grow within the palace
grounds I pressed her to me for, perhaps, the last time and then,
lest by ill-fate I meet the messenger, I scaled the great wall that
guards the palace and passed through the darkened city. My name and
rank carried me beyond the city gate. Since then I have wandered far
from the haunts of the Ho-don but strong within me is the urge to
return if even but to look from without her walls upon the city that
holds her most dear to me and again to visit the village of my birth,
to see again my father and my mother.''

{}``But the risk is too great?''\ asked Tarzan.

{}``It is great, but not too great,'' replied Ta-den. {}``I shall
go.''

{}``And I shall go with you, if I may,'' said the ape-man, {}``for
I must see this City of Light, this A-lur of yours, and search there
for my lost mate even though you believe that there is little chance
that I find her. And you, Om-at, do you come with us?''\ 

{}``Why not?''\ asked the hairy one. {}``The lairs of my tribe
lie in the crags above A-lur and though Es-sat, our chief, drove me
out I should like to return again, for there is a she there upon whom
I should be glad to look once more and who would be glad to look upon
me. Yes, I will go with you. Es-sat feared that I might become chief
and who knows but that Es-sat was right. But Pan-at-lee! it is she
I seek first even before a chieftainship.''

{}``We three, then, shall travel together,'' said Tarzan.

{}``And fight together,'' added Ta-den; {}``the three as one,''
and as he spoke he drew his knife and held it above his head.

{}``The three as one,'' repeated Om-at, drawing his weapon and duplicating
Ta-den's act. {}``It is spoken!''\ 

{}``The three as one!''\ cried Tarzan of the Apes. {}``To the
death!''\  and his blade flashed in the sunlight.

{}``Let us go, then,'' said Om-at; {}``my knife is dry and cries
aloud for the blood of Es-sat.''

The trail over which Ta-den and Om-at led and which scarcely could
be dignified even by the name of trail was suited more to mountain
sheep, monkeys, or birds than to man; but the three that followed
it were trained to ways which no ordinary man might essay. Now, upon
the lower slopes, it led through dense forests where the ground was
so matted with fallen trees and over-rioting vines and brush that
the way held always to the swaying branches high above the tangle;
again it skirted yawning gorges whose slippery-faced rocks gave but
momentary foothold even to the bare feet that lightly touched them
as the three leaped chamois-like from one precarious foothold to the
next. Dizzy and terrifying was the way that Om-at chose across the
summit as he led them around the shoulder of a towering crag that
rose a sheer two thousand feet of perpendicular rock above a tumbling
river. And when at last they stood upon comparatively level ground
again Om-at turned and looked at them both intently and especially
at Tarzan of the Apes.

{}``You will both do,'' he said. {}``You are fit companions for
Om-at, the Waz-don.''

{}``What do you mean?''\ asked Tarzan.

{}``I brought you this way,'' replied the black, {}``to learn if
either lacked the courage to follow where Om-at led. It is here that
the young warriors of Es-sat come to prove their courage. And yet,
though we are born and raised upon cliff sides, it is considered no
disgrace to admit that Pastar-ul-ved, the Father of Mountains, has
defeated us, for of those who try it only a few succeed\mbox{---}the
bones of the others lie at the feet of Pastar-ul-ved.''

Ta-den laughed. {}``I would not care to come this way often,'' he
said.

{}``No,'' replied Om-at; {}``but it has shortened our journey by
at least a full day. So much the sooner shall Tarzan look upon the
Valley of Jad-ben-Otho. Come!''\ and he led the way upward along
the shoulder of Pastar-ul-ved until there lay spread below them a
scene of mystery and of beauty\mbox{---}a green valley girt by towering
cliffs of marble whiteness\mbox{---}a green valley dotted by deep
blue lakes and crossed by the blue trail of a winding river. In the
center a city of the whiteness of the marble cliffs\mbox{---}a city
which even at so great a distance evidenced a strange, yet artistic
architecture. Outside the city there were visible about the valley
isolated groups of buildings\mbox{---}sometimes one, again two and
three and four in a cluster\mbox{---}but always of the same glaring
whiteness, and always in some fantastic form.

About the valley the cliffs were occasionally cleft by deep gorges,
verdure filled, giving the appearance of green rivers rioting downward
toward a central sea of green.

{}``Jad Pele ul Jad-ben-Otho,'' murmured Tarzan in the tongue of
the pithecanthropi; {}``The Valley of the Great God\mbox{---}it
is beautiful!''\ 

{}``Here, in A-lur, lives Ko-tan, the king, ruler over all Pal-ul-don,''
said Ta-den.

{}``And here in these gorges live the Waz-don,'' exclaimed Om-at,
{}``who do not acknowledge that Ko-tan is the ruler over all the
Land-of-man.''

Ta-den smiled and shrugged. {}``We will not quarrel, you and I,''
he said to Om-at, {}``over that which all the ages have not proved
sufficient time in which to reconcile the Ho-don and Waz-don; but
let me whisper to you a secret, Om-at. The Ho-don live together in
greater or less peace under one ruler so that when danger threatens
them they face the enemy with many warriors, for every fighting Ho-don
of Pal-ul-don is there. But you Waz-don, how is it with you? You have
a dozen kings who fight not only with the Ho-don but with one another.
When one of your tribes goes forth upon the fighting trail, even against
the Ho-don, it must leave behind sufficient warriors to protect its
women and its children from the neighbors upon either hand. When we
want eunuchs for the temples or servants for the fields or the homes
we march forth in great numbers upon one of your villages. You cannot
even flee, for upon either side of you are enemies and though you
fight bravely we come back with those who will presently be eunuchs
in the temples and servants in our fields and homes. So long as the
Waz-don are thus foolish the Ho-don will dominate and their king will
be king of Pal-ul-don.''

{}``Perhaps you are right,'' admitted Om-at. {}``It is because
our neighbors are fools, each thinking that his tribe is the greatest
and should rule among the Waz-don. They will not admit that the warriors
of my tribe are the bravest and our shes the most beautiful.''

Ta-den grinned. {}``Each of the others presents precisely the same
arguments that you present, Om-at,'' he said, {}``which, my friend,
is the strongest bulwark of defense possessed by the Ho-don.''

{}``Come!''\ exclaimed Tarzan; {}``such discussions often lead
to quarrels and we three must have no quarrels. I, of course, am interested
in learning what I can of the political and economic conditions of
your land; I should like to know something of your religion; but not
at the expense of bitterness between my only friends in Pal-ul-don.
Possibly, however, you hold to the same god?''\ 

{}``There indeed we do differ,'' cried Om-at, somewhat bitterly
and with a trace of excitement in his voice.

{}``Differ!''\ almost shouted Ta-den; {}``and why should we not
differ? Who could agree with the preposterous\mbox{---}''

{}``Stop!''\ cried Tarzan. {}``Now, indeed, have I stirred up
a hornets' nest. Let us speak no more of matters political or religious.''

{}``That is wiser,'' agreed Om-at; {}``but I might mention, for
your information, that the one and only god has a long tail.''

{}``It is sacrilege,'' cried Ta-den, laying his hand upon his knife;
{}``Jad-ben-Otho has no tail!''\ 

{}``Stop!''\ shrieked Om-at, springing forward; but instantly Tarzan
interposed himself between them.

{}``Enough!''\ he snapped. {}``Let us be true to our oaths of
friendship that we may be honorable in the sight of God in whatever
form we conceive Him.''

{}``You are right, Tailless One,'' said Ta-den. {}``Come, Om-at,
let us look after our friendship and ourselves, secure in the conviction
that Jad-ben-Otho is sufficiently powerful to look after himself.''

{}``Done!''\ agreed Om-at, {}``but\mbox{---}''

{}``No `buts,' Om-at,'' admonished Tarzan.

The shaggy black shrugged his shoulders and smiled. {}``Shall we
make our way down toward the valley?''\ he asked. {}``The gorge
below us is uninhabited; that to the left contains the caves of my
people. I would see Pan-at-lee once more. Ta-den would visit his father
in the valley below and Tarzan seeks entrance to A-lur in search of
the mate that would be better dead than in the clutches of the Ho-don
priests of Jad-ben-Otho. How shall we proceed?''\ 

{}``Let us remain together as long as possible,'' urged Ta-den.
{}``You, Om-at, must seek Pan-at-lee by night and by stealth, for
three, even we three, may not hope to overcome Es-sat and all his
warriors. At any time may we go to the village where my father is
chief, for Ja-don always will welcome the friends of his son. But
for Tarzan to enter A-lur is another matter, though there is a way
and he has the courage to put it to the test\mbox{---}listen, come
close for Jad-ben-Otho has keen ears and this he must not hear,''
and with his lips close to the ears of his companions Ta-den, the
Tall-tree, son of Ja-don, the Lion-man, unfolded his daring plan.

And at the same moment, a hundred miles away, a lithe figure, naked
but for a loin cloth and weapons, moved silently across a thorn-covered,
waterless steppe, searching always along the ground before him with
keen eyes and sensitive nostrils.


\chapter{Pan-at-lee}

\markboth{Tarzan the Terrible}{Pan-at-lee}

Night had fallen upon unchartered Pal-ul-don. A slender moon, low
in the west, bathed the white faces of the chalk cliffs presented
to her, in a mellow, unearthly glow. Black were the shadows in Kor-ul-ja,
Gorge-of-lions, where dwelt the tribe of the same name under Es-sat,
their chief. From an aperture near the summit of the lofty escarpment
a hairy figure emerged\mbox{---}the head and shoulders first\mbox{---}and
fierce eyes scanned the cliff side in every direction.

It was Es-sat, the chief. To right and left and below he looked as
though to assure himself that he was unobserved, but no other figure
moved upon the cliff face, nor did another hairy body protrude from
any of the numerous cave mouths from the high-flung abode of the chief
to the habitations of the more lowly members of the tribe nearer the
cliff's base. Then he moved outward upon the sheer face of the white
chalk wall. In the half-light of the baby moon it appeared that the
heavy, shaggy black figure moved across the face of the perpendicular
wall in some miraculous manner, but closer examination would have
revealed stout pegs, as large around as a man's wrist protruding from
holes in the cliff into which they were driven. Es-sat's four handlike
members and his long, sinuous tail permitted him to move with consummate
ease whither he chose\mbox{---}a gigantic rat upon a mighty wall.
As he progressed upon his way he avoided the cave mouths, passing
either above or below those that lay in his path.

The outward appearance of these caves was similar. An opening from
eight to as much as twenty feet long by eight high and four to six
feet deep was cut into the chalklike rock of the cliff, in the back
of this large opening, which formed what might be described as the
front veranda of the home, was an opening about three feet wide and
six feet high, evidently forming the doorway to the interior apartment
or apartments. On either side of this doorway were smaller openings
which it were easy to assume were windows through which light and
air might find their way to the inhabitants. Similar windows were
also dotted over the cliff face between the entrance porches, suggesting
that the entire face of the cliff was honeycombed with apartments.
From many of these smaller apertures small streams of water trickled
down the escarpment, and the walls above others was blackened as by
smoke. Where the water ran the wall was eroded to a depth of from
a few inches to as much as a foot, suggesting that some of the tiny
streams had been trickling downward to the green carpet of vegetation
below for ages.

In this primeval setting the great pithecanthropus aroused no jarring
discord for he was as much a part of it as the trees that grew upon
the summit of the cliff or those that hid their feet among the dank
ferns in the bottom of the gorge.

Now he paused before an entrance-way and listened and then, noiselessly
as the moonlight upon the trickling waters, he merged with the shadows
of the outer porch. At the doorway leading into the interior he paused
again, listening, and then quietly pushing aside the heavy skin that
covered the aperture he passed within a large chamber hewn from the
living rock. From the far end, through another doorway, shone a light,
dimly. Toward this he crept with utmost stealth, his naked feet giving
forth no sound. The knotted club that had been hanging at his back
from a thong about his neck he now removed and carried in his left
hand.

Beyond the second doorway was a corridor running parallel with the
cliff face. In this corridor were three more doorways, one at each
end and a third almost opposite that in which Es-sat stood. The light
was coming from an apartment at the end of the corridor at his left.
A sputtering flame rose and fell in a small stone receptacle that
stood upon a table or bench of the same material, a monolithic bench
fashioned at the time the room was excavated, rising massively from
the floor, of which it was a part.

In one corner of the room beyond the table had been left a dais of
stone about four feet wide and eight feet long. Upon this were piled
a foot or so of softly tanned pelts from which the fur had not been
removed. Upon the edge of this dais sat a young female Waz-don. In
one hand she held a thin piece of metal, apparently of hammered gold,
with serrated edges, and in the other a short, stiff brush. With these
she was occupied in going over her smooth, glossy coat which bore
a remarkable resemblance to plucked sealskin. Her loin cloth of yellow
and black striped jato-skin lay on the couch beside her with the circular
breastplates of beaten gold, revealing the symmetrical lines of her
nude figure in all its beauty and harmony of contour, for even though
the creature was jet black and entirely covered with hair yet she
was undeniably beautiful.

That she was beautiful in the eyes of Es-sat, the chief, was evidenced
by the gloating expression upon his fierce countenance and the increased
rapidity of his breathing. Moving quickly forward he entered the room
and as he did so the young she looked up. Instantly her eyes filled
with terror and as quickly she seized the loin cloth and with a few
deft movements adjusted it about her. As she gathered up her breastplates
Es-sat rounded the table and moved quickly toward her.

{}``What do you want?''\ she whispered, though she knew full well.

{}``Pan-at-lee,'' he said, {}``your chief has come for you.''

{}``It was for this that you sent away my father and my brothers
to spy upon the Kor-ul-lul? I will not have you. Leave the cave of
my ancestors!''\ 

Es-sat smiled. It was the smile of a strong and wicked man who knows
his power\mbox{---}not a pleasant smile at all. {}``I will leave,
Pan-at-lee,'' he said; {}``but you shall go with me\mbox{---}to
the cave of Es-sat, the chief, to be the envied of the shes of Kor-ul-ja.
Come!''\ 

{}``Never!''\ cried Pan-at-lee. {}``I hate you. Sooner would I
mate with a Ho-don than with you, beater of women, murderer of babes.''

A frightful scowl distorted the features of the chief. {}``She-jato!''\ 
he cried. {}``I will tame you! I will break you! Es-sat, the chief,
takes what he will and who dares question his right, or combat his
least purpose, will first serve that purpose and then be broken as
I break this,'' and he picked a stone platter from the table and
broke it in his powerful hands. {}``You might have been first and
most favored in the cave of the ancestors of Es-sat; but now shall
you be last and least and when I am done with you you shall belong
to all of the men of Es-sat's cave. Thus for those who spurn the love
of their chief!''\ 

He advanced quickly to seize her and as he laid a rough hand upon
her she struck him heavily upon the side of his head with her golden
breastplates. Without a sound Es-sat, the chief, sank to the floor
of the apartment. For a moment Pan-at-lee bent over him, her improvised
weapon raised to strike again should he show signs of returning consciousness,
her glossy breasts rising and falling with her quickened breathing.
Suddenly she stooped and removed Es-sat's knife with its scabbard
and shoulder belt. Slipping it over her own shoulder she quickly adjusted
her breastplates and keeping a watchful glance upon the figure of
the fallen chief, backed from the room.

In a niche in the outer room, just beside the doorway leading to the
balcony, were neatly piled a number of rounded pegs from eighteen
to twenty inches in length. Selecting five of these she made them
into a little bundle about which she twined the lower extremity of
her sinuous tail and thus carrying them made her way to the outer
edge of the balcony. Assuring herself that there was none about to
see, or hinder her, she took quickly to the pegs already set in the
face of the cliff and with the celerity of a monkey clambered swiftly
aloft to the highest row of pegs which she followed in the direction
of the lower end of the gorge for a matter of some hundred yards.
Here, above her head, were a series of small round holes placed one
above another in three parallel rows. Clinging only with her toes
she removed two of the pegs from the bundle carried in her tail and
taking one in either hand she inserted them in two opposite holes
of the outer rows as far above her as she could reach. Hanging by
these new holds she now took one of the three remaining pegs in each
of her feet, leaving the fifth grasped securely in her tail. Reaching
above her with this member she inserted the fifth peg in one of the
holes of the center row and then, alternately hanging by her tail,
her feet, or her hands, she moved the pegs upward to new holes, thus
carrying her stairway with her as she ascended.

At the summit of the cliff a gnarled tree exposed its time-worn roots
above the topmost holes forming the last step from the sheer face
of the precipice to level footing. This was the last avenue of escape
for members of the tribe hard pressed by enemies from below. There
were three such emergency exits from the village and it were death
to use them in other than an emergency. This Pan-at-lee well knew;
but she knew, too, that it were worse than death to remain where the
angered Es-sat might lay hands upon her.

When she had gained the summit, the girl moved quickly through the
darkness in the direction of the next gorge which cut the mountain-side
a mile beyond Kor-ul-ja. It was the Gorge-of-water, Kor-ul-lul, to
which her father and two brothers had been sent by Es-sat ostensibly
to spy upon the neighboring tribe. There was a chance, a slender chance,
that she might find them; if not there was the deserted Kor-ul-gryf
several miles beyond, where she might hide indefinitely from man if
she could elude the frightful monster from which the gorge derived
its name and whose presence there had rendered its caves uninhabitable
for generations.

Pan-at-lee crept stealthily along the rim of the Kor-ul-lul. Just
where her father and brothers would watch she did not know. Sometimes
their spies remained upon the rim, sometimes they watched from the
gorge's bottom. Pan-at-lee was at a loss to know what to do or where
to go. She felt very small and helpless alone in the vast darkness
of the night. Strange noises fell upon her ears. They came from the
lonely reaches of the towering mountains above her, from far away
in the invisible valley and from the nearer foothills and once, in
the distance, she heard what she thought was the bellow of a bull
gryf. It came from the direction of the Kor-ul-gryf. She shuddered.

Presently there came to her keen ears another sound. Something approached
her along the rim of the gorge. It was coming from above. She halted,
listening. Perhaps it was her father, or a brother. It was coming
closer. She strained her eyes through the darkness. She did not move\mbox{---}she
scarcely breathed. And then, of a sudden, quite close it seemed, there
blazed through the black night two yellow-green spots of fire.

Pan-at-lee was brave, but as always with the primitive, the darkness
held infinite terrors for her. Not alone the terrors of the known
but more frightful ones as well\mbox{---}those of the unknown. She
had passed through much this night and her nerves were keyed to the
highest pitch\mbox{---}raw, taut nerves, they were, ready to react
in an exaggerated form to the slightest shock.

But this was no slight shock. To hope for a father and a brother and
to see death instead glaring out of the darkness! Yes, Pan-at-lee
was brave, but she was not of iron. With a shriek that reverberated
among the hills she turned and fled along the rim of Kor-ul-lul and
behind her, swiftly, came the devil-eyed lion of the mountains of
Pal-ul-don.

Pan-at-lee was lost. Death was inevitable. Of this there could be
no doubt, but to die beneath the rending fangs of the carnivore, congenital
terror of her kind\mbox{---}it was unthinkable. But there was an
alternative. The lion was almost upon her\mbox{---}another instant
and he would seize her. Pan-at-lee turned sharply to her left. Just
a few steps she took in the new direction before she disappeared over
the rim of Kor-ul-lul. The baffled lion, planting all four feet, barely
stopped upon the verge of the abyss. Glaring down into the black shadows
beneath he mounted an angry roar.

Through the darkness at the bottom of Kor-ul-ja, Om-at led the way
toward the caves of his people. Behind him came Tarzan and Ta-den.
Presently they halted beneath a great tree that grew close to the
cliff.

{}``First,'' whispered Om-at, {}``I will go to the cave of Pan-at-lee.
Then will I seek the cave of my ancestors to have speech with my own
blood. It will not take long. Wait here\mbox{---}I shall return
soon. Afterward shall we go together to Ta-den's people.''

He moved silently toward the foot of the cliff up which Tarzan could
presently see him ascending like a great fly on a wall. In the dim
light the ape-man could not see the pegs set in the face of the cliff.
Om-at moved warily. In the lower tier of caves there should be a sentry.
His knowledge of his people and their customs told him, however, that
in all probability the sentry was asleep. In this he was not mistaken,
yet he did not in any way abate his wariness. Smoothly and swiftly
he ascended toward the cave of Pan-at-lee while from below Tarzan
and Ta-den watched him.

{}``How does he do it?''\ asked Tarzan. {}``I can see no foothold
upon that vertical surface and yet he appears to be climbing with
the utmost ease.''

Ta-den explained the stairway of pegs. {}``You could ascend easily,''
he said, {}``although a tail would be of great assistance.''

They watched until Om-at was about to enter the cave of Pan-at-lee
without seeing any indication that he had been observed and then,
simultaneously, both saw a head appear in the mouth of one of the
lower caves. It was quickly evident that its owner had discovered
Om-at for immediately he started upward in pursuit. Without a word
Tarzan and Ta-den sprang forward toward the foot of the cliff. The
pithecanthropus was the first to reach it and the ape-man saw him
spring upward for a handhold on the lowest peg above him. Now Tarzan
saw other pegs roughly paralleling each other in zigzag rows up the
cliff face. He sprang and caught one of these, pulled himself upward
by one hand until he could reach a second with his other hand; and
when he had ascended far enough to use his feet, discovered that he
could make rapid progress. Ta-den was outstripping him, however, for
these precarious ladders were no novelty to him and, further, he had
an advantage in possessing a tail.

Nevertheless, the ape-man gave a good account of himself, being presently
urged to redoubled efforts by the fact that the Waz-don above Ta-den
glanced down and discovered his pursuers just before the Ho-don overtook
him. Instantly a wild cry shattered the silence of the gorge\mbox{---}a
cry that was immediately answered by hundreds of savage throats as
warrior after warrior emerged from the entrance to his cave.

The creature who had raised the alarm had now reached the recess before
Pan-at-lee's cave and here he halted and turned to give battle to
Ta-den. Unslinging his club which had hung down his back from a thong
about his neck he stood upon the level floor of the entrance-way effectually
blocking Ta-den's ascent. From all directions the warriors of Kor-ul-ja
were swarming toward the interlopers. Tarzan, who had reached a point
on the same level with Ta-den but a little to the latter's left, saw
that nothing short of a miracle could save them. Just at the ape-man's
left was the entrance to a cave that either was deserted or whose
occupants had not as yet been aroused, for the level recess remained
unoccupied. Resourceful was the alert mind of Tarzan of the Apes and
quick to respond were the trained muscles. In the time that you or
I might give to debating an action he would accomplish it and now,
though only seconds separated his nearest antagonist from him, in
the brief span of time at his disposal he had stepped into the recess,
unslung his long rope and leaning far out shot the sinuous noose,
with the precision of long habitude, toward the menacing figure wielding
its heavy club above Ta-den. There was a momentary pause of the rope-hand
as the noose sped toward its goal, a quick movement of the right wrist
that closed it upon its victim as it settled over his head and then
a surging tug as, seizing the rope in both hands, Tarzan threw back
upon it all the weight of his great frame.

Voicing a terrified shriek, the Waz-don lunged headforemost from the
recess above Ta-den. Tarzan braced himself for the coming shock when
the creature's body should have fallen the full length of the rope
and as it did there was a snap of the vertebrae that rose sickeningly
in the momentary silence that had followed the doomed man's departing
scream. Unshaken by the stress of the suddenly arrested weight at
the end of the rope, Tarzan quickly pulled the body to his side that
he might remove the noose from about its neck, for he could not afford
to lose so priceless a weapon.

During the several seconds that had elapsed since he cast the rope
the Waz-don warriors had remained inert as though paralyzed by wonder
or by terror. Now, again, one of them found his voice and his head
and straightway, shrieking invectives at the strange intruder, started
upward for the ape-man, urging his fellows to attack. This man was
the closest to Tarzan. But for him the ape-man could easily have reached
Ta-den's side as the latter was urging him to do. Tarzan raised the
body of the dead Waz-don above his head, held it poised there for
a moment as with face raised to the heavens he screamed forth the
horrid challenge of the bull apes of the tribe of Kerchak, and with
all the strength of his giant sinews he hurled the corpse heavily
upon the ascending warrior. So great was the force of the impact that
not only was the Waz-don torn from his hold but two of the pegs to
which he clung were broken short in their sockets.

As the two bodies, the living and the dead, hurtled downward toward
the foot of the cliff a great cry arose from the Waz-don. {}``Jad-guru-don!
Jad-guru-don!''\ they screamed, and then: {}``Kill him! Kill him!''\ 

And now Tarzan stood in the recess beside Ta-den. Jad-guru-don!''\ 
repeated the latter, smiling\mbox{---}{}``The terrible man! Tarzan
the Terrible! They may kill you, but they will never forget you.''

{}``They shall not ki\mbox{---}What have we here?''\ Tarzan's
statement as to what {}``they'' should not do was interrupted by
a sudden ejaculation as two figures, locked in deathlike embrace,
stumbled through the doorway of the cave to the outer porch. One was
Om-at, the other a creature of his own kind but with a rough coat,
the hairs of which seemed to grow straight outward from the skin,
stiffly, unlike Om-at's sleek covering. The two were quite evidently
well matched and equally evident was the fact that each was bent upon
murder. They fought almost in silence except for an occasional low
growl as one or the other acknowledged thus some new hurt.

Tarzan, following a natural impulse to aid his ally, leaped forward
to enter the dispute only to be checked by a grunted admonition from
Om-at. {}``Back!''\ he said. {}``This fight is mine, alone.''

The ape-man understood and stepped aside.

{}``It is a gund-bar,'' explained Ta-den, {}``a chief-battle. This
fellow must be Es-sat, the chief. If Om-at kills him without assistance
Om-at may become chief.''

Tarzan smiled. It was the law of his own jungle\mbox{---}the law
of the tribe of Kerchak, the bull ape\mbox{---}the ancient law of
primitive man that needed but the refining influences of civilization
to introduce the hired dagger and the poison cup. Then his attention
was drawn to the outer edge of the vestibule. Above it appeared the
shaggy face of one of Es-sat's warriors. Tarzan sprang to intercept
the man; but Ta-den was there ahead of him. {}``Back!''\ cried
the Ho-don to the newcomer. {}``It is gund-bar.'' The fellow looked
scrutinizingly at the two fighters, then turned his face downward
toward his fellows. {}``Back!''\  he cried, {}``it is gund-bar
between Es-sat and Om-at.'' Then he looked back at Ta-den and Tarzan.
{}``Who are you?''\ he asked.

{}``We are Om-at's friends,'' replied Ta-den.

The fellow nodded. {}``We will attend to you later,'' he said and
disappeared below the edge of the recess.

The battle upon the ledge continued with unabated ferocity, Tarzan
and Ta-den having difficulty in keeping out of the way of the contestants
who tore and beat at each other with hands and feet and lashing tails.
Es-sat was unarmed\mbox{---}Pan-at-lee had seen to that\mbox{---}but
at Om-at's side swung a sheathed knife which he made no effort to
draw. That would have been contrary to their savage and primitive
code for the chief-battle must be fought with nature's weapons.

Sometimes they separated for an instant only to rush upon each other
again with all the ferocity and nearly the strength of mad bulls.
Presently one of them tripped the other but in that viselike embrace
one could not fall alone\mbox{---}Es-sat dragged Om-at with him,
toppling upon the brink of the niche. Even Tarzan held his breath.
There they surged to and fro perilously for a moment and then the
inevitable happened\mbox{---}the two, locked in murderous embrace,
rolled over the edge and disappeared from the ape-man's view.

Tarzan voiced a suppressed sigh for he had liked Om-at and then, with
Ta-den, approached the edge and looked over. Far below, in the dim
light of the coming dawn, two inert forms should be lying stark in
death; but, to Tarzan's amazement, such was far from the sight that
met his eyes. Instead, there were the two figures still vibrant with
life and still battling only a few feet below him. Clinging always
to the pegs with two holds\mbox{---}a hand and a foot, or a foot
and a tail, they seemed as much at home upon the perpendicular wall
as upon the level surface of the vestibule; but now their tactics
were slightly altered, for each seemed particularly bent upon dislodging
his antagonist from his holds and precipitating him to certain death
below. It was soon evident that Om-at, younger and with greater powers
of endurance than Es-sat, was gaining an advantage. Now was the chief
almost wholly on the defensive. Holding him by the cross belt with
one mighty hand Om-at was forcing his foeman straight out from the
cliff, and with the other hand and one foot was rapidly breaking first
one of Es-sat's holds and then another, alternating his efforts, or
rather punctuating them, with vicious blows to the pit of his adversary's
stomach. Rapidly was Es-sat weakening and with the knowledge of impending
death there came, as there comes to every coward and bully under similar
circumstances, a crumbling of the veneer of bravado which had long
masqueraded as courage and with it crumbled his code of ethics. Now
was Es-sat no longer chief of Kor-ul-ja\mbox{---}instead he was
a whimpering craven battling for life. Clutching at Om-at, clutching
at the nearest pegs he sought any support that would save him from
that awful fall, and as he strove to push aside the hand of death,
whose cold fingers he already felt upon his heart, his tail sought
Om-at's side and the handle of the knife that hung there.

Tarzan saw and even as Es-sat drew the blade from its sheath he dropped
catlike to the pegs beside the battling men. Es-sat's tail had drawn
back for the cowardly fatal thrust. Now many others saw the perfidious
act and a great cry of rage and disgust arose from savage throats;
but as the blade sped toward its goal, the ape-man seized the hairy
member that wielded it, and at the same instant Om-at thrust the body
of Es-sat from him with such force that its weakened holds were broken
and it hurtled downward, a brief meteor of screaming fear, to death.


\chapter{Tarzan-jad-guru}

\markboth{Tarzan the Terrible}{Tarzan-jad-guru}

\textit{\emph{As}} \textit{\emph{Tarzan}} and Om-at clambered back
to the vestibule of Pan-at-lee's cave and took their stand beside
Ta-den in readiness for whatever eventuality might follow the death
of Es-sat, the sun that topped the eastern hills touched also the
figure of a sleeper upon a distant, thorn-covered steppe awakening
him to another day of tireless tracking along a faint and rapidly
disappearing spoor.

For a time silence reigned in the Kor-ul-ja. The tribesmen waited,
looking now down upon the dead thing that had been their chief, now
at one another, and now at Om-at and the two who stood upon his either
side. Presently Om-at spoke. {}``I am Om-at,'' he cried. {}``Who
will say that Om-at is not gund of Kor-ul-ja?''\ 

He waited for a taker of his challenge. One or two of the larger young
bucks fidgeted restlessly and eyed him; but there was no reply.

{}``Then Om-at is gund,'' he said with finality. {}``Now tell me,
where are Pan-at-lee, her father, and her brothers?''\ 

An old warrior spoke. {}``Pan-at-lee should be in her cave. Who should
know that better than you who are there now? Her father and her brothers
were sent to watch Kor-ul-lul; but neither of these questions arouse
any tumult in our breasts. There is one that does: Can Om-at be chief
of Kor-ul-ja and yet stand at bay against his own people with a Ho-don
and that terrible man at his side\mbox{---}that terrible man who
has no tail? Hand the strangers over to your people to be slain as
is the way of the Waz-don and then may Om-at be gund.''

Neither Tarzan nor Ta-den spoke then, they but stood watching Om-at
and waiting for his decision, the ghost of a smile upon the lips of
the ape-man. Ta-den, at least, knew that the old warrior had spoken
the truth\mbox{---}the Waz-don entertain no strangers and take no
prisoners of an alien race.

Then spoke Om-at. {}``Always there is change,'' he said. {}``Even
the old hills of Pal-ul-don appear never twice alike\mbox{---}the
brilliant sun, a passing cloud, the moon, a mist, the changing seasons,
the sharp clearness following a storm; these things bring each a new
change in our hills. From birth to death, day by day, there is constant
change in each of us. Change, then, is one of Jad-ben-Otho's laws.

{}``And now I, Om-at, your gund, bring another change. Strangers
who are brave men and good friends shall no longer be slain by the
Waz-don of Kor-ul-ja!''\ 

There were growls and murmurings and a restless moving among the warriors
as each eyed the others to see who would take the initiative against
Om-at, the iconoclast.

{}``Cease your mutterings,'' admonished the new gund. {}``I am
your chief. My word is your law. You had no part in making me chief.
Some of you helped Es-sat to drive me from the cave of my ancestors;
the rest of you permitted it. I owe you nothing. Only these two, whom
you would have me kill, were loyal to me. I am gund and if there be
any who doubts it let him speak\mbox{---}he cannot die younger.''

Tarzan was pleased. Here was a man after his own heart. He admired
the fearlessness of Om-at's challenge and he was a sufficiently good
judge of men to know that he had listened to no idle bluff\mbox{---}Om-at
would back up his words to the death, if necessary, and the chances
were that he would not be the one to die. Evidently the majority of
the Kor-ul-jaians entertained the same conviction.

I will make you a good gund,'' said Om-at, seeing that no one appeared
inclined to dispute his rights. {}``Your wives and daughters will
be safe\mbox{---}they were not safe while Es-sat ruled. Go now to
your crops and your hunting. I leave to search for Pan-at-lee. Ab-on
will be gund while I am away\mbox{---}look to him for guidance and
to me for an accounting when I return\mbox{---}and may Jad-ben-Otho
smile upon you.''

He turned toward Tarzan and the Ho-don. {}``And you, my friends,''
he said, {}``are free to go among my people; the cave of my ancestors
is yours, do what you will.''

{}``I,'' said Tarzan, {}``will go with Om-at to search for Pan-at-lee.''

{}``And I,'' said Ta-den.

Om-at smiled. {}``Good!''\ he exclaimed. {}``And when we have
found her we shall go together upon Tarzan's business and Ta-den's.
Where first shall we search?''\ He turned toward his warriors. {}``Who
knows where she may be?''\ 

None knew other than that Pan-at-lee had gone to her cave with the
others the previous evening\mbox{---}there was no clew, no suggestion
as to her whereabouts.

{}``Show me where she sleeps,'' said Tarzan; {}``let me see something
that belongs to her\mbox{---}an article of her apparel\mbox{---}then,
doubtless, I can help you.''

Two young warriors climbed closer to the ledge upon which Om-at stood.
They were In-sad and O-dan. It was the latter who spoke.

{}``Gund of Kor-ul-ja,'' he said, {}``we would go with you to search
for Pan-at-lee.''

It was the first acknowledgment of Om-at's chieftainship and immediately
following it the tenseness that had prevailed seemed to relax\mbox{---}the
warriors spoke aloud instead of in whispers, and the women appeared
from the mouths of caves as with the passing of a sudden storm. In-sad
and O-dan had taken the lead and now all seemed glad to follow. Some
came to talk with Om-at and to look more closely at Tarzan; others,
heads of caves, gathered their hunters and discussed the business
of the day. The women and children prepared to descend to the fields
with the youths and the old men, whose duty it was to guard them.

{}``O-dan and In-sad shall go with us,'' announced Om-at, {}``we
shall not need more. Tarzan, come with me and I shall show you where
Pan-at-lee sleeps, though why you should wish to know I cannot guess\mbox{---}she
is not there. I have looked for myself.''

The two entered the cave where Om-at led the way to the apartment
in which Es-sat had surprised Pan-at-lee the previous night.

{}``All here are hers,'' said Om-at, {}``except the war club lying
on the floor\mbox{---}that was Es-sat's.''

The ape-man moved silently about the apartment, the quivering of his
sensitive nostrils scarcely apparent to his companion who only wondered
what good purpose could be served here and chafed at the delay.

{}``Come!''\ said the ape-man, presently, and led the way toward
the outer recess.

Here their three companions were awaiting them. Tarzan passed to the
left side of the niche and examined the pegs that lay within reach.
He looked at them but it was not his eyes that were examining them.
Keener than his keen eyes was that marvelously trained sense of scent
that had first been developed in him during infancy under the tutorage
of his foster mother, Kala, the she-ape, and further sharpened in
the grim jungles by that master teacher\mbox{---}the instinct of
self-preservation.

From the left side of the niche he turned to the right. Om-at was
becoming impatient.

{}``Let us be off,'' he said. {}``We must search for Pan-at-lee
if we would ever find her.''

{}``Where shall we search?''\ asked Tarzan.

Om-at scratched his head. {}``Where?''\ he repeated. {}``Why all
Pal-ul-don, if necessary.''

{}``A large job,'' said Tarzan. {}``Come,'' he added, {}``she
went this way,'' and he took to the pegs that led aloft toward the
summit of the cliff. Here he followed the scent easily since none
had passed that way since Pan-at-lee had fled. At the point at which
she had left the permanent pegs and resorted to those carried with
her Tarzan came to an abrupt halt. {}``She went this way to the summit,''
he called back to Om-at who was directly behind him; {}``but there
are no pegs here.''

{}``I do not know how you know that she went this way,'' said Om-at;
{}``but we will get pegs. In-sad, return and fetch climbing pegs
for five.''

The young warrior was soon back and the pegs distributed. Om-at handed
five to Tarzan and explained their use. The ape-man returned one.
{}``I need but four,'' he said.

Om-at smiled. {}``What a wonderful creature you would be if you were
not deformed,'' he said, glancing with pride at his own strong tail.

{}``I admit that I am handicapped,'' replied Tarzan. {}``You others
go ahead and leave the pegs in place for me. I am afraid that otherwise
it will be slow work as I cannot hold the pegs in my toes as you do.''

{}``All right,'' agreed Om-at; {}``Ta-den, In-sad, and I will go
first, you follow and O-dan bring up the rear and collect the pegs\mbox{---}we
cannot leave them here for our enemies.''

{}``Can't your enemies bring their own pegs?''\ asked Tarzan.

{}``Yes; but it delays them and makes easier our defense and\mbox{---}they
do not know which of all the holes you see are deep enough for pegs\mbox{---}the
others are made to confuse our enemies and are too shallow to hold
a peg.''

At the top of the cliff beside the gnarled tree Tarzan again took
up the trail. Here the scent was fully as strong as upon the pegs
and the ape-man moved rapidly across the ridge in the direction of
the Kor-ul-lul.

Presently he paused and turned toward Om-at. {}``Here she moved swiftly,
running at top speed, and, Om-at, she was pursued by a lion.''

{}``You can read that in the grass?''\ asked O-dan as the others
gathered about the ape-man.

Tarzan nodded. {}``I do not think the lion got her,'' he added;
{}``but that we shall determine quickly. No, he did not get her\mbox{---}look!''\ 
and he pointed toward the southwest, down the ridge.

Following the direction indicated by his finger, the others presently
detected a movement in some bushes a couple of hundred yards away.

{}``What is it?''\ asked Om-at. {}``It is she?''\ and he started
toward the spot.

{}``Wait,'' advised Tarzan. {}``It is the lion which pursued her.''

{}``You can see him?''\ asked Ta-den.

{}``No, I can smell him.''

The others looked their astonishment and incredulity; but of the fact
that it was indeed a lion they were not left long in doubt. Presently
the bushes parted and the creature stepped out in full view, facing
them. It was a magnificent beast, large and beautifully maned, with
the brilliant leopard spots of its kind well marked and symmetrical.
For a moment it eyed them and then, still chafing at the loss of its
prey earlier in the morning, it charged.

The Pal-ul-donians unslung their clubs and stood waiting the onrushing
beast. Tarzan of the Apes drew his hunting knife and crouched in the
path of the fanged fury. It was almost upon him when it swerved to
the right and leaped for Om-at only to be sent to earth with a staggering
blow upon the head. Almost instantly it was up and though the men
rushed fearlessly in, it managed to sweep aside their weapons with
its mighty paws. A single blow wrenched O-dan's club from his hand
and sent it hurtling against Ta-den, knocking him from his feet. Taking
advantage of its opportunity the lion rose to throw itself upon O-dan
and at the same instant Tarzan flung himself upon its back. Strong,
white teeth buried themselves in the spotted neck, mighty arms encircled
the savage throat and the sinewy legs of the ape-man locked themselves
about the gaunt belly.

The others, powerless to aid, stood breathlessly about as the great
lion lunged hither and thither, clawing and biting fearfully and futilely
at the savage creature that had fastened itself upon him. Over and
over they rolled and now the onlookers saw a brown hand raised above
the lion's side\mbox{---}a brown hand grasping a keen blade. They
saw it fall and rise and fall again\mbox{---}each time with terrific
force and in its wake they saw a crimson stream trickling down ja's
gorgeous coat.

Now from the lion's throat rose hideous screams of hate and rage and
pain as he redoubled his efforts to dislodge and punish his tormentor;
but always the tousled black head remained half buried in the dark
brown mane and the mighty arm rose and fell to plunge the knife again
and again into the dying beast.

The Pal-ul-donians stood in mute wonder and admiration. Brave men
and mighty hunters they were and as such the first to accord honor
to a mightier.

{}``And you would have had me slay him!''\ cried Om-at, glancing
at In-sad and O-dan.

{}``Jad-ben-Otho reward you that you did not,'' breathed In-sad.

And now the lion lunged suddenly to earth and with a few spasmodic
quiverings lay still. The ape-man rose and shook himself, even as
might ja, the leopard-coated lion of Pal-ul-don, had he been the one
to survive.

O-dan advanced quickly toward Tarzan. Placing a palm upon his own
breast and the other on Tarzan's, {}``Tarzan the Terrible,'' he
said, {}``I ask no greater honor than your friendship.''

{}``And I no more than the friendship of Om-at's friends,'' replied
the ape-man simply, returning the other's salute.

{}``Do you think,'' asked Om-at, coming close to Tarzan and laying
a hand upon the other's shoulder, {}``that he got her?''\ 

{}``No, my friend; it was a hungry lion that charged us.''

{}``You seem to know much of lions,'' said In-sad.

{}``Had I a brother I could not know him better,'' replied Tarzan.

{}``Then where can she be?''\ continued Om-at.

{}``We can but follow while the spoor is fresh,'' answered the ape-man
and again taking up his interrupted tracking he led them down the
ridge and at a sharp turning of the trail to the left brought them
to the verge of the cliff that dropped into the Kor-ul-lul. For a
moment Tarzan examined the ground to the right and to the left, then
he stood erect and looking at Om-at pointed into the gorge.

For a moment the Waz-don gazed down into the green rift at the bottom
of which a tumultuous river tumbled downward along its rocky bed,
then he closed his eyes as to a sudden spasm of pain and turned away.

{}``You\mbox{---}mean\mbox{---}she jumped?''\ he asked.

{}``To escape the lion,'' replied Tarzan. {}``He was right behind
her\mbox{---}look, you can see where his four paws left their impress
in the turf as he checked his charge upon the very verge of the abyss.''

{}``Is there any chance\mbox{---}'' commenced Om-at, to be suddenly
silenced by a warning gesture from Tarzan.

{}``Down!''\ whispered the ape-man, {}``many men are coming. They
are running\mbox{---}from down the ridge.'' He flattened himself
upon his belly in the grass, the others following his example.

For some minutes they waited thus and then the others, too, heard
the sound of running feet and now a hoarse shout followed by many
more.

{}``It is the war cry of the Kor-ul-lul,'' whispered Om-at\mbox{---}{}``the
hunting cry of men who hunt men. Presently shall we see them and if
Jad-ben-Otho is pleased with us they shall not too greatly outnumber
us.''

{}``They are many,'' said Tarzan, {}``forty or fifty, I should
say; but how many are the pursued and how many the pursuers we cannot
even guess, except that the latter must greatly outnumber the former,
else these would not run so fast.''

{}``Here they come,'' said Ta-den.

{}``It is An-un, father of Pan-at-lee, and his two sons,'' exclaimed
O-dan. {}``They will pass without seeing us if we do not hurry,''
he added looking at Om-at, the chief, for a sign.

{}``Come!''\ cried the latter, springing to his feet and running
rapidly to intercept the three fugitives. The others followed him.

{}``Five friends!''\ shouted Om-at as An-un and his sons discovered
them.

{}``Adenen yo!''\ echoed O-dan and In-sad.

The fugitives scarcely paused as these unexpected reinforcements joined
them but they eyed Ta-den and Tarzan with puzzled glances.

{}``The Kor-ul-lul are many,'' shouted An-un. {}``Would that we
might pause and fight; but first we must warn Es-sat and our people.''

{}``Yes,'' said Om-at, {}``we must warn our people.''

{}``Es-sat is dead,'' said In-sad.

{}``Who is chief?''\ asked one of An-un's sons.

{}``Om-at,'' replied O-dan.

{}``It is well,'' cried An-un. {}``Pan-at-lee said that you would
come back and slay Es-sat.''

Now the enemy broke into sight behind them.

{}``Come!''\ cried Tarzan,'' let us turn and charge them, raising
a great cry. They pursued but three and when they see eight charging
upon them they will think that many men have come to do battle. They
will believe that there are more even than they see and then one who
is swift will have time to reach the gorge and warn your people.''

{}``It is well,'' said Om-at. {}``Id-an, you are swift\mbox{---}carry
word to the warriors of Kor-ul-ja that we fight the Kor-ul-lul upon
the ridge and that Ab-on shall send a hundred men.''

Id-an, the son of An-un, sped swiftly toward the cliff-dwellings of
the Kor-ul-ja while the others charged the oncoming Kor-ul-lul, the
war cries of the two tribes rising and falling in a certain grim harmony.
The leaders of the Kor-ul-lul paused at sight of the reinforcements,
waiting apparently for those behind to catch up with them and, possibly,
also to learn how great a force confronted them. The leaders, swifter
runners than their fellows, perhaps, were far in advance while the
balance of their number had not yet emerged from the brush; and now
as Om-at and his companions fell upon them with a ferocity born of
necessity they fell back, so that when their companions at last came
in sight of them they appeared to be in full rout. The natural result
was that the others turned and fled.

Encouraged by this first success Om-at followed them into the brush,
his little company charging valiantly upon his either side, and loud
and terrifying were the savage yells with which they pursued the fleeing
enemy. The brush, while not growing so closely together as to impede
progress, was of such height as to hide the members of the party from
one another when they became separated by even a few yards. The result
was that Tarzan, always swift and always keen for battle, was soon
pursuing the enemy far in the lead of the others\mbox{---}a lack
of prudence which was to prove his undoing.

The warriors of Kor-ul-lul, doubtless as valorous as their foemen,
retreated only to a more strategic position in the brush, nor were
they long in guessing that the number of their pursuers was fewer
than their own. They made a stand then where the brush was densest\mbox{---}an
ambush it was, and into this ran Tarzan of the Apes. They tricked
him neatly. Yes, sad as is the narration of it, they tricked the wily
jungle lord. But then they were fighting on their own ground, every
foot of which they knew as you know your front parlor, and they were
following their own tactics, of which Tarzan knew nothing.

A single black warrior appeared to Tarzan a laggard in the rear of
the retreating enemy and thus retreating he lured Tarzan on. At last
he turned at bay confronting the ape-man with bludgeon and drawn knife
and as Tarzan charged him a score of burly Waz-don leaped from the
surrounding brush. Instantly, but too late, the giant Tarmangani realized
his peril. There flashed before him a vision of his lost mate and
a great and sickening regret surged through him with the realization
that if she still lived she might no longer hope, for though she might
never know of the passing of her lord the fact of it must inevitably
seal her doom.

And consequent to this thought there enveloped him a blind frenzy
of hatred for these creatures who dared thwart his purpose and menace
the welfare of his wife. With a savage growl he threw himself upon
the warrior before him twisting the heavy club from the creature's
hand as if he had been a little child, and with his left fist backed
by the weight and sinew of his giant frame, he crashed a shattering
blow to the center of the Waz-don's face\mbox{---}a blow that crushed
the bones and dropped the fellow in his tracks. Then he swung upon
the others with their fallen comrade's bludgeon striking to right
and left mighty, unmerciful blows that drove down their own weapons
until that wielded by the ape-man was splintered and shattered. On
either hand they fell before his cudgel; so rapid the delivery of
his blows, so catlike his recovery that in the first few moments of
the battle he seemed invulnerable to their attack; but it could not
last\mbox{---}he was outnumbered twenty to one and his undoing came
from a thrown club. It struck him upon the back of the head. For a
moment he stood swaying and then like a great pine beneath the woodsman's
ax he crashed to earth.

Others of the Kor-ul-lul had rushed to engage the balance of Om-at's
party. They could be heard fighting at a short distance and it was
evident that the Kor-ul-ja were falling slowly back and as they fell
Om-at called to the missing one: {}``Tarzan the Terrible! Tarzan
the Terrible!''\ 

{}``Jad-guru, indeed,'' repeated one of the Kor-ul-lul rising from
where Tarzan had dropped him. {}``Tarzan-jad-guru! He was worse than
that.''


\chapter{In the Kor-ul-gryf}

\markboth{Tarzan the Terrible}{In the Kor-ul-gryf}

\textit{\emph{As}} \textit{\emph{Tarzan}} fell among his enemies a
man halted many miles away upon the outer verge of the morass that
encircles Pal-ul-don. Naked he was except for a loin cloth and three
belts of cartridges, two of which passed over his shoulders, crossing
upon his chest and back, while the third encircled his waist. Slung
to his back by its leathern sling-strap was an Enfield, and he carried
too a long knife, a bow and a quiver of arrows. He had come far, through
wild and savage lands, menaced by fierce beasts and fiercer men, yet
intact to the last cartridge was the ammunition that had filled his
belts the day that he set out.

The bow and the arrows and the long knife had brought him thus far
safely, yet often in the face of great risks that could have been
minimized by a single shot from the well-kept rifle at his back. What
purpose might he have for conserving this precious ammunition? in
risking his life to bring the last bright shining missile to his unknown
goal? For what, for whom were these death-dealing bits of metal preserved?
In all the world only he knew.

When Pan-at-lee stepped over the edge of the cliff above Kor-ul-lul
she expected to be dashed to instant death upon the rocks below; but
she had chosen this in preference to the rending fangs of ja. Instead,
chance had ordained that she make the frightful plunge at a point
where the tumbling river swung close beneath the overhanging cliff
to eddy for a slow moment in a deep pool before plunging madly downward
again in a cataract of boiling foam, and water thundering against
rocks.

Into this icy pool the girl shot, and down and down beneath the watery
surface until, half choked, yet fighting bravely, she battled her
way once more to air. Swimming strongly she made the opposite shore
and there dragged herself out upon the bank to lie panting and spent
until the approaching dawn warned her to seek concealment, for she
was in the country of her people's enemies.

Rising, she moved into the concealment of the rank vegetation that
grows so riotously in the well-watered kors%
\footnote{I have used the Pal-ul-don word for gorge with the English plural,
which is not the correct native plural form. The latter, it seems
to me, is awkward for us and so I have generally ignored it throughout
my manuscript, permitting, for example, Kor-ul-ja to answer for both
singular and plural. However, for the benefit of those who may be
interested in such things I may say that the plurals are formed simply
for all words in the Pal-ul-don language by doubling the initial letter
of the word, as k'kor, gorges, pronounced as though written kakor,
the a having the sound of a in sofa. Lions, then, would be j'ja, or
men d' don. %
} of Pal-ul-don.

Hidden amidst the plant life from the sight of any who might chance
to pass along the well-beaten trail that skirted the river Pan-at-lee
sought rest and food, the latter growing in abundance all about her
in the form of fruits and berries and succulent tubers which she scooped
from the earth with the knife of the dead Es-sat.

Ah! if she had but known that he was dead! What trials and risks and
terrors she might have been saved; but she thought that he still lived
and so she dared not return to Kor-ul-ja. At least not yet while his
rage was at white heat. Later, perhaps, her father and brothers returned
to their cave, she might risk it; but not now\mbox{---}not now.
Nor could she for long remain here in the neighborhood of the hostile
Kor-ul-lul and somewhere she must find safety from beasts before the
night set in.

As she sat upon the bole of a fallen tree seeking some solution of
the problem of existence that confronted her, there broke upon her
ears from up the gorge the voices of shouting men\mbox{---}a sound
that she recognized all too well. It was the war cry of the Kor-ul-lul.
Closer and closer it approached her hiding place. Then, through the
veil of foliage she caught glimpses of three figures fleeing along
the trail, and behind them the shouting of the pursuers rose louder
and louder as they neared her. Again she caught sight of the fugitives
crossing the river below the cataract and again they were lost to
sight. And now the pursuers came into view\mbox{---}shouting Kor-ul-lul
warriors, fierce and implacable. Forty, perhaps fifty of them. She
waited breathless; but they did not swerve from the trail and passed
her, unguessing that an enemy she lay hid within a few yards of them.

Once again she caught sight of the pursued\mbox{---}three Waz-don
warriors clambering the cliff face at a point where portions of the
summit had fallen away presenting a steep slope that might be ascended
by such as these. Suddenly her attention was riveted upon the three.
Could it be? O Jad-ben-Otho! had she but known a moment before. When
they passed she might have joined them, for they were her father and
two brothers. Now it was too late. With bated breath and tense muscles
she watched the race. Would they reach the summit? Would the Kor-ul-lul
overhaul them? They climbed well, but, oh, so slowly. Now one lost
his footing in the loose shale and slipped back! The Kor-ul-lul were
ascending\mbox{---}one hurled his club at the nearest fugitive.
The Great God was pleased with the brother of Pan-at-lee, for he caused
the club to fall short of its target, and to fall, rolling and bounding,
back upon its owner carrying him from his feet and precipitating him
to the bottom of the gorge.

Standing now, her hands pressed tight above her golden breastplates,
Pan-at-lee watched the race for life. Now one, her older brother,
reached the summit and clinging there to something that she could
not see he lowered his body and his long tail to the father beneath
him. The latter, seizing this support, extended his own tail to the
son below\mbox{---}the one who had slipped back\mbox{---}and thus,
upon a living ladder of their own making, the three reached the summit
and disappeared from view before the Kor-ul-lul overtook them. But
the latter did not abandon the chase. On they went until they too
had disappeared from sight and only a faint shouting came down to
Pan-at-lee to tell her that the pursuit continued.

The girl knew that she must move on. At any moment now might come
a hunting party, combing the gorge for the smaller animals that fed
or bedded there.

Behind her were Es-sat and the returning party of Kor-ul-lul that
had pursued her kin; before her, across the next ridge, was the Kor-ul-gryf,
the lair of the terrifying monsters that brought the chill of fear
to every inhabitant of Pal-ul-don; below her, in the valley, was the
country of the Ho-don, where she could look for only slavery, or death;
here were the Kor-ul-lul, the ancient enemies of her people and everywhere
were the wild beasts that eat the flesh of man.

For but a moment she debated and then turning her face toward the
southeast she set out across the gorge of water toward the Kor-ul-gryf\mbox{---}at
least there were no men there. As it is now, so it was in the beginning,
back to the primitive progenitor of man which is typified by Pan-at-lee
and her kind today, of all the hunters that woman fears, man is the
most relentless, the most terrible. To the dangers of man she preferred
the dangers of the gryf.

Moving cautiously she reached the foot of the cliff at the far side
of Kor-ul-lul and here, toward noon, she found a comparatively easy
ascent. Crossing the ridge she stood at last upon the brink of Kor-ul-gryf\mbox{---}the
horror place of the folklore of her race. Dank and mysterious grew
the vegetation below; giant trees waved their plumed tops almost level
with the summit of the cliff; and over all brooded an ominous silence.

Pan-at-lee lay upon her belly and stretching over the edge scanned
the cliff face below her. She could see caves there and the stone
pegs which the ancients had fashioned so laboriously by hand. She
had heard of these in the firelight tales of her childhood and of
how the gryfs had come from the morasses across the mountains and
of how at last the people had fled after many had been seized and
devoured by the hideous creatures, leaving their caves untenanted
for no man living knew how long. Some said that Jad-ben-Otho, who
has lived forever, was still a little boy. Pan-at-lee shuddered; but
there were caves and in them she would be safe even from the gryfs.

She found a place where the stone pegs reached to the very summit
of the cliff, left there no doubt in the final exodus of the tribe
when there was no longer need of safeguarding the deserted caves against
invasion. Pan-at-lee clambered slowly down toward the uppermost cave.
She found the recess in front of the doorway almost identical with
those of her own tribe. The floor of it, though, was littered with
twigs and old nests and the droppings of birds, until it was half
choked. She moved along to another recess and still another, but all
were alike in the accumulated filth. Evidently there was no need in
looking further. This one seemed large and commodious. With her knife
she fell to work cleaning away the debris by the simple expedient
of pushing it over the edge, and always her eyes turned constantly
toward the silent gorge where lurked the fearsome creatures of Pal-ul-don.
And other eyes there were, eyes she did not see, but that saw her
and watched her every move\mbox{---}fierce eyes, greedy eyes, cunning
and cruel. They watched her, and a red tongue licked flabby, pendulous
lips. They watched her, and a half-human brain laboriously evolved
a brutish design.

As in her own Kor-ul-ja, the natural springs in the cliff had been
developed by the long-dead builders of the caves so that fresh, pure
water trickled now, as it had for ages, within easy access to the
cave entrances. Her only difficulty would be in procuring food and
for that she must take the risk at least once in two days, for she
was sure that she could find fruits and tubers and perhaps small animals,
birds, and eggs near the foot of the cliff, the last two, possibly,
in the caves themselves. Thus might she live on here indefinitely.
She felt now a certain sense of security imparted doubtless by the
impregnability of her high-flung sanctuary that she knew to be safe
from all the more dangerous beasts, and this one from men, too, since
it lay in the abjured Kor-ul-gryf.

Now she determined to inspect the interior of her new home. The sun
still in the south, lighted the interior of the first apartment. It
was similar to those of her experience\mbox{---}the same beasts
and men were depicted in the same crude fashion in the carvings on
the walls\mbox{---}evidently there had been little progress in the
race of Waz-don during the generations that had come and departed
since Kor-ul-gryf had been abandoned by men. Of course Pan-at-lee
thought no such thoughts, for evolution and progress existed not for
her, or her kind. Things were as they had always been and would always
be as they were.

That these strange creatures have existed thus for incalculable ages
it can scarce be doubted, so marked are the indications of antiquity
about their dwellings\mbox{---}deep furrows worn by naked feet in
living rock; the hollow in the jamb of a stone doorway where many
arms have touched in passing; the endless carvings that cover, ofttimes,
the entire face of a great cliff and all the walls and ceilings of
every cave and each carving wrought by a different hand, for each
is the coat of arms, one might say, of the adult male who traced it.

And so Pan-at-lee found this ancient cave homelike and familiar. There
was less litter within than she had found without and what there was
was mostly an accumulation of dust. Beside the doorway was the niche
in which wood and tinder were kept, but there remained nothing now
other than mere dust. She had however saved a little pile of twigs
from the debris on the porch. In a short time she had made a light
by firing a bundle of twigs and lighting others from this fire she
explored some of the inner rooms. Nor here did she find aught that
was new or strange nor any relic of the departed owners other than
a few broken stone dishes. She had been looking for something soft
to sleep upon, but was doomed to disappointment as the former owners
had evidently made a leisurely departure, carrying all their belongings
with them. Below, in the gorge were leaves and grasses and fragrant
branches, but Pan-at-lee felt no stomach for descending into that
horrid abyss for the gratification of mere creature comfort\mbox{---}only
the necessity for food would drive her there.

And so, as the shadows lengthened and night approached she prepared
to make as comfortable a bed as she could by gathering the dust of
ages into a little pile and spreading it between her soft body and
the hard floor\mbox{---}at best it was only better than nothing.
But Pan-at-lee was very tired. She had not slept since two nights
before and in the interval she had experienced many dangers and hardships.
What wonder then that despite the hard bed, she was asleep almost
immediately she had composed herself for rest.

She slept and the moon rose, casting its silver light upon the cliff's
white face and lessening the gloom of the dark forest and the dismal
gorge. In the distance a lion roared. There was a long silence. From
the upper reaches of the gorge came a deep bellow. There was a movement
in the trees at the cliff's foot. Again the bellow, low and ominous.
It was answered from below the deserted village. Something dropped
from the foliage of a tree directly below the cave in which Pan-at-lee
slept\mbox{---}it dropped to the ground among the dense shadows.
Now it moved, cautiously. It moved toward the foot of the cliff, taking
form and shape in the moonlight. It moved like the creature of a bad
dream\mbox{---}slowly, sluggishly. It might have been a huge sloth\mbox{---}it
might have been a man, with so grotesque a brush does the moon paint\mbox{---}master
cubist.

Slowly it moved up the face of the cliff\mbox{---}like a great grubworm
it moved, but now the moon-brush touched it again and it had hands
and feet and with them it clung to the stone pegs and raised itself
laboriously aloft toward the cave where Pan-at-lee slept. From the
lower reaches of the gorge came again the sound of bellowing, and
it was answered from above the village.

Tarzan of the Apes opened his eyes. He was conscious of a pain in
his head, and at first that was about all. A moment later grotesque
shadows, rising and falling, focused his arousing perceptions. Presently
he saw that he was in a cave. A dozen Waz-don warriors squatted about,
talking. A rude stone cresset containing burning oil lighted the interior
and as the flame rose and fell the exaggerated shadows of the warriors
danced upon the walls behind them.

{}``We brought him to you alive, Gund,'' he heard one of them saying,
{}``because never before was Ho-don like him seen. He has no tail\mbox{---}he
was born without one, for there is no scar to mark where a tail had
been cut off. The thumbs upon his hands and feet are unlike those
of the races of Pal-ul-don. He is more powerful than many men put
together and he attacks with the fearlessness of ja. We brought him
alive, that you might see him before he is slain.''

The chief rose and approached the ape-man, who closed his eyes and
feigned unconsciousness. He felt hairy hands upon him as he was turned
over, none too gently. The gund examined him from head to foot, making
comments, especially upon the shape and size of his thumbs and great
toes.

{}``With these and with no tail,'' he said, {}``it cannot climb.''

{}``No,'' agreed one of the warriors, {}``it would surely fall
even from the cliff pegs.''

{}``I have never seen a thing like it,'' said the chief. {}``It
is neither Waz-don nor Ho-don. I wonder from whence it came and what
it is called.''

{}``The Kor-ul-ja shouted aloud, `Tarzan-jad-guru!' and we thought
that they might be calling this one,'' said a warrior. {}``Shall
we kill it now?''\ 

{}``No,'' replied the chief, {}``we will wait until it's life returns
into its head that I may question it. Remain here, In-tan, and watch
it. When it can again hear and speak call me.''

He turned and departed from the cave, the others, except In-tan, following
him. As they moved past him and out of the chamber Tarzan caught snatches
of their conversation which indicated that the Kor-ul-ja reinforcements
had fallen upon their little party in great numbers and driven them
away. Evidently the swift feet of Id-an had saved the day for the
warriors of Om-at. The ape-man smiled, then he partially opened an
eye and cast it upon In-tan. The warrior stood at the entrance to
the cave looking out\mbox{---}his back was toward his prisoner.
Tarzan tested the bonds that secured his wrists. They seemed none
too stout and they had tied his hands in front of him! Evidence indeed
that the Waz-don took few prisoners\mbox{---}if any.

Cautiously he raised his wrists until he could examine the thongs
that confined them. A grim smile lighted his features. Instantly he
was at work upon the bonds with his strong teeth, but ever a wary
eye was upon In-tan, the warrior of Kor-ul-lul. The last knot had
been loosened and Tarzan's hands were free when In-tan turned to cast
an appraising eye upon his ward. He saw that the prisoner's position
was changed\mbox{---}he no longer lay upon his back as they had
left him, but upon his side and his hands were drawn up against his
face. In-tan came closer and bent down. The bonds seemed very loose
upon the prisoner's wrists. He extended his hand to examine them with
his fingers and instantly the two hands leaped from their bonds\mbox{---}one
to seize his own wrist, the other his throat. So unexpected the catlike
attack that In-tan had not even time to cry out before steel fingers
silenced him. The creature pulled him suddenly forward so that he
lost his balance and rolled over upon the prisoner and to the floor
beyond to stop with Tarzan upon his breast. In-tan struggled to release
himself\mbox{---}struggled to draw his knife; but Tarzan found it
before him. The Waz-don's tail leaped to the other's throat, encircling
it\mbox{---}he too could choke; but his own knife, in the hands
of his antagonist, severed the beloved member close to its root.

The Waz-don's struggles became weak\-er\mbox{---}a film was obscuring
his vision. He knew that he was dying and he was right. A moment later
he was dead. Tarzan rose to his feet and placed one foot upon the
breast of his dead foe. How the urge seized him to roar forth the
victory cry of his kind! But he dared not. He discovered that they
had not removed his rope from his shoulders and that they had replaced
his knife in its sheath. It had been in his hand when he was felled.
Strange creatures! He did not know that they held a superstitious
fear of the weapons of a dead enemy, believing that if buried without
them he would forever haunt his slayers in search of them and that
when he found them he would kill the man who killed him. Against the
wall leaned his bow and quiver of arrows.

Tarzan stepped toward the doorway of the cave and looked out. Night
had just fallen. He could hear voices from the nearer caves and there
floated to his nostrils the odor of cooking food. He looked down and
experienced a sensation of relief. The cave in which he had been held
was in the lowest tier\mbox{---}scarce thirty feet from the base
of the cliff. He was about to chance an immediate descent when there
occurred to him a thought that brought a grin to his savage lips\mbox{---}a
thought that was born of the name the Waz-don had given him Tarzan-jad-guru\mbox{---}Tarzan
the Terrible\mbox{---}and a recollection of the days when he had
delighted in baiting the blacks of the distant jungle of his birth.
He turned back into the cave where lay the dead body of In-tan. With
his knife he severed the warrior's head and carrying it to the outer
edge of the recess tossed it to the ground below, then he dropped
swiftly and silently down the ladder of pegs in a way that would have
surprised the Kor-ul-lul who had been so sure that he could not climb.

At the bottom he picked up the head of In-tan and disappeared among
the shadows of the trees carrying the grisly trophy by its shock of
shaggy hair. Horrible? But you are judging a wild beast by the standards
of civilization. You may teach a lion tricks, but he is still a lion.
Tarzan looked well in a Tuxedo, but he was still a Tarmangani and
beneath his pleated shirt beat a wild and savage heart.

Nor was his madness lacking in method. He knew that the hearts of
the Kor-ul-lul would be filled with rage when they discovered the
thing that he had done and he knew too, that mixed with the rage would
be a leaven of fear and it was fear of him that had made Tarzan master
of many jungles\mbox{---}one does not win the respect of the killers
with bonbons.

Below the village Tarzan returned to the foot of the cliff searching
for a point where he could make the ascent to the ridge and thus back
to the village of Om-at, the Kor-ul-ja. He came at last to a place
where the river ran so close to the rocky wall that he was forced
to swim it in search of a trail upon the opposite side and here it
was that his keen nostrils detected a familiar spoor. It was the scent
of Pan-at-lee at the spot where she had emerged from the pool and
taken to the safety of the jungle.

Immediately the ape-man's plans were changed. Pan-at-lee lived, or
at least she had lived after the leap from the cliff's summit. He
had started in search of her for Om-at, his friend, and for Om-at
he would continue upon the trail he had picked up thus fortuitously
by accident. It led him into the jungle and across the gorge and then
to the point at which Pan-at-lee had commenced the ascent of the opposite
cliffs. Here Tarzan abandoned the head of In-tan, tying it to the
lower branch of a tree, for he knew that it would handicap him in
his ascent of the steep escarpment. Apelike he ascended, following
easily the scent spoor of Pan-at-lee. Over the summit and across the
ridge the trail lay, plain as a printed page to the delicate senses
of the jungle-bred tracker.

Tarzan knew naught of the Kor-ul-gryf. He had seen, dimly in the shadows
of the night, strange, monstrous forms and Ta-den and Om-at had spoken
of great creatures that all men feared; but always, everywhere, by
night and by day, there were dangers. From infancy death had stalked,
grim and terrible, at his heels. He knew little of any other existence.
To cope with danger was his life and he lived his life as simply and
as naturally as you live yours amidst the dangers of the crowded city
streets. The black man who goes abroad in the jungle by night is afraid,
for he has spent his life since infancy surrounded by numbers of his
own kind and safeguarded, especially at night, by such crude means
as lie within his powers. But Tarzan had lived as the lion lives and
the panther and the elephant and the ape\mbox{---}a true jungle
creature dependent solely upon his prowess and his wits, playing a
lone hand against creation. Therefore he was surprised at nothing
and feared nothing and so he walked through the strange night as undisturbed
and unapprehensive as the farmer to the cow lot in the darkness before
the dawn.

Once more Pan-at-lee's trail ended at the verge of a cliff; but this
time there was no indication that she had leaped over the edge and
a moment's search revealed to Tarzan the stone pegs upon which she
had made her descent. As he lay upon his belly leaning over the top
of the cliff examining the pegs his attention was suddenly attracted
by something at the foot of the cliff. He could not distinguish its
identity, but he saw that it moved and presently that it was ascending
slowly, apparently by means of pegs similar to those directly below
him. He watched it intently as it rose higher and higher until he
was able to distinguish its form more clearly, with the result that
he became convinced that it more nearly resembled some form of great
ape than a lower order. It had a tail, though, and in other respects
it did not seem a true ape.

Slowly it ascended to the upper tier of caves, into one of which it
disappeared. Then Tarzan took up again the trail of Pan-at-lee. He
followed it down the stone pegs to the nearest cave and then further
along the upper tier. The ape-man raised his eyebrows when he saw
the direction in which it led, and quickened his pace. He had almost
reached the third cave when the echoes of Kor-ul-gryf were awakened
by a shrill scream of terror.


\chapter{The Tor-o-don}

\markboth{Tarzan the Terrible}{The Tor-o-don}

\textit{\emph{Pan}}\emph{-}\textit{\emph{at}}\emph{-}\textit{\emph{lee}}
slept\mbox{---}the troubled sleep, of physical and nervous exhaustion,
filled with weird dreamings. She dreamed that she slept beneath a
great tree in the bottom of the Kor-ul-gryf and that one of the fearsome
beasts was creeping upon her but she could not open her eyes nor move.
She tried to scream but no sound issued from her lips. She felt the
thing touch her throat, her breast, her arm, and there it closed and
seemed to be dragging her toward it. With a super-human effort of
will she opened her eyes. In the instant she knew that she was dreaming
and that quickly the hallucination of the dream would fade\mbox{---}it
had happened to her many times before. But it persisted. In the dim
light that filtered into the dark chamber she saw a form beside her,
she felt hairy fingers upon her and a hairy breast against which she
was being drawn. Jad-ben-Otho! this was no dream. And then she screamed
and tried to fight the thing from her; but her scream was answered
by a low growl and another hairy hand seized her by the hair of the
head. The beast rose now upon its hind legs and dragged her from the
cave to the moonlit recess without and at the same instant she saw
the figure of what she took to be a Ho-don rise above the outer edge
of the niche.

The beast that held her saw it too and growled ominously but it did
not relinquish its hold upon her hair. It crouched as though waiting
an attack, and it increased the volume and frequency of its growls
until the horrid sounds reverberated through the gorge, drowning even
the deep bellowings of the beasts below, whose mighty thunderings
had broken out anew with the sudden commotion from the high-flung
cave. The beast that held her crouched and the creature that faced
it crouched also, and growled\mbox{---}as hideously as the other.
Pan-at-lee trembled. This was no Ho-don and though she feared the
Ho-don she feared this thing more, with its catlike crouch and its
beastly growls. She was lost\mbox{---}that Pan-at-lee knew. The
two things might fight for her, but whichever won she was lost. Perhaps,
during the battle, if it came to that, she might find the opportunity
to throw herself over into the Kor-ul-gryf.

The thing that held her she had recognized now as a Tor-o-don, but
the other thing she could not place, though in the moonlight she could
see it very distinctly. It had no tail. She could see its hands and
its feet, and they were not the hands and feet of the races of Pal-ul-don.
It was slowly closing upon the Tor-o-don and in one hand it held a
gleaming knife. Now it spoke and to Pan-at-lee's terror was added
an equal weight of consternation.

{}``When it leaves go of you,'' it said, {}``as it will presently
to defend itself, run quickly behind me, Pan-at-lee, and go to the
cave nearest the pegs you descended from the cliff top. Watch from
there. If I am defeated you will have time to escape this slow thing;
if I am not I will come to you there. I am Om-at's friend and yours.''

The last words took the keen edge from Pan-at-lee's terror; but she
did not understand. How did this strange creature know her name? How
did it know that she had descended the pegs by a certain cave? It
must, then, have been here when she came. Pan-at-lee was puzzled.

{}``Who are you?''\ she asked, {}``and from whence do you come?''\ 

{}``I am Tarzan,'' he replied, {}``and just now I came from Om-at,
of Kor-ul-ja, in search of you.''

Om-at, gund of Kor-ul-ja! What wild talk was this? She would have
questioned him further, but now he was approaching the Tor-o-don and
the latter was screaming and growling so loudly as to drown the sound
of her voice. And then it did what the strange creature had said that
it would do\mbox{---}it released its hold upon her hair as it prepared
to charge. Charge it did and in those close quarters there was no
room to fence for openings. Instantly the two beasts locked in deadly
embrace, each seeking the other's throat. Pan-at-lee watched, taking
no advantage of the opportunity to escape which their preoccupation
gave her. She watched and waited, for into her savage little brain
had come the resolve to pin her faith to this strange creature who
had unlocked her heart with those four words\mbox{---}{}``I am
Om-at's friend!''\  And so she waited, with drawn knife, the opportunity
to do her bit in the vanquishing of the Tor-o-don. That the newcomer
could do it unaided she well knew to be beyond the realms of possibility,
for she knew well the prowess of the beastlike man with whom it fought.
There were not many of them in Pal-ul-don, but what few there were
were a terror to the women of the Waz-don and the Ho-don, for the
old Tor-o-don bulls roamed the mountains and the valleys of Pal-ul-don
between rutting seasons and woe betide the women who fell in their
paths.

With his tail the Tor-o-don sought one of Tarzan's ankles, and finding
it, tripped him. The two fell heavily, but so agile was the ape-man
and so quick his powerful muscles that even in falling he twisted
the beast beneath him, so that Tarzan fell on top and now the tail
that had tripped him sought his throat as had the tail of In-tan,
the Kor-ul-lul. In the effort of turning his antagonist's body during
the fall Tarzan had had to relinquish his knife that he might seize
the shaggy body with both hands and now the weapon lay out of reach
at the very edge of the recess. Both hands were occupied for the moment
in fending off the clutching fingers that sought to seize him and
drag his throat within reach of his foe's formidable fangs and now
the tail was seeking its deadly hold with a formidable persistence
that would not be denied.

Pan-at-lee hovered about, breathless, her dagger ready, but there
was no opening that did not also endanger Tarzan, so constantly were
the two duelists changing their positions. Tarzan felt the tail slowly
but surely insinuating itself about his neck though he had drawn his
head down between the muscles of his shoulders in an effort to protect
this vulnerable part. The battle seemed to be going against him for
the giant beast against which he strove would have been a fair match
in weight and strength for Bolgani, the gorilla. And knowing this
he suddenly exerted a single super-human effort, thrust far apart
the giant hands and with the swiftness of a striking snake buried
his fangs in the jugular of the Tor-o-don. At the same instant the
creature's tail coiled about his own throat and then commenced a battle
royal of turning and twisting bodies as each sought to dislodge the
fatal hold of the other, but the acts of the ape-man were guided by
a human brain and thus it was that the rolling bodies rolled in the
direction that Tarzan wished\mbox{---}toward the edge of the recess.

The choking tail had shut the air from his lungs, he knew that his
gasping lips were parted and his tongue protruding; and now his brain
reeled and his sight grew dim; but not before he reached his goal
and a quick hand shot out to seize the knife that now lay within reach
as the two bodies tottered perilously upon the brink of the chasm.

With all his remaining strength the ape-man drove home the blade\mbox{---}once,
twice, thrice, and then all went black before him as he felt himself,
still in the clutches of the Tor-o-don, topple from the recess.

Fortunate it was for Tarzan that Pan-at-lee had not obeyed his injunction
to make good her escape while he engaged the Tor-o-don, for it was
to this fact that he owed his life. Close beside the struggling forms
during the brief moments of the terrific climax she had realized every
detail of the danger to Tarzan with which the emergency was fraught
and as she saw the two rolling over the outer edge of the niche she
seized the ape-man by an ankle at the same time throwing herself prone
upon the rocky floor. The muscles of the Tor-o-don relaxed in death
with the last thrust of Tarzan's knife and with its hold upon the
ape-man released it shot from sight into the gorge below.

It was with infinite difficulty that Pan-at-lee retained her hold
upon the ankle of her protector, but she did so and then, slowly,
she sought to drag the dead weight back to the safety of the niche.
This, however, was beyond her strength and she could but hold on tightly,
hoping that some plan would suggest itself before her powers of endurance
failed. She wondered if, after all, the creature was already dead,
but that she could not bring herself to believe\mbox{---}and if
not dead how long it would be before he regained consciousness. If
he did not regain it soon he never would regain it, that she knew,
for she felt her fingers numbing to the strain upon them and slipping,
slowly, slowly, from their hold. It was then that Tarzan regained
consciousness. He could not know what power upheld him, but he felt
that whatever it was it was slowly releasing its hold upon his ankle.
Within easy reach of his hands were two pegs and these he seized upon
just as Pan-at-lee's fingers slipped from their hold.

As it was he came near to being precipitated into the gorge\mbox{---}only
his great strength saved him. He was upright now and his feet found
other pegs. His first thought was of his foe. Where was he? Waiting
above there to finish him? Tarzan looked up just as the frightened
face of Pan-at-lee appeared over the threshold of the recess.

{}``You live?''\ she cried.

{}``Yes,'' replied Tarzan. {}``Where is the shag\-gy one?''\ 

Pan-at-lee pointed downward. {}``There,'' she said, {}``dead.''

{}``Good!''\ exclaimed the ape-man, clambering to her side. {}``You
are unharmed?''\ he asked.

{}``You came just in time,'' replied Pan-at-lee; {}``but who are
you and how did you know that I was here and what do you know of Om-at
and where did you come from and what did you mean by calling Om-at,
gund?''\ 

{}``Wait, wait,'' cried Tarzan; {}``one at a time. My, but you
are all alike\mbox{---}the shes of the tribe of Kerchak, the ladies
of England, and their sisters of Pal-ul-don. Have patience and I will
try to tell you all that you wish to know. Four of us set out with
Om-at from Kor-ul-ja to search for you. We were attacked by the Kor-ul-lul
and separated. I was taken prisoner, but escaped. Again I stumbled
upon your trail and followed it, reaching the summit of this cliff
just as the hairy one was climbing up after you. I was coming to investigate
when I heard your scream\mbox{---}the rest you know.''

{}``But you called Om-at, gund of Kor-ul-ja,'' she insisted. {}``Es-sat
is gund.''

{}``Es-sat is dead,'' explained the ape-man. {}``Om-at slew him
and now Om-at is gund. Om-at came back seeking you. He found Es-sat
in your cave and killed him.''

{}``Yes,'' said the girl, {}``Es-sat came to my cave and I struck
him down with my golden breastplates and escaped.''

{}``And a lion pursued you,'' continued Tarzan, {}``and you leaped
from the cliff into Kor-ul-lul, but why you were not killed is beyond
me.''

{}``Is there anything beyond you?''\ exclaimed Pan-at-lee. {}``How
could you know that a lion pursued me and that I leaped from the cliff
and not know that it was the pool of deep water below that saved me?''\ 

{}``I would have known that, too, had not the Kor-ul-lul come then
and prevented me continuing upon your trail. But now I would ask you
a question\mbox{---}by what name do you call the thing with which
I just fought?''\ 

{}``It was a Tor-o-don,'' she replied. {}``I have seen but one
before. They are terrible creatures with the cunning of man and the
ferocity of a beast. Great indeed must be the warrior who slays one
single-handed.'' She gazed at him in open admiration.

{}``And now,'' said Tarzan, {}``you must sleep, for tomorrow we
shall return to Kor-ul-ja and Om-at, and I doubt that you have had
much rest these two nights.''

Pan-at-lee, lulled by a feeling of security, slept peacefully into
the morning while Tarzan stretched himself upon the hard floor of
the recess just outside her cave.

The sun was high in the heavens when he awoke; for two hours it had
looked down upon another heroic figure miles away\mbox{---}the figure
of a godlike man fighting his way through the hideous morass that
lies like a filthy moat defending Pal-ul-don from the creatures of
the outer world. Now waist deep in the sucking ooze, now menaced by
loathsome reptiles, the man advanced only by virtue of Herculean efforts
gaining laboriously by inches along the devious way that he was forced
to choose in selecting the least precarious footing. Near the center
of the morass was open water\mbox{---}slimy, green-hued water. He
reached it at last after more than two hours of such effort as would
have left an ordinary man spent and dying in the sticky mud, yet he
was less than halfway across the marsh. Greasy with slime and mud
was his smooth, brown hide, and greasy with slime and mud was his
beloved Enfield that had shone so brightly in the first rays of the
rising sun.

He paused a moment upon the edge of the open water and then throwing
himself forward struck out to swim across. He swam with long, easy,
powerful strokes calculated less for speed than for endurance, for
his was, primarily, a test of the latter, since beyond the open water
was another two hours or more of gruelling effort between it and solid
ground. He was, perhaps, halfway across and congratulating himself
upon the ease of the achievement of this portion of his task when
there arose from the depths directly in his path a hideous reptile,
which, with wide-distended jaws, bore down upon him, hissing shrilly.

Tarzan arose and stretched, expanded his great chest and drank in
deep draughts of the fresh morning air. His clear eyes scanned the
wondrous beauties of the landscape spread out before them. Directly
below lay Kor-ul-gryf, a dense, somber green of gently moving tree
tops. To Tarzan it was neither grim, nor forbidding\mbox{---}it
was jungle, beloved jungle. To his right there spread a panorama of
the lower reaches of the Valley of Jad-ben-Otho, with its winding
streams and its blue lakes. Gleaming whitely in the sunlight were
scattered groups of dwellings\mbox{---}the feudal strongholds of
the lesser chiefs of the Ho-don. A-lur, the City of Light, he could
not see as it was hidden by the shoulder of the cliff in which the
deserted village lay.

For a moment Tarzan gave himself over to that spiritual enjoyment
of beauty that only the man-mind may attain and then Nature asserted
herself and the belly of the beast called aloud that it was hungry.
Again Tarzan looked down at Kor-ul-gryf. There was the jungle! Grew
there a jungle that would not feed Tarzan? The ape-man smiled and
commenced the descent to the gorge. Was there danger there? Of course.
Who knew it better than Tarzan? In all jungles lies death, for life
and death go hand in hand and where life teems death reaps his fullest
harvest. Never had Tarzan met a creature of the jungle with which
he could not cope\mbox{---}sometimes by virtue of brute strength
alone, again by a combination of brute strength and the cunning of
the man-mind; but Tarzan had never met a gryf.

He had heard the bellowings in the gorge the night before after he
had lain down to sleep and he had meant to ask Pan-at-lee this morning
what manner of beast so disturbed the slumbers of its betters. He
reached the foot of the cliff and strode into the jungle and here
he halted, his keen eyes and ears watchful and alert, his sensitive
nostrils searching each shifting air current for the scent spoor of
game. Again he advanced deeper into the wood, his light step giving
forth no sound, his bow and arrows in readiness. A light morning breeze
was blowing from up the gorge and in this direction he bent his steps.
Many odors impinged upon his organs of scent. Some of these he classified
without effort, but others were strange\mbox{---}the odors of beasts
and of birds, of trees and shrubs and flowers with which he was unfamiliar.
He sensed faintly the reptilian odor that he had learned to connect
with the strange, nocturnal forms that had loomed dim and bulky on
several occasions since his introduction to Pal-ul-don.

And then, suddenly he caught plainly the strong, sweet odor of Bara,
the deer. Were the belly vocal, Tarzan's would have given a little
cry of joy, for it loved the flesh of Bara. The ape-man moved rapidly,
but cautiously forward. The prey was not far distant and as the hunter
approached it, he took silently to the trees and still in his nostrils
was the faint reptilian odor that spoke of a great creature which
he had never yet seen except as a denser shadow among the dense shadows
of the night; but the odor was of such a faintness as suggests to
the jungle bred the distance of absolute safety.

And now, moving noiselessly, Tarzan came within sight of Bara drinking
at a pool where the stream that waters Kor-ul-gryf crosses an open
place in the jungle. The deer was too far from the nearest tree to
risk a charge, so the ape-man must depend upon the accuracy and force
of his first arrow, which must drop the deer in its tracks or forfeit
both deer and shaft. Far back came the right hand and the bow, that
you or I might not move, bent easily beneath the muscles of the forest
god. There was a singing twang and Bara, leaping high in air, collapsed
upon the ground, an arrow through his heart. Tarzan dropped to earth
and ran to his kill, lest the animal might even yet rise and escape;
but Bara was safely dead. As Tarzan stooped to lift it to his shoulder
there fell upon his ears a thunderous bellow that seemed almost at
his right elbow, and as his eyes shot in the direction of the sound,
there broke upon his vision such a creature as paleontologists have
dreamed as having possibly existed in the dimmest vistas of Earth's
infancy\mbox{---}a gigantic creature, vibrant with mad rage, that
charged, bellowing, upon him.

When Pan-at-lee awoke she looked out upon the niche in search of Tarzan.
He was not there. She sprang to her feet and rushed out, looking down
into Kor-ul-gryf guessing that he had gone down in search of food
and there she caught a glimpse of him disappearing into the forest.
For an instant she was panic-stricken. She knew that he was a stranger
in Pal-ul-don and that, so, he might not realize the dangers that
lay in that gorge of terror. Why did she not call to him to return?
You or I might have done so, but no Pal-ul-don, for they know the
ways of the gryf\mbox{---}they know the weak eyes and the keen ears,
and that at the sound of a human voice they come. To have called to
Tarzan, then, would but have been to invite disaster and so she did
not call. Instead, afraid though she was, she descended into the gorge
for the purpose of overhauling Tarzan and warning him in whispers
of his danger. It was a brave act, since it was performed in the face
of countless ages of inherited fear of the creatures that she might
be called upon to face. Men have been decorated for less.

Pan-at-lee, descended from a long line of hunters, assumed that Tarzan
would move up wind and in this direction she sought his tracks, which
she soon found well marked, since he had made no effort to conceal
them. She moved rapidly until she reached the point at which Tarzan
had taken to the trees. Of course she knew what had happened; since
her own people were semi-arboreal; but she could not track him through
the trees, having no such well-developed sense of scent as he.

She could but hope that he had continued on up wind and in this direction
she moved, her heart pounding in terror against her ribs, her eyes
glancing first in one direction and then another. She had reached
the edge of a clearing when two things happened\mbox{---}she caught
sight of Tarzan bending over a dead deer and at the same instant a
deafening roar sounded almost beside her. It terrified her beyond
description, but it brought no paralysis of fear. Instead it galvanized
her into instant action with the result that Pan-at-lee swarmed up
the nearest tree to the very loftiest branch that would sustain her
weight. Then she looked down.

The thing that Tarzan saw charging him when the warning bellow attracted
his surprised eyes loomed terrifically monstrous before him\mbox{---}monstrous
and awe-inspiring; but it did not terrify Tarzan, it only angered
him, for he saw that it was beyond even his powers to combat and that
meant that it might cause him to lose his kill, and Tarzan was hungry.
There was but a single alternative to remaining for annihilation and
that was flight\mbox{---}swift and immediate. And Tarzan fled, but
he carried the carcass of Bara, the deer, with him. He had not more
than a dozen paces start, but on the other hand the nearest tree was
almost as close. His greatest danger lay, he imagined, in the great,
towering height of the creature pursuing him, for even though he reached
the tree he would have to climb high in an incredibly short time as,
unless appearances were deceiving, the thing could reach up and pluck
him down from any branch under thirty feet above the ground, and possibly
from those up to fifty feet, if it reared up on its hind legs.

But Tarzan was no sluggard and though the gryf was incredibly fast
despite its great bulk, it was no match for Tarzan, and when it comes
to climbing, the little monkeys gaze with envy upon the feats of the
ape-man. And so it was that the bellowing gryf came to a baffled stop
at the foot of the tree and even though he reared up and sought to
seize his prey among the branches, as Tarzan had guessed he might,
he failed in this also. And then, well out of reach, Tarzan came to
a stop and there, just above him, he saw Pan-at-lee sitting, wide-eyed
and trembling.

{}``How came you here?''\ he asked.

She told him. {}``You came to warn me!''\ he said. {}``It was
very brave and unselfish of you. I am chagrined that I should have
been thus surprised. The creature was up wind from me and yet I did
not sense its near presence until it charged. I cannot understand
it.''

{}``It is not strange,'' said Pan-at-lee. {}``That is one of the
peculiarities of the gryf\mbox{---}it is said that man never knows
of its presence until it is upon him\mbox{---}so silently does it
move despite its great size.''

{}``But I should have smelled it,'' cried Tarzan, disgustedly.

{}``Smelled it!''\ ejaculated Pan-at-lee. {}``Smel\-led it?''\ 

{}``Certainly. How do you suppose I found this deer so quickly? And
I sensed the gryf, too, but faintly as at a great distance.'' Tarzan
suddenly ceased speaking and looked down at the bellowing creature
below them\mbox{---}his nostrils quivered as though searching for
a scent. {}``Ah!''\ he exclaimed. {}``I have it!''\ 

{}``What?''\ asked Pan-at-lee.

{}``I was deceived because the creature gives off practically no
odor,'' explained the ape-man. {}``What I smelled was the faint
aroma that doubtless permeates the entire jungle because of the long
presence of many of the creatures\mbox{---}it is the sort of odor
that would remain for a long time, faint as it is.

{}``Pan-at-lee, did you ever hear of a triceratops? No? Well this
thing that you call a gryf is a triceratops and it has been extinct
for hundreds of thousands of years. I have seen its skeleton in the
museum in London and a figure of one restored. I always thought that
the scientists who did such work depended principally upon an overwrought
imagination, but I see that I was wrong. This living thing is not
an exact counterpart of the restoration that I saw; but it is so similar
as to be easily recognizable, and then, too, we must remember that
during the ages that have elapsed since the paleontologist's specimen
lived many changes might have been wrought by evolution in the living
line that has quite evidently persisted in Pal-ul-don.''

{}``Triceratops, London, paleo\mbox{---}I don't know what you are
talking about,'' cried Pan-at-lee.

Tarzan smiled and threw a piece of dead wood at the face of the angry
creature below them. Instantly the great bony hood over the neck was
erected and a mad bellow rolled upward from the gigantic body. Full
twenty feet at the shoulder the thing stood, a dirty slate-blue in
color except for its yellow face with the blue bands encircling the
eyes, the red hood with the yellow lining and the yellow belly. The
three parallel lines of bony protuberances down the back gave a further
touch of color to the body, those following the line of the spine
being red, while those on either side are yellow. The five- and three-toed
hoofs of the ancient horned dinosaurs had become talons in the gryf,
but the three horns, two large ones above the eyes and a median horn
on the nose, had persisted through all the ages. Weird and terrible
as was its appearance Tarzan could not but admire the mighty creature
looming big below him, its seventy-five feet of length majestically
typifying those things which all his life the ape-man had admired\mbox{---}courage
and strength. In that massive tail alone was the strength of an elephant.

The wicked little eyes looked up at him and the horny beak opened
to disclose a full set of powerful teeth.

{}``Herbivorous!''\ murmured the ape-man. {}``Your ancestors may
have been, but not you,'' and then to Pan-at-lee: {}``Let us go
now. At the cave we will have deer meat and then\mbox{---}back to
Kor-ul-ja and Om-at.''

The girl shuddered. {}``Go?''\ she repeated. {}``We will never
go from here.''

{}``Why not?''\ asked Tarzan.

For answer she but pointed to the gryf.

{}``Nonsense!''\ exclaimed the man. {}``It cannot climb. We can
reach the cliff through the trees and be back in the cave before it
knows what has become of us.''

{}``You do not know the gryf,'' replied Pan-at-lee gloomily.

{}``Wherever we go it will follow and always it will be ready at
the foot of each tree when we would descend. It will never give us
up.''

{}``We can live in the trees for a long time if necessary,'' replied
Tarzan, {}``and sometime the thing will leave.''

The girl shook her head. {}``Never,'' she said, {}``and then there
are the Tor-o-don. They will come and kill us and after eating a little
will throw the balance to the gryf\mbox{---}the gryf and Tor-o-don
are friends, because the Tor-o-don shares his food with the gryf.''

{}``You may be right,'' said Tarzan; {}``but even so I don't intend
waiting here for someone to come along and eat part of me and then
feed the balance to that beast below. If I don't get out of this place
whole it won't be my fault. Come along now and we'll make a try at
it,'' and so saying he moved off through the tree tops with Pan-at-lee
close behind. Below them, on the ground, moved the horned dinosaur
and when they reached the edge of the forest where there lay fifty
yards of open ground to cross to the foot of the cliff he was there
with them, at the bottom of the tree, waiting.

Tarzan looked ruefully down and scratched his head.


\chapter{Jungle Craft}

\markboth{Tarzan the Terrible}{Jungle Craft}

\textit{\emph{Presently}} he looked up and at Pan-at-lee. {}``Can
you cross the gorge through the trees very rapidly?''\ he questioned.

{}``Alone?''\ she asked.

{}``No,'' replied Tarzan.

{}``I can follow wherever you can lead,'' she said then.

{}``Across and back again?''\ 

{}``Yes.''

{}``Then come, and do exactly as I bid.'' He started back again
through the trees, swiftly, swinging monkey-like from limb to limb,
following a zigzag course that he tried to select with an eye for
the difficulties of the trail beneath. Where the underbrush was heaviest,
where fallen trees blocked the way, he led the footsteps of the creature
below them; but all to no avail. When they reached the opposite side
of the gorge the gryf was with them.

{}``Back again,'' said Tarzan, and, turning, the two retraced their
high-flung way through the upper terraces of the ancient forest of
Kor-ul-gryf. But the result was the same\mbox{---}no, not quite;
it was worse, for another gryf had joined the first and now two waited
beneath the tree in which they stopped.

The cliff looming high above them with its innumerable cave mouths
seemed to beckon and to taunt them. It was so near, yet eternity yawned
between. The body of the Tor-o-don lay at the cliff's foot where it
had fallen. It was in plain view of the two in the tree. One of the
gryfs walked over and sniffed about it, but did not offer to devour
it. Tarzan had examined it casually as he had passed earlier in the
morning. He guessed that it represented either a very high order of
ape or a very low order of man\mbox{---}something akin to the Java
man, perhaps; a truer example of the pithecanthropi than either the
Ho-don or the Waz-don; possibly the precursor of them both. As his
eyes wandered idly over the scene below his active brain was working
out the details of the plan that he had made to permit Pan-at-lee's
escape from the gorge. His thoughts were interrupted by a strange
cry from above them in the gorge.

{}``Whee-oo! Whee-oo!''\ it sounded, coming closer.

The gryfs below raised their heads and looked in the direction of
the interruption. One of them made a low, rumbling sound in its throat.
It was not a bellow and it did not indicate anger. Immediately the
{}``Whee-oo!''\ responded. The gryfs repeated the rumbling and
at intervals the {}``Whee-oo!''\ was repeated, coming ever closer.

Tarzan looked at Pan-at-lee. {}``What is it?''\ he asked.

{}``I do not know,'' she replied. {}``Perhaps a strange bird, or
another horrid beast that dwells in this frightful place.''

{}``Ah,'' exclaimed Tarzan; {}``there it is. Look!''\ 

Pan-at-lee voiced a cry of despair. {}``A Tor-o-don!''\ 

The creature, walking erect and carrying a stick in one hand, advanced
at a slow, lumbering gait. It walked directly toward the gryfs who
moved aside, as though afraid. Tarzan watched intently. The Tor-o-don
was now quite close to one of the triceratops. It swung its head and
snapped at him viciously. Instantly the Tor-o-don sprang in and commenced
to belabor the huge beast across the face with his stick. To the ape-man's
amazement the gryf, that might have annihilated the comparatively
puny Tor-o-don instantly in any of a dozen ways, cringed like a whipped
cur.

{}``Whee-oo! Whee-oo!''\ shouted the Tor-o-don and the gryf came
slowly toward him. A whack on the median horn brought it to a stop.
Then the Tor-o-don walked around behind it, clambered up its tail
and seated himself astraddle of the huge back. {}``Whee-oo!''\ he
shouted and prodded the beast with a sharp point of his stick. The
gryf commenced to move off.

So rapt had Tarzan been in the scene below him that he had given no
thought to escape, for he realized that for him and Pan-at-lee time
had in these brief moments turned back countless ages to spread before
their eyes a page of the dim and distant past. They two had looked
upon the first man and his primitive beasts of burden.

And now the ridden gryf halted and looked up at them, bellowing. It
was sufficient. The creature had warned its master of their presence.
Instantly the Tor-o-don urged the beast close beneath the tree which
held them, at the same time leaping to his feet upon the horny back.
Tarzan saw the bestial face, the great fangs, the mighty muscles.
From the loins of such had sprung the human race\mbox{---}and only
from such could it have sprung, for only such as this might have survived
the horrid dangers of the age that was theirs.

The Tor-o-don beat upon his breast and growled horribly\mbox{---}hideous,
uncouth, beastly. Tarzan rose to his full height upon a swaying branch\mbox{---}straight
and beautiful as a demigod\mbox{---}unspoiled by the taint of civilization\mbox{---}a
perfect specimen of what the human race might have been had the laws
of man not interfered with the laws of nature.

The Present fitted an arrow to his bow and drew the shaft far back.
The Past basing its claims upon brute strength sought to reach the
other and drag him down; but the loosed arrow sank deep into the savage
heart and the Past sank back into the oblivion that had claimed his
kind.

{}``Tarzan-jad-guru!''\ murmured Pan-at-lee, unknowingly giving
him out of the fullness of her admiration the same title that the
warriors of her tribe had bestowed upon him.

The ape-man turned to her. {}``Pan-at-lee,'' he said, {}``these
beasts may keep us treed here indefinitely. I doubt if we can escape
together, but I have a plan. You remain here, hiding yourself in the
foliage, while I start back across the gorge in sight of them and
yelling to attract their attention. Unless they have more brains than
I suspect they will follow me. When they are gone you make for the
cliff. Wait for me in the cave not longer than today. If I do not
come by tomorrow's sun you will have to start back for Kor-ul-ja alone.
Here is a joint of deer meat for you.'' He had severed one of the
deer's hind legs and this he passed up to her.

{}``I cannot desert you,'' she said simply; {}``it is not the way
of my people to desert a friend and ally. Om-at would never forgive
me.''

{}``Tell Om-at that I commanded you to go,'' replied Tarzan.

{}``It is a command?''\ she asked.

{}``It is! Good-bye, Pan-at-lee. Hasten back to Om-at\mbox{---}you
are a fitting mate for the chief of Kor-ul-ja.'' He moved off slowly
through the trees.

{}``Good-bye, Tarzan-jad-guru!''\ she called after him. {}``Fortunate
are my Om-at and his Pan-at-lee in owning such a friend.''

Tarzan, shouting aloud, continued upon his way and the great gryfs,
lured by his voice, followed beneath. His ruse was evidently proving
successful and he was filled with elation as he led the bellowing
beasts farther and farther from Pan-at-lee. He hoped that she would
take advantage of the opportunity afforded her for escape, yet at
the same time he was filled with concern as to her ability to survive
the dangers which lay between Kor-ul-gryf and Kor-ul-ja. There were
lions and Tor-o-dons and the unfriendly tribe of Kor-ul-lul to hinder
her progress, though the distance in itself to the cliffs of her people
was not great.

He realized her bravery and understood the resourcefulness that she
must share in common with all primitive people who, day by day, must
contend face to face with nature's law of the survival of the fittest,
unaided by any of the numerous artificial protections that civilization
has thrown around its brood of weaklings.

Several times during this crossing of the gorge Tarzan endeavored
to outwit his keen pursuers, but all to no avail. Double as he would
he could not throw them off his track and ever as he changed his course
they changed theirs to conform. Along the verge of the forest upon
the southeastern side of the gorge he sought some point at which the
trees touched some negotiable portion of the cliff, but though he
traveled far both up and down the gorge he discovered no such easy
avenue of escape. The ape-man finally commenced to entertain an idea
of the hopelessness of his case and to realize to the full why the
Kor-ul-gryf had been religiously abjured by the races of Pal-ul-don
for all these many ages.

Night was falling and though since early morning he had sought diligently
a way out of this cul-de-sac he was no nearer to liberty than at the
moment the first bellowing gryf had charged him as he stooped over
the carcass of his kill: but with the falling of night came renewed
hope for, in common with the great cats, Tarzan was, to a greater
or lesser extent, a nocturnal beast. It is true he could not see by
night as well as they, but that lack was largely recompensed for by
the keenness of his scent and the highly developed sensitiveness of
his other organs of perception. As the blind follow and interpret
their Braille characters with deft fingers, so Tarzan reads the book
of the jungle with feet and hands and eyes and ears and nose; each
contributing its share to the quick and accurate translation of the
text.

But again he was doomed to be thwarted by one vital weakness\mbox{---}he
did not know the gryf, and before the night was over he wondered if
the things never slept, for wheresoever he moved they moved also,
and always they barred his road to liberty. Finally, just before dawn,
he relinquished his immediate effort and sought rest in a friendly
tree crotch in the safety of the middle terrace.

Once again was the sun high when Tarzan awoke, rested and refreshed.
Keen to the necessities of the moment he made no effort to locate
his jailers lest in the act he might apprise them of his movements.
Instead he sought cautiously and silently to melt away among the foliage
of the trees. His first move, however, was heralded by a deep bellow
from below.

Among the numerous refinements of civilization that Tarzan had failed
to acquire was that of profanity, and possibly it is to be regretted
since there are circumstances under which it is at least a relief
to pent emotion. And it may be that in effect Tarzan resorted to profanity
if there can be physical as well as vocal swearing, since immediately
the bellow announced that his hopes had been again frustrated, he
turned quickly and seeing the hideous face of the gryf below him seized
a large fruit from a nearby branch and hurled it viciously at the
horned snout. The missile struck full between the creature's eyes,
resulting in a reaction that surprised the ape-man; it did not arouse
the beast to a show of revengeful rage as Tarzan had expected and
hoped; instead the creature gave a single vicious side snap at the
fruit as it bounded from his skull and then turned sulkily away, walking
off a few steps.

There was that in the act that recalled immediately to Tarzan's mind
similar action on the preceding day when the Tor-o-don had struck
one of the creatures across the face with his staff, and instantly
there sprung to the cunning and courageous brain a plan of escape
from his predicament that might have blanched the cheek of the most
heroic.

The gambling instinct is not strong among creatures of the wild; the
chances of their daily life are sufficient stimuli for the beneficial
excitement of their nerve centers. It has remained for civilized man,
protected in a measure from the natural dangers of existence, to invent
artificial stimulants in the form of cards and dice and roulette wheels.
Yet when necessity bids there are no greater gamblers than the savage
denizens of the jungle, the forest, and the hills, for as lightly
as you roll the ivory cubes upon the green cloth they will gamble
with death\mbox{---}their own lives the stake.

And so Tarzan would gamble now, pitting the seemingly wild deductions
of his shrewd brain against all the proofs of the bestial ferocity
of his antagonists that his experience of them had adduced\mbox{---}against
all the age-old folklore and legend that had been handed down for
countless generations and passed on to him through the lips of Pan-at-lee.

Yet as he worked in preparation for the greatest play that man can
make in the game of life, he smiled; nor was there any indication
of haste or excitement or nervousness in his demeanor.

First he selected a long, straight branch about two inches in diameter
at its base. This he cut from the tree with his knife, removed the
smaller branches and twigs until he had fashioned a pole about ten
feet in length. This he sharpened at the smaller end. The staff finished
to his satisfaction he looked down upon the triceratops.

{}``Whee-oo!''\ he cried.

Instantly the beasts raised their heads and looked at him. From the
throat of one of them came faintly a low rumbling sound.

{}``Whee-oo!''\ repeated Tarzan and hurled the balance of the carcass
of the deer to them.

Instantly the gryfs fell upon it with much bellowing, one of them
attempting to seize it and keep it from the other: but finally the
second obtained a hold and an instant later it had been torn asunder
and greedily devoured. Once again they looked up at the ape-man and
this time they saw him descending to the ground.

One of them started toward him. Again Tarzan repeated the weird cry
of the Tor-o-don. The gryf halted in his track, apparently puzzled,
while Tarzan slipped lightly to the earth and advanced toward the
nearer beast, his staff raised menacingly and the call of the first-man
upon his lips.

Would the cry be answered by the low rumbling of the beast of burden
or the horrid bellow of the man-eater? Upon the answer to this question
hung the fate of the ape-man.

Pan-at-lee was listening intently to the sounds of the departing gryfs
as Tarzan led them cunningly from her, and when she was sure that
they were far enough away to insure her safe retreat she dropped swiftly
from the branches to the ground and sped like a frightened deer across
the open space to the foot of the cliff, stepped over the body of
the Tor-o-don who had attacked her the night before and was soon climbing
rapidly up the ancient stone pegs of the deserted cliff village. In
the mouth of the cave near that which she had occupied she kindled
a fire and cooked the haunch of venison that Tarzan had left her,
and from one of the trickling streams that ran down the face of the
escarpment she obtained water to satisfy her thirst.

All day she waited, hearing in the distance, and sometimes close at
hand, the bellowing of the gryfs which pursued the strange creature
that had dropped so miraculously into her life. For him she felt the
same keen, almost fanatical loyalty that many another had experienced
for Tarzan of the Apes. Beast and human, he had held them to him with
bonds that were stronger than steel\mbox{---}those of them that
were clean and courageous, and the weak and the helpless; but never
could Tarzan claim among his admirers the coward, the ingrate or the
scoundrel; from such, both man and beast, he had won fear and hatred.

To Pan-at-lee he was all that was brave and noble and heroic and,
too, he was Om-at's friend\mbox{---}the friend of the man she loved.
For any one of these reasons Pan-at-lee would have died for Tarzan,
for such is the loyalty of the simple-minded children of nature. It
has remained for civilization to teach us to weigh the relative rewards
of loyalty and its antithesis. The loyalty of the primitive is spontaneous,
unreasoning, unselfish and such was the loyalty of Pan-at-lee for
the Tarmangani.

And so it was that she waited that day and night, hoping that he would
return that she might accompany him back to Om-at, for her experience
had taught her that in the face of danger two have a better chance
than one. But Tarzan-jad-guru had not come, and so upon the following
morning Pan-at-lee set out upon her return to Kor-ul-ja.

She knew the dangers and yet she faced them with the stolid indifference
of her race. When they directly confronted and menaced her would be
time enough to experience fear or excitement or confidence. In the
meantime it was unnecessary to waste nerve energy by anticipating
them. She moved therefore through her savage land with no greater
show of concern than might mark your sauntering to a corner drug-store
for a sundae. But this is your life and that is Pan-at-lee's and even
now as you read this Pan-at-lee may be sitting upon the edge of the
recess of Om-at's cave while the ja and jato roar from the gorge below
and from the ridge above, and the Kor-ul-lul threaten upon the south
and the Ho-don from the Valley of Jad-ben-Otho far below, for Pan-at-lee
still lives and preens her silky coat of jet beneath the tropical
moonlight of Pal-ul-don.

But she was not to reach Kor-ul-ja this day, nor the next, nor for
many days after though the danger that threatened her was neither
Waz-don enemy nor savage beast.

She came without misadventure to the Kor-ul-lul and after descending
its rocky southern wall without catching the slightest glimpse of
the hereditary enemies of her people, she experienced a renewal of
confidence that was little short of practical assurance that she would
successfully terminate her venture and be restored once more to her
own people and the lover she had not seen for so many long and weary
moons.

She was almost across the gorge now and moving with an extreme caution
abated no wit by her confidence, for wariness is an instinctive trait
of the primitive, something which cannot be laid aside even momentarily
if one would survive. And so she came to the trail that follows the
windings of Kor-ul-lul from its uppermost reaches down into the broad
and fertile Valley of Jad-ben-Otho.

And as she stepped into the trail there arose on either side of her
from out of the bushes that border the path, as though materialized
from thin air, a score of tall, white warriors of the Ho-don. Like
a frightened deer Pan-at-lee cast a single startled look at these
menacers of her freedom and leaped quickly toward the bushes in an
effort to escape; but the warriors were too close at hand. They closed
upon her from every side and then, drawing her knife she turned at
bay, metamorphosed by the fires of fear and hate from a startled deer
to a raging tiger-cat. They did not try to kill her, but only to subdue
and capture her; and so it was that more than a single Ho-don warrior
felt the keen edge of her blade in his flesh before they had succeeded
in overpowering her by numbers. And still she fought and scratched
and bit after they had taken the knife from her until it was necessary
to tie her hands and fasten a piece of wood between her teeth by means
of thongs passed behind her head.

At first she refused to walk when they started off in the direction
of the valley but after two of them had seized her by the hair and
dragged her for a number of yards she thought better of her original
decision and came along with them, though still as defiant as her
bound wrists and gagged mouth would permit.

Near the entrance to Kor-ul-lul they came upon another body of their
warriors with which were several Waz-don prisoners from the tribe
of Kor-ul-lul. It was a raiding party come up from a Ho-don city of
the valley after slaves. This Pan-at-lee knew for the occurrence was
by no means unusual. During her lifetime the tribe to which she belonged
had been sufficiently fortunate, or powerful, to withstand successfully
the majority of such raids made upon them, but yet Pan-at-lee had
known of friends and relatives who had been carried into slavery by
the Ho-don and she knew, too, another thing which gave her hope, as
doubtless it did to each of the other captives\mbox{---}that occasionally
the prisoners escaped from the cities of the hairless whites.

After they had joined the other party the entire band set forth into
the valley and presently, from the conversation of her captors, Pan-at-lee
knew that she was headed for A-lur, the City of Light; while in the
cave of his ancestors, Om-at, chief of the Kor-ul-ja, bemoaned the
loss of both his friend and she that was to have been his mate.


\chapter{A-lur}

\markboth{Tarzan the Terrible}{A-lur}

\textit{\emph{As}} \textit{\emph{the}} hissing reptile bore down upon
the stranger swimming in the open water near the center of the morass
on the frontier of Pal-ul-don it seemed to the man that this indeed
must be the futile termination of an arduous and danger-filled journey.
It seemed, too, equally futile to pit his puny knife against this
frightful creature. Had he been attacked on land it is possible that
he might as a last resort have used his Enfield, though he had come
thus far through all these weary, danger-ridden miles without recourse
to it, though again and again had his life hung in the balance in
the face of the savage denizens of forest, jungle, and steppe. For
whatever it may have been for which he was preserving his precious
ammunition he evidently held it more sacred even than his life, for
as yet he had not used a single round and now the decision was not
required of him, since it would have been impossible for him to have
unslung his Enfield, loaded and fired with the necessary celerity
while swimming.

Though his chance for survival seemed slender, and hope at its lowest
ebb, he was not minded therefore to give up without a struggle. Instead
he drew his blade and awaited the oncoming reptile. The creature was
like no living thing he ever before had seen although possibly it
resembled a crocodile in some respects more than it did anything with
which he was familiar.

As this frightful survivor of some extinct progenitor charged upon
him with distended jaws there came to the man quickly a full consciousness
of the futility of endeavoring to stay the mad rush or pierce the
armor-coated hide with his little knife. The thing was almost upon
him now and whatever form of defense he chose must be made quickly.
There seemed but a single alternative to instant death, and this he
took at almost the instant the great reptile towered directly above
him.

With the celerity of a seal he dove headforemost beneath the oncoming
body and at the same instant, turning upon his back, he plunged his
blade into the soft, cold surface of the slimy belly as the momentum
of the hurtling reptile carried it swiftly over him; and then with
powerful strokes he swam on beneath the surface for a dozen yards
before he rose. A glance showed him the stricken monster plunging
madly in pain and rage upon the surface of the water behind him. That
it was writhing in its death agonies was evidenced by the fact that
it made no effort to pursue him, and so, to the accompaniment of the
shrill screaming of the dying monster, the man won at last to the
farther edge of the open water to take up once more the almost superhuman
effort of crossing the last stretch of clinging mud which separated
him from the solid ground of Pal-ul-don.

A good two hours it took him to drag his now weary body through the
clinging, stinking muck, but at last, mud covered and spent, he dragged
himself out upon the soft grasses of the bank. A hundred yards away
a stream, winding its way down from the distant mountains, emptied
into the morass, and, after a short rest, he made his way to this
and seeking a quiet pool, bathed himself and washed the mud and slime
from his weapons, accouterments, and loin cloth. Another hour was
spent beneath the rays of the hot sun in wiping, polishing, and oiling
his Enfield though the means at hand for drying it consisted principally
of dry grasses. It was afternoon before he had satisfied himself that
his precious weapon was safe from any harm by dirt, or dampness, and
then he arose and took up the search for the spoor he had followed
to the opposite side of the swamp.

Would he find again the trail that had led into the opposite side
of the morass, to be lost there, even to his trained senses? If he
found it not again upon this side of the almost impassable barrier
he might assume that his long journey had ended in failure. And so
he sought up and down the verge of the stagnant water for traces of
an old spoor that would have been invisible to your eyes or mine,
even had we followed directly in the tracks of its maker.

As Tarzan advanced upon the gryfs he imitated as closely as he could
recall them the methods and mannerisms of the Tor-o-don, but up to
the instant that he stood close beside one of the huge creatures he
realized that his fate still hung in the balance, for the thing gave
forth no sign, either menacing or otherwise. It only stood there,
watching him out of its cold, reptilian eyes and then Tarzan raised
his staff and with a menacing {}``Whee-oo!''\ struck the gryf a
vicious blow across the face.

The creature made a sudden side snap in his direction, a snap that
did not reach him, and then turned sullenly away, precisely as it
had when the Tor-o-don commanded it. Walking around to its rear as
he had seen the shaggy first-man do, Tarzan ran up the broad tail
and seated himself upon the creature's back, and then again imitating
the acts of the Tor-o-don he prodded it with the sharpened point of
his staff, and thus goading it forward and guiding it with blows,
first upon one side and then upon the other, he started it down the
gorge in the direction of the valley.

At first it had been in his mind only to determine if he could successfully
assert any authority over the great monsters, realizing that in this
possibility lay his only hope of immediate escape from his jailers.
But once seated upon the back of his titanic mount the ape-man experienced
the sensation of a new thrill that recalled to him the day in his
boyhood that he had first clambered to the broad head of Tantor, the
elephant, and this, together with the sense of mastery that was always
meat and drink to the lord of the jungle, decided him to put his newly
acquired power to some utilitarian purpose.

Pan-at-lee he judged must either have already reached safety or met
with death. At least, no longer could he be of service to her, while
below Kor-ul-gryf, in the soft green valley, lay A-lur, the City of
Light, which, since he had gazed upon it from the shoulder of Pastar-ul-ved,
had been his ambition and his goal.

Whether or not its gleaming walls held the secret of his lost mate
he could not even guess but if she lived at all within the precincts
of Pal-ul-don it must be among the Ho-don, since the hairy black men
of this forgotten world took no prisoners. And so to A-lur he would
go, and how more effectively than upon the back of this grim and terrible
creature that the races of Pal-ul-don held in such awe?

A little mountain stream tumbles down from Kor-ul-gryf to be joined
in the foothills with that which empties the waters of Kor-ul-lul
into the valley, forming a small river which runs southwest, eventually
entering the valley's largest lake at the City of A-lur, through the
center of which the stream passes. An ancient trail, well marked by
countless generations of naked feet of man and beast, leads down toward
A-lur beside the river, and along this Tarzan guided the gryf. Once
clear of the forest which ran below the mouth of the gorge, Tarzan
caught occasional glimpses of the city gleaming in the distance far
below him.

The country through which he passed was resplendent with the riotous
beauties of tropical verdure. Thick, lush grasses grew waist high
upon either side of the trail and the way was broken now and again
by patches of open park-like forest, or perhaps a little patch of
dense jungle where the trees overarched the way and trailing creepers
depended in graceful loops from branch to branch.

At times the ape-man had difficulty in commanding obedience upon the
part of his unruly beast, but always in the end its fear of the relatively
puny goad urged it on to obedience. Late in the afternoon as they
approached the confluence of the stream they were skirting and another
which appeared to come from the direction of Kor-ul-ja the ape-man,
emerging from one of the jungle patches, discovered a considerable
party of Ho-don upon the opposite bank. Simultaneously they saw him
and the mighty creature he bestrode. For a moment they stood in wide-eyed
amazement and then, in answer to the command of their leader, they
turned and bolted for the shelter of the nearby wood.

The ape-man had but a brief glimpse of them but it was sufficient
indication that there were Waz-don with them, doubtless prisoners
taken in one of the raids upon the Waz-don villages of which Ta-den
and Om-at had told him.

At the sound of their voices the gryf had bellowed terrifically and
started in pursuit even though a river intervened, but by dint of
much prodding and beating, Tarzan had succeeded in heading the animal
back into the path though thereafter for a long time it was sullen
and more intractable than ever.

As the sun dropped nearer the summit of the western hills Tarzan became
aware that his plan to enter A-lur upon the back of a gryf was likely
doomed to failure, since the stubbornness of the great beast was increasing
momentarily, doubtless due to the fact that its huge belly was crying
out for food. The ape-man wondered if the Tor-o-dons had any means
of picketing their beasts for the night, but as he did not know and
as no plan suggested itself, he determined that he should have to
trust to the chance of finding it again in the morning.

There now arose in his mind a question as to what would be their relationship
when Tarzan had dismounted. Would it again revert to that of hunter
and quarry or would fear of the goad continue to hold its supremacy
over the natural instinct of the hunting flesh-eater? Tarzan wondered
but as he could not remain upon the gryf forever, and as he preferred
dismounting and putting the matter to a final test while it was still
light, he decided to act at once.

How to stop the creature he did not know, as up to this time his sole
desire had been to urge it forward. By experimenting with his staff,
however, he found that he could bring it to a halt by reaching forward
and striking the thing upon its beaklike snout. Close by grew a number
of leafy trees, in any one of which the ape-man could have found sanctuary,
but it had occurred to him that should he immediately take to the
trees it might suggest to the mind of the gryf that the creature that
had been commanding him all day feared him, with the result that Tarzan
would once again be held a prisoner by the triceratops.

And so, when the gryf halted, Tarzan slid to the ground, struck the
creature a careless blow across the flank as though in dismissal and
walked indifferently away. From the throat of the beast came a low
rumbling sound and without even a glance at Tarzan it turned and entered
the river where it stood drinking for a long time.

Convinced that the gryf no longer constituted a menace to him the
ape-man, spurred on himself by the gnawing of hunger, unslung his
bow and selecting a handful of arrows set forth cautiously in search
of food, evidence of the near presence of which was being borne up
to him by a breeze from down river.

Ten minutes later he had made his kill, again one of the Pal-ul-don
specimens of antelope, all species of which Tarzan had known since
childhood as Bara, the deer, since in the little primer that had been
the basis of his education the picture of a deer had been the nearest
approach to the likeness of the antelope, from the giant eland to
the smaller bushbuck of the hunting grounds of his youth.

Cutting off a haunch he cached it in a nearby tree, and throwing the
balance of the carcass across his shoulder trotted back toward the
spot at which he had left the gryf. The great beast was just emerging
from the river when Tarzan, seeing it, issued the weird cry of the
Tor-o-don. The creature looked in the direction of the sound voicing
at the same time the low rumble with which it answered the call of
its master. Twice Tarzan repeated his cry before the beast moved slowly
toward him, and when it had come within a few paces he tossed the
carcass of the deer to it, upon which it fell with greedy jaws.

{}``If anything will keep it within call,'' mused the ape-man as
he returned to the tree in which he had cached his own portion of
his kill, {}``it is the knowledge that I will feed it.'' But as
he finished his repast and settled himself comfortably for the night
high among the swaying branches of his eyrie he had little confidence
that he would ride into A-lur the following day upon his prehistoric
steed.

When Tarzan awoke early the following morning he dropped lightly to
the ground and made his way to the stream. Removing his weapons and
loin cloth he entered the cold waters of the little pool, and after
his refreshing bath returned to the tree to breakfast upon another
portion of Bara, the deer, adding to his repast some fruits and berries
which grew in abundance nearby.

His meal over he sought the ground again and raising his voice in
the weird cry that he had learned, he called aloud on the chance of
attracting the gryf, but though he waited for some time and continued
calling there was no response, and he was finally forced to the conclusion
that he had seen the last of his great mount of the preceding day.

And so he set his face toward A-lur, pinning his faith upon his knowledge
of the Ho-don tongue, his great strength and his native wit.

Refreshed by food and rest, the journey toward A-lur, made in the
cool of the morning along the bank of the joyous river, he found delightful
in the extreme. Differentiating him from his fellows of the savage
jungle were many characteristics other than those physical and mental.
Not the least of these were in a measure spiritual, and one that had
doubtless been as strong as another in influencing Tarzan's love of
the jungle had been his appreciation of the beauties of nature. The
apes cared more for a grubworm in a rotten log than for all the majestic
grandeur of the forest giants waving above them. The only beauties
that Numa acknowledged were those of his own person as he paraded
them before the admiring eyes of his mate, but in all the manifestations
of the creative power of nature of which Tarzan was cognizant he appreciated
the beauties.

As Tarzan neared the city his interest became centered upon the architecture
of the outlying buildings which were hewn from the chalklike limestone
of what had once been a group of low hills, similar to the many grass-covered
hillocks that dotted the valley in every direction. Ta-den's explanation
of the Ho-don methods of house construction accounted for the ofttimes
remarkable shapes and proportions of the buildings which, during the
ages that must have been required for their construction, had been
hewn from the limestone hills, the exteriors chiseled to such architectural
forms as appealed to the eyes of the builders while at the same time
following roughly the original outlines of the hills in an evident
desire to economize both labor and space. The excavation of the apartments
within had been similarly governed by necessity.

As he came nearer Tarzan saw that the waste material from these building
operations had been utilized in the construction of outer walls about
each building or group of buildings resulting from a single hillock,
and later he was to learn that it had also been used for the filling
of inequalities between the hills and the forming of paved streets
throughout the city, the result, possibly, more of the adoption of
an easy method of disposing of the quantities of broken limestone
than by any real necessity for pavements.

There were people moving about within the city and upon the narrow
ledges and terraces that broke the lines of the buildings and which
seemed to be a peculiarity of Ho-don architecture, a concession, no
doubt, to some inherent instinct that might be traced back to their
early cliff-dwelling progenitors.

Tarzan was not surprised that at a short distance he aroused no suspicion
or curiosity in the minds of those who saw him, since, until closer
scrutiny was possible, there was little to distinguish him from a
native either in his general conformation or his color. He had, of
course, formulated a plan of action and, having decided, he did not
hesitate in the carrying out his plan.

With the same assurance that you might venture upon the main street
of a neighboring city Tarzan strode into the Ho-don city of A-lur.
The first person to detect his spuriousness was a little child playing
in the arched gateway of one of the walled buildings. {}``No tail!
no tail!''\ it shouted, throwing a stone at him, and then it suddenly
grew dumb and its eyes wide as it sensed that this creature was something
other than a mere Ho-don warrior who had lost his tail. With a gasp
the child turned and fled screaming into the courtyard of its home.

Tarzan continued on his way, fully realizing that the moment was imminent
when the fate of his plan would be decided. Nor had he long to wait
since at the next turning of the winding street he came face to face
with a Ho-don warrior. He saw the sudden surprise in the latter's
eyes, followed instantly by one of suspicion, but before the fellow
could speak Tarzan addressed him.

{}``I am a stranger from another land,'' he said; {}``I would speak
with Ko-tan, your king.''

The fellow stepped back, laying his hand upon his knife. {}``There
are no strangers that come to the gates of A-lur,'' he said, {}``other
than as enemies or slaves.''

{}``I come neither as a slave nor an enemy,'' replied Tarzan. {}``I
come directly from Jad-ben-Otho. Look!''\ and he held out his hands
that the Ho-don might see how greatly they differed from his own,
and then wheeled about that the other might see that he was tailless,
for it was upon this fact that his plan had been based, due to his
recollection of the quarrel between Ta-den and Om-at, in which the
Waz-don had claimed that Jad-ben-Otho had a long tail while the Ho-don
had been equally willing to fight for his faith in the taillessness
of his god.

The warrior's eyes widened and an expression of awe crept into them,
though it was still tinged with suspicion. {}``Jad-ben-Otho!''\ he
murmured, and then, {}``It is true that you are neither Ho-don nor
Waz-don, and it is also true that Jad-ben-Otho has no tail. Come,''
he said, {}``I will take you to Ko-tan, for this is a matter in which
no common warrior may interfere. Follow me,'' and still clutching
the handle of his knife and keeping a wary side glance upon the ape-man
he led the way through A-lur.

The city covered a large area. Sometimes there was a considerable
distance between groups of buildings, and again they were quite close
together. There were numerous imposing groups, evidently hewn from
the larger hills, often rising to a height of a hundred feet or more.
As they advanced they met numerous warriors and women, all of whom
showed great curiosity in the stranger, but there was no attempt to
menace him when it was found that he was being conducted to the palace
of the king.

They came at last to a great pile that sprawled over a considerable
area, its western front facing upon a large blue lake and evidently
hewn from what had once been a natural cliff. This group of buildings
was surrounded by a wall of considerably greater height than any that
Tarzan had before seen. His guide led him to a gateway before which
waited a dozen or more warriors who had risen to their feet and formed
a barrier across the entrance-way as Tarzan and his party appeared
around the corner of the palace wall, for by this time he had accumulated
such a following of the curious as presented to the guards the appearance
of a formidable mob.

The guide's story told, Tarzan was conducted into the courtyard where
he was held while one of the warriors entered the palace, evidently
with the intention of notifying Ko-tan. Fifteen minutes later a large
warrior appeared, followed by several others, all of whom examined
Tarzan with every sign of curiosity as they approached.

The leader of the party halted before the ape-man. {}``Who are you?''\ 
he asked, {}``and what do you want of Ko-tan, the king?''\ 

{}``I am a friend,'' replied the ape-man, {}``and I have come from
the country of Jad-ben-Otho to visit Ko-tan of Pal-ul-don.''

The warrior and his followers seemed impressed. Tarzan could see the
latter whispering among themselves.

{}``How come you here,'' asked the spokesman, {}``and what do you
want of Ko-tan?''\ 

Tarzan drew himself to his full height. {}``Enough!''\ he cried.
{}``Must the messenger of Jad-ben-Otho be subjected to the treatment
that might be accorded to a wandering Waz-don? Take me to the king
at once lest the wrath of Jad-ben-Otho fall upon you.''

There was some question in the mind of the ape-man as to how far he
might carry his unwarranted show of assurance, and he waited therefore
with amused interest the result of his demand. He did not, however,
have long to wait for almost immediately the attitude of his questioner
changed. He whitened, cast an apprehensive glance toward the eastern
sky and then extended his right palm toward Tarzan, placing his left
over his own heart in the sign of amity that was common among the
peoples of Pal-ul-don.

Tarzan stepped quickly back as though from a profaning hand, a feigned
expression of horror and disgust upon his face.

{}``Stop!''\ he cried, {}``who would dare touch the sacred person
of the messenger of Jad-ben-Otho? Only as a special mark of favor
from Jad-ben-Otho may even Ko-tan himself receive this honor from
me. Hasten! Already now have I waited too long! What manner of reception
the Ho-don of A-lur would extend to the son of my father!''\ 

At first Tarzan had been inclined to adopt the role of Jad-ben-Otho
himself but it occurred to him that it might prove embarrassing and
considerable of a bore to be compelled constantly to portray the character
of a god, but with the growing success of his scheme it had suddenly
occurred to him that the authority of the son of Jad-ben-Otho would
be far greater than that of an ordinary messenger of a god, while
at the same time giving him some leeway in the matter of his acts
and demeanor, the ape-man reasoning that a young god would not be
held so strictly accountable in the matter of his dignity and bearing
as an older and greater god.

This time the effect of his words was immediately and painfully noticeable
upon all those near him. With one accord they shrank back, the spokesman
almost collapsing in evident terror. His apologies, when finally the
paralysis of his fear would permit him to voice them, were so abject
that the ape-man could scarce repress a smile of amused contempt.

{}``Have mercy, O Dor-ul-Otho,'' he pleaded, {}``on poor old Dak-lot.
Precede me and I will show you to where Ko-tan, the king, awaits you,
trembling. Aside, snakes and vermin,'' he cried pushing his warriors
to right and left for the purpose of forming an avenue for Tarzan.

{}``Come!''\ cried the ape-man peremptorily, {}``lead the way,
and let these others follow.''

The now thoroughly frightened Dak-lot did as he was bid, and Tarzan
of the Apes was ushered into the palace of Kotan, King of Pal-ul-don.


\chapter{Blood-Stained Altars}

\markboth{Tarzan the Terrible}{Blood-Stained Altars}

\textit{\emph{The}} entrance through which he caught his first glimpse
of the interior was rather beautifully carved in geometric designs,
and within the walls were similarly treated, though as he proceeded
from one apartment to another he found also the figures of animals,
birds, and men taking their places among the more formal figures of
the mural decorator's art. Stone vessels were much in evidence as
well as ornaments of gold and the skins of many animals, but nowhere
did he see an indication of any woven fabric, indicating that in that
respect at least the Ho-don were still low in the scale of evolution,
and yet the proportions and symmetry of the corridors and apartments
bespoke a degree of civilization.

The way led through several apartments and long corridors, up at least
three flights of stone stairs and finally out upon a ledge upon the
western side of the building overlooking the blue lake. Along this
ledge, or arcade, his guide led him for a hundred yards, to stop at
last before a wide entrance-way leading into another apartment of
the palace.

Here Tarzan beheld a considerable concourse of warriors in an enormous
apartment, the domed ceiling of which was fully fifty feet above the
floor. Almost filling the chamber was a great pyramid ascending in
broad steps well up under the dome in which were a number of round
apertures which let in the light. The steps of the pyramid were occupied
by warriors to the very pinnacle, upon which sat a large, imposing
figure of a man whose golden trappings shone brightly in the light
of the afternoon sun, a shaft of which poured through one of the tiny
apertures of the dome.

{}``Ko-tan!''\ cried Dak-lot, addressing the resplendent figure
at the pinnacle of the pyramid. {}``Ko-tan and warriors of Pal-ul-don!
Behold the honor that Jad-ben-Otho has done you in sending as his
messenger his own son,'' and Dak-lot, stepping aside, indicated Tarzan
with a dramatic sweep of his hand.

Ko-tan rose to his feet and every warrior within sight craned his
neck to have a better view of the newcomer. Those upon the opposite
side of the pyramid crowded to the front as the words of the old warrior
reached them. Skeptical were the expressions on most of the faces;
but theirs was a skepticism marked with caution. No matter which way
fortune jumped they wished to be upon the right side of the fence.
For a moment all eyes were centered upon Tarzan and then gradually
they drifted to Ko-tan, for from his attitude would they receive the
cue that would determine theirs. But Ko-tan was evidently in the same
quandary as they\mbox{---}the very attitude of his body indicated
it\mbox{---}it was one of indecision and of doubt.

The ape-man stood erect, his arms folded upon his broad breast, an
expression of haughty disdain upon his handsome face; but to Dak-lot
there seemed to be indications also of growing anger. The situation
was becoming strained. Dak-lot fidgeted, casting apprehensive glances
at Tarzan and appealing ones at Ko-tan. The silence of the tomb wrapped
the great chamber of the throneroom of Pal-ul-don.

At last Ko-tan spoke. {}``Who says that he is Dor-ul-Otho?''\ he
asked, casting a terrible look at Dak-lot.

{}``He does!''\ almost shouted that terrified noble.

{}``And so it must be true?''\ queried Ko-tan.

Could it be that there was a trace of irony in the chief's tone? Otho
forbid! Dak-lot cast a side glance at Tarzan\mbox{---}a glance that
he intended should carry the assurance of his own faith; but that
succeeded only in impressing the ape-man with the other's pitiable
terror.

{}``O Ko-tan!''\ pleaded Dak-lot, {}``your own eyes must convince
you that indeed he is the son of Otho. Behold his godlike figure,
his hands, and his feet, that are not as ours, and that he is entirely
tailless as is his mighty father.''

Ko-tan appeared to be perceiving these facts for the first time and
there was an indication that his skepticism was faltering. At that
moment a young warrior who had pushed his way forward from the opposite
side of the pyramid to where he could obtain a good look at Tarzan
raised his voice.

{}``Ko-tan,'' he cried, {}``it must be even as Dak-lot says, for
I am sure now that I have seen Dor-ul-Otho before. Yesterday as we
were returning with the Kor-ul-lul prisoners we beheld him seated
upon the back of a great gryf. We hid in the woods before he came
too near, but I saw enough to make sure that he who rode upon the
great beast was none other than the messenger who stands here now.''

This evidence seemed to be quite enough to convince the majority of
the warriors that they indeed stood in the presence of deity\mbox{---}their
faces showed it only too plainly, and a sudden modesty that caused
them to shrink behind their neighbors. As their neighbors were attempting
to do the same thing, the result was a sudden melting away of those
who stood nearest the ape-man, until the steps of the pyramid directly
before him lay vacant to the very apex and to Ko-tan. The latter,
possibly influenced as much by the fearful attitude of his followers
as by the evidence adduced, now altered his tone and his manner in
such a degree as might comport with the requirements if the stranger
was indeed the Dor-ul-Otho while leaving his dignity a loophole of
escape should it appear that he had entertained an impostor.

{}``If indeed you are the Dor-ul-Otho,'' he said, addressing Tarzan,
{}``you will know that our doubts were but natural since we have
received no sign from Jad-ben-Otho that he intended honoring us so
greatly, nor how could we know, even, that the Great God had a son?
If you are he, all Pal-ul-don rejoices to honor you; if you are not
he, swift and terrible shall be the punishment of your temerity. I,
Ko-tan, King of Pal-ul-don, have spoken.''

{}``And spoken well, as a king should speak,'' said Tarzan, breaking
his long silence, {}``who fears and honors the god of his people.
It is well that you insist that I indeed be the Dor-ul-Otho before
you accord me the homage that is my due. Jad-ben-Otho charged me specially
to ascertain if you were fit to rule his people. My first experience
of you indicates that Jad-ben-Otho chose well when he breathed the
spirit of a king into the babe at your mother's breast.''

The effect of this statement, made so casually, was marked in the
expressions and excited whispers of the now awe-struck assemblage.
At last they knew how kings were made! It was decided by Jad-ben-Otho
while the candidate was still a suckling babe! Wonderful! A miracle!
and this divine creature in whose presence they stood knew all about
it. Doubtless he even discussed such matters with their god daily.
If there had been an atheist among them before, or an agnostic, there
was none now, for had they not looked with their own eyes upon the
son of god?

{}``It is well then,'' continued the ape-man, {}``that you should
assure yourself that I am no impostor. Come closer that you may see
that I am not as are men. Furthermore it is not meet that you stand
upon a higher level than the son of your god.'' There was a sudden
scramble to reach the floor of the throne-room, nor was Ko-tan far
behind his warriors, though he managed to maintain a certain majestic
dignity as he descended the broad stairs that countless naked feet
had polished to a gleaming smoothness through the ages. {}``And now,''
said Tarzan as the king stood before him, {}``you can have no doubt
that I am not of the same race as you. Your priests have told you
that Jad-ben-Otho is tailless. Tailless, therefore, must be the race
of gods that spring from his loins. But enough of such proofs as these!
You know the power of Jad-ben-Otho; how his lightnings gleaming out
of the sky carry death as he wills it; how the rains come at his bidding,
and the fruits and the berries and the grains, the grasses, the trees
and the flowers spring to life at his divine direction; you have witnessed
birth and death, and those who honor their god honor him because he
controls these things. How would it fare then with an impostor who
claimed to be the son of this all-powerful god? This then is all the
proof that you require, for as he would strike you down should you
deny me, so would he strike down one who wrongfully claimed kinship
with him.''

This line of argument being unanswerable must needs be convincing.
There could be no questioning of this creature's statements without
the tacit admission of lack of faith in the omnipotence of Jad-ben-Otho.
Ko-tan was satisfied that he was entertaining deity, but as to just
what form his entertainment should take he was rather at a loss to
know. His conception of god had been rather a vague and hazy affair,
though in common with all primitive people his god was a personal
one as were his devils and demons. The pleasures of Jad-ben-Otho he
had assumed to be the excesses which he himself enjoyed, but devoid
of any unpleasant reaction. It therefore occurred to him that the
Dor-ul-Otho would be greatly entertained by eating\mbox{---}eating
large quantities of everything that Ko-tan liked best and that he
had found most injurious; and there was also a drink that the women
of the Ho-don made by allowing corn to soak in the juices of succulent
fruits, to which they had added certain other ingredients best known
to themselves. Ko-tan knew by experience that a single draught of
this potent liquor would bring happiness and surcease from worry,
while several would cause even a king to do things and enjoy things
that he would never even think of doing or enjoying while not under
the magical influence of the potion, but unfortunately the next morning
brought suffering in direct ratio to the joy of the preceding day.
A god, Ko-tan reasoned, could experience all the pleasure without
the headache, but for the immediate present he must think of the necessary
dignities and honors to be accorded his immortal guest.

No foot other than a king's had touched the surface of the apex of
the pyramid in the throneroom at A-lur during all the forgotten ages
through which the kings of Pal-ul-don had ruled from its high eminence.
So what higher honor could Ko-tan offer than to give place beside
him to the Dor-ul-Otho? And so he invited Tarzan to ascend the pyramid
and take his place upon the stone bench that topped it. As they reached
the step below the sacred pinnacle Ko-tan continued as though to mount
to his throne, but Tarzan laid a detaining hand upon his arm.

{}``None may sit upon a level with the gods,'' he admonished, stepping
confidently up and seating himself upon the throne. The abashed Ko-tan
showed his embarrassment, an embarrassment he feared to voice lest
he incur the wrath of the king of kings.

{}``But,'' added Tarzan, {}``a god may honor his faithful servant
by inviting him to a place at his side. Come, Ko-tan; thus would I
honor you in the name of Jad-ben-Otho.''

The ape-man's policy had for its basis an attempt not only to arouse
the fearful respect of Ko-tan but to do it without making of him an
enemy at heart, for he did not know how strong a hold the religion
of the Ho-don had upon them, for since the time that he had prevented
Ta-den and Om-at from quarreling over a religious difference the subject
had been utterly taboo among them. He was therefore quick to note
the evident though wordless resentment of Ko-tan at the suggestion
that he entirely relinquish his throne to his guest. On the whole,
however, the effect had been satisfactory as he could see from the
renewed evidence of awe upon the faces of the warriors.

At Tarzan's direction the business of the court continued where it
had been interrupted by his advent. It consisted principally in the
settling of disputes between warriors. There was present one who stood
upon the step just below the throne and which Tarzan was to learn
was the place reserved for the higher chiefs of the allied tribes
which made up Ko-tan's kingdom. The one who attracted Tarzan's attention
was a stalwart warrior of powerful physique and massive, lion-like
features. He was addressing Ko-tan on a question that is as old as
government and that will continue in unabated importance until man
ceases to exist. It had to do with a boundary dispute with one of
his neighbors.

The matter itself held little or no interest for Tarzan, but he was
impressed by the appearance of the speaker and when Ko-tan addressed
him as Ja-don the ape-man's interest was permanently crystallized,
for Ja-don was the father of Ta-den. That the knowledge would benefit
him in any way seemed rather a remote possibility since he could not
reveal to Ja-don his friendly relations with his son without admitting
the falsity of his claims to godship.

When the affairs of the audience were concluded Ko-tan suggested that
the son of Jad-ben-Otho might wish to visit the temple in which were
performed the religious rites coincident to the worship of the Great
God. And so the ape-man was conducted by the king himself, followed
by the warriors of his court, through the corridors of the palace
toward the northern end of the group of buildings within the royal
enclosure.

The temple itself was really a part of the palace and similar in architecture.
There were several ceremonial places of varying sizes, the purposes
of which Tarzan could only conjecture. Each had an altar in the west
end and another in the east and were oval in shape, their longest
diameter lying due east and west. Each was excavated from the summit
of a small hillock and all were without roofs. The western altars
invariably were a single block of stone the top of which was hollowed
into an oblong basin. Those at the eastern ends were similar blocks
of stone with flat tops and these latter, unlike those at the opposite
ends of the ovals were invariably stained or painted a reddish brown,
nor did Tarzan need to examine them closely to be assured of what
his keen nostrils already had told him\mbox{---}that the brown stains
were dried and drying human blood.

Below these temple courts were corridors and apartments reaching far
into the bowels of the hills, dim, gloomy passages that Tarzan glimpsed
as he was led from place to place on his tour of inspection of the
temple. A messenger had been dispatched by Ko-tan to announce the
coming visit of the son of Jad-ben-Otho with the result that they
were accompanied through the temple by a considerable procession of
priests whose distinguishing mark of profession seemed to consist
in grotesque headdresses; sometimes hideous faces carved from wood
and entirely concealing the countenances of their wearers, or again,
the head of a wild beast cunningly fitted over the head of a man.
The high priest alone wore no such head-dress. He was an old man with
close-set, cunning eyes and a cruel, thin-lipped mouth.

At first sight of him Tarzan realized that here lay the greatest danger
to his ruse, for he saw at a glance that the man was antagonistic
toward him and his pretensions, and he knew too that doubtless of
all the people of Pal-ul-don the high priest was most likely to harbor
the truest estimate of Jad-ben-Otho, and, therefore, would look with
suspicion on one who claimed to be the son of a fabulous god.

No matter what suspicion lurked within his crafty mind, Lu-don, the
high priest of A-lur, did not openly question Tarzan's right to the
title of Dor-ul-Otho, and it may be that he was restrained by the
same doubts which had originally restrained Ko-tan and his warriors\mbox{---}the
doubt that is at the bottom of the minds of all blasphemers even and
which is based upon the fear that after all there may be a god. So,
for the time being at least Lu-don played safe. Yet Tarzan knew as
well as though the man had spoken aloud his inmost thoughts that it
was in the heart of the high priest to tear the veil from his imposture.

At the entrance to the temple Ko-tan had relinquished the guidance
of the guest to Lu-don and now the latter led Tarzan through those
portions of the temple that he wished him to see. He showed him the
great room where the votive offerings were kept, gifts from the barbaric
chiefs of Pal-ul-don and from their followers. These things ranged
in value from presents of dried fruits to massive vessels of beaten
gold, so that in the great main storeroom and its connecting chambers
and corridors was an accumulation of wealth that amazed even the eyes
of the owner of the secret of the treasure vaults of Opar.

Moving to and fro throughout the temple were sleek black Waz-don slaves,
fruits of the Ho-don raids upon the villages of their less civilized
neighbors. As they passed the barred entrance to a dim corridor, Tarzan
saw within a great company of pithecanthropi of all ages and of both
sexes, Ho-don as well as Waz-don, the majority of them squatted upon
the stone floor in attitudes of utter dejection while some paced back
and forth, their features stamped with the despair of utter hopelessness.

{}``And who are these who lie here thus unhappily?''\ he asked
of Lu-don. It was the first question that he had put to the high priest
since entering the temple, and instantly he regretted that he had
asked it, for Lu-don turned upon him a face upon which the expression
of suspicion was but thinly veiled.

{}``Who should know better than the son of Jad-ben-Otho?''\ he
retorted.

{}``The questions of Dor-ul-Otho are not with impunity answered with
other questions,'' said the ape-man quietly, {}``and it may interest
Lu-don, the high priest, to know that the blood of a false priest
upon the altar of his temple is not displeasing in the eyes of Jad-ben-Otho.''

Lu-don paled as he answered Tarzan's question. {}``They are the offerings
whose blood must refresh the eastern altars as the sun returns to
your father at the day's end.''

{}``And who told you,'' asked Tarzan, {}``that Jad-ben-Otho was
pleased that his people were slain upon his altars? What if you were
mistaken?''\ 

{}``Then countless thousands have died in vain,'' replied Ludon.

Ko-tan and the surrounding warriors and priests were listening attentively
to the dialogue. Some of the poor victims behind the barred gateway
had heard and rising, pressed close to the barrier through which one
was conducted just before sunset each day, never to return.

{}``Liberate them!''\ cried Tarzan with a wave of his hand toward
the imprisoned victims of a cruel superstition, {}``for I can tell
you in the name of Jad-ben-Otho that you are mistaken.''


\chapter{The Forbidden Garden}

\markboth{Tarzan the Terrible}{The Forbidden Garden}

\textit{\emph{Lu}}\emph{-}\textit{\emph{don}} paled. {}``It is sacrilege,''
he cried; {}``for countless ages have the priests of the Great God
offered each night a life to the spirit of Jad-ben-Otho as it returned
below the western horizon to its master, and never has the Great God
given sign that he was displeased.''

{}``Stop!''\ commanded Tarzan. {}``It is the blindness of the
priesthood that has failed to read the messages of their god. Your
warriors die beneath the knives and clubs of the Wazdon; your hunters
are taken by ja and jato; no day goes by but witnesses the deaths
of few or many in the villages of the Ho-don, and one death each day
of those that die are the toll which Jad-ben-Otho has exacted for
the lives you take upon the eastern altar. What greater sign of his
displeasure could you require, O stupid priest?''\ 

Lu-don was silent. There was raging within him a great conflict between
his fear that this indeed might be the son of god and his hope that
it was not, but at last his fear won and he bowed his head. {}``The
son of Jad-ben-Otho has spoken,'' he said, and turning to one of
the lesser priests: {}``Remove the bars and return these people from
whence they came.''

He thus addressed did as he was bid and as the bars came down the
prisoners, now all fully aware of the miracle that had saved them,
crowded forward and throwing themselves upon their knees before Tarzan
raised their voices in thanksgiving.

Ko-tan was almost as staggered as the high priest by this ruthless
overturning of an age-old religious rite. {}``But what,'' he cried,
{}``may we do that will be pleasing in the eyes of Jad-ben-Otho?''\ 
turning a look of puzzled apprehension toward the ape-man.

{}``If you seek to please your god,'' he replied, {}``place upon
your altars such gifts of food and apparel as are most welcome in
the city of your people. These things will Jad-ben-Otho bless, when
you may distribute them among those of the city who need them most.
With such things are your storerooms filled as I have seen with mine
own eyes, and other gifts will be brought when the priests tell the
people that in this way they find favor before their god,'' and Tarzan
turned and signified that he would leave the temple.

As they were leaving the precincts devoted to the worship of their
deity, the ape-man noticed a small but rather ornate building that
stood entirely detached from the others as though it had been cut
from a little pinnacle of limestone which had stood out from its fellows.
As his interested glance passed over it he noticed that its door and
windows were barred.

{}``To what purpose is that building dedicated?''\ he asked of
Lu-don. {}``Who do you keep imprisoned there?''\ 

{}``It is nothing,'' replied the high priest nervously, {}``there
is no one there. The place is vacant. Once it was used but not now
for many years,'' and he moved on toward the gateway which led back
into the palace. Here he and the priests halted while Tarzan with
Ko-tan and his warriors passed out from the sacred precincts of the
temple grounds.

The one question which Tarzan would have asked he had feared to ask
for he knew that in the hearts of many lay a suspicion as to his genuineness,
but he determined that before he slept he would put the question to
Ko-tan, either directly or indirectly\mbox{---}as to whether there
was, or had been recently within the city of A-lur a female of the
same race as his.

As their evening meal was being served to them in the banquet hall
of Ko-tan's palace by a part of the army of black slaves upon whose
shoulders fell the burden of all the heavy and menial tasks of the
city, Tarzan noticed that there came to the eyes of one of the slaves
what was apparently an expression of startled recognition, as he looked
upon the ape-man for the first time in the banquet hall of Ko-tan.
And again later he saw the fellow whisper to another slave and nod
his head in his direction. The ape-man did not recall ever having
seen this Waz-don before and he was at a loss to account for an explanation
of the fellow's interest in him, and presently the incident was all
but forgotten.

Ko-tan was surprised and inwardly disgusted to discover that his godly
guest had no desire to gorge himself upon rich foods and that he would
not even so much as taste the villainous brew of the Ho-don. To Tarzan
the banquet was a dismal and tiresome affair, since so great was the
interest of the guests in gorging themselves with food and drink that
they had no time for conversation, the only vocal sounds being confined
to a continuous grunting which, together with their table manners
reminded Tarzan of a visit he had once made to the famous Berkshire
herd of His Grace, the Duke of Westminster at Woodhouse, Chester.

One by one the diners succumbed to the stupefying effects of the liquor
with the result that the grunting gave place to snores, so presently
Tarzan and the slaves were the only conscious creatures in the banquet
hall.

Rising, the ape-man turned to a tall black who stood behind him. {}``I
would sleep,'' he said, {}``show me to my apartment.''

As the fellow conducted him from the chamber the slave who had shown
surprise earlier in the evening at sight of him, spoke again at length
to one of his fellows. The latter cast a half-frightened look in the
direction of the departing ape-man. {}``If you are right,'' he said,
{}``they should reward us with our liberty, but if you are wrong,
O Jad-ben-Otho, what will be our fate?''\ 

{}``But I am not wrong!''\ cried the other.

{}``Then there is but one to tell this to, for I have heard that
he looked sour when this Dor-ul-Otho was brought to the temple and
that while the so-called son of Jad-ben-Otho was there he gave this
one every cause to fear and hate him. I mean Lu-don, the high priest.''

{}``You know him?''\ asked the other slave.

{}``I have worked in the temple,'' replied his companion.

{}``Then go to him at once and tell him, but be sure to exact the
promise of our freedom for the proof.''

And so a black Waz-don came to the temple gate and asked to see Lu-don,
the high priest, on a matter of great importance, and though the hour
was late Lu-don saw him, and when he had heard his story he promised
him and his friend not only their freedom but many gifts if they could
prove the correctness of their claims.

And as the slave talked with the high priest in the temple at A-lur
the figure of a man groped its way around the shoulder of Pastar-ul-ved
and the moonlight glistened from the shiny barrel of an Enfield that
was strapped to the naked back, and brass cartridges shed tiny rays
of reflected light from their polished cases where they hung in the
bandoliers across the broad brown shoulders and the lean waist.

Tarzan's guide conducted him to a chamber overlooking the blue lake
where he found a bed similar to that which he had seen in the villages
of the Waz-don, merely a raised dais of stone upon which was piled
great quantities of furry pelts. And so he lay down to sleep, the
question that he most wished to put still unasked and unanswered.

With the coming of a new day he was awake and wandering about the
palace and the palace grounds before there was sign of any of the
inmates of the palace other than slaves, or at least he saw no others
at first, though presently he stumbled upon an enclosure which lay
almost within the center of the palace grounds surrounded by a wall
that piqued the ape-man's curiosity, since he had determined to investigate
as fully as possible every part of the palace and its environs.

This place, whatever it might be, was apparently without doors or
windows but that it was at least partially roofless was evidenced
by the sight of the waving branches of a tree which spread above the
top of the wall near him. Finding no other method of access, the ape-man
uncoiled his rope and throwing it over the branch of the tree where
it projected beyond the wall, was soon climbing with the ease of a
monkey to the summit.

There he found that the wall surrounded an enclosed garden in which
grew trees and shrubs and flowers in riotous profusion. Without waiting
to ascertain whether the garden was empty or contained Ho-don, Waz-don,
or wild beasts, Tarzan dropped lightly to the sward on the inside
and without further loss of time commenced a systematic investigation
of the enclosure.

His curiosity was aroused by the very evident fact that the place
was not for general use, even by those who had free access to other
parts of the palace grounds and so there was added to its natural
beauties an absence of mortals which rendered its exploration all
the more alluring to Tarzan since it suggested that in such a place
might he hope to come upon the object of his long and difficult search.

In the garden were tiny artificial streams and little pools of water,
flanked by flowering bushes, as though it all had been designed by
the cunning hand of some master gardener, so faithfully did it carry
out the beauties and contours of nature upon a miniature scale.

The interior surface of the wall was fashioned to represent the white
cliffs of Pal-ul-don, broken occasionally by small replicas of the
verdure-filled gorges of the original.

Filled with admiration and thoroughly enjoying each new surprise which
the scene offered, Tarzan moved slowly around the garden, and as always
he moved silently. Passing through a miniature forest he came presently
upon a tiny area of flowerstudded sward and at the same time beheld
before him the first Ho-don female he had seen since entering the
palace. A young and beautiful woman stood in the center of the little
open space, stroking the head of a bird which she held against her
golden breastplate with one hand. Her profile was presented to the
ape-man and he saw that by the standards of any land she would have
been accounted more than lovely.

Seated in the grass at her feet, with her back toward him, was a female
Waz-don slave. Seeing that she he sought was not there and apprehensive
that an alarm be raised were he discovered by the two women, Tarzan
moved back to hide himself in the foliage, but before he had succeeded
the Ho-don girl turned quickly toward him as though apprised of his
presence by that unnamed sense, the manifestations of which are more
or less familiar to us all.

At sight of him her eyes registered only her surprise though there
was no expression of terror reflected in them, nor did she scream
or even raise her well-modulated voice as she addressed him.

{}``Who are you,'' she asked, {}``who enters thus boldly the Forbidden
Garden?''\ 

At sound of her mistress' voice the slave maiden turned quickly, rising
to her feet. {}``Tarzan-jad-guru!''\ she exclaimed in tones of
mingled astonishment and relief.

{}``You know him?''\ cried her mistress turning toward the slave
and affording Tarzan an opportunity to raise a cautioning finger to
his lips lest Pan-at-lee further betray him, for it was Pan-at-lee
indeed who stood before him, no less a source of surprise to him than
had his presence been to her.

Thus questioned by her mistress and simultaneously admonished to silence
by Tarzan, Pan-at-lee was momentarily silenced and then haltingly
she groped for a way to extricate herself from her dilemma. {}``I
thought\mbox{---}'' she faltered, {}``but no, I am mistaken\mbox{---}I
thought that he was one whom I had seen before near the Kor-ul-gryf.''

The Ho-don looked first at one and then at the other an expression
of doubt and questioning in her eyes. {}``But you have not answered
me,'' she continued presently; {}``who are you?''\ 

{}``You have not heard then,'' asked Tarzan, {}``of the visitor
who arrived at your king's court yesterday?''\ 

{}``You mean,'' she exclaimed, {}``that you are the Dor-ul-Otho?''\ 
And now the erstwhile doubting eyes reflected naught but awe.

{}``I am he,'' replied Tarzan; {}``and you?''\ 

{}``I am O-lo-a, daughter of Ko-tan, the king,'' she replied.

So this was O-lo-a, for love of whom Ta-den had chosen exile rather
than priesthood. Tarzan had approached more closely the dainty barbarian
princess. {}``Daughter of Ko-tan,'' he said, {}``Jad-ben-Otho is
pleased with you and as a mark of his favor he has preserved for you
through many dangers him whom you love.''

{}``I do not understand,'' replied the girl but the flush that mounted
to her cheek belied her words. {}``Bu-lat is a guest in the palace
of Ko-tan, my father. I do not know that he has faced any danger.
It is to Bu-lat that I am betrothed.''

{}``But it is not Bu-lat whom you love,'' said Tarzan.

Again the flush and the girl half turned her face away. {}``Have
I then displeased the Great God?''\ she asked.

{}``No,'' replied Tarzan; {}``as I told you he is well satisfied
and for your sake he has saved Ta-den for you.''

{}``Jad-ben-Otho knows all,'' whispered the girl, {}``and his son
shares his great knowledge.''

{}``No,'' Tarzan hastened to correct her lest a reputation for omniscience
might prove embarrassing. {}``I know only what Jad-ben-Otho wishes
me to know.''

{}``But tell me,'' she said, {}``I shall be reunited with Ta-den?
Surely the son of god can read the future.''

The ape-man was glad that he had left himself an avenue of escape.
{}``I know nothing of the future,'' he replied, {}``other than
what Jad-ben-Otho tells me. But I think you need have no fear for
the future if you remain faithful to Ta-den and Ta-den's friends.''

{}``You have seen him?''\ asked O-lo-a. {}``Tell me, where is
he?''\ 

{}``Yes,'' replied Tarzan, {}``I have seen him. He was with Om-at,
the gund of Kor-ul-ja.''

{}``A prisoner of the Waz-don?''\ interrupted the girl.

{}``Not a prisoner but an honored guest,'' replied the ape-man.

{}``Wait,'' he exclaimed, raising his face toward the heavens; {}``do
not speak. I am receiving a message from Jad-ben-Otho, my father.''

The two women dropped to their knees, covering their faces with their
hands, stricken with awe at the thought of the awful nearness of the
Great God. Presently Tarzan touched O-lo-a on the shoulder.

{}``Rise,'' he said. {}``Jad-ben-Otho has spoken. He has told me
that this slave girl is from the tribe of Kor-ul-ja, where Ta-den
is, and that she is betrothed to Om-at, their chief. Her name is Pan-at-lee.''

O-lo-a turned questioningly toward Pan-at-lee. The latter nodded,
her simple mind unable to determine whether or not she and her mistress
were the victims of a colossal hoax. {}``It is even as he says,''
she whispered.

O-lo-a fell upon her knees and touched her forehead to Tarzan's feet.
{}``Great is the honor that Jad-ben-Otho has done his poor servant,''
she cried. {}``Carry to him my poor thanks for the happiness that
he has brought to O-lo-a.''

{}``It would please my father,'' said Tarzan, {}``if you were to
cause Pan-at-lee to be returned in safety to the village of her people.''

{}``What cares Jad-ben-Otho for such as she?''\ asked O-lo-a, a
slight trace of hauteur in her tone.

{}``There is but one god,'' replied Tarzan, {}``and he is the god
of the Waz-don as well as of the Ho-don; of the birds and the beasts
and the flowers and of everything that grows upon the earth or beneath
the waters. If Pan-at-lee does right she is greater in the eyes of
Jad-ben-Otho than would be the daughter of Ko-tan should she do wrong.''

It was evident that O-lo-a did not quite understand this interpretation
of divine favor, so contrary was it to the teachings of the priesthood
of her people. In one respect only did Tarzan's teachings coincide
with her belief\mbox{---}that there was but one god. For the rest
she had always been taught that he was solely the god of the Ho-don
in every sense, other than that other creatures were created by Jad-ben-Otho
to serve some useful purpose for the benefit of the Ho-don race. And
now to be told by the son of god that she stood no higher in divine
esteem than the black handmaiden at her side was indeed a shock to
her pride, her vanity, and her faith. But who could question the word
of Dor-ul-Otho, especially when she had with her own eyes seen him
in actual communion with god in heaven?

{}``The will of Jad-ben-Otho be done,'' said O-lo-a meekly, {}``if
it lies within my power. But it would be best, O Dor-ul-Otho, to communicate
your father's wish directly to the king.''

{}``Then keep her with you,'' said Tarzan, {}``and see that no
harm befalls her.''

O-lo-a looked ruefully at Pan-at-lee. {}``She was brought to me but
yesterday,'' she said, {}``and never have I had slave woman who
pleased me better. I shall hate to part with her.''

{}``But there are others,'' said Tarzan.

{}``Yes,'' replied O-lo-a, {}``there are others, but there is only
one Pan-at-lee.''

{}``Many slaves are brought to the city?''\ asked Tarzan.

{}``Yes,'' she replied.

{}``And many strangers come from other lands?''\ he asked.

She shook her head negatively. {}``Only the Ho-don from the other
side of the Valley of Jad-ben-Otho,'' she replied, {}``and they
are not strangers.''

{}``Am I then the first stranger to enter the gates of A-lur?''\ 
he asked.

{}``Can it be,'' she parried, {}``that the son of Jad-ben-Otho
need question a poor ignorant mortal like O-lo-a?''\ 

{}``As I told you before,'' replied Tarzan, {}``Jad-ben-Otho alone
is all-knowing.''

{}``Then if he wished you to know this thing,'' retorted O-lo-a
quickly, {}``you would know it.''

Inwardly the ape-man smiled that this little heathen's astuteness
should beat him at his own game, yet in a measure her evasion of the
question might be an answer to it. {}``There have been other strangers
here then recently?''\ he persisted.

{}``I cannot tell you what I do not know,'' she replied. {}``Always
is the palace of Ko-tan filled with rumors, but how much fact and
how much fancy how may a woman of the palace know?''\ 

{}``There has been such a rumor then?''\ he asked.

{}``It was only rumor that reached the Forbidden Garden,'' she replied.

{}``It described, perhaps, a woman of another race?''\ As he put
the question and awaited her answer he thought that his heart ceased
to beat, so grave to him was the issue at stake.

The girl hesitated before replying, and then. {}``No,'' she said,
{}``I cannot speak of this thing, for if it be of sufficient importance
to elicit the interest of the gods then indeed would I be subject
to the wrath of my father should I discuss it.''

{}``In the name of Jad-ben-Otho I command you to speak,'' said Tarzan.
{}``In the name of Jad-ben-Otho in whose hands lies the fate of Ta-den!''\ 

The girl paled. {}``Have mercy!''\ she cried, {}``and for the
sake of Ta-den I will tell you all that I know.''

{}``Tell what?''\ demanded a stern voice from the shrubbery behind
them. The three turned to see the figure of Ko-tan emerging from the
foliage. An angry scowl distorted his kingly features but at sight
of Tarzan it gave place to an expression of surprise not unmixed with
fear. {}``Dor-ul-Otho!''\ he exclaimed, {}``I did not know that
it was you,'' and then, raising his head and squaring his shoulders
he said, {}``but there are places where even the son of the Great
God may not walk and this, the Forbidden Garden of Ko-tan, is one.''

It was a challenge but despite the king's bold front there was a note
of apology in it, indicating that in his superstitious mind there
flourished the inherent fear of man for his Maker. {}``Come, Dor-ul-Otho,''
he continued, {}``I do not know all this foolish child has said to
you but whatever you would know Ko-tan, the king, will tell you. O-lo-a,
go to your quarters immediately,'' and he pointed with stern finger
toward the opposite end of the garden.

The princess, followed by Pan-at-lee, turned at once and left them.

{}``We will go this way,'' said Ko-tan and preceding, led Tarzan
in another direction. Close to that part of the wall which they approached
Tarzan perceived a grotto in the miniature cliff into the interior
of which Ko-tan led him, and down a rocky stairway to a gloomy corridor
the opposite end of which opened into the palace proper. Two armed
warriors stood at this entrance to the Forbidden Garden, evidencing
how jealously were the sacred precincts of the place guarded.

In silence Ko-tan led the way back to his own quarters in the palace.
A large chamber just outside the room toward which Ko-tan was leading
his guest was filled with chiefs and warriors awaiting the pleasure
of their ruler. As the two entered, an aisle was formed for them the
length of the chamber, down which they passed in silence.

Close to the farther door and half hidden by the warriors who stood
before him was Lu-don, the high priest. Tarzan glimpsed him but briefly
but in that short period he was aware of a cunning and malevolent
expression upon the cruel countenance that he was subconsciously aware
boded him no good, and then with Ko-tan he passed into the adjoining
room and the hangings dropped.

At the same moment the hideous headdress of an under priest appeared
in the entrance of the outer chamber. Its owner, pausing for a moment,
glanced quickly around the interior and then having located him whom
he sought moved rapidly in the direction of Lu-don. There was a whispered
conversation which was terminated by the high priest.

{}``Return immediately to the quarters of the princess,'' he said,
{}``and see that the slave is sent to me at the temple at once.''
The under priest turned and departed upon his mission while Lu-don
also left the apartment and directed his footsteps toward the sacred
enclosure over which he ruled.

A half-hour later a warrior was ushered into the presence of Ko-tan.
{}``Lu-don, the high priest, desires the presence of Ko-tan, the
king, in the temple,'' he announced, {}``and it is his wish that
he come alone.''

Ko-tan nodded to indicate that he accepted the command which even
the king must obey. {}``I will return presently, Dor-ul-Otho,''
he said to Tarzan, {}``and in the meantime my warriors and my slaves
are yours to command.''


\chapter{The Sentence of Death}

\markboth{Tarzan the Terrible}{The Sentence of Death}

\textit{\emph{But}} it was an hour before the king re-entered the
apartment and in the meantime the ape-man had occupied himself in
examining the carvings upon the walls and the numerous specimens of
the handicraft of Pal-ul-donian artisans which combined to impart
an atmosphere of richness and luxury to the apartment.

The limestone of the country, close-grained and of marble whiteness
yet worked with comparative ease with crude implements, had been wrought
by cunning craftsmen into bowls and urns and vases of considerable
grace and beauty. Into the carved designs of many of these virgin
gold had been hammered, presenting the effect of a rich and magnificent
cloisonne. A barbarian himself the art of barbarians had always appealed
to the ape-man to whom they represented a natural expression of man's
love of the beautiful to even a greater extent than the studied and
artificial efforts of civilization. Here was the real art of old masters,
the other the cheap imitation of the chromo.

It was while he was thus pleasurably engaged that Ko-tan returned.
As Tarzan, attracted by the movement of the hangings through which
the king entered, turned and faced him he was almost shocked by the
remarkable alteration of the king's appearance. His face was livid;
his hands trembled as with palsy, and his eyes were wide as with fright.
His appearance was one apparently of a combination of consuming anger
and withering fear. Tarzan looked at him questioningly.

{}``You have had bad news, Ko-tan?''\ he asked.

The king mumbled an unintelligible reply. Behind there thronged into
the apartment so great a number of warriors that they choked the entrance-way.
The king looked apprehensively to right and left. He cast terrified
glances at the ape-man and then raising his face and turning his eyes
upward he cried: {}``Jad-ben-Otho be my witness that I do not this
thing of my own accord.'' There was a moment's silence which was
again broken by Ko-tan. {}``Seize him,'' he cried to the warriors
about him, {}``for Lu-don, the high priest, swears that he is an
impostor.''

To have offered armed resistance to this great concourse of warriors
in the very heart of the palace of their king would have been worse
than fatal. Already Tarzan had come far by his wits and now that within
a few hours he had had his hopes and his suspicions partially verified
by the vague admissions of O-lo-a he was impressed with the necessity
of inviting no mortal risk that he could avoid.

{}``Stop!''\ he cried, raising his palm against them. {}``What
is the meaning of this?''\ 

{}``Lu-don claims he has proof that you are not the son of Jad-ben-Otho,''
replied Ko-tan. {}``He demands that you be brought to the throneroom
to face your accusers. If you are what you claim to be none knows
better than you that you need have no fear in acquiescing to his demands,
but remember always that in such matters the high priest commands
the king and that I am only the bearer of these commands, not their
author.''

Tarzan saw that Ko-tan was not entirely convinced of his duplicity
as was evidenced by his palpable design to play safe.

{}``Let not your warriors seize me,'' he said to Ko-tan, {}``lest
Jad-ben-Otho, mistaking their intention, strike them dead.'' The
effect of his words was immediate upon the men in the front rank of
those who faced him, each seeming suddenly to acquire a new modesty
that compelled him to self-effacement behind those directly in his
rear\mbox{---}a modesty that became rapidly contagious.

The ape-man smiled. {}``Fear not,'' he said, {}``I will go willingly
to the audience chamber to face the blasphemers who accuse me.''

Arrived at the great throneroom a new complication arose. Ko-tan would
not acknowledge the right of Lu-don to occupy the apex of the pyramid
and Lu-don would not consent to occupying an inferior position while
Tarzan, to remain consistent with his high claims, insisted that no
one should stand above him, but only to the ape-man was the humor
of the situation apparent.

To relieve the situation Ja-don suggested that all three of them occupy
the throne, but this suggestion was repudiated by Ko-tan who argued
that no mortal other than a king of Pal-ul-don had ever sat upon the
high eminence, and that furthermore there was not room for three there.

{}``But who,'' said Tarzan, {}``is my accuser and who is my judge?''\ 

{}``Lu-don is your accuser,'' explained Ko-tan.

{}``And Lu-don is your judge,'' cried the high priest.

{}``I am to be judged by him who accuses me then,'' said Tarzan.
{}``It were better to dispense then with any formalities and ask
Lu-don to sentence me.'' His tone was ironical and his sneering face,
looking straight into that of the high priest, but caused the latter's
hatred to rise to still greater proportions.

It was evident that Ko-tan and his warriors saw the justice of Tarzan's
implied objection to this unfair method of dispensing justice. {}``Only
Ko-tan can judge in the throneroom of his palace,'' said Ja-don,
{}``let him hear Lu-don's charges and the testimony of his witnesses,
and then let Ko-tan's judgment be final.''

Ko-tan, however, was not particularly enthusiastic over the prospect
of sitting in trial upon one who might after all very possibly be
the son of his god, and so he temporized, seeking for an avenue of
escape. {}``It is purely a religious matter,'' he said, {}``and
it is traditional that the kings of Pal-ul-don interfere not in questions
of the church.''

{}``Then let the trial be held in the temple,'' cried one of the
chiefs, for the warriors were as anxious as their king to be relieved
of all responsibility in the matter. This suggestion was more than
satisfactory to the high priest who inwardly condemned himself for
not having thought of it before.

{}``It is true,'' he said, {}``this man's sin is against the temple.
Let him be dragged thither then for trial.''

{}``The son of Jad-ben-Otho will be dragged nowhere,'' cried Tarzan.
{}``But when this trial is over it is possible that the corpse of
Lu-don, the high priest, will be dragged from the temple of the god
he would desecrate. Think well, then, Lu-don before you commit this
folly.''

His words, intended to frighten the high priest from his position
failed utterly in consummating their purpose. Lu-don showed no terror
at the suggestion the ape-man's words implied.

{}``Here is one,'' thought Tarzan, {}``who, knowing more of his
religion than any of his fellows, realizes fully the falsity of my
claims as he does the falsity of the faith he preaches.''

He realized, however, that his only hope lay in seeming indifference
to the charges. Ko-tan and the warriors were still under the spell
of their belief in him and upon this fact must he depend in the final
act of the drama that Lu-don was staging for his rescue from the jealous
priest whom he knew had already passed sentence upon him in his own
heart.

With a shrug he descended the steps of the pyramid. {}``It matters
not to Dor-ul-Otho,'' he said, {}``where Lu-don enrages his god,
for Jad-ben-Otho can reach as easily into the chambers of the temple
as into the throneroom of Ko-tan.''

Immeasurably relieved by this easy solution of their problem the king
and the warriors thronged from the throneroom toward the temple grounds,
their faith in Tarzan increased by his apparent indifference to the
charges against him. Lu-don led them to the largest of the altar courts.

Taking his place behind the western altar he motioned Ko-tan to a
place upon the platform at the left hand of the altar and directed
Tarzan to a similar place at the right.

As Tarzan ascended the platform his eyes narrowed angrily at the sight
which met them. The basin hollowed in the top of the altar was filled
with water in which floated the naked corpse of a new-born babe. {}``What
means this?''\ he cried angrily, turning upon Lu-don.

The latter smiled malevolently. {}``That you do not know,'' he replied,
{}``is but added evidence of the falsity of your claim. He who poses
as the son of god did not know that as the last rays of the setting
sun flood the eastern altar of the temple the lifeblood of an adult
reddens the white stone for the edification of Jad-ben-Otho, and that
when the sun rises again from the body of its maker it looks first
upon this western altar and rejoices in the death of a new-born babe
each day, the ghost of which accompanies it across the heavens by
day as the ghost of the adult returns with it to Jad-ben-Otho at night.

{}``Even the little children of the Ho-don know these things, while
he who claims to be the son of Jad-ben-Otho knows them not; and if
this proof be not enough, there is more. Come, Waz-don,'' he cried,
pointing to a tall slave who stood with a group of other blacks and
priests on the temple floor at the left of the altar.

The fellow came forward fearfully. {}``Tell us what you know of this
creature,'' cried Lu-don, pointing to Tarzan.

{}``I have seen him before,'' said the Waz-don. {}``I am of the
tribe of Kor-ul-lul, and one day recently a party of which I was one
encountered a few of the warriors of the Kor-ul-ja upon the ridge
which separates our villages. Among the enemy was this strange creature
whom they called Tarzan-jad-guru; and terrible indeed was he for he
fought with the strength of many men so that it required twenty of
us to subdue him. But he did not fight as a god fights, and when a
club struck him upon the head he sank unconscious as might an ordinary
mortal.

{}``We carried him with us to our village as a prisoner but he escaped
after cutting off the head of the warrior we left to guard him and
carrying it down into the gorge and tying it to the branch of a tree
upon the opposite side.''

{}``The word of a slave against that of a god!''\ cried Ja-don,
who had shown previously a friendly interest in the pseudo godling.

{}``It is only a step in the progress toward truth,'' interjected
Lu-don. {}``Possibly the evidence of the only princess of the house
of Ko-tan will have greater weight with the great chief from the north,
though the father of a son who fled the holy offer of the priesthood
may not receive with willing ears any testimony against another blasphemer.''

Ja-don's hand leaped to his knife, but the warriors next him laid
detaining fingers upon his arms. {}``You are in the temple of Jad-ben-Otho,
Ja-don,'' they cautioned and the great chief was forced to swallow
Lu-don's affront though it left in his heart bitter hatred of the
high priest.

And now Ko-tan turned toward Lu-don. {}``What knoweth my daughter
of this matter?''\ he asked. {}``You would not bring a princess
of my house to testify thus publicly?''\ 

{}``No,'' replied Lu-don, {}``not in person, but I have here one
who will testify for her.'' He beckoned to an under priest. {}``Fetch
the slave of the princess,'' he said.

His grotesque headdress adding a touch of the hideous to the scene,
the priest stepped forward dragging the reluctant Pan-at-lee by the
wrist.

{}``The Princess O-lo-a was alone in the Forbidden Garden with but
this one slave,'' explained the priest, {}``when there suddenly
appeared from the foliage nearby this creature who claims to be the
Dor-ul-Otho. When the slave saw him the princess says that she cried
aloud in startled recognition and called the creature by name\mbox{---}Tarzan-jad-guru\mbox{---}the
same name that the slave from Kor-ul-lul gave him. This woman is not
from Kor-ul-lul but from Kor-ul-ja, the very tribe with which the
Kor-ul-lul says the creature was associating when he first saw him.
And further the princess said that when this woman, whose name is
Pan-at-lee, was brought to her yesterday she told a strange story
of having been rescued from a Tor-o-don in the Kor-ul-gryf by a creature
such as this, whom she spoke of then as Tarzan-jad-guru; and of how
the two were pursued in the bottom of the gorge by two monster gryfs,
and of how the man led them away while Pan-at-lee escaped, only to
be taken prisoner in the Kor-ul-lul as she was seeking to return to
her own tribe.

{}``Is it not plain now,'' cried Lu-don, {}``that this creature
is no god. Did he tell you that he was the son of god?''\ he almost
shouted, turning suddenly upon Pan-at-lee.

The girl shrank back terrified. {}``Answer me, slave!''\ cried
the high priest.

{}``He seemed more than mortal,'' parried Pan-at-lee.

{}``Did he tell you that he was the son of god? Answer my question,''
insisted Lu-don.

{}``No,'' she admitted in a low voice, casting an appealing look
of forgiveness at Tarzan who returned a smile of encouragement and
friendship.

{}``That is no proof that he is not the son of god,'' cried Ja-don.
{}``Dost think Jad-ben-Otho goes about crying `I am god! I am god!'
Hast ever heard him Lu-don? No, you have not. Why should his son do
that which the father does not do?''\ 

{}``Enough,'' cried Lu-don. {}``The evidence is clear. The creature
is an impostor and I, the head priest of Jad-ben-Otho in the city
of A-lur, do condemn him to die.'' There was a moment's silence during
which Lu-don evidently paused for the dramatic effect of his climax.
{}``And if I am wrong may Jad-ben-Otho pierce my heart with his lightnings
as I stand here before you all.''

The lapping of the wavelets of the lake against the foot of the palace
wall was distinctly audible in the utter and almost breathless silence
which ensued. Lu-don stood with his face turned toward the heavens
and his arms outstretched in the attitude of one who bares his breast
to the dagger of an executioner. The warriors and the priests and
the slaves gathered in the sacred court awaited the consuming vengeance
of their god.

It was Tarzan who broke the silence. {}``Your god ignores you Lu-don,''
he taunted, with a sneer that he meant to still further anger the
high priest, {}``he ignores you and I can prove it before the eyes
of your priests and your people.''

{}``Prove it, blasphemer! How can you prove it?''\ 

{}``You have called me a blasphemer,'' replied Tarzan, {}``you
have proved to your own satisfaction that I am an impostor, that I,
an ordinary mortal, have posed as the son of god. Demand then that
Jad-ben-Otho uphold his godship and the dignity of his priesthood
by directing his consuming fires through my own bosom.''

Again there ensued a brief silence while the onlookers waited for
Lu-don to thus consummate the destruction of this presumptuous impostor.

{}``You dare not,'' taunted Tarzan, {}``for you know that I would
be struck dead no quicker than were you.''

{}``You lie,'' cried Lu-don, {}``and I would do it had I not but
just received a message from Jad-ben-Otho directing that your fate
be different.''

A chorus of admiring and reverential {}``Ahs'' arose from the priesthood.
Ko-tan and his warriors were in a state of mental confusion. Secretly
they hated and feared Lu-don, but so ingrained was their sense of
reverence for the office of the high priest that none dared raise
a voice against him.

None? Well, there was Ja-don, fearless old Lion-man of the north.
{}``The proposition was a fair one,'' he cried. {}``Invoke the
lightnings of Jad-ben-Otho upon this man if you would ever convince
us of his guilt.''

{}``Enough of this,'' snapped Lu-don. {}``Since when was Ja-don
created high priest? Seize the prisoner,'' he cried to the priests
and warriors, {}``and on the morrow he shall die in the manner that
Jad-ben-Otho has willed.''

There was no immediate movement on the part of any of the warriors
to obey the high priest's command, but the lesser priests on the other
hand, imbued with the courage of fanaticism leaped eagerly forward
like a flock of hideous harpies to seize upon their prey.

The game was up. That Tarzan knew. No longer could cunning and diplomacy
usurp the functions of the weapons of defense he best loved. And so
the first hideous priest who leaped to the platform was confronted
by no suave ambassador from heaven, but rather a grim and ferocious
beast whose temper savored more of hell.

The altar stood close to the western wall of the enclosure. There
was just room between the two for the high priest to stand during
the performance of the sacrificial ceremonies and only Lu-don stood
there now behind Tarzan, while before him were perhaps two hundred
warriors and priests.

The presumptuous one who would have had the glory of first laying
arresting hands upon the blasphemous impersonator rushed forward with
outstretched hand to seize the ape-man. Instead it was he who was
seized; seized by steel fingers that snapped him up as though he had
been a dummy of straw, grasped him by one leg and the harness at his
back and raised him with giant arms high above the altar. Close at
his heels were others ready to seize the ape-man and drag him down,
and beyond the altar was Lu-don with drawn knife advancing toward
him.

There was no instant to waste, nor was it the way of the ape-man to
fritter away precious moments in the uncertainty of belated decision.
Before Lu-don or any other could guess what was in the mind of the
condemned, Tarzan with all the force of his great muscles dashed the
screaming hierophant in the face of the high priest, and, as though
the two actions were one, so quickly did he move, he had leaped to
the top of the altar and from there to a handhold upon the summit
of the temple wall. As he gained a footing there he turned and looked
down upon those beneath. For a moment he stood in silence and then
he spoke.

{}``Who dare believe,'' he cried, {}``that Jad-ben-Otho would forsake
his son?''\ and then he dropped from their sight upon the other
side.

There were two at least left within the enclosure whose hearts leaped
with involuntary elation at the success of the ape-man's maneuver,
and one of them smiled openly. This was Ja-don, and the other, Pan-at-lee.

The brains of the priest that Tarzan had thrown at the head of Lu-don
had been dashed out against the temple wall while the high priest
himself had escaped with only a few bruises, sustained in his fall
to the hard pavement. Quickly scrambling to his feet he looked around
in fear, in terror and finally in bewilderment, for he had not been
a witness to the ape-man's escape. {}``Seize him,'' he cried; {}``seize
the blasphemer,'' and he continued to look around in search of his
victim with such a ridiculous expression of bewilderment that more
than a single warrior was compelled to hide his smiles beneath his
palm.

The priests were rushing around wildly, exhorting the warriors to
pursue the fugitive but these awaited now stolidly the command of
their king or high priest. Ko-tan, more or less secretly pleased by
the discomfiture of Lu-don, waited for that worthy to give the necessary
directions which he presently did when one of his acolytes excitedly
explained to him the manner of Tarzan's escape.

Instantly the necessary orders were issued and priests and warriors
sought the temple exit in pursuit of the ape-man. His departing words,
hurled at them from the summit of the temple wall, had had little
effect in impressing the majority that his claims had not been disproven
by Lu-don, but in the hearts of the warriors was admiration for a
brave man and in many the same unholy gratification that had risen
in that of their ruler at the discomfiture of Lu-don.

A careful search of the temple grounds revealed no trace of the quarry.
The secret recesses of the subterranean chambers, familiar only to
the priesthood, were examined by these while the warriors scattered
through the palace and the palace grounds without the temple. Swift
runners were dispatched to the city to arouse the people there that
all might be upon the lookout for Tarzan the Terrible. The story of
his imposture and of his escape, and the tales that the Waz-don slaves
had brought into the city concerning him were soon spread throughout
A-lur, nor did they lose aught in the spreading, so that before an
hour had passed the women and children were hiding behind barred doorways
while the warriors crept apprehensively through the streets expecting
momentarily to be pounced upon by a ferocious demon who, bare-handed,
did victorious battle with huge gryfs and whose lightest pastime consisted
in tearing strong men limb from limb.


\chapter{The Giant Stranger}

\markboth{Tarzan the Terrible}{The Giant Stranger}

\textit{\emph{And}} while the warriors and the priests of A-lur searched
the temple and the palace and the city for the vanished ape-man there
entered the head of Kor-ul-ja down the precipitous trail from the
mountains, a naked stranger bearing an Enfield upon his back. Silently
he moved downward toward the bottom of the gorge and there where the
ancient trail unfolded more levelly before him he swung along with
easy strides, though always with the utmost alertness against possible
dangers. A gentle breeze came down from the mountains behind him so
that only his ears and his eyes were of value in detecting the presence
of danger ahead. Generally the trail followed along the banks of the
winding brooklet at the bottom of the gorge, but in some places where
the waters tumbled over a precipitous ledge the trail made a detour
along the side of the gorge, and again it wound in and out among rocky
outcroppings, and presently where it rounded sharply the projecting
shoulder of a cliff the stranger came suddenly face to face with one
who was ascending the gorge.

Separated by a hundred paces the two halted simultaneously. Before
him the stranger saw a tall white warrior, naked but for a loin cloth,
cross belts, and a girdle. The man was armed with a heavy, knotted
club and a short knife, the latter hanging in its sheath at his left
hip from the end of one of his cross belts, the opposite belt supporting
a leathern pouch at his right side. It was Ta-den hunting alone in
the gorge of his friend, the chief of Kor-ul-ja. He contemplated the
stranger with surprise but no wonder, since he recognized in him a
member of the race with which his experience of Tarzan the Terrible
had made him familiar and also, thanks to his friendship for the ape-man,
he looked upon the newcomer without hostility.

The latter was the first to make outward sign of his intentions, raising
his palm toward Ta-den in that gesture which has been a symbol of
peace from pole to pole since man ceased to walk upon his knuckles.
Simultaneously he advanced a few paces and halted.

Ta-den, assuming that one so like Tarzan the Terrible must be a fellow-tribesman
of his lost friend, was more than glad to accept this overture of
peace, the sign of which he returned in kind as he ascended the trail
to where the other stood. {}``Who are you?''\ he asked, but the
newcomer only shook his head to indicate that he did not understand.

By signs he tried to carry to the Ho-don the fact that he was following
a trail that had led him over a period of many days from some place
beyond the mountains and Ta-den was convinced that the newcomer sought
Tarzan-jad-guru. He wished, however, that he might discover whether
as friend or foe.

The stranger perceived the Ho-don's prehensile thumbs and great toes
and his long tail with an astonishment which he sought to conceal,
but greater than all was the sense of relief that the first inhabitant
of this strange country whom he had met had proven friendly, so greatly
would he have been handicapped by the necessity for forcing his way
through a hostile land.

Ta-den, who had been hunting for some of the smaller mammals, the
meat of which is especially relished by the Ho-don, forgot his intended
sport in the greater interest of his new discovery. He would take
the stranger to Om-at and possibly together the two would find some
way of discovering the true intentions of the newcomer. And so again
through signs he apprised the other that he would accompany him and
together they descended toward the cliffs of Om-at's people.

As they approached these they came upon the women and children working
under guard of the old men and the youths\mbox{---}gathering the
wild fruits and herbs which constitute a part of their diet, as well
as tending the small acres of growing crops which they cultivate.
The fields lay in small level patches that had been cleared of trees
and brush. Their farm implements consisted of metal-shod poles which
bore a closer resemblance to spears than to tools of peaceful agriculture.
Supplementing these were others with flattened blades that were neither
hoes nor spades, but instead possessed the appearance of an unhappy
attempt to combine the two implements in one.

At first sight of these people the stranger halted and unslung his
bow for these creatures were black as night, their bodies entirely
covered with hair. But Ta-den, interpreting the doubt in the other's
mind, reassured him with a gesture and a smile. The Waz-don, however,
gathered around excitedly jabbering questions in a language which
the stranger discovered his guide understood though it was entirely
unintelligible to the former. They made no attempt to molest him and
he was now sure that he had fallen among a peaceful and friendly people.

It was but a short distance now to the caves and when they reached
these Ta-den led the way aloft upon the wooden pegs, assured that
this creature whom he had discovered would have no more difficulty
in following him than had Tarzan the Terrible. Nor was he mistaken
for the other mounted with ease until presently the two stood within
the recess before the cave of Om-at, the chief.

The latter was not there and it was mid-afternoon before he returned,
but in the meantime many warriors came to look upon the visitor and
in each instance the latter was more thoroughly impressed with the
friendly and peaceable spirit of his hosts, little guessing that he
was being entertained by a ferocious and warlike tribe who never before
the coming of Ta-den and Tarzan had suffered a stranger among them.

At last Om-at returned and the guest sensed intuitively that he was
in the presence of a great man among these people, possibly a chief
or king, for not only did the attitude of the other black warriors
indicate this but it was written also in the mien and bearing of the
splendid creature who stood looking at him while Ta-den explained
the circumstances of their meeting. {}``And I believe, Om-at,''
concluded the Ho-don, {}``that he seeks Tarzan the Terrible.''

At the sound of that name, the first intelligible word that had fallen
upon the ears of the stranger since he had come among them, his face
lightened. {}``Tarzan!''\ he cried, {}``Tarzan of the Apes!''\ and
by signs he tried to tell them that it was he whom he sought.

They understood, and also they guessed from the expression of his
face that he sought Tarzan from motives of affection rather than the
reverse, but of this Om-at wished to make sure. He pointed to the
stranger's knife, and repeating Tarzan's name, seized Ta-den and pretended
to stab him, immediately turning questioningly toward the stranger.

The latter shook his head vehemently and then first placing a hand
above his heart he raised his palm in the symbol of peace.

{}``He is a friend of Tarzan-jad-guru,'' exclaimed Ta-den.

{}``Either a friend or a great liar,'' replied Om-at.

{}``Tarzan,'' continued the stranger, {}``you know him? He lives?
O God, if I could only speak your language.'' And again reverting
to sign language he sought to ascertain where Tarzan was. He would
pronounce the name and point in different directions, in the cave,
down into the gorge, back toward the mountains, or out upon the valley
below, and each time he would raise his brows questioningly and voice
the universal {}``eh?''\ of interrogation which they could not
fail to understand. But always Om-at shook his head and spread his
palms in a gesture which indicated that while he understood the question
he was ignorant as to the whereabouts of the ape-man, and then the
black chief attempted as best he might to explain to the stranger
what he knew of the whereabouts of Tarzan.

He called the newcomer Jar-don, which in the language of Pal-ul-don
means {}``stranger,'' and he pointed to the sun and said as. This
he repeated several times and then he held up one hand with the fingers
outspread and touching them one by one, including the thumb, repeated
the word adenen until the stranger understood that he meant five.
Again he pointed to the sun and describing an arc with his forefinger
starting at the eastern horizon and terminating at the western, he
repeated again the words as adenen. It was plain to the stranger that
the words meant that the sun had crossed the heavens five times. In
other words, five days had passed. Om-at then pointed to the cave
where they stood, pronouncing Tarzan's name and imitating a walking
man with the first and second fingers of his right hand upon the floor
of the recess, sought to show that Tarzan had walked out of the cave
and climbed upward on the pegs five days before, but this was as far
as the sign language would permit him to go.

This far the stranger followed him and, indicating that he understood
he pointed to himself and then indicating the pegs leading above announced
that he would follow Tarzan.

{}``Let us go with him,'' said Om-at, {}``for as yet we have not
punished the Kor-ul-lul for killing our friend and ally.''

{}``Persuade him to wait until morning,'' said Ta-den, {}``that
you may take with you many warriors and make a great raid upon the
Kor-ul-lul, and this time, Om-at, do not kill your prisoners. Take
as many as you can alive and from some of them we may learn the fate
of Tarzan-jad-guru.''

{}``Great is the wisdom of the Ho-don,'' replied Om-at. {}``It
shall be as you say, and having made prisoners of all the Kor-ul-lul
we shall make them tell us what we wish to know. And then we shall
march them to the rim of Kor-ul-gryf and push them over the edge of
the cliff.''

Ta-den smiled. He knew that they would not take prisoner all the Kor-ul-lul
war\-ri\-ors\mbox{---}that they would be fortunate if they took
one and it was also possible that they might even be driven back in
defeat, but he knew too that Om-at would not hesitate to carry out
his threat if he had the opportunity, so implacable was the hatred
of these neighbors for each other.

It was not difficult to explain Om-at's plan to the stranger or to
win his consent since he was aware, when the great black had made
it plain that they would be accompanied by many warriors, that their
venture would probably lead them into a hostile country and every
safeguard that he could employ he was glad to avail himself of, since
the furtherance of his quest was the paramount issue.

He slept that night upon a pile of furs in one of the compartments
of Om-at's ancestral cave, and early the next day following the morning
meal they sallied forth, a hundred savage warriors swarming up the
face of the sheer cliff and out upon the summit of the ridge, the
main body preceded by two warriors whose duties coincided with those
of the point of modern military maneuvers, safeguarding the column
against the danger of too sudden contact with the enemy.

Across the ridge they went and down into the Kor-ul-lul and there
almost immediately they came upon a lone and unarmed Waz-don who was
making his way fearfully up the gorge toward the village of his tribe.
Him they took prisoner which, strangely, only added to his terror
since from the moment that he had seen them and realized that escape
was impossible, he had expected to be slain immediately.

{}``Take him back to Kor-ul-ja,'' said Om-at, to one of his warriors,
{}``and hold him there unharmed until I return.''

And so the puzzled Kor-ul-lul was led away while the savage company
moved stealthily from tree to tree in its closer advance upon the
village. Fortune smiled upon Om-at in that it gave him quickly what
he sought\mbox{---}a battle royal, for they had not yet come in
sight of the caves of the Kor-ul-lul when they encountered a considerable
band of warriors headed down the gorge upon some expedition.

Like shadows the Kor-ul-ja melted into the concealment of the foliage
upon either side of the trail. Ignorant of impending danger, safe
in the knowledge that they trod their own domain where each rock and
stone was as familiar as the features of their mates, the Kor-ul-lul
walked innocently into the ambush. Suddenly the quiet of that seeming
peace was shattered by a savage cry and a hurled club felled a Kor-ul-lul.

The cry was a signal for a savage chorus from a hundred Kor-ul-ja
throats with which were soon mingled the war cries of their enemies.
The air was filled with flying clubs and then as the two forces mingled,
the battle resolved itself into a number of individual encounters
as each warrior singled out a foe and closed upon him. Knives gleamed
and flashed in the mottling sunlight that filtered through the foliage
of the trees above. Sleek black coats were streaked with crimson stains.

In the thick of the fight the smooth brown skin of the stranger mingled
with the black bodies of friend and foe. Only his keen eyes and his
quick wit had shown him how to differentiate between Kor-ul-lul and
Kor-ul-ja since with the single exception of apparel they were identical,
but at the first rush of the enemy he had noticed that their loin
cloths were not of the leopard-matted hides such as were worn by his
allies.

Om-at, after dispatching his first antagonist, glanced at Jar-don.
{}``He fights with the ferocity of jato,'' mused the chief. {}``Powerful
indeed must be the tribe from which he and Tarzan-jad-guru come,''
and then his whole attention was occupied by a new assailant.

The fighters surged to and fro through the forest until those who
survived were spent with exhaustion. All but the stranger who seemed
not to know the sense of fatigue. He fought on when each new antagonist
would have gladly quit, and when there were no more Kor-ul-lul who
were not engaged, he leaped upon those who stood pantingly facing
the exhausted Kor-ul-ja.

And always he carried upon his back the peculiar thing which Om-at
had thought was some manner of strange weapon but the purpose of which
he could not now account for in view of the fact that Jar-don never
used it, and that for the most part it seemed but a nuisance and needless
encumbrance since it banged and smashed against its owner as he leaped,
catlike, hither and thither in the course of his victorious duels.
The bow and arrows he had tossed aside at the beginning of the fight
but the Enfield he would not discard, for where he went he meant that
it should go until its mission had been fulfilled.

Presently the Kor-ul-ja, seemingly shamed by the example of Jar-don
closed once more with the enemy, but the latter, moved no doubt to
terror by the presence of the stranger, a tireless demon who appeared
invulnerable to their attacks, lost heart and sought to flee. And
then it was that at Om-at's command his warriors surrounded a half-dozen
of the most exhausted and made them prisoners.

It was a tired, bloody, and elated company that returned victorious
to the Kor-ul-ja. Twenty of their number were carried back and six
of these were dead men. It was the most glorious and successful raid
that the Kor-ul-ja had made upon the Kor-ul-lul in the memory of man,
and it marked Om-at as the greatest of chiefs, but that fierce warrior
knew that advantage had lain upon his side largely because of the
presence of his strange ally. Nor did he hesitate to give credit where
credit belonged, with the result that Jar-don and his exploits were
upon the tongue of every member of the tribe of Kor-ul-ja and great
was the fame of the race that could produce two such as he and Tarzan-jad-guru.

And in the gorge of Kor-ul-lul beyond the ridge the survivors spoke
in bated breath of this second demon that had joined forces with their
ancient enemy.

Returned to his cave Om-at caused the Kor-ul-lul prisoners to be brought
into his presence singly, and each he questioned as to the fate of
Tarzan. Without exception they told him the same story\mbox{---}that
Tarzan had been taken prisoner by them five days before but that he
had slain the warrior left to guard him and escaped, carrying the
head of the unfortunate sentry to the opposite side of Kor-ul-lul
where he had left it suspended by its hair from the branch of a tree.
But what had become of him after, they did not know; not one of them,
until the last prisoner was examined, he whom they had taken first\mbox{---}the
unarmed Kor-ul-lul making his way from the direction of the Valley
of Jad-ben-Otho toward the caves of his people.

This one, when he discovered the purpose of their questioning, bartered
with them for the lives and liberty of himself and his fellows. {}``I
can tell you much of this terrible man of whom you ask, Kor-ul-ja,''
he said. {}``I saw him yesterday and I know where he is, and if you
will promise to let me and my fellows return in safety to the caves
of our ancestors I will tell you all, and truthfully, that which I
know.''

{}``You will tell us anyway,'' replied Om-at, {}``or we shall kill
you.''

{}``You will kill me anyway,'' retorted the prisoner, {}``unless
you make me this promise; so if I am to be killed the thing I know
shall go with me.''

{}``He is right, Om-at,'' said Ta-den, {}``promise him that they
shall have their liberty.''

{}``Very well,'' said Om-at. {}``Speak Kor-ul-lul, and when you
have told me all, you and your fellows may return unharmed to your
tribe.''

{}``It was thus,'' commenced the prisoner. {}``Three days since
I was hunting with a party of my fellows near the mouth of Kor-ul-lul
not far from where you captured me this morning, when we were surprised
and set upon by a large number of Ho-don who took us prisoners and
carried us to A-lur where a few were chosen to be slaves and the rest
were cast into a chamber beneath the temple where are held for sacrifice
the victims that are offered by the Ho-don to Jad-ben-Otho upon the
sacrificial altars of the temple at A-lur.

{}``It seemed then that indeed was my fate sealed and that lucky
were those who had been selected for slaves among the Ho-don, for
they at least might hope to escape\mbox{---}those in the chamber
with me must be without hope.

{}``But yesterday a strange thing happened. There came to the temple,
accompanied by all the priests and by the king and many of his warriors,
one whom all did great reverence, and when he came to the barred gateway
leading to the chamber in which we wretched ones awaited our fate,
I saw to my surprise that it was none other than that terrible man
who had so recently been a prisoner in the village of Kor-ul-lul\mbox{---}he
whom you call Tarzan-jad-guru but whom they addressed as Dor-ul-Otho.
And he looked upon us and questioned the high priest and when he was
told of the purpose for which we were imprisoned there he grew angry
and cried that it was not the will of Jad-ben-Otho that his people
be thus sacrificed, and he commanded the high priest to liberate us,
and this was done.

{}``The Ho-don prisoners were permitted to return to their homes
and we were led beyond the City of A-lur and set upon our way toward
Kor-ul-lul. There were three of us, but many are the dangers that
lie between A-lur and Kor-ul-lul and we were only three and unarmed.
Therefore none of us reached the village of our people and only one
of us lives. I have spoken.''

{}``That is all you know concerning Tarzan-jad-guru?''\ asked Om-at.

{}``That is all I know,'' replied the prisoner, {}``other than
that he whom they call Lu-don, the high priest at A-lur, was very
angry, and that one of the two priests who guided us out of the city
said to the other that the stranger was not Dor-ul-Otho at all; that
Lu-don had said so and that he had also said that he would expose
him and that he should be punished with death for his presumption.
That is all they said within my hearing.

{}``And now, chief of Kor-ul-ja, let us depart.''

Om-at nodded. {}``Go your way,'' he said, {}``and Ab-on, send warriors
to guard them until they are safely within the Kor-ul-lul.

{}``Jar-don,'' he said beckoning to the stranger, {}``come with
me,'' and rising he led the way toward the summit of the cliff, and
when they stood upon the ridge Om-at pointed down into the valley
toward the City of A-lur gleaming in the light of the western sun.

{}``There is Tarzan-jad-guru,'' he said, and Jar-don understood.


\chapter{The Masquerader}

\markboth{Tarzan the Terrible}{The Masquerader}

\textit{\emph{As}} \textit{\emph{Tarzan}} dropped to the ground beyond
the temple wall there was in his mind no intention to escape from
the City of A-lur until he had satisfied himself that his mate was
not a prisoner there, but how, in this strange city in which every
man's hand must be now against him, he was to live and prosecute his
search was far from clear to him.

There was only one place of which he knew that he might find even
temporary sanctuary and that was the Forbidden Garden of the king.
There was thick shrubbery in which a man might hide, and water and
fruits. A cunning jungle creature, if he could reach the spot unsuspected,
might remain concealed there for a considerable time, but how he was
to traverse the distance between the temple grounds and the garden
unseen was a question the seriousness of which he fully appreciated.

{}``Mighty is Tarzan,'' he soliloquized, {}``in his native jungle,
but in the cities of man he is little better than they.''

Depending upon his keen observation and sense of location he felt
safe in assuming that he could reach the palace grounds by means of
the subterranean corridors and chambers of the temple through which
he had been conducted the day before, nor any slightest detail of
which had escaped his keen eyes. That would be better, he reasoned,
than crossing the open grounds above where his pursuers would naturally
immediately follow him from the temple and quickly discover him.

And so a dozen paces from the temple wall he disappeared from sight
of any chance observer above, down one of the stone stairways that
led to the apartments beneath. The way that he had been conducted
the previous day had followed the windings and turnings of numerous
corridors and apartments, but Tarzan, sure of himself in such matters,
retraced the route accurately without hesitation.

He had little fear of immediate apprehension here since he believed
that all the priests of the temple had assembled in the court above
to witness his trial and his humiliation and his death, and with this
idea firmly implanted in his mind he rounded the turn of the corridor
and came face to face with an under priest, his grotesque headdress
concealing whatever emotion the sight of Tarzan may have aroused.

However, Tarzan had one advantage over the masked votary of Jad-ben-Otho
in that the moment he saw the priest he knew his intention concerning
him, and therefore was not compelled to delay action. And so it was
that before the priest could determine on any suitable line of conduct
in the premises a long, keen knife had been slipped into his heart.

As the body lunged toward the floor Tarzan caught it and snatched
the headdress from its shoulders, for the first sight of the creature
had suggested to his ever-alert mind a bold scheme for deceiving his
enemies.

The headdress saved from such possible damage as it must have sustained
had it fallen to the floor with the body of its owner, Tarzan relinquished
his hold upon the corpse, set the headdress carefully upon the floor
and stooping down severed the tail of the Ho-don close to its root.
Near by at his right was a small chamber from which the priest had
evidently just emerged and into this Tarzan dragged the corpse, the
headdress, and the tail.

Quickly cutting a thin strip of hide from the loin cloth of the priest,
Tarzan tied it securely about the upper end of the severed member
and then tucking the tail under his loin cloth behind him, secured
it in place as best he could. Then he fitted the headdress over his
shoulders and stepped from the apartment, to all appearances a priest
of the temple of Jad-ben-Otho unless one examined too closely his
thumbs and his great toes.

He had noticed that among both the Ho-don and the Waz-don it was not
at all unusual that the end of the tail be carried in one hand, and
so he caught his own tail up thus lest the lifeless appearance of
it dragging along behind him should arouse suspicion.

Passing along the corridor and through the various chambers he emerged
at last into the palace grounds beyond the temple. The pursuit had
not yet reached this point though he was conscious of a commotion
not far behind him. He met now both warriors and slaves but none gave
him more than a passing glance, a priest being too common a sight
about the palace.

And so, passing the guards unchallenged, he came at last to the inner
entrance to the Forbidden Garden and there he paused and scanned quickly
that portion of the beautiful spot that lay before his eyes. To his
relief it seemed unoccupied and congratulating himself upon the ease
with which he had so far outwitted the high powers of A-lur he moved
rapidly to the opposite end of the enclosure. Here he found a patch
of flowering shrubbery that might safely have concealed a dozen men.

Crawling well within he removed the uncomfortable headdress and sat
down to await whatever eventualities fate might have in store for
him the while he formulated plans for the future. The one night that
he had spent in A-lur had kept him up to a late hour, apprising him
of the fact that while there were few abroad in the temple grounds
at night, there were yet enough to make it possible for him to fare
forth under cover of his disguise without attracting the unpleasant
attention of the guards, and, too, he had noticed that the priesthood
constituted a privileged class that seemed to come and go at will
and unchallenged throughout the palace as well as the temple. Altogether
then, he decided, night furnished the most propitious hours for his
investigation\mbox{---}by day he could lie up in the shrubbery of
the Forbidden Garden, reasonably free from detection. From beyond
the garden he heard the voices of men calling to one another both
far and near, and he guessed that diligent was the search that was
being prosecuted for him.

The idle moments afforded him an opportunity to evolve a more satisfactory
scheme for attaching his stolen caudal appendage. He arranged it in
such a way that it might be quickly assumed or discarded, and this
done he fell to examining the weird mask that had so effectively hidden
his features.

The thing had been very cunningly wrought from a single block of wood,
very probably a section of a tree, upon which the features had been
carved and afterward the interior hollowed out until only a comparatively
thin shell remained. Two-semicircular notches had been rounded out
from opposite sides of the lower edge. These fitted snugly over his
shoulders, aprons of wood extending downward a few inches upon his
chest and back. From these aprons hung long tassels or switches of
hair tapering from the outer edges toward the center which reached
below the bottom of his torso. It required but the most cursory examination
to indicate to the ape-man that these ornaments consisted of human
scalps, taken, doubtless, from the heads of the sacrifices upon the
eastern altars. The headdress itself had been carved to depict in
formal design a hideous face that suggested both man and gryf. There
were the three white horns, the yellow face with the blue bands encircling
the eyes and the red hood which took the form of the posterior and
anterior aprons.

As Tarzan sat within the concealing foliage of the shrubbery meditating
upon the hideous priest-mask which he held in his hands he became
aware that he was not alone in the garden. He sensed another presence
and presently his trained ears detected the slow approach of naked
feet across the sward. At first he suspected that it might be one
stealthily searching the Forbidden Garden for him but a little later
the figure came within the limited area of his vision which was circumscribed
by stems and foliage and flowers. He saw then that it was the princess
O-lo-a and that she was alone and walking with bowed head as though
in meditation\mbox{---}sorrowful meditation for there were traces
of tears upon her lids.

Shortly after his ears warned him that others had entered the garden\mbox{---}men
they were and their footsteps proclaimed that they walked neither
slowly nor meditatively. They came directly toward the princess and
when Tarzan could see them he discovered that both were priests.

{}``O-lo-a, Princess of Pal-ul-don,'' said one, addressing her,
{}``the stranger who told us that he was the son of Jad-ben-Otho
has but just fled from the wrath of Lu-don, the high priest, who exposed
him and all his wicked blasphemy. The temple, and the palace, and
the city are being searched and we have been sent to search the Forbidden
Garden, since Ko-tan, the king, said that only this morning he found
him here, though how he passed the guards he could not guess.''

{}``He is not here,'' said O-lo-a. {}``I have been in the garden
for some time and have seen nor heard no other than myself. However,
search it if you will.''

{}``No,'' said the priest who had before spoken, {}``it is not
necessary since he could not have entered without your knowledge and
the connivance of the guards, and even had he, the priest who preceded
us must have seen him.''

{}``What priest?''\ asked O-lo-a.

{}``One passed the guards shortly before us,'' explained the man.

{}``I did not see him,'' said O-lo-a.

{}``Doubtless he left by another exit,'' remarked the second priest.

{}``Yes, doubtless,'' acquiesced O-lo-a, {}``but it is strange
that I did not see him.'' The two priests made their obeisance and
turned to depart.

{}``Stupid as Buto, the rhinoceros,'' soliloquized Tarzan, who considered
Buto a very stupid creature indeed. {}``It should be easy to outwit
such as these.''

The priests had scarce departed when there came the sound of feet
running rapidly across the garden in the direction of the princess
to an accompaniment of rapid breathing as of one almost spent, either
from fatigue or excitement.

{}``Pan-at-lee,'' exclaimed O-lo-a, {}``what has happened? You
look as terrified as the doe for which you were named!''\ 

{}``O Princess of Pal-ul-don,'' cried Pan-at-lee, {}``they would
have killed him in the temple. They would have killed the wondrous
stranger who claimed to be the Dor-ul-Otho.''

{}``But he escaped,'' said O-lo-a. {}``You were there. Tell me
about it.''

{}``The head priest would have had him seized and slain, but when
they rushed upon him he hurled one in the face of Lu-don with the
same ease that you might cast your breastplates at me, and then he
leaped upon the altar and from there to the top of the temple wall
and disappeared below. They are searching for him, but, O Princess,
I pray that they do not find him.''

{}``And why do you pray that?''\ asked O-lo-a. {}``Has not one
who has so blasphemed earned death?''\ 

{}``Ah, but you do not know him,'' replied Pan-at-lee.

{}``And you do, then?''\ retorted O-lo-a quickly. {}``This morning
you betrayed yourself and then attempted to deceive me. The slaves
of O-lo-a do not such things with impunity. He is then the same Tarzan-jad-guru
of whom you told me? Speak woman and speak only the truth.''

Pan-at-lee drew herself up very erect, her little chin held high,
for was not she too among her own people already as good as a princess?
{}``Pan-at-lee, the Kor-ul-ja does not lie,'' she said, {}``to
protect herself.''

{}``Then tell me what you know of this Tarzan-jad-guru,'' insisted
O-lo-a.

{}``I know that he is a wondrous man and very brave,'' said Pan-at-lee,
{}``and that he saved me from the Tor-o-don and the gryf as I told
you, and that he is indeed the same who came into the garden this
morning; and even now I do not know that he is not the son of Jad-ben-Otho
for his courage and his strength are more than those of mortal man,
as are also his kindness and his honor: for when he might have harmed
me he protected me, and when he might have saved himself he thought
only of me. And all this he did because of his friendship for Om-at,
who is gund of Kor-ul-ja and with whom I should have mated had the
Ho-don not captured me.''

{}``He was indeed a wonderful man to look upon,'' mused O-lo-a,
{}``and he was not as are other men, not alone in the conformation
of his hands and feet or the fact that he was tailless, but there
was that about him which made him seem different in ways more important
than these.''

{}``And,'' supplemented Pan-at-lee, her savage little heart loyal
to the man who had befriended her and hoping to win for him the consideration
of the princess even though it might not avail him; {}``and,'' she
said, {}``did he not know all about Ta-den and even his whereabouts.
Tell me, O Princess, could mortal know such things as these?''\ 

{}``Perhaps he saw Ta-den,'' suggested O-lo-a.

{}``But how would he know that you loved Ta-den,'' parried Pan-at-lee.
{}``I tell you, my Princess, that if he is not a god he is at least
more than Ho-don or Waz-don. He followed me from the cave of Es-sat
in Kor-ul-ja across Kor-ul-lul and two wide ridges to the very cave
in Kor-ul-gryf where I hid, though many hours had passed since I had
come that way and my bare feet left no impress upon the ground. What
mortal man could do such things as these? And where in all Pal-ul-don
would virgin maid find friend and protector in a strange male other
than he?''\ 

{}``Perhaps Lu-don may be mistaken\mbox{---}per\-haps he is a
god,'' said O-lo-a, influenced by her slave's enthusiastic championing
of the stranger.''

{}``But whether god or man he is too wonderful to die,'' cried Pan-at-lee.
{}``Would that I might save him. If he lived he might even find a
way to give you your Ta-den, Princess.''

{}``Ah, if he only could,'' sighed O-lo-a, {}``but alas it is too
late for tomorrow I am to be given to Bu-lot.''

{}``He who came to your quarters yesterday with your father?''\ asked
Pan-at-lee.

{}``Yes; the one with the awful round face and the big belly,''
exclaimed the Princess disgustedly. {}``He is so lazy he will neither
hunt nor fight. To eat and to drink is all that Bu-lot is fit for,
and he thinks of naught else except these things and his slave women.
But come, Pan-at-lee, gather for me some of these beautiful blossoms.
I would have them spread around my couch tonight that I may carry
away with me in the morning the memory of the fragrance that I love
best and which I know that I shall not find in the village of Mo-sar,
the father of Bu-lot. I will help you, Pan-at-lee, and we will gather
armfuls of them, for I love to gather them as I love nothing else\mbox{---}they
were Ta-den's favorite flowers.''

The two approached the flowering shrubbery where Tarzan hid, but as
the blooms grew plentifully upon every bush the ape-man guessed there
would be no necessity for them to enter the patch far enough to discover
him. With little exclamations of pleasure as they found particularly
large or perfect blooms the two moved from place to place upon the
outskirts of Tarzan's retreat.

{}``Oh, look, Pan-at-lee,'' cried O-lo-a presently; {}``there is
the king of them all. Never did I see so wonderful a flower\mbox{---}No!
I will get it myself\mbox{---}it is so large and wonderful no other
hand shall touch it,'' and the princess wound in among the bushes
toward the point where the great flower bloomed upon a bush above
the ape-man's head.

So sudden and unexpected her approach that there was no opportunity
to escape and Tarzan sat silently trusting that fate might be kind
to him and lead Ko-tan's daughter away before her eyes dropped from
the high-growing bloom to him. But as the girl cut the long stem with
her knife she looked down straight into the smiling face of Tarzan-jad-guru.

With a stifled scream she drew back and the ape-man rose and faced
her.

{}``Have no fear, Princess,'' he assured her. {}``It is the friend
of Ta-den who salutes you,'' raising her fingers to his lips.

Pan-at-lee came now excitedly forward. {}``O Jad-ben-Otho, it is
he!''\ 

{}``And now that you have found me,'' queried Tarzan, {}``will
you give me up to Lu-don, the high priest?''\ 

Pan-at-lee threw herself upon her knees at O-lo-a's feet. {}``Princess!
Princess!''\ she beseeched, {}``do not discover him to his enemies.''

{}``But Ko-tan, my father,'' whispered O-lo-a fearfully, {}``if
he knew of my perfidy his rage would be beyond naming. Even though
I am a princess Lu-don might demand that I be sacrificed to appease
the wrath of Jad-ben-Otho, and between the two of them I should be
lost.''

{}``But they need never know,'' cried Pan-at-lee, {}``that you
have seen him unless you tell them yourself for as Jad-ben-Otho is
my witness I will never betray you.''

{}``Oh, tell me, stranger,'' implored O-lo-a, {}``are you indeed
a god?''\ 

{}``Jad-ben-Otho is not more so,'' replied Tarzan truthfully.

{}``But why do you seek to escape then from the hands of mortals
if you are a god?''\ she asked.

{}``When gods mingle with mortals,'' replied Tarzan, {}``they are
no less vulnerable than mortals. Even Jad-ben-Otho, should he appear
before you in the flesh, might be slain.''

{}``You have seen Ta-den and spoken with him?''\ she asked with
apparent irrelevancy.

{}``Yes, I have seen him and spoken with him,'' replied the ape-man.
{}``For the duration of a moon I was with him constantly.''

{}``And\mbox{---}'' she hesitated\mbox{---}{}``he\mbox{---}''
she cast her eyes toward the ground and a flush mantled her cheek\mbox{---}{}``he
still loves me?''\ and Tarzan knew that she had been won over.

{}``Yes,'' he said, {}``Ta-den speaks only of O-lo-a and he waits
and hopes for the day when he can claim her.''

{}``But tomorrow they give me to Bu-lot,'' she said sadly.

{}``May it be always tomorrow,'' replied Tarzan, {}``for tomorrow
never comes.''

{}``Ah, but this unhappiness will come, and for all the tomorrows
of my life I must pine in misery for the Ta-den who will never be
mine.''

{}``But for Lu-don I might have helped you,'' said the ape-man.
{}``And who knows that I may not help you yet?''\ 

{}``Ah, if you only could, Dor-ul-Otho,'' cried the girl, {}``and
I know that you would if it were possible for Pan-at-lee has told
me how brave you are, and at the same time how kind.''

{}``Only Jad-ben-Otho knows what the future may bring,'' said Tarzan.
{}``And now you two go your way lest someone should discover you
and become suspicious.''

{}``We will go,'' said O-lo-a, {}``but Pan-at-lee will return with
food. I hope that you escape and that Jad-ben-Otho is pleased with
what I have done.'' She turned and walked away and Pan-at-lee followed
while the ape-man again resumed his hiding.

At dusk Pan-at-lee came with food and having her alone Tarzan put
the question that he had been anxious to put since his conversation
earlier in the day with O-lo-a.

{}``Tell me,'' he said, {}``what you know of the rumors of which
O-lo-a spoke of the mysterious stranger which is supposed to be hidden
in A-lur. Have you too heard of this during the short time that you
have been here?''\ 

{}``Yes,'' said Pan-at-lee, {}``I have heard it spoken of among
the other slaves. It is something of which all whisper among themselves
but of which none dares to speak aloud. They say that there is a strange
she hidden in the temple and that Lu-don wants her for a priestess
and that Ko-tan wants her for a wife and that neither as yet dares
take her for fear of the other.''

{}``Do you know where she is hidden in the temple?''\ asked Tarzan.

{}``No,'' said Pan-at-lee. {}``How should I know? I do not even
know that it is more than a story and I but tell you that which I
have heard others say.''

{}``There was only one,'' asked Tarzan, {}``whom they spoke of?''\ 

{}``No, they speak of another who came with her but none seems to
know what became of this one.''

Tarzan nodded. {}``Thank you Pan-at-lee,'' he said. {}``You may
have helped me more than either of us guess.''

{}``I hope that I have helped you,'' said the girl as she turned
back toward the palace.

{}``And I hope so too,'' exclaimed Tarzan emphatically.


\chapter{The Temple of the Gryf}

\markboth{Tarzan the Terrible}{The Temple of the Gryf}

\textit{\emph{When}} night had fallen Tarzan donned the mask and the
dead tail of the priest he had slain in the vaults beneath the temple.
He judged that it would not do to attempt again to pass the guard,
especially so late at night as it would be likely to arouse comment
and suspicion, and so he swung into the tree that overhung the garden
wall and from its branches dropped to the ground beyond.

Avoiding too grave risk of apprehension the ape-man passed through
the grounds to the court of the palace, approaching the temple from
the side opposite to that at which he had left it at the time of his
escape. He came thus it is true through a portion of the grounds with
which he was unfamiliar but he preferred this to the danger of following
the beaten track between the palace apartments and those of the temple.
Having a definite goal in mind and endowed as he was with an almost
miraculous sense of location he moved with great assurance through
the shadows of the temple yard.

Taking advantage of the denser shadows close to the walls and of what
shrubs and trees there were he came without mishap at last to the
ornate building concerning the purpose of which he had asked Lu-don
only to be put off with the assertion that it was forgotten\mbox{---}nothing
strange in itself but given possible importance by the apparent hesitancy
of the priest to discuss its use and the impression the ape-man had
gained at the time that Lu-don lied.

And now he stood at last alone before the structure which was three
stories in height and detached from all the other temple buildings.
It had a single barred entrance which was carved from the living rock
in representation of the head of a gryf, whose wide-open mouth constituted
the doorway. The head, hood, and front paws of the creature were depicted
as though it lay crouching with its lower jaw on the ground between
its outspread paws. Small oval windows, which were likewise barred,
flanked the doorway.

Seeing that the coast was clear, Tarzan stepped into the darkened
entrance where he tried the bars only to discover that they were ingeniously
locked in place by some device with which he was unfamiliar and that
they also were probably too strong to be broken even if he could have
risked the noise which would have resulted. Nothing was visible within
the darkened interior and so, momentarily baffled, he sought the windows.
Here also the bars refused to yield up their secret, but again Tarzan
was not dismayed since he had counted upon nothing different.

If the bars would not yield to his cunning they would yield to his
giant strength if there proved no other means of ingress, but first
he would assure himself that this latter was the case. Moving entirely
around the building he examined it carefully. There were other windows
but they were similarly barred. He stopped often to look and listen
but he saw no one and the sounds that he heard were too far away to
cause him any apprehension.

He glanced above him at the wall of the building. Like so many of
the other walls of the city, palace, and temple, it was ornately carved
and there were too the peculiar ledges that ran sometimes in a horizontal
plane and again were tilted at an angle, giving ofttimes an impression
of irregularity and even crookedness to the buildings. It was not
a difficult wall to climb, at least not difficult for the ape-man.

But he found the bulky and awkward headdress a considerable handicap
and so he laid it aside upon the ground at the foot of the wall. Nimbly
he ascended to find the windows of the second floor not only barred
but curtained within. He did not delay long at the second floor since
he had in mind an idea that he would find the easiest entrance through
the roof which he had noticed was roughly dome shaped like the throneroom
of Ko-tan. Here there were apertures. He had seen them from the ground,
and if the construction of the interior resembled even slightly that
of the throneroom, bars would not be necessary upon these apertures,
since no one could reach them from the floor of the room.

There was but a single question: would they be large enough to admit
the broad shoulders of the ape-man.

He paused again at the third floor, and here, in spite of the hangings,
he saw that the interior was lighted and simultaneously there came
to his nostrils from within a scent that stripped from him temporarily
any remnant of civilization that might have remained and left him
a fierce and terrible bull of the jungles of Kerchak. So sudden and
complete was the metamorphosis that there almost broke from the savage
lips the hideous challenge of his kind, but the cunning brute-mind
saved him this blunder.

And now he heard voices within\mbox{---}the voice of Lu-don he could
have sworn, demanding. And haughty and disdainful came the answering
words though utter hopelessness spoke in the tones of this other voice
which brought Tarzan to the pinnacle of frenzy.

The dome with its possible apertures was forgotten. Every consideration
of stealth and quiet was cast aside as the ape-man drew back his mighty
fist and struck a single terrific blow upon the bars of the small
window before him, a blow that sent the bars and the casing that held
them clattering to the floor of the apartment within.

Instantly Tarzan dove headforemost through the aperture carrying the
hangings of antelope hide with him to the floor below. Leaping to
his feet he tore the entangling pelt from about his head only to find
himself in utter darkness and in silence. He called aloud a name that
had not passed his lips for many weary months. {}``Jane, Jane,''
he cried, {}``where are you?''\ But there was only silence in reply.

Again and again he called, groping with outstretched hands through
the Stygian blackness of the room, his nostrils assailed and his brain
tantalized by the delicate effluvia that had first assured him that
his mate had been within this very room. And he had heard her dear
voice combatting the base demands of the vile priest. Ah, if he had
but acted with greater caution! If he had but continued to move with
quiet and stealth he might even at this moment be holding her in his
arms while the body of Lu-don, beneath his foot, spoke eloquently
of vengeance achieved. But there was no time now for idle self-reproaches.

He stumbled blindly forward, groping for he knew not what till suddenly
the floor beneath him tilted and he shot downward into a darkness
even more utter than that above. He felt his body strike a smooth
surface and he realized that he was hurtling downward as through a
polished chute while from above there came the mocking tones of a
taunting laugh and the voice of Lu-don screamed after him: {}``Return
to thy father, O Dor-ul-Otho!''\ 

The ape-man came to a sudden and painful stop upon a rocky floor.
Directly before him was an oval window crossed by many bars, and beyond
he saw the moonlight playing on the waters of the blue lake below.
Simultaneously he was conscious of a familiar odor in the air of the
chamber, which a quick glance revealed in the semidarkness as of considerable
proportion.

It was the faint, but unmistakable odor of the gryf, and now Tarzan
stood silently listening. At first he detected no sounds other than
those of the city that came to him through the window overlooking
the lake; but presently, faintly, as though from a distance he heard
the shuffling of padded feet along a stone pavement, and as he listened
he was aware that the sound approached.

Nearer and nearer it came, and now even the breathing of the beast
was audible. Evidently attracted by the noise of his descent into
its cavernous retreat it was approaching to investigate. He could
not see it but he knew that it was not far distant, and then, deafeningly
there reverberated through those gloomy corridors the mad bellow of
the gryf.

Aware of the poor eyesight of the beast, and his own eyes now grown
accustomed to the darkness of the cavern, the ape-man sought to elude
the infuriated charge which he well knew no living creature could
withstand. Neither did he dare risk the chance of experimenting upon
this strange gryf with the tactics of the Tor-o-don that he had found
so efficacious upon that other occasion when his life and liberty
had been the stakes for which he cast. In many respects the conditions
were dissimilar. Before, in broad daylight, he had been able to approach
the gryf under normal conditions in its natural state, and the gryf
itself was one that he had seen subjected to the authority of man,
or at least of a manlike creature; but here he was confronted by an
imprisoned beast in the full swing of a furious charge and he had
every reason to suspect that this gryf might never have felt the restraining
influence of authority, confined as it was in this gloomy pit to serve
likely but the single purpose that Tarzan had already seen so graphically
portrayed in his own experience of the past few moments.

To elude the creature, then, upon the possibility of discovering some
loophole of escape from his predicament seemed to the ape-man the
wisest course to pursue. Too much was at stake to risk an encounter
that might be avoided\mbox{---}an encounter the outcome of which
there was every reason to apprehend would seal the fate of the mate
that he had just found, only to lose again so harrowingly. Yet high
as his disappointment and chagrin ran, hopeless as his present estate
now appeared, there tingled in the veins of the savage lord a warm
glow of thanksgiving and elation. She lived! After all these weary
months of hopelessness and fear he had found her. She lived!

To the opposite side of the chamber, silently as the wraith of a disembodied
soul, the swift jungle creature moved from the path of the charging
Titan that, guided solely in the semi-darkness by its keen ears, bore
down upon the spot toward which Tarzan's noisy entrance into its lair
had attracted it. Along the further wall the ape-man hurried. Before
him now appeared the black opening of the corridor from which the
beast had emerged into the larger chamber. Without hesitation Tarzan
plunged into it. Even here his eyes, long accustomed to darkness that
would have seemed total to you or to me, saw dimly the floor and the
walls within a radius of a few feet\mbox{---}enough at least to
prevent him plunging into any unguessed abyss, or dashing himself
upon solid rock at a sudden turning.

The corridor was both wide and lofty, which indeed it must be to accommodate
the colossal proportions of the creature whose habitat it was, and
so Tarzan encountered no difficulty in moving with reasonable speed
along its winding trail. He was aware as he proceeded that the trend
of the passage was downward, though not steeply, but it seemed interminable
and he wondered to what distant subterranean lair it might lead. There
was a feeling that perhaps after all he might better have remained
in the larger chamber and risked all on the chance of subduing the
gryf where there was at least sufficient room and light to lend to
the experiment some slight chance of success. To be overtaken here
in the narrow confines of the black corridor where he was assured
the gryf could not see him at all would spell almost certain death
and now he heard the thing approaching from behind. Its thunderous
bellows fairly shook the cliff from which the cavernous chambers were
excavated. To halt and meet this monstrous incarnation of fury with
a futile whee-oo! seemed to Tarzan the height of insanity and so he
continued along the corridor, increasing his pace as he realized that
the gryf was overhauling him.

Presently the darkness lessened and at the final turning of the passage
he saw before him an area of moonlight. With renewed hope he sprang
rapidly forward and emerged from the mouth of the corridor to find
himself in a large circular enclosure the towering white walls of
which rose high upon every side\mbox{---}smooth perpendicular walls
upon the sheer face of which was no slightest foothold. To his left
lay a pool of water, one side of which lapped the foot of the wall
at this point. It was, doubtless, the wallow and the drinking pool
of the gryf.

And now the creature emerged from the corridor and Tarzan retreated
to the edge of the pool to make his last stand. There was no staff
with which to enforce the authority of his voice, but yet he made
his stand for there seemed naught else to do. Just beyond the entrance
to the corridor the gryf paused, turning its weak eyes in all directions
as though searching for its prey. This then seemed the psychological
moment for his attempt and raising his voice in peremptory command
the ape-man voiced the weird whee-oo! of the Tor-o-don. Its effect
upon the gryf was instantaneous and complete\mbox{---}with a terrific
bellow it lowered its three horns and dashed madly in the direction
of the sound.

To right nor to left was any avenue of escape, for behind him lay
the placid waters of the pool, while down upon him from before thundered
annihilation. The mighty body seemed already to tower above him as
the ape-man turned and dove into the dark waters.

Dead in her breast lay hope. Battling for life during harrowing months
of imprisonment and danger and hardship it had fitfully flickered
and flamed only to sink after each renewal to smaller proportions
than before and now it had died out entirely leaving only cold, charred
embers that Jane Clayton knew would never again be rekindled. Hope
was dead as she faced Lu-don, the high priest, in her prison quarters
in the Temple of the Gryf at A-lur. Both time and hardship had failed
to leave their impress upon her physical beauty\mbox{---}the contours
of her perfect form, the glory of her radiant loveliness had defied
them, yet to these very attributes she owed the danger which now confronted
her, for Lu-don desired her. From the lesser priests she had been
safe, but from Lu-don, she was not safe, for Lu-don was not as they,
since the high priestship of Pal-ul-don may descend from father to
son.

Ko-tan, the king, had wanted her and all that had so far saved her
from either was the fear of each for the other, but at last Lu-don
had cast aside discretion and had come in the silent watches of the
night to claim her. Haughtily had she repulsed him, seeking ever to
gain time, though what time might bring her of relief or renewed hope
she could not even remotely conjecture. A leer of lust and greed shone
hungrily upon his cruel countenance as he advanced across the room
to seize her. She did not shrink nor cower, but stood there very erect,
her chin up, her level gaze freighted with the loathing and contempt
she felt for him. He read her expression and while it angered him,
it but increased his desire for possession. Here indeed was a queen,
perhaps a goddess; fit mate for the high priest.

{}``You shall not!''\ she said as he would have touched her. {}``One
of us shall die before ever your purpose is accomplished.''

He was close beside her now. His laugh grated upon her ears. {}``Love
does not kill,'' he replied mockingly.

He reached for her arm and at the same instant something clashed against
the bars of one of the windows, crashing them inward to the floor,
to be followed almost simultaneously by a human figure which dove
headforemost into the room, its head enveloped in the skin window
hangings which it carried with it in its impetuous entry.

Jane Clayton saw surprise and something of terror too leap to the
countenance of the high priest and then she saw him spring forward
and jerk upon a leather thong that depended from the ceiling of the
apartment. Instantly there dropped from above a cunningly contrived
partition that fell between them and the intruder, effectively barring
him from them and at the same time leaving him to grope upon its opposite
side in darkness, since the only cresset the room contained was upon
their side of the partition.

Faintly from beyond the wall Jane heard a voice calling, but whose
it was and what the words she could not distinguish. Then she saw
Lu-don jerk upon another thong and wait in evident expectancy of some
consequent happening. He did not have long to wait. She saw the thong
move suddenly as though jerked from above and then Lu-don smiled and
with another signal put in motion whatever machinery it was that raised
the partition again to its place in the ceiling.

Advancing into that portion of the room that the partition had shut
off from them, the high priest knelt upon the floor, and down tilting
a section of it, revealed the dark mouth of a shaft leading below.
Laughing loudly he shouted into the hole: {}``Return to thy father,
O Dor-ul-Otho!''\ 

Making fast the catch that prevented the trapdoor from opening beneath
the feet of the unwary until such time as Lu-don chose the high priest
rose again to his feet.

{}``Now, Beautiful One!''\ he cried, and then, {}``Ja-don! what
do you here?''\ 

Jane Clayton turned to follow the direction of Lu-don's eyes and there
she saw framed in the entrance-way to the apartment the mighty figure
of a warrior, upon whose massive features sat an expression of stern
and uncompromising authority.

{}``I come from Ko-tan, the king,'' replied Ja-don, {}``to remove
the beautiful stranger to the Forbidden Garden.''

{}``The king defies me, the high priest of Jad-ben-Otho?''\ cried
Lu-don.

{}``It is the king's command\mbox{---}I have spoken,'' snapped
Ja-don, in whose manner was no sign of either fear or respect for
the priest.

Lu-don well knew why the king had chosen this messenger whose heresy
was notorious, but whose power had as yet protected him from the machinations
of the priest. Lu-don cast a surreptitious glance at the thongs hanging
from the ceiling. Why not? If he could but maneuver to entice Ja-don
to the opposite side of the chamber!

{}``Come,'' he said in a conciliatory tone, {}``let us discuss
the matter,'' and moved toward the spot where he would have Ja-don
follow him.

{}``There is nothing to discuss,'' replied Ja-don, yet he followed
the priest, fearing treachery.

Jane watched them. In the face and figure of the warrior she found
reflected those admirable traits of courage and honor that the profession
of arms best develops. In the hypocritical priest there was no redeeming
quality. Of the two then she might best choose the warrior. With him
there was a chance\mbox{---}with Lu-don, none. Even the very process
of exchange from one prison to another might offer some possibility
of escape. She weighed all these things and decided, for Ludon's quick
glance at the thongs had not gone unnoticed nor uninterpreted by her.

{}``Warrior,'' she said, addressing Ja-don, {}``if you would live
enter not that portion of the room.''

Lu-don cast an angry glance upon her. {}``Silence, slave!''\ he
cried.

{}``And where lies the danger?''\ Ja-don asked of Jane, ignoring
Lu-don.

The woman pointed to the thongs. {}``Look,'' she said, and before
the high priest could prevent she had seized that which controlled
the partition which shot downward separating Lu-don from the warrior
and herself.

Ja-don looked inquiringly at her. {}``He would have tricked me neatly
but for you,'' he said; {}``kept me imprisoned there while he secreted
you elsewhere in the mazes of his temple.''

{}``He would have done more than that,'' replied Jane, as she pulled
upon the other thong. {}``This releases the fastenings of a trapdoor
in the floor beyond the partition. When you stepped on that you would
have been precipitated into a pit beneath the temple. Lu-don has threatened
me with this fate often. I do not know that he speaks the truth, but
he says that a demon of the temple is imprisoned there\mbox{---}a
huge gryf.''

{}``There is a gryf within the temple,'' said Ja-don. {}``What
with it and the sacrifices, the priests keep us busy supplying them
with prisoners, though the victims are sometimes those for whom Lu-don
has conceived hatred among our own people. He has had his eyes upon
me for a long time. This would have been his chance but for you. Tell
me, woman, why you warned me. Are we not all equally your jailers
and your enemies?''\ 

{}``None could be more horrible than Lu-don,'' she replied; {}``and
you have the appearance of a brave and honorable warrior. I could
not hope, for hope has died and yet there is the possibility that
among so many fighting men, even though they be of another race than
mine, there is one who would accord honorable treatment to a stranger
within his gates\mbox{---}even though she be a woman.''

Ja-don looked at her for a long minute. {}``Kg-tan would make you
his queen,'' he said. {}``That he told me himself and surely that
were honorable treatment from one who might make you a slave.''

{}``Why, then, would he make me queen?''\ she asked.

Ja-don came closer as though in fear his words might be overheard.
{}``He believes, although he did not tell me so in fact, that you
are of the race of gods. And why not? Jad-ben-Otho is tailless, therefore
it is not strange that Ko-tan should suspect that only the gods are
thus. His queen is dead leaving only a single daughter. He craves
a son and what more desirable than that he should found a line of
rulers for Pal-ul-don descended from the gods?''\ 

{}``But I am already wed,'' cried Jane. {}``I cannot wed another.
I do not want him or his throne.''

{}``Ko-tan is king,'' replied Ja-don simply as though that explained
and simplified everything.

{}``You will not save me then?''\ she asked.

{}``If you were in Ja-lur,'' he replied, {}``I might protect you,
even against the king.''

{}``What and where is Ja-lur?''\ she asked, grasping at any straw.

{}``It is the city where I rule,'' he answered. {}``I am chief
there and of all the valley beyond.''

{}``Where is it?''\ she insisted, and {}``is it far?''\ 

{}``No,'' he replied, smiling, {}``it is not far, but do not think
of that\mbox{---}you could never reach it. There are too many to
pursue and capture you. If you wish to know, however, it lies up the
river that empties into Jad-ben-lul whose waters kiss the walls of
A-lur\mbox{---}up the western fork it lies with water upon three
sides. Impregnable city of Pal-ul-don\mbox{---}alone of all the
cities it has never been entered by a foeman since it was built there
while Jad-ben-Otho was a boy.''

{}``And there I would be safe?''\ she asked.

{}``Perhaps,'' he replied.

Ah, dead Hope; upon what slender provocation would you seek to glow
again! She sighed and shook her head, realizing the inutility of Hope\mbox{---}yet
the tempting bait dangled before her mind's eye\mbox{---}Ja-lur!

{}``You are wise,'' commented Ja-don interpreting her sigh. {}``Come
now, we will go to the quarters of the princess beside the Forbidden
Garden. There you will remain with O-lo-a, the king's daughter. It
will be better than this prison you have occupied.''

{}``And Ko-tan?''\ she asked, a shudder passing through her slender
frame.

{}``There are ceremonies,'' explained Ja-don, {}``that may occupy
several days before you become queen, and one of them may be difficult
of arrangement.'' He laughed, then.

{}``What?''\ she asked.

{}``Only the high priest may perform the marriage ceremony for a
king,'' he explained.

{}``Delay!''\ she murmured; {}``blessed delay!''\ Tenacious
indeed of life is Hope even though it be reduced to cold and lifeless
char\mbox{---}a veritable phoenix.


\chapter{{}``The King Is Dead!''}

\markboth{Tarzan the Terrible}{{}``The King Is Dead!''}

\textit{\emph{As}} \textit{\emph{they}} conversed Ja-don had led her
down the stone stairway that leads from the upper floors of the Temple
of the Gryf to the chambers and the corridors that honeycomb the rocky
hills from which the temple and the palace are hewn and now they passed
from one to the other through a doorway upon one side of which two
priests stood guard and upon the other two warriors. The former would
have halted Ja-don when they saw who it was that accompanied him for
well known throughout the temple was the quarrel between king and
high priest for possession of this beautiful stranger.

{}``Only by order of Lu-don may she pass,'' said one, placing himself
directly in front of Jane Clayton, barring her progress. Through the
hollow eyes of the hideous mask the woman could see those of the priest
beneath gleaming with the fires of fanaticism. Ja-don placed an arm
about her shoulders and laid his hand upon his knife.

{}``She passes by order of Ko-tan, the king,'' he said, {}``and
by virtue of the fact that Ja-don, the chief, is her guide. Stand
aside!''\ 

The two warriors upon the palace side pressed forward. {}``We are
here, gund of Ja-lur,'' said one, addressing Ja-don, {}``to receive
and obey your commands.''

The second priest now interposed. {}``Let them pass,'' he admonished
his companion. {}``We have received no direct commands from Lu-don
to the contrary and it is a law of the temple and the palace that
chiefs and priests may come and go without interference.''

{}``But I know Lu-don's wishes,'' insisted the other.

{}``He told you then that Ja-don must not pass with the stranger?''\ 

{}``No\mbox{---}but\mbox{---}''

{}``Then let them pass, for they are three to two and will pass anyway\mbox{---}we
have done our best.''

Grumbling, the priest stepped aside. {}``Lu-don will exact an accounting,''
he cried angrily.

Ja-don turned upon him. {}``And get it when and where he will,''
he snapped.

They came at last to the quarters of the Princess O-lo-a where, in
the main entrance-way, loitered a small guard of palace warriors and
several stalwart black eunuchs belonging to the princess, or her women.
To one of the latter Ja-don relinquished his charge.

{}``Take her to the princess,'' he commanded, {}``and see that
she does not escape.''

Through a number of corridors and apartments lighted by stone cressets
the eunuch led Lady Greystoke halting at last before a doorway concealed
by hangings of jato skin, where the guide beat with his staff upon
the wall beside the door.

{}``O-lo-a, Princess of Pal-ul-don,'' he called, {}``here is the
stranger woman, the prisoner from the temple.''

{}``Bid her enter,'' Jane heard a sweet voice from within command.

The eunuch drew aside the hangings and Lady Greystoke stepped within.
Before her was a low-ceiled room of moderate size. In each of the
four corners a kneeling figure of stone seemed to be bearing its portion
of the weight of the ceiling upon its shoulders. These figures were
evidently intended to represent Waz-don slaves and were not without
bold artistic beauty. The ceiling itself was slightly arched to a
central dome which was pierced to admit light by day, and air. Upon
one side of the room were many windows, the other three walls being
blank except for a doorway in each. The princess lay upon a pile of
furs which were arranged over a low stone dais in one corner of the
apartment and was alone except for a single Waz-don slave girl who
sat upon the edge of the dais near her feet.

As Jane entered O-lo-a beckoned her to approach and when she stood
beside the couch the girl half rose upon an elbow and surveyed her
critically.

{}``How beautiful you are,'' she said simply.

Jane smiled, sadly; for she had found that beauty may be a curse.

{}``That is indeed a compliment,'' she replied quickly, {}``from
one so radiant as the Princess O-lo-a.''

{}``Ah!''\ exclaimed the princess delightedly; {}``you speak my
language! I was told that you were of another race and from some far
land of which we of Pal-ul-don have never heard.''

{}``Lu-don saw to it that the priests instructed me,'' explained
Jane; {}``but I am from a far country, Princess; one to which I long
to return\mbox{---}and I am very unhappy.''

{}``But Ko-tan, my father, would make you his queen,'' cried the
girl; {}``that should make you very happy.''

{}``But it does not,'' replied the prisoner; {}``I love another
to whom I am already wed. Ah, Princess, if you had known what it was
to love and to be forced into marriage with another you would sympathize
with me.''

The Princess O-lo-a was silent for a long moment. {}``I know,''
she said at last, {}``and I am very sorry for you; but if the king's
daughter cannot save herself from such a fate who may save a slave
woman? for such in fact you are.''

The drinking in the great banquet hall of the palace of Ko-tan, king
of Pal-ul-don had commenced earlier this night than was usual, for
the king was celebrating the morrow's betrothal of his only daughter
to Bu-lot, son of Mo-sar, the chief, whose great-grandfather had been
king of Pal-ul-don and who thought that he should be king, and Mo-sar
was drunk and so was Bu-lot, his son. For that matter nearly all of
the warriors, including the king himself, were drunk. In the heart
of Ko-tan was no love either for Mo-sar, or Bu-lot, nor did either
of these love the king. Ko-tan was giving his daughter to Bu-lot in
the hope that the alliance would prevent Mo-sar from insisting upon
his claims to the throne, for, next to Ja-don, Mo-sar was the most
powerful of the chiefs and while Ko-tan looked with fear upon Ja-don,
too, he had no fear that the old Lion-man would attempt to seize the
throne, though which way he would throw his influence and his warriors
in the event that Mo-sar declare war upon Ko-tan, the king could not
guess.

Primitive people who are also warlike are seldom inclined toward either
tact or diplomacy even when sober; but drunk they know not the words,
if aroused. It was really Bu-lot who started it.

{}``This,'' he said, {}``I drink to O-lo-a,'' and he emptied his
tankard at a single gulp. {}``And this,'' seizing a full one from
a neighbor, {}``to her son and mine who will bring back the throne
of Pal-ul-don to its rightful owners!''\ 

{}``The king is not yet dead!''\ cried Ko-tan, rising to his feet;
{}``nor is Bu-lot yet married to his daughter\mbox{---}and there
is yet time to save Pal-ul-don from the spawn of the rabbit breed.''

The king's angry tone and his insulting reference to Bu-lot's well-known
cowardice brought a sudden, sobering silence upon the roistering company.
Every eye turned upon Bu-lot and Mo-sar, who sat together directly
opposite the king. The first was very drunk though suddenly he seemed
quite sober. He was so drunk that for an instant he forgot to be a
coward, since his reasoning powers were so effectually paralyzed by
the fumes of liquor that he could not intelligently weigh the consequences
of his acts. It is reasonably conceivable that a drunk and angry rabbit
might commit a rash deed. Upon no other hypothesis is the thing that
Bu-lot now did explicable. He rose suddenly from the seat to which
he had sunk after delivering his toast and seizing the knife from
the sheath of the warrior upon his right hurled it with terrific force
at Ko-tan. Skilled in the art of throwing both their knives and their
clubs are the warriors of Pal-ul-don and at this short distance and
coming as it did without warning there was no defense and but one
possible result\mbox{---}Ko-tan, the king, lunged forward across
the table, the blade buried in his heart.

A brief silence followed the assassin's cowardly act. White with terror,
now, Bu-lot fell slowly back toward the doorway at his rear, when
suddenly angry warriors leaped with drawn knives to prevent his escape
and to avenge their king. But Mo-sar now took his stand beside his
son.

{}``Ko-tan is dead!''\ he cried. {}``Mo-sar is king! Let the loyal
warriors of Pal-ul-don protect their ruler!''\ 

Mo-sar commanded a goodly following and these quickly surrounded him
and Bu-lot, but there were many knives against them and now Ja-don
pressed forward through those who confronted the pretender.

{}``Take them both!''\ he shouted. {}``The warriors of Pal-ul-don
will choose their own king after the assassin of Ko-tan has paid the
penalty of his treachery.''

Directed now by a leader whom they both respected and admired those
who had been loyal to Ko-tan rushed forward upon the faction that
had surrounded Mo-sar. Fierce and terrible was the fighting, devoid,
apparently, of all else than the ferocious lust to kill and while
it was at its height Mo-sar and Bu-lot slipped unnoticed from the
banquet hall.

To that part of the palace assigned to them during their visit to
A-lur they hastened. Here were their servants and the lesser warriors
of their party who had not been bidden to the feast of Ko-tan. These
were directed quickly to gather together their belongings for immediate
departure. When all was ready, and it did not take long, since the
warriors of Pal-ul-don require but little impedimenta on the march,
they moved toward the palace gate.

Suddenly Mo-sar approached his son. {}``The princess,'' he whispered.
{}``We must not leave the city without her\mbox{---}she is half
the battle for the throne.''

Bu-lot, now entirely sober, demurred. He had had enough of fighting
and of risk. {}``Let us get out of A-lur quickly,'' he urged, {}``or
we shall have the whole city upon us. She would not come without a
struggle and that would delay us too long.''

{}``There is plenty of time,'' insisted Mo-sar. {}``They are still
fighting in the pal-e-don-so. It will be long before they miss us
and, with Ko-tan dead, long before any will think to look to the safety
of the princess. Our time is now\mbox{---}it was made for us by
Jad-ben-Otho. Come!''\ 

Reluctantly Bu-lot followed his father, who first instructed the warriors
to await them just inside the gateway of the palace. Rapidly the two
approached the quarters of the princess. Within the entrance-way only
a handful of warriors were on guard. The eunuchs had retired.

{}``There is fighting in the pal-e-don-so,'' Mo-sar announced in
feigned excitement as they entered the presence of the guards. {}``The
king desires you to come at once and has sent us to guard the apartments
of the princess. Make haste!''\ he commanded as the men hesitated.

The warriors knew him and that on the morrow the princess was to be
betrothed to Bu-lot, his son. If there was trouble what more natural
than that Mo-sar and Bu-lot should be intrusted with the safety of
the princess. And then, too, was not Mo-sar a powerful chief to whose
orders disobedience might prove a dangerous thing? They were but common
fighting men disciplined in the rough school of tribal warfare, but
they had learned to obey a superior and so they departed for the banquet
hall\mbox{---}the place-where-men-eat.

Barely waiting until they had disappeared Mo-sar crossed to the hangings
at the opposite end of the entrance-hall and followed by Bu-lot made
his way toward the sleeping apartment of O-lo-a and a moment later,
without warning, the two men burst in upon the three occupants of
the room. At sight of them O-lo-a sprang to her feet.

{}``What is the meaning of this?''\ she demanded angrily.

Mo-sar advanced and halted before her. Into his cunning mind had entered
a plan to trick her. If it succeeded it would prove easier than taking
her by force, and then his eyes fell upon Jane Clayton and he almost
gasped in astonishment and admiration, but he caught himself and returned
to the business of the moment.

{}``O-lo-a,'' he cried, {}``when you know the urgency of our mission
you will forgive us. We have sad news for you. There has been an uprising
in the palace and Ko-tan, the king, has been slain. The rebels are
drunk with liquor and now on their way here. We must get you out of
A-lur at once\mbox{---}there is not a moment to lose. Come, and
quickly!''\ 

{}``My father dead?''\ cried O-lo-a, and suddenly her eyes went
wide. {}``Then my place is here with my people,'' she cried. {}``If
Ko-tan is dead I am queen until the warriors choose a new ruler\mbox{---}that
is the law of Pal-ul-don. And if I am queen none can make me wed whom
I do not wish to wed\mbox{---}and Jad-ben-Otho knows I never wished
to wed thy cowardly son. Go!''\ She pointed a slim forefinger imperiously
toward the doorway.

Mo-sar saw that neither trickery nor persuasion would avail now and
every precious minute counted. He looked again at the beautiful woman
who stood beside O-lo-a. He had never before seen her but he well
knew from palace gossip that she could be no other than the godlike
stranger whom Ko-tan had planned to make his queen.

{}``Bu-lot,'' he cried to his son, {}``take you your own woman
and I will take\mbox{---}mine!''\ and with that he sprang suddenly
forward and seizing Jane about the waist lifted her in his arms, so
that before O-lo-a or Pan-at-lee might even guess his purpose he had
disappeared through the hangings near the foot of the dais and was
gone with the stranger woman struggling and fighting in his grasp.

And then Bu-lot sought to seize O-lo-a, but O-lo-a had her Pan-at-lee\mbox{---}fierce
little tiger-girl of the savage Kor-ul-ja\mbox{---}Pan-at-lee whose
name belied her\mbox{---}and Bu-lot found that with the two of them
his hands were full. When he would have lifted O-lo-a and borne her
away Pan-at-lee seized him around the legs and strove to drag him
down. Viciously he kicked her, but she would not desist, and finally,
realizing that he might not only lose his princess but be so delayed
as to invite capture if he did not rid himself of this clawing, scratching
she-jato, he hurled O-lo-a to the floor and seizing Pan-at-lee by
the hair drew his knife and\mbox{---}

The curtains behind him suddenly parted. In two swift bounds a lithe
figure crossed the room and before ever the knife of Bu-lot reached
its goal his wrist was seized from behind and a terrific blow crashing
to the base of his brain dropped him, lifeless, to the floor. Bu-lot,
coward, traitor, and assassin, died without knowing who struck him
down.

As Tarzan of the Apes leaped into the pool in the gryf pit of the
temple at A-lur one might have accounted for his act on the hypothesis
that it was the last blind urge of self-preservation to delay, even
for a moment, the inevitable tragedy in which each some day must play
the leading role upon his little stage; but no\mbox{---}those cool,
gray eyes had caught the sole possibility for escape that the surroundings
and the circumstances offered\mbox{---}a tiny, moonlit patch of
water glimmering through a small aperture in the cliff at the surface
of the pool upon its farther side. With swift, bold strokes he swam
for speed alone knowing that the water would in no way deter his pursuer.
Nor did it. Tarzan heard the great splash as the huge creature plunged
into the pool behind him; he heard the churning waters as it forged
rapidly onward in his wake. He was nearing the opening\mbox{---}would
it be large enough to permit the passage of his body? That portion
of it which showed above the surface of the water most certainly would
not. His life, then, depended upon how much of the aperture was submerged.
And now it was directly before him and the gryf directly behind. There
was no alternative\mbox{---}there was no other hope. The ape-man
threw all the resources of his great strength into the last few strokes,
extended his hands before him as a cutwater, submerged to the water's
level and shot forward toward the hole.

Frothing with rage was the baffled Lu-don as he realized how neatly
the stranger she had turned his own tables upon him. He could of course
escape the Temple of the Gryf in which her quick wit had temporarily
imprisoned him; but during the delay, however brief, Ja-don would
find time to steal her from the temple and deliver her to Ko-tan.
But he would have her yet\mbox{---}that the high priest swore in
the names of Jad-ben-Otho and all the demons of his faith. He hated
Ko-tan. Secretly he had espoused the cause of Mo-sar, in whom he would
have a willing tool. Perhaps, then, this would give him the opportunity
he had long awaited\mbox{---}a pretext for inciting the revolt that
would dethrone Ko-tan and place Mo-sar in power\mbox{---}with Lu-don
the real ruler of Pal-ul-don. He licked his thin lips as he sought
the window through which Tarzan had entered and now Lu-don's only
avenue of escape. Cautiously he made his way across the floor, feeling
before him with his hands, and when they discovered that the trap
was set for him an ugly snarl broke from the priest's lips. {}``The
she-devil!''\ he muttered; {}``but she shall pay, she shall pay\mbox{---}ah,
Jad-ben-Otho; how she shall pay for the trick she has played upon
Lu-don!''\ 

He crawled through the window and climbed easily downward to the ground.
Should he pursue Ja-don and the woman, chancing an encounter with
the fierce chief, or bide his time until treachery and intrigue should
accomplish his design? He chose the latter solution, as might have
been expected of such as he.

Going to his quarters he summoned several of his priests\mbox{---}those
who were most in his confidence and who shared his ambitions for absolute
power of the temple over the palace\mbox{---}all men who hated Ko-tan.

{}``The time has come,'' he told them, {}``when the authority of
the temple must be placed definitely above that of the palace. Ko-tan
must make way for Mo-sar, for Ko-tan has defied your high priest.
Go then, Pan-sat, and summon Mo-sar secretly to the temple, and you
others go to the city and prepare the faithful warriors that they
may be in readiness when the time comes.''

For another hour they discussed the details of the coup d'etat that
was to overthrow the government of Pal-ul-don. One knew a slave who,
as the signal sounded from the temple gong, would thrust a knife into
the heart of Ko-tan, for the price of liberty. Another held personal
knowledge of an officer of the palace that he could use to compel
the latter to admit a number of Lu-don's warriors to various parts
of the palace. With Mo-sar as the cat's paw, the plan seemed scarce
possible of failure and so they separated, going upon their immediate
errands to palace and to city.

As Pan-sat entered the palace grounds he was aware of a sudden commotion
in the direction of the pal-e-don-so and a few minutes later Lu-don
was surprised to see him return to the apartments of the high priest,
breathless and excited.

{}``What now, Pan-sat?''\ cried Lu-don. {}``Are you pursued by
demons?''\ 

{}``O master, our time has come and gone while we sat here planning.
Ko-tan is already dead and Mo-sar fled. His friends are fighting with
the warriors of the palace but they have no head, while Ja-don leads
the others. I could learn but little from frightened slaves who had
fled at the outburst of the quarrel. One told me that Bu-lot had slain
the king and that he had seen Mo-sar and the assassin hurrying from
the palace.''

{}``Ja-don,'' muttered the high priest. {}``The fools will make
him king if we do not act and act quickly. Get into the city, Pan-sat\mbox{---}let
your feet fly and raise the cry that Ja-don has killed the king and
is seeking to wrest the throne from O-lo-a. Spread the word as you
know best how to spread it that Ja-don has threatened to destroy the
priests and hurl the altars of the temple into Jad-ben-lul. Rouse
the warriors of the city and urge them to attack at once. Lead them
into the temple by the secret way that only the priests know and from
here we may spew them out upon the palace before they learn the truth.
Go, Pan-sat, immediately\mbox{---}delay not an instant.''

{}``But stay,'' he called as the under priest turned to leave the
apartment; {}``saw or heard you anything of the strange white woman
that Ja-don stole from the Temple of the Gryf where we have had her
imprisoned?''\ 

{}``Only that Ja-don took her into the palace where he threatened
the priests with violence if they did not permit him to pass,'' replied
Pan-sat. {}``This they told me, but where within the palace she is
hidden I know not.''

{}``Ko-tan ordered her to the Forbidden Garden,'' said Lu-don, {}``doubtless
we shall find her there. And now, Pan-sat, be upon your errand.''

In a corridor by Lu-don's chamber a hideously masked priest leaned
close to the curtained aperture that led within. Were he listening
he must have heard all that passed between Pan-sat and the high priest,
and that he had listened was evidenced by his hasty withdrawal to
the shadows of a nearby passage as the lesser priest moved across
the chamber toward the doorway. Pan-sat went his way in ignorance
of the near presence that he almost brushed against as he hurried
toward the secret passage that leads from the temple of Jad-ben-Otho,
far beneath the palace, to the city beyond, nor did he sense the silent
creature following in his footsteps.


\chapter{The Secret Way}

\markboth{Tarzan the Terrible}{The Secret Way}

\textit{\emph{It}} \textit{\emph{was}} a baffled gryf that bellowed
in angry rage as Tarzan's sleek brown body cutting the moonlit waters
shot through the aperture in the wall of the gryf pool and out into
the lake beyond. The ape-man smiled as he thought of the comparative
ease with which he had defeated the purpose of the high priest but
his face clouded again at the ensuing remembrance of the grave danger
that threatened his mate. His sole object now must be to return as
quickly as he might to the chamber where he had last seen her on the
third floor of the Temple of the Gryf, but how he was to find his
way again into the temple grounds was a question not easy of solution.

In the moonlight he could see the sheer cliff rising from the water
for a great distance along the shore\mbox{---}far beyond the precincts
of the temple and the palace\mbox{---}towering high above him, a
seemingly impregnable barrier against his return. Swimming close in,
he skirted the wall searching diligently for some foothold, however
slight, upon its smooth, forbidding surface. Above him and quite out
of reach were numerous apertures, but there were no means at hand
by which he could reach them. Presently, however, his hopes were raised
by the sight of an opening level with the surface of the water. It
lay just ahead and a few strokes brought him to it\mbox{---}cautious
strokes that brought forth no sound from the yielding waters. At the
nearer side of the opening he stopped and reconnoitered. There was
no one in sight. Carefully he raised his body to the threshold of
the entrance-way, his smooth brown hide glistening in the moonlight
as it shed the water in tiny sparkling rivulets.

Before him stretched a gloomy corridor, unlighted save for the faint
illumination of the diffused moonlight that penetrated it for but
a short distance from the opening. Moving as rapidly as reasonable
caution warranted, Tarzan followed the corridor into the bowels of
the cave. There was an abrupt turn and then a flight of steps at the
top of which lay another corridor running parallel with the face of
the cliff. This passage was dimly lighted by flickering cressets set
in niches in the walls at considerable distances apart. A quick survey
showed the ape-man numerous openings upon each side of the corridor
and his quick ears caught sounds that indicated that there were other
beings not far distant\mbox{---}priests, he concluded, in some of
the apartments letting upon the passageway.

To pass undetected through this hive of enemies appeared quite beyond
the range of possibility. He must again seek disguise and knowing
from experience how best to secure such he crept stealthily along
the corridor toward the nearest doorway. Like Numa, the lion, stalking
a wary prey he crept with quivering nostrils to the hangings that
shut off his view from the interior of the apartment beyond. A moment
later his head disappeared within; then his shoulders, and his lithe
body, and the hangings dropped quietly into place again. A moment
later there filtered to the vacant corridor without a brief, gasping
gurgle and again silence. A minute passed; a second, and a third,
and then the hangings were thrust aside and a grimly masked priest
of the temple of Jad-ben-Otho strode into the passageway.

With bold steps he moved along and was about to turn into a diverging
gallery when his attention was aroused by voices coming from a room
upon his left. Instantly the figure halted and crossing the corridor
stood with an ear close to the skins that concealed the occupants
of the room from him, and him from them. Presently he leaped back
into the concealing shadows of the diverging gallery and immediately
thereafter the hangings by which he had been listening parted and
a priest emerged to turn quickly down the main corridor. The eavesdropper
waited until the other had gained a little distance and then stepping
from his place of concealment followed silently behind.

The way led along the corridor which ran parallel with the face of
the cliff for some little distance and then Pan-sat, taking a cresset
from one of the wall niches, turned abruptly into a small apartment
at his left. The tracker followed cautiously in time to see the rays
of the flickering light dimly visible from an aperture in the floor
before him. Here he found a series of steps, similar to those used
by the Waz-don in scaling the cliff to their caves, leading to a lower
level.

First satisfying himself that his guide was continuing upon his way
unsuspecting, the other descended after him and continued his stealthy
stalking. The passageway was now both narrow and low, giving but bare
headroom to a tall man, and it was broken often by flights of steps
leading always downward. The steps in each unit seldom numbered more
than six and sometimes there was only one or two but in the aggregate
the tracker imagined that they had descended between fifty and seventy-five
feet from the level of the upper corridor when the passageway terminated
in a small apartment at one side of which was a little pile of rubble.

Setting his cresset upon the ground, Pan-sat commenced hurriedly to
toss the bits of broken stone aside, presently revealing a small aperture
at the base of the wall upon the opposite side of which there appeared
to be a further accumulation of rubble. This he also removed until
he had a hole of sufficient size to permit the passage of his body,
and leaving the cresset still burning upon the floor the priest crawled
through the opening he had made and disappeared from the sight of
the watcher hiding in the shadows of the narrow passageway behind
him.

No sooner, however, was he safely gone than the other followed, finding
himself, after passing through the hole, on a little ledge about halfway
between the surface of the lake and the top of the cliff above. The
ledge inclined steeply upward, ending at the rear of a building which
stood upon the edge of the cliff and which the second priest entered
just in time to see Pan-sat pass out into the city beyond.

As the latter turned a nearby corner the other emerged from the doorway
and quickly surveyed his surroundings. He was satisfied the priest
who had led him hither had served his purpose in so far as the tracker
was concerned. Above him, and perhaps a hundred yards away, the white
walls of the palace gleamed against the northern sky. The time that
it had taken him to acquire definite knowledge concerning the secret
passageway between the temple and the city he did not count as lost,
though he begrudged every instant that kept him from the prosecution
of his main objective. It had seemed to him, however, necessary to
the success of a bold plan that he had formulated upon overhearing
the conversation between Lu-don and Pan-sat as he stood without the
hangings of the apartment of the high priest.

Alone against a nation of suspicious and half-savage enemies he could
scarce hope for a successful outcome to the one great issue upon which
hung the life and happiness of the creature he loved best. For her
sake he must win allies and it was for this purpose that he had sacrificed
these precious moments, but now he lost no further time in seeking
to regain entrance to the palace grounds that he might search out
whatever new prison they had found in which to incarcerate his lost
love.

He found no difficulty in passing the guards at the entrance to the
palace for, as he had guessed, his priestly disguise disarmed all
suspicion. As he approached the warriors he kept his hands behind
him and trusted to fate that the sickly light of the single torch
which stood beside the doorway would not reveal his un-Pal-ul-donian
feet. As a matter of fact so accustomed were they to the comings and
goings of the priesthood that they paid scant attention to him and
he passed on into the palace grounds without even a moment's delay.

His goal now was the Forbidden Garden and this he had little difficulty
in reaching though he elected to enter it over the wall rather than
to chance arousing any suspicion on the part of the guards at the
inner entrance, since he could imagine no reason why a priest should
seek entrance there thus late at night.

He found the garden deserted, nor any sign of her he sought. That
she had been brought hither he had learned from the conversation he
had overheard between Lu-don and Pan-sat, and he was sure that there
had been no time or opportunity for the high priest to remove her
from the palace grounds. The garden he knew to be devoted exclusively
to the uses of the princess and her women and it was only reasonable
to assume therefore that if Jane had been brought to the garden it
could only have been upon an order from Ko-tan. This being the case
the natural assumption would follow that he would find her in some
other portion of O-lo-a's quarters.

Just where these lay he could only conjecture, but it seemed reasonable
to believe that they must be adjacent to the garden, so once more
he scaled the wall and passing around its end directed his steps toward
an entrance-way which he judged must lead to that portion of the palace
nearest the Forbidden Garden.

To his surprise he found the place unguarded and then there fell upon
his ear from an interior apartment the sound of voices raised in anger
and excitement. Guided by the sound he quickly traversed several corridors
and chambers until he stood before the hangings which separated him
from the chamber from which issued the sounds of altercation. Raising
the skins slightly he looked within. There were two women battling
with a Ho-don warrior. One was the daughter of Ko-tan and the other
Pan-at-lee, the Kor-ul-ja.

At the moment that Tarzan lifted the hangings, the warrior threw O-lo-a
viciously to the ground and seizing Pan-at-lee by the hair drew his
knife and raised it above her head. Casting the encumbering headdress
of the dead priest from his shoulders the ape-man leaped across the
intervening space and seizing the brute from behind struck him a single
terrible blow.

As the man fell forward dead, the two women recognized Tarzan simultaneously.
Pan-at-lee fell upon her knees and would have bowed her head upon
his feet had he not, with an impatient gesture, commanded her to rise.
He had no time to listen to their protestations of gratitude or answer
the numerous questions which he knew would soon be flowing from those
two feminine tongues.

{}``Tell me,'' he cried, {}``where is the woman of my own race
whom Ja-don brought here from the temple?''\ 

{}``She is but this moment gone,'' cried O-lo-a. {}``Mo-sar, the
father of this thing here,'' and she indicated the body of Bu-lot
with a scornful finger, {}``seized her and carried her away.''

{}``Which way?''\ he cried. {}``Tell me quickly, in what direction
he took her.''

{}``That way,'' cried Pan-at-lee, pointing to the doorway through
which Mo-sar had passed. {}``They would have taken the princess and
the stranger woman to Tu-lur, Mo-sar's city by the Dark Lake.''

{}``I go to find her,'' he said to Pan-at-lee, {}``she is my mate.
And if I survive I shall find means to liberate you too and return
you to Om-at.''

Before the girl could reply he had disappeared behind the hangings
of the door near the foot of the dais. The corridor through which
he ran was illy lighted and like nearly all its kind in the Ho-don
city wound in and out and up and down, but at last it terminated at
a sudden turn which brought him into a courtyard filled with warriors,
a portion of the palace guard that had just been summoned by one of
the lesser palace chiefs to join the warriors of Ko-tan in the battle
that was raging in the banquet hall.

At sight of Tarzan, who in his haste had forgotten to recover his
disguising headdress, a great shout arose. {}``Blasphemer!''\ {}{}``Defiler
of the temple!''\ burst hoarsely from savage throats, and mingling
with these were a few who cried, {}``Dor-ul-Otho!''\ evidencing
the fact that there were among them still some who clung to their
belief in his divinity.

To cross the courtyard armed only with a knife, in the face of this
great throng of savage fighting men seemed even to the giant ape-man
a thing impossible of achievement. He must use his wits now and quickly
too, for they were closing upon him. He might have turned and fled
back through the corridor but flight now even in the face of dire
necessity would but delay him in his pursuit of Mo-sar and his mate.

{}``Stop!''\ he cried, raising his palm against them. {}``I am
the Dor-ul-Otho and I come to you with a word from Ja-don, who it
is my father's will shall be your king now that Ko-tan is slain. Lu-don,
the high priest, has planned to seize the palace and destroy the loyal
warriors that Mo-sar may be made king\mbox{---}Mo-sar who will be
the tool and creature of Lu-don. Follow me. There is no time to lose
if you would prevent the traitors whom Lu-don has organized in the
city from entering the palace by a secret way and overpowering Ja-don
and the faithful band within.''

For a moment they hesitated. At last one spoke. {}``What guarantee
have we,'' he demanded, {}``that it is not you who would betray
us and by leading us now away from the fighting in the banquet hall
cause those who fight at Ja-don's side to be defeated?''\ 

{}``My life will be your guarantee,'' replied Tarzan. {}``If you
find that I have not spoken the truth you are sufficient in numbers
to execute whatever penalty you choose. But come, there is not time
to lose. Already are the lesser priests gathering their warriors in
the city below,'' and without waiting for any further parley he strode
directly toward them in the direction of the gate upon the opposite
side of the courtyard which led toward the principal entrance to the
palace ground.

Slower in wit than he, they were swept away by his greater initiative
and that compelling power which is inherent to all natural leaders.
And so they followed him, the giant ape-man with a dead tail dragging
the ground behind him\mbox{---}a demi-god where another would have
been ridiculous. Out into the city he led them and down toward the
unpretentious building that hid Lu-don's secret passageway from the
city to the temple, and as they rounded the last turn they saw before
them a gathering of warriors which was being rapidly augmented from
all directions as the traitors of A-lur mobilized at the call of the
priesthood.

{}``You spoke the truth, stranger,'' said the chief who marched
at Tarzan's side, {}``for there are the warriors with the priests
among them, even as you told us.''

{}``And now,'' replied the ape-man, {}``that I have fulfilled my
promise I will go my way after Mo-sar, who has done me a great wrong.
Tell Ja-don that Jad-ben-Otho is upon his side, nor do you forget
to tell him also that it was the Dor-ul-Otho who thwarted Lu-don's
plan to seize the palace.''

{}``I will not forget,'' replied the chief. {}``Go your way. We
are enough to overpower the traitors.''

{}``Tell me,'' asked Tarzan, {}``how I may know this city of Tu-lur?''\ 

{}``It lies upon the south shore of the second lake below A-lur,''
replied the chief, {}``the lake that is called Jad-in-lul.''

They were now approaching the band of traitors, who evidently thought
that this was another contingent of their own party since they made
no effort either toward defense or retreat. Suddenly the chief raised
his voice in a savage war cry that was immediately taken up by his
followers, and simultaneously, as though the cry were a command, the
entire party broke into a mad charge upon the surprised rebels.

Satisfied with the outcome of his suddenly conceived plan and sure
that it would work to the disadvantage of Lu-don, Tarzan turned into
a side street and pointed his steps toward the outskirts of the city
in search of the trail that led southward toward Tu-lur.


\chapter{By Jad-bal-lul}

\markboth{Tarzan the Terrible}{By Jad-bal-lul}

\textit{\emph{As}} \textit{\emph{Mo}}\emph{-}\textit{\emph{sar}} carried
Jane Clayton from the palace of Ko-tan, the king, the woman struggled
incessantly to regain her freedom. He tried to compel her to walk,
but despite his threats and his abuse she would not voluntarily take
a single step in the direction in which he wished her to go. Instead
she threw herself to the ground each time he sought to place her upon
her feet, and so of necessity he was compelled to carry her though
at last he tied her hands and gagged her to save himself from further
lacerations, for the beauty and slenderness of the woman belied her
strength and courage. When he came at last to where his men had gathered
he was glad indeed to turn her over to a couple of stalwart warriors,
but these too were forced to carry her since Mo-sar's fear of the
vengeance of Ko-tan's retainers would brook no delays.

And thus they came down out of the hills from which A-lur is carved,
to the meadows that skirt the lower end of Jad-ben-lul, with Jane
Clayton carried between two of Mo-sar's men. At the edge of the lake
lay a fleet of strong canoes, hollowed from the trunks of trees, their
bows and sterns carved in the semblance of grotesque beasts or birds
and vividly colored by some master in that primitive school of art,
which fortunately is not without its devotees today.

Into the stern of one of these canoes the warriors tossed their captive
at a sign from Mo-sar, who came and stood beside her as the warriors
were finding their places in the canoes and selecting their paddles.

{}``Come, Beautiful One,'' he said, {}``let us be friends and you
shall not be harmed. You will find Mo-sar a kind master if you do
his bidding,'' and thinking to make a good impression on her he removed
the gag from her mouth and the thongs from her wrists, knowing well
that she could not escape surrounded as she was by his warriors, and
presently, when they were out on the lake, she would be as safely
imprisoned as though he held her behind bars.

And so the fleet moved off to the accompaniment of the gentle splashing
of a hundred paddles, to follow the windings of the rivers and lakes
through which the waters of the Valley of Jad-ben-Otho empty into
the great morass to the south. The warriors, resting upon one knee,
faced the bow and in the last canoe Mo-sar tiring of his fruitless
attempts to win responses from his sullen captive, squatted in the
bottom of the canoe with his back toward her and resting his head
upon the gunwale sought sleep.

Thus they moved in silence between the verdure-clad banks of the little
river through which the waters of Jad-ben-lul emptied\mbox{---}now
in the moonlight, now in dense shadow where great trees overhung the
stream, and at last out upon the waters of another lake, the black
shores of which seemed far away under the weird influence of a moonlight
night.

Jane Clayton sat alert in the stern of the last canoe. For months
she had been under constant surveillance, the prisoner first of one
ruthless race and now the prisoner of another. Since the long-gone
day that Hauptmann Fritz Schneider and his band of native German troops
had treacherously wrought the Kaiser's work of rapine and destruction
on the Greystoke bungalow and carried her away to captivity she had
not drawn a free breath. That she had survived unharmed the countless
dangers through which she had passed she attributed solely to the
beneficence of a kind and watchful Providence.

At first she had been held on the orders of the German High Command
with a view of her ultimate value as a hostage and during these months
she had been subjected to neither hardship nor oppression, but when
the Germans had become hard pressed toward the close of their unsuccessful
campaign in East Africa it had been determined to take her further
into the interior and now there was an element of revenge in their
motives, since it must have been apparent that she could no longer
be of any possible military value.

Bitter indeed were the Germans against that half-savage mate of hers
who had cunningly annoyed and harassed them with a fiendishness of
persistence and ingenuity that had resulted in a noticeable loss in
morale in the sector he had chosen for his operations. They had to
charge against him the lives of certain officers that he had deliberately
taken with his own hands, and one entire section of trench that had
made possible a disastrous turning movement by the British. Tarzan
had out-generaled them at every point. He had met cunning with cunning
and cruelty with cruelties until they feared and loathed his very
name. The cunning trick that they had played upon him in destroying
his home, murdering his retainers, and covering the abduction of his
wife in such a way as to lead him to believe that she had been killed,
they had regretted a thousand times, for a thousandfold had they paid
the price for their senseless ruthlessness, and now, unable to wreak
their vengeance directly upon him, they had conceived the idea of
inflicting further suffering upon his mate.

In sending her into the interior to avoid the path of the victorious
British, they had chosen as her escort Lieutenant Erich Obergatz who
had been second in command of Schneider's company, and who alone of
its officers had escaped the consuming vengeance of the ape-man. For
a long time Obergatz had held her in a native village, the chief of
which was still under the domination of his fear of the ruthless German
oppressors. While here only hardships and discomforts assailed her,
Obergatz himself being held in leash by the orders of his distant
superior but as time went on the life in the village grew to be a
veritable hell of cruelties and oppressions practiced by the arrogant
Prussian upon the villagers and the members of his native command\mbox{---}for
time hung heavily upon the hands of the lieutenant and with idleness
combining with the personal discomforts he was compelled to endure,
his none too agreeable temper found an outlet first in petty interference
with the chiefs and later in the practice of absolute cruelties upon
them.

What the self-sufficient German could not see was plain to Jane Clayton\mbox{---}that
the sympathies of Obergatz' native soldiers lay with the villagers
and that all were so heartily sickened by his abuse that it needed
now but the slightest spark to detonate the mine of revenge and hatred
that the pig-headed Hun had been assiduously fabricating beneath his
own person.

And at last it came, but from an unexpected source in the form of
a German native deserter from the theater of war. Footsore, weary,
and spent, he dragged himself into the village late one afternoon,
and before Obergatz was even aware of his presence the whole village
knew that the power of Germany in Africa was at an end. It did not
take long for the lieutenant's native soldiers to realize that the
authority that held them in service no longer existed and that with
it had gone the power to pay them their miserable wage. Or at least,
so they reasoned. To them Obergatz no longer represented aught else
than a powerless and hated foreigner, and short indeed would have
been his shrift had not a native woman who had conceived a doglike
affection for Jane Clayton hurried to her with word of the murderous
plan, for the fate of the innocent white woman lay in the balance
beside that of the guilty Teuton.

{}``Already they are quarreling as to which one shall possess you,''
she told Jane.

{}``When will they come for us?''\ asked Jane. {}``Did you hear
them say?''\ 

{}``Tonight,'' replied the woman, {}``for even now that he has
none to fight for him they still fear the white man. And so they will
come at night and kill him while he sleeps.''

Jane thanked the woman and sent her away lest the suspicion of her
fellows be aroused against her when they discovered that the two whites
had learned of their intentions. The woman went at once to the hut
occupied by Obergatz. She had never gone there before and the German
looked up in surprise as he saw who his visitor was.

Briefly she told him what she had heard. At first he was inclined
to bluster arrogantly, with a great display of bravado but she silenced
him peremptorily.

{}``Such talk is useless,'' she said shortly. {}``You have brought
upon yourself the just hatred of these people. Regardless of the truth
or falsity of the report which has been brought to them, they believe
in it and there is nothing now between you and your Maker other than
flight. We shall both be dead before morning if we are unable to escape
from the village unseen. If you go to them now with your silly protestations
of authority you will be dead a little sooner, that is all.''

{}``You think it is as bad as that?''\ he said, a noticeable alteration
in his tone and manner.

{}``It is precisely as I have told you,'' she replied. {}``They
will come tonight and kill you while you sleep. Find me pistols and
a rifle and ammunition and we will pretend that we go into the jungle
to hunt. That you have done often. Perhaps it will arouse suspicion
that I accompany you but that we must chance. And be sure my dear
Herr Lieutenant to bluster and curse and abuse your servants unless
they note a change in your manner and realizing your fear know that
you suspect their intention. If all goes well then we can go out into
the jungle to hunt and we need not return.

{}``But first and now you must swear never to harm me, or otherwise
it would be better that I called the chief and turned you over to
him and then put a bullet into my own head, for unless you swear as
I have asked I were no better alone in the jungle with you than here
at the mercies of these degraded blacks.''

{}``I swear,'' he replied solemnly, {}``in the names of my God
and my Kaiser that no harm shall befall you at my hands, Lady Greystoke.''

{}``Very well,'' she said, {}``we will make this pact to assist
each other to return to civilization, but let it be understood that
there is and never can be any semblance even of respect for you upon
my part. I am drowning and you are the straw. Carry that always in
your mind, German.''

If Obergatz had held any doubt as to the sincerity of her word it
would have been wholly dissipated by the scathing contempt of her
tone. And so Obergatz, without further parley, got pistols and an
extra rifle for Jane, as well as bandoleers of cartridges. In his
usual arrogant and disagreeable manner he called his servants, telling
them that he and the white kali were going out into the brush to hunt.
The beaters would go north as far as the little hill and then circle
back to the east and in toward the village. The gun carriers he directed
to take the extra pieces and precede himself and Jane slowly toward
the east, waiting for them at the ford about half a mile distant.
The blacks responded with greater alacrity than usual and it was noticeable
to both Jane and Obergatz that they left the village whispering and
laughing.

{}``The swine think it is a great joke,'' growled Obergatz, {}``that
the afternoon before I die I go out and hunt meat for them.''

As soon as the gun bearers disappeared in the jungle beyond the village
the two Europeans followed along the same trail, nor was there any
attempt upon the part of Obergatz' native soldiers, or the warriors
of the chief to detain them, for they too doubtless were more than
willing that the whites should bring them in one more mess of meat
before they killed them.

A quarter of a mile from the village, Obergatz turned toward the south
from the trail that led to the ford and hurrying onward the two put
as great a distance as possible between them and the village before
night fell. They knew from the habits of their erstwhile hosts that
there was little danger of pursuit by night since the villagers held
Numa, the lion, in too great respect to venture needlessly beyond
their stockade during the hours that the king of beasts was prone
to choose for hunting.

And thus began a seemingly endless sequence of frightful days and
horror-laden nights as the two fought their way toward the south in
the face of almost inconceivable hardships, privations, and dangers.
The east coast was nearer but Obergatz positively refused to chance
throwing himself into the hands of the British by returning to the
territory which they now controlled, insisting instead upon attempting
to make his way through an unknown wilderness to South Africa where,
among the Boers, he was convinced he would find willing sympathizers
who would find some way to return him in safety to Germany, and the
woman was perforce compelled to accompany him.

And so they had crossed the great thorny, waterless steppe and come
at last to the edge of the morass before Pal-ul-don. They had reached
this point just before the rainy season when the waters of the morass
were at their lowest ebb. At this time a hard crust is baked upon
the dried surface of the marsh and there is only the open water at
the center to materially impede progress. It is a condition that exists
perhaps not more than a few weeks, or even days at the termination
of long periods of drought, and so the two crossed the otherwise almost
impassable barrier without realizing its latent terrors. Even the
open water in the center chanced to be deserted at the time by its
frightful denizens which the drought and the receding waters had driven
southward toward the mouth of Pal-ul-don's largest river which carries
the waters out of the Valley of Jad-ben-Otho.

Their wanderings carried them across the mountains and into the Valley
of Jad-ben-Otho at the source of one of the larger streams which bears
the mountain waters down into the valley to empty them into the main
river just below The Great Lake on whose northern shore lies A-lur.
As they had come down out of the mountains they had been surprised
by a party of Ho-don hunters. Obergatz had escaped while Jane had
been taken prisoner and brought to A-lur. She had neither seen nor
heard aught of the German since that time and she did not know whether
he had perished in this strange land, or succeeded in successfully
eluding its savage denizens and making his way at last into South
Africa.

For her part, she had been incarcerated alternately in the palace
and the temple as either Ko-tan or Lu-don succeeded in wresting her
temporarily from the other by various strokes of cunning and intrigue.
And now at last she was in the power of a new captor, one whom she
knew from the gossip of the temple and the palace to be cruel and
degraded. And she was in the stern of the last canoe, and every enemy
back was toward her, while almost at her feet Mo-sar's loud snores
gave ample evidence of his unconsciousness to his immediate surroundings.

The dark shore loomed closer to the south as Jane Clayton, Lady Greystoke,
slid quietly over the stern of the canoe into the chill waters of
the lake. She scarcely moved other than to keep her nostrils above
the surface while the canoe was yet discernible in the last rays of
the declining moon. Then she struck out toward the southern shore.

Alone, unarmed, all but naked, in a country overrun by savage beasts
and hostile men, she yet felt for the first time in many months a
sensation of elation and relief. She was free! What if the next moment
brought death, she knew again, at least a brief instant of absolute
freedom. Her blood tingled to the almost forgotten sensation and it
was with difficulty that she restrained a glad triumphant cry as she
clambered from the quiet waters and stood upon the silent beach.

Before her loomed a forest, darkly, and from its depths came those
nameless sounds that are a part of the night life of the jungle\mbox{---}the
rustling of leaves in the wind, the rubbing together of contiguous
branches, the scurrying of a rodent, all magnified by the darkness
to sinister and awe-inspiring proportions; the hoot of an owl, the
distant scream of a great cat, the barking of wild dogs, attested
the presence of the myriad life she could not see\mbox{---}the savage
life, the free life of which she was now a part. And then there came
to her, possibly for the first time since the giant ape-man had come
into her life, a fuller realization of what the jungle meant to him,
for though alone and unprotected from its hideous dangers she yet
felt its lure upon her and an exaltation that she had not dared hope
to feel again.

Ah, if that mighty mate of hers were but by her side! What utter joy
and bliss would be hers! She longed for no more than this. The parade
of cities, the comforts and luxuries of civilization held forth no
allure half as insistent as the glorious freedom of the jungle.

A lion moaned in the blackness to her right, eliciting delicious thrills
that crept along her spine. The hair at the back of her head seemed
to stand erect\mbox{---}yet she was unafraid. The muscles bequeathed
her by some primordial ancestor reacted instinctively to the presence
of an ancient enemy\mbox{---}that was all. The woman moved slowly
and deliberately toward the wood. Again the lion moaned; this time
nearer. She sought a low-hanging branch and finding it swung easily
into the friendly shelter of the tree. The long and perilous journey
with Obergatz had trained her muscles and her nerves to such unaccustomed
habits. She found a safe resting place such as Tarzan had taught her
was best and there she curled herself, thirty feet above the ground,
for a night's rest. She was cold and uncomfortable and yet she slept,
for her heart was warm with renewed hope and her tired brain had found
temporary surcease from worry.

She slept until the heat of the sun, high in the heavens, awakened
her. She was rested and now her body was well as her heart was warm.
A sensation of ease and comfort and happiness pervaded her being.
She rose upon her gently swaying couch and stretched luxuriously,
her naked limbs and lithe body mottled by the sunlight filtering through
the foliage above combined with the lazy gesture to impart to her
appearance something of the leopard. With careful eye she scrutinized
the ground below and with attentive ear she listened for any warning
sound that might suggest the near presence of enemies, either man
or beast. Satisfied at last that there was nothing close of which
she need have fear she clambered to the ground. She wished to bathe
but the lake was too exposed and just a bit too far from the safety
of the trees for her to risk it until she became more familiar with
her surroundings. She wandered aimlessly through the forest searching
for food which she found in abundance. She ate and rested, for she
had no objective as yet. Her freedom was too new to be spoiled by
plannings for the future. The haunts of civilized man seemed to her
now as vague and unattainable as the half-forgotten substance of a
dream. If she could but live on here in peace, waiting, waiting for\mbox{---}him.
It was the old hope revived. She knew that he would come some day,
if he lived. She had always known that, though recently she had believed
that he would come too late. If he lived! Yes, he would come if he
lived, and if he did not live she were as well off here as elsewhere,
for then nothing mattered, only to wait for the end as patiently as
might be.

Her wanderings brought her to a crystal brook and there she drank
and bathed beneath an overhanging tree that offered her quick asylum
in the event of danger. It was a quiet and beautiful spot and she
loved it from the first. The bottom of the brook was paved with pretty
stones and bits of glassy obsidian. As she gathered a handful of the
pebbles and held them up to look at them she noticed that one of her
fingers was bleeding from a clean, straight cut. She fell to searching
for the cause and presently discovered it in one of the fragments
of volcanic glass which revealed an edge that was almost razor-like.
Jane Clayton was elated. Here, God-given to her hands, was the first
beginning with which she might eventually arrive at both weapons and
tools\mbox{---}a cutting edge. Everything was possible to him who
possessed it\mbox{---}nothing without.

She sought until she had collected many of the precious bits of stone\mbox{---}until
the pouch that hung at her right side was almost filled. Then she
climbed into the great tree to examine them at leisure. There were
some that looked like knife blades, and some that could easily be
fashioned into spear heads, and many smaller ones that nature seemed
to have intended for the tips of savage arrows.

The spear she would essay first\mbox{---}that would be easiest.
There was a hollow in the bole of the tree in a great crotch high
above the ground. Here she cached all of her treasure except a single
knifelike sliver. With this she descended to the ground and searching
out a slender sapling that grew arrow-straight she hacked and sawed
until she could break it off without splitting the wood. It was just
the right diameter for the shaft of a spear\mbox{---}a hunting spear
such as her beloved Waziri had liked best. How often had she watched
them fashioning them, and they had taught her how to use them, too\mbox{---}them
and the heavy war spears\mbox{---}laughing and clapping their hands
as her proficiency increased.

She knew the arborescent grasses that yielded the longest and toughest
fibers and these she sought and carried to her tree with the spear
shaft that was to be. Clambering to her crotch she bent to her work,
humming softly a little tune. She caught herself and smiled\mbox{---}it
was the first time in all these bitter months that song had passed
her lips or such a smile.

{}``I feel,'' she sighed, {}``I almost feel that John is near\mbox{---}my
John\mbox{---}my Tarzan!''\ 

She cut the spear shaft to the proper length and removed the twigs
and branches and the bark, whittling and scraping at the nubs until
the surface was all smooth and straight. Then she split one end and
inserted a spear point, shaping the wood until it fitted perfectly.
This done she laid the shaft aside and fell to splitting the thick
grass stems and pounding and twisting them until she had separated
and partially cleaned the fibers. These she took down to the brook
and washed and brought back again and wound tightly around the cleft
end of the shaft, which she had notched to receive them, and the upper
part of the spear head which she had also notched slightly with a
bit of stone. It was a crude spear but the best that she could attain
in so short a time. Later, she promised herself, she should have others\mbox{---}many
of them\mbox{---}and they would be spears of which even the greatest
of the Waziri spear-men might be proud.


\chapter{The Lion Pit of Tu-lur}

\markboth{Tarzan the Terrible}{The Lion Pit of Tu-lur}

\textit{\emph{Though}} Tarzan searched the outskirts of the city until
nearly dawn he discovered nowhere the spoor of his mate. The breeze
coming down from the mountains brought to his nostrils a diversity
of scents but there was not among them the slightest suggestion of
her whom he sought. The natural deduction was therefore that she had
been taken in some other direction. In his search he had many times
crossed the fresh tracks of many men leading toward the lake and these
he concluded had probably been made by Jane Clayton's abductors. It
had only been to minimize the chance of error by the process of elimination
that he had carefully reconnoitered every other avenue leading from
A-lur toward the southeast where lay Mo-sar's city of Tu-lur, and
now he followed the trail to the shores of Jad-ben-lul where the party
had embarked upon the quiet waters in their sturdy canoes.

He found many other craft of the same description moored along the
shore and one of these he commandeered for the purpose of pursuit.
It was daylight when he passed through the lake which lies next below
Jad-ben-lul and paddling strongly passed within sight of the very
tree in which his lost mate lay sleeping.

Had the gentle wind that caressed the bosom of the lake been blowing
from a southerly direction the giant ape-man and Jane Clayton would
have been reunited then, but an unkind fate had willed otherwise and
the opportunity passed with the passing of his canoe which presently
his powerful strokes carried out of sight into the stream at the lower
end of the lake.

Following the winding river which bore a considerable distance to
the north before doubling back to empty into the Jad-in-lul, the ape-man
missed a portage that would have saved him hours of paddling.

It was at the upper end of this portage where Mo-sar and his warriors
had debarked that the chief discovered the absence of his captive.
As Mo-sar had been asleep since shortly after their departure from
A-lur, and as none of the warriors recalled when she had last been
seen, it was impossible to conjecture with any degree of accuracy
the place where she had escaped. The consensus of opinion was, however,
that it had been in the narrow river connecting Jad-ben-lul with the
lake next below it, which is called Jad-bal-lul, which freely translated
means the lake of gold. Mo-sar had been very wroth and having himself
been the only one at fault he naturally sought with great diligence
to fix the blame upon another.

He would have returned in search of her had he not feared to meet
a pursuing company dispatched either by Ja-don or the high priest,
both of whom, he knew, had just grievances against him. He would not
even spare a boatload of his warriors from his own protection to return
in quest of the fugitive but hastened onward with as little delay
as possible across the portage and out upon the waters of Jad-in-lul.

The morning sun was just touching the white domes of Tu-lur when Mo-sar's
paddlers brought their canoes against the shore at the city's edge.
Safe once more behind his own walls and protected by many warriors,
the courage of the chief returned sufficiently at least to permit
him to dispatch three canoes in search of Jane Clayton, and also to
go as far as A-lur if possible to learn what had delayed Bu-lot, whose
failure to reach the canoes with the balance of the party at the time
of the flight from the northern city had in no way delayed Mo-sar's
departure, his own safety being of far greater moment than that of
his son.

As the three canoes reached the portage on their return journey the
warriors who were dragging them from the water were suddenly startled
by the appearance of two priests, carrying a light canoe in the direction
of Jad-in-lul. At first they thought them the advance guard of a larger
force of Lu-don's followers, although the correctness of such a theory
was belied by their knowledge that priests never accepted the risks
or perils of a warrior's vocation, nor even fought until driven into
a corner and forced to do so. Secretly the warriors of Pal-ul-don
held the emasculated priesthood in contempt and so instead of immediately
taking up the offensive as they would have had the two men been warriors
from A-lur instead of priests, they waited to question them.

At sight of the warriors the priests made the sign of peace and upon
being asked if they were alone they answered in the affirmative.

The leader of Mo-sar's warriors permitted them to approach. {}``What
do you here,'' he asked, {}``in the country of Mo-sar, so far from
your own city?''\ 

{}``We carry a message from Lu-don, the high priest, to Mo-sar,''
explained one.

{}``Is it a message of peace or of war?''\ asked the warrior.

{}``It is an offer of peace,'' replied the priest.

{}``And Lu-don is sending no warriors behind you?''\ queried the
fighting man.

{}``We are alone,'' the priest assured him. {}``None in A-lur save
Lu-don knows that we have come upon this errand.''

{}``Then go your way,'' said the warrior.

{}``Who is that?''\ asked one of the priests suddenly, pointing
toward the upper end of the lake at the point where the river from
Jad-bal-lul entered it.

All eyes turned in the direction that he had indicated to see a lone
warrior paddling rapidly into Jad-in-lul, the prow of his canoe pointing
toward Tu-lur. The warriors and the priests drew into the concealment
of the bushes on either side of the portage.

{}``It is the terrible man who called himself the Dor-ul-Otho,''
whispered one of the priests. {}``I would know that figure among
a great multitude as far as I could see it.''

{}``You are right, priest,'' cried one of the warriors who had seen
Tarzan the day that he had first entered Ko-tan's palace. {}``It
is indeed he who has been rightly called Tarzan-jad-guru.''

{}``Hasten priests,'' cried the leader of the party. {}``You are
two paddles in a light canoe. Easily can you reach Tu-lur ahead of
him and warn Mo-sar of his coming, for he has but only entered the
lake.''

For a moment the priests demurred for they had no stomach for an encounter
with this terrible man, but the warrior insisted and even went so
far as to threaten them. Their canoe was taken from them and pushed
into the lake and they were all but lifted bodily from their feet
and put aboard it. Still protesting they were shoved out upon the
water where they were immediately in full view of the lone paddler
above them. Now there was no alternative. The city of Tu-lur offered
the only safety and bending to their paddles the two priests sent
their craft swiftly in the direction of the city.

The warriors withdrew again to the concealment of the foliage. If
Tarzan had seen them and should come hither to investigate there were
thirty of them against one and naturally they had no fear of the outcome,
but they did not consider it necessary to go out upon the lake to
meet him since they had been sent to look for the escaped prisoner
and not to intercept the strange warrior, the stories of whose ferocity
and prowess doubtless helped them to arrive at their decision to provoke
no uncalled-for quarrel with him.

If he had seen them he gave no sign, but continued paddling steadily
and strongly toward the city, nor did he increase his speed as the
two priests shot out in full view. The moment the priests' canoe touched
the shore by the city its occupants leaped out and hurried swiftly
toward the palace gate, casting affrighted glances behind them. They
sought immediate audience with Mo-sar, after warning the warriors
on guard that Tarzan was approaching.

They were conducted at once to the chief, whose court was a smaller
replica of that of the king of A-lur. {}``We come from Lu-don, the
high priest,'' explained the spokesman. {}``He wishes the friendship
of Mo-sar, who has always been his friend. Ja-don is gathering warriors
to make himself king. Throughout the villages of the Ho-don are thousands
who will obey the commands of Lu-don, the high priest. Only with Lu-don's
assistance can Mo-sar become king, and the message from Lu-don is
that if Mo-sar would retain the friendship of Lu-don he must return
immediately the woman he took from the quarters of the Princess O-lo-a.''

At this juncture a warrior entered. His excitement was evident. {}``The
Dor-ul-Otho has come to Tu-lur and demands to see Mo-sar at once,''
he said.

{}``The Dor-ul-Otho!''\ exclaimed Mo-sar.

{}``That is the message he sent,'' replied the warrior, {}``and
indeed he is not as are the people of Pal-ul-don. He is, we think,
the same of whom the warriors that returned from A-lur today told
us and whom some call Tarzan-jad-guru and some Dor-ul-Otho. But indeed
only the son of god would dare come thus alone to a strange city,
so it must be that he speaks the truth.''

Mo-sar, his heart filled with terror and indecision, turned questioningly
toward the priests.

{}``Receive him graciously, Mo-sar,'' counseled he who had spoken
before, his advice prompted by the petty shrewdness of his defective
brain which, under the added influence of Lu-don's tutorage leaned
always toward duplicity. {}``Receive him graciously and when he is
quite convinced of your friendship he will be off his guard, and then
you may do with him as you will. But if possible, Mo-sar, and you
would win the undying gratitude of Lu-don, the high-priest, save him
alive for my master.''

Mo-sar nodded understandingly and turning to the warrior commanded
that he conduct the visitor to him.

{}``We must not be seen by the creature,'' said one of the priests.
{}``Give us your answer to Lu-don, Mo-sar, and we will go our way.''

{}``Tell Lu-don,'' replied the chief, {}``that the woman would
have been lost to him entirely had it not been for me. I sought to
bring her to Tu-lur that I might save her for him from the clutches
of Ja-don, but during the night she escaped. Tell Lu-don that I have
sent thirty warriors to search for her. It is strange you did not
see them as you came.''

{}``We did,'' replied the priests, {}``but they told us nothing
of the purpose of their journey.''

{}``It is as I have told you,'' said Mo-sar, {}``and if they find
her, assure your master that she will be kept unharmed in Tu-lur for
him. Also tell him that I will send my warriors to join with his against
Ja-don whenever he sends word that he wants them. Now go, for Tarzan-jad-guru
will soon be here.''

He signaled to a slave. {}``Lead the priests to the temple,'' he
commanded, {}``and ask the high priest of Tu-lur to see that they
are fed and permitted to return to A-lur when they will.''

The two priests were conducted from the apartment by the slave through
a doorway other than that at which they had entered, and a moment
later Tarzan-jad-guru strode into the presence of Mo-sar, ahead of
the warrior whose duty it had been to conduct and announce him. The
ape-man made no sign of greeting or of peace but strode directly toward
the chief who, only by the exertion of his utmost powers of will,
hid the terror that was in his heart at sight of the giant figure
and the scowling face.

{}``I am the Dor-ul-Otho,'' said the ape-man in level tones that
carried to the mind of Mo-sar a suggestion of cold steel; {}``I am
Dor-ul-Otho, and I come to Tu-lur for the woman you stole from the
apartments of O-lo-a, the princess.''

The very boldness of Tarzan's entry into this hostile city had had
the effect of giving him a great moral advantage over Mo-sar and the
savage warriors who stood upon either side of the chief. Truly it
seemed to them that no other than the son of Jad-ben-Otho would dare
so heroic an act. Would any mortal warrior act thus boldly, and alone
enter the presence of a powerful chief and, in the midst of a score
of warriors, arrogantly demand an accounting? No, it was beyond reason.
Mo-sar was faltering in his decision to betray the stranger by seeming
friendliness. He even paled to a sudden thought\mbox{---}Jad-ben-Otho
knew everything, even our inmost thoughts. Was it not therefore possible
that this creature, if after all it should prove true that he was
the Dor-ul-Otho, might even now be reading the wicked design that
the priests had implanted in the brain of Mo-sar and which he had
entertained so favorably? The chief squirmed and fidgeted upon the
bench of hewn rock that was his throne.

{}``Quick,'' snapped the ape-man, {}``Where is she?''\ 

{}``She is not here,'' cried Mo-sar.

{}``You lie,'' replied Tarzan.

{}``As Jad-ben-Otho is my witness, she is not in Tu-lur,'' insisted
the chief. {}``You may search the palace and the temple and the entire
city but you will not find her, for she is not here.''

{}``Where is she, then?''\ demanded the ape-man. {}``You took
her from the palace at A-lur. If she is not here, where is she? Tell
me not that harm has befallen her,'' and he took a sudden threatening
step toward Mo-sar, that sent the chief shrinking back in terror.

{}``Wait,'' he cried, {}``if you are indeed the Dor-ul-Otho you
will know that I speak the truth. I took her from the palace of Ko-tan
to save her for Lu-don, the high priest, lest with Ko-tan dead Ja-don
seize her. But during the night she escaped from me between here and
A-lur, and I have but just sent three canoes full-manned in search
of her.''

Something in the chief's tone and manner assured the ape-man that
he spoke in part the truth, and that once again he had braved incalculable
dangers and suffered loss of time futilely.

{}``What wanted the priests of Lu-don that preceded me here?''\ demanded
Tarzan chancing a shrewd guess that the two he had seen paddling so
frantically to avoid a meeting with him had indeed come from the high
priest at A-lur.

{}``They came upon an errand similar to yours,'' replied Mo-sar;
{}``to demand the return of the woman whom Lu-don thought I had stolen
from him, thus wronging me as deeply, O Dor-ul-Otho, as have you.''

{}``I would question the priests,'' said Tarzan. {}``Bring them
hither.'' His peremptory and arrogant manner left Mo-sar in doubt
as to whether to be more incensed, or terrified, but ever as is the
way with such as he, he concluded that the first consideration was
his own safety. If he could transfer the attention and the wrath of
this terrible man from himself to Lu-don's priests it would more than
satisfy him and if they should conspire to harm him, then Mo-sar would
be safe in the eyes of Jad-ben-Otho if it finally developed that the
stranger was in reality the son of god. He felt uncomfortable in Tarzan's
presence and this fact rather accentuated his doubt, for thus indeed
would mortal feel in the presence of a god. Now he saw a way to escape,
at least temporarily.

{}``I will fetch them myself, Dor-ul-Otho,'' he said, and turning,
left the apartment. His hurried steps brought him quickly to the temple,
for the palace grounds of Tu-lur, which also included the temple as
in all of the Ho-don cities, covered a much smaller area than those
of the larger city of A-lur. He found Lu-don's messengers with the
high priest of his own temple and quickly transmitted to them the
commands of the ape-man.

{}``What do you intend to do with him?''\ asked one of the priests.

{}``I have no quarrel with him,'' replied Mo-sar. {}``He came in
peace and he may depart in peace, for who knows but that he is indeed
the Dor-ul-Otho?''\ 

{}``We know that he is not,'' replied Lu-don's emissary. {}``We
have every proof that he is only mortal, a strange creature from another
country. Already has Lu-don offered his life to Jad-ben-Otho if he
is wrong in his belief that this creature is not the son of god. If
the high priest of A-lur, who is the highest priest of all the high
priests of Pal-ul-don is thus so sure that the creature in an impostor
as to stake his life upon his judgment then who are we to give credence
to the claims of this stranger? No, Mo-sar, you need not fear him.
He is only a warrior who may be overcome with the same weapons that
subdue your own fighting men. Were it not for Lu-don's command that
he be taken alive I would urge you to set your warriors upon him and
slay him, but the commands of Lu-don are the commands of Jad-ben-Otho
himself, and those we may not disobey.''

But still the remnant of a doubt stirred within the cowardly breast
of Mo-sar, urging him to let another take the initiative against the
stranger.

{}``He is yours then,'' he replied, {}``to do with as you will.
I have no quarrel with him. What you may command shall be the command
of Lu-don, the high priest, and further than that I shall have nothing
to do in the matter.''

The priests turned to him who guided the destinies of the temple at
Tu-lur. {}``Have you no plan?''\ they asked. {}``High indeed will
he stand in the counsels of Lu-don and in the eyes of Jad-ben-Otho
who finds the means to capture this impostor alive.''

{}``There is the lion pit,'' whispered the high priest. {}``It
is now vacant and what will hold ja and jato will hold this stranger
if he is not the Dor-ul-Otho.''

{}``It will hold him,'' said Mo-sar; {}``doubtless too it would
hold a gryf, but first you would have to get the gryf into it.''

The priests pondered this bit of wisdom thoughtfully and then one
of those from A-lur spoke. {}``It should not be difficult,'' he
said, {}``if we use the wits that Jad-ben-Otho gave us instead of
the worldly muscles which were handed down to us from our fathers
and our mothers and which have not even the power possessed by those
of the beasts that run about on four feet.''

{}``Lu-don matched his wits with the stranger and lost,'' suggested
Mo-sar. {}``But this is your own affair. Carry it out as you see
best.''

{}``At A-lur, Ko-tan made much of this Dor-ul-Otho and the priests
conducted him through the temple. It would arouse in his mind no suspicion
were you to do the same, and let the high priest of Tu-lur invite
him to the temple and gathering all the priests make a great show
of belief in his kinship to Jad-ben-Otho. And what more natural then
than that the high priest should wish to show him through the temple
as did Lu-don at A-lur when Ko-tan commanded it, and if by chance
he should be led through the lion pit it would be a simple matter
for those who bear the torches to extinguish them suddenly and before
the stranger was aware of what had happened, the stone gates could
be dropped, thus safely securing him.''

{}``But there are windows in the pit that let in light,'' interposed
the high priest, {}``and even though the torches were extinguished
he could still see and might escape before the stone door could be
lowered.''

{}``Send one who will cover the windows tightly with hides,'' said
the priest from A-lur.

{}``The plan is a good one,'' said Mo-sar, seeing an opportunity
for entirely eliminating himself from any suspicion of complicity,
{}``for it will require the presence of no warriors, and thus with
only priests about him his mind will entertain no suspicion of harm.''

They were interrupted at this point by a messenger from the palace
who brought word that the Dor-ul-Otho was becoming impatient and if
the priests from A-lur were not brought to him at once he would come
himself to the temple and get them. Mo-sar shook his head. He could
not conceive of such brazen courage in mortal breast and glad he was
that the plan evolved for Tarzan's undoing did not necessitate his
active participation.

And so, while Mo-sar left for a secret corner of the palace by a roundabout
way, three priests were dispatched to Tarzan and with whining words
that did not entirely deceive him, they acknowledged his kinship to
Jad-ben-Otho and begged him in the name of the high priest to honor
the temple with a visit, when the priests from A-lur would be brought
to him and would answer any questions that he put to them.

Confident that a continuation of his bravado would best serve his
purpose, and also that if suspicion against him should crystallize
into conviction on the part of Mo-sar and his followers that he would
be no worse off in the temple than in the palace, the ape-man haughtily
accepted the invitation of the high priest.

And so he came into the temple and was received in a manner befitting
his high claims. He questioned the two priests of A-lur from whom
he obtained only a repetition of the story that Mo-sar had told him,
and then the high priest invited him to inspect the temple.

They took him first to the altar court, of which there was only one
in Tu-lur. It was almost identical in every respect with those at
A-lur. There was a bloody altar at the east end and the drowning basin
at the west, and the grizzly fringes upon the headdresses of the priests
attested the fact that the eastern altar was an active force in the
rites of the temple. Through the chambers and corridors beneath they
led him, and finally, with torch bearers to light their steps, into
a damp and gloomy labyrinth at a low level and here in a large chamber,
the air of which was still heavy with the odor of lions, the crafty
priests of Tu-lur encompassed their shrewd design.

The torches were suddenly extinguished. There was a hurried confusion
of bare feet moving rapidly across the stone floor. There was a loud
crash as of a heavy weight of stone falling upon stone, and then surrounding
the ape-man naught but the darkness and the silence of the tomb.


\chapter{Diana of the Jungle}

\markboth{Tarzan the Terrible}{Diana of the Jungle}

\textit{\emph{Jane}} had made her first kill and she was very proud
of it. It was not a very formidable anim\-al\mbox{---}only a hare;
but it marked an epoch in her existence. Just as in the dim past the
first hunter had shaped the destinies of mankind so it seemed that
this event might shape hers in some new mold. No longer was she dependent
upon the wild fruits and vegetables for sustenance. Now she might
command meat, the giver of the strength and endurance she would require
successfully to cope with the necessities of her primitive existence.

The next step was fire. She might learn to eat raw flesh as had her
lord and master; but she shrank from that. The thought even was repulsive.
She had, however, a plan for fire. She had given the matter thought,
but had been too busy to put it into execution so long as fire could
be of no immediate use to her. Now it was different\mbox{---}she
had something to cook and her mouth watered for the flesh of her kill.
She would grill it above glowing embers. Jane hastened to her tree.
Among the treasures she had gathered in the bed of the stream were
several pieces of volcanic glass, clear as crystal. She sought until
she had found the one in mind, which was convex. Then she hurried
to the ground and gathered a little pile of powdered bark that was
very dry, and some dead leaves and grasses that had lain long in the
hot sun. Near at hand she arranged a supply of dead twigs and branches\mbox{---}small
and large.

Vibrant with suppressed excitement she held the bit of glass above
the tinder, moving it slowly until she had focused the sun's rays
upon a tiny spot. She waited breathlessly. How slow it was! Were her
high hopes to be dashed in spite of all her clever planning? No! A
thin thread of smoke rose gracefully into the quiet air. Presently
the tinder glowed and broke suddenly into flame. Jane clasped her
hands beneath her chin with a little gurgling exclamation of delight.
She had achieved fire!

She piled on twigs and then larger branches and at last dragged a
small log to the flames and pushed an end of it into the fire which
was crackling merrily. It was the sweetest sound that she had heard
for many a month. But she could not wait for the mass of embers that
would be required to cook her hare. As quickly as might be she skinned
and cleaned her kill, burying the hide and entrails. That she had
learned from Tarzan. It served two purposes. One was the necessity
for keeping a sanitary camp and the other the obliteration of the
scent that most quickly attracts the man-eaters.

Then she ran a stick through the carcass and held it above the flames.
By turning it often she prevented burning and at the same time permitted
the meat to cook thoroughly all the way through. When it was done
she scampered high into the safety of her tree to enjoy her meal in
quiet and peace. Never, thought Lady Greystoke, had aught more delicious
passed her lips. She patted her spear affectionately. It had brought
her this toothsome dainty and with it a feeling of greater confidence
and safety than she had enjoyed since that frightful day that she
and Obergatz had spent their last cartridge. She would never forget
that day\mbox{---}it had seemed one hideous succession of frightful
beast after frightful beast. They had not been long in this strange
country, yet they thought that they were hardened to dangers, for
daily they had had encounters with ferocious creatures; but this day\mbox{---}she
shuddered when she thought of it. And with her last cartridge she
had killed a black and yellow striped lion-thing with great saber
teeth just as it was about to spring upon Obergatz who had futilely
emptied his rifle into it\mbox{---}the last shot\mbox{---}his
final cartridge. For another day they had carried the now useless
rifles; but at last they had discarded them and thrown away the cumbersome
bandoleers, as well. How they had managed to survive during the ensuing
week she could never quite understand, and then the Ho-don had come
upon them and captured her. Obergatz had escaped\mbox{---}she was
living it all over again. Doubtless he was dead unless he had been
able to reach this side of the valley which was quite evidently less
overrun with savage beasts.

Jane's days were very full ones now, and the daylight hours seemed
all too short in which to accomplish the many things she had determined
upon, since she had concluded that this spot presented as ideal a
place as she could find to live until she could fashion the weapons
she considered necessary for the obtaining of meat and for self-defense.

She felt that she must have, in addition to a good spear, a knife,
and bow and arrows. Possibly when these had been achieved she might
seriously consider an attempt to fight her way to one of civilization's
nearest outposts. In the meantime it was necessary to construct some
sort of protective shelter in which she might feel a greater sense
of security by night, for she knew that there was a possibility that
any night she might receive a visit from a prowling panther, although
she had as yet seen none upon this side of the valley. Aside from
this danger she felt comparatively safe in her aerial retreat.

The cutting of the long poles for her home occupied all of the daylight
hours that were not engaged in the search for food. These poles she
carried high into her tree and with them constructed a flooring across
two stout branches binding the poles together and also to the branches
with fibers from the tough arboraceous grasses that grew in profusion
near the stream. Similarly she built walls and a roof, the latter
thatched with many layers of great leaves. The fashioning of the barred
windows and the door were matters of great importance and consuming
interest. The windows, there were two of them, were large and the
bars permanently fixed; but the door was small, the opening just large
enough to permit her to pass through easily on hands and knees, which
made it easier to barricade. She lost count of the days that the house
cost her; but time was a cheap commodity\mbox{---}she had more of
it than of anything else. It meant so little to her that she had not
even any desire to keep account of it. How long since she and Obergatz
had fled from the wrath of the Negro villagers she did not know and
she could only roughly guess at the seasons. She worked hard for two
reasons; one was to hasten the completion of her little place of refuge,
and the other a desire for such physical exhaustion at night that
she would sleep through those dreaded hours to a new day. As a matter
of fact the house was finished in less than a week\mbox{---}that
is, it was made as safe as it ever would be, though regardless of
how long she might occupy it she would keep on adding touches and
refinements here and there.

Her daily life was filled with her house building and her hunting,
to which was added an occasional spice of excitement contributed by
roving lions. To the woodcraft that she had learned from Tarzan, that
master of the art, was added a considerable store of practical experience
derived from her own past adventures in the jungle and the long months
with Obergatz, nor was any day now lacking in some added store of
useful knowledge. To these facts was attributable her apparent immunity
from harm, since they told her when ja was approaching before he crept
close enough for a successful charge and, too, they kept her close
to those never-failing havens of retreat\mbox{---}the trees.

The nights, filled with their weird noises, were lonely and depressing.
Only her ability to sleep quickly and soundly made them endurable.
The first night that she spent in her completed house behind barred
windows and barricaded door was one of almost undiluted peace and
happiness. The night noises seemed far removed and impersonal and
the soughing of the wind in the trees was gently soothing. Before,
it had carried a mournful note and was sinister in that it might hide
the approach of some real danger. That night she slept indeed.

She went further afield now in search of food. So far nothing but
rodents had fallen to her spear\mbox{---}her ambition was an antelope,
since beside the flesh it would give her, and the gut for her bow,
the hide would prove invaluable during the colder weather that she
knew would accompany the rainy season. She had caught glimpses of
these wary animals and was sure that they always crossed the stream
at a certain spot above her camp. It was to this place that she went
to hunt them. With the stealth and cunning of a panther she crept
through the forest, circling about to get up wind from the ford, pausing
often to look and listen for aught that might menace her\mbox{---}herself
the personification of a hunted deer. Now she moved silently down
upon the chosen spot. What luck! A beautiful buck stood drinking in
the stream. The woman wormed her way closer. Now she lay upon her
belly behind a small bush within throwing distance of the quarry.
She must rise to her full height and throw her spear almost in the
same instant and she must throw it with great force and perfect accuracy.
She thrilled with the excitement of the minute, yet cool and steady
were her swift muscles as she rose and cast her missile. Scarce by
the width of a finger did the point strike from the spot at which
it had been directed. The buck leaped high, landed upon the bank of
the stream, and fell dead. Jane Clayton sprang quickly forward toward
her kill.

{}``Bravo!''\ A man's voice spoke in English from the shrubbery
upon the opposite side of the stream. Jane Clayton halted in her tracks\mbox{---}stunned,
almost, by surprise. And then a strange, unkempt figure of a man stepped
into view. At first she did not recognize him, but when she did, instinctively
she stepped back.

{}``Lieutenant Obergatz!''\ she cried. {}``Can it be you?''\ 

{}``It can. It is,'' replied the German. {}``I am a strange sight,
no doubt; but still it is I, Erich Obergatz. And you? You have changed
too, is it not?''\ 

He was looking at her naked limbs and her golden breastplates, the
loin cloth of jato-hide, the harness and ornaments that constitute
the apparel of a Ho-don woman\mbox{---}the things that Lu-don had
dressed her in as his passion for her grew. Not Ko-tan's daughter,
even, had finer trappings.

{}``But why are you here?''\ Jane insisted. {}``I had thought
you safely among civilized men by this time, if you still lived.''

{}``Gott!''\ he exclaimed. {}``I do not know why I continue to
live. I have prayed to die and yet I cling to life. There is no hope.
We are doomed to remain in this horrible land until we die. The bog!
The frightful bog! I have searched its shores for a place to cross
until I have entirely circled the hideous country. Easily enough we
entered; but the rains have come since and now no living man could
pass that slough of slimy mud and hungry reptiles. Have I not tried
it! And the beasts that roam this accursed land. They hunt me by day
and by night.''

{}``But how have you escaped them?''\ she asked.

{}``I do not know,'' he replied gloomily. {}``I have fled and fled
and fled. I have remained hungry and thirsty in tree tops for days
at a time. I have fashioned weapons\mbox{---}clubs and spears\mbox{---}and
I have learned to use them. I have slain a lion with my club. So even
will a cornered rat fight. And we are no better than rats in this
land of stupendous dangers, you and I.\ But tell me about yourself.
If it is surprising that I live, how much more so that you still survive.''

Briefly she told him and all the while she was wondering what she
might do to rid herself of him. She could not conceive of a prolonged
existence with him as her sole companion. Better, a thousand times
better, to be alone. Never had her hatred and contempt for him lessened
through the long weeks and months of their constant companionship,
and now that he could be of no service in returning her to civilization,
she shrank from the thought of seeing him daily. And, too, she feared
him. Never had she trusted him; but now there was a strange light
in his eye that had not been there when last she saw him. She could
not interpret it\mbox{---}all she knew was that it gave her a feeling
of apprehension\mbox{---}a nameless dread.

{}``You lived long then in the city of A-lur?''\ he said, speaking
in the language of Pal-ul-don.

{}``You have learned this tongue?''\ she asked. {}``How?''\ 

{}``I fell in with a band of half-breeds,'' he replied, {}``members
of a proscribed race that dwells in the rock-bound gut through which
the principal river of the valley empties into the morass. They are
called Waz-ho-don and their village is partly made up of cave dwellings
and partly of houses carved from the soft rock at the foot of the
cliff. They are very ignorant and superstitious and when they first
saw me and realized that I had no tail and that my hands and feet
were not like theirs they were afraid of me. They thought that I was
either god or demon. Being in a position where I could neither escape
them nor defend myself, I made a bold front and succeeded in impressing
them to such an extent that they conducted me to their city, which
they call Bu-lur, and there they fed me and treated me with kindness.
As I learned their language I sought to impress them more and more
with the idea that I was a god, and I succeeded, too, until an old
fellow who was something of a priest among them, or medicine-man,
became jealous of my growing power. That was the beginning of the
end and came near to being the end in fact. He told them that if I
was a god I would not bleed if a knife was stuck into me\mbox{---}if
I did bleed it would prove conclusively that I was not a god. Without
my knowledge he arranged to stage the ordeal before the whole village
upon a certain night\mbox{---}it was upon one of those numerous
occasions when they eat and drink to Jad-ben-Otho, their pagan deity.
Under the influence of their vile liquor they would be ripe for any
bloodthirsty scheme the medicine-man might evolve. One of the women
told me about the plan\mbox{---}not with any intent to warn me of
danger, but prompted merely by feminine curiosity as to whether or
not I would bleed if stuck with a dagger. She could not wait, it seemed,
for the orderly procedure of the ordeal\mbox{---}she wanted to know
at once, and when I caught her trying to slip a knife into my side
and questioned her she explained the whole thing with the utmost naivete.
The warriors already had commenced drinking\mbox{---}it would have
been futile to make any sort of appeal either to their intellects
or their superstitions. There was but one alternative to death and
that was flight. I told the woman that I was very much outraged and
offended at this reflection upon my godhood and that as a mark of
my disfavor I should abandon them to their fate.

{}```I shall return to heaven at once!' I exclaimed.

{}``She wanted to hang around and see me go, but I told her that
her eyes would be blasted by the fire surrounding my departure and
that she must leave at once and not return to the spot for at least
an hour. I also impressed upon her the fact that should any other
approach this part of the village within that time not only they,
but she as well, would burst into flames and be consumed.

{}``She was very much impressed and lost no time in leaving, calling
back as she departed that if I were indeed gone in an hour she and
all the village would know that I was no less than Jad-ben-Otho himself,
and so they must thank me, for I can assure you that I was gone in
much less than an hour, nor have I ventured close to the neighborhood
of the city of Bu-lur since,'' and he fell to laughing in harsh,
cackling notes that sent a shiver through the woman's frame.

As Obergatz talked Jane had recovered her spear from the carcass of
the antelope and commenced busying herself with the removal of the
hide. The man made no attempt to assist her, but stood by talking
and watching her, the while he continually ran his filthy fingers
through his matted hair and beard. His face and body were caked with
dirt and he was naked except for a torn greasy hide about his loins.
His weapons consisted of a club and knife of Waz-don pattern, that
he had stolen from the city of Bu-lur; but what more greatly concerned
the woman than his filth or his armament were his cackling laughter
and the strange expression in his eyes.

She went on with her work, however, removing those parts of the buck
she wanted, taking only as much meat as she might consume before it
spoiled, as she was not sufficiently a true jungle creature to relish
it beyond that stage, and then she straightened up and faced the man.

{}``Lieutenant Obergatz,'' she said, {}``by a chance of accident
we have met again. Certainly you would not have sought the meeting
any more than I.\ We have nothing in common other than those sentiments
which may have been engendered by my natural dislike and suspicion
of you, one of the authors of all the misery and sorrow that I have
endured for endless months. This little corner of the world is mine
by right of discovery and occupation. Go away and leave me to enjoy
here what peace I may. It is the least that you can do to amend the
wrong that you have done me and mine.''

The man stared at her through his fishy eyes for a moment in silence,
then there broke from his lips a peal of mirthless, uncanny laughter.

{}``Go away! Leave you alone!''\ he cried. {}``I have found you.
We are going to be good friends. There is no one else in the world
but us. No one will ever know what we do or what becomes of us and
now you ask me to go away and live alone in this hellish solitude.''
Again he laughed, though neither the muscles of his eyes or his mouth
reflected any mirth\mbox{---}it was just a hollow sound that imitated
laughter.

{}``Remember your promise,'' she said.

{}``Promise! Promise! What are promises? They are made to be broken\mbox{---}we
taught the world that at Liege and Louvain. No, no! I will not go
away. I shall stay and protect you.''

{}``I do not need your protection,'' she insisted. {}``You have
already seen that I can use a spear.''

{}``Yes,'' he said; {}``but it would not be right to leave you
here alone\mbox{---}you are but a woman. No, no; I am an officer
of the Kaiser and I cannot abandon you.''

Once more he laughed. {}``We could be very happy here together,''
he added.

The woman could not repress a shudder, nor, in fact, did she attempt
to hide her aversion.

{}``You do not like me?''\ he asked. {}``Ah, well; it is too sad.
But some day you will love me,'' and again the hideous laughter.

The woman had wrapped the pieces of the buck in the hide and this
she now raised and threw across her shoulder. In her other hand she
held her spear and faced the German.

{}``Go!''\ she commanded. {}``We have wasted enough words. This
is my country and I shall defend it. If I see you about again I shall
kill you. Do you understand?''\ 

An expression of rage contorted Obergatz' features. He raised his
club and started toward her.

{}``Stop!''\ she commanded, throwing her spear-hand backward for
a cast. {}``You saw me kill this buck and you have said truthfully
that no one will ever know what we do here. Put these two facts together,
German, and draw your own conclusions before you take another step
in my direction.''

The man halted and his club-hand dropped to his side. {}``Come,''
he begged in what he intended as a conciliatory tone. {}``Let us
be friends, Lady Greystoke. We can be of great assistance to each
other and I promise not to harm you.''

{}``Remember Liege and Louvain,'' she reminded him with a sneer.
{}``I am going now\mbox{---}\linebreak[1]be sure that you do not
follow me. As far as you can walk in a day from this spot in any direction
you may consider the limits of my domain. If ever again I see you
within these limits I shall kill you.''

There could be no question that she meant what she said and the man
seemed convinced for he but stood sullenly eyeing her as she backed
from sight beyond a turn in the game trail that crossed the ford where
they had met, and disappeared in the forest.


\chapter{Silently in the Night}

\markboth{Tarzan the Terrible}{Silently in the Night}

\textit{\emph{In}} A\emph{-}\textit{\emph{lur}} the fortunes of the
city had been tossed from hand to hand. The party of Ko-tan's loyal
warriors that Tarzan had led to the rendezvous at the entrance to
the secret passage below the palace gates had met with disaster. Their
first rush had been met with soft words from the priests. They had
been exhorted to defend the faith of their fathers from blasphemers.
Ja-don was painted to them as a defiler of temples, and the wrath
of Jad-ben-Otho was prophesied for those who embraced his cause. The
priests insisted that Lu-don's only wish was to prevent the seizure
of the throne by Ja-don until a new king could be chosen according
to the laws of the Ho-don.

The result was that many of the palace warriors joined their fellows
of the city, and when the priests saw that those whom they could influence
outnumbered those who remained loyal to the palace, they caused the
former to fall upon the latter with the result that many were killed
and only a handful succeeded in reaching the safety of the palace
gates, which they quickly barred.

The priests led their own forces through the secret passageway into
the temple, while some of the loyal ones sought out Ja-don and told
him all that had happened. The fight in the banquet hall had spread
over a considerable portion of the palace grounds and had at last
resulted in the temporary defeat of those who had opposed Ja-don.
This force, counseled by under priests sent for the purpose by Lu-don,
had withdrawn within the temple grounds so that now the issue was
plainly marked as between Ja-don on the one side and Lu-don on the
other.

The former had been told of all that had occurred in the apartments
of O-lo-a to whose safety he had attended at the first opportunity
and he had also learned of Tarzan's part in leading his men to the
gathering of Lu-don's warriors.

These things had naturally increased the old warrior's former inclinations
of friendliness toward the ape-man, and now he regretted that the
other had departed from the city.

The testimony of O-lo-a and Pan-at-lee was such as to strengthen whatever
belief in the godliness of the stranger Ja-don and others of the warriors
had previously entertained, until presently there appeared a strong
tendency upon the part of this palace faction to make the Dor-ul-otho
an issue of their original quarrel with Lu-don. Whether this occurred
as the natural sequence to repeated narrations of the ape-man's exploits,
which lost nothing by repetition, in conjunction with Lu-don's enmity
toward him, or whether it was the shrewd design of some wily old warrior
such as Ja-don, who realized the value of adding a religious cause
to their temporal one, it were difficult to determine; but the fact
remained that Ja-don's followers developed bitter hatred for the followers
of Lu-don because of the high priest's antagonism to Tarzan.

Unfortunately however Tarzan was not there to inspire the followers
of Ja-don with the holy zeal that might have quickly settled the dispute
in the old chieftain's favor. Instead, he was miles away and because
their repeated prayers for his presence were unanswered, the weaker
spirits among them commenced to suspect that their cause did not have
divine favor. There was also another and a potent cause for defection
from the ranks of Ja-don. It emanated from the city where the friends
and relatives of the palace warriors, who were largely also the friends
and relatives of Lu-don's forces, found the means, urged on by the
priesthood, to circulate throughout the palace pernicious propaganda
aimed at Ja-don's cause.

The result was that Lu-don's power increased while that of Ja-don
waned. Then followed a sortie from the temple which resulted in the
defeat of the palace forces, and though they were able to withdraw
in decent order withdraw they did, leaving the palace to Lu-don, who
was now virtually ruler of Pal-ul-don.

Ja-don, taking with him the princess, her women, and their slaves,
including Pan-at-lee, as well as the women and children of his faithful
followers, retreated not only from the palace but from the city of
A-lur as well and fell back upon his own city of Ja-lur. Here he remained,
recruiting his forces from the surrounding villages of the north which,
being far removed from the influence of the priesthood of A-lur, were
enthusiastic partisans in any cause that the old chieftain espoused,
since for years he had been revered as their friend and protector.

And while these events were transpiring in the north, Tarzan-jad-guru
lay in the lion pit at Tu-lur while messengers passed back and forth
between Mo-sar and Lu-don as the two dickered for the throne of Pal-ul-don.
Mo-sar was cunning enough to guess that should an open breach occur
between himself and the high priest he might use his prisoner to his
own advantage, for he had heard whisperings among even his own people
that suggested that there were those who were more than a trifle inclined
to belief in the divinity of the stranger and that he might indeed
be the Dor-ul-Otho. Lu-don wanted Tarzan himself. He wanted to sacrifice
him upon the eastern altar with his own hands before a multitude of
people, since he was not without evidence that his own standing and
authority had been lessened by the claims of the bold and heroic figure
of the stranger.

The method that the high priest of Tu-lur had employed to trap Tarzan
had left the ape-man in possession of his weapons though there seemed
little likelihood of their being of any service to him. He also had
his pouch, in which were the various odds and ends which are the natural
accumulation of all receptacles from a gold meshbag to an attic. There
were bits of obsidian and choice feathers for arrows, some pieces
of flint and a couple of steel, an old knife, a heavy bone needle,
and strips of dried gut. Nothing very useful to you or me, perhaps;
but nothing useless to the savage life of the ape-man.

When Tarzan realized the trick that had been so neatly played upon
him he had awaited expectantly the coming of the lion, for though
the scent of ja was old he was sure that sooner or later they would
let one of the beasts in upon him. His first consideration was a thorough
exploration of his prison. He had noticed the hide-covered windows
and these he immediately uncovered, letting in the light, and revealing
the fact that though the chamber was far below the level of the temple
courts it was yet many feet above the base of the hill from which
the temple was hewn. The windows were so closely barred that he could
not see over the edge of the thick wall in which they were cut to
determine what lay close in below him. At a little distance were the
blue waters of Jad-in-lul and beyond, the verdure-clad farther shore,
and beyond that the mountains. It was a beautiful picture upon which
he looked\mbox{---}a picture of peace and harmony and quiet. Nor
anywhere a slightest suggestion of the savage men and beasts that
claimed this lovely landscape as their own. What a paradise! And some
day civilized man would come and\mbox{---}spoil it! Ruthless axes
would raze that age-old wood; black, sticky smoke would rise from
ugly chimneys against that azure sky; grimy little boats with wheels
behind or upon either side would churn the mud from the bottom of
Jad-in-lul, turning its blue waters to a dirty brown; hideous piers
would project into the lake from squalid buildings of corrugated iron,
doubtless, for of such are the pioneer cities of the world.

But would civilized man come? Tarzan hoped not. For countless generations
civilization had ramped about the globe; it had dispatched its emissaries
to the North Pole and the South; it had circled Pal-ul-don once, perhaps
many times, but it had never touched her. God grant that it never
would. Perhaps He was saving this little spot to be always just as
He had made it, for the scratching of the Ho-don and the Waz-don upon
His rocks had not altered the fair face of Nature.

Through the windows came sufficient light to reveal the whole interior
to Tarzan. The room was fairly large and there was a door at each
end\mbox{---}a large door for men and a smaller one for lions. Both
were closed with heavy masses of stone that had been lowered in grooves
running to the floor. The two windows were small and closely barred
with the first iron that Tarzan had seen in Pal-ul-don. The bars were
let into holes in the casing, and the whole so strongly and neatly
contrived that escape seemed impossible. Yet within a few minutes
of his incarceration Tarzan had commenced to undertake his escape.
The old knife in his pouch was brought into requisition and slowly
the ape-man began to scrape and chip away the stone from about the
bars of one of the windows. It was slow work but Tarzan had the patience
of absolute health.

Each day food and water were brought him and slipped quickly beneath
the smaller door which was raised just sufficiently to allow the stone
receptacles to pass in. The prisoner began to believe that he was
being preserved for something beside lions. However that was immaterial.
If they would but hold off for a few more days they might select what
fate they would\mbox{---}he would not be there when they arrived
to announce it.

And then one day came Pan-sat, Lu-don's chief tool, to the city of
Tu-lur. He came ostensibly with a fair message for Mo-sar from the
high priest at A-lur. Lu-don had decided that Mo-sar should be king
and he invited Mo-sar to come at once to A-lur and then Pan-sat, having
delivered the message, asked that he might go to the temple of Tu-lur
and pray, and there he sought the high priest of Tu-lur to whom was
the true message that Lu-don had sent. The two were closeted alone
in a little chamber and Pan-sat whispered into the ear of the high
priest.

{}``Mo-sar wishes to be king,'' he said, {}``and Lu-don wishes
to be king. Mo-sar wishes to retain the stranger who claims to be
the Dor-ul-Otho and Lu-don wishes to kill him, and now,'' he leaned
even closer to the ear of the high priest of Tu-lur, {}``if you would
be high priest at A-lur it is within your power.''

Pan-sat ceased speaking and waited for the other's reply. The high
priest was visibly affected. To be high priest at A-lur! That was
almost as good as being king of all Pal-ul-don, for great were the
powers of him who conducted the sacrifices upon the altars of A-lur.

{}``How?''\ whispered the high priest. {}``How may I become high
priest at A-lur?''\ 

Again Pan-sat leaned close: {}``By killing the one and bringing the
other to A-lur,'' replied he. Then he rose and departed knowing chat
the other had swallowed the bait and could be depended upon to do
whatever was required to win him the great prize.

Nor was Pan-sat mistaken other than in one trivial consideration.
This high priest would indeed commit murder and treason to attain
the high office at A-lur; but he had misunderstood which of his victims
was to be killed and which to be delivered to Lu-don. Pan-sat, knowing
himself all the details of the plannings of Lu-don, had made the quite
natural error of assuming that the ocher was perfectly aware that
only by publicly sacrificing the false Dor-ul-Otho could the high
priest at A-lur bolster his waning power and that the assassination
of Mo-sar, the pretender, would remove from Lu-don's camp the only
obstacle to his combining the offices of high priest and king. The
high priest at Tu-lur thought that he had been commissioned to kill
Tarzan and bring Mo-sar to A-lur. He also thought that when he had
done these things he would be made high priest at A-lur; but he did
not know that already the priest had been selected who was to murder
him within the hour that he arrived at A-lur, nor did he know that
a secret grave had been prepared for him in the floor of a subterranean
chamber in the very temple he dreamed of controlling.

And so when he should have been arranging the assassination of his
chief he was leading a dozen heavily bribed warriors through the dark
corridors beneath the temple to slay Tarzan in the lion pit. Night
had fallen. A single torch guided the footsteps of the murderers as
they crept stealthily upon their evil way, for they knew that they
were doing the thing that their chief did not want done and their
guilty consciences warned them to stealth.

In the dark of his cell the ape-man worked at his seemingly endless
chipping and scraping. His keen ears detected the coming of footsteps
along the corridor without\mbox{---}footsteps that approached the
larger door. Always before had they come to the smaller door\mbox{---}the
footsteps of a single slave who brought his food. This time there
were many more than one and their coming at this time of night carried
a sinister suggestion. Tarzan continued to work at his scraping and
chipping. He heard them stop beyond the door. All was silence broken
only by the scrape, scrape, scrape of the ape-man's tireless blade.

Those without heard it and listening sought to explain it. They whispered
in low tones making their plans. Two would raise the door quickly
and the others would rush in and hurl their clubs at the prisoner.
They would take no chances, for the stories that had circulated in
A-lur had been brought to Tu-lur\mbox{---}stories of the great strength
and wonderful prowess of Tarzan-jad-guru that caused the sweat to
stand upon the brows of the warriors, though it was cool in the damp
corridor and they were twelve to one.

And then the high priest gave the signal\mbox{---}the door shot
upward and ten warriors leaped into the chamber with poised clubs.
Three of the heavy weapons flew across the room toward a darker shadow
that lay in the shadow of the opposite wall, then the flare of the
torch in the priest's hand lighted the interior and they saw that
the thing at which they had flung their clubs was a pile of skins
torn from the windows and that except for themselves the chamber was
vacant.

One of them hastened to a window. All but a single bar was gone and
to this was tied one end of a braided rope fashioned from strips cut
from the leather window hangings.

To the ordinary dangers of Jane Clayton's existence was now added
the menace of Obergatz' knowledge of her whereabouts. The lion and
the panther had given her less cause for anxiety than did the return
of the unscrupulous Hun, whom she had always distrusted and feared,
and whose repulsiveness was now immeasurably augmented by his unkempt
and filthy appearance, his strange and mirthless laughter, and his
unnatural demeanor. She feared him now with a new fear as though he
had suddenly become the personification of some nameless horror. The
wholesome, outdoor life that she had been leading had strengthened
and rebuilt her nervous system yet it seemed to her as she thought
of him that if this man should ever touch her she should scream, and,
possibly, even faint. Again and again during the day following their
unexpected meeting the woman reproached herself for not having killed
him as she would ja or jato or any other predatory beast that menaced
her existence or her safety. There was no attempt at self-justification
for these sinister reflections\mbox{---}they needed no justification.
The standards by which the acts of such as you or I may be judged
could not apply to hers. We have recourse to the protection of friends
and relatives and the civil soldiery that upholds the majesty of the
law and which may be invoked to protect the righteous weak against
the unrighteous strong; but Jane Clayton comprised within herself
not only the righteous weak but all the various agencies for the protection
of the weak. To her, then, Lieutenant Erich Obergatz presented no
different problem than did ja, the lion, other than that she considered
the former the more dangerous animal. And so she determined that should
he ignore her warning there would be no temporizing upon the occasion
of their next meeting\mbox{---}the same swift spear that would meet
ja's advances would meet his.

That night her snug little nest perched high in the great tree seemed
less the sanctuary that it had before. What might resist the sanguinary
intentions of a prowling panther would prove no great barrier to man,
and influenced by this thought she slept less well than before. The
slightest noise that broke the monotonous hum of the nocturnal jungle
startled her into alert wakefulness to lie with straining ears in
an attempt to classify the origin of the disturbance, and once she
was awakened thus by a sound that seemed to come from something moving
in her own tree. She listened intently\mbox{---}scarce breathing.
Yes, there it was again. A scuffing of something soft against the
hard bark of the tree. The woman reached out in the darkness and grasped
her spear. Now she felt a slight sagging of one of the limbs that
supported her shelter as though the thing, whatever it was, was slowly
raising its weight to the branch. It came nearer. Now she thought
that she could detect its breathing. It was at the door. She could
hear it fumbling with the frail barrier. What could it be? It made
no sound by which she might identify it. She raised herself upon her
hands and knees and crept stealthily the little distance to the doorway,
her spear clutched tightly in her hand. Whatever the thing was, it
was evidently attempting to gain entrance without awakening her. It
was just beyond the pitiful little contraption of slender boughs that
she had bound together with grasses and called a door\mbox{---}only
a few inches lay between the thing and her. Rising to her knees she
reached out with her left hand and felt until she found a place where
a crooked branch had left an opening a couple of inches wide near
the center of the barrier. Into this she inserted the point of her
spear. The thing must have heard her move within for suddenly it abandoned
its efforts for stealth and tore angrily at the obstacle. At the same
moment Jane thrust her spear forward with all her strength. She felt
it enter flesh. There was a scream and a curse from without, followed
by the crashing of a body through limbs and foliage. Her spear was
almost dragged from her grasp, but she held to it until it broke free
from the thing it had pierced.

It was Obergatz; the curse had told her that. From below came no further
sound. Had she, then, killed him? She prayed so\mbox{---}with all
her heart she prayed it. To be freed from the menace of this loathsome
creature were relief indeed. During all the balance of the night she
lay there awake, listening. Below her, she imagined, she could see
the dead man with his hideous face bathed in the cold light of the
moon\mbox{---}lying there upon his back staring up at her.

She prayed that ja might come and drag it away, but all during the
remainder of the night she heard never another sound above the drowsy
hum of the jungle. She was glad that he was dead, but she dreaded
the gruesome ordeal that awaited her on the morrow, for she must bury
the thing that had been Erich Obergatz and live on there above the
shallow grave of the man she had slain.

She reproached herself for her weakness, repeating over and over that
she had killed in self-defense, that her act was justified; but she
was still a woman of today, and strong upon her were the iron mandates
of the social order from which she had sprung, its interdictions and
its superstitions.

At last came the tardy dawn. Slowly the sun topped the distant mountains
beyond Jad-in-lul. And yet she hesitated to loosen the fastenings
of her door and look out upon the thing below. But it must be done.
She steeled herself and untied the rawhide thong that secured the
barrier. She looked down and only the grass and the flowers looked
up at her. She came from her shelter and examined the ground upon
the opposite side of the tree\mbox{---}there was no dead man there,
nor anywhere as far as she could see. Slowly she descended, keeping
a wary eye and an alert ear ready for the first intimation of danger.

At the foot of the tree was a pool of blood and a little trail of
crimson drops upon the grass, leading away parallel with the shore
of Jad-ben-lul. Then she had not slain him! She was vaguely aware
of a peculiar, double sensation of relief and regret. Now she would
be always in doubt. He might return; but at least she would not have
to live above his grave.

She thought some of following the bloody spoor on the chance that
he might have crawled away to die later, but she gave up the idea
for fear that she might find him dead nearby, or, worse yet badly
wounded. What then could she do? She could not finish him with her
spear\mbox{---}no, she knew that she could not do that, nor could
she bring him back and nurse him, nor could she leave him there to
die of hunger or of thirst, or to become the prey of some prowling
beast. It were better then not to search for him for fear that she
might find him.

That day was one of nervous starting to every sudden sound. The day
before she would have said that her nerves were of iron; but not today.
She knew now the shock that she had suffered and that this was the
reaction. Tomorrow it might be different, but something told her that
never again would her little shelter and the patch of forest and jungle
that she called her own be the same. There would hang over them always
the menace of this man. No longer would she pass restful nights of
deep slumber. The peace of her little world was shattered forever.

That night she made her door doubly secure with additional thongs
of rawhide cut from the pelt of the buck she had slain the day that
she met Obergatz. She was very tired for she had lost much sleep the
night before; but for a long time she lay with wide-open eyes staring
into the darkness. What saw she there? Visions that brought tears
to those brave and beautiful eyes\mbox{---}visions of a rambling
bungalow that had been home to her and that was no more, destroyed
by the same cruel force that haunted her even now in this remote,
uncharted corner of the earth; visions of a strong man whose protecting
arm would never press her close again; visions of a tall, straight
son who looked at her adoringly out of brave, smiling eyes that were
like his father's. Always the vision of the crude simple bungalow
rather than of the stately halls that had been as much a part of her
life as the other. But he had loved the bungalow and the broad, free
acres best and so she had come to love them best, too.

At last she slept, the sleep of utter exhaustion. How long it lasted
she did not know; but suddenly she was wide awake and once again she
heard the scuffing of a body against the bark of her tree and again
the limb bent to a heavy weight. He had returned! She went cold, trembling
as with ague. Was it he, or, O God! had she killed him then and was
this\mbox{---}? She tried to drive the horrid thought from her mind,
for this way, she knew, lay madness.

And once again she crept to the door, for the thing was outside just
as it had been last night. Her hands trembled as she placed the point
of her weapon to the opening. She wondered if it would scream as it
fell.


\chapter{The Maniac}

\markboth{Tarzan the Terrible}{The Maniac}

\textit{\emph{The}} last bar that would make the opening large enough
to permit his body to pass had been removed as Tarzan heard the warriors
whispering beyond the stone door of his prison. Long since had the
rope of hide been braided. To secure one end to the remaining bar
that he had left for this purpose was the work of but a moment, and
while the warriors whispered without, the brown body of the ape-man
slipped through the small aperture and disappeared below the sill.

Tarzan's escape from the cell left him still within the walled area
that comprised the palace and temple grounds and buildings. He had
reconnoitered as best he might from the window after he had removed
enough bars to permit him to pass his head through the opening, so
that he knew what lay immediately before him\mbox{---}a winding
and usually deserted alleyway leading in the direction of the outer
gate that opened from the palace grounds into the city.

The darkness would facilitate his escape. He might even pass out of
the palace and the city without detection. If he could elude the guard
at the palace gate the rest would be easy. He strode along confidently,
exhibiting no fear of detection, for he reasoned that thus would he
disarm suspicion. In the darkness he easily could pass for a Ho-don
and in truth, though he passed several after leaving the deserted
alley, no one accosted or detained him, and thus he came at last to
the guard of a half-dozen warriors before the palace gate. These he
attempted to pass in the same unconcerned fashion and he might have
succeeded had it not been for one who came running rapidly from the
direction of the temple shouting: {}``Let no one pass the gates!
The prisoner has escaped from the pal-ul-ja!''\ 

Instantly a warrior barred his way and simultaneously the fellow recognized
him. {}``Xot tor!''\ he exclaimed: {}``Here he is now. Fall upon
him! Fall upon him! Back! Back before I kill you.''

The others came forward. It cannot be said that they rushed forward.
If it was their wish to fall upon him there was a noticeable lack
of enthusiasm other than that which directed their efforts to persuade
someone else to fall upon him. His fame as a fighter had been too
long a topic of conversation for the good of the morale of Mo-sar's
warriors. It were safer to stand at a distance and hurl their clubs
and this they did, but the ape-man had learned something of the use
of this weapon since he had arrived in Pal-ul-don. And as he learned
great had grown his respect for this most primitive of arms. He had
come to realize that the black savages he had known had never appreciated
the possibilities of their knob sticks, nor had he, and he had discovered,
too, why the Pal-ul-donians had turned their ancient spears into plowshares
and pinned their faith to the heavy-ended club alone. In deadly execution
it was far more effective than a spear and it answered, too, every
purpose of a shield, combining the two in one and thus reducing the
burden of the warrior. Thrown as they throw it, after the manner of
the hammer-throwers of the Olympian games, an ordinary shield would
prove more a weakness than a strength while one that would be strong
enough to prove a protection would be too heavy to carry. Only another
club, deftly wielded to deflect the course of an enemy missile, is
in any way effective against these formidable weapons and, too, the
war club of Pal-ul-don can be thrown with accuracy a far greater distance
than any spear.

And now was put to the test that which Tarzan had learned from Om-at
and Ta-den. His eyes and his muscles trained by a lifetime of necessity
moved with the rapidity of light and his brain functioned with an
uncanny celerity that suggested nothing less than prescience, and
these things more than compensated for his lack of experience with
the war club he handled so dexterously. Weapon after weapon he warded
off and always he moved with a single idea in mind\mbox{---}to place
himself within reach of one of his antagonists. But they were wary
for they feared this strange creature to whom the superstitious fears
of many of them attributed the miraculous powers of deity. They managed
to keep between Tarzan and the gateway and all the time they bawled
lustily for reinforcements. Should these come before he had made his
escape the ape-man realized that the odds against him would be unsurmountable,
and so he redoubled his efforts to carry out his design.

Following their usual tactics two or three of the warriors were always
circling behind him collecting the thrown clubs when Tarzan's attention
was directed elsewhere. He himself retrieved several of them which
he hurled with such deadly effect as to dispose of two of his antagonists,
but now he heard the approach of hurrying warriors, the patter of
their bare feet upon the stone pavement and then the savage cries
which were to bolster the courage of their fellows and fill the enemy
with fear.

There was no time to lose. Tarzan held a club in either hand and,
swinging one he hurled it at a warrior before him and as the man dodged
he rushed in and seized him, at the same time casting his second club
at another of his opponents. The Ho-don with whom he grappled reached
instantly for his knife but the ape-man grasped his wrist. There was
a sudden twist, the snapping of a bone and an agonized scream, then
the warrior was lifted bodily from his feet and held as a shield between
his fellows and the fugitive as the latter backed through the gateway.
Beside Tarzan stood the single torch that lighted the entrance to
the palace grounds. The warriors were advancing to the succor of their
fellow when the ape-man raised his captive high above his head and
flung him full in the face of the foremost attacker. The fellow went
down and two directly behind him sprawled headlong over their companion
as the ape-man seized the torch and cast it back into the palace grounds
to be extinguished as it struck the bodies of those who led the charging
reinforcements.

In the ensuing darkness Tarzan disappeared in the streets of Tu-lur
beyond the palace gate. For a time he was aware of sounds of pursuit
but the fact that they trailed away and died in the direction of Jad-in-lul
informed him that they were searching in the wrong direction, for
he had turned south out of Tu-lur purposely to throw them off his
track. Beyond the outskirts of the city he turned directly toward
the northwest, in which direction lay A-lur.

In his path he knew lay Jad-bal-lul, the shore of which he was compelled
to skirt, and there would be a river to cross at the lower end of
the great lake upon the shores of which lay A-lur. What other obstacles
lay in his way he did not know but he believed that he could make
better time on foot than by attempting to steal a canoe and force
his way up stream with a single paddle. It was his intention to put
as much distance as possible between himself and Tu-lur before he
slept for he was sure that Mo-sar would not lightly accept his loss,
but that with the coming of day, or possibly even before, he would
dispatch warriors in search of him.

A mile or two from the city he entered a forest and here at last he
felt such a measure of safety as he never knew in open spaces or in
cities. The forest and the jungle were his birthright. No creature
that went upon the ground upon four feet, or climbed among the trees,
or crawled upon its belly had any advantage over the ape-man in his
native heath. As myrrh and frankincense were the dank odors of rotting
vegetation in the nostrils of the great Tarmangani. He squared his
broad shoulders and lifting his head filled his lungs with the air
that he loved best. The heavy fragrance of tropical blooms, the commingled
odors of the myriad-scented life of the jungle went to his head with
a pleasurable intoxication far more potent than aught contained in
the oldest vintages of civilization.

He took to the trees now, not from necessity but from pure love of
the wild freedom that had been denied him so long. Though it was dark
and the forest strange yet he moved with a surety and ease that bespoke
more a strange uncanny sense than wondrous skill. He heard ja moaning
somewhere ahead and an owl hooted mournfully to the right of him\mbox{---}long
familiar sounds that imparted to him no sense of loneliness as they
might to you or to me, but on the contrary one of companionship for
they betokened the presence of his fellows of the jungle, and whether
friend or foe it was all the same to the ape-man.

He came at last to a little stream at a spot where the trees did not
meet above it so he was forced to descend to the ground and wade through
the water and upon the opposite shore he stopped as though suddenly
his godlike figure had been transmuted from flesh to marble. Only
his dilating nostrils bespoke his pulsing vitality. For a long moment
he stood there thus and then swiftly, but with a caution and silence
that were inherent in him he moved forward again, but now his whole
attitude bespoke a new urge. There was a definite and masterful purpose
in every movement of those steel muscles rolling softly beneath the
smooth brown hide. He moved now toward a certain goal that quite evidently
filled him with far greater enthusiasm than had the possible event
of his return to A-lur.

And so he came at last to the foot of a great tree and there he stopped
and looked up above him among the foliage where the dim outlines of
a roughly rectangular bulk loomed darkly. There was a choking sensation
in Tarzan's throat as he raised himself gently into the branches.
It was as though his heart were swelling either to a great happiness
or a great fear.

Before the rude shelter built among the branches he paused listening.
From within there came to his sensitive nostrils the same delicate
aroma that had arrested his eager attention at the little stream a
mile away. He crouched upon the branch close to the little door.

{}``Jane,'' he called, {}``heart of my heart, it is I.''

The only answer from within was as the sudden indrawing of a breath
that was half gasp and half sigh, and the sound of a body falling
to the floor. Hurriedly Tarzan sought to release the thongs which
held the door but they were fastened from the inside, and at last,
impatient with further delay, he seized the frail barrier in one giant
hand and with a single effort tore it completely away. And then he
entered to find the seemingly lifeless body of his mate stretched
upon the floor.

He gathered her in his arms; her heart beat; she still breathed, and
presently he realized that she had but swooned.

When Jane Clayton regained consciousness it was to find herself held
tightly in two strong arms, her head pillowed upon the broad shoulder
where so often before her fears had been soothed and her sorrows comforted.
At first she was not sure but that it was all a dream. Timidly her
hand stole to his cheek.

{}``John,'' she murmured, {}``tell me, is it really you?''\ 

In reply he drew her more closely to him. {}``It is I,'' he replied.
{}``But there is something in my throat,'' he said haltingly, {}``that
makes it hard for me to speak.''

She smiled and snuggled closer to him. {}``God has been good to us,
Tarzan of the Apes,'' she said.

For some time neither spoke. It was enough that they were reunited
and that each knew that the other was alive and safe. But at last
they found their voices and when the sun rose they were still talking,
so much had each to tell the other; so many questions there were to
be asked and answered.

{}``And Jack,'' she asked, {}``where is he?''\ 

{}``I do not know,'' replied Tarzan. {}``The last I heard of him
he was on the Argonne Front.''

{}``Ah, then our happiness is not quite complete,'' she said, a
little note of sadness creeping into her voice.

{}``No,'' he replied, {}``but the same is true in countless other
English homes today, and pride is learning to take the place of happiness
in these.''

She shook her head, {}``I want my boy,'' she said.

{}``And I too,'' replied Tarzan, {}``and we may have him yet. He
was safe and unwounded the last word I had. And now,'' he said, {}``we
must plan upon our return. Would you like to rebuild the bungalow
and gather together the remnants of our Waziri or would you rather
return to London?''\ 

{}``Only to find Jack,'' she said. {}``I dream always of the bungalow
and never of the city, but John, we can only dream, for Obergatz told
me that he had circled this whole country and found no place where
he might cross the morass.''

{}``I am not Obergatz,'' Tarzan reminded her, smiling. {}``We will
rest today and tomorrow we will set out toward the north. It is a
savage country, but we have crossed it once and we can cross it again.''

And so, upon the following morning, the Tarmangani and his mate went
forth upon their journey across the Valley of Jad-ben-Otho, and ahead
of them were fierce men and savage beasts, and the lofty mountains
of Pal-ul-don; and beyond the mountains the reptiles and the morass,
and beyond that the arid, thorn-covered steppe, and other savage beasts
and men and weary, hostile miles of untracked wilderness between them
and the charred ruins of their home.

Lieutenant Erich Obergatz crawled through the grass upon all fours,
leaving a trail of blood behind him after Jane's spear had sent him
crashing to the ground beneath her tree. He made no sound after the
one piercing scream that had acknowledged the severity of his wound.
He was quiet because of a great fear that had crept into his warped
brain that the devil woman would pursue and slay him. And so he crawled
away like some filthy beast of prey, seeking a thicket where he might
lie down and hide.

He thought that he was going to die, but he did not, and with the
coming of the new day he discovered that his wound was superficial.
The rough obsidian-shod spear had entered the muscles of his side
beneath his right arm inflicting a painful, but not a fatal wound.
With the realization of this fact came a renewed desire to put as
much distance as possible between himself and Jane Clayton. And so
he moved on, still going upon all fours because of a persistent hallucination
that in this way he might escape observation. Yet though he fled his
mind still revolved muddily about a central desire\mbox{---}while
he fled from her he still planned to pursue her, and to his lust of
possession was added a desire for revenge. She should pay for the
suffering she had inflicted upon him. She should pay for rebuffing
him, but for some reason which he did not try to explain to himself
he would crawl away and hide. He would come back though. He would
come back and when he had finished with her, he would take that smooth
throat in his two hands and crush the life from her.

He kept repeating this over and over to himself and then he fell to
laughing out loud, the cackling, hideous laughter that had terrified
Jane. Presently he realized his knees were bleeding and that they
hurt him. He looked cautiously behind. No one was in sight. He listened.
He could hear no indications of pursuit and so he rose to his feet
and continued upon his way a sorry sight\mbox{---}covered with filth
and blood, his beard and hair tangled and matted and filled with burrs
and dried mud and unspeakable filth. He kept no track of time. He
ate fruits and berries and tubers that he dug from the earth with
his fingers. He followed the shore of the lake and the river that
he might be near water, and when ja roared or moaned he climbed a
tree and hid there, shivering.

And so after a time he came up the southern shore of Jad-ben-lul until
a wide river stopped his progress. Across the blue water a white city
glimmered in the sun. He looked at it for a long time, blinking his
eyes like an owl. Slowly a recollection forced itself through his
tangled brain. This was A-lur, the City of Light. The association
of ideas recalled Bu-lur and the Waz-ho-don. They had called him Jad-ben-Otho.
He commenced to laugh aloud and stood up very straight and strode
back and forth along the shore. {}``I am Jad-ben-Otho,'' he cried,
{}``I am the Great God. In A-lur is my temple and my high priests.
What is Jad-ben-Otho doing here alone in the jungle?''\ 

He stepped out into the water and raising his voice shrieked loudly
across toward A-lur. {}``I am Jad-ben-Otho!''\ he screamed. {}``Come
hither slaves and take your god to his temple.'' But the distance
was great and they did not hear him and no one came, and the feeble
mind was distracted by other things\mbox{---}a bird flying in the
air, a school of minnows swimming around his feet. He lunged at them
trying to catch them, and falling upon his hands and knees he crawled
through the water grasping futilely at the elusive fish.

Presently it occurred to him that he was a sea lion and he forgot
the fish and lay down and tried to swim by wriggling his feet in the
water as though they were a tail. The hardships, the privations, the
terrors, and for the past few weeks the lack of proper nourishment
had reduced Erich Obergatz to little more than a gibbering idiot.

A water snake swam out upon the surface of the lake and the man pursued
it, crawling upon his hands and knees. The snake swam toward the shore
just within the mouth of the river where tall reeds grew thickly and
Obergatz followed, making grunting noises like a pig. He lost the
snake within the reeds but he came upon something else\mbox{---}a
canoe hidden there close to the bank. He examined it with cackling
laughter. There were two paddles within it which he took and threw
out into the current of the river. He watched them for a while and
then he sat down beside the canoe and commenced to splash his hands
up and down upon the water. He liked to hear the noise and see the
little splashes of spray. He rubbed his left forearm with his right
palm and the dirt came off and left a white spot that drew his attention.
He rubbed again upon the now thoroughly soaked blood and grime that
covered his body. He was not attempting to wash himself; he was merely
amused by the strange results. {}``I am turning white,'' he cried.
His glance wandered from his body now that the grime and blood were
all removed and caught again the white city shimmering beneath the
hot sun.

{}``A-lur\mbox{---}City of Light!''\ he shrieked and that reminded
him again of Tu-lur and by the same process of associated ideas that
had before suggested it, he recalled that the Waz-ho-don had thought
him Jad-ben-Otho.

{}``I am Jad-ben-Otho!''\ he screamed and then his eyes fell again
upon the canoe. A new idea came and persisted. He looked down at himself,
examining his body, and seeing the filthy loin cloth, now water soaked
and more bedraggled than before, he tore it from him and flung it
into the lake. {}``Gods do not wear dirty rags,'' he said aloud.
{}``They do not wear anything but wreaths and garlands of flowers
and I am a god\mbox{---}I am Jad-ben-Otho\mbox{---}and I go in
state to my sacred city of A-lur.''

He ran his fingers through his matted hair and beard. The water had
softened the burrs but had not removed them. The man shook his head.
His hair and beard failed to harmonize with his other godly attributes.
He was commencing to think more clearly now, for the great idea had
taken hold of his scattered wits and concentrated them upon a single
purpose, but he was still a maniac. The only difference being that
he was now a maniac with a fixed intent. He went out on the shore
and gathered flowers and ferns and wove them in his beard and hair\mbox{---}blazing
blooms of different colors\mbox{---}green ferns that trailed about
his ears or rose bravely upward like the plumes in a lady's hat.

When he was satisfied that his appearance would impress the most casual
observer with his evident deity he returned to the canoe, pushed it
from shore and jumped in. The impetus carried it into the river's
current and the current bore it out upon the lake. The naked man stood
erect in the center of the little craft, his arms folded upon his
chest. He screamed aloud his message to the city: {}``I am Jad-ben-Otho!
Let the high priest and the under priests attend upon me!''\ 

As the current of the river was dissipated by the waters of the lake
the wind caught him and his craft and carried them bravely forward.
Sometimes he drifted with his back toward A-lur and sometimes with
his face toward it, and at intervals he shrieked his message and his
commands. He was still in the middle of the lake when someone discovered
him from the palace wall, and as he drew nearer, a crowd of warriors
and women and children were congregated there watching him and along
the temple walls were many priests and among them Lu-don, the high
priest. When the boat had drifted close enough for them to distinguish
the bizarre figure standing in it and for them to catch the meaning
of his words Lu-don's cunning eyes narrowed. The high priest had learned
of the escape of Tarzan and he feared that should he join Ja-don's
forces, as seemed likely, he would attract many recruits who might
still believe in him, and the Dor-ul-Otho, even if a false one, upon
the side of the enemy might easily work havoc with Lu-don's plans.

The man was drifting close in. His canoe would soon be caught in the
current that ran close to shore here and carried toward the river
that emptied the waters of Jad-ben-lul into Jad-bal-lul. The under
priests were looking toward Lu-don for instructions.

{}``Fetch him hither!''\ he commanded. {}``If he is Jad-ben-Otho
I shall know him.''

The priests hurried to the palace grounds and summoned warriors. {}``Go,
bring the stranger to Lu-don. If he is Jad-ben-Otho we shall know
him.''

And so Lieutenant Erich Obergatz was brought before the high priest
at A-lur. Lu-don looked closely at the naked man with the fantastic
headdress.

{}``Where did you come from?''\ he asked.

{}``I am Jad-ben-Otho,'' cried the German. {}``I came from heaven.
Where is my high priest?''\ 

{}``I am the high priest,'' replied Lu-don.

Obergatz clapped his hands. {}``Have my feet bathed and food brought
to me,'' he commanded.

Lu-don's eyes narrowed to mere slits of crafty cunning. He bowed low
until his forehead touched the feet of the stranger. Before the eyes
of many priests, and warriors from the palace he did it.

{}``Ho, slaves,'' he cried, rising; {}``fetch water and food for
the Great God,'' and thus the high priest acknowledged before his
people the godhood of Lieutenant Erich Obergatz, nor was it long before
the story ran like wildfire through the palace and out into the city
and beyond that to the lesser villages all the way from A-lur to Tu-lur.

The real god had come\mbox{---}Jad-ben-Otho himself, and he had
espoused the cause of Lu-don, the high priest. Mo-sar lost no time
in placing himself at the disposal of Lu-don, nor did he mention aught
about his claims to the throne. It was Mo-sar's opinion that he might
consider himself fortunate were he allowed to remain in peaceful occupation
of his chieftainship at Tu-lur, nor was Mo-sar wrong in his deductions.

But Lu-don could still use him and so he let him live and sent word
to him to come to A-lur with all his warriors, for it was rumored
that Ja-don was raising a great army in the north and might soon march
upon the City of Light.

Obergatz thoroughly enjoyed being a god. Plenty of food and peace
of mind and rest partially brought back to him the reason that had
been so rapidly slipping from him; but in one respect he was madder
than ever, since now no power on earth would ever be able to convince
him that he was not a god. Slaves were put at his disposal and these
he ordered about in godly fashion. The same portion of his naturally
cruel mind met upon common ground the mind of Lu-don, so that the
two seemed always in accord. The high priest saw in the stranger a
mighty force wherewith to hold forever his power over all Pal-ul-don
and thus the future of Obergatz was assured so long as he cared to
play god to Lu-don's high priest.

A throne was erected in the main temple court before the eastern altar
where Jad-ben-Otho might sit in person and behold the sacrifices that
were offered up to him there each day at sunset. So much did the cruel,
half-crazed mind enjoy these spectacles that at times he even insisted
upon wielding the sacrificial knife himself and upon such occasions
the priests and the people fell upon their faces in awe of the dread
deity.

If Obergatz taught them not to love their god more he taught them
to fear him as they never had before, so that the name of Jad-ben-Otho
was whispered in the city and little children were frightened into
obedience by the mere mention of it. Lu-don, through his priests and
slaves, circulated the information that Jad-ben-Otho had commanded
all his faithful followers to flock to the standard of the high priest
at A-lur and that all others were cursed, especially Ja-don and the
base impostor who had posed as the Dor-ul-Otho. The curse was to take
the form of early death following terrible suffering, and Lu-don caused
it to be published abroad that the name of any warrior who complained
of a pain should be brought to him, for such might be deemed to be
under suspicion, since the first effects of the curse would result
in slight pains attacking the unholy. He counseled those who felt
pains to look carefully to their loyalty. The result was remarkable
and immediate\mbox{---}half a nation without a pain, and recruits
pouring into A-lur to offer their services to Lu-don while secretly
hoping that the little pains they had felt in arm or leg or belly
would not recur in aggravated form.


\chapter{A Journey on a Gryf}

\markboth{Tarzan the Terrible}{A Journey on a Gryf}

\textit{\emph{Tarzan}} and Jane skirted the shore of Jad-bal-lul and
crossed the river at the head of the lake. They moved in leisurely
fashion with an eye to comfort and safety, for the ape-man, now that
he had found his mate, was determined to court no chance that might
again separate them, or delay or prevent their escape from Pal-ul-don.
How they were to recross the morass was a matter of little concern
to him as yet\mbox{---}it would be time enough to consider that
matter when it became of more immediate moment. Their hours were filled
with the happiness and content of reunion after long separation; they
had much to talk of, for each had passed through many trials and vicissitudes
and strange adventures, and no important hour might go unaccounted
for since last they met.

It was Tarzan's intention to choose a way above A-lur and the scattered
Ho-don villages below it, passing about midway between them and the
mountains, thus avoiding, in so far as possible, both the Ho-don and
Waz-don, for in this area lay the neutral territory that was uninhabited
by either. Thus he would travel northwest until opposite the Kor-ul-ja
where he planned to stop to pay his respects to Om-at and give the
gund word of Pan-at-lee, and a plan Tarzan had for insuring her safe
return to her people. It was upon the third day of their journey and
they had almost reached the river that passes through A-lur when Jane
suddenly clutched Tarzan's arm and pointed ahead toward the edge of
a forest that they were approaching. Beneath the shadows of the trees
loomed a great bulk that the ape-man instantly recognized.

{}``What is it?''\ whispered Jane.

{}``A gryf,'' replied the ape-man, {}``and we have met him in the
worst place that we could possibly have found. There is not a large
tree within a quarter of a mile, other than those among which he stands.
Come, we shall have to go back, Jane; I cannot risk it with you along.
The best we can do is to pray that he does not discover us.''

{}``And if he does?''\ 

{}``Then I shall have to risk it.''

{}``Risk what?''\ 

{}``The chance that I can subdue him as I subdued one of his fellows,''
replied Tarzan. {}``I told you\mbox{---}you recall?''\ 

{}``Yes, but I did not picture so huge a creature. Why, John, he
is as big as a battleship.''

The ape-man laughed. {}``Not quite, though I'll admit he looks quite
as formidable as one when he charges.''

They were moving away slowly so as not to attract the attention of
the beast.

{}``I believe we're going to make it,'' whispered the woman, her
voice tense with suppressed excitement. A low rumble rolled like distant
thunder from the wood. Tarzan shook his head.

{}```The big show is about to commence in the main tent,''' he quoted,
grinning. He caught the woman suddenly to his breast and kissed her.
{}``One can never tell, Jane,'' he said. {}``We'll do our best\mbox{---}that
is all we can do. Give me your spear, and\mbox{---}don't run. The
only hope we have lies in that little brain more than in us. If I
can control it\mbox{---}well, let us see.''

The beast had emerged from the forest and was looking about through
his weak eyes, evidently in search of them. Tarzan raised his voice
in the weird notes of the Tor-o-don's cry, {}``Whee-oo! Whee-oo!
Whee-oo!''\ For a moment the great beast stood motionless, his attention
riveted by the call. The ape-man advanced straight toward him, Jane
Clayton at his elbow. {}``Whee-oo!''\ he cried again peremptorily.
A low rumble rolled from the gryf's cavernous chest in answer to the
call, and the beast moved slowly toward them.

{}``Fine!''\ exclaimed Tarzan. {}``The odds are in our favor now.
You can keep your nerve?\mbox{---}but I do not need to ask.''

{}``I know no fear when I am with Tarzan of the Apes,'' she replied
softly, and he felt the pressure of her soft fingers on his arm.

And thus the two approached the giant monster of a forgotten epoch
until they stood close in the shadow of a mighty shoulder. {}``Whee-oo!''\ 
shouted Tarzan and struck the hideous snout with the shaft of the
spear. The vicious side snap that did not reach its mark\mbox{---}that
evidently was not intended to reach its mark\mbox{---}was the hoped-for
answer.

{}``Come,'' said Tarzan, and taking Jane by the hand he led her
around behind the monster and up the broad tail to the great, horned
back. {}``Now will we ride in the state that our forebears knew,
before which the pomp of modern kings pales into cheap and tawdry
insignificance. How would you like to canter through Hyde Park on
a mount like this?''\ 

{}``I am afraid the Bobbies would be shocked by our riding habits,
John,'' she cried, laughingly.

Tarzan guided the gryf in the direction that they wished to go. Steep
embankments and rivers proved no slightest obstacle to the ponderous
creature.

{}``A prehistoric tank, this,'' Jane assured him, and laughing and
talking they continued on their way. Once they came unexpectedly upon
a dozen Ho-don warriors as the gryf emerged suddenly into a small
clearing. The fellows were lying about in the shade of a single tree
that grew alone. When they saw the beast they leaped to their feet
in consternation and at their shouts the gryf issued his hideous,
challenging bellow and charged them. The warriors fled in all directions
while Tarzan belabored the beast across the snout with his spear in
an effort to control him, and at last he succeeded, just as the gryf
was almost upon one poor devil that it seemed to have singled out
for its special prey. With an angry grunt the gryf stopped and the
man, with a single backward glance that showed a face white with terror,
disappeared in the jungle he had been seeking to reach.

The ape-man was elated. He had doubted that he could control the beast
should it take it into its head to charge a victim and had intended
abandoning it before they reached the Kor-ul-ja. Now he altered his
plans\mbox{---}they would ride to the very village of Om-at upon
the gryf, and the Kor-ul-ja would have food for conversation for many
generations to come. Nor was it the theatric instinct of the ape-man
alone that gave favor to this plan. The element of Jane's safety entered
into the matter for he knew that she would be safe from man and beast
alike so long as she rode upon the back of Pal-ul-don's most formidable
creature.

As they proceeded slowly in the direction of the Kor-ul-ja, for the
natural gait of the gryf is far from rapid, a handful of terrified
warriors came panting into A-lur, spreading a weird story of the Dor-ul-Otho,
only none dared call him the Dor-ul-Otho aloud. Instead they spoke
of him as Tarzan-jad-guru and they told of meeting him mounted upon
a mighty gryf beside the beautiful stranger woman whom Ko-tan would
have made queen of Pal-ul-don. This story was brought to Lu-don who
caused the warriors to be hailed to his presence, when he questioned
them closely until finally he was convinced that they spoke the truth
and when they had told him the direction in which the two were traveling,
Lu-don guessed that they were on their way to Ja-lur to join Ja-don,
a contingency that he felt must be prevented at any cost. As was his
wont in the stress of emergency, he called Pan-sat into consultation
and for long the two sat in close conference. When they arose a plan
had been developed. Pan-sat went immediately to his own quarters where
he removed the headdress and trappings of a priest to don in their
stead the harness and weapons of a warrior. Then he returned to Lu-don.

{}``Good!''\ cried the latter, when he saw him. {}``Not even your
fellow-priests or the slaves that wait upon you daily would know you
now. Lose no time, Pan-sat, for all depends upon the speed with which
you strike and\mbox{---}\linebreak[1]remember! Kill the man if
you can; but in any event bring the woman to me here, alive. You understand?''\ 

{}``Yes, master,'' replied the priest, and so it was that a lone
warrior set out from A-lur and made his way northwest in the direction
of Ja-lur.

The gorge next above Kor-ul-ja is uninhabited and here the wily Ja-don
had chosen to mobilize his army for its descent upon A-lur. Two considerations
influenced him\mbox{---}one being the fact that could he keep his
plans a secret from the enemy he would have the advantage of delivering
a surprise attack upon the forces of Lu-don from a direction that
they would not expect attack, and in the meantime he would be able
to keep his men from the gossip of the cities where strange tales
were already circulating relative to the coming of Jad-ben-Otho in
person to aid the high priest in his war against Ja-don. It took stout
hearts and loyal ones to ignore the implied threats of divine vengeance
that these tales suggested. Already there had been desertions and
the cause of Ja-don seemed tottering to destruction.

Such was the state of affairs when a sentry posted on the knoll in
the mouth of the gorge sent word that he had observed in the valley
below what appeared at a distance to be nothing less than two people
mounted upon the back of a gryf. He said that he had caught glimpses
of them, as they passed open spaces, and they seemed to be traveling
up the river in the direction of the Kor-ul-ja.

At first Ja-don was inclined to doubt the veracity of his informant;
but, like all good generals, he could not permit even palpably false
information to go uninvestigated and so he determined to visit the
knoll himself and learn precisely what it was that the sentry had
observed through the distorting spectacles of fear. He had scarce
taken his place beside the man ere the fellow touched his arm and
pointed. {}``They are closer now,'' he whispered, {}``you can see
them plainly.'' And sure enough, not a quarter of a mile away Ja-don
saw that which in his long experience in Pal-ul-don he had never before
seen\mbox{---}two humans riding upon the broad back of a gryf.

At first he could scarce credit even this testimony of his own eyes,
but soon he realized that the creatures below could be naught else
than they appeared, and then he recognized the man and rose to his
feet with a loud cry.

{}``It is he!''\ he shouted to those about him. {}``It is the
Dor-ul-Otho himself.''

The gryf and his riders heard the shout though not the words. The
former bellowed terrifically and started in the direction of the knoll,
and Ja-don, followed by a few of his more intrepid warriors, ran to
meet him. Tarzan, loath to enter an unnecessary quarrel, tried to
turn the animal, but as the beast was far from tractable it always
took a few minutes to force the will of its master upon it; and so
the two parties were quite close before the ape-man succeeded in stopping
the mad charge of his furious mount.

Ja-don and his warriors, however, had come to the realization that
this bellowing creature was bearing down upon them with evil intent
and they had assumed the better part of valor and taken to trees,
accordingly. It was beneath these trees that Tarzan finally stopped
the gryf. Ja-don called down to him.

{}``We are friends,'' he cried. {}``I am Ja-don, Chief of Ja-lur.
I and my warriors lay our foreheads upon the feet of Dor-ul-Otho and
pray that he will aid us in our righteous fight with Lu-don, the high
priest.''

{}``You have not defeated him yet?''\ asked Tarzan. {}``Why I
thought you would be king of Pal-ul-don long before this.''

{}``No,'' replied Ja-don. {}``The people fear the high priest and
now that he has in the temple one whom he claims to be Jad-ben-Otho
many of my warriors are afraid. If they but knew that the Dor-ul-Otho
had returned and that he had blessed the cause of Ja-don I am sure
that victory would be ours.''

Tarzan thought for a long minute and then he spoke. {}``Ja-don,''
he said, {}``was one of the few who believed in me and who wished
to accord me fair treatment. I have a debt to pay to Ja-don and an
account to settle with Lu-don, not alone on my own behalf, but principally
upon that of my mate. I will go with you Ja-don to mete to Lu-don
the punishment he deserves. Tell me, chief, how may the Dor-ul-Otho
best serve his father's people?''\ 

{}``By coming with me to Ja-lur and the villages between,'' replied
Ja-don quickly, {}``that the people may see that it is indeed the
Dor-ul-Otho and that he smiles upon the cause of Ja-don.''

{}``You think that they will believe in me more now than before?''\ 
asked the ape-man.

{}``Who will dare doubt that he who rides upon the great gryf is
less than a god?''\ returned the old chief.

{}``And if I go with you to the battle at A-lur,'' asked Tarzan,
{}``can you assure the safety of my mate while I am gone from her?''\ 

{}``She shall remain in Ja-lur with the Princess O-lo-a and my own
women,'' replied Ja-don. {}``There she will be safe for there I
shall leave trusted warriors to protect them. Say that you will come,
O Dor-ul-Otho, and my cup of happiness will be full, for even now
Ta-den, my son, marches toward A-lur with a force from the northwest
and if we can attack, with the Dor-ul-Otho at our head, from the northeast
our arms should be victorious.''

{}``It shall be as you wish, Ja-don,'' replied the ape-man; {}``but
first you must have meat fetched for my gryf.''

{}``There are many carcasses in the camp above,'' replied Ja-don,
{}``for my men have little else to do than hunt.''

{}``Good,'' exclaimed Tarzan. {}``Have them brought at once.''

And when the meat was-brought and laid at a distance the ape-man slipped
from the back of his fierce charger and fed him with his own hand.
{}``See that there is always plenty of flesh for him,'' he said
to Ja-don, for he guessed that his mastery might be short-lived should
the vicious beast become over-hungry.

It was morning before they could leave for Ja-lur, but Tarzan found
the gryf lying where he had left him the night before beside the carcasses
of two antelope and a lion; but now there was nothing but the gryf.

{}``The paleontologists say that he was herbivorous,'' said Tarzan
as he and Jane approached the beast.

The journey to Ja-lur was made through the scattered villages where
Ja-don hoped to arouse a keener enthusiasm for his cause. A party
of warriors preceded Tarzan that the people might properly be prepared,
not only for the sight of the gryf but to receive the Dor-ul-Otho
as became his high station. The results were all that Ja-don could
have hoped and in no village through which they passed was there one
who doubted the deity of the ape-man.

As they approached Ja-lur a strange warrior joined them, one whom
none of Ja-don's following knew. He said he came from one of the villages
to the south and that he had been treated unfairly by one of Lu-don's
chiefs. For this reason he had deserted the cause of the high priest
and come north in the hope of finding a home in Ja-lur. As every addition
to his forces was welcome to the old chief he permitted the stranger
to accompany them, and so he came into Ja-lur with them.

There arose now the question as to what was to be done with the gryf
while they remained in the city. It was with difficulty that Tarzan
had prevented the savage beast from attacking all who came near it
when they had first entered the camp of Ja-don in the uninhabited
gorge next to the Kor-ul-ja, but during the march to Ja-lur the creature
had seemed to become accustomed to the presence of the Ho-don. The
latter, however, gave him no cause for annoyance since they kept as
far from him as possible and when he passed through the streets of
the city he was viewed from the safety of lofty windows and roofs.
However tractable he appeared to have become there would have been
no enthusiastic seconding of a suggestion to turn him loose within
the city. It was finally suggested that he be turned into a walled
enclosure within the palace grounds and this was done, Tarzan driving
him in after Jane had dismounted. More meat was thrown to him and
he was left to his own devices, the awe-struck inhabitants of the
palace not even venturing to climb upon the walls to look at him.

Ja-don led Tarzan and Jane to the quarters of the Princess O-lo-a
who, the moment that she beheld the ape-man, threw herself to the
ground and touched her forehead to his feet. Pan-at-lee was there
with her and she too seemed happy to see Tarzan-jad-guru again. When
they found that Jane was his mate they looked with almost equal awe
upon her, since even the most skeptical of the warriors of Ja-don
were now convinced that they were entertaining a god and a goddess
within the city of Ja-lur, and that with the assistance of the power
of these two, the cause of Ja-don would soon be victorious and the
old Lion-man set upon the throne of Pal-ul-don.

From O-lo-a Tarzan learned that Ta-den had returned and that they
were to be united in marriage with the weird rites of their religion
and in accordance with the custom of their people as soon as Ta-den
came home from the battle that was to be fought at A-lur.

The recruits were now gathering at the city and it was decided that
the next day Ja-don and Tarzan would return to the main body in the
hidden camp and immediately under cover of night the attack should
be made in force upon Lu-don's forces at A-lur. Word of this was sent
to Ta-den where he awaited with his warriors upon the north side of
Jad-ben-lul, only a few miles from A-lur.

In the carrying out of these plans it was necessary to leave Jane
behind in Ja-don's palace at Ja-lur, but O-lo-a and her women were
with her and there were many warriors to guard them, so Tarzan bid
his mate good-bye with no feelings of apprehension as to her safety,
and again seated upon the gryf made his way out of the city with Ja-don
and his warriors.

At the mouth of the gorge the ape-man abandoned his huge mount since
it had served its purpose and could be of no further value to him
in their attack upon A-lur, which was to be made just before dawn
the following day when, as he could not have been seen by the enemy,
the effect of his entry to the city upon the gryf would have been
totally lost. A couple of sharp blows with the spear sent the big
animal rumbling and growling in the direction of the Kor-ul-gryf nor
was the ape-man sorry to see it depart since he had never known at
what instant its short temper and insatiable appetite for flesh might
turn it upon some of his companions.

Immediately upon their arrival at the gorge the march on A-lur was
commenced.


\chapter{Taken Alive}

\markboth{Tarzan the Terrible}{Taken Alive}

\textit{\emph{As}} \textit{\emph{night}} fell a warrior from the palace
of Ja-lur slipped into the temple grounds. He made his way to where
the lesser priests were quartered. His presence aroused no suspicion
as it was not unusual for warriors to have business within the temple.
He came at last to a chamber where several priests were congregated
after the evening meal. The rites and ceremonies of the sacrifice
had been concluded and there was nothing more of a religious nature
to make call upon their time until the rites at sunrise.

Now the warrior knew, as in fact nearly all Pal-ul-don knew, that
there was no strong bond between the temple and the palace at Ja-lur
and that Ja-don only suffered the presence of the priests and permitted
their cruel and abhorrent acts because of the fact that these things
had been the custom of the Ho-don of Pal-ul-don for countless ages,
and rash indeed must have been the man who would have attempted to
interfere with the priests or their ceremonies. That Ja-don never
entered the temple was well known, and that his high priest never
entered the palace, but the people came to the temple with their votive
offerings and the sacrifices were made night and morning as in every
other temple in Pal-ul-don.

The warriors knew these things, knew them better perhaps than a simple
warrior should have known them. And so it was here in the temple that
he looked for the aid that he sought in the carrying out of whatever
design he had.

As he entered the apartment where the priests were he greeted them
after the manner which was customary in Pal-ul-don, but at the same
time he made a sign with his finger that might have attracted little
attention or scarcely been noticed at all by one who knew not its
meaning. That there were those within the room who noticed it and
interpreted it was quickly apparent, through the fact that two of
the priests rose and came close to him as he stood just within the
doorway and each of them, as he came, returned the signal that the
warrior had made.

The three talked for but a moment and then the warrior turned and
left the apartment. A little later one of the priests who had talked
with him left also and shortly after that the other.

In the corridor they found the warrior waiting, and led him to a little
chamber which opened upon a smaller corridor just beyond where it
joined the larger. Here the three remained in whispered conversation
for some little time and then the warrior returned to the palace and
the two priests to their quarters.

The apartments of the women of the palace at Ja-lur are all upon the
same side of a long, straight corridor. Each has a single door leading
into the corridor and at the opposite end several windows overlooking
a garden. It was in one of these rooms that Jane slept alone. At each
end of the corridor was a sentinel, the main body of the guard being
stationed in a room near the outer entrance to the women's quarters.

The palace slept for they kept early hours there where Ja-don ruled.
The pal-e-don-so of the great chieftain of the north knew no such
wild orgies as had resounded through the palace of the king at A-lur.
Ja-lur was a quiet city by comparison with the capital, yet there
was always a guard kept at every entrance to the chambers of Ja-don
and his immediate family as well as at the gate leading into the temple
and that which opened upon the city.

These guards, however, were small, consisting usually of not more
than five or six warriors, one of whom remained awake while the others
slept. Such were the conditions then when two warriors presented themselves,
one at either end of the corridor, to the sentries who watched over
the safety of Jane Clayton and the Princess O-lo-a, and each of the
newcomers repeated to the sentinels the stereotyped words which announced
that they were relieved and these others sent to watch in their stead.
Never is a warrior loath to be relieved of sentry duty. Where, under
different circumstances he might ask numerous questions he is now
too well satisfied to escape the monotonies of that universally hated
duty. And so these two men accepted their relief without question
and hastened away to their pallets.

And then a third warrior entered the corridor and all of the newcomers
came together before the door of the ape-man's slumbering mate. And
one was the strange warrior who had met Ja-don and Tarzan outside
the city of Ja-lur as they had approached it the previous day; and
he was the same warrior who had entered the temple a short hour before,
but the faces of his fellows were unfamiliar, even to one another,
since it is seldom that a priest removes his hideous headdress in
the presence even of his associates.

Silently they lifted the hangings that hid the interior of the room
from the view of those who passed through the corridor, and stealthily
slunk within. Upon a pile of furs in a far corner lay the sleeping
form of Lady Greystoke. The bare feet of the intruders gave forth
no sound as they crossed the stone floor toward her. A ray of moonlight
entering through a window near her couch shone full upon her, revealing
the beautiful contours of an arm and shoulder in cameo-distinctness
against the dark furry pelt beneath which she slept, and the perfect
profile that was turned toward the skulking three.

But neither the beauty nor the helplessness of the sleeper aroused
such sentiments of passion or pity as might stir in the breasts of
normal men. To the three priests she was but a lump of clay, nor could
they conceive aught of that passion which had aroused men to intrigue
and to murder for possession of this beautiful American girl, and
which even now was influencing the destiny of undiscovered Pal-ul-don.

Upon the floor of the chamber were numerous pelts and as the leader
of the trio came close to the sleeping woman he stooped and gathered
up one of the smaller of these. Standing close to her head he held
the rug outspread above her face. {}``Now,'' he whispered and simultaneously
he threw the rug over the woman's head and his two fellows leaped
upon her, seizing her arms and pinioning her body while their leader
stifled her cries with the furry pelt. Quickly and silently they bound
her wrists and gagged her and during the brief time that their work
required there was no sound that might have been heard by occupants
of the adjoining apartments.

Jerking her roughly to her feet they forced her toward a window but
she refused to walk, throwing herself instead upon the floor. They
were very angry and would have resorted to -cruelties to compel her
obedience but dared not, since the wrath of Lu-don might fall heavily
upon whoever mutilated his fair prize.

And so they were forced to lift and carry her bodily. Nor was the
task any sinecure since the captive kicked and struggled as best she
might, making their labor as arduous as possible. But finally they
succeeded in getting her through the window and into the garden beyond
where one of the two priests from the Ja-lur temple directed their
steps toward a small barred gateway in the south wall of the enclosure.

Immediately beyond this a flight of stone stairs led downward toward
the river and at the foot of the stairs were moored several canoes.
Pan-sat had indeed been fortunate in enlisting aid from those who
knew the temple and the palace so well, or otherwise he might never
have escaped from Ja-lur with his captive. Placing the woman in the
bottom of a light canoe Pan-sat entered it and took up the paddle.
His companions unfastened the moorings and shoved the little craft
out into the current of the stream. Their traitorous work completed
they turned and retraced their steps toward the temple, while Pan-sat,
paddling strongly with the current, moved rapidly down the river that
would carry him to the Jad-ben-lul and A-lur.

The moon had set and the eastern horizon still gave no hint of approaching
day as a long file of warriors wound stealthily through the darkness
into the city of A-lur. Their plans were all laid and there seemed
no likelihood of their miscarriage. A messenger had been dispatched
to Ta-den whose forces lay northwest of the city. Tarzan, with a small
contingent, was to enter the temple through the secret passageway,
the location of which he alone knew, while Ja-don, with the greater
proportion of the warriors, was to attack the palace gates.

The ape-man, leading his little band, moved stealthily through the
winding alleys of A-lur, arriving undetected at the building which
hid the entrance to the secret passageway. This spot being best protected
by the fact that its existence was unknown to others than the priests,
was unguarded. To facilitate the passage of his little company through
the narrow winding, uneven tunnel, Tarzan lighted a torch which had
been brought for the purpose and preceding his warriors led the way
toward the temple.

That he could accomplish much once he reached the inner chambers of
the temple with his little band of picked warriors the ape-man was
confident since an attack at this point would bring confusion and
consternation to the easily overpowered priests, and permit Tarzan
to attack the palace forces in the rear at the same time that Ja-don
engaged them at the palace gates, while Ta-den and his forces swarmed
the northern walls. Great value had been placed by Ja-don on the moral
effect of the Dor-ul-Otho's mysterious appearance in the heart of
the temple and he had urged Tarzan to take every advantage of the
old chieftain's belief that many of Lu-don's warriors still wavered
in their allegiance between the high priest and the Dor-ul-Otho, being
held to the former more by the fear which he engendered in the breasts
of all his followers than by any love or loyalty they might feel toward
him.

There is a Pal-ul-donian proverb setting forth a truth similar to
that contained in the old Scotch adage that {}``The best laid schemes
o' mice and men gang aft a-gley.'' Freely translated it might read,
{}``He who follows the right trail sometimes reaches the wrong destination,''
and such apparently was the fate that lay in the footsteps of the
great chieftain of the north and his godlike ally.

Tarzan, more familiar with the windings of the corridors than his
fellows and having the advantage of the full light of the torch, which
at best was but a dim and flickering affair, was some distance ahead
of the others, and in his keen anxiety to close with the enemy he
gave too little thought to those who were to support him. Nor is this
strange, since from childhood the ape-man had been accustomed to fight
the battles of life single-handed so that it had become habitual for
him to depend solely upon his own cunning and prowess.

And so it was that he came into the upper corridor from which opened
the chambers of Lu-don and the lesser priests far in advance of his
warriors, and as he turned into this corridor with its dim cressets
flickering somberly, he saw another enter it from a corridor before
him\mbox{---}a warrior half carrying, half dragging the figure of
a woman. Instantly Tarzan recognized the gagged and fettered captive
whom he had thought safe in the palace of Ja-don at Ja-lur.

The warrior with the woman had seen Tarzan at the same instant that
the latter had discovered him. He heard the low beastlike growl that
broke from the ape-man's lips as he sprang forward to wrest his mate
from her captor and wreak upon him the vengeance that was in the Tarmangani's
savage heart. Across the corridor from Pan-sat was the entrance to
a smaller chamber. Into this he leaped carrying the woman with him.

Close behind came Tarzan of the Apes. He had cast aside his torch
and drawn the long knife that had been his father's. With the impetuosity
of a charging bull he rushed into the chamber in pursuit of Pan-sat
to find himself, when the hangings dropped behind him, in utter darkness.
Almost immediately there was a crash of stone on stone before him
followed a moment later by a similar crash behind. No other evidence
was necessary to announce to the ape-man that he was again a prisoner
in Lu-don's temple.

He stood perfectly still where he had halted at the first sound of
the descending stone door. Not again would he easily be precipitated
to the gryf pit, or some similar danger, as had occurred when Lu-don
had trapped him in the Temple of the Gryf. As he stood there his eyes
slowly grew accustomed to the darkness and he became aware that a
dim light was entering the chamber through some opening, though it
was several minutes before he discovered its source. In the roof of
the chamber he finally discerned a small aperture, possibly three
feet in diameter and it was through this that what was really only
a lesser darkness rather than a light was penetrating its Stygian
blackness of the chamber in which he was imprisoned.

Since the doors had fallen he had heard no sound though his keen ears
were constantly strained in an effort to discover a clue to the direction
taken by the abductor of his mate. Presently he could discern the
outlines of his prison cell. It was a small room, not over fifteen
feet across. On hands and knees, with the utmost caution, he examined
the entire area of the floor. In the exact center, directly beneath
the opening in the roof, was a trap, but otherwise the floor was solid.
With this knowledge it was only necessary to avoid this spot in so
far as the floor was concerned. The walls next received his attention.
There were only two openings. One the doorway through which he had
entered, and upon the opposite side that through which the warrior
had borne Jane Clayton. These were both closed by the slabs of stone
which the fleeing warrior had released as he departed.

Lu-don, the high priest, licked his thin lips and rubbed his bony
white hands together in gratification as Pan-sat bore Jane Clayton
into his presence and laid her on the floor of the chamber before
him.

{}``Good, Pan-sat!''\ he exclaimed. {}``You shall be well rewarded
for this service. Now, if we but had the false Dor-ul-Otho in our
power all Pal-ul-don would be at our feet.''

{}``Master, I have him!''\ cried Pan-sat.

{}``What!''\ exclaimed Lu-don, {}``you have Tarzan-jad-guru? You
have slain him perhaps. Tell me, my wonderful Pan-sat, tell me quickly.
My breast is bursting with a desire to know.''

{}``I have taken him alive, Lu-don, my master,'' replied Pan-sat.
{}``He is in the little chamber that the ancients built to trap those
who were too powerful to take alive in personal encounter.''

{}``You have done well, Pan-sat, I\mbox{---}''

A frightened priest burst into the apartment. {}``Quick, master,
quick,'' he cried, {}``the corridors are filled with the warriors
of Ja-don.''

{}``You are mad,'' cried the high priest. {}``My warriors hold
the palace and the temple.''

{}``I speak the truth, master,'' replied the priest, {}``there
are warriors in the corridor approaching this very chamber, and they
come from the direction of the secret passage which leads hither from
the city.''

{}``It may be even as he says,'' exclaimed Pan-sat. {}``It was
from that direction that Tarzan-jad-guru was coming when I discovered
and trapped him. He was leading his warriors to the very holy of holies.''

Lu-don ran quickly to the doorway and looked out into the corridor.
At a glance he saw that the fears of the frightened priest were well
founded. A dozen warriors were moving along the corridor toward him
but they seemed confused and far from sure of themselves. The high
priest guessed that deprived of the leadership of Tarzan they were
little better than lost in the unknown mazes of the subterranean precincts
of the temple.

Stepping back into the apartment he seized a leathern thong that depended
from the ceiling. He pulled upon it sharply and through the temple
boomed the deep tones of a metal gong. Five times the clanging notes
rang through the corridors, then he turned toward the two priests.
{}``Bring the woman and follow me,'' he directed.

Crossing the chamber he passed through a small doorway, the others
lifting Jane Clayton from the floor and following him. Through a narrow
corridor and up a flight of steps they went, turning to right and
left and doubling back through a maze of winding passageways which
terminated in a spiral staircase that gave forth at the surface of
the ground within the largest of the inner altar courts close beside
the eastern altar.

From all directions now, in the corridors below and the grounds above,
came the sound of hurrying footsteps. The five strokes of the great
gong had summoned the faithful to the defense of Lu-don in his private
chambers. The priests who knew the way led the less familiar warriors
to the spot and presently those who had accompanied Tarzan found themselves
not only leaderless but facing a vastly superior force. They were
brave men but under the circumstances they were helpless and so they
fell back the way they had come, and when they reached the narrow
confines of the smaller passageway their safety was assured since
only one foeman could attack them at a time. But their plans were
frustrated and possibly also their entire cause lost, so heavily had
Ja-don banked upon the success of their venture.

With the clanging of the temple gong Ja-don assumed that Tarzan and
his party had struck their initial blow and so he launched his attack
upon the palace gate. To the ears of Lu-don in the inner temple court
came the savage war cries that announced the beginning of the battle.
Leaving Pan-sat and the other priest to guard the woman he hastened
toward the palace personally to direct his force and as he passed
through the temple grounds he dispatched a messenger to learn the
outcome of the fight in the corridors below, and other messengers
to spread the news among his followers that the false Dor-ul-Otho
was a prisoner in the temple.

As the din of battle rose above A-lur, Lieutenant Erich Obergatz turned
upon his bed of soft hides and sat up. He rubbed his eyes and looked
about him. It was still dark without.

{}``I am Jad-ben-Otho,'' he cried, {}``who dares disturb my slumber?''\ 

A slave squatting upon the floor at the foot of his couch shuddered
and touched her forehead to the floor. {}``It must be that the enemy
have come, O Jad-ben-Otho.'' She spoke soothingly for she had reason
to know the terrors of the mad frenzy into which trivial things sometimes
threw the Great God.

A priest burst suddenly through the hangings of the doorway and falling
upon his hands and knees rubbed his forehead against the stone flagging.
{}``O Jad-ben-Otho,'' he cried, {}``the warriors of Ja-don have
attacked the palace and the temple. Even now they are fighting in
the corridors near the quarters of Lu-don, and the high priest begs
that you come to the palace and encourage your faithful warriors by
your presence.''

Obergatz sprang to his feet. {}``I am Jad-ben-Otho,'' he screamed.
{}``With lightning I will blast the blasphemers who dare attack the
holy city of A-lur.''

For a moment he rushed aimlessly and madly about the room, while the
priest and the slave remained upon hands and knees with their foreheads
against the floor.

{}``Come,'' cried Obergatz, planting a vicious kick in the side
of the slave girl. {}``Come! Would you wait here all day while the
forces of darkness overwhelm the City of Light?''\ 

Thoroughly frightened as were all those who were forced to serve the
Great God, the two arose and followed Obergatz towards the palace.

Above the shouting of the warriors rose constantly the cries of the
temple priests: {}``Jad-ben-Otho is here and the false Dor-ul-Otho
is a prisoner in the temple.'' The persistent cries reached even
to the ears of the enemy as it was intended that they should.


\chapter{The Messenger of Death}

\markboth{Tarzan the Terrible}{The Messenger of Death}

\textit{\emph{The}} sun rose to see the forces of Ja-don still held
at the palace gate. The old warrior had seized the tall structure
that stood just beyond the palace and at the summit of this he kept
a warrior stationed to look toward the northern wall of the palace
where Ta-den was to make his attack; but as the minutes wore into
hours no sign of the other force appeared, and now in the full light
of the new sun upon the roof of one of the palace buildings appeared
Lu-don, the high priest, Mo-sar, the pretender, and the strange, naked
figure of a man, into whose long hair and beard were woven fresh ferns
and flowers. Behind them were banked a score of lesser priests who
chanted in unison: {}``This is Jad-ben-Otho. Lay down your arms and
surrender.'' This they repeated again and again, alternating it with
the cry: {}``The false Dor-ul-Otho is a prisoner.''

In one of those lulls which are common in battles between forces armed
with weapons that require great physical effort in their use, a voice
suddenly arose from among the followers of Ja-don: {}``Show us the
Dor-ul-Otho. We do not believe you!''\ 

{}``Wait,'' cried Lu-don. {}``If I do not produce him before the
sun has moved his own width, the gates of the palace shall be opened
to you and my warriors will lay down their arms.''

He turned to one of his priests and issued brief instructions.

The ape-man paced the confines of his narrow cell. Bitterly he reproached
himself for the stupidity which had led him into this trap, and yet
was it stupidity? What else might he have done other than rush to
the succor of his mate? He wondered how they had stolen her from Ja-lur,
and then suddenly there flashed to his mind the features of the warrior
whom he had just seen with her. They were strangely familiar. He racked
his brain to recall where he had seen the man before and then it came
to him. He was the strange warrior who had joined Ja-don's forces
outside of Ja-lur the day that Tarzan had ridden upon the great gryf
from the uninhabited gorge next to the Kor-ul-ja down to the capital
city of the chieftain of the north. But who could the man be? Tarzan
knew that never before that other day had he seen him.

Presently he heard the clanging of a gong from the corridor without
and very faintly the rush of feet, and shouts. He guessed that his
warriors had been discovered and a fight was in progress. He fretted
and chafed at the chance that had denied him participation in it.

Again and again he tried the doors of his prison and the trap in the
center of the floor, but none would give to his utmost endeavors.
He strained his eyes toward the aperture above but he could see nothing,
and then he continued his futile pacing to and fro like a caged lion
behind its bars.

The minutes dragged slowly into hours. Faintly sounds came to him
as of shouting men at a great distance. The battle was in progress.
He wondered if Ja-don would be victorious and should he be, would
his friends ever discover him in this hidden chamber in the bowels
of the hill? He doubted it.

And now as he looked again toward the aperture in the roof there appeared
to be something depending through its center. He came closer and strained
his eyes to see. Yes, there was something there. It appeared to be
a rope. Tarzan wondered if it had been there all the time. It must
have, he reasoned, since he had heard no sound from above and it was
so dark within the chamber that he might easily have overlooked it.

He raised his hand toward it. The end of it was just within his reach.
He bore his weight upon it to see if it would hold him. Then he released
it and backed away, still watching it, as you have seen an animal
do after investigating some unfamiliar object, one of the little traits
that differentiated Tarzan from other men, accentuating his similarity
to the savage beasts of his native jungle. Again and again he touched
and tested the braided leather rope, and always he listened for any
warning sound from above.

He was very careful not to step upon the trap at any time and when
finally he bore all his weight upon the rope and took his feet from
the floor he spread them wide apart so that if he fell he would fall
astride the trap. The rope held him. There was no sound from above,
nor any from the trap below.

Slowly and cautiously he drew himself upward, hand over hand. Nearer
and nearer the roof he came. In a moment his eyes would be above the
level of the floor above. Already his extended arms projected into
the upper chamber and then something closed suddenly upon both his
forearms, pinioning them tightly and leaving him hanging in mid-air
unable to advance or retreat.

Immediately a light appeared in the room above him and presently he
saw the hideous mask of a priest peering down upon him. In the priest's
hands were leathern thongs and these he tied about Tarzan's wrists
and forearms until they were completely bound together from his elbows
almost to his fingers. Behind this priest Tarzan presently saw others
and soon several lay hold of him and pulled him up through the hole.

Almost instantly his eyes were above the level of the floor he understood
how they had trapped him. Two nooses had lain encircling the aperture
into the cell below. A priest had waited at the end of each of these
ropes and at opposite sides of the chamber. When he had climbed to
a sufficient height upon the rope that had dangled into his prison
below and his arms were well within the encircling snares the two
priests had pulled quickly upon their ropes and he had been made an
easy captive without any opportunity of defending himself or inflicting
injury upon his captors.

And now they bound his legs from his ankles to his knees and picking
him up carried him from the chamber. No word did they speak to him
as they bore him upward to the temple yard.

The din of battle had risen again as Ja-don had urged his forces to
renewed efforts. Ta-den had not arrived and the forces of the old
chieftain were revealing in their lessened efforts their increasing
demoralization, and then it was that the priests carried Tarzan-jad-guru
to the roof of the palace and exhibited him in the sight of the warriors
of both factions.

{}``Here is the false Dor-ul-Otho,'' screamed Lu-don.

Obergatz, his shattered mentality having never grasped fully the meaning
of much that was going on about him, cast a casual glance at the bound
and helpless prisoner, and as his eyes fell upon the noble features
of the ape-man, they went wide in astonishment and fright, and his
pasty countenance turned a sickly blue. Once before had he seen Tarzan
of the Apes, but many times had he dreamed that he had seen him and
always was the giant ape-man avenging the wrongs that had been committed
upon him and his by the ruthless hands of the three German officers
who had led their native troops in the ravishing of Tarzan's peaceful
home. Hauptmann Fritz Schneider had paid the penalty of his needless
cruelties; Unter-lieutenant von Goss, too, had paid; and now Obergatz,
the last of the three, stood face to face with the Nemesis that had
trailed him through his dreams for long, weary months. That he was
bound and helpless lessened not the German's terror\mbox{---}he
seemed not to realize that the man could not harm him. He but stood
cringing and jibbering and Lu-don saw and was filled with apprehension
that others might see and seeing realize that this bewhiskered idiot
was no god\mbox{---}that of the two Tarzan-jad-guru was the more
godly figure. Already the high priest noted that some of the palace
warriors standing near were whispering together and pointing. He stepped
closer to Obergatz. {}``You are Jad-ben-Otho,'' he whispered, {}``denounce
him!''\ 

The German shook himself. His mind cleared of all but his great terror
and the words of the high priest gave him the clue to safety.

{}``I am Jad-ben-Otho!''\ he screamed.

Tarzan looked him straight in the eye. {}``You are Lieutenant Obergatz
of the German Army,'' he said in excellent German. {}``You are the
last of the three I have sought so long and in your putrid heart you
know that God has not brought us together at last for nothing.''

The mind of Lieutenant Obergatz was functioning clearly and rapidly
at last. He too saw the questioning looks upon the faces of some of
those around them. He saw the opposing warriors of both cities standing
by the gate inactive, every eye turned upon him, and the trussed figure
of the ape-man. He realized that indecision now meant ruin, and ruin,
death. He raised his voice in the sharp barking tones of a Prussian
officer, so unlike his former maniacal screaming as to quickly arouse
the attention of every ear and to cause an expression of puzzlement
to cross the crafty face of Lu-don.

{}``I am Jad-ben-Otho,'' snapped Obergatz. {}``This creature is
no son of mine. As a lesson to all blasphemers he shall die upon the
altar at the hand of the god he has profaned. Take him from my sight,
and when the sun stands at zenith let the faithful congregate in the
temple court and witness the wrath of this divine hand,'' and he
held aloft his right palm.

Those who had brought Tarzan took him away then as Obergatz had directed,
and the German turned once more to the warriors by the gate. {}``Throw
down your arms, warriors of Ja-don,'' he cried, {}``lest I call
down my lightnings to blast you where you stand. Those who do as I
bid shall be forgiven. Come! Throw down your arms.''

The warriors of Ja-don moved uneasily, casting looks of appeal at
their leader and of apprehension toward the figures upon the palace
roof. Ja-don sprang forward among his men. {}``Let the cowards and
knaves throw down their arms and enter the palace,'' he cried, {}``but
never will Ja-don and the warriors of Ja-lur touch their foreheads
to the feet of Lu-don and his false god. Make your decision now,''
he cried to his followers.

A few threw down their arms and with sheepish looks passed through
the gateway into the palace, and with the example of these to bolster
their courage others joined in the desertion from the old chieftain
of the north, but staunch and true around him stood the majority of
his warriors and when the last weakling had left their ranks Ja-don
voiced the savage cry with which he led his followers to the attack,
and once again the battle raged about the palace gate.

At times Ja-don's forces pushed the defenders far into the palace
ground and then the wave of combat would recede and pass out into
the city again. And still Ta-den and the reinforcements did not come.
It was drawing close to noon. Lu-don had mustered every available
man that was not actually needed for the defense of the gate within
the temple, and these he sent, under the leadership of Pan-sat, out
into the city through the secret passageway and there they fell upon
Ja-don's forces from the rear while those at the gate hammered them
in front.

Attacked on two sides by a vastly superior force the result was inevitable
and finally the last remnant of Ja-don's little army capitulated and
the old chief was taken a prisoner before Lu-don. {}``Take him to
the temple court,'' cried the high priest. {}``He shall witness
the death of his accomplice and perhaps Jad-ben-Otho shall pass a
similar sentence upon him as well.''

The inner temple court was packed with humanity. At either end of
the western altar stood Tarzan and his mate, bound and helpless. The
sounds of battle had ceased and presently the ape-man saw Ja-don being
led into the inner court, his wrists bound tightly together before
him. Tarzan turned his eyes toward Jane and nodded in the direction
of Ja-don. {}``This looks like the end,'' he said quietly. {}``He
was our last and only hope.''

{}``We have at least found each other, John,'' she replied, {}``and
our last days have been spent together. My only prayer now is that
if they take you they do not leave me.''

Tarzan made no reply for in his heart was the same bitter thought
that her own contained\mbox{---}not the fear that they would kill
him but the fear that they would not kill her. The ape-man strained
at his bonds but they were too many and too strong. A priest near
him saw and with a jeering laugh struck the defenseless ape-man in
the face.

{}``The brute!''\ cried Jane Clayton.

Tarzan smiled. {}``I have been struck thus before, Jane,'' he said,
{}``and always has the striker died.''

{}``You still have hope?''\ she asked.

{}``I am still alive,'' he said as though that were sufficient answer.
She was a woman and she did not have the courage of this man who knew
no fear. In her heart of hearts she knew that he would die upon the
altar at high noon for he had told her, after he had been brought
to the inner court, of the sentence of death that Obergatz had pronounced
upon him, and she knew too that Tarzan knew that he would die, but
that he was too courageous to admit it even to himself.

As she looked upon him standing there so straight and wonderful and
brave among his savage captors her heart cried out against the cruelty
of the fate that had overtaken him. It seemed a gross and hideous
wrong that that wonderful creature, now so quick with exuberant life
and strength and purpose should be presently naught but a bleeding
lump of clay\mbox{---}and all so uselessly and wantonly. Gladly
would she have offered her life for his but she knew that it was a
waste of words since their captors would work upon them whatever it
was their will to do\mbox{---}for him, death; for her\mbox{---}she
shuddered at the thought.

And now came Lu-don and the naked Obergatz, and the high priest led
the German to his place behind the altar, himself standing upon the
other's left. Lu-don whispered a word to Obergatz, at the same time
nodding in the direction of Ja-don. The Hun cast a scowling look upon
the old warrior.

{}``And after the false god,'' he cried, {}``the false prophet,''
and he pointed an accusing finger at Ja-don. Then his eyes wandered
to the form of Jane Clayton.

{}``And the woman, too?''\ asked Lu-don.

{}``The case of the woman I will attend to later,'' replied Obergatz.
{}``I will talk with her tonight after she has had a chance to meditate
upon the consequences of arousing the wrath of Jad-ben-Otho.''

He cast his eyes upward at the sun. {}``The time approaches,'' he
said to Lu-don. {}``Prepare the sacrifice.''

Lu-don nodded to the priests who were gathered about Tarzan. They
seized the ape-man and lifted him bodily to the altar where they laid
him upon his back with his head at the south end of the monolith,
but a few feet from where Jane Clayton stood. Impulsively and before
they could restrain her the woman rushed forward and bending quickly
kissed her mate upon the forehead. {}``Good-bye, John,'' she whispered.

{}``Good-bye,'' he answered, smiling.

The priests seized her and dragged her away. Lu-don handed the sacrificial
knife to Obergatz. {}``I am the Great God,'' cried the German, {}``thus
falleth the divine wrath upon all my enemies!''\ He looked up at
the sun and then raised the knife high above his head.

{}``Thus die the blasphemers of God!''\ he screamed, and at the
same instant a sharp staccato note rang out above the silent, spell-bound
multitude. There was a screaming whistle in the air and Jad-ben-Otho
crumpled forward across the body of his intended victim. Again the
same alarming noise and Lu-don fell, a third and Mo-sar crumpled to
the ground. And now the warriors and the people, locating the direction
of this new and unknown sound turned toward the western end of the
court.

Upon the summit of the temple wall they saw two figures\mbox{---}a
Ho-don warrior and beside him an almost naked creature of the race
of Tarzan-jad-guru, across his shoulders and about his hips were strange
broad belts studded with beautiful cylinders that glinted in the mid-day
sun, and in his hands a shining thing of wood and metal from the end
of which rose a thin wreath of blue-gray smoke.

And then the voice of the Ho-don warrior rang clear upon the ears
of the silent throng. {}``Thus speaks the true Jad-ben-Otho,'' he
cried, {}``through this his Messenger of Death. Cut the bonds of
the prisoners. Cut the bonds of the Dor-ul-Otho and of Ja-don, King
of Pal-ul-don, and of the woman who is the mate of the son of god.''

Pan-sat, filled with the frenzy of fanaticism saw the power and the
glory of the regime he had served crumpled and gone. To one and only
one did he attribute the blame for the disaster that had but just
overwhelmed him. It was the creature who lay upon the sacrificial
altar who had brought Lu-don to his death and toppled the dreams of
power that day by day had been growing in the brain of the under priest.

The sacrificial knife lay upon the altar where it had fallen from
the dead fingers of Obergatz. Pan-sat crept closer and then with a
sudden lunge he reached forth to seize the handle of the blade, and
even as his clutching fingers were poised above it, the strange thing
in the hands of the strange creature upon the temple wall cried out
its crashing word of doom and Pan-sat the under priest, screaming,
fell back upon the dead body of his master.

{}``Seize all the priests,'' cried Ta-den to the warriors, {}``and
let none hesitate lest Jad-ben-Otho's messenger send forth still other
bolts of lightning.''

The warriors and the people had now witnessed such an exhibition of
divine power as might have convinced an even less superstitious and
more enlightened people, and since many of them had but lately wavered
between the Jad-ben-Otho of Lu-don and the Dor-ul-Otho of Ja-don it
was not difficult for them to swing quickly back to the latter, especially
in view of the unanswerable argument in the hands of him whom Ta-den
had described as the Messenger of the Great God.

And so the warriors sprang forward now with alacrity and surrounded
the priests, and when they looked again at the western wall of the
temple court they saw pouring over it a great force of warriors. And
the thing that startled and appalled them was the fact that many of
these were black and hairy Waz-don.

At their head came the stranger with the shiny weapon and on his right
was Ta-den, the Ho-don, and on his left Om-at, the black gund of Kor-ul-ja.

A warrior near the altar had seized the sacrificial knife and cut
Tarzan's bonds and also those of Ja-don and Jane Clayton, and now
the three stood together beside the altar and as the newcomers from
the western end of the temple court pushed their way toward them the
eyes of the woman went wide in mingled astonishment, incredulity,
and hope. And the stranger, slinging his weapon across his back by
a leather strap, rushed forward and took her in his arms.

{}``Jack!''\ she cried, sobbing on his shoulder. {}``Jack, my
son!''\ 

And Tarzan of the Apes came then and put his arms around them both,
and the King of Pal-ul-don and the warriors and the people kneeled
in the temple court and placed their foreheads to the ground before
the altar where the three stood.


\chapter{Home}

\markboth{Tarzan the Terrible}{Home}

\textit{\emph{Within}} an hour of the fall of Lu-don and Mo-sar, the
chiefs and principal warriors of Pal-ul-don gathered in the great
throneroom of the palace at A-lur upon the steps of the lofty pyramid
and placing Ja-don at the apex proclaimed him king. Upon one side
of the old chieftain stood Tarzan of the Apes, and upon the other
Korak, the Killer, worthy son of the mighty ape-man.

And when the brief ceremony was over and the warriors with upraised
clubs had sworn fealty to their new ruler, Ja-don dispatched a trusted
company to fetch O-lo-a and Pan-at-lee and the women of his own household
from Ja-lur.

And then the warriors discussed the future of Pal-ul-don and the question
arose as to the administration of the temples and the fate of the
priests, who practically without exception had been disloyal to the
government of the king, seeking always only their own power and comfort
and aggrandizement. And then it was that Ja-don turned to Tarzan.
{}``Let the Dor-ul-Otho transmit to his people the wishes of his
father,'' he said.

{}``Your problem is a simple one,'' said the ape-man, {}``if you
but wish to do that which shall be pleasing in the eyes of God. Your
priests, to increase their power, have taught you that Jad-ben-Otho
is a cruel god, that his eyes love to dwell upon blood and upon suffering.
But the falsity of their teachings has been demonstrated to you today
in the utter defeat of the priesthood.

{}``Take then the temples from the men and give them instead to the
women that they may be administered in kindness and charity and love.
Wash the blood from your eastern altar and drain forever the water
from the western.

{}``Once I gave Lu-don the opportunity to do these things but he
ignored my commands, and again is the corridor of sacrifice filled
with its victims. Liberate these from every temple in Pal-ul-don.
Bring offerings of such gifts as your people like and place them upon
the altars of your god. And there he will bless them and the priestesses
of Jad-ben-Otho can distribute them among those who need them most.''

As he ceased speaking a murmur of evident approval ran through the
throng. Long had they been weary of the avarice and cruelty of the
priests and now that authority had come from a high source with a
feasible plan for ridding themselves of the old religious order without
necessitating any change in the faith of the people they welcomed
it.

{}``And the priests,'' cried one. {}``We shall put them to death
upon their own altars if it pleases the Dor-ul-Otho to give the word.''

{}``No,'' cried Tarzan. {}``Let no more blood be spilled. Give
them their freedom and the right to take up such occupations as they
choose.''

That night a great feast was spread in the pal-e-don-so and for the
first time in the history of ancient Pal-ul-don black warriors sat
in peace and friendship with white. And a pact was sealed between
Ja-don and Om-at that would ever make his tribe and the Ho-don allies
and friends.

It was here that Tarzan learned the cause of Ta-den's failure to attack
at the stipulated time. A messenger had come from Ja-don carrying
instructions to delay the attack until noon, nor had they discovered
until almost too late that the messenger was a disguised priest of
Lu-don. And they had put him to death and scaled the walls and come
to the inner temple court with not a moment to spare.

The following day O-lo-a and Pan-at-lee and the women of Ja-don's
family arrived at the palace at A-lur and in the great throneroom
Ta-den and O-lo-a were wed, and Om-at and Pan-at-lee.

For a week Tarzan and Jane and Korak remained the guests of Ja-don,
as did Om-at and his black warriors. And then the ape-man announced
that he would depart from Pal-ul-don. Hazy in the minds of their hosts
was the location of heaven and equally so the means by which the gods
traveled between their celestial homes and the haunts of men and so
no questionings arose when it was found that the Dor-ul-Otho with
his mate and son would travel overland across the mountains and out
of Pal-ul-don toward the north.

They went by way of the Kor-ul-ja accompanied by the warriors of that
tribe and a great contingent of Ho-don warriors under Ta-den. The
king and many warriors and a multitude of people accompanied them
beyond the limits of A-lur and after they had bid them good-bye and
Tarzan had invoked the blessings of God upon them the three Europeans
saw their simple, loyal friends prostrate in the dust behind them
until the cavalcade had wound out of the city and disappeared among
the trees of the nearby forest.

They rested for a day among the Kor-ul-ja while Jane investigated
the ancient caves of these strange people and then they moved on,
avoiding the rugged shoulder of Pastar-ul-ved and winding down the
opposite slope toward the great morass. They moved in comfort and
in safety, surrounded by their escort of Ho-don and Waz-don.

In the minds of many there was doubtless a question as to how the
three would cross the great morass but least of all was Tarzan worried
by the problem. In the course of his life he had been confronted by
many obstacles only to learn that he who will may always pass. In
his mind lurked an easy solution of the passage but it was one which
depended wholly upon chance.

It was the morning of the last day that, as they were breaking camp
to take up the march, a deep bellow thundered from a nearby grove.
The ape-man smiled. The chance had come. Fittingly then would the
Dor-ul-Otho and his mate and their son depart from unmapped Pal-ul-don.

He still carried the spear that Jane had made, which he had prized
so highly because it was her handiwork that he had caused a search
to be made for it through the temple in A-lur after his release, and
it had been found and brought to him. He had told her laughingly that
it should have the place of honor above their hearth as the ancient
flintlock of her Puritan grandsire had held a similar place of honor
above the fireplace of Professor Porter, her father.

At the sound of the bellowing the Ho-don warriors, some of whom had
accompanied Tarzan from Ja-don's camp to Ja-lur, looked questioningly
at the ape-man while Om-at's Waz-don looked for trees, since the gryf
was the one creature of Pal-ul-don which might not be safely encountered
even by a great multitude of warriors. Its tough, armored hide was
impregnable to their knife thrusts while their thrown clubs rattled
from it as futilely as if hurled at the rocky shoulder of Pastar-ul-ved.

{}``Wait,'' said the ape-man, and with his spear in hand he advanced
toward the gryf, voicing the weird cry of the Tor-o-don. The bellowing
ceased and turned to low rumblings and presently the huge beast appeared.
What followed was but a repetition of the ape-man's previous experience
with these huge and ferocious creatures.

And so it was that Jane and Korak and Tarzan rode through the morass
that hems Pa-ul-don, upon the back of a prehistoric triceratops while
the lesser reptiles of the swamp fled hissing in terror. Upon the
opposite shore they turned and called back their farewells to Ta-den
and Om-at and the brave warriors they had learned to admire and respect.
And then Tarzan urged their titanic mount onward toward the north,
abandoning him only when he was assured that the Waz-don and the Ho-don
had had time to reach a point of comparative safety among the craggy
ravines of the foothills.

Turning the beast's head again toward Pal-ul-don the three dismounted
and a sharp blow upon the thick hide sent the creature lumbering majestically
back in the direction of its native haunts. For a time they stood
looking back upon the land they had just quit\mbox{---}the land
of Tor-o-don and gryf; of ja and jato; of Waz-don and Ho-don; a primitive
land of terror and sudden death and peace and beauty; a land that
they all had learned to love.

And then they turned once more toward the north and with light hearts
and brave hearts took up their long journey toward the land that is
best of all\mbox{---}home.


\chapter*{\raggedright Glossary}

\addcontentsline{toc}{chapter}{Glossary}

\markboth{Tarzan the Terrible}{Glossary}

From conversations with Lord Greystoke and from his notes, there have
been gleaned a number of interesting items relative to the language
and customs of the inhabitants of Pal-ul-don that are not brought
out in the story. For the benefit of those who may care to delve into
the derivation of the proper names used in the text, and thus obtain
some slight insight into the language of the race, there is appended
an incomplete glossary taken from some of Lord Greystoke's notes.

A point of particular interest hinges upon the fact that the names
of all male hairless pithecanthropi begin with a consonant, have an
even number of syllables, and end with a consonant, while the names
of the females of the same species begin with a vowel, have an odd
number of syllables, and end with a vowel. On the contrary, the names
of the male hairy black pithecanthropi while having an even number
of syllables begin with a vowel and end with a consonant; while the
females of this species have an odd number of syllables in their names
which begin always with a consonant and end with a vowel.

\begin{description}
\item [A.]\ \\*Light.
\item [Ab.]\ \\*Boy.
\item [Ab-on\emph{.}]\ \\*Acting gund of Kor-ul-ja.
\item [Ad.]\ \\*Three.
\item [Adad.]\ \\*Six
\item [Adadad.]\ \\*Nine.
\item [Adaden.]\ \\*Seven.
\item [Aden.]\ \\*Four.
\item [Adenaden.]\ \\*Eight.
\item [Adenen.]\ \\*Five.
\item [A-lur\emph{.}]\ \\*City of light.
\item [An.]\ \\*Spear.
\item [An-un\emph{.}]\ \\*Father of Pan-at-lee.
\item [As.]\ \\*The sun.
\item [At.]\ \\*Tail.
\item [Bal.]\ \\*Gold or golden.
\item [Bar.]\ \\*Battle.
\item [Ben.]\ \\*Great.
\item [Bu.]\ \\*Moon.
\item [Bu-lot~(moon~face).]\ \\*Son of chief Mo-sar.
\item [Bu-lur~(moon~city).]\ \\*The city of the Waz-ho-don.
\item [Dak\emph{.}]\ \\*Fat.
\item [Dak-at~(fat~tail).]\ \\*Chief of a Ho-don village.
\item [Dak-lot\emph{.}]\ \\*One of Ko-tan's palace warriors.
\item [Dan.]\ \\*Rock.
\item [Den.]\ \\*Tree.
\item [Don.]\ \\*Man.
\item [Dor\emph{.}]\ \\*Son.
\item [Dor-ul-Otho~(son~of~god).]\ \\*Tarzan.
\item [E\emph{.}]\ \\*Where.
\item [Ed.]\ \\*Seventy.
\item [El\emph{.}]\ \\*Grace or graceful.
\item [En\emph{.}]\ \\*One.
\item [Enen\emph{.}]\ \\*Two.
\item [Es\emph{.}]\ \\*Rough.
\item [Es-sat~(rough~skin).]\ \\*Chief of Om-at's tribe of hairy blacks.
\item [Et\emph{.}]\ \\*Eighty.
\item [Fur\emph{.}]\ \\*Thirty.
\item [Ged\emph{.}]\ \\*Forty.
\item [Go\emph{.}]\ \\*Clear.
\item [Gryf\emph{.}]\ \\*{}``\noun{Triceratops}. A genus of huge herbivorous
dinosaurs of the group Ceratopsia. The skull had two large horns above
the eyes, a median horn on the nose, a horny beak, and a great bony
hood or transverse crest over the neck. Their toes, five in front
and three behind, were provided with hoofs, and the tail was large
and strong.''\hspace{\stretch{1}}\mbox{---}\noun{Webster's Dict}.\\
\\
The gryf of Pal-ul-don is similar except that it is omnivorous, has
strong, powerfully armed jaws and talons instead of hoofs. Coloration:
face yellow with blue bands encircling the eyes; hood red on top,
yellow underneath; belly yellow; body a dirty slate blue; legs same.
Bony protuberances yellow except along the spine\mbox{---}these
are red. Tail conforms with body and belly. Horns, ivory.
\item [Gund\emph{.}]\ \\*Chief.
\item [Guru\emph{.}]\ \\*Terrible.
\item [Het\emph{.}]\ \\*Fifty.
\item [Ho\emph{.}]\ \\*White.
\item [Ho-don\emph{.}]\ \\*The hairless white men of Pal-ul-don.
\item [Id.]\ \\*Silver.
\item [Id-an\emph{.}]\ \\*One of Pan-at-lee's two brothers.
\item [In.]\ \\*Dark.
\item [In-sad\emph{.}]\ \\*Kor-ul-ja warrior accompanying Tarzan, Om-at,
and Ta-den in search of Pan-at-lee.
\item [In-tan\emph{.}]\ \\*Kor-ul-lul left to guard Tarzan
\item [Ja.]\ \\*Lion.
\item [Jad.]\ \\*The
\item [Jad-bal-lul.]\ \\*The golden lake.
\item [Jad-ben-lul\emph{.}]\ \\*The big lake.
\item [Jad-ben-Otho.]\ \\*The Great God.
\item [Jad-guru-don.]\ \\*The terrible man.
\item [Jad-in-lul.]\ \\*The dark lake.
\item [Ja-don~(the~lion-man).]\ \\*Chief of a Ho-don village and father
of Ta-den.
\item [Jad]\ \\*Pele ul
\item [Jad-ben-Otho.]\ \\*The valley of the Great God.
\item [Ja-lur~(lion~city).]\ \\*Ja-don's capital.
\item [Jar.]\ \\*Strange.
\item [Jar-don.]\ \\*Name given Korak by Om-at.
\item [Jato.]\ \\*Saber-tooth hybrid.
\item [Ko.]\ \\*Mighty.
\item [Kor.]\ \\*Gorge.
\item [Kor-ul-gryf.]\ \\*Gorge of the gryf.
\item [Kor-ul-ja.]\ \\*Name of Es-sat's gorge and tribe.
\item [Kor-ul-lul\emph{.}]\ \\*Name of another Waz-don gorge and tribe.
\item [Ko-tan.]\ \\*King of the Ho-don.
\item [Lav.]\ \\*Run or running.
\item [Lee.]\ \\*Doe.
\item [Lo.]\ \\*Star.
\item [Lot.]\ \\*Face.
\item [Lu.]\ \\*Fierce.
\item [Lu-don~(fierce~man).]\ \\*High priest of A-lur.
\item [Lul.]\ \\*Water.
\item [Lur.]\ \\*City.
\item [Ma.]\ \\*Child.
\item [Mo.]\ \\*Short.
\item [Mo-sar~(short~nose).]\ \\*Chief and pretender.
\item [Mu.]\ \\*Strong.
\item [No.]\ \\*Brook.
\item [O.]\ \\*Like or similar.
\item [Od.]\ \\*Ninety.
\item [O-dan.]\ \\*Kor-ul-ja warrior accompanying Tarzan, Om-at, and Ta-den
in search of Pan-at-lee.
\item [Og.]\ \\*Sixty.
\item [O-lo-a~(like-star-light).]\ \\*Ko-tan's daughter
\item [Om.]\ \\*Long.
\item [Om-at~(long~tail).]\ \\*A black.
\item [On.]\ \\*Ten.
\item [Otho.]\ \\*God.
\item [Pal.]\ \\*Place; land; country.
\item [Pal-e-don-so~(place~where~men~eat).]\ \\*Banquet hall.
\item [Pal-ul-don~(land~of~man).]\ \\*Name of the country.
\item [Pal-ul-ja.]\ \\*Place of lions.
\item [Pan.]\ \\*Soft.
\item [Pan-at-lee.]\ \\*Om-at's sweetheart.
\item [Pan-sat~(soft~skin).]\ \\*A priest.
\item [Pastar.]\ \\*Father.
\item [Pastar-ul-ved.]\ \\*Father of Mountains.
\item [Pele.]\ \\*Valley.
\item [Ro.]\ \\*Flower.
\item [Sad.]\ \\*Forest.
\item [San.]\ \\*One hundred
\item [Sar.]\ \\*Nose.
\item [Sat.]\ \\*Skin.
\item [So.]\ \\*Eat.
\item [Sod.]\ \\*Eaten.
\item [Sog.]\ \\*Eating.
\item [Son.]\ \\*Ate.
\item [Ta.]\ \\*Tall.
\item [Ta-den~(tall~tree).]\ \\*A white.
\item [Tan.]\ \\*Warrior.
\item [Tarzan-jad-guru.]\ \\*Tarzan the Terrible.
\item [To.]\ \\*Purple.
\item [Ton.]\ \\*Twenty.
\item [Tor.]\ \\*Beast.
\item [Tor-o-don.]\ \\*Beastlike man.
\item [Tu.]\ \\*Bright.
\item [Tu-lur~(bright~city).]\ \\*Mo-sar's city.
\item [Ul.]\ \\*Of.
\item [Un.]\ \\*Eye.
\item [Ut.]\ \\*Corn.
\item [Ved.]\ \\*Mountain
\item [Waz.]\ \\*Black.
\item [Waz-don.]\ \\*The hairy black men of Pal-ul-don.
\item [Waz-ho-don~(black~white~men).]\ \\*A mixed race
\item [Xot.]\ \\*One thousand.
\item [Yo.]\ \\*Friend.
\item [Za.]\ \\*Girl. 
\end{description}

\end{document}
