'We are trying to get back to the coast,' replied Kraski, 'and from there to London .'
'Come with me,' said Tarzan, 'possibly I can help you. You do not deserve it, but I cannot see white men perish here in the jungle.'
They followed him toward the west, and that night they made camp beside a small jungle stream. It was difficult for the four Londoners to accustom themselves to the presence of the great lion, and Bluber was in a state of palpable terror.
As they squatted around the fire after the evening meal, which Tarzan had provided, Kraski suggested that they set to and build some sort of a shelter against the wild beasts.
'It will not be necessary,' said Tarzan. 'Jad-bal-ja will guard you. He will sleep here beside Tarzan of the Apes, and what one of us does not hear the other will.'
Bluber sighed. 'Mein Gott!' he cried. 'I should giff ten pounds for vun night's sleep.'
'You may have it tonight for less than that,' replied Tarzan, 'for nothing shall befall you while Jad-bal-ja and I are here.'
'Vell, den I t'ink I say good night,' said the Jew, and moving a few paces away from the fire he curled up and was soon asleep. Throck and Peebles followed suit, and shortly after Kraski, too.
As the Russian lay, half dozing, his eyes partially open, he saw the ape-man rise from the squatting position he had maintained before the fire, and turn toward a nearby tree. As he did so something fell from beneath his loin cloth—a little sack made of hides—a little sack, bulging with its contents.
Kraski, thoroughly awakened now, watched it as the ape-man moved off a short distance, accompanied by Jad-bal-ja, and lay down to sleep.
The great lion curled beside the prostrate man, and presently the Russian was assured that both slept. Immediately he commenced crawling, stealthily and slowly toward the little package lying beside the fire. With each forward move that he made he paused and looked at the recumbent figures of the two ferocious beasts before him, but both slept on peacefully. At last the Russian could reach out and grasp the sack, and drawing it toward him he stuffed it quickly inside his shirt. Then he turned and crawled slowly and carefully back to his place beyond the fire. There, lying with his head upon one arm as though in profound slumber, he felt carefully of the sack with the fingers of his left hand.
'They feel like pebbles,' he muttered to himself, 'and doubtless that is what they are, for the barbaric ornamentation of this savage barbarian who is a peer of England . It does not seem possible that this wild beast has sat in the House of Lords.'
Noiselessly Kraski undid the knot which held the mouth of the sack closed, and a moment later he let a portion of the contents trickle forth into his open palm.
'My God!' he cried, 'diamonds!'
Greedily he poured them all out and gloated over them— great scintillating stones of the first water—five pounds of pure, white diamonds, representing so fabulous a fortune that the very contemplation of it staggered the Russian.
'My God!' he repeated, 'the wealth of Croesus in my own hand.'
Quickly he gathered up the stones and replaced them in the sack, always with one eye upon Tarzan and Jad-bal-ja; but neither stirred, and presently he had returned them all to the pouch and slipped the package inside his shirt.
'Tomorrow,' he muttered, 'tomorrow—would to God that I had the nerve to attempt it tonight.'
In the middle of the following morning Tarzan, with the four Londoners, approached a good-sized, stockaded village, containing many huts. He was received not only graciously, but with the deference due an emperor.
The whites were awed by the attitude of the black chief and his warriors as Tarzan was conducted into their presence.
After the usual ceremony had been gone through, Tarzan turned and waved his hand toward the four Europeans. 'These are my friends,' he said to the black chief, 'and they wish to reach the coast in safety. Send with them, then, sufficient warriors to feed and guard them during the journey. It is I, Tarzan of the Apes, who requests this favor.'
'Tarzan of the Apes, the great chief, Lord of the Jungle, has but to command,' replied the black.
'Good!' exclaimed Tarzan, 'feed them well and treat them well. I have other business to attend to and may not remain.'
'Their bellies shall be filled, and they shall reach the coast unscathed,' replied the chief.
Without a word of farewell, without even a sign that he realized their existence, Tarzan of the Apes passed from the sight of the four Europeans, while at his heels paced Jad-bal-ja, the golden lion.
CHAPTER XIX
A BARBED SHAFT KILLS
Kraski spent a sleepless night. He could not help but realize that sooner or later Tarzan would discover the loss of his pouch of diamonds, and that he would return and demand an accounting of the four Londoners he had befriended. And so it was that as the first streak of dawn lighted the eastern horizon, the Russian arose from his pallet of dried grasses within the hut that had been assigned him and Bluber by the chief, and crept stealthily out into the village street.
'God!' he muttered to himself. 'There is only one chance in a thousand that I can reach the coast alone, but this,' and he pressed his hand over the bag of diamonds that lay within his shirt—' but this, this is worth every effort, even to the sacrifice of life—the fortune of a thousand kings— my God, what could I not do with it in London, and Paris, and New York!'
Stealthily he slunk from the village, and presently the verdure of the jungle beyond closed about Carl Kraski, the Russian, as he disappeared forever from the lives of his companions.
Bluber was the first to discover the absence of Kraski, for although there was no love between the two, they had been thrown together owing to the friendship of Peebles and Throck.
'Have you seen Carl this morning?' he asked Peebles as the three men gathered around the pot containing the unsavory stew that had been brought to them for their breakfast.
'No,' said Peebles. 'He must be asleep yet.'
'He is not in the hut,' replied Bluber. 'He vas not dere ven I woke up.'
'He can take care of himself,' growled Throck, resuming his breakfast. 'You'll likely find him with some of the ladies,' and he grinned in appreciation of his little joke on Kraski's well-known weakness.
They had finished their breakfast and were attempting to communicate with some of the warriors, in an effort to learn when the chief proposed that they should set forth for the coast, and still Kraski had not made an appearance. By this time Bluber was considerably concerned, not at all for Kraski's safety, but for his own, since, if something could happen to Kraski in this friendly village in the still watches of the night, a similar fate might overtake him, and when he made this suggestion to the others it gave them food for thought, too, so that there were three rather apprehensive men who sought an audience with the chief.
By means of signs and pidgin English, and distorted native dialect, a word or two of which each of the three understood, they managed to convey to the chief the information that Kraski had disappeared, and that they wanted to know what had become of him.
The chief was, of course, as much puzzled as they, and immediately instituted a thorough search of the village, with the result that it was soon found that Kraski was not within the palisade, and shortly afterward footprints were discovered leading through the village gateway into the jungle.
'Mein Gott!' exclaimed Bluber, 'he vent out dere, und he vent alone, in der middle of der night. He must have been crazy.'
'Gord!' cried Trock, 'what did he want to do that for?'
'You ain't missed nothin', have you?' asked Peebles of the other two. ''E might 'ave stolen somethin'.'
'Oi! Oi! Vot have ve got to steal?' cried Bluber. 'Our guns, our ammunition—dey are here beside us. He did not take them. Beside dose ve have nothing of value except my tventy guinea suit.'
'But what did 'e do it for?' demanded Peebles.
