Tarzan and the Lion-Man

the sky voiced a weird cry that sent cold shivers down the spines of the two Americans.

As the last notes of that inhuman scream reverberated through the forest, the stranger, without a glance at the two he had saved, leaped for an overhanging branch, drew himself up into the tree, and disappeared amidst the foliage above.

Orman, pale beneath his tan, turned toward West. 'Did you see what I saw, Bill?' he asked, his voice shaking.

'I don't know what you saw, but I know what I thought I saw—but I couldn't have seen it.'

'Do you believe in ghosts, Bill?'

'I—I don't know—you don't think?'

'You know as well as I do that that couldn't have been him; so it must have been his ghost.'

'But we never knew for sure that Obroski was dead, Tom'

'We know it now.'

Chapter Fourteen A Madman

AS Stanley Obroski was dragged to earth in the village of Rungula, the Bansuto, a white man, naked but for a G string, looked down from the foliage of an overhanging tree upon the scene below and upon the bulk of the giant chieftain standing beneath him.

The pliant strands of a strong rope braided from jungle grasses swung in his powerful hands, the shadow of a grim smile played about his mouth.

Suddenly the rope shot downward; a running noose in its lower end settled about Rungula's body, pinning his arms at his sides. A cry of surprise and terror burst from the chiefs lips as he felt himself pinioned; and as those near him turned, attracted by his cry, they saw him raised quickly from the ground to disappear in the foliage of the tree above as though hoisted by some supernatural power.

Rungula felt himself dragged to a sturdy branch, and then a mighty hand seized and steadied him. He was terrified, for he thought his end had come. Below him a terrified silence had fallen upon the village. Even the prisoner was forgotten in the excitement and fright that followed the mysterious disappearance of the chief.

Obroski stood looking about him in amazement. Surrounded by struggling warriors as he had been he had not seen the miracle of Rungula's ascension. Now he saw every eye turned upward at the tree that towered above the chief's hut. He wondered what had happened. He wondered what they were looking at. He could see nothing unusual. All that lingered in his memory to give him a clew was the sudden, affrighted cry of Rungula as the noose had tightened about him.

Rungula heard a voice speaking, speaking his own language. 'Look at me!' it commanded.

Rungula turned his eyes toward the thing that held him. The light from the village fires filtered through the foliage to dimly reveal the features of a white man bending above him. Rungula gasped and shrank back. 'Walumbe!' he muttered in terror.

'I am not the god of death,' replied Tarzan; 'I am not Walumbe. But I can bring death just as quickly, for I am greater than Walumbe. I am Tarzan of the Apes!'

'What do you want?' asked Rungula through chattering teeth. 'What are you going to do to me?'

'I tested you to see if you were a good man and your people good people. I made myself into two men, and one I sent where your warriors could capture him. I wanted to see what you would do to a stranger who had not harmed you. Now I know. For what you have done you should die. What have you to say?'

'You are here,' said Rungula, 'and you are also down there.' He nodded toward the figure of Obroski standing in surprised silence amidst the warriors. 'Therefore you must be a demon. What can I say to a. demon? I can give you food and drink and weapons. I can give you girls who can cook and draw water and fetch wood and work all day in the fields—girls with broad hips and strong backs. All these things will I give you if you will not kill me—if you just go away and leave us alone.'

'I do not want your food nor your weapons nor your women. I want but one thing from you, Rungula, as the price of your life.'

'What is that, Master?'

'Your promise that you will never again make war upon white men, and that when they come through your country you will help them instead of killing them.'

'I promise, Master.'

'Then call down to your people, and tell them to open the gates and let the prisoner go out into the forest.'

Rungula spoke in a loud voice to his people, and they fell away from Obroski, leaving him standing alone; then warriors went to the village gates and swung them open.

Obroski heard the voice of the chief coming from high in a tree, and he was mystified. He also wondered at the strange action of the natives and suspected treachery. Why should they fall back and leave him standing alone when a few moments before they were trying to seize him and bind him to a tree? Why should they throw the gates wide open? He did not move. He waited, believing that he was being baited into an attempt at escape for some ulterior purpose.

Presently another voice came from the tree above the chief's hut, addressing him in English. 'Go out of the village into the forest,' it said. 'They will not harm you now. I will join you in the forest.'

Obroski was mystified; but the quiet English voice reassured him, and he turned and walked down the village street toward the gateway.

Tarzan removed the rope from about Rungula, ran lightly through the tree to the rear of the hut and dropped to the ground. Keeping the huts between himself and the villagers, he moved swiftly to the opposite end of the village, scaled the palisade, and dropped into the clearing beyond. A moment later he was in the forest and circling back toward the point where Obroski was entering it.

The latter heard no slightest noise of his approach, for there was none. One instant he was entirely alone, and the next a voice spoke close behind him. 'Follow me,' it said.

Obroski wheeled. In the darkness of the forest night he saw dimly only the figure of a man about his own height. 'Who are you?' he asked.

'I am Tarzan of the Apes.'

Obroski was silent, astonished. He had heard of Tarzan of the Apes, but he had thought that it was no more than a legendary character—a fiction of the folklore of Africa. He wondered if this were some demented creature who imagined that it was Tarzan of the Apes. He wished that he could see the fellow's face; that might give him a clew to the sanity of the man. He wondered what the stranger's intentions might be.

Tarzan of the Apes was moving away into the forest. He turned once and repeated his command, 'Follow me!'

'I haven't thanked you yet for getting me out of that mess,' said Obroski as he moved after the retreating figure of the stranger. 'It was certainly decent of you. I'd have been dead by now if it hadn't been for you.'

The ape-man moved on in silence, and Obroski followed him. The silence preyed a little upon his nerves. It seemed to bear out his deduction that the man was not quite normal, not as other men. A normal man would have been asking and answering innumerable questions had he met a stranger for the first time under such exciting circumstances.

And Obroski's deductions were not wholly inaccurate—Tarzan is not as other men; the training and the instincts of the wild beast have given him standards of behavior and a code of ethics peculiarly his own. For Tarzan there are times for silence and times for speech. The depths of the night, when hunting beasts are abroad, is no time to go gabbling through the jungle; nor did he ever care much for speech with strangers unless he could watch their eyes and the changing expressions upon their faces, which often told him more than their words were intended to convey.

So in silence they moved through the forest, Obroski keeping close behind the ape-man lest he lose sight of him in the darkness. Ahead of them a lion roared; and the American wondered if his companion would change his