For a time Tarzan lay watching the two with steady, unblinking eyes—it might have been Numa, himself, weighing the chances of a sudden charge. He saw that each was armed with a sturdy pike and a sword. They could speak English, after a fashion, therefore, he argued, they might be able to give him word of Blake. But would they receive him in a friendly spirit or would they attempt to set upon and slay him?
He determined that he could never ascertain what their attitude would be by lying hidden among the brush, and so he gathered himself, as Numa does when he is about to spring.
The two blacks were idly gossiping, their minds as far from thoughts of danger as it were possible they could be, when suddenly without warning Tarzan launched himself full upon the back of the nearer, hurling him to the ground. Before the other could gather his wits the ape-man had dragged his victim into the concealment of the bush from which he had sprung, while the fellow’s companion turned and fled in the direction of the tunnel.
The man in Tarzan’s grasp fought and struggled to be free but the ape-man held him as easily as he might have held a child.
“Lie still,” he advised, “I shall not harm you.”
“ ’Od’s blud!” cried the black. “What manner of creature be thou?”
“One who will not harm you if you will tell him the truth,” replied Tarzan.
“What wouldst thou know?” demanded the black.
“A white man came this way many weeks ago. Where is he?”
“Thou speakest of Sir James?” asked the soldier.
“Sir James!” mused Tarzan and then he recollected that Blake’s first name was James. “His name was James,” he replied, “James Blake.”
“Verily, ’tis the same,” said the soldier.
“You have seen him? Where is he now?”
“He be defending the honor of Our Lord Jesus and the Knights of Nimmr in the Great Tourney in the lists upon the plain below the city, and have ye come to wreak dispite upon our good Sir James thou wilt find many doughty knights and men-at-arms who wilt take up the gage in his behalf.”
“I am his friend,” said Tarzan.
“Then why didst thou leap upon me thus, if thou beest a friend to Sir James?” demanded the man.
“I did not know how you had received him or how you would receive me.”
“A friend of Sir James will be received well in Nimmr,” said the man.
Tarzan took the man’s sword from him and permitted him to rise—his pike he had dropped before being dragged among the bushes.
“Go before me and lead me to your master,” commanded the ape-man, “and remember that your life will be the forfeit that you must pay for treachery.”
“Do not make me leave the road unguarded against the Saracens,” begged the man. “Soon my companion will return with others and then I shall beg them to take thee where thou wilt.”
“Very well,” agreed the ape-man. They had not waited long before he heard the sound of hastening footsteps and a strange jingling and clanking that might have been caused by the shaking of many chains and the striking against them of objects of metal.
Shortly afterward he was surprised to see a white man clothed in chain mail and carrying a sword and buckler descending the trail at a trot, a dozen pike-men at his back.
“Tell them to halt!” commanded Tarzan, placing the point of the man’s sword in the small of his back. “Tell them I would talk with them before they approach too closely.”
“Stop, I pray thee!” cried the fellow. “This be a friend of Sir James, but he wilt run me through with my own sword an’ ye press him too close. Parley with him, most noble sir knight, for I wouldst live at least to know the result of the Great Tourney.”
The knight halted a few paces from Tarzan and looked him up and down from feet to head. “Thou art truly a friend to Sir James?” he demanded.
Tarzan nodded. “I have been seeking him for days.”
“And some mishap befell thee and thou lost thy apparel.”
The ape-man smiled. “I go thus, in the jungle,” he said.
“Art thou a sir knight and from the same country as Sir James?”
“I am an Englishman,” replied Tarzan of the Apes.
“An Englishman! Thrice welcome then to Nimmr! I be Sir Bertram and a good friend to Sir James.”
“And I am called Tarzan,” said the ape-man.
“And thy rank?” inquired Sir Bertram.
Tarzan was mystified by the strange manners and garb of his seemingly friendly inquisitor, but he sensed that whatever the man might be he took himself quite seriously and would be more impressed if he knew that Tarzan was a man of position, and so he answered him truthfully, in his quiet way.
“A Viscount,” he said.
“A peer of the realm!” exclaimed Sir Bertram. “Prince Gobred wilt be o’er pleased to greet thee, Lord Tarzan. Come thou with me and I wilt furnish thee with apparel that befits thee.”
At the outer barbican Bertram took Tarzan into the quarters reserved for the knight commanding the warders and kept him there while he sent his squire to the castle to fetch raiment and a horse, and while they waited Bertram told Tarzan all that had befallen Blake since his arrival in Nimmr and, too, much of the strange history of this unknown British colony.
When the squire returned with the clothing it was found that it fitted the ape-man well, for Bertram was a large man, and presently Tarzan of the Apes was garbed as a Knight of Nimmr and was riding down toward the castle with Sir Bertram. Here the knight announced him at the gate as the Lord Viscount Tarzan. Once within he introduced him to another knight whom he persuaded to relieve him at the gate while
