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Tarzan shrugged his head ruefully. "It was my own fault," he replied. "I deserve to

be eaten. I crawled out upon a branch that would not bear my weight and when it

broke, instead of alighting on my feet, I caught my foot in a trailer and came

down on my head. Otherwise they would not have taken me--alive."

"Is there no escape?" asked the Englishman.

"I have escaped them before," replied Tarzan, "and I have seen others escape

them. I have seen a man taken away from the stake after a dozen spear thrusts

had pierced his body and the fire had been lighted about his feet."

Lieutenant Smith-Oldwick shuddered. "God!" he exclaimed, "I hope I don't have to

face that. I believe I could stand anything but the thought of the fire. I should

hate like the devil to go into a funk before the devils at the last moment."

Don't worry," said Tarzan. "It doesn't last long and you won't funk. It is really not

half as bad as it sounds. There is only a brief period of pain before you lose

consciousness. I have seen it many times before. It is as good a way to go as

another. We must die sometime. What difference whether it be tonight, tomorrow

night, or a year hence, just so that we have lived--and I have lived!"

Your philosophy may be all right, old top," said the young lieutenant, "but I can't

say that it is exactly satisfying."

Tarzan laughed. "Roll over here," he said, "where I can get at your bonds with my

teeth." The Englishman did as he was bid and presently Tarzan was working at

the thongs with his strong white teeth. He felt them giving slowly beneath his

efforts. In another moment they would part, and then it would be a comparatively

simple thing for the Englishman to remove the remaining bonds from Tarzan and

himself.

It was then that one of the guards entered the hut. In an instant he saw what the

new prisoner was doing and raising his spear, struck the ape-man a vicious blow

across the head with its shaft. Then he called in the other guards and together

they fell upon the luckless men, kicking and beating them unmercifully, after

which they bound the Englishman more securely than before and tied both men

fast on opposite sides of the hut. When they had gone Tarzan looked across at his

companion in misery.

"While there is life," he said, "there is hope," but he grinned as he voiced the

ancient truism.

Lieutenant Harold Percy Smith-Oldwick returned the other's smile. "I fancy," he

said, "that we are getting short on both. It must be close to supper time now."

103

Tarzan the Untamed