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they had slain their officers and taken to the jungle with their women, or had

stolen some from native villages through which they must have passed. It was

evident that they were putting as much ground between themselves and the coast

as possible and doubtless were seeking some impenetrable fastness of the vast

interior where they might inaugurate a reign of terror among the primitively

armed inhabitants and by raiding, looting, and rape grow rich in goods and

women at the expense of the district upon which they settled themselves.

Between two of the black women marched a slender white girl. She was hatless

and with torn and disheveled clothing that had evidently once been a trim riding

habit. Her coat was gone and her waist half torn from her body. Occasionally and

without apparent provocation one or the other of the Negresses struck or pushed

her roughly. Tarzan watched through half-closed eyes. His first impulse was to

leap among them and bear the girl from their cruel clutches. He had recognized

her immediately and it was because of this fact that he hesitated.

What was it to Tarzan of the Apes what fate befell this enemy spy? He had been

unable to kill her himself because of an inherent weakness that would not permit

him to lay hands upon a woman, all of which of course had no bearing upon what

others might do to her. That her fate would now be infinitely more horrible than

the quick and painless death that the ape-man would have meted to her only

interested Tarzan to the extent that the more frightful the end of a German the

more in keeping it would be with what they all deserved.

And so he let the blacks pass with Fraulein Bertha Kircher in their midst, or at

least until the last straggling warrior suggested to his mind the pleasures of

black-baiting--an amusement and a sport in which he had grown ever more

proficient since that long-gone day when Kulonga, the son of Mbonga, the chief,

had cast his unfortunate spear at Kala, the ape-man's foster mother.

The last man, who must have stopped for some purpose, was fully a quarter of a

mile in rear of the party. He was hurrying to catch up when Tarzan saw him, and

as he passed beneath the tree in which the ape-man perched above the trail, a

silent noose dropped deftly about his neck. The main body still was in plain sight,

and as the frightened man voiced a piercing shriek of terror, they looked back to

see his body rise as though by magic straight into the air and disappear amidst

the leafy foliage above.

For a moment the blacks stood paralyzed by astonishment and fear; but presently

the burly sergeant, Usanga, who led them, started back along the trail at a run,

calling to the others to follow him. Loading their guns as they came the blacks

ran to succor their fellow, and at Usanga's command they spread into a thin line

Tarzan the Untamed