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From him Tarzan learned, by dint of much coaxing, that a party of whites had
passed through the village several days before. These men had told them of a
terrible white devil that pursued them, warning the natives against it and the
frightful pack of demons that accompanied it.
The black had recognized Tarzan as the white devil from the descriptions given by
the whites and their black servants. Behind him he had expected to see a horde
of demons disguised as apes and panthers.
In this Tarzan saw the cunning hand of Rokoff. The Russian was attempting to
make travel as difficult as possible for him by turning the natives against him in
superstitious fear.
The native further told Tarzan that the white man who had led the recent
expedition had promised them a fabulous reward if they would kill the white
devil. This they had fully intended doing should the opportunity present itself;
but the moment they had seen Tarzan their blood had turned to water, as the
porters of the white men had told them would be the case.
Finding the ape-man made no attempt to harm him, the native at last recovered
his grasp upon his courage, and, at Tarzan's suggestion, accompanied the white
devil back to the village, calling as he went for his fellows to return also, as "the
white devil has promised to do you no harm if you come back right away and
answer his questions."
One by one the blacks straggled into the village, but that their fears were not
entirely allayed was evident from the amount of white that showed about the eyes
of the majority of them as they cast constant and apprehensive sidelong glances
at the ape-man.
The chief was among the first to return to the village, and as it was he that
Tarzan was most anxious to interview, he lost no time in entering into a palaver
with the black.
The fellow was short and stout, with an unusually low and degraded countenance
and apelike arms. His whole expression denoted deceitfulness.
Only the superstitious terror engendered in him by the stories poured into his
ears by the whites and blacks of the Russian's party kept him from leaping upon
Tarzan with his warriors and slaying him forthwith, for he and his people were
inveterate maneaters. But the fear that he might indeed be a devil, and that out
there in the jungle behind him his fierce demons waited to do his bidding, kept
M'ganwazam from putting his desires into action.
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