Part 1 (1/2)
The Return of Tarzan
by Edgar Rice Burroughs
Chapter I
The Affair on the Liner
”Magnifique!” ejaculated the Countess de Coude, beneath her breath
”Eh?” questioned the count, turning toward his young wife ”What is it that is nificent?” and the count bent his eyes in various directions in quest of the object of her ad at all, ht flushher already pink cheek ”I was but recalling with admiration those stupendous skyscrapers, as they call them, of New York,” and the fair countess settled herself azine which ”nothing at all” had caused her to let fall upon her lap
Her husband again buried himself in his book, but not without a mild wonderment that three days out from New York his countess should suddenly have realized an ads she had but recently characterized as horrid
Presently the count put down his book ”It is very tiresoa,” he said ”I think that I shall hunt up some others who aallant, , ”but as I aive you Go and play at your tiresoone she let her eyes wander slyly to the figure of a tall young man stretched lazily in a chair not far distant
”MAGNIFIQUE!” she breathed once a de Coude enty Her husband forty She was a very faithful and loyal wife, but as she had had nothing whatever to do with the selection of a husband, it is not at all unlikely that she was not wildly and passionately in love with the one that fate and her titled Russian father had selected for her However, simply because she was surprised into a tiny exclaer it hts were in any way disloyal to her spouse She ht have admired a particularly fine speci lance rested upon his profile he rose to leave the deck The Countess de Coude beckoned to a passing steward ”Who is that gentleman?” she asked
”He is booked, madam, as Monsieur Tarzan, of Africa,” replied the steward
”Rather a large estate,” thought the girl, but now her interest was still further aroused
As Tarzan walked slowly toward the s excitedly just without He would have vouchsafed thelance that one of them shot in his direction They reminded Tarzan of melodramatic villains he had seen at the theaters in Paris Both were very dark, and this, in connection with the shrugs and stealthy glances that accoreater force to the siht a chair a little apart from the others ere there He felt in no mood for conversation, and as he sipped his absinth he let his mind run rather sorrowfully over the past feeeks of his life Tiain he had wondered if he had acted wisely in renouncing his birthright to aIt is true that he liked Clayton, but--ah, but that was not the question It was not for William Cecil Clayton, Lord Greystoke, that he had denied his birth It was for the woe freak of fate had given to Clayton instead of to hi doubly difficult to bear, yet he knew that he could have done nothing less than he did do that night within the little railway station in the far Wisconsin woods To him her happiness was the first consideration of all, and his brief experience with civilization and civilized ht him that without money and position life to most of them was unendurable
Jane Porter had been born to both, and had Tarzan taken theed her into a life of misery and torture That she would have spurned Clayton once he had been stripped of both his title and his estates never for once occurred to Tarzan, for he credited to others the same honest loyalty that was so inherent a quality in himself Nor, in this instance, had he erred
Could any one thing have further bound Jane Porter to her promise to Clayton it would have been in the nature of so hihts drifted from the past to the future He tried to look forith pleasurable sensations to his return to the jungle of his birth and boyhood; the cruel, fierce jungle in which he had spent twenty of his twenty-two years But who or what of all the le life would there be to welcome his return? Not one Only Tantor, the elephant, could he call friend The others would hunt him or flee from him as had been their way in the past
Not even the apes of his own tribe would extend the hand of fellowshi+p to hi else for Tarzan of the Apes, it had to soht hienuine pleasure the congenial warmth of companionshi+p And in the same ratio had it made any other life distasteful to hiine a world without a friend--without a living thing who spoke the new tongues which Tarzan had learned to love so well And so it was that Tarzan looked with little relish upon the future he had arette his eyes fell upon a mirror before him, and in it he saw reflected a table at which four men sat at cards
Presently one of them rose to leave, and then another approached, and Tarzan could see that he courteously offered to fill the vacant chair, that the gaht not be interrupted He was the s just outside the s-room
It was this fact that aroused a faint spark of interest in Tarzan, and so as he speculated upon the future he watched in the mirror the reflection of the players at the table behind hiame Tarzan knew the name of but one of the other players It was he who sat opposite the new player, Count Raoul de Coude, whom an over-attentive steward had pointed out as one of the celebrities of the passage, describing hih in the official family of the French minister of war
Suddenly Tarzan's attention was riveted upon the picture in the glass
The other swarthy plotter had entered, and was standing behind the count's chair Tarzan saw hilance furtively about the room, but his eyes did not rest for a sufficient time upon the mirror to note the reflection of Tarzan's watchful eyes Stealthily thefrom his pocket Tarzan could not discern what the object was, for the man's hand covered it
Slowly the hand approached the count, and then, very deftly, the thing that was in it was transferred to the count's pocket Thewhere he could watch the Frenchman's cards Tarzan was puzzled, but he was all attention now, nor did he permit another detail of the incident to escape him
The play went on for some ten er froame, and then Tarzan saw the fellow back of the count's chair nod his head to his confederate Instantly the player arose and pointed a finger at the count