Part 35 (2/2)

Before the other members of the little coton and Miss Strong questioned hi boat

”They are all dead,” replied Thuran ”The three sailors died before we le by so delirious with fever Clayton died of the same fever but a few days since And to think that all this time we have been separated by but a fewJane Porter lay in the darkness of the vault beneath the temple in the ancient city of Opar she did not know For a time she was delirious with fever, but after this passed she coth Every day the woht her food beckoned to her to arise, but for irl could only shake her head to indicate that she was too weak

But eventually she was able to gain her feet, and then to stagger a few steps by supporting herself with one hand upon the wall Her captors noatched her with increasing interest The day was approaching, and the victith

Presently the day ca woman whom Jane Porter had not seen before caeon Here soious nature the girl was sure, and so she took new heart, and rejoiced that she had fallen a influences of religion evidently had fallen They would treat her humanely--of that she was now quite sure

And so when they led her froht of concrete steps to a brilliant courtyard, she illingly, even gladly--for was she not aht be, of course, that their interpretation of the supre differed from her own, but that they owned a God was sufficient evidence to her that they were kind and good

But when she saw a stone altar in the center of the courtyard, and dark-brown stains upon it and the nearby concrete of the floor, she began to wonder and to doubt And as they stooped and bound her ankles, and secured her wrists behind her, her doubts were turned to fear A moment later, as she was lifted and placed supine across the altar's top, hope left her entirely, and she trerotesque dance of the votaries which followed, she lay frozen in horror, nor did she require the sight of the thin blade in the hands of the high priestess as it rose slowly above her to enlighten her further as to her dooan its descent, Jane Porter closed her eyes and sent up a silent prayer to the Maker she was so soon to face--then she succumbed to the strain upon her tired nerves, and swooned

Day and night Tarzan of the Apes raced through the primeval forest toward the ruined city in which he was positive the woman he loved lay either a prisoner or dead

In a day and a night he covered the sahtful men had taken the better part of a week to traverse, for Tarzan of the Apes traveled along the led obstacles that i bull ape had told irl captive had been Jane Porter, for there was not another snized frorotesque parodies upon huirl's fate he could picture as plainly as though he were an eyewitness to it When they would lay her across that triuess, but that her dear, frail body would eventually find its way there he was confident

But, finally, after what seees to the impatient ape-man, he topped the barrier cliffs that herim and awful ruins of the now hideous city of Opar At a rapid trot he started across the dry and dusty, bowlder-strewn ground toward the goal of his desires

Would he be in tiainst hope At least he could be revenged, and in his wrath it see out the entire population of that terrible city

It was nearly noon when he reached the great bowlder at the top of which tere to the pits beneath the city Like a cat he scaled the precipitous sides of the frowning granite KOPJE A , straight tunnel that led to the treasure vault Through this he passed, then on and on until at last he came to the well-like shaft upon the opposite side of which lay the dungeon with the false wall

As he paused a moment upon the brink of the well a faint sound caht and translated it--it was the dance of death that preceded a sacrifice, and the singsong ritual of the high priestess He could even recognize the woman's voice Could it be that the cere he had so hastened to prevent? A wave of horror swept over him Was he, after all, to be just a htened deer he leaped across the narrow chase beyond At the false wall he tore like one possessed to deianthis head and shoulders through the first s the balance of the ith hieon

With a single leap he cleared the length of the chaainst the ancient door But here he stopped The ainst such muscles as his

It needed but ato force that inable barrier There was but one other way, and that led back through the long tunnels to the bowlder a mile beyond the city's walls, and then back across the open as he had come to the city first with his Waziri

He realized that to retrace his steps and enter the city froround would irl, if it were indeed she who lay upon the sacrificial altar above him But there seemed no other way, and so he turned and ran swiftly back into the passageway beyond the broken wall At the well he heard again the lanced aloft, the opening, twenty feet above, seemed so near that he was tempted to leap for it in a mad endeavor to reach the inner courtyard that lay so near

If he could but get one end of his grass rope caught upon so aperture! In the instant's pause and thought an idea occurred to hi back to the tue, flat slabs that had co one end of his rope fast to the piece of granite, he returned to the shaft, and, coiling the balance of the rope on the floor beside hiing it several tiet the distance and the direction fixed, he let the weight fly up at a slight angle, so that, instead of falling straight back into the shaft again, it grazed the far edge, tued for a moment upon the slack end of the rope until he felt that the stone was lodged with fair security at the shaft's top, then he swung out over the black depths beneath The ht came upon the rope he felt it slip from above He waited there in awful suspense as it dropped in little jerks, inch by inch The stone was being dragged up the outside of thethe top of the shaft--would it catch at the very edge, or would his weight drag it over to fall upon him as he hurtled into the unknown depths below?

Chapter 25