This was the plan that he had conceived to hold them off, using the girl as a hostage. It was a good plan; but, like many another good plan, it failed to function properly.
"They will not stop," said the girl. "They do not care if you kill me. You have taken me. I belong to you. They will kill us all and eat us—if they can. Throw rocks down on them; drive them back; then I will show you how we can get away from them."
Following her own advice, she picked up a bit of loose rock and hurled it at the nearest of the creatures. It struck him on the head, and he tumbled backward to a lower ledge. The girl laughed and screamed taunts and insults at her former companions.
Tarzan, realizing the efficacy of this mode of defense, gathered fragments of rock and threw them at the approaching monsters; then Rhonda joined in the barrage, and the three rained down a hail of missiles that drove their enemies to the shelter of the caves below.
"They won't eat us for a while," laughed the girl.
"You eat human flesh?" asked Tarzan.
"Not Malb'yat nor I," she replied; "but they do—they eat anything."
"Who is Malb'yat?"
"My he—you fought with him and took me from him. Now I am yours. I will fight for you. No one else shall have you!" She turned upon Rhonda with a snarl, and would have attacked her had not Tarzan seized her.
"Leave her alone," he warned.
"You shall have no other she but me," said the wild-girl.
"She is not mine," explained the ape-man; "you must not harm her."
The girl continued to scowl at Rhonda, but she quit her efforts to reach her. "I shall watch," she said. "What is her name."
"Rhonda."
"And what is yours?" she demanded.
"You may call me Stanley," said Tarzan. He was amused, but not at all disconcerted, by the strange turn events 'had taken. He realized that their only chance of escape might be through this strange, beautiful, little savage, and he could not afford to antagonize her.
"Stanley," she repeated, stumbling a little over the strange word. "My name is Balza."
Tarzan thought that it fitted her well, for in the language of the great apes it meant golden girl. Ape names are always descriptive. His own meant white skin. Malb'yat was yellow head.
Balza stooped quickly and picked up a rock which she hurled at a head that had been cautiously poked from a cave mouth below them. She scored another hit and laughed gaily.
"We will keep them away until night," she said; "then we will go. They will not follow us at night. They are afraid of the dark. If we went now they would follow us, and there are so many of them that we should all be killed."
The girl interested Tarzan. Remembering what the gorilla god had told him of these mutants, he had assumed that her perfect human body was dominated by the brain of a gorilla; but he had not failed to note that she had repeated the name he had given her—something no gorilla could have done.
"Do you speak English?" he asked in that language.
She looked at him in surprise. "Yes," she replied; "but I didn't imagine that you did."
"Where did you learn it?" he asked.
"In London—before they drove me out."
"Why did they drive you out?"
"Because I was not like them. My mother kept me hidden for years, but at last they found me out. They would have killed me had I remained."
"And Malb'yat is like you?"
"No, Malb'yat is like the others. He cannot learn a single English word. I like you much better. I hope that you killed Malb'yat."
"I didn't, though," said the ape-man. "I see him moving on the ledge down there where he has been lying."
The girl looked; then she picked up a rock and flung it at the unfortunate Malb'yat. It missed him, and he crawled to shelter. "If he gets me back he'll beat me," she remarked.
"I should think he'd kill you," said Tarzan.
"No—there is no one else like me. The others are ugly—I am beautiful. No, he will never kill me, but the shes would all like to." She laughed gaily. "I suppose this one would like to kill me." She nodded toward Rhonda.
The American girl had been a surprised and interested listener to that part of the conversation that had been carried on in English, but she had not spoken.
"I do not want to kill you," she said. "There is no reason why we should not be friends."
Balza looked at her in surprise; then she studied her carefully.
"Is she speaking the truth?" she asked Tarzan.
The ape-man nodded. "Yes."
"Then we are friends," said Balza to Rhonda. Her decisions in matters of love, friendship, or murder were equally impulsive.
For hours the three kept vigil upon the ledge, but only occasionally was it necessary to remind the monsters below them to keep their distance.
31. DIAMONDS!
At last the long day drew to a close. All were hungry and thirsty. All were anxious to leave the hard, uncomfortable ledge where they had been exposed to the hot African sun since morning.
Tarzan and Rhonda had been entertained and amused by the savage little wild-girl. She was wholly unspoiled and without inhibitions of any nature. She said or did whatever she wished to say or do with a total lack of self-consciousness that was disarming and, often, not a little embarrassing.
As the sun was dropping behind the western hills across the valley, she rose to her feet. "Come," she said; "we can go now. They will not follow, for it will soon be night."
She led the way into the interior of the cave that opened upon the ledge. The cave was narrow but quite straight. The girl led them to the back of the cave to the bottom of a natural chimney formed by a cleft in the rocky hill. The twilight sky was visible above them, the light revealing the rough surface of the interior of the chimney to its top a few yards up.
Tarzan took in the situation at a glance. He saw that by bracing their backs against one side of the chimney, their feet against the other, they could work themselves to the top; but he also realized that the rough surface would scratch and tear the flesh of the girls' backs.
"I'll go first," he said. "Wait here, and I'll drop a rope for you. It's strange, Balza, that your people didn't come to the cliff top and get us from above—they could have come down this chimney and taken us by surprise."
"They are too stupid," replied the girl. "They have brains enough only to follow us; they would never think of going around us and heading us off."
"Which is fortunate for us and some of them," remarked the ape- man as he started the ascent of the chimney.
Reaching the top, he lowered his rope and raised the two girls easily to his side, where they found themselves in a small, bowl- shaped gully the floor of which was covered with rough, crystallized pebbles that gave back the light of the dying day, transforming the gully into a well of soft luminance.
The moment that her eyes fell upon the scene, Rhonda voiced an exclamation of surprised incredulity. "Diamonds!" she gasped. "The valley of diamonds!"
She stooped and gathered some of the precious stones in her hands. Balza looked at her in surprise; the gems meant nothing to her. Tarzan, more sophisticated, gathered several of the larger specimens.
"May I take some with me?" asked Rhonda.
"Why not?" inquired the ape-man. "Take what you can carry comfortably."
"We shall all be rich!" exclaimed the American girl. "We can bring the whole company here and take truck loads of these stones back with us— why there must be tons of them here!"
"And then do you know what will happen?" asked Tarzan.
"Yes," she replied. "I shall have a villa on the Riviera, a town house in Beverly Hills, a hundred and fifty thousand dollar cottage at Malibu, a place at Palm Beach, a penthouse in New York."
"You will have no more than you have always had," the ape-man interrupted, "for if you took all these diamonds back to civilization the market would be glutted; and diamonds would be as cheap as glass. If you are wise, you will take just a few for yourself and your f
riends; and then tell nobody how they may reach the valley of diamonds."
Rhonda pondered this for a moment. "You are right," she admitted. "From this moment, as far as I am concerned, there is no valley of diamonds."
During the brief twilight Balza guided them to a trail that led down into the valley some distance below the cave dwellings of the tribe of mutants, and all during the night they moved southward toward the escarpment and Omwamwi Falls.
The way was new to all of them, for Balza had never been far south of the cave village; and this, combined with the darkness, retarded them, so that it was almost dawn when they reached the escarpment.
For much of the way Tarzan carried Rhonda who was almost exhausted by all that she had passed through, and only thus were they able to progress at all. But Balza was tireless, moving silently in the footsteps of her man, as she now considered Tarzan. She did not speak, for experience and instinct both had trained her to the necessity for stealth if one would pass through savage nights alive. Every sense must be alert, concentrated upon the business of self- preservation. But who may know what passed in that savage little brain as the beautiful creature followed her new lord and master out into a strange world?
In the early dawn the scene from the top of the escarpment looked weird and forbidding to Rhonda Terry. The base was mist- hidden. Only the roar of the falls, rising sepulchral, like the voices of ghostly Titans from the tomb, belied the suggestion of bottomless depth. She seemed to be gazing down into another world, a world she would never reach alive.
Strong in her memory was that other experience when the giant gorilla had carried her up this dizzy height. She knew that she could never descend it safely alone. She knew that Stanley Obroski could not carry her down. She had learned that he could do many things with the possibility of which none might ever have credited him a few weeks before, but here was something that no man might do. She even doubted his ability to descend alone.
Even as these thoughts passed quickly through her mind the man swung her across one broad shoulder and started the descent. Rhonda gasped, but she clenched her teeth and made no outcry. Seemingly with all the strength of the bull gorilla and with far greater agility he swung down into the terrifying abyss, finding foothold and handhold with unerring accuracy; and after him came Balza, the wild-girl, as sure of herself as any monkey.
And at last the impossible was achieved—the three stood safely at the foot of the escarpment. The sun had risen, and before it the mist was disappearing. New hope rose in the breast of the American girl, and new strength animated her body.
"Let me down, Stanley," she said. "I am sure I can walk all right now. I feel stronger."
He lowered her to the ground. "It is not a great way to the camp where I left Orman and the others," he said.
Rhonda glanced at Balza and cleared her throat. "Of course we're all from Hollywood," she said, "but don't you think we ought to rig some sort of skirt for Balza before we take her into camp?"
Tarzan laughed. "Poor Balza," he said; "she will have to eat of the apple soon enough now that she is coming into contact with civilized man. Let her keep her naturalness and her purity of mind as long as she may."
"But I was thinking of her," remonstrated Rhonda. "She won't be embarrassed," Tarzan assured her. "A skirt would probably embarrass her far more."
Rhonda shrugged. "O.K." she said. "And Tom and Bill forgot how to blush years ago, anyway."
They had proceeded but a short distance down the river when Tarzan stopped and pointed. "There is where they were camped," he said, "but they are gone."
"What could have happened to them? Weren't they going to wait for you?"
The ape-man stood listening and sniffing the air. "They are farther down the river," he announced presently, "and they are not alone—there are many with them."
They continued on for over a mile when they suddenly came in sight of a large camp. There were many tents and motor trucks.
"The safari!" exclaimed Rhonda. "Pat got through!" As they approached the camp some one saw them and commenced to shout; then there was a stampede to meet them. Everyone kissed Rhonda, and Naomi Madison kissed Tarzan; whereat, with a growl, Balza leaped for her. The ape-man caught the wild-girl around the waist and held her, while Naomi shrank back, terrified.
"Hands off Stanley," warned Rhonda with a laugh. "The young lady has annexed him."
Tarzan took Balza by the shoulders and wheeled her about until she faced him. "These are my people," he said. "Their ways are not as your ways. If you quarrel with them I shall send you away. These shes are your friends."
Every one was staring at Balza with open admiration, Orman with the eye of a director discovering a type, Pat O'Grady with the eye of an assistant director—which is something else again.
"Balza," continued the ape-man, "go with these shes. Do as they tell you. They will cover your beautiful body with uncomfortable clothing, but you will have to wear it. In a month you will be smoking cigarettes and drinking high balls; then you will be civilized. Now you are only a barbarian. Go with them and be unhappy."
Every one laughed except Balza. She did not know what it was all about; but her god had spoken, and she obeyed. She went with Rhonda and Naomi to their tent.
Tarzan talked with Orman, Bill West, and O'Grady. They all thought that he was Stanley Obroski, and he did not attempt to undeceive them. They told him that Bill West had spent half the previous night trying to scale the escarpment. He had ascended far enough to see the camp fires of the safari and the headlights of some of the trucks; then, forced to abandon his attempt to reach the summit, he had returned and led the others to the main camp.
Orman was now enthusiastic to go ahead with the picture. He had his star back again, his leading woman, and practically all the other important members of his cast. He decided to play the heavy himself and cast Pat O'Grady in Major White's part, and he had already created a part for Balza. "She'll knock 'em cold," he prophesied.
32. GOOD-BYE, AFRICA!
FOR two weeks Orman shot scene after scene against the gorgeous background of the splendid river and the magnificent falls. Tarzan departed for two days and returned with a tribe of friendly natives to replace those that had deserted. He led the cameramen to lions, to elephants, to every form of wild life that the district afforded; and all marveled at the knowledge, the power, and the courage of Stanley Obroski.
Then came a sad blow. A runner arrived bringing a cablegram to Orman. It was from the studio; and it ordered him to return at once to Hollywood, bringing the company and equipment with him.
Every one except Orman was delighted. "Hollywood!" exclaimed Naomi Madison. "Oh, Stanley, just think of it! Aren't you crazy to get to Hollywood?"
"Perhaps that's the right word," he mused.
The company danced and sang like children watching the school house burn, and Tarzan watched them and wondered. He wondered what this Hollywood was like that it held such an appeal to these men and women. He thought that some day he might go and see for himself.
Over broken trails the return journey was made with ease and speed. Tarzan accompanied the safari through the Bansuto country, assuring them that they would have no trouble. "I arranged that with Rungula before I left his village," he explained.
Then he left them, saying that he was going on ahead to Jinja. He hastened to the village of Mpugu, where he had left Obroski. Mpugu met him with a long face. "White bwana die seven days ago," announced the chief. "We take his body to Jinja so that the white men know that we did not kill him."
Tarzan whistled. It was too bad, but there was nothing to do about it. He had done the best that he could for Obroski.
Two days later the lord of the jungle and Jad-bal-ja, the Golden Lion, stood on a low eminence and watched the long caravan of trucks wind toward Jinja.
In command of the rear guard walked Pat O'Grady. At his side was Balza. Each had an arm about the other, and Balza puffed on a cigarette.
33. HELLO, HOLLYWOOD!<
br />
A year had passed. A tall, bronzed man alighted from The Chief in the railroad station at Los Angeles. The easy, majestic grace of his carriage; his tread, at once silent and bold; his flowing muscles; the dignity of his mien; all suggested the leonine, as though he were, indeed, a personification of Numa, the lion.
A great throng of people crowded about the train. A cordon of good natured policemen held them back, keeping an aisle clear for the alighting passengers and for the great celebrity that all awaited with such eagerness.
Cameras clicked and whirred for local papers, for news syndicates, for news reels; eager reporters, special correspondents, and sob-sisters pressed forward.
At last the crowd glimpsed the celebrity, and a great roar of welcome billowed into the microphones strategically placed by Freeman Lang.
A slip of a girl with green hair had alighted from The Chief; her publicity agent preceded her, while directly behind her were her three secretaries, who were followed by a maid leading a gorilla.
Instantly he was engulfed by the reporters. Freeman forced his way to her side. "Won't you say just a word to all your friends of the air?" he asked, taking her by the arm. "Right over here, please, dear."
She stepped to the microphone. "Hello, everybody! I wish you were all here. It's simply marvelous. I'm so happy to be back in Hollywood."
Freeman Lang took the microphone. "Ladies and gentlemen," he announced, "you have just heard the voice of the most beautiful and most popular little lady in motion pictures today. You should see the crowds down here at the station to welcome her back to Hollywood. I've seen lots of these homecomings, but honestly, folks, I never saw anything like this before —all Los Angeles has turned out to greet B.O.'s beautiful star— the glorious Balza."
There was a suspicion of a smile in the eyes of the bronzed stranger as he succeeded at last in making his way through the crowd to the street, where he hailed a taxi and asked to be driven to a hotel in Hollywood,
As he was registering at The Roosevelt, a young man leaning against the desk covertly noted his entry, John Clayton, London; and as Clayton followed the bell boy toward the elevator, the young man watched him, noting the tall figure, the broad shoulders, and the free, yet cat-like stride.
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