Tarzan stroked his head and spoke to him in a low voice, praising him, and then, drawing his hunting knife, he cut the jugular of the antelope and let the blood from the carcass. Jane and Korak stood close, watching Jad-bal-ja—what would the lion do with the smell of fresh, hot blood in his nostrils? He sniffed at it and growled, and with bared fangs he eyed the three wickedly. The ape-man pushed him away with his open palm and the lion growled again angrily and snapped at him.
Quick is Numa, quick is Bara, the deer, but Tarzan of the Apes is lightning. So swiftly did he strike, and so heavily, that Jad-bal-ja was falling on his back almost in the very instant that he had growled at his master. Swiftly he came to his feet again and the two stood facing one another.
“Down!” commanded the ape-man. “Lie down, Jad-bal-ja!” His voice was low and firm. The lion hesitated but for an instant, and then lay down as Tarzan of the Apes had taught him to do at the word of command. Tarzan turned and lifted the carcass of the antelope to his shoulder.
“Come,” he said to Jad-bal-ja. “Heel!” and without another glance at the carnivore he moved off toward the horses.
“I might have known it,” said Korak, with a laugh, “and saved my hundred pounds.”
“Of course you might have known it,” said his mother.
CHAPTER III
A MEETING OF MYSTERY
A RATHER attractive-looking, though overdressed, young woman was dining in a second-rate chop-house in London. She was noticeable, not so much for her fine figure and coarsely beautiful face as for the size and appearance of her companion, a large, well-proportioned man in the mid-twenties, with such a tremendous beard that it gave him the appearance of hiding in ambush. He stood fully three inches over six feet. His shoulders were broad, his chest deep, and his hips narrow. His physique, his carriage, everything about him, suggested indubitably the trained athlete.
The two were in close conversation, a conversation that occasionally gave every evidence of bordering upon heated argument.
“I tell you,” said the man, “that I do not see what we need of the others. Why should they share with us—why divide into six portions that which you and I might have alone?”