Rungula heard a voice speaking, speaking his own language. "Look at me!" it commanded.
Rungula turned his eyes toward the thing that held him. The light from the village fires filtered through the foliage to dimly reveal the features of a white man bending above him. Rungula gasped and shrank back. "Walumbe!" he muttered in terror.
"I am the god of death," replied Tarzan; "I am not Walumbe. But I can bring death just as quickly, for I am greater than Walumbe. I am Tarzan of the Apes!"
"What do you want?" asked Rungula through chattering teeth. "What are you going to do to me?"
"I tested you to see if you were a good man and your people good people. I made myself into two men, and one I sent where your warriors could capture him. I wanted to see what you would do to a stranger who had not harmed you. Now I know. For what you have done you should die. What have you to say?"
"You are here," said Rungula, "and you are also down there." He nodded toward the figure of Obroski standing in surprised silence amidst the warriors. "Therefore you must be a demon. What can I say to a demon? I can give you food and drink and weapons. I can give you girls who can cook and draw water and fetch wood and work all day in the fields—girls with broad hips and strong backs. All these things will I give you if you will not kill me—if you will just go away and leave us alone."
"I do not want your food nor your weapons nor your women. I want but one thing from you, Rungula, as the price of your life."
"What is that, Master?"
"Your promise that you will never again make war upon white men, and that when they come through your country you will help them instead of killing them."
"I promise, Master."