For a moment every eye was bent upon the noonday sun, and then in
unison the people in the galleries and those in the court below
took up the refrain of a low, weird chant. Presently those about
Tarzan began to dance to the cadence of their solemn song. They
circled him slowly, resembling in their manner of dancing a number
of clumsy, shuffling bears; but as yet they did not look at him,
keeping their little eyes fixed upon the sun.

For ten minutes or more they kept up their monotonous chant and
steps, and then suddenly, and in perfect unison, they turned toward
their victim with upraised bludgeons and emitting fearful howls,
the while they contorted their features into the most diabolical
expressions, they rushed upon him.

At the same instant a female figure dashed into the midst of the
bloodthirsty horde, and, with a bludgeon similar to their own,
except that it was wrought from gold, beat back the advancing men.





Chapter 20

La




For a moment Tarzan thought that by some strange freak of fate