One result of the duel was that they all rode back to Paris together
in D'Arnot's car, the best of friends. De Coude was so relieved to
have had this double assurance of his wife's loyalty that he felt
no rancor at all toward Tarzan. It is true that the latter had
assumed much more of the fault than was rightly his, but if he lied
a little he may be excused, for he lied in the service of a woman,
and he lied like a gentleman.

The ape-man was confined to his bed for several days. He felt that
it was foolish and unnecessary, but the doctor and D'Arnot took the
matter so to heart that he gave in to please them, though it made
him laugh to think of it.

"It is droll," he said to D'Arnot. "To lie abed because of a pin
prick! Why, when Bolgani, the king gorilla, tore me almost to
pieces, while I was still but a little boy, did I have a nice soft
bed to lie on? No, only the damp, rotting vegetation of the jungle.
Hidden beneath some friendly bush I lay for days and weeks with
only Kala to nurse me--poor, faithful Kala, who kept the insects
from my wounds and warned off the beasts of prey.

"When I called for water she brought it to me in her own mouth--the
only way she knew to carry it. There was no sterilized gauze,
there was no antiseptic bandage--there was nothing that would not
have driven our dear doctor mad to have seen. Yet I recovered--recovered
to lie in bed because of a tiny scratch that one of the jungle folk
would scarce realize unless it were upon the end of his nose."

But the time was soon over, and before he realized it Tarzan found