t would not be necessary to make promises of any
sort. Not that Rokoff would have felt the slightest compunction in
ignoring any promises he might have made the girl, but he disliked the
idea of having to sue for favour with one who had so recently assaulted
and escaped him.

Already he was gloating over the days and nights of revenge that would
be his while the heavy dugout drifted its slow way to the ocean.

Jane Clayton, working furiously to shove the boat beyond his reach,
suddenly realized that she was to be successful, for with a little
lurch the dugout swung quickly into the current, just as the Russian
reached out to place his hand upon its bow.

His fingers did not miss their goal by a half-dozen inches. The girl
almost collapsed with the reaction from the terrific mental, physical,
and nervous strain under which she had been labouring for the past few
minutes. But, thank Heaven, at last she was safe!

Even as she breathed a silent prayer of thanksgiving, she saw a sudden
expression of triumph lighten the features of the cursing Russian, and
at the same instant he dropped suddenly to the ground, grasping firmly
upon something which wriggled through the mud toward the water.

Jane Clayton crouched, wide-eyed and horror-stricken, in the bottom of
the boat as she realized that at the last instant success had been
turned to failure, and that she was indeed again in the power of the
malignant Rokoff.

For the thing that the man had seen and grasped was the end of the
trailing rope with which the dugout had been moored to the tree.

Chapter 15

Down the Ugambi

Halfway between the Ugambi and the village of the Waganwazam, Tarzan
came upon the pack moving slowly along his old spoor. Mugambi could
scarce believe that the trail of the Russian and the mate of his savage
master had passed so close to that of the pack.

It seemed incredible that two human beings should have come so close to
them without having been detected by some of the marvellously keen and
alert beasts; but Tarzan pointed out the spoor of the two he trailed,
and at certain points the black could see that the man and the woman
must have been in hiding as the pack passed them, watching every move
of the ferocious creatures.

It had been apparent to Tarzan from the first that Jane and Rokoff were
not travelling together. The spoor showed distinctly that the young
woman had been a considerable distance ahead of the Russian at fi