se guards, however, were small, consisting usually of not more than
five or six warriors, one of whom remained awake while the others
slept. Such were the conditions then when two warriors presented
themselves, one at either end of the corridor, to the sentries who
watched over the safety of Jane Clayton and the Princess O-lo-a, and
each of the newcomers repeated to the sentinels the stereotyped words
which announced that they were relieved and these others sent to watch
in their stead. Never is a warrior loath to be relieved of sentry duty.
Where, under different circumstances he might ask numerous questions he
is now too well satisfied to escape the monotonies of that universally
hated duty. And so these two men accepted their relief without question
and hastened away to their pallets.

And then a third warrior entered the corridor and all of the newcomers
came together before the door of the ape-man's slumbering mate. And one
was the strange warrior who had met Ja-don and Tarzan outside the city
of Ja-lur as they had approached it the previous day; and he was the
same warrior who had entered the temple a short hour before, but the
faces of his fellows were unfamiliar, even to one another, since it is
seldom that a priest removes his hideous headdress in the presence even
of his associates.

Silently they lifted the hangings that hid the interior of the room
from the view of those who passed through the corridor, and stealthily
slunk within. Upon a pile of furs in a far corner lay the sleeping form
of Lady Greystoke. The bare feet of the intruders gave forth no sound
as they crossed the stone floor toward her. A ray of moonlight entering
through a window near her couch shone full upon her, revealing the
beautiful contours of an arm and shoulder in cameo-distinctness against
the dark furry pelt beneath which she slept, and the perfect profile
that was turned toward the skulking three.

But neither the beauty nor the helplessness of the sleeper aroused such
sentiments of passion or pity as might stir in the breasts of normal
men. To the three priests she was but a lump of clay, nor could they
conceive aught of that passion which had aroused men to intrigue and to
murder for possession of this beautiful American girl, and which even
now was influencing the destiny of undiscovered Pal-ul-don.

Upon the floor of the chamber were numerous pelts and as the leader of
the trio came close to the sleeping woman he stooped and