the roots. The ground rose in little mounds and ridges about
the base of the bole, the tree tilted--in another moment it would be
uprooted and fall.

The ape-man whirled La to his back and just as the tree inclined slowly
in its first movement out of the perpendicular, before the sudden rush
of its final collapse, he swung to the branches of a lesser neighbor.
It was a long and perilous leap. La closed her eyes and shuddered; but
when she opened them again she found herself safe and Tarzan whirling
onward through the forest. Behind them the uprooted tree crashed
heavily to the ground, carrying with it the lesser trees in its path
and then Tantor, realizing that his prey had escaped him, set up once
more his hideous trumpeting and followed at a rapid charge upon their
trail.

14

A Priestess But Yet a Woman

At first La closed her eyes and clung to Tarzan in terror, though she
made no outcry; but presently she gained sufficient courage to look
about her, to look down at the ground beneath and even to keep her eyes
open during the wide, perilous swings from tree to tree, and then there
came over her a sense of safety because of her confidence in the
perfect physical creature in whose strength and nerve and agility her
fate lay. Once she raised her eyes to the burning sun and murmured a
prayer of thanks to her pagan god that she had not been permitted to
destroy this godlike man, and her long lashes were wet with tears. A
strange anomaly was La of Opar--a creature of circumstance torn by
conflicting emotions. Now the cruel and bloodthirsty creature of a
heartless god and again a melting woman filled with compassion and
tenderness. Sometimes the incarnation of jealousy and revenge and
sometimes a sobbing maiden, generous and forgiving; at once a virgin
and a wanton; but always--a woman. Such was La.

She pressed her cheek close to Tarzan's shoulder. Slowly she turned
her head until her hot lips were pressed against his flesh. She loved
him and would gladly have died for him; yet within an hour she had been
ready to plunge a knife into his heart and might again within the
coming hour.

A hapless priest seeking shelter in the jungle chanced to show himself
to enraged Tantor. The great beast turned to one side, bore down upon
the crooked, little man, snuffed him out and then, diverted from his
course, blundered away toward the south. In a few minutes even the
noise of his trumpeting was lost in the