"I have so much wished to see you," she was saying. "It has troubled
me not a little to think that after the service you rendered to both my
husband and myself no adequate explanation was ever made you of what
must have seemed ingratitude on our part in not taking the necessary
steps to prevent a repetition of the attacks upon us by those two men."

"You wrong me," replied Tarzan. "My thoughts of you have been only the
most pleasant. You must not feel that any explanation is due me. Have
they annoyed you further?"

"They never cease," she replied sadly. "I feel that I must tell some
one, and I do not know another who so deserves an explanation as you.
You must permit me to do so. It may be of service to you, for I know
Nikolas Rokoff quite well enough to be positive that you have not seen
the last of him. He will find some means to be revenged upon you.
What I wish to tell you may be of aid to you in combating any scheme of
revenge he may harbor. I cannot tell you here, but tomorrow I shall be
at home to Monsieur Tarzan at five."

"It will be an eternity until tomorrow at five," he said, as he bade
her good night. From a corner of the theater Rokoff and Paulvitch saw
Monsieur Tarzan in the box of the Countess de Coude, and both men
smiled.

At four-thirty the following afternoon a swarthy, bearded man rang the
bell at the servants' entrance of the palace of the Count de Coude.
The footman who opened the door raised his eyebrows in recognition as
he saw who stood without. A low conversation passed between the two.

At first the footman demurred from some proposition that the bearded
one made, but an instant later something passed from the hand of the
caller to the hand of the servant. Then the latter turned and led the
visitor by a roundabout way to a little curtained alcove off the
apartment in which the countess was wont to serve tea of an afternoon.

A half hour later Tarzan was ushered into the room, and presently his
hostess entered, smiling, and with outstretched hands.

"I am so glad that you came," she said.

"Nothing could have prevented," he replied.

For a few moments they spoke of the opera, of the topics that were then
occupying the attention of Paris, of the pleasure of renewing their
brief acquaintance which had had its inception under such odd
circumstances, and this brought them to the subject that was uppermost
in the minds of both.

"You must have wondered," said the countess fina