ls were now but a dim, ill-defined blur
ahead. Sometimes he forgot that they were hills, and again he
wondered vaguely why he must go on forever through all this torture
endeavoring to overtake them--the fleeing, elusive hills. Presently
he began to hate them and there formed within his half-delirious
brain the hallucination that the hills were German hills, that they
had slain someone dear to him, whom he could never quite recall,
and that he was pursuing to slay them.

This idea, growing, appeared to give him strength--a new and
revivifying purpose--so that for a time he no longer staggered; but
went forward steadily with head erect. Once he stumbled and fell,
and when he tried to rise he found that he could not--that his
strength was so far gone that he could only crawl forward on his
hands and knees for a few yards and then sink down again to rest.

It was during one of these frequent periods of utter exhaustion
that he heard the flap of dismal wings close above him. With his
remaining strength he turned himself over on his back to see Ska
wheel quickly upward. With the sight Tarzan's mind cleared for a
while.

"Is the end so near as that?" he thought. "Does Ska know that I am
so near gone that he dares come down and perch upon my carcass?"
And even then a grim smile touched those swollen lips as into the
savage mind came a sudden thought-the cunning of the wild beast
at bay. Closing his eyes he threw a forearm across them to protect
them from Ska's powerful beak and then he lay very still and waited.

It was restful lying there, for the sun was now obscured by clouds
and Tarzan was very tired. He feared that he might sleep and something
told him that if he did he would never awaken, and so he concentrated
all his remaining powers upon the one thought of remaining awake.
Not a muscle moved-to Ska, circling above, it became evident that
the end had come--that at last he should be rewarded for his long
vigil.

Circling slowly he dropped closer and closer to the dying man. Why
did not Tarzan move? Had he indeed been overcome by the sleep of
exhaustion, or was Ska right--had death at last claimed that mighty
body? Was that great, savage heart stilled forever? It is unthinkable.

Ska, filled with suspicions, circled warily. Twice he almost alighted
upon the great, naked breast only to wheel suddenly away; but the
third time his talons touched the brown skin. It was as though the
contact closed an electric circu