y disappeared from
view around a bend in the gorge.

Tarzan had picked up Numa's trail with the intention of following
it southward in the belief that it would lead to water. In the sand
that floored the bottom of the gorge tracks were plain and easily
followed. At first only the fresh tracks of Numa were visible, but
later in the day the ape-man discovered the older tracks of other
lions and just before dark he stopped suddenly in evident surprise.
His two companions looked at him questioningly, and in answer to
their implied interrogations he pointed at the ground directly in
front of him.

"Look at those," he exclaimed.

At first neither Smith-Oldwick nor the girl saw anything but a
confusion of intermingled prints of padded feet in the sand, but
presently the girl discovered what Tarzan had seen, and an exclamation
of surprise broke from her lips.

"The imprint of human feet!" she cried.

Tarzan nodded.

"But there are no toes," the girl pointed out.

"The feet were shod with a soft sandal," explained Tarzan.

"Then there must be a native village somewhere in the vicinity,"
said Smith-Oldwick.

"Yes," replied the ape-man, "but not the sort of natives which we
would expect to find here in this part of Africa where others all
go unshod with the exception of a few of Usanga's renegade German
native troops who wear German army shoes. I don't know that you can
notice it, but it is evident to me that the foot inside the sandal
that made these imprints were not the foot of a Negro. If you will
examine them carefully you will notice that the impression of the
heel and ball of the foot are well marked even through the sole of
the sandal. The weight comes more nearly in the center of a Negro's
footprint.

"Then you think these were made by a white person?"

"It looks that way," replied Tarzan, and suddenly, to the surprise
of both the girl and Smith-Oldwick, he dropped to his hands and
knees and sniffed at the tracks--again a beast utilizing the senses
and woodcraft of a beast. Over an area of several square yards his
keen nostrils sought the identity of the makers of the tracks. At
length he rose to his feet.

"It is not the spoor of the Gomangani," he said, "nor is it exactly
like that of white men. There were three who came this way. They
were men, but of what race I do not know."

There was no apparent change in the nature of the gorge except that
it had steadily grown deeper as they followed it downwa