ve
you can establish your base within a day's march of the city and
if such is the case the force you send ahead should have no trouble
on the score of lack of water as there certainly must be water
in the valley where the city lies. Detail a couple of planes for
reconnaissance and messenger service so that the base can keep in
touch at all times with the advance party. When can your force move
out?"

"We can load the lorries tonight," replied Capell, "and march about
one o'clock tomorrow morning."

"Good," said the general, "keep me advised," and returning the
others' salutes he departed.

As Tarzan leaped for the vines he realized that the lion was
close upon him and that his life depended upon the strength of the
creepers clinging to the city walls; but to his intense relief he
found the stems as large around as a man's arm, and the tendrils
which had fastened themselves to the wall so firmly fixed, that his
weight upon the stem appeared to have no appreciable effect upon
them.

He heard Numa's baffled roar as the lion slipped downward clawing
futilely at the leafy creepers, and then with the agility of the
apes who had reared him, Tarzan bounded nimbly aloft to the summit
of the wall.

A few feet below him was the flat roof of the adjoining building
and as he dropped to it his back was toward the niche from which
an embrasure looked out upon the gardens and the forest beyond, so
that he did not see the figure crouching there in the dark shadow.
But if he did not see he was not long in ignorance of the fact that
he was not alone, for scarcely had his feet touched the roof when
a heavy body leaped upon him from behind and brawny arms encircled
him about the waist.

Taken at a disadvantage and lifted from his feet, the ape-man was,
for the time being, helpless. Whatever the creature was that had
seized him, it apparently had a well-defined purpose in mind, for
it walked directly toward the edge of the roof so that it was soon
apparent to Tarzan that he was to be hurled to the pavement below--a
most efficacious manner of disposing of an intruder. That he would
be either maimed or killed the ape-man was confident; but he had
no intention of permitting his assailant to carry out the plan.

Tarzan's arms and legs were free but he was in such a disadvantageous
position that he could not use them to any good effect. His only
hope lay in throwing the creature off its balance, and to this end
Tarzan straightened hi