; Chet stooped low
and stepped forth cautiously that the surging horde on the ground might
not see him. The others followed. He felt Harkness' hand in a sudden
warning grip upon him.

"Chet!" said Harkness, "there is something there in the shadow--there!"
And Chet saw, even before Walt pointed, a wriggling figure that crept
toward them.

He struck down the bow that Kreiss had raised, and a ray of light came
through a jagged niche in the rock above to fall upon the face of the
one who drew near.

Abjectly, in utmost humility, the naked figure crept toward their feet,
and the savage face that was raised to theirs was wreathed in a
distorted smile.

Beside him, Chet felt Harkness struggling to speak. In wondering tones
that were almost unbelieving, Harkness choked out one word.

"Towahg!" he said. "Towahg!"

And the thick lips in that upraised face echoed proudly:

"Towahg! Me come!"

CHAPTER XIII

_Happy Valley_

"Towahg!" Chet marveled; "you little devil! It's you who has been
following us all this time!"

"I wish he hadn't been so bashful," Harkness added. "If he had come out
and showed himself he would have saved us a lot of trouble." But
Harkness stepped forward and patted the black shoulder that quivered
with joy beneath his touch. "Good boy, Towahg!" he told the grinning
ape-man.

Monkey-like, Towahg had to imitate, and this time he gave a reproduction
of his own acts. He wriggled toward the entrance of the passage, peered
around the edge, and seemed to see something that made him draw back.
Then he fitted an arrow to his bow and springing upright, let it fly.

So realistic was the performance that Chet actually expected to see
another enemy transfixed, but the squat figure of Towahg was doing a
dance of victory beside the prostrate figure of the first and only
victim. Chet reached out with one long arm and swung the exulting savage
about. He heard Herr Kreiss expressing his opinion in accents of
disgust.

"Ugly little beast!" Kreiss was saying. "And murderous!"

There was no time to lose: the sound of scrambling bodies was coming
nearer from the dark pit beyond. Yet, even then, Chet found an instant
to defend the black.

"Damned lucky for us that he is a murderer!" he told Kreiss. Then to
Towahg:

"Listen, you little imp of hell! You don't know more than ten words, but
get this!"

Chet was standing where the Earth-light struck upon him; he pointed into
the dark where the sounds of