corpse across his shoulder and entered the
jungle. There he concealed the body and once more took to the trees.

The forest ended suddenly, some fifty yards from the base of an immense
overhanging cliff. A single glance told Tharn that he had reached the
trail's end, and he leaped lightly into the branches of a tree at the
lip of the clearing. Swiftly he swarmed upward until a broad bough was
reached that pointed outward toward the hillside.

Below and before him went on the everyday life of a Cro-Magnon village.
Four women carved steaks from the freshly killed body of a deer; naked
children climbed in and out of the caves and ran about the open ground;
two girls, several seasons short of woman-hood, scraped hair, by means
of flint tools, from a deerskin staked flat to the ground.

There was but one thing lacking in this peaceful, commonplace picture,
and Tharn noted its absence at once. There was not a single grown male
in sight! Did this mean a trap had been laid for the pursuit which the
warriors of this tribe had every reason to expect? Were they, then,
lying in wait for Barkoo and his men at the outer rim of the forest?

Tharn was about to start back toward the prairie, when he suddenly
stiffened to attention. A woman--a girl, rather; she could not have been
more than eighteen--had slid to the ground from one of the caves. The
man in the trees half rose to watch her.

She was a bit above average in height, slim, yet perfectly formed. That
part of her body not covered by the soft folds of panther skin was
evenly tanned but not darkly so. Soft, lustrous brown hair fell to her
bare shoulders in lovely half-curls that gave off reddish glints when
touched by the sun's direct rays.

This breath-taking young person was coming straight toward the very tree
that sheltered him. As she drew nearer, he could make out her features
more clearly, and he saw that the wide eyes were also brown, flecked
with tiny bits of Dyta, the sun (or so he thought); her cheeks were high
but not too prominent, her nose rather small but beautifully shaped. She
walked gracefully, shoulders back, her head lifted proudly, an almost
saucy tilt to her chin.

* * * * *

She passed beneath him and went on into the forest. Tharn came down
quickly and set out to follow. Why he did so was not considered; some
strange force drew him on. Less than twenty feet separated them, now;
but so guarded were his movements that