 Farzan of the Loops, brought to you from out the pages of Edgar Rice Borough's romantic book. Hidden behind the stream of festooned creepers, Farzan, all head wrinkled in thought, tries to decipher Jane Porter's letter. After hours of study here, that last found resemblance between the bugs of his picture book and the girl's handwriting. He shakes his head, the contents of the letter papples him. He can read it, but all that it means to him is that her name is J-A-N-E. And though he cannot express it in sound, he feels an association, a kinship, a bond, a something that was not there before. Farzan folds the letter carefully, places it in the bottom of his quiver and writes it to his feet. He faces that red disc for his besetting sun. All about him, seen and unseen, the beasts of the jungle. New mother lion, Tantor, the elephant, even the little mongoose, all great and small, are facing the west. There, building the mountain that saddles the equator is that with all the beasts of the jungle worship, the setting sun. Farzan watches the deep streams fade to purple, blend the game into deeper blue, and then, lost in the sky, the snow-capped sparkles with reflected gold. We find Jane Porter and Clayton watching the same sunset. What a perfectly gorgeous sunset. Daddy, Mr. Philander, why don't you join Cecil and me outside the hut? It's so nice and cool after the heathen day, and the sunset is so beautiful on the scene. A very excellent suggestion, Jane, but don't you think I'd better get you something to put over your shoulder? The proper evening is as dangerous as it is magnificent. It's strange, isn't it? That the jungle, everything here that is so beautiful should be so terrifying, so dangerous. But that's why there is life, which like the toad, ugly and venomous, wears yet a precious jewel, and it says, This our life, exempt from public haunt, finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, sermons in stone, and goods in everything. Our might, dear Clayton, fits your refreshing to finding an army man and acquaintanceship with the immortal guard of Avery. Possibly Shakespeare found books in the running brooks, but you, Daddy, the trial can be much drier than a brook. I believe, Professor, if we'd only rescued our chessmen, with which to beguile our evenings, you and I would find the setting perfect. Oh, you too. If you were interested in a few days about surroundings, all but no. Nothing appeals to you unless it is wrinkled with aims. Well, come, come, my dear. Never mind, Daddy, I was only teasing you. Oh, fine, Joe. Put the model, Cecil. I completely forgot to look at our beacons today. Monkeys or other animals might come upon us and drag away the wood, and toss me or four back together and pile there. I'll just jog along and look it over. There's a darkest coming on, Cecil. Couldn't you leave it till morning? I'd rather not. It's one of my duties, and I'll feel better if I look after it tonight. I'll come along with you, Cecil. I feel relieved with exercise. Oh, good. I'll be shopping off. Come along, then. Tarzan sees the figures of Clayton and Jane moving up the beach toward the headland. The stepping sun dips over the horizon, and the long tapering shadows of the jungle cast a mellow twilight across the clearing toward the beach. Tarzan wonders where the humans can be going at such an hour. Usually, they lock themselves into their cabinet sunset. Sure to us, he swings himself along the upper reaches of the gigantic jungle trees lazily, almost carelessly. To Tarzan, who covers many miles an hour through the trees, the white man and woman below move at the pace of tiny beetles. The figures come to a stop before a pile of dry wood, heaped upon a promontory which looks out to sea. Tarzan drops swiftly, noiselessly, easily to the lower branches in order to gaze more clearly at that white shee to whom he's so strongly attracted. Blood calls to blood. Tarzan at this moment would give almost anything to drop from his perch, boldly walk out and talk to these, his own kind. A shyness overcomes him. He hears Jane's questioning voice, pretends answers, and inhibitions, born of contact with the wild, bid him remain hidden from those he cannot understand. Is it no animal to sit here? Wait, look, is that what happened in touch? I think you did a wonderful job in making assessors. No, it wasn't anything. Only wanted a bit of work in the doing. Look across that water, thousands of miles of it. Oh, Cecil, isn't there any shit to ever, ever come for? Now, look here, Jane, you've got to keep your mind on other things. You can't be longing and yearning for something like that without going a bit barmy, you know. All right, Cecil, I won't think of it anymore. There are wonderful things right here to absorb, aren't you? Wonderful. And the most wonderful thing of all is that white man from the forest. No, I can't for the life of me understand what a white man can be doing off here in the midst of the African jungle. Do you suppose he might be Tarzan of the Eighth? I don't know. It may be possible. Yes, the man who is saved up from the animals doesn't speak English. And we know that Tarzan of the Eighth does because of the notes we found pinned to the door. Well, well, it's beyond me. Cecil, what's that doing? I don't know. I've heard native drums in other parts of the world. That sound isn't like anything I've ever heard. Oh, that's terrible. It frightened me. Oh, sure. I don't suppose it's anything to be frightened of, really? Oh, come on off. I'll raise you back to the hut. Tarzan hears the weird, compelling throb of the dum-dum. He looks down at Jane Porter and Clayton, but his eyes see only the huge earthen drum far off in the clearing sacred to the great apes. The sacrificial altar of his tribe. Now he's torn between two desires. This heart, it is, though he knows it's not the cause to him to stay and watch this fascinating sheen. But all the background of years calls out to him to join his tribe in this fair dance of victory. He starts after Jane and Clayton. The rhythm of the drum changes. He stops, hesitates, looks again at the two below him. The throbbing of the drum pulses in his blood and he turns toward the sound, swings into the leaping trail that leads to the dum-dum. Down in the hut, by the shore, Professor Porter and Philander are waiting. Jane and Clayton's return discuss the events of the past few days. I have been meaning to speak of it for some time, Mr. Philander, but we've still seldom been alone since the day the lion... Quite so, Professor Porter. Quite so. I wish to speak to you concerning these skeletal remains of... Of Lord and Lady Christophe. Yes, yes, I understand. And now, Mr. Philander, I beg of you, please check this irritating propensity for jumping at conclusions. It was not of the mere mature beings that I wish to speak, but of the... But of the baby skeleton, Professor? Quite so. You will doubtless recall that I brought to your attention at the time the baby skull. You did, Professor, and I gave my opinion, and I give it again, that the skull of Simeon, one of the answer-boy lames... That coincides perfectly with my own opinion, my dear Philander. I wish to caution you, however, unless you let some unconscious remark before Jane and Clayton, I think that it would only unnecessarily disturb their minds to let them into the secret... Don't worry, Professor. No unguarded remark of mine, you'll betray it. Philander, do you notice some sort of drumming noise? Some... Do you notice it too, Professor? I notice it, of course I notice. I notice everything. I heard it for the last ten minutes. I didn't like to say anything about it. I feared it was one of my old hearings starting again. Hello, the hub! Hello! Hear the drum? Ah, yes, yes. Uh, Philander and I were just remarking about them. Perhaps you could explain such phenomenically. No, I'm afraid not. Weird, isn't it? We'll help them start. Do you suppose a black man may try to be a tool to us? Oh, no, no, no. We'd have had some wind of them before now. Well, at any rate, I think we'd better go inside. Deep in the almost impenetrable pastness of the jungle, the great apes circle in mad confusion their earth and drum. All that hollow miles comes to death, throbbing that penetrates to the innermost corners of the wilderness. After and after, sleeping, happy, gyrating in terrible proportions, the eggstores in their tits are circling to beat the short stick to form a drum-like mound. The female apes in their all-strings weighing back and forth to the uncanny rhythms, they are now circling about the map in full, sleeping higher than any is drawn in, resting before the gleaming in the moonlight is far zanned. Founding in an outlet circling, he comes upon a blue-dominated jack-a-lot, and he will then celebrate his day in heaven. The jack-a-lot is filled with vulcanese pride, but is alive to tell the tale. Only Farzan before him has killed a gorilla and seen another day. Farzan steps up to the great pool and pumps the hairy chest to show him congratulations. The jack-a-lot's eyes shine with pride. He leaps into the center of the sacred gate, beats his chest with massive hairy paws, and shatters the night air with a fearful fear proclaiming himself a mighty hunter, a mighty killer. The moon pales in the sky. The great apes sleep the deep sleep of utter exhaustion. Not so farzan. Fearful less than his absence, something may have happened to white sheep. He returns to the hut quietly, with cat-like tread he creeps to the lattice, testing. Well within the shadow, he moves to the door, cautiously lifts the latch. The door holds, satisfied that those within are safe. Farzan lifts himself into the trees, curls himself in a moss-grown crotch, and falls asleep.