7

Tarzan, the Jewels of Opar

by Edgar R. Burroughs

7, TARZAN, THE JEWELS OF OPAR by Edgar R. Burroughs
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The Jewel-Room of Opar


For some time Tarzan lay where he had fallen upon the
floor of the treasure chamber beneath the ruined walls
of Opar. He lay as one dead; but he was not dead.
At length he stirred. His eyes opened upon the utter
darkness of the room. He raised his hand to his head
and brought it away sticky with clotted blood. He
sniffed at his fingers, as a wild beast might sniff at
the life-blood upon a wounded paw.

Slowly he rose to a sitting posture--listening.
No sound reached to the buried depths of his sepulcher.
He staggered to his feet, and groped his way about
among the tiers of ingots. What was he? Where was he?
His head ached; but otherwise he felt no ill effects
from the blow that had felled him. The accident he did not
recall, nor did he recall aught of what had led up to it.

He let his hands grope unfamiliarly over his limbs,
his torso, and his head. He felt of the quiver at his
back, the knife in his loin cloth. Something struggled
for recognition within his brain. Ah! he had it.
There was something missing. He crawled about upon
the floor, feeling with his hands for the thing that
instinct warned him was gone. At last he found it--the
heavy war spear that in past years had formed so
important a feature of his daily life, almost of his
very existence, so inseparably had it been connected
with his every action since the long-gone day that he
had wrested his first spear from the body of a black
victim of his savage training.

Tarzan was sure that there was another and more lovely
world than that which was confined to the darkness of
the four stone walls surrounding him. He continued his
search and at last found the doorway leading inward
beneath the city and the temple. This he followed,
most incautiously. He came to the stone steps leading
upward to the higher level. He ascended them and
continued onward toward the well.

Nothing spurred his hurt memory to a recollection of
past familiarity with his surroundings. He blundered
on through the darkness as though he were traversing an
open plain under the brilliance of a noonday sun, and
suddenly there happened that which had to happen under
the circumstances of his rash advance.

He reached the brink of the well, stepped outward into
space, lunged forward, and shot downward into the inky
depths below. Still clutching his spear, he struck the
water, and sank beneath its surface, plumbing the
depths.

The fall had not injured him, and when he rose to the
surface, he shook the water from his eyes, and found
that he could see. Daylight was filtering into the
well from the orifice far above his head. It illumined
the inner walls faintly. Tarzan gazed about him.
On the level with the surface of the water he saw a
large opening in the dark and slimy wall. He swam to it,
and drew himself out upon the wet floor of a tunnel.

Along this he passed; but now he went warily, for
Tarzan of the Apes was learning. The unexpected pit
had taught him care in the traversing of dark
passageways--he needed no second lesson.

For a long distance the passage went straight as an
arrow. The floor was slippery, as though at times the
rising waters of the well overflowed and flooded it.
This, in itself, retarded Tarzan's pace, for it was
with difficulty that he kept his footing.

The foot of a stairway ended the passage. Up this he
made his way. It turned back and forth many times,
leading, at last, into a small, circular chamber,
the gloom of which was relieved by a faint light which
found ingress through a tubular shaft several feet in
diameter which rose from the center of the room's
ceiling, upward to a distance of a hundred feet or
more, where it terminated in a stone grating through
which Tarzan could see a blue and sun-lit sky.

Curiosity prompted the ape-man to investigate his
surroundings. Several metal-bound, copper-studded
chests constituted the sole furniture of the round
room. Tarzan let his hands run over these. He felt
of the copper studs, he pulled upon the hinges, and at
last, by chance, he raised the cover of one.

An exclamation of delight broke from his lips at sight
of the pretty contents. Gleaming and glistening in the
subdued light of the chamber, lay a great tray full of
brilliant stones. Tarzan, reverted to the primitive by
his accident, had no conception of the fabulous value
of his find. To him they were but pretty pebbles.
He plunged his hands into them and let the priceless gems
filter through his fingers. He went to others of the
chests, only to find still further stores of precious
stones. Nearly all were cut, and from these he
gathered a handful and filled the pouch which dangled at
his side--the uncut stones he tossed back into the chests.

Unwittingly, the ape-man had stumbled upon the
forgotten jewel-room of Opar. For ages it had lain
buried beneath the temple of the Flaming God, midway of
one of the many inky passages which the superstitious
descendants of the ancient Sun Worshipers had either
dared not or cared not to explore.

Tiring at last of this diversion, Tarzan took up his way
along the corridor which led upward from the jewel-room
by a steep incline. Winding and twisting, but always
tending upward, the tunnel led him nearer and
nearer to the surface, ending finally in a low-ceiled
room, lighter than any that he had as yet discovered.

Above him an opening in the ceiling at the upper end of
a flight of concrete steps revealed a brilliant sunlit
scene. Tarzan viewed the vine-covered columns in mild
wonderment. He puckered his brows in an attempt to
recall some recollection of similar things. He was not
sure of himself. There was a tantalizing suggestion
always present in his mind that something was eluding
him--that he should know many things which he did not know.

His earnest cogitation was rudely interrupted by a
thunderous roar from the opening above him. Following
the roar came the cries and screams of men and women.
Tarzan grasped his spear more firmly and ascended the
steps. A strange sight met his eyes as he emerged from
the semi-darkness of the cellar to the brilliant light
of the temple.

The creatures he saw before him he recognized for what
they were--men and women, and a huge lion. The men and
women were scuttling for the safety of the exits.
The lion stood upon the body of one who had been less fortunate
than the others. He was in the center of the temple.
Directly before Tarzan, a woman stood beside a
block of stone. Upon the top of the stone lay
stretched a man, and as the ape-man watched the scene,
he saw the lion glare terribly at the two who remained
within the temple. Another thunderous roar broke from
the savage throat, the woman screamed and swooned
across the body of the man stretched prostrate upon the
stone altar before her.

The lion advanced a few steps and crouched. The tip of
his sinuous tail twitched nervously. He was upon the
point of charging when his eyes were attracted toward
the ape-man.

Werper, helpless upon the altar, saw the great
carnivore preparing to leap upon him. He saw the
sudden change in the beast's expression as his eyes
wandered to something beyond the altar and out of the
Belgian's view. He saw the formidable creature rise to
a standing position. A figure darted past Werper.
He saw a mighty arm upraised, and a stout spear shoot
forward toward the lion, to bury itself in the broad chest.

He saw the lion snapping and tearing at the weapon's
shaft, and he saw, wonder of wonders, the naked giant
who had hurled the missile charging upon the great
beast, only a long knife ready to meet those ferocious
fangs and talons.

The lion reared up to meet this new enemy. The beast
was growling frightfully, and then upon the startled
ears of the Belgian, broke a similar savage growl from
the lips of the man rushing upon the beast.

By a quick side step, Tarzan eluded the first swinging
clutch of the lion's paws. Darting to the beast's
side, he leaped upon the tawny back. His arms
encircled the maned neck, his teeth sank deep into the
brute's flesh. Roaring, leaping, rolling and
struggling, the giant cat attempted to dislodge this
savage enemy, and all the while one great, brown fist
was driving a long keen blade repeatedly into the
beast's side.

During the battle, La regained consciousness.
Spellbound, she stood above her victim watching the
spectacle. It seemed incredible that a human being
could best the king of beasts in personal encounter and
yet before her very eyes there was taking place just
such an improbability.

At last Tarzan's knife found the great heart, and with
a final, spasmodic struggle the lion rolled over upon
the marble floor, dead. Leaping to his feet the
conqueror placed a foot upon the carcass of his kill,
raised his face toward the heavens, and gave voice to
so hideous a cry that both La and Werper trembled as it
reverberated through the temple.

Then the ape-man turned, and Werper recognized him as
the man he had left for dead in the treasure room.