Tarzan and the Golden Lion. Edgar Rice Burroughs

at Miranda and then at Kraski.

      “Now,” soothed Bluber, “let’s all shake hands and be good friends.”

      “Right-o,” cried Peebles, “that’s the talk. Give ’im your ’and, Esteban. Come, Carl, bury the ’atchet. We can’t start in on this thing with no hanimosities, and ’ere we are, and that’s that.”

      The Russian, feeling secure in his position with Flora, and therefore in a magnanimous mood, extended his hand across the table toward the Spaniard. For a moment Esteban hesitated.

      “Come, man, shake!” growled Throck, “or you can go back to your job as an extra man, blime, and we’ll find someone else to do your work and divvy the swag with.”

      Suddenly the dark countenance of the Spaniard was lighted by a pleasant smile. He extended his hand quickly and clasped Kraski’s. “Forgive me,” he said, “I am hot-tempered, but I mean nothing. Miss Hawkes is right, we must all be friends, and here’s my hand on it, Kraski, as far as I am concerned.”

      “Good,” said Kraski, “and I am sorry if I offended you;” but he forgot that the other was an actor, and if he could have seen into the depths of that dark soul he would have shuddered.

      “Und now, dot ve are all good friends,” said Bluber, rubbing his hands together unctuously, “vy not arrange for vhen ve shall commence starting to finish up everyt’ings? Miss Flora, she gives me the map und der directions und we start commencing immediately.”

      “Loan me a pencil, Carl,” said the girl, and when the man had handed her one she searched out a spot upon the map some distance into the interior from X, where she drew a tiny circle. “This is O,” she said. “When we all reach here you shall have the final directions and not before.”

      Bluber threw up his hands. “Oi! Miss Flora, vhat you t’ink, ve spend two t’ousand pounds to buy a pig in a poke? Oi! Oi! you vouldn’t ask us to do dot? Ve must see everyt’ing, ve must know everyt’ing, before ve spend vun farthing.”

      “Yes, and ’ere we are, and that’s that!” roared John Peebles, striking the table with his fist.

      The girl rose leisurely from her seat. “Oh, very well,” she said with a shrug. “If you feel that way about it we might as well call it all off.”

      “Oh, vait, vait, Miss Flora,” cried Bluber, rising hurriedly. “Don’t be ogcited. But can’t you see vere ve are? Two t’ousand pounds is a lot of money, and ve are good business men. Ve shouldn’t be spending it all vit’out getting not’ings for it.”

      “I am not asking you to spend it and get nothing for it,” replied the girl, tartly; “but if anyone has got to trust anyone else in this outfit, it is you who are going to trust me. If I give you all the information I have, there is nothing in the world that could prevent you from going ahead and leaving me out in the cold, and I don’t intend that that shall happen.”

      “But we are not gonoffs, Miss Flora,” insisted the Jew. “Ve vould not t’ink for vun minute of cheating you.”

      “You’re not angels, either, Bluber, any of you,” retorted the girl. “If you want to go ahead with this you’ve got to do it in my way, and I am going to be there at the finish to see that I get what is coming to me. You’ve taken my word for it, up to the present time, that I had the dope, and now you’ve got to take it the rest of the way or all bets are off. What good would it do me to go over into a bally jungle and suffer all the hardships that we are bound to suffer, dragging you along with me, if I were not going to be able to deliver the goods when I got there? And I am not such a softy as to think I could get away with it with a bunch of bandits like you if I tried to put anything of that kind over on you. And as long as I do play straight I feel perfectly safe, for I know that either Esteban or Carl will look after me, and I don’t know but what the rest of you would, too. Is it a go or isn’t it?”

      “Vell, John, vot do you und Dick t’ink?” asked Bluber, addressing the two ex-prize-fighters. “Carl, I know he vill t’ink v’hatever Flora t’inks. Hey? V’at?”

      “Blime,” said Throck, “I never was much of a hand at trusting nobody unless I had to, but it looks now as though we had to trust Flora.”

      “Same ’ere,” said John Peebles. “If you try any funny work, Flora—” He made a significant movement with his finger across his throat.

      “I understand, John,” said the girl with a smile, “and I know that you would do it as quickly for two pounds as you would for two thousand. But you are all agreed, then, to carry on according to my plans? You too, Carl?”

      The Russian nodded. “Whatever the rest say goes with me,” he remarked.

      And so the gentle little coterie discussed their plans in so far as they could—each minutest detail that would be necessary to place them all at the O which the girl had drawn upon the map.