Tarzan Trilogy by Thomas Zachek by Thomas Zachek

Author:Thomas Zachek [Zachek, Thomas]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: action and adventure
Publisher: Edgar Rice Burroughs, Inc.
Published: 2017-03-06T05:00:00+00:00

Chapter 11

D I S C O V E R Y

When Tarzan and Ruth arrived at the missionary camp, Walter Adamson was in the middle of a service, preaching a sermon he called “The Miracle of Faith” to adult men and women sitting in the wooden benches facing his hand-hewn wooden podium. He was exhorting, “We must remember that God guides all things in our lives. When we make choices, we must ask ourselves if we are serving God or denying him….”

Ruth invited the ape man to stay for some rest and refreshment, but he declined and turned to leave. For her part, Ruth chose not to listen to the rest of the sermon, either, and retired to her tent, feeling that she needed to rest before telling Walter and the others about her ordeal.

But she could not rest. Ruth lay on her cot deeply conflicted, too conflicted to sleep even in her exhausted state. She had, indeed, harbored ill thoughts toward those bones and wished that they were eliminated from the picture. Yet Maximilian had committed theft, and he had done so at her behest. And a web of lies had already commenced to conceal the theft. How could she come here and preach the Commandments to her flock and yet be instrumental in their violation?

She wondered about this man Maximilian and his cohorts. When she first met him, he seemed benevolent and supportive. He seemed confident about jungle living, and he and his men had certainly been very helpful to the mission. She remembered feeling fortunate to have men of their abilities and had wondered more than once how the mission might have gotten along without them. Yet there was something about him that she could not fathom. He had never seemed to her to be particularly religious. He talked about matters of faith and the Gospels hardly at all, she recalled. He and his men rarely participated in the services, preferring to remain on the sidelines and not conspicuously joining in the singing or prayer. Why, then, would such men align themselves with a religious mission?

She had wondered how Adamson had found these men, and now she wondered why. When Walter had introduced them the second month of the mission, she had simply accepted on faith that they were part of the missionary effort. Had she allowed her innate belief in the goodness of people to cloud her judgment? What hidden, darker purpose did Maximilian have in being here that she and Adamson were too blind to recognize?

She had no idea what to do. Should she act on her suspicions? If so, in whom should she confide? Mabuto? Captain Reynolds? Perhaps, it occurred to her, she should be forthright with Tarzan. Perhaps he could be instrumental in setting things aright between the Urulu and the Waziri and Reynolds and Doctor Granger. Perhaps, despite his protestations, he truly was the agent of her deliverance in more ways than one.

And yet, what if she said nothing? She was not directly implicated in the theft.

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