"It is very peculiar," he said. "It is something that I have never before heard of. Why should we be friends?"

"Why should we be enemies?" countered von Horst. "Neither one of us has ever harmed the other. I am from a very far country, a stranger in yours. Were you to come to my country, you would be treated well. No one would wish to kill you. You would be given shelter and fed. People would be kindly toward you, just because they are kindly by nature and not because you could be of any service to them. Here, it is far more practical that we be friends; because we are surrounded by dangerous beasts, and two men can protect themselves better than one.

"However, if you wish to be my enemy, that is up to you. I may go my way, and you yours; or, if you wish to try to kill me, that, too, is a matter for you to decide; but do not forget how easily I killed this beast here. Just as easily could I kill you."

"Your words are true words," said the man. "We shall be friends. I am Skruf. Who are you?"

In his conversations with Dangar, von Horst had noticed that no Pellucidarians that the other had mentioned had more than one name, to which was sometimes added a descriptive title such as the Hairy One, the Sly One, the Killer, or the like; and as Dangar usually called him von, he had come to accept this as the name he would use in the inner world; so this was the name that he gave to Skruf.

"What are you doing here?" asked the man. "This is a bad country because of the Trodons."

"I have found it so," replied von Horst. "I was brought here by a Trodon."

The other eyed him skeptically. "You would be dead now if a Trodon had ever seized you."

"One did, and took me to its nest to feed its young. I and another man escaped."

"Where is he?"

"Back by the river in our camp. I was hunting for food when I met you. I was following some sheep up this canyon. What were you doing here?"

"I was escaping from the Mammoth Men," replied Skruf. "Some of them captured me. They were taking me back to their country to make a slave of me, but I escaped from them. They were pursuing me, but when I reached this canyon I was safe. In places it is too narrow to admit a mammoth."

"What are you going to do now?"

"Wait until I think they have given up the chase and then return to my own country."

Von Horst suggested that Skruf come to his camp and wait and that then the three of them could go together as far as their trails were identical, but first he wished to bag some game. Skruf offered to help him, and with the latter's knowledge of the quarry it was not long before they had found the sheep and von Horst had killed a young buck. Skruf was greatly impressed and not a little frightened by the report of the pistol and the, to him, miraculous results that von Horst achieved with it.

After skinning the buck and dividing the weight of the carcass between them, they set off for camp, which they reached without serious interruption. Once a bull thag charged them, but they climbed trees and waited until it had gone away, and another time a saber-tooth crossed their path; but his belly was full, and he did not molest them. Thus, through the primitive savagery of Pellucidar, they made their way to the camp.

Dangar was delighted that von Horst had returned safely, for he knew the many dangers that beset a hunter in this fierce world.