Tarzan hides his inheritance as an English lord, because he believes his cousin William Cecil Clayton would make a better lord and husband for his beloved Jane. He is distracted by a married Russian countess, whose criminal brother Nicholas Rokoff is a real villain for the series. Tarzan is set up for attack by a dozen Paris muggers.

Tarzan fondly recalls his foster ape mother to D'Arnot:
"To you my friend, she would have appeared a hideous and ugly creature, but to me she was beautiful -- so gloriously does love transfigure its object."