Page:The Cave Girl - Edgar Rice Burroughs.pdf/87

 strange chance which had snatched him bodily from one life to throw him into this new one, which had forced upon him the development of attributes of self-reliance, courage, initiative, and resourcefulness that would have lain dormant within him always but for the necessity which had given birth to them.

Yes, Waldo realized that he owed a great deal to this experience—a great deal to— And then a sudden realization of the truth rushed in upon him—he owed everything to Nadara.

“I was never shipwrecked on a desert island,” said the second mate, breaking in upon Waldo’s reveries, “but I can imagine just about how good you feel at the thought that you are at last rescued and that in an hour or so you will see the shoreline of your prison growing smaller and smaller upon the southern horizon.”

“Yes,” acquiesced Waldo in a far away voice: “it’s awfully good of you, but I am not going with you.”

Two hours later Waldo Emerson stood alone upon the beach, watching the diminishing hull of a great ship as it dropped over the rim of the world far to the north.

A vague hint of tears dimmed his vision; then he threw back his shoulders, swallowed the thing that