THE OUTPOST OF THE WORLD
Only when the little babe was mentioned did the tone of the diary alter from the habitual note of despair which had crept into it by degrees after the first two months upon the shore.
Then the passages were tinged with a subdued happiness that was even sadder than the rest.
One entry showed an almost hopeful spirit.
Today our little boy is six months old. He is sitting in Alice's lap beside the table where I am writing—a happy, healthy, perfect child.
Somehow, even against all reason, I seem to see him a grown man, taking his father's place in the world—the second John Clayton—and bringing added honors to the house of Greystoke.
There—as though to give my prophecy the weight of his endorsement—he has grabbed my pen in his chubby fist and with his inkbegrimed little fingers has placed the seal of his tiny finger prints upon the page.
And there, on the margin of the page, were the partially blurred imprints of four wee fingers and the outer half of the thumb.
When D'Arnot had finished the diary the two men sat in silence for some minutes.
"Well! Tarzan of the Apes, what think you?" asked D'Arnot. "Does not this little book clear up the mystery of your parentage?
"Why, man, you are Lord Greystoke."
Tarzan shook his head.
"The book speaks of but one child," he replied. "Its little skeleton lay in the crib, where it died crying for nourishment, from the first time I entered the cabin until Professor Porter's party
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