XIII

"Why didn't you let me catch the Indian?" demanded Higgins when the

riders were gone. "A man without a canoe here is almost as badly off

as a man afoot in Death Valley."

"I realize that," agreed Roger. "But Garman had made up his mind that

we weren't going to have that canoe."

"I had almost made up my mind we were going to have it."

"I saw that; that's why I stopped you."

"Well! After what happened on the river boat I didn't expect you to

stop so easy."

"Those men on the boat were quite different from Garman. I knew they

would take a bluff, or I'd never have let you pull your gun. If you

had done the same here there would have been shooting or else you'd

have had to put your gun away and back down. It's one thing to pull a

gun on a bunch of river rats, and another on a man like Garman. I

don't want any shooting round here."

"Neither do I."

"Then never make a gun move with Garman round. You can't beat a man

like him with a gun."

"No, I'll say he's a real he-devil."

"I'm here on a business proposition. It's a question of brains, not

guns, in a fight with Garman."

"And he's got a few of them too."

"Decidedly. Therefore, no rough work."

Higgins laughed skeptically.

"No rough work, eh? How about little Willy High Pockets? I've seen a

few men here and there who've been manhandled, but I've never seen on

with the fear of the devil driven into him as hard as Willy. What in

the name of black hell could they have done to the poor buck?"

Payne shook his head.

"I give it up. Sorry, too, because I was responsible for his getting

mixed up with us."

"Not entirely so."

Higgins refrained from mentioning the girl's connection with the

matter, and Payne was grateful for his delicacy. Garman, of course,

had learned that it was the girl of the Egret who had bidden Willy

Tiger guide the two to their destination. How greatly this had angered

Garman was apparent by the fashion in which he had visited

punishment--whatever it had been--on the inoffensive Seminole. What

was Garman to the girl?

"Poor Willy was the goat," said Higgins. "But go back a little: Garman

seems to me to be the big boss of this district. Is that the way you

figure it out?"

"Certainly."

"There's a whole lot of hard-boiled eggs round here, and they're scared

fightless about some one, and he's it. A man doesn't get that sort of

a grip without rough work, and he's not pleased with your proposition

here; and I don't see him changing his method much in dealing with you."

"Perhaps not. It's going to be hard for him to find an excuse though.

I'm here on a business proposition, as I say, and business is going to

be supreme on the job, and rough work a mere incident--if at all."

"Fair enough. What's your first move?"

"To find a way out of this country without troubling friend Garman."

"Sure. The dugout was the first answer. You let that go without

winking an eyelid. That means you'd already figured out a second

answer. What is it?"

Payne spread out his maps and consulted them carefully.

"Garman felt he had us sewed up tight because the average man who gets

down here isn't a woodsman."

"Except that fellow, Davis, I haven't seen one who looked like it since

we got here," agreed Higgins.

"Yep." Payne was drawing out a new large-scale survey map. "I don't

think one of the old-time timber cruisers up North would call it too

big a job to get out of here. There's water almost all the way over to

the east coast--the maps agree on that--so that's no good. To the

south is that cypress swamp. West we've got that sand prairie. Must

be some trap there. But another thing the maps all agree on is that

the old trading post of Legrue, which is the end of the railroad's

survey line, is about forty-five miles north of this hammock."

"Sure. And look at what's between 'em--on the map there."

"The Devil's Playground."

"That's one of the spots down here nobody's been through."

"Well, Hig, I suspect you and I are going to be the first to try to do

it. I know the descriptions read tough: great crevices in limestone

formation filled with impassable liquid mud. We'll try it, though;

we've got to."

Without a word Higgins began to cut up more venison, and Payne rebuilt

the fire. After a substantial meal they roasted and packed two small

bundles of meat for carrying and were ready for the start. Payne

carefully searched the country about with his glasses and, assured that

no skulking watchers were in sight, they waded out from the hammock and

plunged into the elderberry jungle to the north.

From the first they had literally to break their way forward. The

elder trees grew from ten to twelve feet in height and so close

together that to squeeze between them was impossible. Payne went ahead

at first, walking sidewise, throwing his shoulder against the brittle

stems and crashing a path through. Higgins soon stepped to the fore

and did likewise. At the end of an hour, when they had covered a scant

mile, they paused.

They were now in the heart of the elder growth, hidden from all the

rest of the world and isolated from anything that might have promised

relief. In the branches innumerable large, glossy blackbirds kept up a

maddening chatter, and higher above, up in the hot sky, the omnipresent

buzzards floated lazily, awaiting sight of possible carrion prey.

Animals began to appear almost underfoot, coons and rabbits, disturbed

for the first time in their fastness. Water holes appeared rarely, and

the water in them was unfit for drinking. Despite the shade it was

stiflingly hot.

Higgins began to pant. He was broader and stockier than Payne and less

favorably built for wedging his weight through the growth. Neither

spoke a word. At the pauses they consulted compasses, laid out the

trail straight north and drove on. Payne's breath also soon was coming

in sharp pants; and the leg muscles of both began to weaken with the

treacherous going. Grimly they held to their pace, waiting the release

of fresh reservoirs of energy, the coming of the athlete's "second

wind," to relieve them.

When it came they had need for it, for the jungle growth now was

thicker. Heavy creepers and vines had appeared among the elder bushes,

their phenomenal growth often matted thickly together as high as a

man's waist. Bushes which formerly had given way at the thrust of a

shoulder now hung toughly, suspended by the inextricable grip of the

vines. Along the ground the matted creepers caught and clung

tenaciously to ankles. The carpet of them hid with fair leaves and

blossoms treacherous water holes into which the travelers plunged at

times foot deep. In one such a plunge Payne's boots sent squirming a

nest of slimy water moccasins. A moment later he slipped and all but

fell on the hard slippery back of a hidden turtle.

A gleam of light in the solid growth ahead promised an open space for a

rest and breathing spell. With a silent agreement they plunged

straight for it. As they wedged their way into sight a flock of black

buzzards rose lazily from something upon the ground, their wings barely

lifting their gorged bodies, their foul red heads reeking with the

putrid feast they were so loath to leave.

Higgins voiced his disgust in one swift curse, but Payne bored silently

on in a wide circuit round the stench.

A broken trail in the jungle soon told the story. The tracks of a

single steer were discernible, pointing toward the opening, and there

were no tracks returning. The animal, lost in the thicket had fought

its way out till, in the open space, its strength gone, it had

collapsed.

Payne stopped at the animal's tracks.

"That steer came in from the west. It couldn't have come very far

through this jam, so probably that cattle prairie isn't very far out

that way. We could go out there. I suppose some of Garman's men would

see us if we did. I don't like to have him know where we're bound for."

Higgins was silent.

"Well?"

The engineer's reply was to crash into the thicket, breaking the way;

and Payne followed without more words.

At noon they dropped on a bed of vines which fairly smothered the

brush, and ate sparingly of the venison they had brought; cautiously

they dipped water from a deep root hole and barely wet their lips.

"Have we made four miles?" asked Higgins.

"Just about--less than a mile an hour. Better start again before we

begin to stiffen."

They went on, resigned to a continuance of the morning struggle, unable

to see far enough ahead to distinguish the country beyond. One moment

they were in the grasp of the jungle, the next they had broken through

and stood panting and wide-eyed on the edge of a realized paradise of

dreams. It was a tiny lake bordered by a small, grass-grown prairie

dotted with small clean clumps of palmetto, pine and cypress. The

water of the lakelet was clear blue, and the grass round it waved

softly. The palmettos grew in small circles and with the pines and

cypress seemed like islands in a gentle sea; and each island held in

its center a spring of cold clear water seeping up through a limestone

bottom. Long, swaying streamers of Spanish moss hung from the pines;

up in the cypress were the mysterious air plants with the scarlet

orchids naming in their hearts. And beyond the prairie was a grove of

custard apple swathed in the gentle, blooming moon vine.

"It was black!" said Payne firmly, when they had drunk carefully from

the lake.

"What was?"

"That land we just came through."

"Black is right. First-class stuff."

"Worth the fight to find it--if it isn't already sold. Land fit for a

man to spend his time and money to put in shape. Come on!"

They crossed the enchanted prairie with scarcely a word for its beauty

and plunged into the grove beyond. The custard-apple trees ran to

fifteen feet in height and twelve inches in diameter, but between their

trunks was plenty of room for passage.

The grove gave way and they were up to their waists in a growth of

thick, rank saw grass, its half-inch wide blades with sharp, serrated

edges cutting the bare skin of their hands like knives. Far away on

the northern horizon, beyond an apparently unbroken sea of grass, rose

the ragged forest of a great swamp, its outlines sinister even at that

distance.

For the rest of the afternoon they fought their way toward the trees.

It was growing dark when they had won through. The ground beyond was

lower than the saw-grass land and seemed to be composed of oozy slime.

The growth that covered it was tangled and twisted as if thrown

together by a mad burst of storms. Dark, sinister and threatening the

interior loomed before them; and without needing to consult their maps

they spoke as one: "The Devil's Playground!"

As they trod down the grass for a camping spot a streak of white

gleamed in the gloomy nightmare of the garden and a flock of white

egrets swept gracefully out into the gilding rays of the setting sun.

A hundred in number, perhaps, they swerved in dignified fashion and in

their ineffably beautiful posture of flying, necks gently bent backward

and long legs trailing delicately, flew away to the west. They were

beginning to rise for a long flight when a harsh rattle of shots broke

the evening quiet. Pop-pop-pop! Repeating shotguns worked at full

speed. The flock crumpled and broke and a score of the beautiful birds

came crashing down in shapeless, broken lumps. And then, too late to

prevent the crime, darkness was upon the scene.

Dawn revealed the interior of the Devil's Playground apparently less

forbidding than in the gloaming, and Payne and Higgins plunged to their

task as soon as breakfast was over. A hard spit of land ran northwest,

from the saw grass and they followed it till it ended abruptly at a

narrow gully filled to the brim with liquid mud. Swiftly and

skillfully they bridged the space with saplings and branches, a process

which they were forced to repeat at intervals throughout the forenoon.

Luncheon they ate seated on cypress roots in water up to their knees;

and soon after Higgins put a bullet between the yellow eyes of a

panther which glared at them from its hiding place. Snakes and

alligators were in abundance; for miles there was no sign of other life.

"They named it right," panted Higgins in a pause.

"Yes; come on!"

Now they had come to the "flowerpots" of the Playground, beautiful

grass plots interwoven with delicate blooms and ringed about with water

lilies. Into the first one Payne went with a splash to his armpits;

the grass was only a treacherous skin above a hole of liquid mud, from

which Higgins with difficulty drew his employer.

For an hour or more they threaded their way, cautiously between these

beautiful traps. Then, they found themselves on the brink of a gully a

hundred yards in width; and Payne, driving ahead at full speed, cried

out in anguish as he realized how they were stopped.

"Hold on," said Higgins. "That ground on the other side is higher, and

it looks to me like a different formation. Yes; it's limestone with

sand on top. Cheer up!"

Payne threw a dry branch onto the mud and it sank immediately. Wearily

he turned at right angles to the trail and led the way in a search for

the end of the gully. For a mile they followed the barrier of mud,

then Higgins called a halt. "Look at this formation." He pointed to a

slight swell in the level monotony of the swamp. "If that showed in

any human country I'd say it was the beginning of a little ridge."

The slight rise ran to the edge of the gully, where it was broken, and

appeared again on the farther side of the mud.

"There's just a chance that it runs right through that mud," Higgins

was probing into the slime with a broken branch. "Yep. Here it is,

about five feet down. Ugh! Pretty little piece of wading, but unless

I miss my guess it will be miles before we find another fording place

through that mud. Wish Willy High Pockets was here. He's the boy who

could show us how."

Payne looked at the span of slime between the banks.

"Do you think we'll be through if we get to the other bank?" he asked.

"Sure. This mess can't last forever. Hold on." Payne had stepped off

into the breast-high mud. "What are you going to do?"

"See if this shallow runs all the way across."

"No you don't! Chances are there's a break in it in the middle and

then you'd be all out of luck. I'll do the investigating."

"Stay right where you are; I'm boss." Payne was forcing his way out

from shore. Halfway across he stopped, panting and exhausted from the

task of driving through the clinging mud.

"No break?" called Higgins.

"No; solid so far."

"Then it's solid all the way across." Higgins leaped in and, profiting

by the trail broken in the mud, came swiftly up to where Roger stood,

took a desperate chance and fairly swam through the mud, and took the

lead.

"I'll break trail the rest of the way. Now--both together!"

Pushing, pulling, falling and floundering they thrust on. The mud grew

thicker, heavier, and each step in it now was an appalling effort. At

last Higgins came to a stop. They were twenty feet from the farther

bank and the mud had assumed the consistency of heavy clay.

"Stuck?" gasped Payne.

"No!" Higgins began to dig at the stuff with his hands.

"Cheer up!" he panted. "Get to bank--trouble's over."

They literally dug themselves forward for the rest of the way, the

hideousness of their situation relieved only by the bank before their

eyes and the hope of high ground held out by it. With the last bit of

energy in them they freed themselves from the mud's suction and

painfully crawled up the bank.

"Made it!" said Higgins, dropping flat on his face.

Payne raised himself on all fours and looked round through mud-caked

eyes. And then he began to laugh in a way that brought Higgins' head

up with a start. The high ground of the bank was a strip perhaps ten

feet in width. Beyond it as far as they could see was a sea of mud

similar to that which they had just wallowed through.