plaintive sound of untrained voices enthusiastically raised in song. Roger smiled grimly as he pressed his ear to the crack and caught the faint words:

  "Shall we gather at the river?
  The beautiful, the beautiful river——"

Granger's voice was distinguished above the rest; he was on the job; he was leading his shorn flock back from the gates of Paradise to the tune of a hymn. At Flora City, Granger, being through with this flock, would quit it; and ere its members, obstructed time after time in their efforts to reach the Colony, would disperse, Granger, in a new field, would be laying his snares for fresh victims.

In a few minutes the hull of the Cormorant began to throb with the drive of her powerful engines. With no word of command she slid silently away from her mooring to the deep channel and began to drive her way upstream at a speed that caused Roger and Higgins to look at one another. The captain was in the wheelhouse above their heads, the mulatto lounged on the deck near the cabin door; so they did not even dare to whisper, but each knew the question the other would ask: Why such terrific speed in a dirty craft like the Cormorant?

Through his precarious peekhole Payne caught glimpses of the water and land that the Cormorant was leaving behind her. At first there was little to see save blue water, for the mouth of the Chokohatchee was more an estuary of the sea than a river. Far away on either side were the low-growing tangled growths of mangrove which represented the river's banks near the sea, and toward these banks, from both sides of the wake, water birds could be seen winging their way, frightened from their feeding ground by the Cormorant's rush. Great, clumsy pelicans rose painfully and flew with surprising speed, once they were in the air; small blue herons went shoreward in uncountable flocks, flying high into the morning sun. Close to the water, ducks of many kinds clove the air with business-like intent and speed.

The water itself seemed alive with an abundance of life. The black back of a porpoise showed above the surface; far away the sun glinted on the silver scales of a leaping tarpon. The red sides of a mangrove snapper were seen as it tried in vain to escape the jaws of a steel-gray barracuda, and a moment later half of the slim barracuda flew into the air as the jaws of a shark, catching it in full flight, snapped it in two.

The course of the Cormorant was shifted slightly, and by the muddy color of the water Payne knew they were entering the river proper. The stream here was perhaps two hundred yards across and over the stern, to port and starboard, the banks were plainly visible. The land was low, so low that it seemed but a little higher than the water level, but it bore an amazingly abundant growth. The river seemed to flow through a channel cut in the dense, solid vegetation. Great cypress trees towered up from the water, enormously thick at the roots and rapidly dwindling above. Between their rough trunks cypress scrub, sturdy cabbage palms, mangrove, custard apple and other varieties of tropical trees found space to grow; and between the trunks of the smaller trees was a tangle of palmetto, saw grass, jungle vine, Virginia creeper and the beautiful moon vine and its dainty flowers. Blue, yellow and red flowers peeped from the tangle. Air plants bearing in their hearts scarlet orchids clung to the trunks of hoary live oak, and the Spanish moss, fragile, listless, drooping, hung like delicate drapery over all.

The stream grew narrower and the turtles upon the shore became visible. A water turkey, though the boat was past, fell clumsily off its perch into the water and after frantic efforts flopped away. Alligators lay here and there along the banks; and a wild hog plowed about in the matted water-hyacinths, unconcernedly seeking food, not alarmed by the alligators or the boat or by the fierce brown Mexican buzzards—the killing variety—which contemplated him from the dead cypress branches above.

VI

For two hours the Cormorant drove upstream without missing a stroke of her engines. Then the speed was diminished. Through the crack in the door Payne caught glimpses which showed that the stream had narrowed suddenly and began to wind. In another hour the captain shouted back an order. The engineer's head popped up from the engine pit near the stern, his expression indicating that the order had taken him by surprise.

"What'd you say, cap? Stop at Mangrove Point?"

"Yep. Boss' orders."

The engineer disappeared in the pit and the boat began to slow down as its course was altered to bring it in shore. Presently leaves brushed against its side and the craft came to a dead stop.

The mangrove branches on the bank were pushed aside, revealing a creek, and a long Seminole dugout, bearing two rough-looking men, slipped like a snake out of the jungle and up to the Cormorant's bow. The two men vaulted easily over the low rail onto the deck.

"Where is he?" asked the hideously scarred leader. "The boss said we should take him to Palm Island and leave him tied."

"My way would be to knock 'im in the head an' sink him in an alligator hole," grumbled the captain. "He's hard as nails; he'll be hard to get tied."

"You're too lazy to live. Call 'im out; we want to be going."

The speaker and his companion took up a position on the port rail; the captain and the mulatto lounged to starboard.

"Oh, Davis," called the captain, drawing a revolver. "Give us a hand here, will you?"

Davis emerged from the engine room, wiping his hands on a wisp of waste, saw by the eyes of the four men that he was trapped, and looked steadily at the captain.

"What's the idea, cap?"

"Stick up them hands!"

"What is it, I say?"

"Guess you know. You wanted to get into the swamp with us, did you, you damn snooper? Well, you're going in there—to stay."

The scarred man thrust forward a noosed rope.

"Put your hands in that, you damn snooper."

"Put 'em in," growled the captain, "or I'll shoot your ears off."

Davis made a pretense of obeying, caught the rope holder about the middle and rushed him at the captain. So swift and skillful was his move that ere the lethargic captain could move he found himself pinned against the rail. With one hand Davis flung his human shield aside while the other leaped up and caught the captain's gun hand. His disengaged hand slipped inside his shirt; and then two men leaped like wolves upon his back.

"He's got a gun on him! Look out!"

The mulatto's thick arm was about Davis' throat, dragging him back, yet he managed to give the captain's wrist a sharp twist which flung the revolver high in the air to drop with a splash into the river ere he fell in a tangle with his assailants to the deck.

"Look out! He's strong's a bear! He's got a gun! Kick his head, somebody! Kick his head!"

In their little coop forward, from which they saw it all, Payne looked at Higgins. Higgins returned the look.

"He's a white man against four."

"Come on, Hig!"

With a kick Payne sent the door flying and crawled out on deck.

The captain saw him and sprang for an ax. Roger caught him in a leap, flung him aside and threw the ax overboard.

Higgins kicked, struck and pulled at the pile on Davis and saved him from being kicked unconscious or killed, and suddenly found himself on the deck with the pile on top of