White promptly made good his promise concerning the ditches. Within a week his dredger had eaten its way through sawgrass, water and muck from the headwaters of the Chokohatchee to Deer Key, digging a broad, main drainage canal through the middle of Payne's thousand acres of drowned land. Higgins' calculations proved themselves in practice, and the big ditch soon drew off the bulk of the surface water on the track. The work of cutting the small lateral canals progressed rapidly with the smaller ditching machine. White worked his men in two shifts, and kept his shovels at work day and night. He made no effort to conceal the reason for his haste.
"I took the job, and I'll see it through," said he, "but outside of collecting my money the best part of this job to me will be when I wind it up and get out."
"Still," retorted Higgins, to whom the statement was made, "you don't look exactly like a man troubled with cold feet."
But White would not permit himself to be drawn out.
"I'll be glad when I look back from my tug and see Gumbo Key behind me; that's all I'm saying."
As the work progressed and it became apparent that the muck lands could be sufficiently drained to be available for agricultural purposes, Roger grew puzzled. There had been so far no opposition or interference from Garman. Apparently he had been sincere in his declaration that he wished to see Roger successful in the development of the tract. Garman himself was not seen during the period that the ditcher was at work, but the conduct of his employees made it obvious that they had received orders to assist, not interfere with the draining project. One day the proud Egret stopped to tow a disabled supply boat up the river for White's crew. Another time two of Garman's men came out and took the place of a pair of ditch workers who were ill.
Why was Garman doing it? What was behind his apparent friendliness?
Roger gave up the puzzle. In fact, he had discovered that he was not so vitally interested in his land project as he had thought himself to be. He worked and saw that his men worked, and kept the job up to the program he had outlined. And he tossed at night on his camp cot, his mind tortured with other thoughts.
White completed his job, pocketed his check and chugged away down the river.
Two days after his departure Roger and Higgins were measuring the acreage cleared in the elder brush when one of the blacks said suddenly:
"Wha' dem man do ovah thah, Boss?"
Payne glanced out over the ditched sawgrass land whither the negro was pointing and saw three men carefully picking their way along the spoil banks beside the ditches.
Roger studied the group for a long time, then suddenly he dropped the measuring line and strode toward them.
"Right," growled Higgins, doing likewise. "Those fellows aren't just sightseeing by a darn sight."
Payne studied the men as he approached them. They were dressed in tourist apparel, but their hard faces belied their clothes. Each carried a cane, but the thick hands that held them would have appeared more at home gripping a blackjack or a revolver. The largest of the trio, a hard-faced man with thin lips, studiously placed himself across Roger's path.
"Well," he said, with the snarl of the city tough in his tones, "what can we do for you?"
Roger choked down the rage that lept for mastery in his breast and said calmly:
"You can explain your insolence to begin with."
"Don't come that—don't try to come that on us, kid! You ain't dealing with no crackers now. What do you want, huh?"
The hot blood flush passed from Roger; he felt himself growing comfortably cool; and within he laughed silently.
"No," he said softly, "I can see that you aren't crackers. What jail held you last?"
The stranger swore foully, a string of oaths that reeked with the stench of corner saloons. He pushed his hat far back upon his round head, looked Roger up and down contemptuously, and swore some more.
"Know who you're talking to?" he demanded. "Better get wise, you——"
Again he polluted the air with his foulness.
Roger waited until the stream of filth had ceased.
"Are you going to explain what you're doing here?" he asked.
"Am—I? Am I going to explain? Hell! Are you going to explain, you mean."
"Yes," said Roger, and leaped forward.
Even Higgins whooped in surprise at the swiftness of the spring. Before the stranger could move Roger was close to him. His right fist swung from far behind caught the man full on the solar plexus, literally lifted him off the spoil bank and knocked him into the water of the ditch.
The other two strangers, heavy-jowled toughs, had sprung to meet Payne. One Roger staggered with a left swing on the ear; the other grappled his legs. This man Higgins rewarded with a kick which would have shattered a thinner skull to bits. Then two separate fights raged up and down the spoil bank. Instantly Roger and Higgins realized that they had their hands full. Payne ran into a body punch which made him realize that his opponent was nearly his equal. Higgins was knocked down at once, bounding up like a rubber ball and cheering the man who struck him.
"That was a peach, that one!" he roared, and returned the compliment.The man rose, knocked Higgins down again and jumped on him.
"Rough and tumble it is!" cried Higgins, and grappled with bear-like arms.
Roger refused to go into a clinch, meeting his antagonist's rushes with straight lefts, and following with futile swings of his right. The tough was too skilled to be caught with a solid blow. Once Roger landed full on the jaw with what he expected to be a knockout and the blow glanced harmlessly, as the man rolled his head back with the trained pugilist's skill. Roger realized that it would be no short fight, and he thought of the man he had knocked into the canal. The fight had raged down the spoil bank, and he glanced around and saw the leader clawing his way up the bank. The pause nearly proved fatal. Roger's opponent leaped in and caught his head in chancery.
"Hand it to him!" screamed the tough to his partner in the ditch."Shoot him in the back!"
With a mighty lunge Roger flung himself and his opponent to the ground as a pistol snapped viciously and a steel-jacketed bullet zipped over his head.
"Look out, Hig!" he shouted. "Stay under your man."
"Turn 'im over!" The leader who had crawled upon the spoil bank fired again and missed. "Can't yah turn him up so I can get a crack at 'im?"
Roger felt the tough beneath him exerting all his energy. Slowly, surely he felt himself being turned. Then out from the sawgrass came the roar of a rifle, and a heavy slug whined over the gunman's head.
Bang! Another shot. Then the voice of Blease, the squatter:
"Next shot, I'll hold a foot lower. Throw that gun in the ditch.Throw it, you——" Bang! "That's right—Now get 'em boys, get 'em!"
Bare feet came drumming down the dirt of the spoil bank. A huge Bahama black was in the lead of his fellows. He leaped like something wild, his machete flashing in the sun. The gunman cried out and tumbled to safety in the ditch. The black men came with a rush. The fight was over. Panting, grinning, their teeth and eyeballs gleaming, the negroes stood aside awaiting orders.
"I'll be darned," said Roger, puzzled. "Boys, how did you ever come here?"
"Dat white man"—a grinning negro pointed to where Blease had fired from the jungle—"he say he shoot us if we don' come."
Higgins had searched the two strangers and taken a revolver from each.
"All right, boys," said Roger. "You can get right back to work. The show's over."
From the opposite sides of the canal Roger and the leader of the trio glared at one another.
"Well," said Payne, "you tried to run a bluff and it didn't work.What's the idea?"
The man swore again and replied:
"What's the idear, huh? That's what I want to know. You'll get yours for this—coming on people's land and starting a roughhouse."
Roger stared stupidly across the canal at the speaker, incomprehension taking the place of anger. "Oh," he said at last, "it's all a mistake. You got on the wrong tract: this is my land."
"Like —— it is!"
"What?"
"Don't try to come that on us; don't waste your breath. Think we're dummies? This is our land. We bought it last week. And I'm telling you to keep off of it from now on. Oh, I got the right description; a thousand acres west of a line from Deer Key there to the Cypress Swamp. Want to look at the deed? Give you our lawyer's address if you do."
"Who is your lawyer?"
"Big Tom Connors, Washington, D. C. And if it'll make you feel any better—why, he's a law partner of Senator Fairclothe."
"If you think you have really bought this land," said Roger slowly, "you have been cheated."
"Huh! Do we look like easy marks? Listen, boh: you're the fish that got hooked. You bought a bum title. Get that? Didn't know this little piece of dirt was in the courts, eh? Well, it was; and Big Tom got it, and we got it from him. Your title ain't worth the paper it's written on. Now, you're guilty of tresp——Hold on!"
Roger had thrown his self-control to the winds. He leaped into the canal and wallowed across.
"Get off, my land!" he growled. "Get off!"
The gunman was running for dear life down the spoil bank. On the opposite side his companions were in full flight. Payne did not follow. He stood and watched them, outraged to the marrow. "And keep off, too!" he shouted grimly. "Tell your lawyer, tell your sheriff, tell 'em all, keep off!"
"It's impossible!"
Roger was too stunned to grasp the true significance of the situation at once.
"The Senator's company wouldn't have sold me this land if there was a suit on it."
Then, little by little, the facts began to clarify in his mind. Connors, the lawyer, was Senator Fairclothe's law partner; Fairclothe had been anxious to see the tract drained.
"Oh, my God!" he groaned, "Are they that rotten!"
"But you had the title searched before you bought?" said Higgins.
"Of course. Right back to the first Spanish land grant, and there wasn't a flaw in it."
"Then those fellows are stung."
"Pooh! Those cheap toughs. They're nothing but tools. There's probably been a false transfer made to their names, but that's all; they were picked because they were fighters. Well, whoever picked them hasn't got the least suspicion of what he's started."
"Land titles are rotten things," growled Higgins. "Specially when land sharks are juggling them."
"They waited until the ditches were dug," mused Roger. "They didn't know it would make good land. And then they struck! Higgins, I'm going right down to Garman's and have a little talk with Senator Fairclothe."
"Bet you won't find him. Bet he's away selling this tract again to some other sucker."
But Higgins was wrong. Senator Fairclothe had not gone away. As Roger entered Garman's grounds, he saw Garman, the Senator and a man in long black coat and broad-brimmed black hat in conference upon the verandah. At his appearance Garman, lolling in a lawn chair, chuckled lazily; the Senator became as cold and pompous as the statue he hoped some day would commemorate his services to the Republic, and the black-hatted stranger closed his eyes to mere slits.
"Lo, Payne!" drawled Garman. "Come up out of the sun. You look all heated up."
He looked down at Roger, a smile on his lips as he noted the tenseness of the young man's expression.
"Worrying about something, Payne? Ideals been shattered? Ambition, love— Where's Annette, by the way?"
His chuckle rose to rumbling laughter.
Senator Fairclothe caught the black-clad stranger's eye and nodded stiffly. The man rose.
"You are Roger Payne?"
"Sit down!" In one leap Roger was upon the verandah facing the stranger. "Sit down!" he repeated. "My business is with Senator Fairclothe."
"My business——"
"Sit down," said Roger softly, and the stranger sat.
"Senator Fairclothe," continued Payne, "there seems to be a little misunderstanding about the title to the land I bought from you."
"You bought no land from me, young man."
"You are president of the Prairie Highlands Association?"
"I was. I severed that connection some months ago."
"Before you wrote me those letters?"
"No, the day after I wrote you the last letter of our correspondence. I had no connection with the company you mention at the time you made your purchase. I had discovered that the Prairie Highlands Association was not upon a firm basis. Of the land which they sold not a foot was owned by them. Their original title was false and invalid. The company now is defunct."
"I see," said Roger after a pause. "And knowing that your recommendations as a United States Senator would influence people to purchase this land, and knowing the title to be invalid, did you take any steps to warn them?"
"A United States Senator, I assure you, young man, has other and more important duties than nursing the petty interests of persons stupid enough to purchase land without seeing it. In fact, it might be considered a duty not to interfere. For the welfare of the country, it is desirable, in fact, that such money as such helpless persons may possess be transferred to the possession of the shrewd energetic men who constitute the vital portion of our population."
"Bravo, bravo!" rumbled Garman, applauding. "Senator, I congratulate you on your logic. Payne, there's the philosophy of our era in a nutshell. Now let us hear how star-eyed youth, inspired by ideals, controverts the wisdom of the togoed sage? Annette, dear!" he roared. "Come out! Come out and have some sport!"
"Miss Annette is not in the house," responded a maid.
"What? She was a minute ago."
"She is not now."
"All right. Too bad; wish you could see her, Payne. She's changed. She's grown up now. Senator, it just occurred to me: Annette is rapidly becoming her father's daughter."
"Well, young man," said Fairclothe complacently. "Have you anything more to say to me?"
"I'm going to keep that land, Garman," said Roger, ignoring the Senator. "Going to keep it in spite of all your tools, whether they're city gangsters, United States Senators, or"—with a glance at the stranger—"your deputy sheriffs."
"Senator!" cried Garman in mock horror. "He slanders the honor of your sacred office!"
"Better keep a-hold of your tongue, young feller," warned the deputy."I'm a little interested in this, too."
"Well," said Roger, "I think there is something in this that will interest people bigger than you or I or the state of Florida. I think the United States Government is due to become interested down here."
The suspicion of a smile curved the corners of Garman's mouth. There was a moment of pregnant silence; then Senator Fairclothe said impressively:
"I represent the United States Government, sir."
"Do you really?" laughed Roger bitterly. "Then the poor old United States Government is in a bad way indeed. But I deny your claim, sir; I don't think you represent the United States Government, because the United States Government consists of about a hundred million working people like myself; and all you represent, sir, are the few rich men and the few hundred millions of dollars which constitute the power that put you in the Senate."
"Do I understand, sir, that you mean to impugn the honor of the august body of which I have the honor to be a member?"
"No; I'm a busy man; I haven't any time to waste like that. But there's going to be something said about using the mails to defraud before this is over. That's Federal business."
"Be careful, sir; I am a member of and represent the Federal Government, and I shall take care that nobody casts any aspersions upon its honor or mine."
"What are you going to do about it?"
"What? Sir, do you mean to defy——?"
"Consider the aspersions cast. What are you going to do about it?"
"He calls," chuckled Garman; "show your cards."
"I shall——"
"Hm," interrupted Garman, and the Senator obediently hesitated.
"I shall not state here and now what means I shall utilize in meeting, as befits it, this defiance of our sacred Government. Nor shall I continue any communication or intercourse, or any association whatsoever, with the party or parties guilty of such defiance."
"I reckon this young feller has tooted his horn long enough," drawled the deputy sheriff. "Roger Payne, I——"
Roger turned his back deliberately and went down the stairs.
"Here! Come back here!"
Roger was walking across the lawn, bound for the path that led to his camp. He heard the click of a revolver being cocked on the verandah, but he did not look up.
"Oh, put that thing up, you ass!" said Garman disgustedly. "And go back to Flora City and draw your time—Payne, you're a big, bold buck. There's only one bigger in the country; and you and I are going to have a lot of fun before we're many days older."
Payne did not pause to look back or reply. Garman's taunts had driven him close to the point of explosion. The wretched situation in which he found himself in regard to the land he had paid for and drained was a muddle in his mind. Senator Fairclothe's brazen confession was a confusion. The one thing that was clear to his comprehension—as a touch of white-hot steel is clear to its victim—was Garman's assertion that Annette had changed and was becoming her father's daughter. And when he came upon her—rather when she stepped out before him—in the hidden path near the edge of the wild apple trees, Roger saw that Garman had spoken the truth.
She had changed. She had grown older. Her beauty was as great as ever, but it was now the beauty of a sophisticated, disillusioned and hardened woman, rather than that of the buoyant girl he had known. He could not define the change that had taken place in her, so subtle was it; but as he looked at her he instinctively flung out his hand, a gesture of pleading for something gone, and cried out in youth's agony:
"Annette! Annette!"
And then the miracle happened. At the sight of him, at the heart throb in his tones as he called her name, she seemed to shiver, then to awaken. She seemed to change before his eyes; though it was only he, seeing with the eyes which that moment had given him, who could have been sensible of the change. She seemed to grow and freshen as a parched rose at the touch of life-giving water. Her eyes gleamed with the old, frank look, her cheeks were rosy, and she walked girlishly as she came forward.
"Ah! Goody, goody!" she cried, clapping her hands. "Somebody likes me the other way—the way I want to be!"
"Annette!" he said again, and stretched out his hands and touched hers and held them.
"You—are happy again now, aren't you?" he stammered.
"Don't I look it?"
Her eyes were brimming with soothing tears.
"Happy?"
"Yes—for a minute."
He drew her hands against his breast. He held her so, and she looked up, her wet eyes close to his. He put an arm about his shoulders, and she nestled against his strength with a little sigh of content. And then he drew her closer to him, and they kissed once, instinctively, naturally; and she threw her head back and cried, "Ah, God! No, no!"
"Annette! Annette! What is it?"
"No, no! Let me go—let me go, dear. Please—you must, you must!"
She tore herself out of his relaxed arms and pressed her fists against her eyes to shut out the sight of him.
"Go away!" Her voice was flat and heavy. She turned and crossed her arms against the vine-clad trunk of a wild-apple tree and leaned her head upon them. "Don't come near me. You must not. You won't if you—if you play fair."
"Forgive me!" he said miserably. "I forgot—I didn't think——"
"Don't! Don't apologize—to me."
She waited a moment longer, then turned and faced him. The girlhood was gone from her eyes once more, and her mouth was hardened. She did not meet his eyes, she did not look at him, but stared off into the jungle as she spoke.
"I came out here on purpose to meet you." Her tone was cold and precise. "He—Mr. Garman—told me the truth about those three men last night. It is a lie—about your title being a false one. Your title is the good one. The other title is false. They intend to get possession of the land and entangle it in a lawsuit which will ruin you."
"What does it matter?" he cried pleadingly. "What does that matter?"
There was no response from her. She looked steadily off into the jungle.
"That is just what does matter," she said. "You must not let them get possession of your land."
"I don't intend to. But that——"
"I don't want to see them gobble you up like"—she laughed bitterly—"like they're doing to me."
"No! They haven't done that. They can't. I saw it a moment ago."
"Don't! It hurts. No, they haven't gobbled me up yet, but I don't think they'll delay much longer. They're too strong for me, you see: Aunty, and father, and—him. Aunty trained me for it; poor father cries: he's in his power; and he—it's a terribly strong array against one girl—all alone."
"Not quite alone."
"Yes, quite alone. That's the horror of it. I've told you before; you couldn't understand; but it's myself, only my own soul, that can settle this—it's very strange."
"You can't tell me—what it is?"
"I've told you too much now. But you must take care of yourself. No matter what happens you must take care of yourself."
"I don't know if that's so important," said Roger. "I confess I've lost considerable interest in just myself."
"I've—made you—do that?"
"I want to take care of you."
She smiled a smile too old, too cynical for her youthful lips.
"That was a kind thing to say, but——"
"I love you," said Roger bluntly. "I believe you care a little——"
"Don't, don't, don't!" She turned a face toward him full of pleading."Do you want to torture me? Can't you see——?" Her voice failed her.She struggled a moment and turned round; holding back tears and smilingby sheer force of will, and held out her hand frankly.
"Good-by!"
"I love you," repeated Roger doggedly.
A low chuckle in the jungle startled them.
"Ah, youth, youth, youth!" Garman's huge face was peering at them from behind a mask of flowering moon vine. "'I love you.' Ho ho! Poor Payne!"
"You cad, Garman; you mucker!" cried Roger.
"Go!" Annette flung herself upon him, seeking to push him away, but he stood like an oak.
"Eavesdropping! Fine work, Garman."
Garman roared with laughter.
"Do you really love me?" whispered Annette, suddenly, her lips closed to Roger's.
"You know that now."
"No, not yet; but I will soon. If you love me, you'll do what I ask.Go away. Please, please at once!"
"I can't leave you here, Annette, helpless among all this devilishness."
"I am not helpless. Not if I know you really love me. Can you understand that—it will mean so much to me—it will be the one way you can help me—the only way. Help me to save myself, dear, by showing me I have your love. Go!"
He looked at her. Then he bowed his head and went.
"They've jumped us!" Higgins' great neck was swollen with impotent rage as he greeted Roger's return to camp.
"It's my fault, too. Take a good, swift kick at me. I fell down on the job while you were away."
"What has happened?"
Higgins led the way to the edge of the elderberry jungle and pointed out over the drained land. A dozen armed men, outlaws and fugitives of the most vicious kind from Big Cypress Swamp, were scattered systematically over the thousand-acre tract. Two men lay behind the spoil banks at each of the main canal, their heads and rifle barrels showing above the black-earth breastworks. The other men were placed in pairs at strategic points. No one could set foot on the drained land without being seen and subject to fire from two sides.
Through his glasses Payne studied the pair which guarded the end of the main ditch near Deer Key. These were no city toughs who would try to bully rather than fight, but lank-haired, sallow-faced killers from the darkest part of Big Cypress Swamp; men who were desperate because of the crimes they had left behind them, and to whom rifle fire was a familiar argument. By the fashion in which they handled their weapons, Roger saw they were hunters; and the grim way in which they kept watch proved that they had come expecting a fight; to shoot and be shot at; to kill and perhaps be killed.
"That's Garman's work; no one else could get that crowd out of the swamp. How did it happen, Hig?"
"It happened because I'm all bone from the neck up. They used an old trick, and I fell into the trap like a tenderfoot. A few of them came hollering and shooting out of Flower Prairie, stampeding the boys. I figured it to be a raid on the camp, and I hollered for Blease and we ran for the tents. They played the bluff strong. Steamboat Bill got it through the head while he was running for cover—you remember him, the big, black fellow with earrings. Then they threw some lead into the tents, and Blease and I had quite a time holding 'em off. Blease got one of 'em; saw them carrying him away too dead to skin. Then we heard three quick shots, repeated three times down on the muck lands, and the shooting up here quitpronto.
"After a while it got through my thick head what had happened. Blease and I took in on the gallop back toward the ditches, but we were too late. They'd jumped it already, a whole army of 'em, and real hardhombres. Shoot?" He held out his perforated sun helmet. "I pushed that up on the stick for an experiment, and the guy that drilled it was two hundred yards away."
"It was my fault," said Payne. "Garman was too smart for me. I played right into his hand by going down there. He knew that's what I'd do, and he had this gang waiting and shot them over here as soon as he saw me coming."
"That isn't all," continued Higgins. "As soon as the boys saw Steamboat Bill run against his bad luck they left the job and ran for the brush like rabbits. Blease says they won't come back; they always make tracks when white men start shooting."
"You mean there's only two of us here now?"
"Three. Old Blease has put on the war paint."
"Three isn't enough."
"Not by a dozen, it isn't. Did you learn what they're trying to do to you?"
"They're trying to beat me out of the land by fixing up a false title. Now they've got possession, and their scheme is to carry me from court to court till I'm busted and tired out."
As he spoke he realized fully what this meant. Garman's wealth and influence and the pomp and honor of Senator Fairclothe's position would be arrayed against him. He had seen and heard enough to appreciate that the vast territory of Southern Florida was in the hands of a set of powerful, fearless plunderers, with Garman the arch plunderer of them all. And it was organized, protected plundering.
A county sheriff was a petty pawn in the great game. A county judge would be only slightly larger, and so on, up through state legislatures, the governor, congressman, state supreme court judges, and even up and into the sacred precincts of the United States Senate in the person of Senator Fairclothe. How vast was the power of Garman's plunder organization might be estimated by the degree of ignorance in which the land-buying public throughout the country was kept concerning the true situation in the district. Full-page advertisements in Sunday newspapers created a golden dream in the public mind concerning the Western Everglades; not one single news item crept into print revealing the truth. Roger realized that for such a power to crush him in a court test would require merely that the machine created for such purpose be set in motion. He realized also that the vicious nature of the desperados whom Garman had placed upon his drained land and the desperate measures which would be necessary to regain possession of his own.
Yet he found, a little to his own amazement, that he could look upon the theft with entire calmness. The fact was that it did not seem to concern him deeply. His emotions were a throb from the memory of Annette in his arms. He recalled little else of the meeting. She had been in his arms. And now his arms ached for her again with a poignance which made all other things insignificant.
"Well?" said Higgins. "Going to let 'em do it?"
"Do what, Hig?"
"Going to let them drag you into court and beat you because they've got possession of your land?"
"It takes thinking over," mused Roger.
"It takes fighting, that's what it takes," retorted Higgins. "We've got to roust those hard guys out of there before they take root and put up buildings. Some one's got to chase out to Citrus Grove and burn the wires up for about twenty tough fighting men to be delivered at Citrus Grove as quick as the trains will bring 'em. Twenty fighting men, and twenty riot pump-guns, and a dark night, and I'll kick that bunch off the place and have the place back in your own hands by daylight."
Roger laughed sharply.
"What's the matter?" demanded Higgins, "got a better idea?"
"Higgins, if you think Garman has left our back door open you don't half appreciate what the man is. When were the ox teams due?"
"Whew!" Higgins whistled. "That's so; this is the day for 'em to show up. They've been due since daylight."
"And they've never missed their weekly schedule so far. Ox teams are slow, Higgins, but they're darn sure."
"You think Garman's cut us off then?"
"Higgins, if you'd studied Garman half as hard as I have you'd know he wouldn't fail to do just that thing."
At dark Blease came noiselessly to Roger's tent to substantiate this deduction.
He had followed craftily after the party which he and Higgins had driven northward from the camp, and had found them encamped on Coon Hammock, across the ox trail, a scant mile from the camp.
Roger lay on his cot that night calmly appraising his situation. To the south of the camp Garman's henchmen were in possession of his land. To the eastward lay the trackless waters of the Everglades through which only the Seminoles cared to find a way; on the west—the only way out was through Garman's grounds which meant there was no way at all. Northward there was the ox trail, now closed, and the ghastly mud of the Devil's Playground.
Garman's trap was quite complete. Roger wondered when Garman would see fit to bring its jaws together.
But Garman had contemplated and prepared a sport more pleasing to him than this. The trap did not spring; day after day passed, and the situation remained the same. The men on the muck lands guarded against trespass by day or night. The moon was losing its radiance of nights, but sufficient light still prevailed to make an attempt to cross the ditched track plain suicide. In the north the men on Coon Hammock followed the same policy. No attack was made, but neither was there opportunity for any one to pass unobserved or unharmed.
One of the negroes, weary of hiding in the swamp, tried it and came staggering back to the camp with a bullet hole in his foot. Roger reasoned that Garman's cat-and-mouse tactics were calculated to break his nerve or to provoke a fight which could have only one result. Failing in this the trap had but to be maintained and the inevitable result would be surrender.
On the first night when a slight cloudiness, promised considerable darkness Roger slipped out of his tent trained and primed for the ordeal of a passage through the Devil's Playground to Citrus Grove. He crossed the open space of Flower Prairie while a cloudlet hid the moon. In the uncertain light a course through the jungle was not to be thought of. He looked up, and, encouraged by the gathering clouds, slipped through his fence onto the sand prairie and ran northward.
If he could reach unobserved the timber at the southern end of the Devil's Playground he felt he would be safe. As he ran he prayed for the clouds to hold together until he reached the dark wood. His prayer was answered. He made out a trail running into the timber and plunged into the darkness. The darkness lasted but a little while, however. Roger heard the whinny of horses on the trail ahead. The clouds suddenly parted and the moonlight seemed to light the forest like day. He was in an open space in the forest, and Garman and Mrs. Livingstone and Annette were sitting their horses facing him a few paces away.
"I figured it almost to the minute!" said Garman. "Almost to the minute I figured when you were due to start through the Devil's Playground, Payne."
He laughed shortly at the young man's amazement. "Didn't know I knew about that, eh, Payne? Well, I didn't until you bought that land from the Cypress Company. Then I knew you'd found a new way out and I had it looked up. No go now, Payne; the Devil's Playground is closed for traffic."
Annette was sitting straight and firm in her saddle. She turned onGarman with no fear or faltering in her attitude.
"Is this what you brought me out here for?" she asked, so sharply thatMrs. Livingstone cried out protestingly:
"My dear!"
Garman lowered his head ominously and the taunting smile on his lips turned to a threat as he returned her look. Even by the faint moonlight the sudden leap of anger and the desire to hurt were apparent in his countenance. He controlled himself.
"Yes, dear," he purred dangerously, "it is."
Annette met his gaze fearlessly. "Is there to be any more of the exhibition?"
"Not unless you irritate me, dear. Don't ride away. Gaze upon Payne's young, star-eyed face, my dear. Look upon it well; let it soak into your soul's memory, as it is now. It is your last chance. Next time you see him his face will not be the face of star-eyed youth at all! Preserve the memory, Annette!"
"Have you quite done?" she said.
"I? Certainly, my dear." Garman was nettled at her self-mastery. "Mrs. Livingstone, perhaps Annette has a word or two she wishes to speak to Payne. Shall we ride on and give them a moment alone?"
"I am sure Annette can have nothing to say to this Mr. Payne," repliedMrs. Livingstone quickly.
"Don't you be so sure of that," said Garman curtly. "Youth calls to youth!"
Annette's riding crop fell suddenly upon her mount and she went pastRoger on the gallop out onto the prairie.
"Youth calls to youth!" repeated Garman staring after her with angry eyes. "Mrs. Livingstone, don't you remember when you were young; when you had ideals and hopes of realizing them, and you could love, nobly and purely, without thinking of money?—ha, ha, ha! Must you really follow Annette? Really!"
He pulled his horse close to Roger.
"Well, Payne, how do you like my rat pit? Hard to get out of, eh?Don't waste your time trying; I've made sure you're going to stay put."
"I've been thinking," said Roger calmly, "that perhaps the best act of my life would be to pull the gun inside my shirt and shoot you through the head right here."
"Don't talk nonsense; you can't; you're too civilized. Besides—Hi, there!—Look behind you, Payne."
Roger laughed without turning.
"No, you don't get the drop on me with that old trick, Garman."
"Speak, you back there—what's your name—Harney?"
"Yes, sir," said a muffled voice in the shadows behind Roger. "EdHarney—Joe Harney's brother. I've got him covered."
"Ho hum!" yawned Garman. "I must follow the ladies. Especially, Annette—magnificent, tender, fiery little Annette!—Damn her! Something has happened; she's bold, defiant! She needs taming. Great sport, woman taming—in the swamp. Good night, Payne. Pleasant dreams!"
A cloud bank floated across the moon, plunging the woods into Stygian darkness. Out on the sand of the prairie the thud, thud, thud of Garman's galloping horse grew fainter and died away. A rift in the clouds revealed the moon for an instant. Roger whirled round, seeking to see the man who had called himself Harney. The clouds closed up again, the woods were black; and a Southern whippoorwill chuckled foolishly. Ahead, on the trail which he must follow to reach the Devil's Playground, Roger heard the footsteps of three men, and knew that Garman had taken all precautions to make good his assertion that the Devil's Playground was closed to traffic.
The anger which was in his heart craved an outlet. He moved toward the hidden men, then paused. They were three to one; in the dark a fight would be folly. Nothing would please Garman better than for him to plunge blindly into a hopeless battle. As Roger thought over the situation his anger rose and clarified. He realized now what a poor figure he had cut face to face with Garman, and he understood why. Garman had dominated him, and made him appear the baffled victim of Garman's superiority. Garman had dominated him, had played with Mrs. Livingstone till she rode away, helpless, outraged. But Annette had outfaced him, and Garman knew it!
"Something has happened!"
Roger recalled Garman's words, and a thrill shot along his spine. Garman did not dominate Annette; he did not hold her helpless by his hypnotic presence as formerly. Something had happened. Roger feared to think what, though hope whispered to him; and he turned back to camp not at all crest-fallen because the secret way through the Devil's Playground was closed. He came into camp with an easy, swinging step, such as no defeated man should display, and Higgins, appraising him as he listened to Roger's brief statement of the case, said:
"Hm. Then you know about it, do you?"
"About what, Hig?"
"About Willie High Pockets!"
"What! Willy been here?"
Higgins' thick brows met in a puzzled frown above his eyes.
"Payne, do you mean to tell me that you go out and find we're shut in like rats in a pit and come back here stepping high, without knowing about our friend Willy?"
"I don't know anything but what I've told you, Hig! Garman has got us shut in. Got us hopelessly cooped up. That's all I know."
"Well, you're a gamer bird than I thought, then. But why so frisky?"
"I figure he's got us about licked," replied Roger, ignoring the question. "We've got one chance in a million. We'll have it out with those birds on the muck land to-night after the moon is down. We may roust 'em. We may not."
"By God!" swore Higgins swiftly. "I'm almost sorry Willy High Pockets showed up. Your idea is the one I've had in mind for days. A fine fight we'd have given them, too. And now that darned Injun cones along and spoils it. We can't try it now."
"Why not?" demanded Roger.
"Willy High Pockets came crawling into camp on his belly about ten minutes after you'd left. He came with a message from that white side-kick of his he met in the swamp. You can't guess who that guy is."
"Who is he?"
"Davis."
"What! The fellow they tried to get on the Cormorant?"
"Exactly."
"Is he some sort of a detective?"
"I suspect so. Willy ain't much on the tell. He says that man has got Uncle Sam behind him! And this Davis sends us serious word that we're to keep away from Garman's men. Whatever happens we mustn't get into a fight. We've got to stick right in camp and play safe, or we'll spoil two years' work for Uncle Sam. The first dark night—to-morrow night probably—it will be over, whatever it is, and Davis will come here and explain. That's what Willy High Pockets said, and if you'd seen him tell it you'd know it was a darn serious business. By the great smoked fish, Payne, there's a big game being played round here. I feel it in my bones. And I'm sore because I haven't got a finger in the pie."
"What can it be?"
"You got me. But whoever this Davis man is he's got Willy so he isn't afraid of Garman. That means something big."
"We'll give Davis to-night and to-morrow night," said Roger, after pondering the matter a moment. "After that——"
"Hell's delight! And I almost hope that Davis falls down on whatever he's doing."
On the narrow there was no sign to indicate that Davis or any one else was concerned in the affairs of the district. The grim guards on the muck lands held their stations. It was apparent that they had orders not to leave the tract or to seek trouble, but to be ready to shoot and shoot accurately at any one venturing to trespass. Blease scouted northward on the ox-team trail and reported that Coon Hammock was still occupied. Payne himself went through the elderberry and saw grass jungle and through his glasses saw men guarding the approach to the Devil's Playground.
The strain was beginning to tell on all three men in the clearing.Each hour now seemed a day, each sight of a Garman man was a torture.
"It ain't human," muttered Blease. "I can't stand it."
Higgins lay flat on his back in his tent, staring up at the canvas.
"It had better be a dark night to-night," he said, with a grim smile. Roger silently agreed. And he realized that this was what Garman had foreseen and planned for when he digged the pit—the sense of imprisonment and the desperate attempt to break out, regardless of consequences.
"He's too smart to be just a man, Garman is," droned Blease; but Roger stopped him.
"He's nothing but a man; nothing but a man who likes to hurt. Don't let me hear you say he's anything but that."
To Roger and Higgins the sudden, fierce sunset came as a benison, presaging the coming of the night. There was no thought of food or sleep. Narrowly they watched the sun go angrily down in the west and the night come rolling over the heavens from the east. Clouds appeared, first a few scatterings of fleecy stuff, next solid cloud banks through which the waning moon strove in vain to send its rays.
"It will be a dark one," said Roger.
Higgins on his cot laughed harshly.
"Come through, Davis; to-night or never."
They lay out through the night, waiting, hoping for events, and they waited in vain. The first purple-rayed warning of sunrise in the morning found them in a mood of despair. As the second day came on with no sign of Davis they turned their steps toward the tents.
"I don't wait any longer," said Higgins, loading his rifle. "Soon as good shooting light comes I start doing business."
The others followed his example, and Blease led the way by a tortuous path through the elderberry jungle to a point near Deer Hammock. They crawled forward, ready to cover the pair of guards at the head of the canal. Blease was in the lead. Lying flat on his breast he thrust his rifle barrel out of the jungle, searching for his quarry. Presently he rubbed his eyes.
Roger crept close to him and searched the grass-covered expanse of drained land carefully with his glasses. Then he stood up and stepped out into the open.
The drained land was deserted. Garman's guards were gone.
The discovery brought neither relief nor elation to Roger. Amazement smote him dumb for a moment, then came suspicion that this was only another of Garman's traps. He strove to follow the man's psychology to an explanation of this move. Was Garman merely playing with him again, arousing false hopes which would be diabolically crushed?
That seemed the logical reason for the move. What would Garman's next move be?
"Looks like a trick, doesn't it?" said Higgins.
"Yes."
Roger strode down to the head of the main drainage ditch where two of the guards had held watch. The forms where the men had lain in the soft black muck behind the spoil bank were still sharply defined. Their departure must have occurred during the darkest hours of early morning. They had left behind them a flask full of colorless liquid, one whiff of which proved its contents to be moonshine whisky.
"Queer thing," said Blease. "Reckon they must have left in a hurry or they'd never have forgot their licker."
Higgins and Roger preceded cautiously over the tract, making sure that no guards lay hidden in the ditches. The trails left by the departing men were easily followed. They led, not to the river or toward Garman's as might have been expected, but scattered and lost themselves to the southward in the tangle morass of the cypress swamp. Here and there articles had been left behind in what savored of a flight; unopened canned goods, a deer carcass, a frying pan, a rifle and a pair of shoes. Roger studied the tracks leading into the swamp and saw that several of them had been made on the run. It was apparent from all signs that the guards had fled, driven by fear of something.
"Blease," said Roger suddenly, "you scout up the ox trail and see if they're gone from Coon Hammock, too; and, Higgins, you slip up towards the Devil's Playground and see what you can see."
He went on down the main ditch toward its junction with the headwaters of the Chokohatchee River, keeping a close watch for possible lurking danger beyond his line. Near the mouth of the ditch he found a dugout evidently left behind in the flight of the guards. In the dugout he paddled the rest of the distance down the ditch, hidden from sight by the spoil banks on the canal's sides.
It was broad daylight when suddenly he checked the canoe at the entrance to the river. The plop of a pair of paddles propelling a canoe upstream came from round a bend and Roger lay down flat on the bottom of the dugout, his rifle resting upon the prow. The rifle covered the spot where the canoe must come round the bend. He was on his own land, and he would not allow the guards to regain possession without a fight. He saw the white prow of the canoe shoot out past a tuft of saw-grass on the bend, and laid his eye to the sights. Another stroke of the paddles and the canoe was in full view, and Roger found his front sight bearing upon a button on the silken shirt which stretched taut across Garman's great chest.
A roar like the bellow of an angered bull welled from Garman's throat as he recognized Payne, an inarticulate cry of rage, then a silence. The current carried the canoe back a trifle and with an oath Garman drove it forward with his paddle. In the stern was Senator Fairclothe, dumb and helpless from fear.
Garman struck his paddle in the bottom and held the canoe motionless. His eyes, usually lazy and indifferent, now blazed beneath the fleshy brows with the madness of rage. He glared full in the eyes above the rifle barrel and bellowed:
"Where's Annette! —— you, Payne, give her up!"
Roger's heart leaped at the words. He felt an impulse to jump up and shout; but he kept his cheek to the rifle butt and responded:
"Keep to your own side of those stakes, Garman, or I'll sink your canoe."
"Answer me!" hissed Garman. "Answer me, or by God! the alligators will make a meal of you!"
"You've got your answer. Keep off and keep out of danger."
"Give her up! Do you hear: give her up or she'll be sorry she ever was born."
Roger pondered a moment for the right answer.
"Nothing doing," he said firmly.
"You admit she's come here then?"
"Keep your hands in sight, Garman," said Roger. "I'm taking no chances—now."
"You hear, Fairclothe?" demanded Garman. "She's run away to this squirt. She's been with him all night. By——! when I get hold of her there won't be any talk of marriage—now."
"You've got to come and get her first, Garman," retorted Roger. If Annette had fled she had undoubtedly gone to get away from Garman. Garman had jumped to the conclusion she had gone to Payne. She had not; and Roger reasoned that in some manner she had gone down the river, whence she would eventually reach civilization. Every hour that he could delay Garman from turning to this surmise would be valuable.
"You've got to come and take her," he repeated. "I won't give her up now."
"You hear him, Fairclothe?" sneered Garman. "What do you think of your daughter now? Nicely brought up, nicely watched, I must say. You poor—fool! You'd better jump in right here and drown yourself. He's had your Annette all night; now he's going to keep her at the point of a rifle. I suppose you intend to make the conventional restitution by marrying her, Payne? By——! I'll spoil that—I'll take her away from you. I'll turn her back to you when I'm tired of her. Then you can marry her, Payne! Give her up. I'll wipe you out, including her, before I'll let her get away like this."
"Come and get her," repeated Roger.
Fairclothe found his voice.
"I demand that you return my daughter, young man."
"I am not holding her against her will. She is free to return to you if she wishes to do so."
"I demand that I be allowed to speak to her."
"I cannot grant that demand."
"You refuse to allow me to communicate with her?"
"If she wishes to communicate with you I won't prevent it."
"You young scoundrel!"
Roger did not reply.
"If you have harmed my little girl, I warn you you will be punished to the utmost."
"You talk like a parrot!" snarled Garman. "Talk sense—if you can."
Fairclothe cleared his throat. "Did my daughter Annette come to you of her own free will?"
Roger hesitated before replying.
"No!" he said defiantly.
"Ah! Garman, Garman, what did I tell you—what did I tell you? I knewAnnette never would leave you of her own free will!"
"You —— impudent squirt!" said Garman, "You mean to tell me you——No, you wouldn't be man enough to steal her. Who brought her to you?"
Again Roger debated.
"If you come and get her as you threaten to do, you may find out."
Garman's rage was ghastly to behold. The flesh of his face seemed to swell in puffs, his nostrils widened, his eyes seemed to recede beneath the fleshy brows. He held up his great hairy hands, closing and opening them; but enough reason remained in his rage-drunken mind to comprehend the iciness of the blue eyes above the rifle barrel.
"By——! Fairclothe, I believe you did it yourself," he cried, venting his rage on the helpless Senator. "Don't try to talk back. I believe you did it, you and that dried-up, gold-digger of a sister. But by——! if you have you'll be yanked out of the Senate and go to jail, Fairclothe! Don't talk! I'm sick of you."
He jerked his paddle from the bottom and the current gently drew the canoe back downstream. Roger forced a smile of false triumph upon his face. He must not let Garman turn elsewhere to look for Annette.
"Licked, eh, Garman?" he taunted. "I'll go back and tell Annette about it. We'll enjoy it together."
The canoe was drifting down the bend.
"And come in a hurry, Garman, if you intend to get her; because if you wait long you won't find her here."
Garman appeared not to hear; but he swung the canoe round furiously, and paddled out of sight down the river.
Higgins and Blease returned soon afterward, each reporting that the guards to the northward had departed, apparently in the same hurried fashion as those on the muck land. Payne wasted no time in an attempt to puzzle out the reason for it. If Garman had withdrawn the men to lay a new trap, it was obvious that Annette's flight had upset his plans. For the time being at least his mind was too inflamed with rage over her daring in thwarting his will, to admit the consideration of any other problem. He would be too obsessed with thought for gratifying his revengeful lust to trouble about Payne's land.
Roger related briefly the fact of Garman's visit, omitting mention ofAnnette.
"Then he'll be coming back to clean us up, you think?" asked Higgins hopefully.
"I think so—I've got good reasons for believing so," replied Roger. "He won't come alone, but with a gang big enough to make sure of the job. Blease, this isn't your scrap at all, and I suspect it's going to be a real one. The ox trail is open and the mules can travel it, so you'd better take a span of them and drive your family out of danger."
Blease deliberated.
"Reckon I won't," he said at last. "Family's safe in there in the elder bush. I'll stay. Mebbe get a chance to even up with Garman."
Roger selected a high spoil bank near the center of the muck land as his post. From there he could see any one who approached from the river or from the cypress swamp. Blease took up a hidden position in the elderberry jungle, from which he could cover the open prairie toward Garman's, and Higgins secreted himself in the palmetto scrub of Flower Prairie. Higgins awaited the expected onslaught merrily; Blease was hopeful of revenge; and Roger, as he lay with his rifle ready, smiled because Annette was out of Garman's power. Wherever she was, he felt she was safe. He pictured her as she had faced Garman fearlessly two nights before—straight, strong, self-reliant—and was confident that her absence was of her own doing, and that whatever the circumstances she was free of the influence of her aunt, of her father, of the drugging magnetism of Garman, and in control of her own destiny.
As the hours dragged by and he broiled beneath the merciless sun with no sign of a move on Garman's part, his confidence waned. Had Garman discovered that Annette was not at Payne's camp? Had he discovered her whereabouts?
Roger recalled the signs of an unpremeditated flight on the part of Garman's guards, and his heart sank. Was it possible that their flight had some connection with Annette's disappearance? They were all desperate men, the most vicious Of criminals, who had fled to safety in the cypress swamps because their savagery unfitted them for existence in a civilized environment. Inflamed by moonshine whiskey they would be capable of anything, even of forgetting for the moment of Garman's dominance of them.
Roger swore helplessly, and sought relief from his torturing thoughts in physical labor. The direct rays of the subtropical sun had dried and heated the surface of the soft muck land until it radiated heat like a stone pavement. With the butt of his rifle Roger dug deeply beneath the surface until he reached damp, cool earth and, scooping a hollow, stretched out full length to cool his burning body. A buzzard soared lazily about in the cloudless sky, and his thoughts leaped back to the flight of the desperadoes.
What a fool he had been to feel assured of Annette's safety merely because Garman was unaware of her whereabouts! She rode out in the evening—probably alone. And the rattlesnakes in the swamp were no more dangerous than the gang which Garman had scattered about the district!
He rose, and with glasses to his eyes peered through the dazzling heat waves, hoping against hope to catch some sign that Garman was coming. He gave up hope. Hours had passed. Garman would have been back long ago if he was coming. And he would have come if he had continued to believe that Annette was with Payne.
Garman must have discovered the true circumstances of Annette's disappearance. In no other way was his failure to return to be explained. And Roger had been lying there in the dirt, waiting like a fool, while Garman was taking measures to get her in his power again!
The dugout lay in the big ditch close to its junction with the river; and the river ran down to Garman's house. Roger stepped into the craft and shoved off. He was thrusting the boat out into the current of the river when a faint whip-like crack came to his ears. He shoved back and leaped ashore.
Higgins had fired a shot up on Flower Prairie.