Jack circled the spot several times, with his exhaust muffled, and even the propeller keeping unusually quiet, as though in full sympathy with their desire for secrecy.
“Cover every rod of both land and water with your glass, partner,” he told Perk; “because it means a whole lot to us to make sure that there isn’t any chance for hostile eyes to take note of our stopping here. Unless I’m away off in my reckoning this same bayou must be the identical place where we are to later on make a rendezvous with that cracker guide, Jethro Hicks, who knows every foot of these water trails—I understood he hid out in this terrible region for several years when at loggerheads with the authorities, though innocent of any crime. How does the ground look to you, buddy?”
“Like the ole Sam Patch, an’ that aint no lie either, Boss,” Perk lost no time in telling his mate; “I never did see sech a awful stretch o’ mixed land an’ water nohaow, nowhere; but jest the same that’s zactly what we want, so’s to make dead sartin they beant nobody araound hyah calc’lated to bother weuns, that’s the way I looks at hit, suh.”
“Quite right too, Wally, boy!” snapped Jack; “and such being the case here goes to settle down on that Black Water Bayou—I think that was the name Mr. Herriott gave the slough.”
“Gosh all hemlock! an’ it couldn’t have a better name, I’m asayin’ suh—tough enough lookin’ to give anybody a shiver; but as we’re itchin’ fo’ to keep aour comin’ secret, it suits aour case to the dot.”
There was plenty of room in the middle of the mysterious little lagoon for their landing, if such it could be called; and so cleverly did the pilot bring the pontoons of his craft in contact with the surface that hardly the slightest splash followed.
Jack lost no time in taxiing over to a certain spot that seemed to hold possibilities for the maneuver he intended putting into effect—thick trees hung low over the water, and if only they could manage to push far enough in, the boat would be beautifully camouflaged—hidden under a fringe of branches, and so well disguised as to be discovered only after a close search.
“Wonderfully fine,” was Jack’s announcement after this had been successfully brought about. “Why, it’s almost like late evening under this thick canopy; and the bayou itself, surrounded as it is with tall cypress trees, with those long trailing beards of gray Spanish moss give it a gruesome look.”
“Urr! jest makes me think o’ the ole graveyard I used to run past a goin’ home late nights, when I was a country kid up in New England,” Perk was saying, toning his voice down to almost a whisper.
It certainly did have a most funereal appearance, with the breeze making all manner of weird sounds through the tops of the trees, and the festoons of dangling moss waving to and fro like mourning banners; some unseen swamp creatures added to the shivering feeling that had attacked Perk by emitting the most gruesome grunts and groans his ears had ever heard.