“Good thing we found this boat,” Murphy commented; “we’d have drowned before this if we had tried to cross this place without it.”
Scott did not reply. He was wondering how far it was from the north edge of the swamp to the railroad track and how long it would be before they could get a train going in their direction. When he had discovered the log canal and the hidden mill he had thought his work in Florida was about completed, and successfully completed. The scare at the cabin had showed him how easy it would be for him to fail completely even yet. He was anxious now to get back to headquarters and place his information where it would be safe.
They had covered at least another mile and were beginning to think that the swamp must extend clear up into Georgia when they began to see some signs of land ahead. They were coming to a fringe of dense underbrush and behind it they could see the tops of pine trees. In a few minutes they were standing on solid ground once more with an open pine forest stretching away to the northward as far as they could see.
“Well, it can’t be more than a hundred miles from here to the railroad!” Murphy exclaimed. “Let’s go.”
They were both anxious to get out of that unknown country where so many unexpected things seemed to happen to them, and set out at a lively pace. The country continued to be dry and open, but it was at least two hours before they saw any sign of life or a road or anything else which would indicate that they were anywhere near civilization. Then they sighted a little cabin far ahead of them in the woods. Smoke was curling from the chimney and two men were leaning on the front fence with their backs toward them.
Scott decided that there could be no danger in approaching these people who could not possibly know anything about them and he wanted to learn the shortest way to the railroad. They advanced in silence and their feet made no sound in the soft sand. The men in the yard turned out to be a couple of darkies and they seemed to be enjoying some huge joke. Their laughter broke out in an almost continuous high-pitched cackle and they were having altogether too good a time to pay any attention to the approach of strangers. In fact, strangers were so rare in that section that no one ever thought of seeing one. The boys were not very far from the cabin when one of the darkies roared between his gusts of laughter, “No, suh, you won’t ketch me tryin’ to steal no grub out of dat cabin ag’in. A little mo’ and we’d a-walked right in on ’em and you know what Mist’ Roberts said de las’ time he ketched us out dere. No, suh, I’ll buy my grub fust.”
Scott stopped in astonishment and stared at Murphy. So that was what had scared them so at the cabin; only a couple of darkies trying to steal some of the supplies. And Roberts had not learned anything of their whereabouts, nor was he likely to from these fellows. It was the first cheerful news he had had for some time.
Murphy cleared his throat loudly and the two darkies jumped almost out of their skins and looked as though they were about to run away. The sight of the two forest service uniforms did not seem to reassure them. The weight of a guilty conscience made them nervous.
“Say, boy,” Murphy called to reassure them, for he was familiar enough with darkies to know that if they were frightened there would be no hope of getting the truth out of them about anything, “which is the nearest road to the railroad station?”
It took the darky a moment to recover from his fright, but the terror died from his face when he realized that the stranger had not said anything about robbing a cabin and he grinned respectfully. “Dat de road right deah, boss, de ain’t no otheh.”