When a criminal in southern Florida escapes with his booty, and is seen no more, the officers are wont to shake their heads and say:
“He has hiked it into the Everglades.”
“Which is as good as saying that the criminal is where he can’t be found or tracked, and that he is safe from the law unless he should take it into his head to come out once more into the communities. Nor is it necessary for these men to return to the haunts of civilization, unless they wish to do so. Crops may be raised in these hidden fastnesses, and wild animals may be shot for meat and clothing. Yet it is the nature of mankind to yearn for a return to old haunts. So every now and then a fugitive from the Everglades is caught, though rarely or never in the Everglades themselves.
“A nice crowd I’m with, and a fine chance I’ve got ever to get back to my friends!” was the thought that rushed, with swift alarm, through Tom Halstead’s brain. “And it was plain they did want me. They were looking for me, more than for anyone else. But why?”
The more Halstead racked his brain for the answer the more puzzled he became.
“Of course, Oliver Dixon might want me out of the way; undoubtedly he does. Yet he had no acquaintance with these ruffians. Dixon is as much of a stranger to this section as any of the rest of us.”
Then, at last, came the stunning thought:
“Jupiter! Dixon claims he met something that looked like a ghost! Was that all a lie? Did he go alone into the woods, and call so convincingly that he brought some of these scoundrels to him? Did he pay them to take me away? Were his story and his wild shots, his scared looks and his wild talk all parts of a monstrous lie?”
Tom Halstead throbbed with agony as he became more and more sure in his own mind that he had solved the mystery of his abduction by these wretches of the Everglades.
If he had not solved the puzzle correctly, then he could think of no other explanation that seemed at all plausible.