There could be no doubt that the creature was lying still on its back.
“I fired for one of the eyes,” admitted the young motor boat skipper.
“You hit the eye, then, and pierced what little brain the beast has,” declared Henry Tremaine. “Run us up alongside, Dawson. Jeff, get out one of the towing lines. Jove! What a fine afternoon’s sport, almost within sight of the bungalow.”
“You shoot as splendidly as you do everything else, Tom!” effused Ida Silsbee.
“I guess it was a fluke shot,” Tom laughed, modestly.
But Oliver Dixon noted the use of his first name by the girl, and Dixon’s heart burned with jealousy.
Joe ran the boat up alongside the motionless, overturned alligator. Mr. Tremaine and Jeff bent far out over the gunwale, deftly, expertly slipped a noose taut over the hard, scaled tail of the dead creature, then made the line fast at the stern of the boat.
“We’ll cruise about a bit longer,” decided Mr. Tremaine. “I don’t believe we’ll get anything more like this, though, out in the open lake. I don’t believe I ever heard of a ’gator being shot out here in the lake before.”
“It happens once in a while,” nodded Jeff, gravely.
They cruised for an hour more, after which Henry Tremaine declared they might as well return.