"Know you are."
"So you might tip us off about why it's going to be hard luck for us to hit this place we're bound for."
There was no reply. The captain sullenly kept the boat's nose in the deep channel, but beyond this the gang was apparently no more responsive to words than the alligators which lay sunning themselves at the water's edge. The river now grew narrower, its waters grew clearer, changing from a yellow to a faint indigo.
"Getting into a limestone formation," called Higgins over his shoulder. "But I don't see anything that looks like land yet. This stuff ought to be sold by the gallon instead of the acre."
Soon, however, a change began to appear in the landscape. The mangroves gave way to banks of solid land. A few scattering pines, tall, straight, thin and branchless save for their crowns, reared their tops high above the tropical growths.
"There's land there," said Roger. "Where there are pines there's honest ground beneath, even if it's only sand. It's good to see them."
"You're right. I begin to feel at home again. That thick stuff is pretty, but give me some real trees."
The sand area, and with it the pines, gave way to a stretch of muck and saw grass, the saw grass to a jungle of elderberry trees so thick the light barely filtered in. Blackbirds by thousands, large and plump and glistening, swarmed about in the jungle; and on the thicker branches the loathsome buzzards sat waiting, waiting.
Payne carefully inspected the shore before leaving the boat when the landing was made at the high banks.
"Step ashore, Higgins, and see if there's a trail."