For the next half hour they slaved through the lilies, and in the stretch of open water finally reached, Bill spoke again.
“I know you’re making for the southeast, Osceola. And I suppose you’ve got a plan. But I should have thought you’d point north. Isn’t there an automobile causeway that crosses the Everglades somewhere up there?”
Osceola nodded. “There is, Bill, but I am going to make for the home of my people. I figure that we can get down there in three or four days, if our luck holds. It would take us much longer to reach the causeway.”
“Good enough! Swell plan, I should say.”
“But that’s only half the plan, Bill.”
“What’s the other half?”
“I’ll tell you when I’ve talked with my people. I’m not trying to be cagy, but I’ll need their consent to put it over—and I don’t want to get up false hopes, you know. You don’t mind, if I keep it to myself till I’m more certain?”
“Of course not. I’ve been doing a little thinking on my own. And maybe I can spring mine when you come across with yours. If these all-fired pond lilies would only—”
Bill never finished that sentence. There was a stirring among the lilypads just aft of Bill’s paddle. He caught a fleeting glimpse of what he took to be a gnarled tree trunk among the blooms overside. Then the stern of the dugout rose in the air, toppled over, and clutching wildly at the gunwale, he catapulted into the lilies.
“‘Gator!” yelled a voice which he took to be Sam’s, and the water closed over his head.