"In the event of your coming, you must break your journey at False Cape and ask for an old man named Slunk. He will give you a packet; you will give him a dollar, and drive on to Cape Canaveral, and you will do what is to be done there. From there to Fort Kissimmee, to Okeechobee, traversing the lake to the Rita River, where I have marked the trail to Little Sprite.
"At Little Sprite I shall await you; beyond that point a merciful Providence alone can know what awaits us.
"Yours fraternally,
"Farrago.
"P.S.—I think that you had better make your will, and suggest the same idea to the stenographer who is to accompany you. F."
And that was the letter I received while seated comfortably on the floor of my work-room, surrounded by innocent isopods, all patiently awaiting scientific investigation.
And this is what I did: Within twenty-four hours I had assembled the supplies required—the cage, the woman's clothing, tank, arms and ammunition, and the chemicals; I had secured accommodations, for that evening, on the Florida, Volusia, and Fort Lauderdale Railway as far as Citron City; and I had been interviewing stenographers all day long, the result of an innocently worded advertisement in the daily newspapers.
It was now very close to the time when I must summon a cab and drive to the ferry; and yet I was still shy one stenographer.
I had seen scores; they simply would not listen to the proposition. "Why does a gentleman in the backwoods of Florida want a stenographer?" they demanded; and as I had not the faintest idea, I could only say so. I think the majority interviewed concluded I had escaped from a State institution.
As the time for departure approached I became desperate, urging and beseeching applicants to accompany me; but neither sympathy for my instant need nor desire for salary moved them.