On the shore a light canoe of cedar, hollowed out of the virgin wood as the Seminoles create their water craft, lay upturned.
Beyond that there was a spot cleared in the heavy brush growth, and there were piled cases and crates, perhaps fifty of them!
It did not require the stenciled black letters at the visible ends of certain cases to indicate the truth to the chums. An old ship’s lantern of the sort used at the starboard and port sides, with a screen of green glass over its front indicated where the previous night’s uncanny glow had come from. But the cases themselves told more.
“Rum runners!” gasped Nicky.
“We ought to have guessed,” Cliff said. “Nelse is one of them. That’s why he tried to scare us away. This is a nest of them. I suppose they can run up from the islands—especially Cuba—get their large boat hidden from the Government patrol on some dark night, in among the keys, and then ferry the cases over here in smaller boats.”
“But what good does that do them?” Tom wondered. “How do they get the cases to market?”
“I guess the Seminole Indians, or maybe half-breeds, work with them. It must be the Seminoles because they know the waterways in the Big Cypress Swamp and the Everglades, and I don’t think many white men do—they didn’t up to recently, anyhow, according to a book on exploration I read.” Nicky made the statement excitedly.
“Even if we never find any treasure,” he added, “there must be a big reward for breaking up trade like this. It’s wicked. It’s against the law and the Constitution, and even if there wasn’t any reward we will have to try some way to get word to the Government boats.”
There was a slight stir in the grass and scrub behind and to the left of them.
When, with one accord, they turned, a Seminole Indian faced them.