"I reckon it was sort of an error of judgment that we didn't tie them fellows up while we had the chance. They was too plum wore out to put up much of a fight," said the captain, regretfully.
Charley said nothing, but his expression was that of one who after long puzzling has solved a troublesome problem, and has found the solution not that which he desired. The outlaws' statement that there was a party of Indians on their way from the Everglades had given him the key.
CHAPTER VII.
THE QUAGMIRE.
It was already late when the convicts departed, and our hunters immediately began their preparations for their first trial with the plume birds.
"I wonder where we had better strike in at first," said the captain, "there seems a powerful lot of them islands, an' they 'pear to me pretty much alike."
"I have been keeping a kind of eye out all day," Charley answered, "and it seems to me that there has been a lot of birds flying around that little island of dead trees in the marsh right across from us. Suppose we try that first."
The others readily agreed, and, while Chris was cooking supper, the boys prepared a number of torches from fat pitch pine and looked over their fowling-pieces carefully.
As soon as it was dark, Charley and Walter entered one of the canoes and the captain the other. Chris begged hard to be taken, but Charley was firm in his refusal.