along.'
Simon sat still. A man had come slowly erect on the deck of the abandoned barge and was standing like a wood carving in the blaze of the spotlight. Over dirty white ducks, a long-sleeved jacket glowed with the colours of the rainbow. A red neckerchief was knotted about the man's throat. The face of well-seasoned ancient mahogany was topped with long straight black lustreless hair.
It was the sight of the face that kept Simon so still. A black mustache covered wide thick lips. The slightly Negroid nose was straight and aquiline. Wrinkles made deep by the sorrows of a thousand years branched upwards from a firm strong chin. Large flat eyes lay close to his head.
The Indian stared straight into the spotlight, and his paunched eyes burned unblinkingly like the eyes of some jungle animal looking unmoved into the noonday sun. He moved as smoothly as rippling water, and with less sound. One second Simon was watching him on the dredge; in the next, he was beside the car.
Gallipolis said: 'We were looking for you, Charlie. If you want to make twentyfive bucks, this gentleman with me has a job to do.'
'Got drink?' asked Charlie Halwuk, and stretched out his wrinkled hand.
Simon said over his shoulder: 'It won't hurt you to share your bottle, Hoppy.'
Mr. Uniatz surrendered it grudgingly. Charlie Halwuk took it and tilted it up.
The Greek said confidentially: 'It's strictly a Federal offence, but we'll all have to drink with him. A Seminole has an idea that any party starting out to do anything just ain't worth a damn if they're dry.'
'Okay,' said the Saint, and wondered if he had at last stumbled upon the dark secret of Hoppy's ancestry.
Charlie gave the bottle to Gallipolis and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. The Greek took two swallows and passed it on. Simon touched it perfunctorily to his lips, and slid it back into Hoppy's clutching paw. Mr Uniatz emptied it, tossed it out of the window, and breathed with deep satisfaction. Simon expected smoke to come out of his mouth, and was disappointed.
Charlie Halwuk had also watched the demolition with respect. He pointed a finger at Hoppy's blazer.
'Plenty good drinker, big boy,' he stated admiringly. 'Plenty pretty clothes. Him damn good man.'
'Chees,' said Mr Uniatz unbelievingly. 'Dat's me!'
Gallipolis pointed to Simon.
'This is the Saint, Charlie. He's a good man, too. They say he's one of the world's greatest hunters with a gun.'
The Indian's round wrinkled eyes shifted impassively to take in their new target.
'You know Lostman's River?' Gallipolis went on.
Charlie nodded.
'The Saint wants to go down there where all that digging went on last summer.'
'Take boat?' asked Charlie Halwuk.
'No,' said Gallipolis. 'He wants to go through the Everglades, and start tonight.'
The Seminole stared unmovingly.
'Take canoe?' he asked.
Gallipolis nodded.
'Plenty miles. Plenty tough,' said Charlie Halwuk. 'No can do.'
'I'll make it fifty dollars if you can take us there,' Simon put in.
'Plenty rain,' said Charlie. 'Plenty bad. You great hunter. Rain too much for you.'
'Damn the rain!' Simon leaned across Gallipolis. In the light from the dashboard his blue eyes glinted with tiny flecks of steel, but his voice was quiet and persuasive. 'You're a great hunter and a great guide, Charlie Halwuk. I've heard about you from many people. They all say there's nothing you can't do. Now, I have to get to this place on Lostman's River, and get there right away. If you won't take me I'll have to try it by myself. But I'm going to get there somehow, I'll give you a hundred dollars.'
'Plenty big talk,' said Charlie Halwuk. 'You get marsh buggy, maybe me go too.'
Gallipolis slapped a hand down on his thigh.
'By God, he's got it!'
'What the devil is a marsh buggy?' Simon asked.
'They use it prospecting for oil around this part of the country,' the Greek explained. 'It's a combination boat and automobile that 'll run over any sort of ground and float across streams and rivers. It's a hell of a looking thing with wheels ten feet high and cleated tyres that only carry four pounds of air.'
It sounded like a fearsome vehicle, but its advantages sounded considerable, Simon felt a microscopic flicker of excitement as he wondered if their prospects were brightening.
'Where can we get one of these amphibious machines?' he asked; and the Greek lifted his shoulders to shrug them and then stopped them in the middle of the movement.
'There's a prospecting company at Ochopee that owns four, but you'll probably be the first guy who ever tried to rent one by the day.'
'Could you drive it?'
'Hell, no. I'm not so keen on riding in one either, but for the the price you're paying I'll try anything.'
'I'll get you a marsh buggy, Charlie,' said the Saint, and opened the back door. 'Get in. We're starting right away.'
'Wait,' said the Indian. 'Get gun.'
Simon watched him climb up the side of the dredge, admiring his fluid agility. The Seminole might claim to be a hundred and two, but his limbs worked with the suppleness of a twenty-year-old acrobat He was back again in a moment with a light double-barrelled shotgun.
'I t'ought dey used bows 'n arrers,' said Mr Uniatz, open-mouthed.
'That's only when they're acting in movies,' Simon explained to him. 'This one hasn't been to Hollywood, so he still uses a gun.'
'And good, too,' added Gallipolis, as Charlie climbed into the car.
They sped back to Ochopee. Gallipolis guided the Saint to a tremendous corrugated-iron garage that looked more like an airplane hangar about a hundred yards down a rutty turning off the main street. A small frame house adjoined the garage. Gallipolis gestured at it with his thumb.
'The manager lives in there. Maybe you can do business with him, but he's a crusty guy.'
The Saint got out and banged on the bungalow door. Somewhere back of the house a dog barked viciously. Simon knocked again.
From a window opening on to the porch a man's voice said heatedly: 'Get the hell away from here, you damn drunk, or I'll run you off at the end of a gun.'
'Are you the manager of the prospecting company?' Simon inquired placatingly.
'Yeah,' snarled the voice. 'And we do our business in the daytime.'
'I'm sorry,' said the Saint, with the most engaging courtesy he could command. 'I know this is the hell of an hour to wake you up, but my business won't wait. I want to rent one of your marsh buggies and get it right now.'
Don't be funny,' came the grinding reply. 'This isn't a garage running 'See the Everglades' tours. We don't rent marsh buggies. Now run away and play.'
Muscles began to tighten in the Saint's jaw.
'Listen,' he said with an effort of self-control 'I'll leave you a brand-new Cadillac as security. I don't know what your machine is worth, but if it'll do what I've been told it will I'll pay you a hundred dollars a day for it, cash in advance.'
The man inside laughed raucously.
'I told you we weren't in the rental business, and a hundred bucks a day is peanuts to the owner of this shebang.'
'Where is he?' Simon persisted. 'Maybe he'll listen to reason.'
'Maybe he will,' agreed the man sarcastically. 'Why don't you go and talk to him? You can find him at Miami on his yacht, the March Hare. Now get the hell out of here and let me sleep before I put some bird-shot into you!'
4 Simon started to walk back a little shakenly towards the car. But the shock lasted for exactly three steps.
