'log' walked out of the water with him. It was a giant gator. The big reptile was picketed with a rope like a cow. It was apparently a pet, for it made no effort to annex Johnny's leg.
'Yo' can sleep in de moss shed,' suggested Buck Boontown.
And there Johnny spent the rest of the night. He slept soundly, although subconsciously alert for the slightest hostile sound.
A tremendous dog fight, punctuated with the howls of pickaninnies trying to break up the fray, awakened him. This seemed to be a usual morning occurrence, since none of the grown-ups paid particular attention.
Soon after this, a series of piercing shrieks came from one of the largest shacks. The sounds were inhuman, terrible. They gave Johnny a crawling sensation along his spine. They set him to fingering his gun uneasily.
'What is de racket?' he asked a swamp man.
'Eet is Sill Boontown,' explained the fellow. He tapped his head, then made a corkscrew movement in the air with his finger. 'Hees got bats in de head!'
Investigating, Johnny discovered Buck Boontown was married. The swamp man's wife was slightly better looking than the other females of the settlement, although that was not saying much.
The couple had one child—a son about eighteen, named Sill. He was mentally unbalanced—crazy. He had been that way, Johnny learned, since a blow on the head suffered from a falling tree two years ago.
It was a hideous, squalid colony here in the swamp. The people were an admixture of many races. They retained the bad qualities of them all, and the good points of none.
The moment he judged the time propitious, Johnny began to exhibit his voodoo hocus-pocus. To the usual repellant rites and incantations of a voodoo man, Johnny added a few masterly touches of his own.
First, he 'hypnotized' the pet alligator. He did this by secretly breaking one of Doc's glass balls of anaesthetic under the reptile's snout. The trick created quite a furor. Johnny's stock as a man of magic went soaring.
Using simple acids, Johnny made a bucket of water change color at his command.
His crowning feat was to drive a long, thin rod of steel through his own brain. This he accomplished by having a tubing in his hat. The steel rod was flexible. It was guided around his head by the tubing—although the impression was that it passed directly through his skull.
This made the eyes of his audience stand out until they could almost have been knocked off with a stick.
THE next day, Johnny's performance paid dividends. Buck Boontown had disappeared. Now he returned.
'Man here who want talk wit' you'!' he muttered to Johnny.
'Ees he from de Gray Spider?' Johnny demanded.
Buck Boontown replied sharply: 'Me—I don' know nothin' about nobody by name of Gray Spider!'
Obviously, some one had put the bee in Buck's bonnet—warned him not to talk. Johnny silently berated himself for a lummox. Why hadn't he trailed Buck Boontown when he disappeared? The swamp man had apparently gotten in touch with the Gray Spider.
said Johnny. 'Vare ees de man who want to talk wit' me?'
'Here I am, buddy!' said a harsh voice.
Whirling, Johnny eyed the speaker.
The man was wide and thick of limb. He wore muck-caked overalls. Underneath these, he was attired in something the true swamp man never saw—a collar and necktie.
A brilliant silk mask obscured his face. It was even tied at the back of his head so as to hide the color of his hair. And he wore all-concealing cheap cotton gloves. It was impossible to as much as glimpse the hue of his skin.
Johnny, however, knew by the sound of his words that he was a white man.
'Buck Boontown tells me you're quite a voodoo guy,' growled the man.
said Johnny. 'That ees right.'
'And he says you want to join the Gray Spider's outfit?'
'Eet pay good?'
'I'll say it'll pay you good!'
Then I join.'
The other man laughed shortly. 'I'm not so sure that I’ll let you join. I must know more about you before we start talking that over.'
In his best dialect, Johnny repeated substantially the same story he had told Buck Boontown. He told it as earnestly as he could. A great deal might come from this, for Johnny thought he was under the scrutiny of the Gray Spider himself!
'Ees yo' de Gray Spider?' he asked boldly.
The masked man tensed visibly. He put a hand in a pocket that bulged as if it might hold a gun.
'Listen—don't go asking silly questions!' he snarled.
said Johnny, shrugging.
The other man did not renew the talk immediately. Finally he said, 'I'm gonna do some thinkin' about you. Hang around here for a few days. A man who knows voodoo like you would come in handy. But there can't be no chances taken, see!'
Johnny saw. He also thought he saw that this man was the Gray Spider! If he could just get a look at the fellow's face! But that was too dangerous.
Johnny was suddenly seized with an idea.
'BE yo' goin' to New O'leans?' he questioned
'What's it to you?' snarled the masked man.
Johnny replied with the declaration that he had left New Orleans in a hurry. As a consequence, a considerable sum of his money had remained behind. He was careful to lend the impression difficulties with the police had led to his sudden departure.
He gave the masked man the address of the room where Doc Savage's bronzed, skilled fingers had applied the makeup. This room was in a private residence in New Orleans.
'Could yo' bring me my money?' Johnny finished. 'Yo' bein' de Gray Spider, yo' ees to be trusted.'
'Who said anything about me being the Gray Spider?' rapped the other.
nobody!' Johnny said hastily. 'Weel yo' bring my money?'
'I'll bring it,' replied the man.
A subtle something in his tone told Johnny that the man intended to do nothing of the sort. This didn't bother Johnny greatly—because there was no money. The important thing was to get the man to go to the private residence in New Orleans.
