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Joh
Suddenly there reached Joh
"A seaplane taxiing along the lake edge!" he decided aloud.
Soon the buzzing quality left the motor spurts. They became violent hisses. The exhaust had been cut into mufflers.
"Doc's speed job!" Joh
He gri
Joh
Boldly, Joh
He did not expect danger. He knew positively he had not been trailed here. So he took no pains to muffle his footsteps or keep to the shadows.
That was a mistake.
Swi-s-h!
Something sailed out of the blackness beneath a near-by tree. It settled on Joh
Joh
Three scrawny swamp men pitched from the murk beneath the tree. One flashed an ordinary cane knife which was honed like a razor.
"Non!"
gritted one of his fellows. "Gray Spider ees want talk to dis scamp!" He knocked the knife aside.
Joh
A club rapped Joh
"Bien!"
puffed one of the Gray Spider's swamp men. "Eet ees about over!"
It was. But not like the swamp man expected.
There suddenly wafted over the scene of strife an unca
It seemed to come from everywhere.
Joh
THE sound had a remarkable effect on Joh
Out of the night came flashing a mighty bronze form. The charge of a lion would hardly have been more disastrous to the Gray Spider's two men.
Only two blows, coming so close together that they sounded like two men clapping hands simultaneously, and the pair went tumbling like rabbits shot on the run. It was doubtful if either had seen what caused their downfall. The third man, disabled by Joh
Doc freed Joh
"You're a handy guy to have around, Doc," Joh
"Ham is flying the bus," Doc explained. "It occurred to me after you called that the Gray Spider might be doing some wire-tapping himself. In that case, he might have heard us make the appointment to meet here. So I dropped around merely to play safe. And here we are."
"Yeah—thanks to you," Joh
"Sure—there's no harm done," Doc agreed. "In fact, we've added three more prisoners to our menagerie. Every little bit helps."
The plane now taxied close in. Ham, slender and waspish, waded ashore. He held his sword cane high over his head and said some uncomplimentary things about the mud underfoot.
"You are to take the plane into the swamp," Doc told Joh
"Righto," Joh
"There's some stuff in the ship that you might need," Doc added.
Joh
Joh
THE foggy area proved to be only in the vicinity of New Orleans. Joh
A narrow bayou wound like a frayed silver ribbon through the marshy jungle which looked from that height like so much green velvet. Joh
An occasional sawmill town made a spotty patch of lights. These sawmill towns differed from other settlements in that they were always scattered about a group of mill buildings—sawing structure, kilns, rough-dry and finish storing sheds, planing mill, machine shops, and other shacks.
The sawmill towns became scarcer. Riverlike bayous, the only avenue of transportation in the swamp, ceased to gleam in the moonlight. Tall trees suitable for timber also became scattered.
Joh
The great ship settled upon the swamp like a monster bat with wings outstretched and paralyzed.
Joh
Lightly, the plane dunked its floats in the water. It coasted ahead. The wake it left fa
"If I just don't hit the bank too hard!" Joh
He didn't. The ship grounded with a slight jar, after sloughing through tall cane and under heavy overhanging branches.
Joh
This moss was the variety called "old man's beard" by the natives. Joh