CHAPTER III.
WOODCRAFT.
For a while the little party rode forward in silence, winding in andout between pretty lakes and bunches of timber, with no path to guidethem, but with the help of the compass, managing to edge slowly to thewest. Charley still maintained the lead, but in the open countrythrough which they were traveling it was possible to ride abreast, andWalter soon spurred up beside his chum.
"Do you know, Charley, I begin to feel like a babe in the woods," heconfessed. "I suspect you are the only one of us who knows anythingabout woodcraft. I know nothing about it, I am sure Chris doesn't, andI suspect the captain is far more at home reefing a top-sail. You havegot to be our guide and leader, I guess."
"I have hunted a good deal, and a fellow can't help but learn a fewthings if he is long in the woods," said Charley, modestly, "but I'venever been so far into the interior before. I wish, Walt," hecontinued gravely, "that there was someone along with us that knew thecountry we are going to better than I, or else that we were safely backin town once more."
"Why?" demanded Walter in astonishment.
"I dread the responsibility, and," lowering his voice so the otherscould not hear, "I have seen something I do not like."
"What?" queried his chum, eagerly.
Charley produced a square plug of black chewing tobacco from hispocket. "I picked that up in the edge of the clearing this morning,"he explained. "It wasn't even damp, so it must have been dropped afterthe dew settled last night."
"Some lone hunter passed by in the night," suggested Walter, cheerfully.
"I wish I could think so," said Charley anxiously. "But you know aswell as I that there are some gangs of lawless men in Florida, gatheredfrom all quarters of the globe, and, Walter," lowering his voice to awhisper, "I saw signs that there was more than one man near our camplast night."
"What kind of signs?" his chum demanded.
"Broken bushes, the marks of horses' hoofs, and a dozen other littlethings of no importance when considered separately."
"A fig for your signs, you old croaker," laughed Walter, "you'll beseeing ghosts next. I didn't see any of the signs you talk about.Besides, if anyone had wished to do us harm they could have done sowithout hindrance last night."
"I know it," Charley admitted, "and that's what puzzles me. As for thesigns, your not noticing them proves nothing. It's the little thingsthat make up the science of woodcraft. The little things that one doesnot usually notice."
"My eyes are pretty good, and I don't go around with them shut all thetime," began Walter hotly, but Charley only smiled.
"Look around and tell me what you see, Walt," he requested.
"A flat, level country, covered with saw palmetto, dotted with prettylittle lakes, what looks like a couple of acres of prairie ahead, and,oh yes, a lot of gopher holes all around us like the one you robbedthis morning."
"We'll begin with the gopher holes," Charley said with a smile. "Tellme what is in each hole as we pass it."
"Why, gophers, I suppose."
Charley reined in his horse before four large holes and pointed at themwith his riding-whip. "Gopher in that one," he declared withouthesitation. "Mr. Gopher is away from the next one, out getting hisdinner likely; a coon lives in the next, but he is away from home.Rattlesnake, and a big one, lives in the fourth, but he is also awayfrom home, I am glad to say."
Chris and the captain had ridden up to the boys, and they with Walter,stood staring at Charley in silent wonder.
"It's easy to see," explained the young woodsman. "When a gopher goesdown his hole, he simply draws in his flippers and slides, but when hewants to get out he has to claw his way up. You'll see the first holehas the sand pressed smooth at the entrance, while the sand in theother hole shows the mark of the flippers. That third hole is easy,too; you can see the coon tracks if you look close, and you will noticethat the claws point outward. The last hole is equally simple, you cansee the trail of the snake's body in the soft sand and those littlespots here and there made by his rattles show which way he wastraveling."
The captain brought his hand down on his knee with a hard slap. "Ireckon I can handle any ship that was ever built," he said, "but I'm alubber on land, boys. Charley's our pilot from now on, an' we mustmind him, lads, like a ship minds her helm."
"If I'm going to be pilot, I'll make you all captains on the spot,"laughed Charley, as he spurred forward again into the lead.
"Do those wonderful eyes see anything more?" mocked Walter, as he oncemore ranged alongside.
"Don't make fun of me, Walt," said his chum, seriously. "What I havedone is nothing. It's just noting little things and putting two andtwo together. You can easily do the same if you will train yourself toobserve things closely."
"Do you really think I could?" asked Walter, eagerly.
"Certainly you can, and now for the first lesson. Look closely at allthe bushes as we pass them and see if you notice anything out of theway."
They rode on in silence for a few minutes, Walter scanning the scrub inpassing with a puzzled expression growing upon his face.
"Well, what do you make of it?" Charley asked.
"I don't know what to make of it," Walter confessed. "Every fewhundred feet there are branches partly broken off and left hanging.Queer, isn't it?"
"Look closer and see if you can notice anything peculiar about thosebranches."
"They haven't been broken off very long, for they are not very muchwithered. I should say it was done about ten days ago."
"Good," exclaimed Charley, approvingly, "notice anything else?"
"Yes," declared Walter, his wits sharpening by his success, "althoughthose boughs seem to be broken accidentally, yet all are caught inamongst other twigs so that each one points in the same direction--theway we are going. What does it mean, Charley, if it means anything?"
"My color is wrong to tell you all that those broken branches mean, butI can tell you a little. About ten days ago a party of Indians passedthrough this way bound in the same direction we are. They expectedanother party of their people to follow later so they marked the wayfor them as you have seen. If I were a Seminole, I could tell fromthose broken twigs the number of the first party, whither they werebound, what was the object of their journey, and a dozen other thingshidden from me on account of my ignorance of their sign language."
"Indians, Seminoles," said Walter, bewildered, "I had almost forgottenthere were any in the state."
"There isn't, legally. Years ago the United States rounded them all upand started to transport them out west to a reservation. But at St.Augustine a few hundred made their escape and fled back to theEverglades, where they have lived ever since without help orprotection, and ignored by the United States government."
"What kind of a race are they?" asked Walter, curiously.
"The finest race of savages I ever saw," declared Charley, warmly;"tall, splendidly-built, cleanly, honest, and with the manners ofgentlemen--look out!" he shouted, warningly.
Walter's horse had reared back upon his haunches with a snort ofterror. Walter, though taken by surprise, was a good horseman, andslipped from the saddle to avoid being crushed by a fall.
A few feet in front of the frightened pony lay coiled a giganticrattlesnake, its ugly head and tail raised and its rattles singingominously. Two more steps and the pony would have been upon it.
"Don't shoot," pleaded Walter as Charley drew his revolver. "I knowwhere I can sell that skin for $25.00, if there's no holes in it."
"Let me shoot it, Walt," pleaded Charley, anxiously, "they're awfullydangerous."
"Aye, lad," seconded the captain, who, with Chris, had reached thespot, "better let him shoot it, those things are too dangerous to takechances with."
But Walter's obstinacy was roused. "Keep back, I'll fix him," hedeclared confidently. "I'm going to have that skin and that $25.00."
Breaking off a dead bough from a scrub oak he approached the snakecautiously while the re
st sat in their saddles silently anxious, andCharley edged his restive pony a little closer to the repulsive reptile.
Slowly Walter moved forward, his gaze fixed intently upon the slowlywaving head before him with its glistening little diamond eyes. Nearerand nearer he crept till only a few feet separated him from thatvenomous head with its malignant unwinking eyes.
"Strike, boy, strike, you're getting too close," shouted the captain.
"Oh, golly," shrieked Chris, "look at him, look at him."
Walter had stopped as though frozen in his tracks. His face had gonedeathly pale, and great drops of sweat stood on his forehead. The handthat held the stick unclasped, and it rattled unheeded to the ground.
"He's charmed," cried the captain.
"Jump to one side, Walt, jump," Charley shouted, "for God's sake, jump.It's going to strike."