ou'd already figured out a second
answer. What is it?"

Payne spread out his maps and consulted them carefully.

"Garman felt he had us sewed up tight because the average man who gets
down here isn't a woodsman."

"Except that fellow, Davis, I haven't seen one who looked like it since
we got here," agreed Higgins.

"Yep." Payne was drawing out a new large-scale survey map. "I don't
think one of the old-time timber cruisers up North would call it too
big a job to get out of here. There's water almost all the way over to
the east coast--the maps agree on that--so that's no good. To the
south is that cypress swamp. West we've got that sand prairie. Must
be some trap there. But another thing the maps all agree on is that
the old trading post of Legrue, which is the end of the railroad's
survey line, is about forty-five miles north of this hammock."

"Sure. And look at what's between 'em--on the map there."

"The Devil's Playground."

"That's one of the spots down here nobody's been through."

"Well, Hig, I suspect you and I are going to be the first to try to do
it. I know the descriptions read tough: great crevices in limestone
formation filled with impassable liquid mud. We'll try it, though;
we've got to."

Without a word Higgins began to cut up more venison, and Payne rebuilt
the fire. After a substantial meal they roasted and packed two small
bundles of meat for carrying and were ready for the start. Payne
carefully searched the country about with his glasses and, assured that
no skulking watchers were in sight, they waded out from the hammock and
plunged into the elderberry jungle to the north.

From the first they had literally to break their way forward. The
elder trees grew from ten to twelve feet in height and so close
together that to squeeze between them was impossible. Payne went ahead
at first, walking sidewise, throwing his shoulder against the brittle
stems and crashing a path through. Higgins soon stepped to the fore
and did likewise. At the end of an hour, when they had covered a scant
mile, they paused.

They were now in the heart of the elder growth, hidden from all the
rest of the world and isolated from anything that might have promised
relief. In the branches innumerable large, glossy blackbirds kept up a
maddening chatter, and higher above, up in the hot sky, the omnipresent
buzzards floated lazily, awaiting sight of possible carrion prey.
Animals began to appear almos