There's a letter in my
room. You can read for yourself."
Aunt Agatha burst into tears. Carl patiently essayed a comforting word
of advice and followed Dick indoors to seek relief in less calamitous
showers. Before he did so, however, he read his cousin's letter.
For that night and the night following Carl did not sleep. On the
morning of the third day, after a careless inquiry he went to West Palm
Beach and interviewed some traders who were reported to be on the eve
of an expedition into the Everglades with a wagonload of scarlet calico
and beads to trade for Indian products.
The fourth day he was missing.
CHAPTER XXXVIII
IN PHILIP'S WIGWAM
For hours now, Carl had lain hidden in the waist-high grass, staring at
the Seminole camp. The sun had set in a wild red glory in the west,
staining dank pool and swamp with the color of blood. The twilight
came and with it the eerie hoot of the great owls whirring by in the
darkness. Unseen things crept silently by. Once a great winged wraith
of ghostly white flapped by with a croak, a snowy heron, winging like a
shape of Wrath Incarnate, above the crouching man in the grass. The
wheel fires of the Seminoles flared among the live oaks, silhouetting
dusky figures and palmetto wigwams.
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