The night proved very quiet, and as there was now a moon of fair size, the early part of it was not wholly dark and forbidding.

And such a variety of queer sounds as came to their ears from the adjacent marshes, most of which must have been made by the aquatic birds that spent the night there; but there were also mysterious grunts and squawks that kept both boys guessing for the longest time, while they sat on deck, Thad smoking his pet pipe and Maurice just bundled up in a blanket, taking it easy.

"I rather think if a fellow hunted around in that place he'd find 'c.o.o.ns and 'possums galore, besides a fox or two prowling around in search of a fat duck, for you know, Thad, they're like you, and can eat one at every meal, day in and day out. A funny a.s.sortment of sounds to woo a chap to sleep, eh? If you wake up in the night please don't think you're in a menagerie and shout for me to jump in and pull you out. To speak of it makes me feel that I'm pretty sleepy and that a turn of a few hours in that cozy bunk of mine wouldn't go amiss. What say?"

It turned out that Thad was about as sleepy as his chum, so after looking to the anchor to see that it had good holding ground, for a sudden storm coming out of the east would be apt to sweep them down the big river, extremely dangerous at this point, they retired inside the cabin.

The night pa.s.sed without any storm, breaking over their devoted heads, for which both boys were thankful when morning came, and they looked out to see the sun painting the heavens red with his advance couriers.

Maurice was washing his face in the only little tin basin they owned when he heard an exclamation from his friend--whenever anything out of the usual occurred Thad always began growling and talking to himself as though he had an audience which was waiting to be addressed.

"Well, it's gone sure enough, and that's all there is to it. Now, hang it, how could a fox have come aboard our boat with twenty feet of water separating us from the sh.o.r.e? That's a conundrum I give up," Thad was saying to himself.

"Hey what all this row about--who's been aboard during the night, and what do you miss, Mr. Cook? You remember we ate those two ducks last night; did you expect they would turn up again this morning to be devoured over again?" laughed the Captain, still dashing the cold water in his face, and finally s.n.a.t.c.hing up the coa.r.s.e huck towel to rub his skin dry.

"That's all right, but it's the other chap I'm after now--perhaps you'll be so obliging as to tell me where I can put my paws on him. I hung the duck from this nail--the cord was good and strong, and it couldn't have broken loose. You see it ain't there now. So the question is did the blamed bird come to life again and skedaddle off, or was one of your friends the foxes aboard while we snoozed, to make way with my fat duck? Anyhow, it's gone, dead sure, and that's no lie."

"I see it is. Certain, are you, that it hung there when we went to bed?"

"One of the last things I did was to slip around here and nip it to make sure it was as tender as those jolly birds we had for supper. There wasn't any wind to whip it around and twist the cord till it broke. Yet where is it now?" and he shook his head dolefully, looked at his friend as if confident Maurice could in some way explain the mystery.

Maurice went at things in a far different way from his chum; instead of calling it an unfathomable mystery he stepped forward and took hold of the piece of cord that still hung from the nail.

Thad saw him closely examine it.

"Could a fox swim aboard and climb on top of the cabin to reach over and down to where that duck was hanging, and cut the cord with his sharp teeth, and then sling the bird over his shoulder to swim back again to--" he began.

"Stop!" exclaimed Maurice. "You're on the wrong track. It wasn't a fox!"

"'c.o.o.n, 'possum, wildcat, whatever could it have been?"

"A two-legged thief," announced Maurice, quietly.

"Shucks! you don't say so? How'd he ever get here, and if he wanted to steal why didn't he run off with something more valuable than a poor little teal?"

"H'm, will you tell me what he could have taken, with everything nailed down, the cabin door locked and even the little d.i.n.ky fastened with a chain and lock. This cord was cut with a knife and never twisted apart. Do you know that once in the night I awoke and thought I heard something knock against the side of the boat-- that must have been his skiff when he came aboard, and I thought it was only a floating log. Well, our teal is gone; but think of the lot over in the marsh yonder. The fellow must have been mighty hungry, and with no way of shooting a dinner. Why, while you cook breakfast I'm going to see what I can do with taking toll of our neighbors who kept serenading us all night."

Which he did.

Once in the marsh with the little boat and his gun, Maurice found that it would be the easiest thing in the world to knock over a dozen ducks if he wanted them, and indeed he held his fire from the first because he believed he could get several victims with the one shot.

Four times he pulled the trigger inside of ten minutes, and when Thad looked out to see if he were in sight, so as to wave to him that breakfast was ready, the lone hunter was just in the act of throwing a couple of plump birds upon the deck.

"Two--wow, that's good!" cried Cookey, in his usual ornate style, darting out to pick the game up.

"Four!" exclaimed Maurice, suiting the action to the word, and landing a second brace beside the first.

As Thad stooped down to feel of these he received a shock, for a third couple struck him on the head.

"Six?" he e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed, almost afraid to believe his eyes.

"That's not all. I'm determined to keep you on a duck diet for a week, so there's another brace, and for good measure count these as ten!" announced the mighty Nimrod, climbing over the gunwhale himself, gun in hand.

It was a pretty a.s.sortment of game, six of them teal, three mallards and one of an unknown breed, which Maurice thought might be a broadbill, though he had an idea that cla.s.s of divers kept near the salt water in its migration.

"I forgive that wretched thief; he's welcome to the lone duck he took. Why, it looks like you'd enjoy nothing better than to agree to supply food for all the families in Evansville at this rate; and I believe you could do it, too, down here, for every time you shot, a million or two ducks sprang up above that marsh, and their wings made a roar like thunder. Say, I like this country around here. Given a good old gun like this Marlin, plenty of ammunition, a fishing outfit, and some cooking things and matches--yes, and a little tobacco for a fellow's pipe, and I think I could exist here forever without needing a cent. I'm awful glad I came, ain't you, pal?"

"Don't I look like it, Cook? See anything like regret on my phiz?

I'm just as happy as I look, and the end isn't yet, for we've got several months of this before us; of course, there'll be troubles and setbacks, but in spite of all we're sure to keep making steady progress into Dixieland, and long before Uncle Ambrose gets into port again we'll be waiting for him in New Orleans. It was just the finest thing in the world that his letter should have reached me on that black day; and then to think how you had this inspiration, too--why, I consider that we're two of the luckiest fellows on earth this morning," said Maurice, earnestly.

"Bully for you, old pal; my sentiments exactly; and now, come in to breakfast."

CHAPTER VII.

A WILD BLOW.

"How does it look to you--think we can make the riffle today?"

asked Thad, as they floated down the stream, very broad and swollen at this point, as the low sh.o.r.es allowed the water just that much more expanse--further up, the Ohio is confined by hills that prevent its spreading to any great extent, even in the spring freshets.

Maurice knew what he meant, for they had only the one thought in mind just now, and that was getting into the Mississippi.

He drew out his charts and studied them to make sure he was right, though from frequent use he knew the same by heart.

"I can see no reason why we shouldn't. As near as I can make out we're now something like twenty-three miles above Cairo, and at the rate we're sailing along we ought to pa.s.s there shortly after noon--say by two o'clock anyway. That will give us time to move down a few miles and have our first night on the greatest of American rivers," he remarked.

"I'm a little bit worried as to how we'll get on. You see I've heard so much about the tricks of the big river that I'm nervous,"

admitted Thad.

"Oh, rats! It can't be much worse than the old Ohio when she gets on a bender, and we've seen some pretty big ones in my time. We'll come out all right, never fear, old chap. Every day will have to look out for itself. What's the use of borrowing trouble? Not any for me. Now, what could be finer than this view, for instance?"

sweeping his hand around to include land and water, with the sun dimpling the little waves.

"Nothing on earth; it's just grand, that's a fact, and I'm a fool for thinking anything can get the better of a couple of fellows like you and me when we've got our war clothes on. Hurrah for We, Us and Company, not forgetting the old Tramp. Say, she's behaving herself some, eh, pard," laughed Thad, his face all wreathed in genial smiles again.

"She's all right, and a credit to you. A little cool and inclined to be draughty on a windy night, but taken all in all a thing of beauty and a joy forever. Here's to her--may it be many a moon before she's broken up into hindling wood."

So they joked and chatted as the day wore along.

Nothing escaped their eagle eyes on the sh.o.r.e, and from time to time one would draw the attention of the other to some point of especial interest.

Now it might be the peculiar formation of a point of land, some trees, a swamp with hanging Spanish moss, which, however, was nothing to what they would see further south--or anon perhaps it was some negro cabin on an elevation, with the pickaninnies playing by the door, and the strapping woman of the household leaning against the post, always smoking her clay pipe.

Maurice, with the hunter instinct, watched the flight of an osprey that was circling the river brink with an eye to dinner; and later on observed an eagle drop down into a fluttering flock of ducks, from which he evidently took his usual toll, as presently he flew heavily away, with some dark object dangling below.

About noon they had a little lunch, Thad making a pot of coffee, and otherwise the meal was called in local parlance a "snack,"