Death Shoots a Birdie (21 page)

“What kind of other snakes?” asked Lark.

“Coral snakes, copperheads, rattlers. Cottonmouths are the ones you’re most likely to see from the water. Some grow to be eight feet long. In fact, we should have warned you to stay away from the banks. The snakes like to climb into the trees, and they have been known to drop into the boats at times.”

Lark looked pale.

“That happened once, Dwayne,” said Fancy. “He’s just trying to scare you. Though, if it happens, abandon your canoe. Cottonmouths don’t like people, but they get aggressive if they feel trapped.”

“Of course, in the water, the alligators can be a problem,” said Dwayne. “Especially in the spring.” He pointed at a five-foot alligator on the bank of the canal. The gator opened its jaws and hissed. “They have young ’uns to protect this time of year. If you stay in the canoes and away from the mounds, you’ll be fine.”

Rachel pointed to a tree and pretended to read, PLEASE DO NOT SWIM.

Lark took her paddle and sent a shower of brackish water into the canoe.

“Hey.”

Dorothy shot them both a stern look. “How large is the refuge?”

“At present?” Fancy swiveled around in her seat. “Three hundred ninety-six thousand acres, 90 percent of which are protected federal lands. The Okefenokee is one the most well-preserved freshwater areas in America.”

She sounded proud of that, thought Rachel.

“The Indians used to call this place the ‘land of the trembling earth.’ Peat deposits up to fifteen feet thick cover much of the swamp floor, and these deposits are so unstable in areas that if you stomp on the earth, you can cause the trees and bushes to tremble. The waters are slow-moving and tea colored from the tannic acid released from decaying plants. You can swim in it, and you can drink it, though we don’t recommend it. It’s about as acidic as a cola drink.”

They paddled about three miles out, moving from the main canal onto the Chesser Prairie, an open-water area with white and yellow water lilies, blue iris, and miles of floating chunks of peat.

“These floating islands are called ‘batteries,’” explained Fancy. “They start as peat ‘blowups,’ small clumps of peat dislodged by the alligators and snapping turtles, and they provide a surface for seeds to germinate. Fast-growing herbs and grasses such as spike rush, beak rush, wiry bladderwort, sundews, and others move in, forming a firm surface that can support larger herbs and grasses such as chain fern, bur-marigold, yellow-eyed grass, redroot, maiden cane, and others.”

Rachel didn’t recognize the names of any of the ferns and grasses, but they sounded exotic.

“Eventually, some of the batteries grow firm enough to support shrubs like bay and blackgum trees. When a battery becomes rooted to the bottom of the swamp they’re called ‘houses.’ Cypress trees will eventually grow on houses, and that changes the face of the swamp.”

Dwayne stood up in his canoe and pushed on the side of a peat battery. The edge bobbed into the water. “Alligators sometimes wait for an animal, like a wild pig, to fall into the water and get trapped under the lip of one of these batteries, and then they feed on it.”

“It would make a great place to dump a body,” said Cecilia.

With that image in mind, the group pushed deeper onto the prairie. Far in the distance, Rachel caught sight of Wolcott and Anderson paddling in a northwesterly direction.

They must be headed for Swamper’s Island, she thought, which made sense. The Carters had barred them access across their land.

She watched the men paddling as Fancy explained how fire was important to the swamp—the cypress were fire-resistant, but the understory burned—creating the old cypress forests. By the time she had moved onto talking about old-growth cypress forests, Wolcott and Anderson were out of sight.

Rachel turned around to look at Lark. She seemed to have noticed them, too.

The men had made much better time than the group, which had stopped to birdwatch along the way. Prothonotary warblers, commonly known as the swamp canary, had flitted in the cypress knees along the canal. Bright yellow with blue wings, its
sweet, sweet, sweet
call had announced its presence at every turn. Yellow-rumped warblers, commonly known as butter-butts, Northern parula, and Carolina wrens had joined in to entertain them as well.

Now, sandhill cranes demanded their attention. The large, graceful birds trumpeted their movements. Osprey flew overhead. Anihingas, cormorants, herons, and egrets adorned the lush green grasses of the swamp.

“Can you walk on the batteries?” asked the young girl with her mother.

“It’s not advised,” said Fancy, “The tangle of roots creates a porous surface, sort of like a scouring pad. It will hold you, but only if you keep moving. The trees swing and sway.” She tipped her canoe side to side, and the young girl’s eyes widened. “Remember, that’s why it’s called the ‘trembling earth.’ ”

Before long, talk turned to issues of conservation, then Dorothy said, “Tell us some more swamp legends.”

This time Fancy deferred to Dwayne.

“Okay. There used to be a form of communication between swamp dwellers known as ‘hollerin’.’ It’s a form of yodeling that traveled for miles.” Dwayne spread his arms wide. “When someone got lost in the swamp, hollerin’ helped others figure out their position. During the bootlegging years . . .” He looked at the young girl. “You know what those are, don’t you?”

She scrunched up her face, and shook her head.

“Those were the years when drinkin’ was outlawed by the government, and people made illegal whiskey to sell.”

The girl looked to her mother for confirmation. Her mother nodded.

“Anyway, there was this one bootlegger who had a big still set up on Bugscratch Island. It was a great island for bootlegging because it sits right off the Suwannee Canal.” He went on to describe the island, and the still, and a craggy old man named Henry MacNair. “According to legend, old Henry made a lot of money selling his whiskey, and he buried it all on Bugscratch Island.”

“Is it still there?” asked Dorothy.

“You’re jumping ahead of the story.” He waited a beat, and then continued. “One night, the police came out to arrest him. But old Henry, he was smart. He set up an ambush. A shoot-out ensued, and when the powder settled old Henry was nowhere to be found. Neither was his money. The police dug so many holes in Bugscratch Island that it sank to the bottom of the swamp. People claim that the ghost of old Henry MacNair still travels these waters, and that if you listen real close sometimes you can still hear him hollerin’. Some folks say he’s trying to tell people where the treasure is buried. Others think he’s trying to lead folks deep into the swamp where they’ll never be heard from again.”

The silence of the group was punctuated by the noise of the swamp. Birds called in the background, an alligator bellowed, and flies buzzed.

“Have you heard him?” asked the young girl.

“You bet,” said Dwayne.

A murmur ran through the boaters, then he looked at his watch.

“That does it for us,” he said, paddling his canoe in a circle. “Our arrangement with the festival is that you can keep the canoes until five P.M. That’s closing time, and we don’t want any of you out here after dark. It’s eleven o’clock now. We’ve taken our time getting out here, but plan on it taking you at least an hour to get back from this point. You’re free to wander. Keep in hollerin’ distance of each other. Anyone who wants to head back now can come with us.”

Fancy and Dwayne headed back with three of the canoes in their wake. Most of the others headed off toward the south, in the direction of the sandhill cranes. Rachel turned north.

“Where are you going?” called Cecilia. “Everyone else is going—”

“Shhhhh.” Rachel exaggerated her whisper. “I know where they’re going.” Rachel told them what she had witnessed, the loading of what looked like a gun case into the canoe, and their disappearance to the north.

“I saw them, too,” confirmed Lark.

“They were headed northeast,” said Rachel.

“Are you sure that’s north?” asked Cecilia. “It think that’s west.”

Dorothy adjusted her sun visor. “The sun rises in the east and sets in the west. Trust me, Cec, Rae’s right. That’s north.”

“What do you think they were doing with a gun?” asked Cecilia.

Dorothy looked at her sister askance. “Hiding the weapon that killed Becker and Knapp.”

Rachel shook her head. “Why bring it this far into the swamp, or risk someone seeing them with it? No, I think they’re hunting.”

Cecilia turned around and stared at Rachel. “Hunting for what?”

“What do they both want dead?”

The others stared at Rachel, and then one by one understanding bloomed on their faces.

“Oh my.”

Rachel nodded. “I think they’re planning on shooting the ivory-billed woodpecker. With both Becker and Knapp dead and the film destroyed, if the bird was gone, life reverts back to normal. The land trade will go through. Everyone gets their money.” Rachel remembered the two of them talking with Fancy and wondered if she was in on it.

“But everyone heard them talking about the bird,” said Dorothy. “Someone would check it out.”

“Maybe. But if no one finds anything . . .” Rachel paused to let her words sink in. “The deal might be delayed, but it wouldn’t be dead.”

With that, Lark started paddling faster. Rachel worked to keep the canoe headed in the right direction, and Dorothy and Cecilia fell in behind, working hard to keep pace. After better than an hour of steady paddling, Dorothy yelled, “Can we stop and rest for a minute?”

Rachel gladly shipped her oar. She wanted a chance to look at the map of the swamp she had bought.

The laminated map opened up to about the size of an eight-by-eleven sheet of paper. Judging from where they started and where they were now, she placed them halfway between the Mizell Prairie and the Christie Prairie.

Lark leaned to look over her shoulder. “How much farther do we have to go?”

“We should be able to turn east somewhere in here.” Rachel pointed to the map, and held her hand up to shield her face from the sun, looking for an opening along the edge at the prairie. “Swamper’s Island isn’t on this map.”

“What?” exclaimed Dorothy. “You mean to tell me we have been pushing through the floating peat and lilies, and we don’t even know where we’re headed?” She took a swig off her water bottle. “It’s already getting close to twelve-thirty.”

Based on Dwayne’s instructions that meant, at a stiff clip, they were two hours from camp. That gave them two and a half hours to play with.

“We need to head east.” Rachel pointed to the map. “I say we paddle another hour. Then, if we don’t find any sign of them, we turn back.”

“What are we going to do if we find them?” asked Lark.

That part of her plan was hazy. “Stop them from shooting the bird.”

“How?” asked Lark, pulling her braids through a hole in the back of her cap and wiggling her fanny on the wide seat. The canoe rocked gently side to side. “By letting them shoot us?”

“Let’s find them first,” said Dorothy, sounding more like her old self than Rachel had heard her all week. “Then we’ll think of something. Right, Rae?”

Rachel smiled, hoping she exuded more confidence than she felt. “Right.”

“Oh my, here we go again,” said Cecilia.

They paddled a short distance farther, and then Lark discovered a path to the east. The peat bogs closed in tighter, and Rachel had a more difficult time shoving the clumps out of the way.

“We’re never going to get turned around in here,” said Lark.

“Stop worrying.” Rachel wasn’t about to admit she was thinking the same thing. “Keep paddling.”

A few more strokes brought them into more open water, and the landscape in front of them changed from floating peat to actual land. Tall cypress trees anchored the banks, with blackgum filling the understory.

“Look.” Rachel pointed with her oar to a green canoe tied up a short way upstream.

“Let’s go ashore here,” suggested Dorothy.

A brief discussion ensued about whether it was better to tie off upstream or downstream of the men’s canoe.

“Let’s tie off here,” said Lark, paddling toward shore. “We don’t plan on them getting ahead of us.”

“That’s right,” said Dorothy. “Grab the knee. We can pull the boats up on the backside.”

Rachel crawled up into the bow, and stretched outward. Her hand brushed the bark of the cypress, and then something moved on the ground.

R
achel froze. An eight-foot-long alligator opened its mouth, hissed, and lunged. Rachel yanked back her hand and screamed.

At least, she thought she had screamed. Her mouth came open, but all she heard was the blood rushing in her ears.

Throwing herself back into the canoe, she clamped one hand over her mouth and with the other frantically signaled for Lark to back paddle.

“It won’t follow,” said Dorothy, her voice low and calm. “It’s protecting its nest.”

Rachel’s heart banged against her rib cage, threatening to burst through her chest. Her breath came in sharp, short bursts.

“Breathe, Rae. Deep breaths. See, it’s okay.” Dorothy pointed to the alligator backing up onto the land. Cecilia and Lark both looked as white as the water lily flowers, a stark contrast to the lush greens of the swamp and a dead giveaway of how scared they were.

“Why don’t we pull up there?” suggested Cecilia, pointing to a spot nearer to Anderson and Wolcott’s canoe.

“Because we don’t want them to know we’re here,” said Dorothy.

Rachel remained speechless. Inhale two . . . three . . . four, hold two . . . three . . . four, exhale two . . . three . . . four. It was an exercise she had learned in yoga class to calm herself down.

Cecilia looked confused. “Aren’t we planning to tell them?”