r as he has done without being some shrewd as a politician.
It's a one-hundred-to-one bet that he's never seen this lake that his
company is selling as farms. He might be willing to do something as
crooked as that, but he wouldn't be so foolish. Understand?

"It would be taking too big a risk. He'd be afraid that his political
opponents would get next. If they did, they'd get some swindled buyer
to start action against him, just before an election. My guess is that
Fairclothe doesn't know a thing about what this tract is. He's been
got by somebody, as the soil experts were got; and I'm wondering who it
is that's big enough to get him. It must be somebody pretty big; but
whoever it is, that's the gang or the man I'm going to talk business
with."

"Make 'em cough up your money, eh? They'll probably do it--to keep
your mouth shut."

"They can't keep my mouth shut now."

"Nor mine. It's too rotten, too--rotten."

"You're right, Hig. And I don't know whether I want to just take my
money back and clear out--even if they'd offer it to me."

"Well"--Higgins' chuckle came forth sleepily--"it might be made
something of at that.--Alligators? No. Fish? No. There's the water
buffalo. That's never been tried down here. Hah! I see a fortune in
it. 'Buy a wonderful Water Buffalo Ranch and Get Rich Quick. He Lives
on Water. Have We Got Lots of it? Ask Us!'--How does that hit you for
advertising matter?--Form a stock corporation; get a picture of a
Philippine buffalo; and sell stock for all the money a sucker's got.
Of course there aren't any water buffalos here; but neither is there
any land; and that doesn't keep them from selling it just the same."

"There is land here--under the water."

"Yes. Pretty good, too--under the water."

"Water can be drained off."

"Sure. But--well, we'll look her over in the morning, Payne. Hey,
Willy High Pockets! Touch up that fire a little."

But Willy High Pockets was snoring. Higgins rolled out, replenished
the fire and soon followed the Indian's example.

Payne did not go to sleep for a long time. It was not the sensuously
whispering night with its mistlike darkness and near-by stars that kept
him awake. Nor was it the splash of an otter, of minks and the sounds
of other animals of the darkness. The deep eyes of the girl of the
morning were the lights that he saw as he lay staring up at the
palmetto tops; and what sent his blood racing too swiftly for sleep