Everything went smoothly and there was no more excitement on the trip until in the afternoon, when Dick was working the sculling oar.  He was swinging it slowly, as he looked down into the water, when there appeared suddenly, just under the dingy, a great black creature, broader than the boat was long.  As it rose nearer to the surface, almost touching the craft, he saw a great open mouth, three feet across, with a heavy black horn on each side of it, which looked quite equal to disposing of Dick and his boat at a single bite.  The sight was so frightful that Dick impulsively thrust his oar against the creature, and was instantly thrown from his feet as the stern of the dingy was tossed in the air and a column of water fell upon and around him.  When the commotion was over and Johnny had crawled back into the submerged boat and was rocking it dry, Dick said to Captain Tom, who was swimming beside him: 

“I believe I’ll swim the rest of the way.  I’m getting tired of being pitched overboard every few minutes.”

After they were all aboard and Dick had resumed his work with the oar, he asked the captain: 

“What was that thing that looked like a devil, that I hit and that hit back?”

“That was a devil-fish.  They are perfectly harmless,” said the captain, adding, reflectively, “unless you punch ’em.”

The tide favored the castaways at Sand-Fly Pass and they reached Chokoloskee Bay without further adventure, but then came the painful part of the trip:  telling the owner of the Etta of its destruction by a waterspout.  All the comment Mr. Streeter made was: 

“Glad none of you went down with the boat.”

The captain and Johnny went to their homes, while Dick accepted Mr. Streeter’s invitation to stay with him.

CHAPTER V

OUTFITTING FOR THE HUNT

The Streeter home was on the bank of a little river that emptied into Chokoloskee Bay, and Dick, for the first time, saw oranges and grape-fruit growing and tasted the delicious alligator pear and the guava.

After supper Mr. Streeter said to Dick: 

“Johnny tells me you have got a friend lying around loose somewhere in the Big Cypress Swamp, or the Everglades, and that you and he are going to take a day off to look him up.”

“That’s about the size of it, only of course I don’t expect to find him in a day or a week.  I had some hope that a month would do.  I suppose it all seems very silly to you?”

“Not a bit, not a bit.  The Big Swamp isn’t a bad place, if you’ve sand and sense, and I reckon you have both or you wouldn’t have got as far as you have.  I suppose it’s Ned Barstow you’re looking for?”

“Who in the world could have told you?  I haven’t spoken his name since I left home.”