Out of the sun-shot
sky a cloud of tiny specks, white as the driven snow, were fluttering
downward and settling upon the dark tops of the trees. Fascinated he
watched the spectacle until the white patch had doubled in area and
only a scatter of specks continued to add their mite to the countless
number which had preceded them.
"Egrets!" he cried aloud. "Millions of them. What a sight!"
He was looking at one of the rarest sights beheld by men, a great egret
rookery with its countless beautiful birds settling upon their nests
for the night. He was about to turn his glasses elsewhere when an
interruption seemed to take place in the snow-white patch. A cloud of
gray smoke belched explosively up through its center. Another and
another followed swiftly until six of the blasts had occurred. The
dense mass of birds rose in fluttering flight and flew wildly up into
the sky where the setting sun turned their spotless white to pink and
gold. Only there remained upon the dark tops of the mangroves six
small, ragged patches of white, the limp bodies of scores of the
beautiful birds in each, where the strange smoke blasts had wrought
their deadly work.
"What's the good word; found a way out?" called Higgins from below.
"Not yet." Payne dismissed the tragedy he had witnessed and moved his
glasses in a slow arc to the north and east.
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