engineer, his boat, the sea and sky and man. But mostly the lilies. He
could see a mile up the bayou between cypress-grown banks, and not a
foot of water showed. A solid field of green, waxy leaves and upright
purple spikes, jammed tight and moving. That was what made the master
rage. They were moving--a flower glacier slipping imperceptibly to the
gulf bays. They were moving slowly but inexorably, and his dirty
cattle boat, frantically driving into the blockade, was moving
backward--stern first!

He hated them with the implacable fury of a man whose fists had lorded
his world. A water hyacinth--what was it? He could stamp one to a
smear on his deck, but a river of them no man could fight. He swore
the lilies had ruined his whisky-running years ago to the Atchafalaya
lumber camps; they blocked Grand River when he went to log-towing;
they had cost him thousands of dollars for repairs and lost time in
his swamp ventures.

Bareheaded under the semi-tropic sun, he glowered at the lily-drift.
Then he snarled at Crump to reverse the motor. Tedge would retreat
again!

"I'll drive the boat clean around Southwest Pass to get shut of 'em!
No feed, huh, for these cows! They'll feed sharks, they will! Huh, Mr.
Cowman, the blisterin' lilies cost me five hundred dollars already!"

The lone passenger smoked idly and watched the gaunt cattle
staggering, penned in the flat, dead heat of the foredeck. Tedge
cursed him, too, under his breath. Milt Rogers had asked to make the
coast run from Beaumont on Tedge's boat. Tedge remembered what Rogers
said--he was going to see a girl who lived up Bayou Boeuf above