Val's mount snorted and his ears pricked back. He began to have very definite ideas about what he saw. The thing slipped down the marshy bank and took to the water with ease, turning its square nose downstream and sending waves shoreward. "Ride 'em, cowboy!" yelled one of the men derisively as Sam's horse decided to stand on his hind legs and wave at the strange apparition as it went by. Val brought him down upon four feet again, and he stood sweating, his ears still back. "What do you call that?" the boy shouted back. "Prospecting engine for swamp use," answered the driver. "Don't you swampers ever get the news?" The car, or whatever it was, moved on downstream and so out of sight. "Now I wonder what that was," Val said aloud as his mount sidled toward the center of the road. The hound-dog came up and sat down to kick a patch of flea-invaded territory which lay behind his left ear. Again the morning was quiet. But not for long. A mud-spattered car came around the bend in the road and headed at Val, going a good pace for the dirt surfacing. Before it quite reached him it stopped and the driver stuck his head out of the window. "Hey, you, move over! Whatya tryin' to do--break somebody's neck?" Val surveyed him with interest. The man was, perhaps, Rupert's age, a small, thin fellow with thick black hair and the white seam of an old scar beneath his left eye. "This is," the boy replied, "a private road." "Yeah," he snarled, "I know. And I'm the owner. So get your hobby-horse going and beat it, kid." Val shifted in the saddle and stared down at him. "And what might your name be?" he asked softly. "What d'yuh think it is? Hitler? I'm Ralestone, the owner of this place. On your way, kid, on your way." "So? Well, good morning, cousin." Val tightened rein. The invader eyed him cautiously. "What d'yuh mean--cousin?" "I happen to be a Ralestone also," the boy answered grimly. "Huh? You the guy who thinks he owns this?" he asked aggressively. "My brother is the present master of Pirate's Haven--" "That's what _he_ thinks," replied the rival with a relish. "Well, he isn't. That is, not until he pays me for my half. And if he wants to get tough, I'll take it all," he ended, and withdrew into the car like a lizard into its rock den. Val sat by the side of the road and watched the car slide along toward the plantation. As it passed him he caught a glimpse of a second passenger in the back seat. It was the red-faced man he had seen with LeFleur's clerk on the street in New Orleans. Resolutely Val turned back and started for the house in the wake of the rival. By making use of a short-cut, he reached the front of the house almost as soon as the car. Ricky had been working with the morning-glory vines about the terrace steps, young Sam standing attendance with a rusty trowel and one of the kitchen forks.