A flat-bottomed swamp boat was tied up on the other side of the branch. Bubba jumped in and reached up to give me a hand. I handed him my camera bag and jumped in and sat up front. Bubba handed me the bag and started up the motor.
"As I told you on the phone," he said, "something has been eating the gators. It's been upsetting the balance in the swamp."
"Do vampires kill gators?" I asked. The word vampire didn't seem farfetched here where trees grew out of the water and wept Spanish moss. I could hear birds calling from the branches high above. The sunlight was dyed green by leaf and moss. Other than the smell it was like being in a magical other world.
The stink got worse as we rounded a corner and I saw a dead alligator caught in the roots of a mangrove.
"Not if they have something
