“Now I know where I am!” he exclaimed, “or rather where I am going.”
Scott looked at him inquiringly. He had not seen anything which meant anything to him. He waited impatiently for an explanation.
“These people did not build this embankment,” Murphy explained. “It’s as old as the hills. It is one of the first railroad embankments ever built in the United States if it is what I think it is.”
Scott smiled a little incredulously. He had never heard of a railroad in Florida at a very early date, especially in that part of it, and he thought that he knew his history pretty well. Murphy was too interested in what he had found to notice him.
“I have never seen the thing before but I have heard of it often. It ran from Weewahitchka up on the river to the town of St. Joseph down on the gulf. It was built with wooden rails just like this and the cars were pulled by niggers instead of an engine.”
“What was it for?” Scott asked.
“To get the cotton from the back country down to the coast.”
“But why didn’t they take it down through the river instead of hauling it down through this big swamp on this expensive fill?”
“Because there was no deep water harbor at the mouth of the river and St. Joseph had one of the best harbors east of Pensacola.”
“Never heard of it,” Scott retorted. It sounded like an improbable story, and he thought that Murphy must be trying to string him.