A few days before the boys finished their contract, a party of surveyors stopped at their shanty to get a drink of water, and to see if they could get them for a couple of days.
As the pay offered was good, the boys were glad to accept it, and five minutes were sufficient to put their few belongings into the shanty and to nail up the door.
It took the party some hours to reach their destination, and as soon as they had
partaken of a lunch, they began to survey a site for a new town.
The boys had seen a great many “paper towns” since they came to Florida, but as a rule had taken little interest in them. They were usually ventures of men who did not have money enough to make their speculations a success.
Tom and Dave were put to work carrying chain, and very soon became interested in the talk of their companions.
The spot chosen was a very beautiful one—a sloping hillside gradually narrowing into a strip six or seven hundred yards wide and running between two of the most picturesque lakes the boys had ever seen.
“‘WHY, BOYS, WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE?’
TOM LOOKED UP TO MEET THE KEEN EYES OF THE DOCTOR.”
From the talk of the surveyors they learned that a number of them were railroad men, and that they were endeavoring to buy at nominal figures all the choice lands along the line of the new road before the settlers became aware of its value.