The doctor and his friends laughed good-humoredly.
"That"s right, boys," said the one called professor; "hold the land for an advance. It will come sooner than you expect, perhaps. But we shall want your services for the next three months, to help our surveyors; so be at our camp in the morning."
After this the boys could not complain of loneliness. A few weeks of surveying outlined the streets and blocks of the new town; a sawmill was quickly under way; buildings went up rapidly, and here and there were displayed the new goods of enterprising young merchants.
The fame of the new town spread through the surrounding country, and every day brought new arrivals, seeking work; and soon hundreds of axes could be heard on the hillside, clearing the land and making ready for the numerous young groves to be put out in the spring.
Dave and Tom had all the work they could do, and utilized the evenings and odd moments in burning the trees and stumps on their land. By the first of February they had five acres cleared and fenced, and ready for trees.
Believing the best to be the cheapest, they sent to one of the nurseries for three hundred and fifty budded trees. They took especial pains in setting them out, and in due time had as thrifty a young grove as one could wish to see.
The trees cost them all the money they had earned and most of what they had laid aside; but when they looked at their beautiful young grove, they were more than satisfied.
Before the end of the year the proposed railroad was built, and its advent made a tremendous rise in the value of land.
The boys had had many excellent offers for their land before, but invariably declined to consider them. As the depot had been built very near them, they knew their place must advance rapidly.
However, shortly after the erection of the depot, they received an offer of seven thousand dollars for the unimproved ten acres, and after a short consultation, decided to accept it. Dave had not seen his people for nearly two years, and was anxious to visit them. Tom, who was alone in the world, was to remain and look after their grove.
So a few weeks later saw Dave walking up the lane to the old homestead.
Knowing how particular his father was, he was greatly surprised at the thriftless look of everything. A man was hobbling across the yard as he approached, and Dave saw with dismay that the haggard face belonged to his father.
Their meeting may be imagined, and Dave soon knew of the broken leg and the long, hard winter following it, with no one to look after things and unpaid bills acc.u.mulating rapidly.
"A sorry home-coming, my boy," said his father, with a wan smile.
But Dave"s story quickly changed the aspect of things. The bills were paid; pinching want was a thing of the past.
And then Dave talked and argued until his parents agreed to return with him and spend the winter in Florida, and give that genial climate a chance to make his father well and strong again.
[_This Story began in No. 21._]
JACK STANWOOD;
or,
FROM OCEAN TO OCEAN.
BY JAMES H. SMITH.
CHAPTER XIII.
I BREAK JAIL THROUGH NO EFFORTS OF MY OWN.
I was handed over to the custody of a little man, with big, staring eyes, and a magnified head of hair that made him look like a gun-swab.
This was Mr. Janks, the jailor.
He stood looking at me for some moments, swinging a bunch of keys on his finger, and then said, mournfully, "So, you"ve come, have you?" which made me think that he must have dreamed of my coming.
Then he took up a small lamp, and, after examining me from head to foot as if I were some strange animal, he gave vent to a dismal groan, and asked me if I was hungry.
Receiving a negative answer, he groaned again, and beckoned me to follow him.
He led the way along a damp and chilly stone corridor, lined with little iron doors, which I needed no one to tell me belonged to cells, and I followed him very readily. My previous notions of prison treatment included the immediate ironing of the culprit to the extent of several hundredweight, and, finding myself mistaken, my spirits rose accordingly.
He stopped before one of the little doors near the end of the corridor, and, opening it with a large key, ushered me into an apartment about eight feet square.
This was my cell. The walls and ceiling were whitewashed, and the only furniture was an iron bedstead, covered with two coa.r.s.e, gray blankets.
Mr. Janks waved his keys around as if to welcome me to this abode, and then, instead of going out and leaving me to my reflections, he leaned up against the door and groaned once more.
"The wickedness of these boys!" he said, pa.s.sing his hand through his hair, and apparently addressing the ceiling. "Why do they ever come here? Why did you come here?"
I hastened to explain that I did not come of my own accord, and so far from wishing to be in jail, if he would only have the kindness to open the door, I would promise him to make my exit, and never return.
"And so young!" continued Mr. Janks, without paying any attention to my remarks, and still apostrophizing the ceiling. "But it"s allus the way!
The younger they are, the worse they are!"
Then he launched forth into a description of the number of bad boys who had pa.s.sed through his hands, and endeavored to draw a parallel between their case and mine, but, I think, with poor success.
He kept up this monologue for at least ten minutes, while I sat on the couch and listened with anything but pleasurable emotions.
At the end of that time he came to a sudden stop, and went out slowly, groaning dismally.
When the sound of his footsteps had died away down the corridor, I surrendered myself to my thoughts. And how I did think!
What had been all my trouble compared to this? _In prison!_ The thought was horrifying!
I felt now that I would not dare return home--for who would not shrink from me as a malefactor?
Besides, I was extremely dubious as to my impending fate. I was not afraid of being convicted of larceny, unless Mary Jane Robinson perjured herself; but I was desperately afraid of Mr. Barron.
I knew he took the Lancaster Examiner, and should he see my name in it, I felt certain he would pounce down on me, and then--well, something terrible would certainly happen.
The sky looked very dark and cloudy just then, and you may easily imagine how bitterly I regretted my foolishness in running away.
I lay awake for an hour or more thinking in this fashion, and then I fell into a fitful slumber.
How long I slept, I don"t know; but when I awoke it was with a strange feeling that I was not alone--that some one was in the cell with me.
I was wide awake in an instant, and my heart beat so loudly that I fancied I could hear it.
I listened intently, and presently heard a light "pitapat," as if some one was walking across the floor; and while I was trying to muster up courage to call out, there was a sharp click, a flood of light illumined the cell, and I saw that the intruder was a man.
He was standing near the opposite wall, and in his hand he held a lighted wax taper, with the aid of which he was taking a survey of the room.