THE HIDDEN PATH Overhead sang the steady trade wind, tempering the golden sunshine's heat.

To eastward, under an incredibly blue sky, stretched the more incredibly multi-hued waters of Biscayne Bay, the snow-white wonder-city of Miami dreaming on its shores.
Dividing the residence and business part of the city from the giant hotels, Flagler Avenue split the mass of buildings, from back-country to bay.

To its westward side spread the shaded expanse of Royal Palm Park, with its deep-shaded short lane of Australian pines, its rustling palm trees, its white church and its frond-flecked vistas of grass.
Here, scarce a quarter-century ago, a sandspit had broiled beneath an untempered sun.

Shadeless, grassless, it had been an abomination of desolution and a rallying-place for mosquitoes.

Then had come the hand of man.