The Chief Guardian shook her head sadly.

“I fear we can not.  You have but to look out there to know that any efforts on our part would be futile.”

Miss Elting suddenly cried out.

“Girls, what can we be thinking of?  We must patrol the beach.  The sea is going down a little.  Divide up into pairs; keep as close to the shore as possible without being caught by a wave; then search every foot of the beach all along.  I will go up the beach.  Hazel, you come with me.  Mrs. Livingston, will you have the other girls assist us?”

The Chief Guardian gave the orders promptly.  Fifty girls began running along the shore.  Mrs. Livingston quickly called them back, dividing the party into groups of two.  She was very business-like and calm, which, in a measure, served to calm the girls themselves.

“Look carefully,” she cautioned.  “The missing girls may have been washed ashore; they may be found nearly drowned, and it may not be too late to revive them.  Make all haste!”

There was no delay.  The Camp Girls took up their work systematically.  A thorough search was made of the beach in both directions, the patrols eventually returning to the Chief Guardian to report that they had found no trace of the missing girls.

“Keep moving.  They may drift in,” commanded Mrs. Livingston.

The search was again taken up, pairs of girls going over the ground thoroughly, investigating every shadow, every sticky mass of sea weed that caught their anxious glances, but not a sign of either of the two girls did they find.

An hour had passed; then Mrs. Livingston called them in.  She directed certain groups to return to camp and begin getting the tents laid out, and to put up such as were in condition to be raised.  The Chief Guardian herself remained on the beach with Miss Elting and the Meadow-Brook Girls.  There was little conversation.  The women walked slowly back and forth, scanning the sea, of which they could see but little, for the night was still very dark.  At first they tried calling out at intervals, ceasing only when their voices had grown hoarse.  To none of their calls was there any reply.  Harriet and Tommy were too far out, and the noise about them was too great to permit of their hearing a human voice, even had it been closer at hand.

Meantime the two girls were now swimming quite steadily.  Harriet knew that, were they to remain quiet too long, they would grow stiff and gradually get chilled through.  That would mark the end, as she well understood.  Then again it was necessary to give Tommy enough to do to keep her mind from her troubles, which were many that night.

All the time Harriet was straining eyes and ears to locate the land.  She had not the remotest idea in which direction it lay, and dared not swim straight ahead in any direction for fear of going farther away.  The wind died out and rose again.  Had it continued to freshen from the start, she would have permitted herself to drift with it, but Harriet feared that the wind had veered, and that it was now blowing out to sea, what little there was of it, so she tried to swim about in a circle in so far as was possible.  Tommy, of course, knew nothing of what was in the mind of her companion, nor did Harriet think best to confide in her.