“It was so fine when we left,” said Bart, “that I thought we’d have it all the way.”

“Wal, so we did—­pooty much all; but then, you see, about four this mornin we run straight into a fog bank.”

“Has the wind changed?”

“Wal, thar don’t seem jest now to be any wind to speak of, but it kine o’ strikes me that it’s somethin like southerly weather.  Hence this here fog.”

After a few hours the vessel began to get under way again; and now, too, there arose a light breeze, which favored them.  As they went on they heard the long, regular blast of a steam whistle, which howled out a mournful note from time to time.  Together with this, they heard, occasionally, the blasts of fog horns from unseen schooners in their neighborhood, and several times they could distinguish the rush of some steamer past them, whose whistle sounded sharply in their ears.

As they drew nearer, these varied sounds became louder, and at length the yell of one giant whistle sounded close beside them.

“We’re a enterin o’ the harbure,” said Captain Corbet.

Hours passed away from the time the Antelope raised anchor until she reached the wharf.  In passing up the harbor, the shadowy forms of vessels at anchor became distinguishable amid the gloom, and in front of them, as they neared the wharf, there arose a forest of masts belonging to schooners.  It was now midday.  Suddenly there arose a fearful din all around.  It was the shriek of a large number of steam whistles, and seemed to come up from every side.

“Is that for the fog?” asked Bruce.

“O, no,” said Bart; “those are the saw-mills whistling for twelve o’clock.”

The boys had already completed their preparations for landing, and had changed their eccentric clothing for apparel which was more suited to making their appearance in society.  Bart had insisted that they should go to his house, and wait until they might decide what to do; and the boys had accepted his hospitable invitation.

They stepped on shore full of hope, not doubting that they would hear news of Tom.  They had persuaded themselves that he had been picked up by some vessel which was coming down the bay, and had probably been put ashore here; in which case they knew that he would at once communicate with Bart’s people.  They even thought that Tom would be there to receive them.

“Of course he will be,” said Bart; “if he did turn up, they’d make him stay at the house, you know; and he’d know that we fellows would come down here in the hope of hearing about him.  So we’ll find him there all right, after all.  Hurrah!”

But, on reaching his home, Bart’s joyous meeting with his family was very much marred by the deep, dark, and bitter disappointment that awaited him and his companions.

They knew nothing whatever about Tom.  Bart’s father was shocked at the story.  He knew that no boy had been picked up adrift in the bay during the past week.  Such an event would have been known.  He felt exceedingly anxious, and at once instituted a search among the coasting vessels.  The search was a thorough one, but resulted in nothing.  There was no one who had seen anything of a drifting boat.  All reported thick fog in the bay.