“No; but I can soon attend to that.”
“I’d go below and do it, then, sir.”
“Thank you; I will.”
Powell Seaton, as he started down the after companionway, trembled so that compassionate Halstead aided him. Then, returning, the Motor 176 Boat Club boy stepped steadily forward to the bridge deck.
Studying the time, Tom determined to keep to the present course for fifteen minutes more, and at the same speed, then to head about due north. This, he figured, would keep him about in the path of southmoving coast steamships.
Hank, who was still at the wheel, took the orders. Joe, after a glance at the bridge deck chronometer, dropped below on his way to his sending table. The crash of his call soon sounded at the spark-gap and quivered on its lightning way up the aerials.
“Nothing happening in my line,” announced Dawson, soberly, when, some minutes later, he returned to deck.
Captain Tom stood by, almost idly attending to the fog-horn, though Butts would have been able to do that as well as steer.
“Did you get anything at all?” Halstead inquired.
“Nothing; not a click by way of answer,” Joe Dawson responded. “I had half a hope that I might be able to pick up a ship that could relay back to another, and so on to New York. If that had happened, I was going to ask the companies direct, in New York, when their next boats would leave port. I’ll do that, if I get a 177 chance. I’m bound to know when to look for the next Rio boat.”