Alas! and alas! who could answer that!
Mr. Long, at any rate, would not give up. As though in defiance of fate, he would not haul down that flag which Bart had hoisted, but kept it flying, in the fond hope that it would once more greet their eyes.
VII.
Lost in the Fog.—At the Mercy of the Tide.—The last Rock.—Wanderings on a lonely Shore.—A great Discovery.—A new Mode of Cooking.
MEANTIME, what had become of the boys? Was the “B. O. W. C.” thus overwhelmed beneath the dark wave? Were all the grief, and the watching, and the tireless search of the noble-hearted Mr. Long to be unavailing?
We shall see.
As the boat sped away, dragged on by the swift current, the boys sat in astonishment and consternation. Bart supported Bruce’s head, and Arthur hurried to the stern to assist. They wet his pale brow in silence; while Bruce, in a faint voice, told them that he had been seized with a sudden spasm. He soon felt better, though unable to exert himself.
By that time the fog had closed in around them, and both the schooner and the shore had been shut out from their view. They were drifting swiftly on, they could not tell where. For a long time they sat watching and waiting—how long they did not know. In seasons of suspense, moments are prolonged to hours; and so it was here. On they went, and still on. Each one well knew all the possibilities of the danger that lay before them. There was a wide and a wild sea, overspread with fog-clouds, where the waves were rising and the night was coming down. Into the midst of all this they were being borne by swift currents. This they all knew, yet not a sound of dismay escaped any one of them. Whatever each one may have felt of fear, he sat in silence and gave no sign. There were stout hearts that beat in those slender, boyish breasts, that awaited, undismayed, the terrors of the deep.
Bart was the first to rouse himself.