rd of Winn, and am on his track. The boy is all right.----W.
B."

"That is true so far as it goes," soliloquized Billy Brackett, "and
will relieve their present anxiety. By to-morrow, or perhaps within a
few minutes, I shall certainly have something more definite to wire."

At the hotel he was greatly disappointed to find no trace of the
missing lad, and after eating a hearty breakfast he made a thorough
search of the water-front, though of course without avail. He had
intended dropping a hint here and there of the predicament in which he
had left Sheriff Riley and his followers, but on second thoughts
concluded to let them work out their own plan of escape from the
island, rather than run the risk of further delay.

By noon he was ready to depart from Dubuque, satisfied that there was
no information to be gained in that place concerning either Winn or the
raft. Although he was not discouraged, he was puzzled, and was even
beginning to feel anxious at the strange aspect this affair of the lost
_Venture_ was assuming.

Until sunset he rowed steadily and swiftly downstream, hailing the
ferrymen as he passed, and stopping at the settlements on both sides of
the river to make inquiries. He also hailed passing boats, and boarded
several rafts that he discovered tied to the western bank, but all in
vain. He failed to learn anything about Winn, and heard that but one
raft had passed down the river the day before. It was described as
having a single "shanty," a tent, and a crew of three men. As that was
not the kind of a raft he was looking for, this information only added
to the young man's perplexity. It never occurred to him that the raft
might have been stolen and disguised. So, as he was certain he had not
passed it, there was but one solution to the problem. The _Venture_
must have been wrecked and gone to pieces during the storm of that
first night, and Winn must have escaped to the island.

Even with this explanation the mystery of Winn's second disappearance
remained as great as ever, and by the time Billy Brackett hailed the
_Whatnot_, as has already been noted, he was as thoroughly bewildered
as ever in his life. Nor could he decide on any plan of action that
seemed in the least satisfactory. He knew there was a town a mile or
so below where the _Whatnot_ lay, and there he had determined to spend
the night. But for his desire to reach this place before darkness
should wholly shut in, he would hav