commented the captain, refilling his pipe, "reckon
I'll have ter stay here till she lifts a bit. Wind's hauled to the
sou'west too. Bad quarter means more fog and smother."

"Who-o-o-o-o!" boomed the siren of the hidden vessel once more, and
this time it was answered by another whistle somewhere further off in
the fog.

"Two uv 'em now. Stand by fer a collision," shouted the captain, while
the scouts, intensely interested in the development of this hidden
drama of the fog, clustered about him.

"Who-o-o-o-o! Who-o-o-o-o! Who-o-o-o-o!" came the nearest siren.

"She's standin' in shore," shouted the captain, "boys, she's in grave
danger."

"What's she coming in for?" asked Merritt.

"I suppose her skipper thinks he's got plenty uv water under his keel
and wants ter give a wide berth ter the other vessel," explained the
captain. "Boys, if only we had a big bell or a steam whistle we could
warn them poor fellows uv their peril."

"It does seem hard to hear them blundering in and not be able to warn
them," agreed Rob, "there should have been a lighthouse put on these
shoals long ago."

"Right yer are, boy, but the government is a slow movin' vessel and
hard ter get under way."

The boys had to laugh at this odd way of expressing the difficulty of
getting new lights erected, but they knew as well almost as their
companion the dangers of the ocean off this part of Long Island.

The whistle boomed out its wailing note again.

"Closer and closer," lamented the captain, "what's the matter with
those lubbers? Yer'd think they'd have a leadsman out."

All at once the catastrophe for which they had been more or less
prepared happened. So quickly did it come that they had not time to
speak.

The echoes of the last note of the siren had hardly died out when there
came a loud explosion.

"Bang!"

"A signal gun," roared the captain.

"They are calling for help?" asked Rob.

"That's it, my boy. They've struck, just as I thought they would."

The distress gun sounded again.

"They're in a bad mess by the sound uv that," said the captain.

"It doesn't sound as if they were more than half a mile or so out,"
remarked Rob.

"I guess they're not. Hark at that! They must be scared ter death."

The gun was fired three times in rapid succession.

"They'll never hear that at Lone Hill life savin' station," grimly
commented the captain, "and this fog's too thick fer them ter see her."

"Do you imagine she