s as
straight as an arrow here. The lights in the small towns of Milton and
Camelot were visible on either side; tiny lights flickered along the
railroads that skirted either shore, and beyond in the distance twinkled
the lights on the great bridge at Poughkeepsie.

"We're right in the steamer's path here," said Tom; "let's hurry."

Roy played the shaft for a minute to attract attention, then threw his
message again and again into the skies. The long, bright, silent column
seemed to fill the whole heaven as it pierced the darkness in short and
long flashes. The chugging of the _Good Turn's_ engine was emphasized by
the solemn stillness as they ran in toward shore, and the splash of
their dropping anchor awakened a faint echo from the neighboring
mountains.

"Well, that's all we can do till morning," said Roy. "What do you say to
some eats?"

"Gee, it's big and wild and lonely, isn't it?" said Tom.

They had never thought of the Hudson in this way before.

After breakfast in the morning they started upstream, their big yellow
camp flag flying and keeping as near the shore as possible so as to be
within hail. Now that the black background of the night had passed and
the broad daylight was all about them, their hope had begun to wane. The
spell seemed broken; the cheerful reality of the morning sunlight upon
the water and the hills seemed to dissipate their confidence in that
long shaft, and they saw the whole experience of the night as a sort of
fantastic dream.

But Pee-wee was gone; there was no dream about that, and the boat did
not seem like the same place without him.

The first place they passed was Stoneco, but there was no sign of life
near the shore, and the _Good Turn_ chugged by unheeded. They ran across
to Milton where a couple of men lolled on a wharf and a few people were
waiting at the little station. They could not get in very close to the
shore on account of the flats, but Roy, making a megaphone of an old
newspaper, asked if a flash message had been received there. After much
shouting back and forth, he learned that the searchlight had been seen
but had been thought to be from one of the night boats plying up and
down the river. It had evidently meant nothing to the speaker or to
anyone else there. Roy asked if they would please ask the telegraph
operator if he had seen it.

"He'd understand it all right," he said, a bit disheartened. But the
answer came back that the operator had not seen it.