Even the stern of the boat was half hidden by the fog.
"Wa'al," thought the shiftless one philosophically, "ef it's hard fur me to find anything it'll be hard fur anything to find us." But his troubled mind would not be quiet.

Philosophy was not a sufficient reply to the warning of the sixth sense, and, leaning far over the edge of the boat, he listened with ears long trained to every sound of the wilderness.

He heard only the stray murmur of the wind among the leaves--and was that a ripple in the water?
He strained his ears and decided that it was either a ripple or the splash of a fish, and he sank back again in his seat.
Although he had resumed his old position, the shiftless one was not satisfied.

The feeling of apprehension, like a mysterious mental signal, was not effaced.

That thick, whitish fog was surcharged with an alien quality, and slowly he raised himself up once more.