Cap'n Cod would have telegraphed to Sheriff Riley but for the fact that the wires had not yet been extended to Mandrake.

So he wrote and begged the Sheriff to hasten down the river by first boat.
He also wrote to Major Caspar, expressing his sympathy, telling him that he was now travelling down the Mississippi in his own boat, the _Whatnot_, asking for full particulars concerning the lost boy, and offering to make every effort to discover his whereabouts.
On the morning of that very day, just before his departure from Mandrake, Billy Brackett had also written and mailed a letter that read as follows: "MY DEAR SISTER,--I am up a stump just at present, but hope to climb down very soon.

In other words, your boy is smarter than I took him to be.

He has not only managed to hide the raft, but himself as well, and both so completely that thus far I have had but little success in tracing them.

I have reason to believe that he and I spent some time very close to each other on an island the night I left you, but before daylight he had again disappeared, leaving no trace.