He's a man, sir, of the name of Jones, and rayther soft, like!" "How unfortunate!" muttered the Captain, while Mr Strong groaned and upbraided himself for his seeming harshness to Bob in the morning.

"How very unlucky!" "Of course," went on the coastguardsman earnestly, in deep sympathy with both--"the moment the man tells me of this, I knows what happens, seeing that blessed sea-fog a creeping up and the wind falling; and so I goes off to the commander and tells him what I thinks--as how Master Bob and that young Dick o' yourn, Cap'en, were most likely all adrift and couldn't fetch in to the land.

I--" "But what did your commander do ?" cried the old sailor, interrupting.
"Tell me that!" "Why, sir, he sent word round to all our stations and down to the Dockyard, and he's telegraphed likewise to the h'island so as how there'll be a strict look-out kep' all round the coast for the poor lads." "I am very much obliged to you, Hellyer, and to the commander as well," said the Captain as he and Mr Strong turned away mournfully, retracing their steps back to "the Moorings." "I'm afraid we can do nothing more now." No, nothing more could be done then.
The morning brought no news to gladden their hearts or brighten their hopes.
Matters, indeed, looked worse than had been expected.
For, as the day wore on, reports reached the Dockyard from the different coastguard-stations along the eastern and western coast of the mainland and from the Isle of Wight, whence a strict look-out had been kept on the approaches to Spithead and the adjacent waters of the Channel.
These reports were all to the same effect.
Not a trace had been seen of the missing boat; nor anything heard of Bob and Dick.
It was the same the following day, nothing likewise being then reported; although the search had been redoubled and one of the Government tugs sent out from the harbour to scour the offing.
Hope now gave way to despair before the certainty that stared them in the face, putting possibility beyond doubt.
Everybody believed the boat had been swamped, or run down in the fog, and that Bob and Dick were drowned! Poor boys!.