Evan returned to the saloon. "All straightened out below," he said cheerfully. "The old flivver has made a complete job of her engine. We'll have to get a horse."
The children laughed. Evan said aside to Dordess: "When they're tired of singing, get up a show."
He went on up to the pilot-house. The mate and Tenterden were anxiously straining their eyes through the fog. At minute intervals the mate sounded the distress signal of five short blasts on the _Ernestina's_ whistle.
The mate made a significant gesture of turning his hand up at his mouth.
Evan whistled noiselessly. "Has he been that way all day?"
"No, he took a dram when the crash came to steady his nerves."
"Well, let him be," said Evan. "What chance have we of being picked up here?"
"Not very good," said the mate. "We're on the flats inside the Hook. Few small vessels come down here, and a big vessel couldn't come to us even if she heard us. I'm afraid it's a case of wait till the fog lifts."
"We can't keep this gang out all night," said Evan. "That's flat."
"Somebody must go ashore in a boat to telephone for a tug."
"No easy matter to take a boat ashore in this fog."
"It can be done. Just before the fog came down on us I marked that Atlantic Highlands was due south of us, and not above a mile distant. The wind has just come in from the east, and she'll hold there a while. By keeping the wind abeam on the port side you'd hit the shore somewhere near the pier."
"No; you're our only qualified seaman. You must stand by the vessel. I'll go."
"I'll borrow or beg a compass ashore. You keep the whistle going, and if the steam gives out, ring your bell."
"I doubt if you'll get the deckhands to bring you back. They'll go quick enough."
"I'll get boatmen from the shore if they desert."
The deckhands were brought up through the forward hatch, and one of the _Ernestina's_ boats was lowered away. As Evan stepped in he said:
"Don't tell them below that I've gone ashore unless you have to."
It was a ghostly trip. At a hundred yards' distance the _Ernestina_ was swallowed up entire in the fog, and thereafter they proceeded blindly in a grey void. Only a little circle of leaden water was visible around them, which travelled with them as they went. At minute intervals the sound of her whistle reached them, but it was only confusing for it seemed to come now from this side, now from that. Fog plays strange tricks with acoustics. Evan steered, keeping the wake of his boat straight and the wind in his left ear.