"That's what Mr. Aikens said--and everybody else. But tell me what
else it could have been I saw. I saw _some_thing, _that_ I know."

"We ought to have gone after the boat," admitted Dave, slowly. "We
didn't do a bit of good here, that's sure."

"But we didn't know that at the time," Frank argued. "Everybody'd
have blamed us if we'd gone on a wild goose chase down the river
after an empty boat----"

"But nobody would have said a word if we'd found him in the bottom
of a boat everybody else thought was empty. If the moon was only
higher----"

"You don't catch me drilling off down Plum Bun at night, moon or no
moon. There's a rattlesnake or copperhead for every hundred yards!"
It was Frank who took up Jerry's thought. "Besides, it would be
different if we hadn't waited so long. Tod--Tod's--he's dead now,"
voicing at last the feeling they had never before put into words.

There was a gruffness in Jerry's voice as he answered, a gruffness
that tried hard to mask the trembling of his tones. "I know it, but--
but--I want to do something for Mr. Fulton. Won't you fellows go
along with me? I guess I--I'll go."

"Down river?" asked both boys, but without eagerness.

"Till we find the boat."