Now that the black background of the night had passed and
the broad daylight was all about them, their hope had begun to wane. The
spell seemed broken; the cheerful reality of the morning sunlight upon
the water and the hills seemed to dissipate their confidence in that
long shaft, and they saw the whole experience of the night as a sort of
fantastic dream.
But Pee-wee was gone; there was no dream about that, and the boat did
not seem like the same place without him.
The first place they passed was Stoneco, but there was no sign of life
near the shore, and the _Good Turn_ chugged by unheeded. They ran across
to Milton where a couple of men lolled on a wharf and a few people were
waiting at the little station. They could not get in very close to the
shore on account of the flats, but Roy, making a megaphone of an old
newspaper, asked if a flash message had been received there. After much
shouting back and forth, he learned that the searchlight had been seen
but had been thought to be from one of the night boats plying up and
down the river. It had evidently meant nothing to the speaker or to
anyone else there. Roy asked if they would please ask the telegraph
operator if he had seen it.
"He'd understand it all right," he said, a bit disheartened. But the
answer came back that the operator had not seen it.
At Poughkeepsie they made a landing at the wharf. Here expressmen were
moving trunks about, a few stragglers waiting for some boat peered
through the gates like prisoners; there was a general air of bustle and
a "city" atmosphere about the place.
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