There were nearly ten minutes before the boat left, but the hurry for tickets, the rush to check baggage, the shouts of hackmen and expressmen, the rattle and confusion of the coming and departing street-cars that centered at the ferry, made us inconspicuous among the throng as we stepped out of the hack. “Here Fitzhugh, Brown,” I said, catching sight of two of my retainers, “get close about. Have you seen anything--_any_ signs of the enemy?” “I haven't,” said Fitzhugh, “but Abrams thought he saw Dotty Ferguson over by the Fair Wind saloon there. Said he cut up Clay Street before the rest of us caught sight of him--so maybe Abrams was off his nut.” “Quite likely,” I admitted as we turned the jutting corner of the building and came under shelter by the ticket office. “But keep a close watch.” The other four retainers were in the passageway, and I called to the ticket-seller for the tickets to Livermore. By the price I decided that Livermore must be somewhere within fifty miles, and marshaling my troop about the boy, marched into the waiting-room, past the door-keeper, through the sheds, and on to the ferry boat. I saw no signs of the enemy, and breathed freer as the last belated passenger leaped aboard, the folding gang-plank was raised, and the steamer, with a prolonged blast of the whistle, slid out into the yellow-green waters of the bay. The morning had dawned pleasant, but the sky was now becoming overcast. The wind came fresh and strong from the south. The white-capped waves were beginning to toss and fret the shallow waters, and the air gave promise of storm. We could see men busy making all things snug on the vessels that swung uneasily to their anchors in the harbor, and tugs were rushing about, puffing noisily over nothing, or here and there towing some vessel to a better position to meet the rising gale. The panorama of the bay, with the smoke-laden city, grim and dark behind, the forest of masts lining its shore, the yellow-green waters, dotted here and there with ships tossing sharply above the white-capped waves that chased each other toward the north, the cloud squadrons flying up in scattered array from the south, and the Alameda hills lying somber and dark under the gray canopy of the eastern sky in front, had a charm that took my mind for the time from the mysterious enterprise that lay before me. “Keep together, boys,” I cautioned my retainers as I recalled the situation. “Has any one seen signs of the other gang?” There was a general murmur in the negative. “Well, Abrams, will you slip around and see if any of them got aboard? There's no such thing as being comfortable until we are sure.”