And Else hadn't her wrap on when a pilot came in, bringing news of a boat which had gone out at two o'clock to a steamer signaled from Wissow Hook and flying the signals of distress. They were launched in ten minutes, and in half an hour were past the Hook, but they hadn't found the steamer, which had reached the open sea around Golmberg, as they had seen after passing there on their return--it was half-past four; they had been terrified at the surf, which had risen along the dunes between the Hook and Golmberg, and held to as long as possible to ascertain whether the sea had broken through as Reinhold had predicted. They were not able to determine that at first because of the heavy surf; but as they came nearer, in order to be sure about it, Claus Lachmund first, and then the others, saw two persons on the White Dune, one apparently a woman, who did not stir, the other a man who made a sign. But, in spite of all efforts, they had not been able to get over there--indeed they were lucky to get afloat again after sailing so close to the White Dune--and had then seen that the breach had been made by the sea--certainly to the north and south of the White Dune, and possibly at other places--for they had seen nothing but water landward--how far they could not say--the fog was too dense. It must be bad in Ahlbeck, too; but they did not approach nearer, because those there, with the Hook near by, could not be in peril; but the situation of the two on the White Dune would be very serious if they were not rescued before night. "Who can the unfortunate ones be?" asked Valerie. "Shipwrecked sailors, Madame--who else!" replied Reinhold. "Farewell, my Reinhold," said Else; and then with her arms around his neck, half laughing, half crying--"Take six men again who know their business!" "And promise me," said Reinhold, "that the carriage shall not go down from the village to the castle unless you can see the road clearly through the hollow when you are on the height!" The ladies had gone; Reinhold prepared for his second trip. It was not really his duty--any more than it had been in the morning; but none of the sailors--even the best of them--quite understood how to manage the new life-boat. The two people on the Dune--he did not wish to tell Else about it--were certainly not shipwrecked, because a ship, if stranded, would have long since been signaled from the Hook. They could hardly be from Pölitz's house, although that was nearby, because Mrs. Rickmann had told him, when he went to change his clothes, that Pölitz had sent back word by the messenger that he was dispatching little Ernst and the men with the stock to Warnow; that he himself could not leave, nor could Marie, and least of all his wife, who during the night had given birth to a boy; and that it probably wouldn't be very bad, after all.