“Let me out! Put me ashore! By the buck-jumping broncos of Butte, I wasn’t born for a watery grave!”
“Gracious!” cried Jack, in a startled tone, as a head of red hair poked itself out from under the seat, “we’ve got an aerial stowaway aboard!”
For the moment, the affairs of Dick Donovan,—our readers will have guessed that this first aerial stowaway on record was the young reporter,—had to wait. This drop through space was too thrilling, daring, dangerous for anyone on board to pay Dick more than passing attention. There was not even time to ask him who he was.
Indeed, at the instant that Dick, who had hidden in the machine without any idea that immediate flight was to be undertaken, made himself known, peril loomed swiftly and ominously before them.
As they swooped downward, like a giant fishhawk diving after its finny prey, there was a sudden shout of alarm from Tom. The great airbag swung to one side, dragging the carriage of the flying machine with it in a dizzying swerve.
There was no need to ask him the cause of his sudden alarm. The _Wondership_, yawing before a sharp flaw of wind which came too suddenly for Jack to counter it, was being driven straight for one of the slender, sharp-topped masts of the yacht.
“Keep her off!” shouted Mr. Chadwick, half rising, “we’ll rip the bag open if you don’t look out.”
Jack’s lips set grimly, determinedly. With a swift motion of his hand he applied power. The propeller began to whirl, forcing the wind-driven craft away from the peril of the mast. Dick Donovan, in frank terror, shouted aloud.
“Gracious! We’ll strike!” was the cry forced from Tom’s lips.
The next instant, despite Jack’s prompt action, the _Wondership_, deliriously sagging and swaying, crashed against the tip of the yacht’s after mast.
The steel tipped weather-vane that was fixed on the top of the spar had penetrated the midship section of the bag and inflicted a bad tear in it before Jack had had time to hold the big craft off. The propeller had been set in motion an instant too late. With a vicious hissing sound the gas rushed from the rent as the _Wondership_, the mischief done, careened drunkenly away from the mast that had inflicted the wound.
There was a sudden, appalling dash downward. A stone from a roof could not have fallen much faster. Amidst a shout of alarm from the yacht’s decks, which was echoed by those on the _Wondership_, she struck the sea with a force that sent spray and foam half way as high as the vessel’s mast heads.