They speedily left the good city of Charleston behind them, and were passing over the Navy-yard; which place Perk meant to examine more closely with his glasses on another occasion, when matters would be easier for him.
“How does she go?” shouted Jack, later on, when they could no longer catch even a fugitive glimpse of the city, saving the cloud of smoke that almost always hung over the high buildings and steeples.
“Bang up, boss; works like a charm!” yelled Perk, happily, as though he was not “caring a Continental” just how long Jack allowed him to hold the post of honor. “Whoever looked after the job o’ gettin’ this classic old-timer in great shape for this work, he shore knew his onions, I’ll say. It’s a snap to run this boat, if yeou want to know my ’pinion.”
“I think I’ll take a whirl at the controls, partner!” cried Jack; “stay just where you are for a while at least; I can play the game as a back-seat driver. Here goes, then.”
He was pleased to find it no trouble whatever to handle the amphibian as though he knew everything about such craft; after all airships are run pretty much alike; and it depends on the adaptability of the pilot as to whether he can work the same as with his own familiar type of craft—there are some people who are able to master any and all models of automobiles, even though handling them for the first time, especially men mechanically inclined by Nature,—and Jack happened to belong to that class.
“You can go about your duties, Wally; I’ll work over into the front seat okay, for its an easy job, I reckon. When we make up our minds to dip down and wet the pontoons in some body of water, fresh or salt, I’ll let you handle the boat again; though I imagine I could do the thing without much splash if I was put to it. I’ll soon get the hang of the trick, you can well believe.”
“Huh! yeou would, Mister—it aint much that’d faize yeou, take it from me as knows.”
After that conversation was such a tremendous effort that it languished until a better opportunity opened up—this would come when Jack found it expedient to make a test of the muffler system, with which their boat had been supplied, and which Perk was eager to see tried out.
To the delight of both fliers the device worked to a charm, most of the deafening racket being abated, even when they going at the fastest speed of which the “has-been” Curtiss-Falcon was capable of exhibiting—much more than a hundred miles an hour, Perk figured.
“Huh! mebbe naow they call this ship a relic o’ the past,” he grunted, when the success of the experiment was assured; “but I wanter say right naow there aint amany up-to-the-minute ships as kin run circles ’raound this tub, as some wise guy pilot’d call her. See, yeou kin hear ev’ry word I’m asayin’ an’ yet I aint ahollerin’ any to notice. It’s a bully invention, an’ shows where we’re agettin’ in this science o’ aviation. From what I hears, them ships as is acarryin’ smuggled stuff ’long the seaboard aint great at speed, ’cause they don’t need to be, their job bein’ to carry hefty loads each trip, an’ be steady goers. If the chanct ever comes to try this Falcon aout agin one o’ that dirty bunch, I’m wagerin’ we’ll overhaul the same hands down, an’ no takers.”