“Huh! it’s like gropin’ ’raound yeour bedroom in the pitch dark, when wakin’ up from a bad dream—kinder lose yeour head, an’ get sorter nutty in the bargain. Mebbe we’re miles an’ miles eouten the way, even gettin’ wuss rattled right along; but say, that aint like my partner, to lose his head, an’ run us into a blind sack. I jest got to depend on Jack to pull us through—aint I seen him come eout right-side up heaps o’ times when things they had an awful black look?”
Taking himself to task after this fashion Perk rose up out of his state of despondency, and actually forced himself to chuckle, as if things looked perfectly all right in his eyes; but there was something lacking in the sound, something superficial, and his seeming hilarity did not last long.
Thus it happened that once, when Jack, believing they were attaining too great altitude, took a slide down, shutting off the power; Perk felt positive he again caught a sound from somewhere that must certainly have come from the exhaust of an airship motor, running at full speed!
The thought gave him a momentary thrill, it seemed so pregnant of accumulating possibilities in the line of hazards; his old fear lest they should have been surreptitiously followed by some secret enemy, in the shape of an ally of the men they sought to run down, returned in full force, to stab him most viciously.
CHAPTER XI
The Mystery Airship
“I say, Jack!” Perk called, making use of the friendly ear-phones.
“What’s eating you, buddy?” demanded the other, who must have known from his comrade’s shifting about so much there was something amiss.
“Did yeou hear it?” asked Perk, anxiously.
“You mean that sound in the fog pack, don’t you?” Jack countered.
“Yeah, yeou said it, partner—I kinder guess naow it was a ship up here in this same sea we’re buzzin’ through, don’t yeou?”