“Tell me, did you come through this crash without being seriously hurt yourself?” he asked her.
Perk must have made the same sudden discovery as Jack for he was standing near by, staring hard at the novice pilot and with his mouth open. Possibly Perk also deplored the fact that their meeting with a woman flyer was bound to interfere more or less with those plans of his pal’s which above all things concerned the need of speedy action, unhampered liberty of going where they willed and staying on the job steadily, come storm, fog, riotous wind or fair weather.
“A few little bruises seems to be the extent of my injuries—next to nothing, I assure you, but if they were ten times as serious it would not keep me from going up again, if my ship were workable—indeed, it is absolutely necessary for me to do so!”
Jack looked at her again. Most assuredly she did have the necessary stamina required of a successful air pilot. He did not believe any ordinary peril could deter such a girl from attempting what she had planned.
“I am glad to know that you were not badly hurt, he told her, but it’s plain to be seen you must have handled your stick cleverly or your ship would have crashed ten times as hard as it did. The first thing to be done is for us to check the craft over and learn the extent of the damage. If, luckily, it happens to be but a broken wing, possibly we can fix it up well enough to get the boat out of this fearful hole. However did it happen you picked out this place to come down in, or was it just by a rare chance? You could not have found as good a landing-field inside of a hundred miles I reckon, miss.”
She smiled at hearing him address her by that title, since it was the first real evidence that he understood the situation.
“I suppose it was partly luck,” she told him simply, “although I did have an idea it would be a hundred per cent better to fall on what looked like a sandy shore down here, than take chances with those terrible rocks up above. Just what I did and how I landed so easily, I’m not at all certain about, but Heaven was kind and yet I hope never to find myself in the same bad fix again. Did you say you would take a look at my ship and find out what’s wrong? It’s kind of you to go to all that trouble, but I must get out of this as soon as possible—oh! I surely must!”
Jack could not help being struck with the way she said this, with her pretty sun and wind-tanned face taking on a determined, resolute expression. He would not have been human to thus hear and see without beginning to wonder what is could be that influenced her to speak so. Why should she show such a yearning for a chance to continue her flight? What genuine reason could a girl have for such an overwhelming desire for action? Was there any sort of endurance race on the books for women pilots who had recently obtained their necessary flying licenses—or was it some sort of a private wager that caused her to betray so much solicitude?
Would he and Perk be justified in holding over so as to get her started, granting that her ship could be put in condition again by means of their combined knowledge and ability along those lines?
Somehow, when he looked keenly into her face, he failed to discover the faintest trace of guile thereon. Once convinced of this fact, Jack threw every suspicion to the four winds and came to the conclusion that both duty and the natural chivalry in his nature compelled him to do all that was possible to aid a fellow pilot in distress.