"Hurry up, Hal! Hurry up! Here they come!"
"Shut up, Stubbs!" exclaimed Hal, straining all his energies to fix the break in the plane. "I'll have it in a minute."
"A minute will be too late!" cried Stubbs.
"Be still, Stubbs!" said Chester, quietly. "Give Hal a chance. There is still time to run if it's necessary."
And at that moment Hal sprang to his feet.
"Fixed!" he cried joyfully. "Climb in here, quickly!"
The others needed no urging and soon all were in their places. It was now that Hal thanked his stars that the plane was one of the few that could rise from the ground.
Slowly the large army plane gathered headway as he moved along the ground. Hal increased the speed slowly in spite of the close proximity, for he realized that too great haste might spell disaster, and he wished to test the engine carefully before soaring into the air.
"Up, Hal!" cried Stubbs. "Here they come!"
Hal paid no heed to this frantic exclamation. Instead, for a moment, he reduced the speed of the craft as something seemed not to be working exactly right. Calmly he bent over the engine and tinkered with it a moment later. Then he sat straight and exclaimed: