“There’s a score of ’em!” cried Harvey Brill, as he looked out and saw the Indians in the glare of the searchlight. “Oh, if we could only get out of this! We don’t want to hurt any of ’em, for it will mean trouble, and yet we can’t let ’em strip us! Can we go up, Jerry!”
“Yes!” cried the tall lad. “We’ll take a chance. There’s no wind, and we can manage without the rudder. We’ll go up as a balloon! Ned—Bob! Start the gas machine!”
The two lads, dropping their guns, rushed to the engine room. Jerry hurried to the pilot house where he saw that all was in readiness for a quick flight. For, though the Comet could not ascend as an aeroplane, owing to the broken rudder, it could still rise as a balloon.
The two Westerners were rapidly firing their rifles, taking care to aim high, hoping to intimidate the Indians by the seeming danger. And, in a measure, they succeeded. Several of the redmen leaped off the motorship, and disappeared in the woods. Others, more bold, laid hands on whatever they could find in the half-darkness out on deck, and ran off. Still others penetrated to the interior of the craft. But not one had a weapon. This the boys thought very strange until later they learned that Chief Standing Horse, fearing that some of his followers might try to take revenge on the whites for the bear incident, had confiscated the arms of the younger members of his party, giving them in charge of the older, and more trusted warriors of his tribe.
“Are you ready, Ned?” called Jerry to his chum.
“All right,” was the answer.
“Then start her going, and we’ll go up!”
It was just beginning to get daylight when there came a tremor through the whole length of the Comet. Jerry had cast off the anchor ropes, and as the powerful gas filled the bag she tore loose from the earth and shot upward.
There was a cry of surprise and terror from the Indians still aboard, and the rapid running of feet across the deck told of a rush to leap off before the craft went too high.
As it was, several had to drop off from a considerable distance, and in the dawn of the morning our friends saw many of the Indians limping into the forest.