In fact, even as we stared, they were hanging by a single bolt, and the head of that was missing.
“Griggs! Griggs!” shouted Hawkins, wildly endeavoring to stop the engine. “Grab those seats before they fall! I didn't screw 'em on with a wrench—only used my hands—but I supposed they were fast. Heavens! If they drop, we shall go——”
Just at that moment a sudden jolt sent the seats into the road.
Two hundred pounds of solid material had left the Hawkins Auto-aero-mobile!
Hawkins didn't have to finish the sentence.
It became painfully evident where we should go.
We went up!
Up, up, up! In the suddenness of it, it seemed to me that we were shooting straight for the midday sun, that another thirty seconds would see us frying in the solar flames.
As I gripped the cushions, I believe that I shrieked with terror.
But Hawkins, scared though he was, didn't lose his head entirely. The machine hadn't turned turtle. It was ascending slowly in its normal attitude, and as a matter of cold fact we hadn't risen more than thirty feet when Hawkins remarked, shakily: