“Oh, well, we will soon find a town, now that it is light enough to find our way.”
Dot brought the oranges, and they tasted good, although they had become exceedingly warm from the hot sun.
“Think we’ll have any trouble taking off?” she inquired, as they finished the fruit.
“I guess not. If the Sky Rocket could get off—and she evidently did—I’m sure the Ladybug can make it. It’s good hard ground all about.”
Linda sounded confident, but Dot’s heart was in her mouth until she saw the Ladybug actually rise from the earth and soar up into the skies—wherein lay safety.
Once again Linda’s heart was singing with rapture. She had enjoyed piloting that swift plane of Mr. Eckert’s, but after all, there was nothing like her beloved Ladybug. Why, the thing was almost human, the way it responded to her touch!
Another great advantage at the present time, when the girls had lost their way, was the autogiro’s ability to fly low. Now they could watch the landscape for towns and airports and landing-fields. Oh, it was good to have the Ladybug back again, if she couldn’t make a hundred and fifty miles an hour!
The country was so strange, so different from anything they were used to, that, in spite of its barrenness, they watched it in fascination. They came to the mountains and Linda nosed her plane upward, over the steep slopes covered with pine forests, until she was rewarded by seeing little villages on the other side. Straw-roofed houses dotted the landscape; there was evidence of farm-life, of some kind of civilization, though just what, the girls couldn’t make out from their height in the air.
Linda consulted her map, and familiarized herself with the names of several of the towns near the mountains, determined to fly on until she could find a good landing. She noticed the tracks of a railroad in the distance, and this she decided to follow, until it should lead to a station, and be identified as a town. Her gas was growing low, but she had no fear of a forced landing. In country like this there would be plenty of opportunities for an autogiro.
Half an hour later she hovered over a small Mexican town that provided an airport, and brought the Ladybug to earth.