"Put me down!" roared Carl, scared out of his senses, for the machine had tilted, and from his own position he could look direct to the ground beneath. He felt the machine slipping bodily sideways.
"Got in an air hole," observed Joe calmly. "Skidding a trifle. But she can't go far. The cross sections between the planes hold her up nicely. Up we go again, turning all the time. Hold on for a moment."
It was truly a terrifying experience for Carl, and he never quite became accustomed to this new form of locomotion. Even when Joe, having elevated the machine to the height of ten thousand feet, set the automatic gear in motion, and, lighting a cigarette in the shelter of the cab, went to chat with the Major, the magnate felt far from happy.
"But—but," he quavered, "leave the steering gear! Who, then, controls this machine? What is to prevent us being dashed to pieces?"
"Atoms, rather," suggested Dick, always ready with something likely to improve the occasion.
"Eh?" asked Carl.
"You said pieces," grinned the midshipman. "We're ten thousand feet up. We wouldn't make jelly even if we fell. We'd be smashed to atoms."
"Horrible! Loathsome young fool!" thought Carl, groaning at the mere mention of such an ending. "Anything will be more pleasant than this. When will this awful trip be over?"
Flying steadily at over one hundred miles an hour it can be reckoned that the biplane soon swallowed up distance. In fact, late that afternoon she was over Italy, while an hour afterwards she swooped out over the Adriatic Sea, where she sighted the airship. Not that the latter was easily visible. But a practised eye could make her out.
"See—the airship," said the Major, pointing towards her for Carl's benefit.