CHAPTER XVII
A Desperate Situation
A terrible five minutes followed the discovery that Joe Gresson had made, a period short enough as a general rule, but seeming almost unending under the tragic circumstances. For the great airship lay helpless in the air, turning slowly as if on a pivot, and dangling a thousand feet above that tiny Union Jack which marked the summit of Mount Everest. Then a breeze caught her and wafted her to one side, so that Dick, looking desperately from the window of the engine-room, could gaze down into India. But a swirling current from the opposite direction gripped her a moment later, swayed the ship which was rocking like a vessel at sea, drove her round and launched her northward, till the opposite slopes of the Himalayas came into view.
"Tibet—the road to Lhasa, the forbidden city," Dick told himself. "And that shining streak away over there must be the Brahmaputra. What's to be done? This is a nasty sort of hole in which to find ourselves. And I don't like the look of some of our friends. Larkin is as blue as blue, while Mr. Andrew don't appear much better. Where's Alec?"
That young gentleman was stretched full length at the foot of the ladder leading from the engine-room, and at once Dick stepped toward him and secured the mouthpiece of his oxygen apparatus to his face.
"Can't do more," he thought. "Wish I could. George! Joe don't seem too bright. He's as green as grass, and, 'pon my word, he's falling."
He was just in time to catch the leader of this attempt upon a world's record and snatch him from the engines. Catching him in his arms he sat him down with his back against the wall of the engine-room. Then, quite by the merest chance, he caught a glimpse of his own reflection in that same square piece of looking-glass.
"My hat! Dusky as a nigger! But never felt better in my life. Oxygen seems to agree with me, but not with my lovely complexion. Now, what the blazes is a fellow to do? This is a corker."