“You can’t help him after you get up there!” declared Ben.
“We can tell better about that after we get to him.”
“All right, go it!” replied the other. “I’ll remain here and watch the Bertha and the camp while you’re gone. But look here,” he continued, “if Mr. Havens is in bad shape, don’t either one of you boys try to shift over to the Ann. If you do, you’ll break your neck.”
The next moment the Louise was in the air, her lights burning brilliantly. The Ann was still approaching, but staggering as if the aviator had lost all control. Below the boys saw Ben piling dry pine on the fire so as to provide a broadly-lighted landing-place for the oncoming machine.
“I don’t know what we’re going to do when we get up there,” Jimmie shouted in Carl’s ear, “but there’s one thing sure, and that is that if we don’t do something Mr. Havens will soon go crashing to the ground!”
The boys were now obliged to give over conversation, for the motors were in swift motion and the roar of an express train could hardly have been heard above the sparking.
When at last they came close to the Ann and swung about so as to move with her, they saw Mr. Havens sitting limply in the aviator’s seat. His chin was lowered upon his breast, and he appeared to be too weak or too dazed in mind to look up as the Louise swept past him, whirled and moved along directly above him.
The boys saw that the great machine was rapidly getting beyond his control. Had he understood the nature of the ground below, he might have shut off his motors and volplaned down, but they understood, of course, that the dark surface below was unknown territory to him.
For some reason, probably because the disabled aviator had realized that he was fast reaching his objective point and shut the motors down to half power, the Ann was not making good speed. The Louise slowed down so as to keep exact step with her and Jimmie bent over in his seat and looked past the edge of the upper plane to the framework and propeller of the Ann. Directly he sent the Louise faster for a second and looked under the edge of the Ann’s upper wing to the vacant seat at the left of the aviator.
“Do you think,” he shrilled into Carl’s ear, “that I could get down into that seat?”