Satisfied that the motor would do its share, Tim settled himself for the test. He glanced ahead. The edge of the shelf looked dangerously near but there was no other course to take. He must get Perkins where he could have the best of medical attention.
Tim opened his throttle. Faster and faster he threw the raw gas into the motor until the plane quivered like a thing alive. The engine was thrumming wildly and Tim threw up his left hand, the signal for Ralph to cut the cable.
With a well-aimed blow, Ralph’s axe bit through the rope and the Lark leaped forward like an arrow and flashed toward the edge of the precipice.
The plane bounced from side to side on the uneven ground and Tim held his breath as they swooped nearer the end of their short runway. But the plane was gaining speed rapidly. How rapidly, he didn’t dare look.
At the last moment Tim pulled back hard on the stick but it was as though some giant had tied a string to the Lark and was playing with them. The plane staggered into the air, settled back, bounced hard, and then shot skyward. They were off at last but hovering dizzily in the air. The motor labored at its task and Tim sensed a losing battle. The added weight of Perkins in the front cockpit might be just enough to turn the scales against them. In another second they would be in a spin, hurtling down to death on the gaunt pines.
In a flash Tim took his only chance and threw the Lark into a power dive. That would give him the momentum necessary to handle his craft. Down the side of the mountain roared the plane, the wild beating of its motor echoing and re-echoing among the cliffs and valleys. They were almost on the tree tops when Tim pulled the nose of his ship up and leveled off with his plane under control.
Tim set his course for the crest of the range and was just sliding around the Billy Goat when the sun went down in the west, a great, red ball of fire. The evening shadows were thickening, for night comes quickly in the mountains.
The Lark made splendid time and they were less than fifty miles from Atkinson when Tim sighted the gray bank of fog rolling out of the east. Although fogs were not uncommon at that time of year he had not counted on that hazard.
With his gas getting low there was only one thing to do—hammer through and trust to his compass to bring him over his home field.
The cold, gray banks swallowed the little plane and Tim was flying in a world alone. The mist was so thick that Ralph, only a half dozen feet ahead of him, was only a blurred outline.