"He's no business up there at this late hour in the afternoon," grumbled the other man.
"That talk won't save us, either, if anything happens."
Jetson, filled with the desire to show off before the comrade he hated, had increased the speed of his brilliant flying movements.
But suddenly he slipped. There was no regaining his grip. With a howl of fright he felt himself plunging head downward more than thirty feet to the hard floor of the gym. He was in a fair way of landing on his head, cracking his skull and breaking his neck. Worse, in his sudden dread, he seemed to have lost control of his muscles.
"Turn! Land on your feet!" called Dave.
It all happened in a second. Dave, brief as the instant was, realized that the other midshipman was not going to land on his feet. In the same fleeting moment that Darrin called he hurled himself into position.
Straight down shot Jetson. Dave waited, with outstretched arms, ready to risk his own neck in the effort to save his sulky comrade.
From their end of the gym. the two startled attendants had watched the impending disaster, but there was no time for them to do anything.
From the way that Jetson fell it looked as though he had made a straight dive for Dave Darrin's head. At all events, their heads met in sharp collision.
Down went Dave, as though shot, and Jetson went with him, but Darrin's outstretched arms had grasped the other's body, and Jetson was saved the worst of his fall.