[CHAPTER XV]
TIMBADO KEY AND CAPTAIN MONCKTON BASSETT
From the moment Andy dropped his message to Ba, he had no time for thought of those he had left behind. For three or four miles he shot straight down the river at a height of about four hundred feet. In that time his first nervousness lessened. He made ready to begin his flight over the water.
The compass course he had laid was almost S.E. by S. His first alarming discovery was that his compass would be of almost no use. The vibration of the frame and the constant alteration of his level in ascending and descending so agitated the needle that it was always in motion.
“That ain’t goin’ to stop me,” he said at once. “There’s land everywhere over there to the southeast. I’ll hit something somewhere sometime.”
Laying a general course by the sun, he veered to the southeast. The moment he passed out over the ocean, the air changed. The movement of it was less regular, and Andy knew it was due to the counter-current of cooler water sent southward by the northward-flowing gulf stream. Steadying the car, he began to ascend. At a thousand feet, the lower eddies disappeared, and he felt the steady southwest breeze reasserting itself.
Taking advantage of this, as a ship tacks, he steadied the car again. Up to that moment every second had been one of activity; both hands had been busy, and every sense was alert. As the aeroplane now fell into a long, almost motionless glide—with nothing to mark its progress but the whistling wind—for the water beneath gave him no measure of flight—the boy discovered that his muscles were already partly numb from the strain.
As best he could, he relaxed his tension—exercised his feet, legs, fingers, and arms. But the attempt to relax his arms brought his second big discovery—when soaring on an even keel at high speed, the slightest movement of the rudder may instantly cost many minutes of hard climbing upward.
Attempting to steady the control lever with his left hand, there was a slight pull to the left and back. As the responsive ship answered her double helm and veered to the left and down, Andy thrust the lever back, changed hands, and his benumbed fingers for a moment refused to act.
Shaking itself, under the conflicting movements, the Pelican wavered and then leaped to the right and down. Aghast, the nervous boy saw the sea—the shore already out of sight—apparently rising to meet and grasp him. Paralyzed for a moment, Andy gave instant proof that he was a born aviator.
Withdrawing his eyes from the sea and bringing all his will power to stamp out his sudden panic, he did two things with hardly the operation of thinking. Setting his teeth and forcing his eyes on the stanchion at his side to get his line, with both hands—and as carefully as if he had minutes for the work—he brought the control lever to a vertical position, and at right angles with the beam to which it was attached.