“West, one-half south,” answered Roy without spirit. It was the third time he had announced this in the last half hour. By his figures the Flyer was over Fogo Island at 9:36 P. M.
“What d’ you know about that?” yelled Buck climbing awkwardly down the ladder. “We’re over America again—a half hour ago.”
“How far is it now?” asked Mr. Clarke, slowly as if the words were an effort.
“Only eleven hundred miles,” answered Bob.
“Eleven hundred—?” sighed the London reporter. Then he became silent and his head sank between his numb, gloved hands.
At eleven o’clock Buck and Bob prepared food—soup and coffee. Mr. Ballard and the photographer were the only ones who ate nothing. The Flyer was now at an altitude of 31,000 feet and Captain Napier took his coffee standing with his eyes on the compressed air gauge. A few pounds too much pressure and all felt the extra supply by the pains in their chests and heads. The thermometer had now dropped to two degrees above zero.
When the chronometer showed twelve thirty o’clock, Roy prepared to make a new calculation. He climbed down the ladder for a cup of tea to quicken his brain. Bob alone was awake. But he sat gazing stolidly at the engine and did not even notice Roy’s entrance. The London reporter and Buck sat crouched together and sound asleep. With a supply of tea for Alan and Ned, Roy returned to his desk. Wearily getting the time again—and the thirty-four hours in which he had been doing this constantly, seemed a week—he read his aerometer, calculated the wind pressure charts and then, to his last figures, added the advance.
“Captain,” he said at last, “we’re only a little over three hundred miles from New York.”
For a moment this seemed to have no special significance. Then Ned aroused himself.
“It’s only two hundred and five miles from New York to Ipswich. Are we goin’ to make it?”