CHAPTER VIII
THROUGH THE STORM
If Roberta had really been unconscious when the fury of the storm burst upon them, with the repeated cutting flashes of light and the thunder booming like a terrific bombardment all about the gallant little Nike, she would have come to if there was any life in her at all. She started up with a wild cry, then remembered instantly that she was supposed to be just coming out of a prolonged period of sleep, and so, strained forward on her straps, stared around as if she had no knowledge of anything which had transpired, and struggled to free herself from the belts that held her secure.
At first Mrs. Pollzoff was too fully occupied to pay any attention to the plane’s real pilot, and the girl managed to take in the whole situation. The lightning revealed an endless surge of white rollers stretched row after row and piling themselves on top of one another as the gale lashed them like an escaped demon. Her first sensation was one of dismayed certainty that her second glove had gone into the raging water beneath them, so that its chances of being picked up were ruined; the tiny thing would never be recovered and the name printed indelibly on the stiff cuff would never be deciphered.
Twisting and wriggling to get free of her bonds, Roberta verified what she already suspected, that they were secured well out of her reach. The rain began to pour down on them in great sheets as if the heavens had suddenly opened and dumped the accumulation of years on the struggling machine. She managed to catch a glimpse of the indicators and saw that the tanks were well filled; the altimeter registered eight thousand feet but it was going lower with each jerk of the pointer. Whether the engine was functioning or not she couldn’t tell, because the howling wind deadened every other sound as Nike tipped and spun like a helpless leaf.
“Let me loose,” Roberta shrieked, but if Mrs. Pollzoff heard, she paid no attention, but battled with grim determination with the controls, endeavoring to climb above the tempest which was pressing down on them with such power that it seemed impossible for the plane to lift an inch.
“Let me fly her,” the girl pleaded frantically, for she realized above everything else, that Mrs. Pollzoff was losing her head, and that their chances of getting out of the dilemma were growing more and more remote. She strained so far forward that her shoulder touched that of the woman, who whirled about angrily, her teeth bared like those of a snarling animal at bay.
“Get out of the way!” She shoved her back into the drenched seat and shook her fist in her face. “Stay where you are or I’ll throw you out!” Roberta couldn’t hear a word, but there was no mistaking the command. “If I can’t get us out, the three of us will go down together. I won’t have it said that you saved me.” Again the clenched fist shot close to the girl’s face, and probably if there had been a moment to waste, she would have been struck.
With a furious snarl, Mrs. Pollzoff turned her attention back to her job, and after a grilling ten minutes, Nike’s nose began to lift slowly. The brave little plane climbed sturdily into the gale, which continued to fight every fraction of an inch gained. Ten minutes more and they struggled above the worst of the storm, then Mrs. Pollzoff took time to put the cover over the top of the machine. Before it was closed she scanned the heavens and waters as best she could, but there was no sign of another plane in the air or ship on the ocean. When the cover was finally in place, the cock-pit no longer acted as a space to fill and help drag them to destruction, but the rain beat on the top, and in spite of the lights Mrs. Pollzoff turned on both inside and outside, the lightning filled the whole atmosphere with its weird glow, changing the cheerful illumination to a ghastly, sulphurous hue.
Consulting the altimeter again, Mrs. Pollzoff forced the plane to climb higher, but there seemed to be no ceiling to the storm, and they could not get above its rage. The wind veered around until it was on Nike’s tail, and its force drove her ahead at a terrific speed. Here the woman showed a bit more sense than before, by letting the tempest carry them forward instead of struggling against it. She also kept climbing, but at a gradual ascent. The tiny clock on the control-board ticked away two hours, but they seemed more like one hundred and twenty years than that many minutes to the imprisoned young girl. It was nearly morning and if they succeeded in coming through the storm, the first streaks of dawn would be flashing across the heavens in another hour. But that hour too went by bringing no hopeful rays of day to relieve the blackness. On and on they went, once the tank had to be replenished, and once the engine crackled alarmingly for a moment, but that was adjusted. Two hours later they had traveled nearly two hundred miles. It was still raining, but a bit of light was beginning to force its way through the darkness.