If Roque had an opinion he kept it to himself.
There was one thing sure, the flight had carried the aviators beyond the path of the recent blizzard, for brown and gray were again showing above the white in the checkered landscape.
That Roten was planning an intermission was apparent by the circling action of his machine over a plateau of broad expanse, probably an intermediate station with which he was acquainted.
His initiative set the balance of the flock on the down grade, and the pilots rejoiced over the immediate prospect of a thaw-out.
The chief aviator wore a satisfied smile on his bewhiskered countenance. "The Carpathians were never built to down me," he briskly proclaimed; "we'll go to the mark now like a bullet through cheese as soon as the steering boys get the cricks out of their backs."
"Come to think of it," volunteered Billy, "it is a tolerably nifty morning to hold a still curve for a hundred and twenty minutes at a stretch."
Roten, who understood American, grinned appreciatively at this recognition of his welfare action in behalf of the pilots.
"Right over there, Mr. Roque," he continued, indicating a summit a quarter of a mile distant, "is a rise exactly on a line west from where you started the other day to hunt for petrol—some twenty miles or thereabouts."
"You ought to have a medal for accuracy, my friend," genially complimented Roque, "and I apologize for holding the suspicion at least once to-day that the snow had thrown you out of balance."
"Can't blame you much, sir; I was mizzled a bit by too much white shroud back there. But here comes Ansel with the oil stove and the coffee pot, and we will have a brew that will reach all the cold spots under the vest."