Fortunately for the boys, the aeroplane had suffered only minor injuries. Both rubber tires on the landing wheels were punctured, and some of the framework supporting the wheels was badly bent, but there was no damage done that they could not repair on the spot.
“It might have been a lot worse,” said Phil, at length. “I guess we’d better break out our axes and clear a space where we can work. After we’ve fixed the machine, I don’t see anything for it but to chop a clear space big enough to get started in. And that’s going to be some job, too, believe me.”
“It certainly looks as though it might be,” said Tom, gazing ruefully at the tangle of bushes and vines. “But before we start in, why not have something to eat. I’ve got a feeling that it’s way past lunch time right now.”
This suggestion met with instant approval, and they all ate with appetites unimpaired by their recent narrow escape. Having finished, they rested for a brief spell, and then, getting out their axes, attacked the thick undergrowth in earnest. After an hour’s hard labor, they had a space cleared under and around the aeroplane, and then proceeded to straighten the bent framework and repair the tires. They worked fast, and in a surprisingly short time had everything in good shape. Then they turned their attention to clearing a path sufficiently long to allow the aeroplane to gather speed for its take-off. But here they found themselves in a quandary. Less than three hundred feet from the edge of the precipice there were a number of large trees, and to cut these down and level off the ground there was out of the question. Toward the brink of the cliff there was only the underbrush, but to take-off in that direction was perilous in the extreme. It meant heading straight for the edge of the abyss, and what if the aeroplane could not gather sufficient speed in that short distance to rise? In that event they might plunge downward, and so meet the very death that they had so lately avoided.
They fell to work on the stubborn undergrowth, but although they worked with desperate haste and energy, the sun was close to the horizon before they were finally ready to take their hazardous start.
“Well, fellows, I guess we’ve done all we can,” said Phil at length, mopping at a countenance that was fiery red from sunburn and exertion. “We’ve done our part, and now it’s up to the old machine. If it rises, all right, if not—” he shrugged his shoulders.
The boys climbed to their places in the machine with grave faces. Phil ran the motor until it was thoroughly warm, and then, with lips grimly set, opened the throttle.
CHAPTER IX
Deeds Of Darkness
Bushes and small trees in back of the machine were bent almost to the ground by the force of the wind driven rearward by the propeller, and the machine leaped ahead, bumping and swaying drunkenly over the uneven ground. Bushes caught at the wide-spread wings, retarding their speed, and the rough ground also hindered. As they approached the sheer edge of the chasm, and the awful expanse of empty air was almost under their wheels, Phil moved the elevating controls, but the aeroplane had not gathered sufficient speed to rise. It shot out over the brink of the abyss, the nose pointed downward, and with a tightening sensation around their hearts the boys realized that they were falling into the dizzy depths at sickening speed.
For a few seconds the aeroplane dropped like a stone, with Phil fighting to get control. The rocky floor of the canyon rushed up at them, but just at the moment when it seemed as though they must strike, the aeroplane flattened out, quivered and vibrated, and then swooped upward into the rays of the setting sun.