“What’s that?” cried Bob quickly. He had seen something that looked like a huge black mass directly before them.
Joe sat on the edge of his seat, expecting every moment to feel a terrible crash and then.... For the first time he wondered what death was like.
Cries of relief came from the youths as they saw that instead of crashing into the black mass, they were passing through it.
“As if a million pounds were lifted off my back,” gasped Joe. “I thought we were goners sure.”
“Would be if that were a mountain,” Bob said. “As it is, we’re no worse off than before. It’s a lot darker, though.”
Karl sought to pass out of the cloud by gaining altitude, but he soon saw that this was useless. Still, he thought it best to fly higher. There was a limit to the height he could safely reach, however, for neither himself nor the youths were using oxygen, and the high rare air was not sufficient to supply enough necessary to the human body.
“I’ll have to trust to luck, I guess,” he said through the telephone. “We may make it all right.”
“Karl didn’t say that any too hopefully,” remarked Joe. “Do you suppose he really fears disaster?”
“It seems like it.” Bob was terribly worried. He did not have much hope of getting out unharmed.
Then suddenly the air travelers received a surprise. The cloud that had a few seconds before been so heavy and dense quickly thinned out until it passed from view. Once more the blue sky was visible.