Eighteen thousand feet, and the needle, still continuing its circle of the dial, registered nineteen thousand before he could tear his glance away.
Bang! Sput, sput! Bang!
One of the engines was missing audibly. The petrol indicator now registered almost nothing. The altimeter needle was just flirting with the point marking twenty thousand feet.
Jack for the first time took his eyes from a straightaway upward course and gazed about him—principally outward and downward toward the Irish coast.
The petrol gauge registered nothing noticeable and both engines were firing now at interrupted intervals only, and the propellers were spinning in jerky uneven response to the queer spurts of power shot to them from the well-nigh exhausted engines.
Jack grabbed the petrol pump, and with a few sudden lusty jerks sent the remaining dregs of fuel into the engines. They responded nobly with what little ammunition they got, and with this power the plane gave a loop, like a scenic railway car taking a hump, and what had been the upward angle was reversed.
The ingenious purpose was now apparent. The throttles were closed because there was no longer any use in keeping them open. Jack was trying the only course that had been left open to them. He had mounted to the greatest possible height with what little fuel they had left, while still continuing their eastward direction.
They were now on a great ten-mile downward glide which was their only hope of reaching somewhere near the coast line. How successful they were in this depended now upon the skill with which the captain-pilot used the plane's momentum.
Although with no propelling power whatever, they rapidly gathered a terrific speed. When this had reached a point where it threatened to tear the wings or rudder loose, Jack lifted her to an almost horizontal course, and the plane sailed along for more than a mile before it became necessary to again turn her nose down to gather increased momentum. When this was had the same process was repeated.
How good a pilot Jack was, this situation would develop. They had come perhaps five miles nearer the shore line now, and they were still some twelve or thirteen thousand feet in the air. A swift glance at the altimeter and barometer assuring him of this fact, and Jack permitted himself a smile which gave heart and renewed courage to each of the other three.