“Shall we go up again?” asked Frank, after a hasty examination had been made to ascertain if anything had parted or snapped under the strain of the suddenly arrested tumble through the air pocket.
“Yes. We had better lose as little time as possible,” was the rejoinder. “If you are ready, start the engine up, and we will try a flight from the surface of the water.”
“You want full power?” asked Frank.
“Yes; but start up gently at first, gradually increasing to top velocity. I think, however, that we shall leave the water at about 1,500 revolutions a minute.”
The next minute the roar of the newly started engine prevented further conversation. In order to develop every ounce of power of which the motor was capable Frank had opened the muffler cut-out, and the uproar was terrific. Spurts of greenish flame spouted from the exhausts, and the acrid smell of burning oil and gasolene filled the air. To any one less accustomed than the Boy Aviators to the uproar of aërial motors, the noise would have been alarming to say the least. They, however, were too much used to such scenes to pay any attention to it.
Faster and faster the Sea Eagle sped over the waves, till her keel barely touched the tips of the swells. Then suddenly the jerky motion ceased, and the craft, buoyed by its wings, began to soar upward in a steadily increasing gradient. Before ten minutes had passed they were once more on an even keel at a five-hundred-feet altitude, and bearing steadily for the southwest.
Frank looked at his watch.
“We ought to be getting pretty close to that yacht by now,” he remarked to Harry, who had seated himself at his side, and was assisting in attending to the lubrication and watching of the motor.
“I’ll keep a sharp lookout,” rejoined Harry; “they surely ought to hear the noise of our motor and send up a rocket or wave lights, or something, if they are in the vicinity.
“That’s just what I think. Keep your eyes open while I watch the engine.”