And she didn’t feel at all strange or in the least frightened. It all seemed perfectly natural and usual. A dreadful doubt assailed her. Suppose she were not awake. Suppose she was asleep and dreaming. “Excuse me,” she said timidly to the Man with the Growly Voice, “but will you please tell me your name?” “My name,” he growled in reply, “is Morse.” “Well then Mr. Morse,” she said, “tell me, please, honest to goodness cross your heart—am I awake?” And the Man with the Growly Voice crossed his heart and said, “Yes.” So that was settled, for of course he wouldn’t tell a story and say she was awake if she were asleep. Oh, what a happy little Maida, drifting—drifting far above the clouds, no more lessons or oatmeal porridge, or short frocks. Never again. Never would she have to go to bed at twilight. Traily, fluffy dresses and sit up nights and ice-cream—oh, lots and lots of ice-cream, for she was going to the Wishing Post and she would never come back till she had grown up.
Chapter IV
They flew and flew and flew. Maida could look out of her window and see the lights in houses far beneath. By and by the sky turned gray, little streaks of silver began to appear and the stars overhead grew pale. The streaks of silver turned to pink, to crimson, and then a huge red ball of fire seemed to shoot up out of the sea and hang in the East. “What is it?” asked Maida. She was quite surprised when the Man with the Growly Voice told her it was the sun. She had never seen the sun look like that—for never before had she been awake at sunrise. Over great lakes they sailed, and over forests of pines and ranges of high mountains, but there were no more cities and towns, only tents with Indians standing about them. And all the time the Man with the Growly Voice stood beside the wheel, steering the airship and looking straight ahead; you know how careful papa has to be when he takes you out in his auto car? Well—it’s just like that when one is sailing a flying machine, only it’s harder because an auto can only turn to the right or left, and if anything happens to the sparking plug or the jibboom, why papa can take the monkey-wrench and the hammer and the saw and the screw-driver and crawl under the auto to fix it. Then when he finds he’s only made it worse he can get a horse to haul you home again.
“When one is sailing a flying machine”
But a flying machine can turn to the right and to the left. Besides that, it can go up or down or sideways or turn over and over, and my goodness, when anything happens to the sparking plug or the jibboom of a flying machine you don’t have time to crawl under and fix it, for it falls and falls—and—oh, it’s “shuddery” to think of such a thing.
Well—Maida knew the Man with the Growly Voice must be tired, and besides it was breakfast time, so she asked him to let her sit by the wheel and steer the flying machine a while:—then he could rest and get breakfast, and of course he did. She was a very proud little girl as she sat there guiding the airship through the air, and before long she began to play a bit.
It was great sport to make a long dip downward and just miss the top of a mountain. It was quite a joke to glide along behind an eagle and take him by surprise and watch him flap his wings madly to get out of the way, as she hooted the horn, “hoot, hoot.” Did I tell you that all flying ships have horns, just like automobiles? Well they do, to warn the birds and frighten the shooting stars away. Oh, she was having a lovely time.