As he did so his trained ear detected an unaccustomed sound. The rythmic roar of the motor was giving place to a decidedly jerky splutter. Greatly retarding the spark, he attempted to coax the engine to pick up; juggling with the throttle produced no satisfactory result. The "revs" grew slower and more erratic, until Alec realized that there was nothing for it but to come down.
The floats struck the water with considerable force. The struts whipped and groaned, but withstood the severe strain. The Cormorant had alighted safely, but was beginning to drift steadily before the breeze.
"At this rate she'll put me ashore at Ni Telang," thought Alec, as he took off his gloves, pushed back his goggles, and prepared for a determined attempt to trace the fault.
He located it quickly enough, but the knowledge disconcerted him. The magneto had shorted. Possibly the damage had been caused during the gale, but, by one of those extraordinary pranks that magnetos will play, it had functioned perfectly for several hours before "going West".
Claverhouse clambered down to one of the floats and lit a cigarette.
"There's one blessing," he observed to the empty expanse of sea: "Ni Telang in 1920 isn't Ostend in 1917. But I'll have to pitch a yarn to von Giespert, or he'll smell a rat. Wonder what'll happen, though, if I miss the island altogether?"
At the end of two hours drift he was able to reassure himself on that score. Unless there were a decided shift of wind the Cormorant would hit Ni Telang or the reef surrounding it. He did not fancy the latter locality. Even viewed from a great height the surf did not appear inviting.
"If I could only steer the old bus, I'd make the entrance to the lagoon," he decided.
Juggling with the ailerons seemed a likely solution, but the only result was to cause the machine to dip and have a tendency to turn broadside on. The hydro rudder, by which the Cormorant could be turned when taxi-ing on the surface, was inadequate while drifting at slow speed.
"The old bus is done for in any case," he soliloquized, and, armed with a knife, wire-cutters, and pliers he made his way out on one of the planes and removed the starboard aileron. This he lashed to a dismantled strut, and on taking the improvised paddle to the after float he found that he could keep the sea-plane fairly under control with the clumsy steering-oar.