‘That’s better,’ said Lucius. ‘Do you know, I think it was rather rash to come up in the dark.’
‘Maybe it war,’ admitted Ephraim; ‘but ef we’d tried ter start in the daytime, we’d never hev come up at all.’
‘We should have been stopped, sure enough,’ assented Lucius, who with the absence of motion on the part of the balloon had lost most of the fear which had possessed him at the start. ‘All the same, I think we might as well have waited for the dawn.’
‘I don’t suppose thar’s much risk er a collision up hyar,’ said Ephraim quaintly. ‘I ’magine we’ve got the sky pretty much ter ourselves. But ye won’t hev long ter wait fer dawn on a June night; and meantime, ef we watch the valve we’ll hev no trouble.’
‘That brings us down?’ said Lucius.
‘Ezacly. It’s all jest ez easy ez fallin’ off’n a log, this yer balloonin’. When we want ter git up, ye chuck out a bag of ballast, and when ye want ter come down, ye pull the valve cord and let out a smart lump of gas. That’s about the lot of it.’
‘When we get back to Staunton,’ advised Lucius, ‘you ought to turn professional.’
‘Professional what?’ inquired Ephraim, who was busy setting things to rights in the car by the light of the lantern.
‘Why, professional—what d’ye call him? The man who goes up in balloons.’
‘Airy-nort!’ shouted Ephraim joyously. ‘By time! Luce, thet’s a perfectly grand idee. So I will. I’ll turn airy-nort and take folks up and down fer five dollars the trip. Luce, I’m obleeged ter ye fer thet idee. I p’intedly am.’