The water of the bay seemed leaping upward, catching at their wheels, but the ship’s nose raised and the defeated bay dropped away below them. King slipped into the seat, revivified the congealed Cross with a triumphant smile and went after altitude.
With a thousand feet under them, he gave Cross the wheel again, mounted the wing and poured the other can into the tank.
Then he turned the plane toward Long Island and safety. The biplane winged on ahead. King followed slowly. He had to stretch that gas and slow speed was the only way to do it. Once, remembering his passengers, he turned around to smile reassuringly into the cabin where the board of directors sat. One of them was unconscious; two others ministered to him, but Mr. Winship met King’s eye.
The dignified financier shook hands with himself in most fervent pantomime. King Horn looked sideways at the still blanched countenance of Franklin Cross. Cross had been game enough in the pinch but now he was not far from fainting.
“This transport business is great stuff,” King Horn confided, “but I don’t know that my nerves will stand it.”
“Great work,” Cross said with a shiver.
King Horn grinned. “Sinful recklessness,” he declared. “I’d have risked a forced landing if I’d still been in the stunt business.”
“You aren’t in the stunt business.”
“Think the old man will give me a job?”
Franklin Cross nodded stiffly.