While Vernon was tugging breathlessly at the ropes, Dave noted that the machine was due to land with a terrific shock inside of two minutes. It just grazed the tops of some tall trees. Then it missed a flagpole in the center of some private grounds.
“Shut off the power, or we are lost!” cried Dave.
Brackett had just enough sense left to obey him, but that did not prevent a catastrophe. They were just passing near some glass-covered hothouses. The first one they skidded. At the second one the head of the machine ripped the top row of glasses out of place like a toboggan shoe splintering a stretch of thin ice. Then the under floats tangled in the frame work, and Dave bore company with the others in a dive into a bed of geraniums.
The shock of even that soft landing place was sufficient to half stun our hero for the moment. In a dim blur of vision he seemed to see two figures limping away. He caught sight of the machine lying half-way through a frail trellis. Then he heard these startled words in an unfamiliar voice:
“Hello! I say, what’s this?”
Dave looked up to see a man in gardener’s garb staring in turn at himself, the Gossamer, and the havoc the machine had made.
“If you’ll help me up,” said Dave, rather faintly; “I’ll try to explain.”
“You’ll have to!” cried the gardener. “Who ever heard of such a thing? Get up, but don’t you try to run away from all the mischief you’ve done.”
“Hardly,” promised Dave, as the man cut the ropes securing him. “How badly is the machine damaged?”
“How badly are my greenhouses damaged, you’d better say!” shouted the man. “Say, who’s to pay for all this wreck and ruin?”