"I don'd know vere he iss. Iss he on der groundt? Himmelblitzen! Oof anyt'ing has habbened mit Tick——"
"Dick?" shouted Matt. "I say, Dick!"
There was no answer, and a sickening sensation sped along the young motorist's nerves.
Turning again, he stared with frenzied eyes toward the ground near the tree. With an exclamation of thankfulness, he saw nothing there to justify his worst fears.
The tree was a live oak and thickly covered with Spanish moss. Dick could very easily be somewhere in the tree and yet out of sight. Certainly, although unconscious and not able to answer, he must have been caught and held among the branches.
"Is your position a safe one, Carl?" queried Matt.
"Veil, oof I don't hang on mit bot' handts und my eye vinkers I vill be on der groundt in some heaps."
"Hang on, then, and stay right where you are. I'm going to look for Dick."
One of the mooring ropes was close to Matt. Carefully he took his knife from his pocket and severed the rope; then, making one end fast to the tree limb, he clung to it while he got out from under the iron guard rail. Presently he was able to stand upright on the limb and peer about him through the trailing streamers of moss. He could not see Dick, but he did see something that impressed him powerfully. The Hawk, in one brief minute, had been relegated from the ranks of successful air ships into a mere mass of junk, wedged into the branches of the oak.
The gas bag was almost entirely deflated and looped itself over the bent and broken limbs. The silken envelope was hopelessly torn and much of it in rags.