Crack! Crack! Crack!
No! It never could be reached in safety!
A sharp, startling snap sounded almost at the feet of the aviator's son—a stone had been splintered—shattered, and the fragments narrowly missed him.
Don Hale was puffing harder and harder with the strenuous exertion; his heart seemed to beat with alarming force; a painful dryness had come into his throat. The boy could see Dunstan on his left; Chase on his right; both, like himself, striving with all the energy and determination they possessed to get out of the danger zone.
Crack! Crack!
Suddenly Chase tripped and went sprawling—down he was on his knees, his arms outstretched before him.
Don Hale groaned. To his excited, overwrought imagination, one of them at least had ended his part in the game of life and death.
Notwithstanding an almost irresistible impulse to keep on running, a desperate, flying leap sent him to the other side.
"Chase—Chase!" he gasped, hoarsely. "Chase!"
The other was beginning to scramble up.