“Safety first in airplanes means not to go up at all,” chimed in another.
Don, however, wasn’t paying the slightest attention to these jocular remarks, for the mechanic had his hand on the propeller.
It certainly was a wonderful sensation to the young airman when he felt the machine suddenly begin to move, slowly at first, but rapidly gathering momentum, until, like a high power motor car, it was racing at a speed which made him almost gasp for breath.
Presently the boy gritted his teeth together, and, with a peculiar feeling suggestive of I-wonder-what-is-going-to-happen-next state of mind, pulled back gently on the control stick.
And then, abruptly, he realized that the monoplane was traveling ahead with a most wonderful smoothness. The wind rushed past, lashing and stinging his face with its terrific force, but the heavy goggles prevented his eyes from being affected.
Don Hale glanced over the side of the cockpit, and, a little to his dismay, discovered that he was just skimming a few feet above the surface of the earth.
A quick pull on the control stick sent the monoplane racing aloft, and before the boy, trembling with excitement, could bring it to an even keel he was far above the height limit set by the instructor.
At first Don Hale had been acutely nervous—even fearful and apprehensive. To him it was a very marvelous thing to be actually off the earth, the pilot of a real flying machine. And it scarcely seemed possible that the machine should require so little attention. Like a flash, all the unpleasant feelings that had disturbed him vanished.
Jubilant, exultant, almost ready to shout with the sheer joy of the exhilarating sensations he was experiencing, Don Hale once more looked earthward. How strange the ground looked flying beneath him at incredible speed! How high above it he appeared to be! If anything should happen to his machine a fall from that height might produce most serious results.
With one swift, comprehensive glance, his eyes took in the boys at various points on the field and the planes which, for one reason or another, were resting here and there on the turf. Then his greatest desire and ambition in the world was to descend—to return to that haven of safety.