Far in the rear the Sphere shone brightly, like a beacon. Between it and himself he could see the professor’s lantern bobbing up and down as he strode along.
As he continued bewilderedly to search the sands for some sign of Taggert, his eyes became better accustomed to the semi-darkness.
Suddenly he descried a long dark shape lying in the sand several rods away.
He approached it cautiously, only to discover what seemed to be a large log. But as he looked up another dark object ahead caught his eye. Surely that looked like the figure of a man sprawled upon the sand. Even as he looked, it moved and struggled to a sitting posture.
“Hello—that you, Taggert, old fellow?” he sang out, approaching.
“It’s me all right,” came Taggert’s voice, weakly.
“What happened to you?”
“Fell over that dashed boulder back there. About knocked the wind out of me. I must have been going about forty miles an hour,” he explained, getting to his feet with Robert’s assistance.
“What are you two up to?” cried Professor Palmer, coming up with them.
“Our stowaway just tried to break his neck over a log back there.”