Or was he watching and seeing nothing—in which case it would be proved that the invention, when put to practical test in the air, was a failure.
A further thousand yards away I proceeded, and thrice again Roseye pulled over the switch, peering down below, as though in order to try and get sight of the flashes of electricity behind that convenient laurel bush.
For a few moments I made a rapid spiral ascent until I judged that I was a full three thousand yards in a westerly direction from the church steeple.
Then I myself made the contact with our apparatus, directing the intensely powerful current towards the church.
Thrice I repeated it. Then, once more I went back to a thousand yards, and again switched on the current. Afterwards I made two rapid “shorts” with the searchlight, to indicate to my friend that I had finished and, turning tail, set forth straight back to try and find the spot where old Theed had lit the acetylene lamps to mark the field wherein we could land.
Being so late, all lights of the villages were now practically extinguished except railway signal-lights.
In consequence, a great difficulty confronted me.
With Roseye seated at my side, motionless and wondering whether our experiments had proved successful, I flew on until, of a sudden, we entered a second bank of cloud, all the vista before and below us becoming obscured. Since we had started some drifting clouds had blown across, and in one of these we now found ourselves. To rise higher would mean that I could not pick up any landmarks, or perhaps not see the flares awaiting us.
We knew that young Theed had found Teddy with the car, for he had flashed on his electric headlights three times to us as signal.
I confess that, at the moment, I became greatly puzzled for, on emerging from the cloud, I found myself over a big patch of forest, with rising ground behind it. My altimeter showed three thousand three hundred feet, and before me were other clouds drifting rapidly in my direction.