A MESSAGE FOR HELP
“What sort of stunts are you going to try, Jerry?” asked Ned, as the
tall lad hurried here and there about the _Comet_, looking to see that
all the machinery was properly adjusted.
“Oh, I don’t know. We’ll go up quite a distance--higher than any of the
craft they have here, I guess, and we’ll do some aerial evolutions.
Then I thought we might show them how we can change from a dirigible to
an aeroplane and back again, in mid-air, by letting the gas out of the
bag, and filling it again.”
“That’s a good idea.”
“Why don’t you demonstrate the hydroplanes, too?” asked Bob, who, for
some time now, had not mentioned eating.
“Where’s the water?” inquired Jerry.
“I saw a little lake over in that direction as we were coming down,”
announced the stout lad, pointing toward the left. “It looked big
enough to land on, and even if you can’t scoot across it, and rise from
it, we can go up as a balloon.”
“All right, we’ll do it,” agreed Jerry. “Better tell the secretary that
if the crowd wants to see that stunt they’ll have to hustle over.”
Bob took this information to the official, who came hurrying over from
his office, greatly delighted at the prospect of having some attraction
to take the part on the program that was to have been filled by the
biplane. The secretary had announcements made through megaphones,
concerning the prospective flight of the motor boys, and telling of the
hydroplane feature.
Matters were soon in readiness, and, after a vain search for Professor
Snodgrass, who, the boys thought likely, was off gathering bugs, it was
decided to go up without him.
Up shot the _Comet_ as Jerry turned on the gas. Straight up into the
air she went, for it was as a dirigible balloon that the owners decided
to show their craft’s ability. Then, after doing some intricate figures
at a comparatively low elevation, Jerry went out after a height record.
It is needless to say that he got it, for the barograph registered a
little over three miles when they started to descend. They would not
have had to come down then, only they ran into a cold snowstorm in the
upper regions, and they did not want to take any chances.
When they landed, and the officials gave out the verified figures of
their climb into space there was a hearty cheer. Jerry, with the aid
of his chums, next showed what their craft could do as an aeroplane.
She was sent skimming along the ground on the bicycle wheels, and, when
enough momentum had been acquired, the steersman tilted the elevation
rudder and up soared the _Comet_ again.
This time the stunt of sailing along as an aeroplane, suddenly stopping
the propellers, and changing to the form of a dirigible balloon was
successfully accomplished, to the delight of the watching throng.
“Now for the hydroplanes!” Jerry announced to Bob and Ned, giving the
signal agreed upon to those below. The press of people made a rush for
the little lake about half a mile distant, and the boys waited until
most of the crowd lined the shores before starting toward it.
Then, after sailing swiftly above the surface of the water Jerry
suddenly began a descent. While Bob and Ned managed the craft Jerry
stood ready at the hydroplane levers.
“Tell me when to shunt them into place,” he called to Bob who was on
the lookout.
“Now!” suddenly shouted the stout lad.
The lever snapped forward, the floats on the toggle-jointed arms went
downward, while the bicycle wheels came up and, a moment later, the
_Comet_ was afloat.
A cheer went up from the crowd, and there was continued hearty applause
for a feat that has seldom been seen, save very recently in airship
circles.
Jerry put the craft slowly about on the lake, and then as it was
drawing toward noon, when other aeroplane “stunts” would be the order
of the day, and as they were anxious to see if they could sight Mr.
Jackson returning, it was decided to go back to the aviation park.
Another cheer greeted the ability of our heroes, as they headed their
craft for the park, and the crowd streamed back below them.
“See anything of the dirigible?” asked Jerry, as Ned was anxiously
scanning the air all about them.
“No,” was the somewhat despondent answer. “Mr. Jackson’s machine
doesn’t appear to be in sight.”
“Try with the glasses,” suggested the tall lad, passing to the
merchant’s son a pair of powerful binoculars. “Maybe you can pick him
up with those.”
Ned swept the horizon, and pointed the glasses to the zenith, taking in
all the intervening space as well as he could. But the sight of a black
speck, which could be focussed into a dirigible balloon, did not greet
his eyes.
“Oh, well, he’ll come back sooner or later,” declared Jerry. “Perhaps
he went farther than he intended to.”
“Sure, he’ll come back,” added Bob. “We do seem to have the greatest
luck missing that man. Everywhere we go we are just too late.”
“I hope not this time,” said Ned in a low voice. “The only thing that’s
worrying me is that he may have met with some accident, and----”
“Oh, nonsense!” exclaimed Jerry. “If there had been an accident we’d
have heard of it. The grounds here are connected by telegraph with New
York City and the whole country for that matter. In fact we’re only a
few miles from New York. We must try a trip across it before we go back
to Cresville.”
“That’ll make the people in the skyscrapers look out of the windows and
get stiff necks,” predicted Bob with a laugh.
As they landed and made fast their craft, in a sheltered space set
aside for them by the secretary of the meet, the boys were aware of
some excitement around a small building near the committee offices.
“What’s going on over there I wonder?” asked Ned, as he saw a crowd
running toward it, and surrounding a man in his shirt sleeves, who held
a paper in his hand.
“We’ll go over and see,” suggested Jerry. “Maybe Professor Snodgrass
has just discovered a pink flea on a yellow dog, or has picked some new
kind of July bug from a lady’s hat.”
As they neared the place they saw by a sign on the temporary wooden
building that it was a telegraph office, and also one where wireless
messages could be received and sent.
“It’s news from somewhere, evidently,” commented Ned.
They pushed their way through the press of people.
“What is it?” cried several. “Read it to us!”
“I will, if you’ll be quiet,” answered the man with the fluttering
paper in his hand. “This is a wireless message I just received from Mr.
Wescott Jackson. It was sent from his dirigible balloon _Manhattan_.”
“Read it!” cried the impatient throng.
“Here it is!” went on the man, and read as follows:
“‘We are disabled and are being blown out to sea in the grip of an
upper-air hurricane! Send help, if possible!’”