ABOVE THE CLOUDS
Mr. Griggs, the American consul at Aden, proved an affable, pleasant
entertainer. His little wife was also very genial and painstaking for
their comforts, declaring at their protests that she was doing no more
for them than she had done for the other flyers when they came through,
a short time before. The couple had two children, a boy and a girl,
and both of these plied the boys with innumerable questions about their
journey, expressing the greatest interest and excitement when they
worked out of Paul the story of the adventure with the gorilla and
python.
After the meal, which was very appetizing and refreshing, they spent a
short time preparing their reports to the _Daily Independent_, and then
accompanied their host to the post-office, where the letter and roll of
films were mailed. At the telegraph office they received a pleasant
surprise in the shape of a message from Mr. Giddings, which stated
their reports were coming in to the newspaper all right, and that the
greatest interest was being manifested in them by the world in general
and by New York people in particular.
"Whatever you do, don't let the other crew beat you," were his
concluding words. "I have ordered the helium shipped to Nukahiva by
fast steamer."
"That's good news," said John, with satisfaction, referring to the
helium, and the others accorded with him.
They dispatched a telegram to Mr. Giddings, and then started out to buy
some fruit and other foods. As they went along the narrow, crooking
street upon which they had been walking they met so many Arabs with
small sprays of dark-green leaves which they put in their mouths and
chewed, that their curiosity was aroused, and Bob asked Mr. Griggs what
the leaves were.
"Those are the leaves of the khat bush," was the response. "You must
have passed numerous plantations of such bushes up on the hillsides as
you flew over into the basin here. The Yemen Arabs like to chew the
leaves so well that they have all of the passion for them that a toper
has for whiskey, and they will spend their last rupee for a small
bundle."
"Does this chewing of the leaves intoxicate them?" asked John.
"Oh, no; the leaves are quite harmless. But they do produce a
strangely exhilarating effect upon those who chew them. If you ask a
Yemen Arab what he chews the leaves for, he will invariably look at you
with astonishment and tell you that he forgets all his troubles, sees
the most beautiful of fairies and the richest rose-gardens of Allah,
and lives in a new world."
"Do they go to the fields after it themselves?" inquired Tom.
"Not at all," said Mr. Griggs; "the khat is brought into town every
morning about eleven o'clock by long caravans of camels which proceed
from the khat farms along the mountain slopes. Long before these
camels appear in the valley, with a bundle of khat swung on each side
of the beasts, messengers on fleeter camels have brought the tidings of
approach. From the shelters of the shops, so silent except just now,
cheerful cries break out; the streets are filled with Arabs who sing
joyfully; tikka gharries rattle madly by, whips waving and turbans
awry; there are flashes of color from rich men's gowns and the sounds
of their clicking oryx-hide sandals as they rapidly strike the stony
pavements; there is a continual blunt clatter from the tom-toms in the
hands of long-gowned fellows. They are all going to the market where
the khat will soon arrive, each one anxious to have first choice and
get the best bargain. There they will bicker with the khat traders for
an hour sometimes, then in will come the despised hadjis, the venders
of firewood, who will buy up for a few pice the scraps which remain."
This was all very interesting to the flyers, but it was high time to
hurry back and resume their flight; so, restraining their impulse to
ask more questions or investigate the attractions of the town, they
bought their supplies, and returned with the American minister to the
landing-field.
Ten minutes later the Sky-Bird was mounting easily up into the sky,
viewed by hundreds of shouting Arabs. It was good-bye to Persia now.
Looking at his watch, Paul, at the throttle, saw that it was
nine-fifty. They were leaving Aden only fifty minutes behind schedule.
That was not at all bad; but it was not pleasant to think that their
rivals were still ahead of them. And two hours was a pretty stiff lead.
They were not long in passing over the hills to the south, and then
headed eastward out over the elongated gulf. Looking back, John saw
the sandhills by the sea glistening in the bright sunlight like mounds
of gold-dust. Every leaf and stem in the scrub stood out in black and
silver filigree; and euphorbias and adeniums, gouty and pompous above
the lower growths, seemed like fantasies of gray on a Japanese screen
covered with cerulean velvet. It was their last sight of Persia, and
one not soon to be forgotten.
Our friends now settled down for a long hop, for they would have to fly
all day and all night before reaching Colombo.
After a while they sighted Socotra, the little isle off the coast of
Cape Guardafui, from whence comes most of the world's supply of
frankincense; then leaving its rocky shores behind them they cut
straight across the Persian Sea, braving whatever tropical storm might
arise.
All that day they swept over the blue waters of this great body,
frequently seeing ships below and sometimes small islands. Toward
night they ran into such hard headwinds that Bob went up higher. He
climbed steadily until the Sky-Bird had attained an altitude of nine
thousand feet. Here, as expected, they found the winds much less
forceful, but the sea was blotted out entirely by the clouds through
which they had passed in the process of rising and which now lay
between.
Indeed, these clouds resembled a billowy ocean of white foam in
themselves, or a landscape covered with hills and valleys of snow. The
rounded cloud contours could easily be likened to the domes of
snow-covered mountains. It was really difficult to conceive that that
amorphous expanse was not actually solid. Here and there flocculent
towers and summits heaved up, piled like mighty snow dumps, toppling
and crushing into one another, as the breezes stirred them.
Then there were tiny wisps of cloud, more delicate and frail than
feathers or the down of a dandelion-blow. Chasms hundreds of feet
deep, sheer columns, and banks, extended almost beyond eye-reach.
Between the flyers and the sun stretched isolated towers of cumulus,
cast up as if erupted by the chaos below. The sunlight, filtering
through this or that gossamer bulk, was scattered into every
conceivable shade and monotone. And around the margins of the heaving
billows the sun's rays played unhampered, unrestricted, outlining all
with edgings of the purest silver.
The scene was one of such extravagance that the brain was staggered
with what the eye tried to register. Below the aviators, the shadow of
their machine pursued them on white film like a grotesque gray bird of
some supernatural region. The shadow followed tirelessly, gaining as
the hour of noon approached, gaining still as afternoon began to
gather, swell, and wane; and always it skipped from crest to crest down
there just below, jumping gulfs like a bewitched phantom.
It was so cold at this height that the aviators had to put on their
heaviest garments, and they were content to open the windows only a
slight way for ventilation.
When darkness fell, they were still flying high, though at reduced
speed, as John was afraid that a rate too much over schedule might
cause them to overrun their destination before daylight could disclose
its outlines to them. Every half-hour the pilot's helper checked up
their position on the chart. Had this not been done from the very
start of the trip, they never could have struck their ports with the
accuracy they did, and disaster would have been the result, if not
death to the crew.
As it was, they had taken every precaution they could. When they had
crossed the Atlantic they had been careful to inflate the four spare
inner tubes of their landing wheels, as these would make capital
life-preservers in case the flyers were thrown into the sea; and one of
the last things they did before leaving Aden was to see that the tubes
were still inflated.
The long night passed with considerable anxiety on the part of Tom and
John, but when dawn finally broke they felt like uttering a "hurrah,"
and called Paul and Bob up from their sleep to witness the cheering
sight ahead of them.
At a distance of what must have been close to fifty miles, was a white
patch in a haziness of green plain surrounded by hills and low
mountains. The land itself was encircled by the sea, and when they saw
a great peninsula spreading away to the northward, they knew that the
island was Ceylon, and the other land the peninsula of Hindustan.
Somewhat off their course, they wheeled a little north. Soon details
became apparent in the island. The white patch grew, developing into a
considerable town--Colombo.
They swept up and around it, then settled, and climbed stiffly out of
the Sky-Bird not twenty yards from another airplane, about which four
men in flying-suits had been working. These fellows looked toward the
new arrivals scowlingly.
But our flyers, overjoyed to think they had caught the _Clarion's_
crew, only smiled back indulgently.