The war had by this time begun to pall upon the boys, and Alan voiced
the sentiments of all four when he said:
“I’m sick of all this treachery, thunder of cannon, wails from the
wretched common people and indiscriminate bloodshed. The United States
is good enough for yours truly, and I wish that I was there right now.”
So it was decided that the _Ocean Flyer_ be headed homeward without
further delay and, after bidding good-bye to the genial von Schleinitz
and Racoszky and his courageous little wife, the boys early one morning
started their engines and let the hectic life of Vienna sink into a
miniature panorama far beneath them.
The course was set northwesterly and a spanking breeze in a murky sky
accelerated their speed.
“Off for America again at last!” shouted Bob jubilantly, and the other
boys echoed him in three rousing cheers.
By ten o’clock, however, there was a marked change in the atmosphere.
The barometer fell low in the glass, and every delicate instrument in
the pilot room gave ominous indications of nasty weather.
Ned’s face showed his worry, but he forced a cheerful smile before his
chums.
“It will blow over, I am sure,” he said.
The _Flyer_ was being held to an elevation of perhaps 2,500 feet. The
lower cloud banks cut off all view of the world beneath, and Alan
suggested that they descend to a lower level where, although they
might feel the effects of the rainstorm from the clouds, the rapidly
increasing velocity of the wind would not hold them so surely in its
grip.
Ned listened to the demoniacal shrieks of the wind as the _Flyer_
scudded along, and was not slow to acknowledge the common sense of
Alan’s advice. So the airship was dropped down to a considerably lower
level below the clouds.
In that region a terrible storm was raging. The thunder burst in
crashes that seemed louder than ten thousand cannon. The air vibrated
with the shocks. Appalling zigzags of lightning shot yellow across the
sky. The rain fell in torrents from an inky sky and dashed dismally
against the metal sides of the speeding airship.
Being mistrustful of air eddies or whirlpool currents as a result of
the hurricane, Ned reduced the _Flyer’s_ speed to the minimum. As he
wisely observed, “No use taking unnecessary chances.”
Thus the big vessel fled before the storm for half an hour or more
when, with astonishing suddenness, the reverberations of thunder ceased
and the sun turned the rainfall into a fog so dense that it seemed that
the _Flyer_ was cutting its way through a solid substance. It became so
dark inside that the boys had to turn on the electric lights.
“I don’t like this at all,” muttered Ned at last, as he strained his
eyes through the mist-clouded observation-port.
“Well, anyway, we aren’t flying low enough to hit any trees or church
steeples,” grinned Bob.
“No, but all the same I don’t like to keep going even this slowly
through vapor as thick as this is. If I could only see the character of
the ground below, I’d try to make a landing.”
The earth, however, continued wholly shrouded and Ned had to hold on
his unwilling way.
It was perhaps a quarter of an hour later that Buck, who had been
calculating at the speedometer, and referring to various charts,
announced that the _Ocean Flyer_ was probably over northern Germany.
Shortly afterward the increasing strength of the sun’s rays began to
dissipate the fog, which assumed fantastic forms that writhed and
squirmed as they floated away into nothingness. It amused the boys to
pick out these patches of mist and to note their outline resemblance to
one animal or another.
“There’s a cow!” laughed Bob, pointing.
“And over there is a giraffe--see his long neck?”
“Look straight ahead, boys, and see the bologna sausage,” called Ned
from his station at the wheel.
Sure enough--there it was, gigantic and dull gray, directly ahead
of them. But strange to say, while it kept moving along in the same
direction as the _Flyer_, it did not soon dissolve into thin air.
Instead of that it took vast tangible form. Other vapor forms began
to appear transparent beside it. The vague outlines of complicated
rigging extending down from the sausage became easily apparent. Then a
suspended metal body, punctured with many windows, appeared.
By this time the speeding _Ocean Flyer_ was almost upon it, and only
Ned’s presence of mind in veering the huge right side planes abruptly
averted a sure collision. The _Flyer_ swept down past the other huge
voyager of the sky at an acute angle and did not right itself until a
considerable distance below.
“Holy smoke!” gasped Bob. “What is that curious looking thing?”
Ned was deadly pale, but his lips were pressed grimly together.
“That, boys,” said he, “is one of the famous German armored Zeppelins.
Look up there to the left--three more of them sailing close together.
See over there to the right--two more of them. I can see more flitting
along down below us, and I think that there are more ahead. We have
descended into the very midst of them. Look out for trouble now,
because I’ll bet dollars to doughnuts that this is the long-dreaded
aerial raid upon England!”