The Motor Boys in the Clouds; or, A Trip for Fame and Fortune

by Clarence Young

  CHAPTER XXVI

  IN A HEAVY STORM

  "Do you apprehend any danger to the ship in case of a storm?" askedProfessor Snodgrass, calling the question to Mr. Glassford, who was nowin the pilot house.

  "Oh, no," was the answer. "I expect we will meet with a storm or twobefore we finish. There are frequently storms in the upper air that donot get down to the earth. But the _Comet_ is well built, and I am notafraid. I hope you are not, professor."

  "Not in the least, but I was thinking that if there was a storm itmight scatter the insects which I hope to capture to illustrate my bookon bugs of the upper air."

  "There are some kind of bugs over on this side, near my window,professor," called Bob.

  "Some more mosquitoes, probably," remarked Jerry as he came back fromthe steering tower, where Mr. Glassford had relieved him.

  "No, they've got funny little fuzzy things on their legs. They're notmosquitoes."

  "Fuzzy things on their legs!" exclaimed the professor. "That is a veryrare form of a katydid, which lives only in the upper air. I must catchsome."

  He hurried to where Bob was, carrying his long-handled net, and he sooncaught more of the odd insects than he cared for. Some he preserved insmall boxes, and the others he released.

  It grew darker and darker as the clouds gathered, until it was difficultto see more than a few hundred feet away from the motor ship. Still Mr.Glassford pressed on, keeping his course due south.

  "I can't see any of the other airships," remarked Ned, trying to peerthrough the gloom.

  "Try the telescope," suggested the inventor, and the lad took a largeone from the rack in the cabin. But even with the aid of the powerfulglass there was nothing to be seen.

  "Better close the cabin windows, light the lamps, and get ready for abad night," said Mr. Glassford presently.

  The boys did so, and soon, with lamps glowing in the cozy little cabin,even though they knew a bad storm was gathering, every one felt safer.

  "I guess it must be supper-time," remarked Bob.

  "Chunky tells by his stomach, not by the clock," commented Jerry. "Allright, Bob, set out the repast, if you like."

  The lad lost no time in complying, having constituted himself cook ofthe motor ship, and a simple but good meal was soon prepared on thegasolene stove.

  "Ned, suppose you take charge in the pilot house while I eat," calledMr. Glassford down the little flight of stairs which led from the maincabin to the steering tower. "All you have to do is keep everythingwhere I leave it, and maintain a course as near south as you can. We'remaking to the west some, as the wind is a little too strong for us, butby changing the angle of the planes we may overcome it a bit."

  Ned, with some anxiety, went to the pilot house, but he had little todo, as most of the machinery was automatic, and he only had to watchthe gages and occasionally move a lever or a wheel.

  "We're still making a little too much west," said Mr. Glassfordanxiously when he again took charge. "I think I'll change our elevationa trifle."

  "Going up or down?" asked Ned.

  "Down, I think. I don't care to be too high up when the storm breaks,as it looks as if it would very soon now."

  Low mutterings of thunder and occasional flashings of lightning boreout this belief. There was no howling of the wind, as there is on earthin a storm, for the reason that the motor ship was being carried rightalong with the gale, being a part of it, so to speak, and it offered noresistance to the air current. Occasionally, when a cross current blewthrough the guy wires and gas bag net, there was a low moaning sound,not very cheerful to hear.

  Mr. Glassford shifted the elevation rudder, and the ship at once pokedher pointed nose toward the earth. It was now very dark, and nothingcould be seen outside of the craft. Still, there was no fear ofcolliding with anything in the upper air, and the pilot might as wellhave closed his eyes, for all he could see ahead of him.

  "Maybe we'll smash into the red balloon," suggested Bob. "It must bebelow and ahead of us."

  "It's very hard to say where it is," remarked Jerry, "but I don'tbelieve there's any danger of a collision. We're only a thousand feethigh now," he added, looking at one of the registers in the cabin.

  "Yes, and we're right over some city," added Ned, opening a cabinwindow and thrusting his head out to take an observation. "I can seethousands of lights underneath us."

  The other boys also looked, and saw below them what seemed to bemillions of tiny fireflies, as they sparkle over a meadow on a Junenight. They were the lights of a large city, and doubtless theinhabitants of it, if they looked up and saw an illuminated bodyshooting across the heavens (for the lights of the motor ship couldplainly be seen from below), imagined that it was a new style of comet,as, indeed, it was.

  Then as Mr. Glassford again shifted the lever of the elevation rudder,the motor ship resumed an even keel and shot along about nine hundredfeet above the earth. It was calmer at this elevation, and though thesigns of the storm did not abate the travelers hoped they might escapethe worst of it.

  But the hope was a vain one. Half an hour later, when the boys werebeginning to think of seeking their bunks, for they were very tiredfrom the day of preparation, the ship suddenly lurched to one side. Itwas such a violent motion that Bob, who was walking across the cabin,was thrown into Jerry's lap, as he sat reading a paper.

  "What's the matter?" cried Professor Snodgrass, looking up from somenotes he was making concerning the latest insects he had captured."Have we landed?"

  "We're in a bad storm," called Mr. Glassford from the steering tower."Jerry, you'll have to come here and help me. I can't manage everythingat once."

  Once more the ship tilted at an unpleasant angle, but Jerry managed tomake his way to the pilot house.

  "Change the planes!" cried Mr. Glassford, and he had to shout to makehis voice heard above the noise of a counter current of wind that wasnow howling through the rigging of wires and wooden braces. "Shift themabout four feet. That may put us on a level keel again," for the motorship was now almost in the position of a sailing ship when she hasnearly been thrown "on her beam-ends" by a heavy blow and the action ofthe waves.

  Jerry shifted the handles manipulating the planes, while Mr. Glassfordsteered the ship to one side to take some of the wind pressure offthe big areas of taut muslin. An instant later the _Comet_ swungaround and floated level. The worth of the aeroplanes had been quicklydemonstrated. Without them the ship could not have been so easilymanaged.

  On and on rushed the motor ship, the powerful propellers fairly pullingher through the air. They had left the lighted city far behind,and were now over what was probably open country, for there was noillumination.

  Suddenly, with a fierceness that was appalling, the storm broke uponthem. There came a dash of rain, accompanied by thunder and lightning,and the fury of the blast fairly bore the craft down.

  "We're falling!" cried Ned as he looked at the hand of the elevationgage and noted that they were steadily approaching the earth.

  "Keep cool!" called Jerry from the pilot house.

  At the same instant the ship shot upward, for Mr. Glassford, realizingthe danger, had shifted the lever to tilt the rudder, and the _Comet_began to ascend. But as they went higher the storm became worse, untilthey were right in the midst of it.

  All at once the wind shifted, and instead of blowing from thenortheast, so as to send the ship in a southeasterly direction, it blewfrom the east, full, driving the travelers to the west.

  "That isn't the way we want to go," remarked Bob. "New Orleans doesn'tlie in that direction."

  "I guess we can't help ourselves," spoke Ned. "It's a bad storm."

  Mr. Glassford tried to shift the planes, so as to counteract thechanging wind, but he had little success.

  "I think I'll go higher," he said to Jerry, who stood beside him in thepilot house. "We may be able to get above the storm."

  He pulled the lever toward him. The ship again tilted her nose towardthe heavens. The speed of the motor was
increased, and the _Comet_fairly trembled throughout her whole frame. Anxiously did the travelerswatch the compass to see if their course would be changed. Up and upshot the airship. Then, with a loud explosion, the motor stopped, andthose in the _Comet_ felt her falling rapidly.

  "Something's broken!" cried Jerry as he hurried from the steering towerto the engine compartment.