Jack Darrow had to decide quickly—and he must determine which of the two risks to take.
Speedy as theSnowbirdwas, she could not get out from under the shadow of the strange aeroplane. That was driven at a sharp angle down upon the boys' flying machine, and it seemed to all those in the lower 'plane that a collision was imminent.
The thunder fairly deafened them all. Around them rolled the mists and the wind shrieked through the stays of the aeroplane and shook the structure like a dog worrying a bone.
Down they fell, and in an instant the rushing rain, emptied in a torrent from the clouds, swept about them, saturating their garments and beating the flying machine itself toward the distant earth.
During the next few moments Jack Darrow, Mark Sampson, and their companions were in as grave peril as had ever threatened them in their eventful lives.
The torrents of water all but beat the flying machine to the earth—and to be dashed down from such a height spelled death to all and destruction to the aeroplane.
Jack, however, had been taught to keep cool in moments of danger, and he realized that their lives depended entirely upon his handling of the great machine. They had descended below the level of the storm-cloud at a most inopportune moment. They were caught in the midst of a veritable cloudburst.
Shaken desperately by the wind, and beaten upon by tons upon tons of water, it was a wonder that the great planes, or wings, of the flying machine were not torn away. All Jack could do was to guide her the best he could, and all his companions could do was to cling to a slender hope and endure the lashing of the gale.
But Jack Darrow did not propose to be cast to the ground—and the flying machine and his friends with him—without some further attempt to avert such a catastrophe.
After the first breath-taking rush of the storm he diverted the course of the machine again upward. He could scarcely see, the driving rain was so blinding; nor could he observe the indicators before him with any clearness. But he was quite sure that the enemy that had driven him down into the storm-cloud could see theSnowbirdno better than he could see that strange aeroplane that had threatened to collide with them.
So he shot theSnowbirdupward again at a long slant, and put on all the power of the engine to drive her onward. The flying machine shook and throbbed in every part. The power of the engines would have driven her, under other and more favorable conditions, at more than one hundred miles an hour—possibly a hundred and twenty-five.
Jack himself was almost blinded and deafened. He was strapped to his seat, so could give both hands to the work of manipulating the levers. He brought theSnowbirdthrough the cloud and—with startling suddenness—they shot out of the mass of rolling moisture and into the sunlight of the dawn. But they were far off their course.
The change from the chaos of the storm-cloud to the almost perfect calm of the upper ether was so great that it was almost stunning. For a minute none of the five spoke a word.
Then it was Mark who shouted:
"There's that 'plane again, Jack I Look out for her!"
The enemy had missed them. She was some miles away, and although still on a level above, at the pace theSnowbirdwas now traveling it would take a fast flying machine indeed to overtake her.
The pursuit of the enemy (which they all believed to be the smuggler, manned by Bainbridge and his friends) was not kept up for long. By eight o'clock theSnowbirdhad dropped the other machine below the horizon, and the swift pace at which they had driven theSnowbirdwas rapidly bringing them once more toward Canada.
The storm had broken, but the clouds still hovered below them. They descended about noon, passing harmlessly through the vapor which had so long hidden the earth from them, and so came to within a thousand feet of the ground, where they swung along at fair speed for some hours.
They crossed the line, but did not descend until near St. Thomas. They went out of their way a good bit to land near this town on the shore of the St. Lawrence, for the flying machine had been so shaken in its struggle with the thunderstorm that some repairs were needed.
They descended in a field on the edge of the town, gave the farmer who owned the place a five-dollar bill to allow the machine to stand on his land, and then engaged him to drive Professor Henderson and the boys into town.
While the professor saw the authorities and obtained a legal document recommending the exploring party to the good offices of all British-Canadian officers whom they might meet, the boys went to a machine shop to have a rod repaired. The party took supper with the farmer, and an hour later the flying machine being pronounced by both Mark and Jack in perfect order, they got off amid the cheers of the onlookers, whose numbers were by that time swelled to almost five hundred persons.
It was long after dark and the moon had not risen. It was a cloudless night, however, and as the flying machine soared heavenward the voyagers could look deep into the seeming black-velvet of the skies, picked out by the innumerable sparkling stars, and thought they had never seen so wonderful or beautiful a sight.
As they cast their gaze downward, too, they beheld the torches at the Canadian farm rapidly receding, and then, in a few minutes, they were flying over St. Thomas, where the lights twinkled, too. Then they shot over the broad, island-dotted bosom of the St. Lawrence River, and so on across country and town toward the vast Canadian wilderness.
The professor and Andy had the watch and Jack and Mark went to bed. The excitement of the previous twenty-four hours had kept the boys up; but once they closed their eyes, they slept like logs all night. Andy Sudds relieved the professor now and then in the operator's seat, and they did not call the boys until Washington White made breakfast at daybreak. By that time theSnowbirdhad passed Lake St. John, far to the north and east, and was heading for Hudson Bay. The earth below them was a checker-board of forest and field, with here and there a ribbon of river, and occasionally a group of farmsteads, or a small town. Suddenly they were forced down, and had to remain many hours for repair work before ascending again.
The ranges of hills—some of them dignified enough to be termed "mountains"—which they crossed necessitated their flying high. They were generally at an altitude of two thousand feet and the rarefied atmosphere so far above the earth was cool, anyway. Since leaving St. Thomas, on the bank of the St. Lawrence, they had averaged eighty miles an hour, and before moonrise they were cognizant of the fact that they were approaching a great sheet of water.
"St. James Bay, the lower part of Hudson Bay," Professor Henderson explained.
Soon the moonlight shimmered upon the waves beneath them. Jack, who was guiding the craft, deflected the wings and they slid down the airways toward the water. They traveled all night over this great inland sea, at times so close to the surface that the leaping waves sprinkled them with their spray—for there was a stiff breeze.
A gale broke in earnest over the Hudson Bay territory that day, and despite the efforts of the voyagers they could not rise in theSnowbirdabove the tempest. Had there been solid ground beneath them they could easily have descended and remained upon terra firma until the storm was past.
This gale was favorable to their course, but it gripped them in its giant grasp and hurled them on into the northwest at a speed that imperiled the safety of the flying machine each moment. There was no sleep for any of the party now, and Washington White came pretty near (as Jack said) "making good his name in his face"—for if ever a darkey of Wash's ebony complexion turned pale, the professor's servant did so at this juncture.
On and on they were driven hour after hour. Scarcely a word was spoken the entire time. There was no cessation of the gale. The great body of water was passed and they knew that there was land beneath them again. But each time they tried to descend they found the storm near the earth-crust far heavier than at the upper levels.
To descend through the belt of the storm might partially wreck their flying machine and the professor knew, by the study of his recording instruments, that they were passing over an utter wilderness in which no help could be obtained and from which, should they be wrecked, they could not escape before the rigorous Arctic winter set in.
Hour after hour they drove on. The speed of theSnowbirdat times, when driven by the full force of the gale, had mounted to one hundred thirty miles an hour.
Great Slave Lake was far south of their route; yet the professor told them that, had it been clear, at the altitude they traveled, they could have seen and marked this great body of water.
They actually crossed the Great Bear Lake and the Mackenzie River, however, and saw the ragged peaks of the Rocky Mountains, which here almost touch the shores of the Arctic Sea. Blown on and on, with little diminution of speed, it was not many hours before theSnowbirdwas flying over Alaskan wilds. The flying machine had kept closely to the course the professor had laid out for her when they left Maine. They were still headed for the slopes of the Endicott Range and the native town of Aleukan.
The question paramount in all their minds, however, was this: Would they reach their destination in safety?
A thick mantle of fog masked the heavens; but beneath this the wind—traveling at great velocity—drove the ragged clouds like frightened sheep across the pastures of the firmament.
The moon and stars gave so little light that the earth seemed but a vague and shadowy mass—nothing more. The wind shrieked in many voices, as though a troop of goblins raced through the air, or rode the strangely formed and hurrying clouds.
Driven on with the tumbling banks of vapor, as vaguely outlined in the gloom as the clouds themselves, was the great flying machine, which the wind buffeted and harried about as though against it Old Boreas had some special spite.
Jack was in the operator's seat; but there was little to do but hang on to the steering wheel. The wind blew them as it listed.
"I don't well see how anybody can sleep in this horrid storm," complained Mark Sampson. "And the machine rocks so—ugh! I'm as sick as though we were at sea." "And we are pretty completely 'at sea,'" chuckled the more volatile Jack. "I hope the professor knows where we are.Idon't!"
"And I don't see how he can tell," grumbled his chum.
"Pluck up your spirits, old man!" returned the older lad, but Mark interrupted him, still crossly:
"I hope I am as courageous as the next. We've done some funny stunts together, Jack Darrow—you and I and the old professor. But this caps them all, I declare. It's a mystery to me how Mr. Henderson and Andy Sudds can remain asleep."
"Well, they are both tired out, I reckon. They had a long watch—andweslept, you know."
"That was a long time ago," grunted Mark,
"It's pretty tough, I admit," said Jack, when Washington White broke in with:
"Hi, yi! Whuffo' you boys be sech cowards? IsIskeert? Huh!"
"You bet you're scared," returned Jack, emphatically. "When we got caught in that flaw yesterday afternoon he wanted to jump out; didn't he, Mark?"
"Wash certainly tried to climb out," rejoined Mark. "Well, den! dat showed I warn't no coward," crowed the black man, though in a very shaky voice. "If I'd been scart', would I really have wanted ter jump? It was a might long way to de groun' right den, I guess."
Suddenly the Shanghai crowed loudly. "Tell yo' what!" cried the black man, scratching his head. "Dat rooster done crow fo' company."
"Company!" gasped Mark. "What does he think he hears up here—angels' wings? We're about as near being in the company of the celestial hosts as we'll ever be and remain alive, I reckon."
"No, sah!" retorted Washington. "Dat Shanghai done know dat we is near some oder fow-el——"
"Up here in the air, Wash?" cried Jack.
"Dunno whar dey is," said the darkey, doggedly. "Dar he crows ergin!Dar is suttenly critters ob his kind nearby—yes—sah!"
It may have been the Shanghai's raucous tone that aroused Andy. The old hunter suddenly appeared on the platform behind the operator's seat, where the boys and Wash were clinging, and Andy brought his rifle with him.
"Hullo!" he said. "Is the watch called?"
"I'm sorry if we awoke you, Andy," Jack said. "There is nothing for you to do."
"Nothing to shoot at; eh?" said the old hunter. "I reckon I ain't of much use in a flying machine, anyway. Sort of 'up in the air'; ain't I?"
"That's where we all are," complained Mark. "And I, for one, wish we were down again."
"Guess we're all with you in that wish, old man," agreed Jack.
As he spoke, the wind-blown figure of the professor hove into view from the small, sheltered cabin. He glanced at the various indicators and the compass in front of Jack.
"We are all in safety yet; are we, boys?" he queried.
"If you can call being driven helplessly before such a gale and about a mile above the earthsafe," retorted Mark.
"Surely not as high as that," exclaimed Professor Henderson. He examined the instruments again, and said, quickly: "We are descending! How is that, Jack?"
"Not with my knowledge, sir," returned the boy aviator. "I think we have remained on the thousand-foot level since crossing the Rocky Mountains."
"I believe you have been faithful, my boy," returned the professor, quickly. "But the earth is certainly less than three hundred feet below us—ah! see that? The indicator registers 250 feet. Now 240!" "We are falling!" cried Mark.
"No!" said the professor. "The earth is rising. We are being blown against the mountainside. We must be within a few hundred miles, at least, of our destination. Those are the Endicott Mountains yonder," and he waved a hand at the darkness to the south of them.
"Hark!" cried Andy Sudds, suddenly.
There was a momentary lull in the wind. From below came the broken crowing of a cock in answer to the Shanghai's challenge. Then a dog barked.
"There's a farmhouse down there," said the hunter.
"What did I tell yo'?" cried Washington White. "Dat Buttsy knows his business, all right!"
"We must descend," commanded the professor. "Deflect the planes, Jack. Watch the indicator. Reduce the speed. Let us float down as easily as possible."
But, wrestling as the flying machine was with the wind, she could not descend easily. She scaled earthward with fearful velocity. The irrepressible Jack yelled:
"Go-ing down! We're going to bump hard in a minute!"
The aged professor and Andy Sudds showed no perturbation. Jack andMark had been through so many wonderful experiences with the professor,Andy, and the negro, that they were not likely to be panic-stricken. Yetall realized that death was imminent.
The finger on the dial showed a hundred feet from earth, and still they descended. Fifty feet!
"Hold hard!" commanded the professor. "We'll be down in a minute."
There seemed to be a break in the hurrying clouds. There was light in the sky—the twilight of the Long Day, for they were far beyond the Arctic Circle.
Looking down they could dimly see objects on the earth—trees, a house of some kind—several houses, in fact.
And then suddenly there was added to their perils an unlooked-for danger. Out of the murk which covered the earth below the flying machine sprang a point of light and the explosion of a gun echoed in the aviators' ears.
A rifle bullet tore right through to the inside and passed between the professor and Andy Sudds. There were men with firearms below, and they were firing point blank at the flying machine.
As has been said, the boys and their older companions had been in many perilous situations; but no adventure promised to end more tragically than this flight of the huge airship. The descent of theSnowbird, punctuated by the rifle shot below, seemed likely to be fatal to them all.
"What kind of people can they be?" gasped Mark. "They are trying to shoot us."
"Give me my rifle! I'll show 'em!" exclaimed the old hunter.
"You'll do nothing of the kind, Andy," commanded Professor Henderson."Do not make a bad matter worse by yielding to your passions."
A second shot was fired by those upon the ground; but the bullet went wide of the mark. Jack shouted:
"We are drawing away from them. Look out! we all but hit that tree!"
"Steady, Jack," admonished the professor. "We'll be down in a minute, my lads. Cling to anything handy. She will bounce some, but I believe we shall not be injured." The calmness of the aged scientist would have shamed the others into some semblance of order, were it needed; but both the boys were courageous, Andy Sudds did not know fear, and if Washington White was in a panic of terror, he did not get in the way of the others to hamper their movements.
TheSnowbirdwas fluttering over the ground like a wounded bird, while so black were their surroundings that none of the party could distinguish anything of nearby objects. The clouds had broken but little, and only for a moment.
"She's down!" suddenly shouted Mark Sampson, and the flying machine jounced on its rubber-tired wheels, and then struck the ground again almost immediately.
Mark leaped down on one side and Andy Sudds on the other. Instantly, relieved of their weight, the flying machine was carried on again and Mark and Andy were thrown to the ground.
Perhaps that was well, for several rifles were again fired behind them and they heard the bullets whistle above their heads.
"Low bridge, Mark!" cried the old hunter, meaning for the boy to keep close to the earth. "I've got my gun."
"Don't fire on them, Andy," responded young Sampson, remembering the professor's warning. "We don't know who they are or what they mean by their actions."
"We don't want to be shot down without making any fight; do we?" criedAndy.
"Let us escape without a fight if possible," urged the cautious youth, feeling sure that Professor Henderson would approve of this advice.
But the pounding of many feet approaching over the rising ground—evidently, as Mr. Henderson had said, the foothills of the mountain range—warned Mark and the hunter to keep still. In the partial light they saw a group of tall men, all armed, running past them in the direction the woundedSnowbirdhad been blown.
"Hush!" whispered Andy. "Indians!"
Mark had seen their long hair and beardless faces, and believed the hunter was right. The enemy were dressed in clothing of skins and were without hats. Yet Mark knew that the Indians of Alaska were much different from the savages of the western territories of the United States. He did not believe these Alaskan aborigines would attack white men.
It was growing lighter about them every moment. The lad and the tall hunter arose and stood listening for a further alarm—or for some cry from their comrades in the flying machine.
As the light increased they saw that they were in a grove of huge trees. Somehow theSnowbirdhad fluttered away through these forest monarchs and was now out of sight.
"I wonder what's happened to them?" gasped Mark.
"Them Indians haven't attacked yet," growled Andy Sudds. "If they begin to shoot we'll know which way to go, and we'll foller them."
But the first sound they heard came from behind them. There was the crash of heavy footsteps and a big man suddenly came panting up the slope. Cold as it was, his shirt was open at the neck, he was bare-headed, and he had not stopped to pull on his boots when he arose from his bed. In his right hand he carried a battered "fish-horn," and without seeing Mark and Andy he stopped and put this instrument to his lips, blowing a blast that made his eyes bulge and his cheeks turn purple.
"Hold on, Mister!" ejaculated the hunter. "What you got to sell? Or be you callin' the cows?"
"Mercy on me!" cried the fat man, and in a high, squeaky voice that seemed to be a misfit for his huge body. "I am sure I'm glad to meet you. You must have just arrived," and he squinted at the strangely clad hunter and his boy companion, for Mark wore a helmet with ear-tabs.
"We just landed, that's sure," admitted Andy. "From an airship, I fancy," exclaimed the other. "That is what is the matter with my Aleuts, then. They never have seen such a thing as an airship, I'll be bound. Have they hurt any of your party?"
"I don't know," Mark said, hastily. "If you are in command of those Indians, call them off, please. There are three of our party somewhere with the flying machine, and the Indians have been shooting at them."
"I'll try it," declared the man, instantly. "I can usually call them together with this horn," and he raised it to his lips again and blew another mighty blast.
"I have had this bunch of Aleuts six months," he explained, when he got his breath again. "They are good workers, but as superstitious as you can imagine. They are particularly shaky just now, for a number of queer things have happened lately in these parts. There is a volcano somewhere in action—we had a storm of ashes a week ago. And night before last there was a positive earth-shock."
"You seem like a pretty intelligent man," grunted Andy Sudds, in his blunt way. "What are you doing up here in this heaven-forsaken country?"
"Why, I am an oil hunter," said the fat man, simply. "Awhat?" repeated Andy and Mark together.
"Oil hunter. My name is Phineas Roebach, and I am in the employ of the Universal Oil Company. I am here—as I have been in many lands—boring for petroleum. You understand that my mission is semi-secret. If we find oil here we shall obtain a grant from the Government, or something like that."
Just at that moment Mark Sampson was not particularly interested in the odd-looking Mr. Roebach or his business.
"Blow your horn again, sir," he begged. "Call off your Indians. They may shoot our friends."
"If your party is all dressed as peculiarly as yourself, young sir," said Phineas Roebach, "my Aleuts could scarcely be blamed for taking a pot shot at them."
Then he blew the horn mightily for the third time.
The long twilight which preceded full day had now grown so strong as to reveal matters more plainly about the spot where Mark and Andy Sudds had disembarked from the flying machine. They soon saw several objects running through the grove toward them, and these objects proved to be the returning Indians.
There were half a dozen of them, and they were all armed with rifles.The moment they beheld the old hunter and the youth, with PhineasRoebach, they gave every indication of shooting, for they stopped andraised their rifles, pointing them at Mark and Andy.
Mr. Roebach sprang between his Aleuts and his visitors and began to harangue them angrily in their own harsh dialect. However, his huge body so entirely sheltered Mark and Andy that neither was much terrified by the Indians. Besides, the Maine hunter advanced his own rifle and calculated he could do considerable execution with it while the red men were hesitating.
"They believed you all spirits of the air," said the oil man, turning finally to speak to his new friends. "They were much frightened."
"Ask them for news of Professor Henderson and the others," begged the anxious Mark.
"They chased the crippled flying machine for some distance, but did not find it. My horn bade them return," replied Mr. Roebach.
Even as they started to walk with the oil man and his sullen Indians toward various shacks which they saw through the trees, and lower on the mountain side, they heard a hail and looked up to see Professor Henderson, Jack Darrow, and the negro, Washington White, descending the mountain in their rear.
"This is your party; is it?" demanded Mr. Roebach.
"Yes, sir," said Mark.
"Bring them directly to my cabin. The Aleuts will not hurt you, now that they know we are friends."
He hurried away, but Andy handled his rifle very suggestively and kept both eyes on the red men. The latter, however, kept to themselves and only stared at the crew of theSnowbirdwith great curiosity.
"Hurrah!" quoth Jack, when in earshot. "Here they are, safe and sound,Professor!"
"We have been just as afraid that something bad was happening to you," Mark said, quickly. "Where's the machine?" "Your beautiful 'plane is badly wrecked, Mark, my boy," said Professor Henderson. "But I believe we shall be able to repair it in time. We are not, however, I feel sure, far from Aleukan. Do those men speak English?"
"Not much of it, I reckon, Professor," said Andy Sudds. "But they have got mighty nasty dispositions. If it wasn't for the fat man I reckon they would jump on us."
"He told us to follow along to his cabin," Mark proposed. "I do not think these Indians will touch us."
"They'd better think twice about it," said the belligerent Andy, pushing in between the professor and the Aleuts, as the whole party descended the mountain side toward the place where the oil man had pitched his camp.
As they proceeded the light grew and the newcomers to Alaska identified objects about them more clearly. Near at hand was the framework of a boring machine, or derrick. The professor began to notice a deposit of ash that lay thickly on the ground in sheltered places.
"How remarkable—how very remarkable!" he ejaculated. "One would think there was a volcano in action very near here."
Mark repeated what Phineas Roebach had said about the 'quake and the storm of ashes. The professor began to rub his hands together and his eyes twinkled. "I declare! I declare!" he repeated. "A seismic disturbance in this locality? Ah! our visit to Alaska for Dr. Todd may repay us nobly indeed."
Washington White's eyes opened very wide and he demanded:
"What's disher t'ing yo' calls 'sezmik', Professor Henderson? I suah don't understand no sech langwidge."
"He means an earthquake, Wash," said Jack, as the professor paid no attention to the darkey's question.
"Gollyation! is we goin' ter collek anearthquakealong wid dat chrisomela-bypunktater plant? And what good's a nearthquake w'en you got him?"
This unanswerable question of the darkey's fell flat, for the party just then reached the huge, two-roomed log cabin in which Phineas Roebach made his headquarters. The "oil hunter," as he called himself, appeared in a costume more fitted to the rigor of the weather.
"Come right in, gentlemen," was his cordial cry. "I have an Indian woman here who can cook almost as well as white folks. At any rate, she can make coffee and fry bacon. This is Professor Henderson? Glad to meet you, sir," and so went on, being introduced to the whole party.
The professor immediately began to question the oil hunter regarding the exact situation of his camp and learned that they were but a hundred and fifty miles from Aleukan. Phineas Roebach had a plentiful supply of dogs and sleds, too, with a goodly store of provisions. If worse came to worst and the flying machine could not be at once prepared, Mr. Roebach could supply the party with transportation to the Indian settlement where Professor Henderson would meet his own supplies from Coldfoot and there could obtain other dogs and sleds to go on to the valley where theChrysothele-Byzantiumwas supposed to flourish.
"And the road from here to Aleukan is a good one at this season of the year. More than half the way you travel over a glacier, and as the icefield has not been in motion for ages, it makes a fine highroad," the oil hunter declared.
They were discussing these matters during breakfast, and everybody was feeling particularly thankful over the safe descent of the aeroplane, when they were startled by a sudden, jarring shock. The cabin rocked and the boys, at least, felt a qualmishness in the pit of the stomach that forbade further eating.
"What's that?" demanded Andy Sudds.
Washington White dropped the plate he was carrying to the table and ran to the door. Before he could open it, the door was broken in by the Indians, who came pouring in, loudly jabbering in their native tongue.
"A 'quake, sure enough!" ejaculated Phineas Roebach, getting quickly on his feet.
As he spoke, there was a repetition of the shock, only greatly increased. The oil hunter was thrown to the floor, as was everybody else in the house who was not seated. The roof of the cabin creaked and threatened to descend upon their heads.
The Indians, uttering cries of alarm, scrambled out of the cabin faster than they came in. But they had nothing on Washington Whitethere. He was the first person to get through the door.
The white people followed the others in quick time. Jack and Mark felt that if the cabin was going to fall, the open air was the safer place. Here, however, it seemed that they could not keep their feet. They reeled about like drunken men, and the forest trees bent and writhed as though an invisible wind tore at them, whereas the fact was that the wind had fallen and it was a dead calm.
The air about them seemed to rock with the shock, there was a dull roaring sound which hummed continually in their ears, and the vibrations of the earth continued. They were indeed experiencing a most serious earthquake.
The 'quake was over in a very few moments; the Indians and WashingtonWhite, however, cowered upon the ground for some time, crying out theirfear of what they considered supernatural phenomena. Jack Darrow andMark Sampson were not frightened in the same way as the darkey and theAleuts; nevertheless they were much shaken.
Professor Henderson, however, displayed naught but the keenest interest in the scientific side of the happening. He clambered to his feet the moment he could stand, and observed:
"A most pronounced seismic disturbance—I should say earthquake."
"I should say it was pronounced!" grunted Phineas Roebach. Being a fat man, he had fallen heavily. He was now rubbing himself tenderly where he had been bruised upon the hard ground. "This shock beats the one we had the other day."
"Not a shock, my dear sir," said Professor Henderson, quickly. "An earthquake is not, strictly speaking, a shock at all. Within the past twenty years science has learned to measure and to study earthquakes. If we have learned nothing else, we have learned that an earthquake isnota shock."
"It tumbled us about a whole lot, then, Professor," said Jack Darrow."What would you call it, if not a shock?"
The phenomena being over for the time—as all could see—they returned to the cabin to complete their meal. Roebach had said something soothing to his Indians, but they, like Washington White, preferred remaining in the open. Wash sat down beside the cage of his pet rooster, and declared to the boys when they urged him to come in again:
"No, sah! I ain't hongry, nohow. An' w'edder de professor am right dat dese yer earthquakes ain't shockin', I kin tell yo' right now dat it shockedme! Nor I ain't gwine ter gib it no secon' chance ter tumble dat ruff down on ma haid—no, sah!"
Once more at the breakfast table, with the affrighted Indian squaw waiting upon them, the professor took up the topic of earthquakes again, in answer to Jack's observation.
"From the time of the ancients to the middle of the last century the phenomena of earthquakes were observed and described upon countless occasions," he said. "Yet even Humboldt's 'Cosmos', published as late as 1844, which summarized the then existing knowledge on the subject, did not suggest that earthquakes should be studied like other mechanical motions.
"The effects of the great Neapolitan earthquake of 1857 were so studied by Mr. Robert Mallet," continued the professor. "He disabused his mind of all superstition, threw away all the past mysteries, and attacked the problem from its mechanical side only. He believed that an earthquake was a series of shocks, or blows; but what he learned led other and later students to the discovery that an earthquake is not made up of blows at all."
"That's all very well to say," grumbled Mr. Roebach. "I'm pretty solid on my feet; but what was it but a shock that threw me down? Tell me that, sir!"
"Very easily explained," said the scientist, smiling. "Which will the quicker take you off your feet—a blow from, say, Jack's fist, or your stepping inadvertently upon a piece of glare ice? The ice, because it affords you so insecure a footing, is likely to throw you easier than a pretty solid blow; eh?"
"True enough," admitted the oil hunter, smiling at Jack. "Although Darrow looks to be a pretty husky youngster." "My point is this," pursued the professor. "An earthquake is a continuous series of intricate twistings and oscillations in all possible directions, up and down, east and west, north and south, of the greatest irregularity both in intensity and direction. This writhing of the earth—of the very foundations of the ground we walk on—caused our recent overthrow," concluded Mr. Henderson.
But the two boys were much more interested in the possibility of there being an active volcano in the neighborhood. The volcanic ash which covered the leaves and grass like road-dust assured them all that some huge "blow-hole" of the earth was near.
"I wasn't looking for no such things as volcanoes," said Andy Sudds, seriously, "when I shipped for this voyage. I reckoned volcanoes blowed mostly in the tropics."
"Alaska is a mighty field of active volcanoes," declared Professor Henderson. "But they have been mostly active on the Pacific coast, and among the islands which form a barrier between that ocean and Bering Sea. Islands have been thrown up, while others have sunk there because of volcanic disturbances, within the last few years."
"And I presume the earthquake and the volcanic eruption are closely connected?" suggested Mark.
"We may safely believe that," agreed the professor. "I am sorry my instruments are not at hand. I sincerely hope none was damaged when theSnowbirdmade such a bad landing."
"And I'd like to give the machine an overhauling at once to see just how badly she's damaged," Jack Darrow said, hastily. "What do you say, Mark?"
"I'm with you," returned his chum. "Can't we take Andy and Wash, Mr. Henderson, and go right up to that hollow and see what needs to be done to the flying machine? Perhaps we can get off for Aleukan by to-morrow if we hustle."
"If you boys think you can repair the damage done the machine in so short a time," agreed the professor, doubtfully. "But you know we must at least arrive at Aleukan in time to meet the train from Coldfoot. If theSnowbirdcannot be launched again, we will have to see if our good friend here, Mr. Roebach, can fit us out with dogs and men."
"That I'll do to the best of my ability," said the oil man, rising. "But I'd better get out now and set my men to work. I am boring in a new place this week, and it looks promising. We are down a hundred and twenty feet already." They put on their outer garments and left the cabin. Although this was summer weather, there was a sting of frost in the air even as it neared mid-forenoon. But the sun was strangely overcast, and that might account for the drop in temperature.
"Disher day fo'git ter grow," complained Washington, rolling his eyes until, as Jack suggested, they could see only the whites of them in the dark, and the gleam of his teeth. "'Nstead o' bein' as sunshiny as it doughter be arter dat storm, it's suah growin' night fast! 'Taint a full-grown day, nohow!"
"Sort of stunted; is it, Wash?" chuckled Jack.
Andy Sudds here spoke decisively:
"I been tryin' to make out what it was, like feathers, a-touchin' my face. But it ain't snow.It's ashes!"
"Volcanic dust!" cried Mark.
"That volcano must be active again. That's what brought about the earthquake," said Jack. "And the darkness. What we thought was a fog over the sun must be a cloud of ashes."
"This ain't no place for us," declared Andy. "I wish we were back at that man's house."
"Or could find theSnowbirdpretty soon," added Mark.
"We're going right for it—I'm sure of that," said Jack, cheerfully. And scarcely had he spoken when the four suddenly clung to each other, rocking on their feet! Washington White shrieked aloud, fell upon his knees, and it took but little to drag the boys and Andy Sudds with him.
"The whole world is done rockin' ergain!" wailed the darkey. "Dis is de end ob de finish!"
The vibrations of the ground grew in strength. The air about them seemed to shake. The darkness was so intense that Jack, holding a shaking hand before his face, could not distinguish its outline. And all the time the volcanic ash drifted down through the writhing tree-tops, while the boys and their companions were unable to stand erect.
Unlike the former trembling of the earth, this experience gave no immediate promise of cessation. The world rocked on in awful throes—as though it really was, as the black man feared, the end of all material things. Jack and Mark rolled upon the ground in the grove of huge trees, clinging to each other's hands, but unable to rise, or to find their two comrades.
A rising thunder of sound accompanied this manifestation, too. And, after some stricken minutes, the boys realized that it was thunder.
With the earthquake and the storm of volcanic ashes, came an electric disturbance of the atmosphere, the like of which neither of the boys had ever dreamed. They had felt the "itch" of the electric current just before the 'quake. Now the hair on their heads rose stiffly like that on the back of an angry cat, and when Jack and Mark chanced to separate for a moment, and each put out their hands to seize the other, the darkness under the trees was vividly shot through for an instant with the sparks which flew from their fingers.
Washington White began to bawl terrifically at this display of "fireworks," as he called it.
His lamentations were well nigh drowned by the rolling thunder. This latter did not sound in ordinary explosions, or "claps," but traveled in rapidly repeated echoes across the skies. The thick cloud of ashes which obscured the sun and the whole sky was cut through occasionally by a sword of lightning; but mostly the electricity showed itself in a recurrent, throbbing glow upon the northern horizon, not unlike some manifestations of the Aurora Borealis.
But even this uncertain—almost terrifying—light was of aid to the boys; Jack, at least, remembered very clearly the way to the wrecked flying machine, and of course the old hunter was not likely to lose his way in as black a night as ever was made.
They struggled on between the intervals of pitch darkness, for the trembling of the earth had again ceased. The visitation had been much heavier than they had previously suffered.
"The best thing we can do," muttered Mark in Jack's ear, "is to fix up theSnowbirdand beat it away from here just as fast as we can. This is altogether too strenuous a place for us, believe me!" "If we onlycan!" responded Jack, secretly as worried as his chum. "This is a pretty fierce proposition, Mark. Just think of our bonnySnowbirdwrecked on her first voyage! It's mighty hard; eh, chum?"
But the duty before the two boys just then was to find the wrecked 'plane and see what could be done with it. The thunder continued to mutter and the intermittent flashes of electricity helped them somewhat in finding the way to the spot where theSnowbirdhad made her final landing. But the fall of volcanic ash continued and the darkness, between the lightning flashes, remained as smothering as before.
They reached the spot, however—seemingly a small plateau on which the huge trees did not encroach, giving them plenty of space for a flight if they were fortunate enough to get theSnowbirdin condition for such an attempt.
There were both electric lamps and lanterns in the machine and Mark sent Washington White to light every one while he and Jack went over the wrenched mechanism. Andy Sudds stood guard with his rifle, or ready to lend a hand should the boys need him.
The storm in the clutch of which the flying machine had traveled so many hundred miles had wrenched her not a little. And the two landings she had made on the mountainside had done her no particular good. There was a broken plane, any number of wires to splice, and bent rods innumerable.
These were the more apparent injuries. But the more delicate machinery of theSnowbirdrequired a thorough overhauling. It was absolutely necessary for them to have the use of a forge, and Jack had already learned that such an article was among the oil hunter's possessions at his camp.
They were a solid three hours putting to rights the machine and correcting the damage done to her smaller parts. Then, with several rods to be straightened and the light framework of the broken plane, that must be put in the fire for a bit, the party started down the mountain to Phineas Roebach's camp.
The four had left the plateau where theSnowbirdlay and were just descending into the forest, carrying two storage battery lamps with which the easier to find their way.
There was no preliminary trembling of the earth or the air. There was an unheralded clap of sound—a sharp detonation that almost burst their ear-drums.
They did not fall to the ground; the earth, instead, seemed actually to rise and smite them!
A cataract of sound followed, that completely overwhelmed them. They realized that the huge trees were swaying and writhing as though a sudden storm-breath had blown upon them. Had a tornado swept through this wood no greater danger could have menaced them. Trees about them were uprooted; many bent to the earth; some snapped off short at the ground—great boles two and three feet through!
Jack and Mark, with Andy Sudds and the terrified Wash, would have been destroyed within the first few seconds of this awful upheaval had it not been for a single fortunate circumstance. When the cataclysm was inaugurated the first shock drove the four into a sort of hollow walled about with solid rock. Upon this hollow fell the first huge tree trunk of the flying forest—and it sheltered them instead of crushing them to death.
The four had but small appreciation of this—of either their temporary safety, or the perils that menaced them. Suddenly the thick air seemed to stifle them. They could neither breathe nor see. The lamps had been lost when they were flung—like dice in a box—into the rock-sheltered hollow.
As the huge tree fell across their harbor of refuge, they all lost consciousness.
What happened during the next few minutes—perhaps it was a quarter of an hour—none of the little party of adventurers ever knew. It was Jack who first aroused.
The whole world seemed still shrouded in pitch darkness. But he could breathe without difficulty and he sprang to his feet with a peculiar feeling of lightness as he did so.
But then he stumbled over Mark, and his chum came up, too, ejaculating:
"What is it, Jack? What is the matter now?"
"You can search me!" responded the other boy. "If this sort of business keeps on I shall wish, with Wash, that we'd never come to Alaska."
"You can wish it with me!" grumbled Mark. "Washington doesn't want to get back to Maine any more than I do right now, Jack."
"We must complete the repairing of theSnowbird," gasped Jack.
"And where are the rods—and the plane frame? And where are the lights?"
They held on to each other in the darkness of this over-shadowed hollow and neither boy was willing to speak for a moment. Then Andy Sudds staggered to them.
"I've lost my gun!" he ejaculated, with a quaver in his voice that was quite surprising.
"And we've lost our lamps; but we'll find 'em, Andy," said Jack Darrow, curiously enough becoming leader of the expedition right then, instead of the man. It wasn't that the old hunter was frightened; merely, he did not know what to do in this emergency.
"Do you notice—?" began Jack, seriously, and then stopped.
"Do I notice what, son?" responded Andy.
"I don't see how you can notice anything without a light," interruptedMark querulously.
This statement seemed to arouse Jack's faculties completely. He did not continue his remark, but said:
"That's our first job; isn't it?"
"What's our first job?" asked the hunter.
"To get a light. We can't find the flying machine, nor get back to Roebach's camp, without light. Why, it can't be more than mid-afternoon, yet it's as dark as a stack of black cats in a coal-chute."
"And that's where I feel as though I'd been," declared Mark.
"Where?"
"Fighting the cats in the coal-hole. Ouch! I'm lame and sore all over."
"We're sure up against it," repeated Andy. "But there must be some way out, boys."
"Light is the first requisite," agreed Jack, more cheerfully. "Got any matches, Andy?"
"Plenty of 'em in a corked flask. I don't ever travel without matches, son," returned the old hunter.
"But matches won't show us the way to Roebach's camp," complained Mark.
"Don't croak, old boy," advised Jack. "Let's have that bottle of cosmolene I saw you tuck in your pocket there at theSnowbird."
"I was taking that to the professor. He said he would want it," saidMark. "What's it good for?"
"You'll come pretty near seeing in a minute, Mark," returned the quick-thinking Jack. "Here, Andy! let me have that woolen scarf you wear. You'll have to say good-bye to it—bid it a fond farewell."
"I'm sort of friendly to that scarf, youngster," said the hunter."What's to be done to it?"
"It's going to become a lamp wick right here and now," declared youngDarrow, promptly. "So! I've got the cosmolene smeared on it already.There! that's the last of it. Now a match, Andy."
"Joshua!" grumbled the hunter. "Itisgood-bye, I guess!" The match flared up. Jack touched it to the greasy woolen cloth. It began to burn brightly and steadily at once.
"Now, you all hunt around for the things we dropped. If we can find them we'll push out right away for the camp and the professor. You know he'll be worried about us, just as we are worried about him!"
With the light of the improvised torch flaring about them they saw what manner of place they were in. The huge trunk of the fallen tree had not entirely shut them in the hole. Mark got in position to climb out beside the tree-trunk.
There was a small, tough root sticking out of the bank above his head. He leaped to catch it with one hand, intending to scramble out by its aid.
And then the very queerest thing happened to him that could be imagined. The spring he took shot him up through the hole like an arrow taking flight.
He never touched the root, but over-shot the mark and disappeared with a loud scream of amazement and alarm into the outer world.
"Somebody grabbed him!" shouted Andy Sudds.
"Oh, lawsy-massy-gollyation!" yelped the frightened darkey. "Massa Mark done been kerried up, suah 'nuff! I tole youse disher was de end ob de worl'."
But Jack, followed by the old hunter, sprang to the opening. How light they were upon their feet! The experience of moving shot this surprising thought through Jack Darrow's mind:
"I'm as light as a feather. I have lost half my weight, I declare IHow can that be possible?"
Andy Sudds was evidently disturbed by the same thought. He cried:
"Somebody holt onto me! I'm going up!"
He did actually bump his head upon the tree trunk above them. But the next moment Jack scrambled through the opening, light and all, and came out upon the open ground.
"I'm here, Jack! I'm here!" cried Mark. "But what's happened to me?" "Whatever it is, it has happened to us all," returned his chum. "I seem to have overcome a good bit of the law of gravitation. Never felt so light in my heels in all my life before."
"What can it mean?" whispered Mark in his chum's ear. "It's magic!"
"You've got me," admitted Jack. "I'm not trying to explain it. But I know that the air pressure on me isn't as great as it was. I feel like we did when we were on the moon."
"Something awful has happened," suggested Mark, his tone still worried.
"We can be sure of that," Andy Sudds said. "What shall we do?"
"Find that stuff we were carrying and get back to the professor with it," said Jack, briefly. "Here! I see the storage battery lamp—or, one of them at least."
Mark at the same time stooped to pick up two of the lost rods. Jack found the lamp to be in good order and gave it to Andy. The torch was rapidly becoming exhausted.
"Come, Washington," urged Jack, "you hunt around, too. We must find the parts of the airship we dropped. If we don't find them we'llneverget away from this place."
"And is we gotter go in deSnowbird, Massa Jack?" queried the darkey. "Has we jestgottergo in dat flyin' contraption? Gollyation! dis chile hoped de walkin' would be good out oh Alaska. He an' Buttsy jest erbout made up deir minds dat dey wouldn't fly no mo'. Fac' is, I had some idea ob clippin' Buttsy's wings so dat he couldn't fly no mo'!"
"You can walk if you want to," said Mark, crossly; "but I want to get away from this part of the country just as soon as ever I can. If the flying machine was ready I'd only wait long enough to get the professor and then we'd start."
"Guess we're with you there, Mark," agreed his chum, emphatically.
Meanwhile they were all scrambling about for the parts of the machine that had escaped them when the awful blast had knocked them into the hole and deprived them of consciousness. Fortunately none of the missing parts was very small and in twenty minutes of close scrutiny every piece was assembled. They did not find the second hand lamp, however.
"Now we must hurry back to the professor," Jack urged. "I know he will be dreadfully worried."
"Do you notice that it's getting lighter, boys?" remarked Andy Sudds.
"I believe you!" cried Mark. "The ash has stopped falling, too."
"I know that the air is a whole lot clearer," rejoined his chum. "And it's colder—or is it rare? Doesn't it seem like mountain air, Mark?"
"We've been half-stifled for so long I reckon the change to purer air is what makes it seem so peculiar," returned his friend.
Yet Mark was puzzled—indeed they all were more or less disturbed by the strange feeling that possessed them. Unless Washington White was an exception. The darkey went along blithely despite his expressed distaste for their surroundings, and as they came to the lower end of the grove of big trees, he began to run.
It had grown lighter all the time as they advanced. The cloud that had hidden the sun seemed to be rolled away like a scroll. The party could see all about them. The ashes lay from two to eight inches deep on the ground. Plants and shrubs were covered with the volcanic dust, and it was shaken from the trees as they passed.
Washington White bounded along like a rubber ball. He came to the plateau that overlooked the sheltered camp of the oil hunter. As the darkness retreated across the valley, the derrick and the shanties belonging to Phineas Roebach's outfit appeared.
Suddenly several gunshots rang out in succession, and the sounds startled the boys and Andy. Wild cries likewise arose from the valley. The commotion was at the camp.
"The professor is in danger!" cried Andy Sudds, and began to run.
His first leap carried him twenty feet; his second took him over a fallen tree-trunk six feet through.
"By Joshua!" ejaculated the startled hunter. "I've got springs in my shoes; ain't I?"
"What can it mean, Jack?" panted Mark, as the boys hurried on, side by side.
Jack Darrow had no answer to make. He was as amazed as his companions, and perhaps a little frightened as well.
They hurried after Andy and Wash; but the latter was far ahead. There was a second volley of gunshots and at that moment Wash came to the verge of the steep descent to the camp.
He beheld some half dozen Indians—all swart, lank, fierce-looking bucks—just at the point of rushing the oil borer's hut.
It was no time for explanations, nor for hesitancy. Wash, like the others behind him, believed that the Indians were making an attack upon their master, and the first thought of all was that Professor Henderson was with the oil man, and in peril.
"Gollyation! Git erway from dat dar door!" bawled Washington. The black man was as timid as a fawn as a usual thing; but he was devoted to the old professor and he had that feeling of gratitude for Mr. Henderson that overcame his natural cowardice. When the Indians, without giving him a glance, rushed at the door, and a single shot from the half-opened window missed them by ten feet, Wash uttered another yell and sprang to reach the descending path.
But this strange lightness of body that had overtaken them all during the past hour, played Wash a strange trick. Instead of landing a few feet down the steep way, he cast himself fairly into the air, twenty feet out from the hillside, and sailed down upon the startled Indians like some huge black buzzard.
The red men glanced up over their shoulders and beheld the flying man. The sight seemed to terrify them. With loud cries they started to run; but two of them could not escape the flying black man.
Wash landed sprawling upon their shoulders bearing both Aleuts to the ground. The door of the cabin was dashed open and Phineas Roebach ran out and seized the two red men before they could scramble up. The others were streaking it for the woods as fast as they could travel.
"Gollyation!" quoth Washington White. "Has dem rapscallawags done harmed de ole perfesser?"
"I am perfectly safe, Washington," said Professor Henderson, appearing at the door of the cabin. "And here are the boys and Andy. I am relieved to see you all alive again—I really am."
"Ain't this been a gee-whizzer of a storm?" queried the oil man, holding the two Aleuts at arm's length.
Already the boys and Andy were tearing down the steep path. They traveled like goats—as surefooted and as light upon their feet. Professor Henderson watched their career in evident interest. Then, gingerly, trying the feat curiously, the old gentleman sprang for a small boulder beside the cabin. He leaped entirely over it.
"Light! Light as air!" he murmured. "This is a most puzzling circumstance."
"Now, you fellows," growled Phineas, urging the two Indians along to the boring machine. "You'll get to work. I don't care if your friends have run off and left you to do it all alone. I tell you we've near struck oil. I know the signs." Then he gabbled at them a bit in their own language and the Aleuts took hold of the heavy bar by which the earth-auger was turned. "They left the job—the whole of them—when that last clap came," he explained to the boys.
But Jack and Mark were not much interested in the oil hunter's affairs. Only Jack remarked that he thought the fat man had been foolish to arm the Aleuts, or allow them to be armed. The Indians had evidently quite gone off their heads.
"They believe that we are spirits of the air," Professor Henderson told his friends. "That we are evil spirits. And I guess that Washington flying down upon them as he did will clinch that belief in their minds."
"Did you ever hear of anything like it before in all your days, Professor?" cried Jack. "Why, we can all jump like deer. I never saw anything like it."
Before the professor could reply there came a shout from the direction of the oil man's derrick. The two Aleuts, with their driver, had been working only a few moments at the auger. But perhaps the tool, so far down in the earth, had been ready to bite into the gas-chamber. There was a rumble from beneath that suggested to all that another 'quake was at hand. Then the Indians and the fat man started away from the derrick on the run.
The auger and piping shot out of the hole like stones driven by a catapult. Following the broken tools was a column of gas, gravel, water and mud that rose two hundred feet in the air. The earth trembled, and squawking like frightened geese, the Aleuts took to the tall timber, following the trail of their more fortunate comrades who had gotten away before. And they were not alone in their fright. The white men were likewise amazed and troubled by the marvelous geyser. It was as though the oil man had bored down to the regions infernal.