XFLYING BLIND
Instantly the head of the ship was pointed downward and they started to coast—even as this maneuver was in progress and the roar became deafening, both of them caught a fragmentary glimpse of bright lights passing just overhead.
It had indeed been a close shave, for only that Perk proved so clever at the stick they must have met the mail ship head on with the inevitable result that yet another tragedy of the air would be chronicled in the morning newspapers with scare headlines fully an inch high.
Perk had lost his voice due to the sudden nerve strain and even ordinarily cool Jack Ralston waited a brief spell, in order to insure proper breathing before trying to speak.
“Reckon you got all the thrill you could stand that time, Perk!” he finally remarked with a little quiver in his voice.
“Beat anything I ever stacked up against—that’s right partner,” Perk frankly admitted, doubtless taking in a deep breath of relief.
“Never might happen again in twenty years,” said Jack, as if that feature of the near tragedy affected him most of all. “With all this wide space all around us, just to think of two airships heading straight at each other in a fog—who says now we’re not watched over by a special Providence?”
“You said it buddy,” Perk agreed. “That sure was a time when that muffler paid a big interest on its cost an’ I kinder guess saved our lives in the bargain. It pays to advertise an’ also to pick up the newest fixin’s along the line o’ aviation discoveries an’ inventions.”
“Just so Perk. If our engine had kept thundering away right along we might not have been warned in time to get out of the road and let that stunt-flying air mail pilot squeeze past. He ought to be reported for hustling along like that in such a thick soup; but since we’re still alive and kicking, I reckon we’ll just have to let it drop at that.”
“Mebbe you’re right there, Jack old bean—strikes me we were hittin’ it up like hot cakes in the bargain an’ not so innocent after all. I’m a’wonderin’ if he got wind o’ the close call he had—must have lamped our lights as we ducked and went down like a bullet or the stick o’ a rocket that’d exploded up near the stars. Shucks! I’d jest like to meet up with that guy sometime an’ ask him what his feelin’ was—bet you he was as scart as we felt when he whizzed right over our heads.”
“It might be the part of wisdom to climb to a higher level now, partner,” hinted Jack. “Unless I miss my guess that chap was dropping, as if he’d come down from the upper regions, which gives me an idea he knew where he was and had been keeping a big ceiling so as to avoid butting into some mountain peak.”
“Here goes then,” and with the words Perk commenced to climb, the new ship being so constructed as to be a great improvement over the old type of plane, able to ascend at a steep angle without any of those formerly necessary laborious spirals.
At the height of four thousand feet he again leveled off and kept to the course Jack had marked out. Perhaps they were over some air mail line with its friendly flashing beacons winking far below; but that deadly wall of fog lying under their keel effectually prevented them from taking advantage of any such guide posts along the way; nor would it have availed them greatly could they have dropped down to within a few hundred feet of the earth, for even at such a distance it must have been utterly out of the question for the keenest vision to have picked up a beacon or even detect its flash because of the curtain that fairly smothered them on all sides, above and below.
They no longer conversed, even Perk understanding how serious their condition must be and holding his usually ready tongue in check, while Jack took it out in tense thinking, watching the various dials and figuring just which way they would be going in case of drift.
So half an hour crept by, with no change whatever in the conditions by which they were surrounded. It was now growing most unbearable, so monotonous, so very tiresome. A heavy fog is hard enough to bear at any time but when it stretches along hour after hour, without the slightest sign of any diminuation, it is bound to get on the stoutest nerves and produce symptoms bordering on a panic.
“Perhaps we might find some relief if we kept going up,” suggested Jack after some time had passed. “It sort of stifles me to keep in such a thick mess as this, growing worse all the while.”
“Huh, if I wasn’t jest thinkin’ that way myself partner,” Perk declared, thus showing that it was a case of “me too.”
They kept on climbing, although neither could discover much difference in that miserable opaque blanket. It began to grow much colder too, although they managed to don some heavier coats which would keep them from feeling the change in weather conditions to any extent.
“Don’t seem to be much use I guess Perk, in all my experience I can’t say I ever ran across a fog that expended such a distance above the earth. Most times you can get out of the ditch by climbing, but here we are at a thirteen thousand foot ceiling and it’s as black as ever. No use trying to get above the line—it just can’t be done.”
“Right you are partner,” admitted Perk, leveling off, “though I must say the breathin’ seems a shade easier than down below.”
“We’ll stick it out here for a while,” Jack went on to say, “and it may be that the coming dawn may bring some sort of a breeze along to scatter this beastly stuff and let us see what’s what.”
“Anyway,” Perk was saying, as if in relief, “at such a height we ain’t likely to rub noses with any rock pinnacle and to our everlastin’ grief in the bargain. The air’s like enough free of mountain peaks around this section o’ country, which is some comfort to a fog-bound pair o’ ginks, I admit.”
It was by this time about five o’clock and Perk was banking heavily on the fact that inside of another half hour, at that extreme height, they were likely to discover the advance couriers of approaching dawn commencing to paint the eastern heavens with fingers of delicate shaded colors.
“Got any sort o’ idee where we might be right now, Jack?”
“Why, sitting tight in a nice fog blanket I’d say, brother,” replied the one who was now at the controls, having some time back made the exchange, easily enough accomplished without the necessity of changing seats.
“Jokin’ aside, Jack, I mean what section o’ country might be away down below-stairs where there’s land and green things—how I’d like to rest my tired peepers on somethin’greenfor a change.”
“I’m not as sure of my figures as I’d like to be Perk, for it’s been hours since we saw anything at all except this fog; but we’ve covered a lot of space and must be well on our way to the hunting ground we started for. Wait until we get out of this mess and then it can be settled as soon as we strike any town, village or even hamlet, that’ll give us a hint concerning our bearings.”
“I’m bothered a little bit just the same,” complained Perk.
“What about, old pal?” demanded Jack quickly.
“What if somethin’ should happen to our ship—we’re a long way from any place an’ well, ’fore you took over the stick Jack, seemed to me there was a bit o’ a holdup to the slick way the boat had been whooping things up—I might a’been mistaken, but she seemed to be wallowin’ some, like she didn’t just feel pleased over the cargo she had to carry.”
“Perk, now that you mention it I do believe you’re right—I’m not pushing her much, but she does act sort of sulky, as if tired of this thing—not that we could blame her for feeling that way. Tell you what, partner—suppose you climb out and take a look around to see if everything seems okay.”
Accordingly Perk, as if sensing some hidden motive in what the other had just remarked, left his seat and made his way out to the port wing—the ship was swaying more or less, dipping and nosing upward as Jack held her to it, but Perk being quite accustomed to such things had no trouble whatever. A minute later and he came hurrying back to attach his earphones again and cry out in a tone filled with more or less excitement:
“Jack, there is something the matter for sure—fact is there’s ice formin’ on both wings, and right heavy at that!”