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Updated: May 13, 2025
"Hold fast, if you value life at all, dear boys!" he warned, then added: "Heaven be kind to you, even if my life pays the forfeit! Now!" Without further delay, he cast the heavy grapnel into that mass of boiling vapour, then fell flat, as an awful jerk was given the aerostat.
For the aerostat was indulging itself in sundry distressing gyrations, pretty much as a boy's kite swoops from side to side, when lacking in tail-ballast, while the professor seemed unable to keep the machine under complete control. "Nothing serious, only hold fast, all! I believe 'twould be as well to make our descent, for fear something steady!"
While the two air-voyagers were thus engaged in talk, Bruno silently stole away with Ixtli, taking a bundle along, and leaving Waldo to throw their uncle off the track in case his suspicions should be prematurely awakened. Then, side by side, two Indian braves silently approached the aerostat, causing Professor Featherwit to make a hasty dive for his dynamite gun to repel a fancied onslaught.
If you reject these terms, or if I do not receive an answer to this letter within two hours of the time that the bearer of it descends in the aerostat, I shall give orders for the immediate destruction of the war-balloons now in my hands, and I shall then proceed to destroy Cüstrin and the other aerostats which are moored near the town.
I could reply only by these words: "In pity, let us descend! The clouds are gathering around us in every direction, and frightful detonations reverberating from the cavity of the aerostat are multiplying around us." "You make me impatient!" said he. "You shall no longer know whether we are ascending or descending." And the barometer went after the compass, along with some bags of sand.
"It will be perfectly safe here," the exile hastened to give assurance, as that landing was made. "Then, too, this is the only spot nigh at hand from which a hasty ascent could well be made, even with such an admirable machine as yours. Ah, me!" with a long breath which lacked but little of being a sigh, as he keenly, eagerly examined the aerostat. "A marvel!
To all seeming, the aerostat had sustained some fatal damage during that brief eruption caused by the professor's little experiment, for it was pitching drunkenly end for end, refusing to obey the hand of its builder, bearing all to certain death upon the earth far below.
The aerostat barely landed upon the top of the temple, before Cooper Edgecombe, with a wild scream of ecstatic joy, caught his wife in his arms and hurried her into the car, while Waldo and uncle Phaeton aided Bruno. And Bruno clung fast to the half-swooning maiden, so that two in place of one had to be assisted by uncle and nephew!
"Just as soon as we can put all in readiness," he continued, "I am going to leave this spot. My first wish is to thoroughly test the aerostat, to make certain it has received no serious injury. Then, if all promises well, I mean to begin our tour of exploration, hoping that we may, at least, find something well worthy the strange reputation given these Olympics by the natives."
Divining the real cause of that dread, he took the easiest method of allaying it, speaking briskly as he moved across to the aerostat. "Bear the gentleman company, my lads, while I manage the ship. You will know what signals to make, and I can contrive the rest." Again the recluse laughed, but now it was through pure joy, such as he had not experienced for long years gone by.
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