The Aeroplane Boys Flight | Page 9

a vindictive lad, and he believed the fellows had received sufficient punishment, especially as no one knew exactly what they had meant to do in connection with the new hydroplane. Possibly Percy only wanted to look it over at close quarters, and knowing he would not be allowed to do so if he asked permission outright, sought to take this opportunity. But from the way in which they had rigged themselves out, so as to avoid being recognized, if seen, it looked as though the four boys had something more than that in view.
However, all's well that ends well, and Andy was quite satisfied with the way things had turned out.
"Here's hopin' a few of 'em may be limpin' 'round this same mornin', and feelin' rayther stiff in the legs," Felix took occasion to remark, as they sat at table, and Andy was again in danger of being foundered by the multitude of good things which the farmer's wife spread thereon, bacon and eggs, fried potatoes, scrapple, puffy biscuits, apple sauce, doughnuts, cold pie, jelly, and finally heaping dishes of light pancakes, which were to be smothered in butter and real maple syrup made on the farm each early spring when the sap was running.
"I expect Frank will be along any minute now," Andy remarked, about the time he had to firmly refuse a fourth helping of cakes, because he could hardly breathe comfortably. "It wouldn't take him long to do what little work was necessary, in our shop, which you know my old guardian, Colonel Whympers, built for us before we found my father, when he was marooned in that valley in South America, a prisoner for many months, because the cliffs around prevented him from escaping. And of course he'll gallop out here on your saddle horse, Mr. Quackenboss."
"Well, work ain't got any call on either Felix or me until we see all that goes on, that's flat," remarked the farmer, with a smile, "and it's lucky he done the milkin' already, or else the cows'd have to wait long after their usual hour, which is a bad way to treat 'em, you know."
They all went out to the field, even the housewife and little Billie wanting to see what a real aeroplane looked like at close quarters. Many times had all of them seen the Bird boys, and perhaps Percy Carberry as well, soaring aloft as if the upper air currents might be their natural heritage; but up to now they had never had the chance to examine one of the wonderful machines, and touch the various parts gingerly as though afraid of injuring them.
"Beats all what people are a-doing nowadays," ventured the farmer, shaking his head with astonishment, almost awe, as he looked the thing over. "They ain't even contented to just fly like a red-tailed hawk, or an eagle that kin look the sun direct in the eye; but now they got to have a contraption that's at home in the air or on the water; a hydroplane you called, it didn't you, Andy? And them ere twin pontoons underneath, that look kinder like gondolas, as you say, are made of aluminum, and kin hold up the whole affair when you light on water. But tell me, how in all creation kin you ever mount up agin, once you settle there?"
"Why that's the easiest thing of all," replied the young aviator; "you've watched a wild duck get up many a time, haven't you, Mr. Quackenboss; well, we do just the same, only instead of flapping our wings, we start the engine, and skim along the surface for a little distance, then elevate the planes, and immediately begin to soar upward. And it does the stunt as gracefully as anything you ever saw. Some time I hope to give you a chance to see how it works. When we leave here, of course we'll use the bicycle wheels you see underneath, and run along the ground until going fast enough to soar. But I think I see Frank coming, away down the road there."
"That's right," declared the farmer; "I know my Bob as far as I can see him, and his gallop in the bargain."
Frank was evidently coming at full speed, and Andy presently got the idea in his head that his cousin seemed to be strangely in a hurry for him. He wondered whether anything could have happened at home, and if Frank would prove to be the bearer of bad news.
The other dashed into the narrow road leading from the pike to the barns of the Quackenboss farm. Hitching the horse to a post, he started toward the spot in the big field where the two boys and the farmer awaited his coming, close beside the stranded aeroplane.
Frank was carrying the little part he