seemed to Jack that hope must yield to despair he realized
that the jumpy motion of the plane ceased suddenly. He knew what this
meant, and that Tom had finally shown his hand, for they no longer bumped
along but began to move through space!

Then Jack fell back, breathing freely again. Success had rewarded their
efforts, and once more the big bomber was speeding through its own
element on the wings of the wind.

But it had indeed been a narrow escape for the adventurous trio; for
hardly had they started to swing upward into space when from behind them
arose a series of horrible crashings, gurglings, and the mad splashing of
water, telling that in truth the giant berg had carried out its threat
and rolled completely over, playing havoc with the entire floe.

No one spoke immediately. In fact, none of them could have uttered a
word, no matter how hard he had tried. In each young heart a feeling of
intense gratitude reigned, as well as a sensation of horror, for only too
well did they know what their immediate fate must have been had they
remained prisoners on the ice but another two minutes.

Tom pointed the nose of the plane directly into the southwest. He even
seemed to be getting additional speed out of his motors, as though bent
on making up for the lost time.

All of them began to settle down for another long monotonous period with
the whole night before them. Far from comfortable might be their
situation, but not a single complaint would be heard. All they asked was
that things might go on as they were, with the plane reeling off knot
after knot of the cruise into the west.

After a while Jack remembered that Tom had had but a bite of supper.
Accordingly he got out the supplies and proceeded to serve them. Then he
took Tom's place for a while and held the airship true to her course.

They kept about five hundred feet or so above the sea. Somehow it
gave them a little encouragement just to catch the glint of the
stars on the tumbling waves below. There was a friendliness in the
billows, a something that seemed to keep them in contact with their
fellow men; a thing which they missed when passing along two thousand
feet or more above the surface of the terrestrial globe, even beyond
the floating clouds.

So the long vigil was taken up. Hour after hour the giant bomber must
wing its swift flight, ever speeding onward into the realm of space
through which it was now making a voyage unequalled since Columbus sai