Mr.
Sharp. "Do you think you can stand going a trifle higher?"

"Try it," suggested the eccentric man. "Bless my watch chain, but, as I
said, I might as well die this way as any other. Hitting a cloud-bank
is easier than trying to climb a tree on a motorcycle, eh, Tom?"

"Very much so, Mr. Damon," conceded the young inventor, with a laugh.

"Oh, we'll not attempt any cloud heights for a day or two," went on Mr.
Sharp. "I want you, to gradually get used to the rarefied atmosphere,
Mr. Damon. Tom and I are getting to be old hands at it. But, if you
think you can stand it, I'll go up about a thousand feet higher."

"Make it two thousand, while you're at it," proposed the odd character.
"Might as well take a long fall as a short one."

Accordingly, the elevation rudder was used to send the Red Cloud to a
greater height while she was still skimming along like some great bird.
Of course the desired elevation could have been obtained by forcing
more gas from the machine into the big, red container overhead, but it
was decided to be as sparing of this vapor as possible, since the
voyagers did not want to descend to get more material, in case they
used up what they had. It was just as easy to rise by properly working
the rudders, when the ship was in motion, and that was the method now
employed.

With the great propellers, fore and aft, making about a thousand
revolutions a minute the craft slanted up toward the sky.

The ship was not being run at top speed as Mr. Sharp did not care to
force it, and there was no need for haste. Long distance, rather than
high speed was being aimed at on this first important flight.

Tom was at the steering wheel, and, with his hand on the lever
controlling the elevation rudder, kept watch of the face of Mr. Damon,
occasionally noting what height the hand on the gauge registered. He
fancied he saw the cheeks of his friend growing pale, and, when a
height of thirty-five hundred feet was indicated, with a yank the young
inventor put the airship on a level keel.

"Are you distressed, Mr. Damon?" he asked.

"Ye--yes, I--I have--some--some difficulty in breathing," was the
answer.

Tom gave his friend the same advice the aeronaut had given the lad on
his first trip, and the eccentric man soon felt better.

"Bless my buttons!" he ventured to explain. "But I feel as if I had
lost several pounds of flesh, and I'm glad of it."

Mr. Sharp was busy with the motor, which needed some slight
a