onth would have to elapse before she could keep her
rendezvous with the steamer that was to bring out the materials for
the construction of the new air-ships from England, there was plenty
of time to make the voyage in a leisurely and comfortable fashion. As
soon, therefore, as he was out of sight of the skirmishers, he had
reduced the speed of the _Ariel_ to about forty miles an hour, using
only the stern-propeller driven by one engine, and supporting the
ship on the air-planes and two fan-wheels.

At this speed he would traverse the three thousand odd miles which
lay between the Hindu Kush and "Aeria"--as Louis Holt had somewhat
fancifully named the region that could be reached only through the
air--in a little over seventy-five hours, or rather more than three
days.

Those three days were the happiest that his life had so far
contained. The complete success of his invention, and the absolute
fulfilment of his promises to the Brotherhood, had made him a power
in the world, and a power which, as he honestly believed, would be
used for the highest good of mankind when the time came to finally
confront and confound the warring forces of rival despotisms.

But far more than this in his eyes was the fact that he had been able
to use the unique power which his invention had placed in his hands,
to rescue the woman that he loved so dearly from a fate which, even
now that it was past, he could not bring himself to contemplate.

When she had first greeted him in the Council-chamber of the Inner
Circle, the distance that had separated her from him had seemed
immeasurable, and she--the daughter of Natas and the idol of the most
powerful society in the world--might well have looked down upon
him--the nameless dreamer of an unrealised dream, and a pauper, who
would not have known where to have looked for his next meal, had the
Brotherhood not had faith in him and his invention.

But now all that was changed. The dream had become the reality, and
the creation of his genius was bearing her with him swiftly and
smoothly through a calm atmosphere, and under a cloudless sky, over
sea and land, with more ease than a bird wings its flight through
space. He had accomplished the greatest triumph in the history of
human discovery. He had revolutionised the world, and ere long he
would make war impossible. Surely this entitled him to approach even
her on terms of equality, and to win her for his own if he could.

Natasha saw this too