of lights, growing in intensity as
the sky darkened.

The "Albatross" and the storm were sure to meet, for they were
exactly in front of each other.

And Frycollin? Well! Frycollin was being towed--and towed is exactly
the word, for the rope made such an angle, with the aeronef, now
going at over sixty knots an hour, that the tub was a long way behind
her.

The crew were busy in preparing for the storm, for the "Albatross"
would either have to rise above it or drive through its lowest
layers. She was about three thousand feet above the sea when a clap
of thunder was heard. Suddenly the squall struck her. In a few
seconds the fiery clouds swept on around her.

Phil Evans went to intercede for Frycollin, and asked for him to be
taken on board again. But Robur had already given orders to that
effect, and the rope was being hauled in, when suddenly there took
place an inexplicable slackening in the speed of the screws.

The engineer rushed to the central deck-house. "Power! More power!"
he shouted. "We must rise quickly and get over the storm!"

"Impossible, sir!"

"What is the matter?"

"The currents are troubled! They are intermittent!" And, in fact, the
"Albatross" was falling fast.

As with the telegraph wires on land during a storm, so was it with
the accumulators of the aeronef. But what is only an inconvenience in
the case of messages was here a terrible danger.

"Let her down, then," said Robur, "and get out of the electric zone!
Keep cool, my lads!"

He stepped on to his quarter-deck and his crew went to their stations.

Although the "Albatross" had sunk several hundred feet she was still
in the thick of the cloud, and the flashes played across her as if
they were fireworks. It seemed as though she was struck. The screws
ran more and more slowly, and what began as a gentle descent
threatened to become a collapse.

In less than a minute it was evident they would get down to the
surface of the sea. Once they were immersed no power could drag them
from the abyss.

Suddenly the electric cloud appeared above them. The "Albatross" was
only sixty feet from the crest of the waves. In two or three seconds
the deck would be under water.

But Robur, seizing the propitious moment, rushed to the central house
and seized the levers. He turned on the currents from the piles no
longer neutralized by the electric tension of the surrounding
atmosphere. In a moment the screws had regained their normal speed
and