Page:Dick Hamilton's Fortune.djvu/268

 CHAPTER XXX

A DISASTROUS FLIGHT

" it goes!" cried a score of voices, Dick's among them. And, sure enough, the airship moved. Slowly, but gathering speed, like some ungainly creature, it rose into the air in a slanting direction. Up and up it went, until it was about two hundred feet above the earth. Then Herr Doodlebrod shifted a rudder and the machine flew along on a level keel.

"Look at her go!" cried Frank Bender, for he and all of Dick's boy chums had been invited to the test. "Gee, but I wish I was in her!"

"You'd stand on your head on one of the propeller blades, I suppose," commented Walter Mead.

"Look, he's turning around!" exclaimed Frank, to change the subject from his acrobatic abilities, concerning which he was a bit sensitive.

Sure enough, Herr Doodlebrod was flying around in a circle. He seemed to be able to manage the ship perfectly, and Dick was delighted. He already saw the prize won with the improved craft, and himself holder of half the money.

"Look out, he's falling!" yelled Bricktop, Rh