"We'll lose the start," spoke Tyrrell hurriedly.

"Don't you get aboard."

"No, sah; yo' just obey Mistah Parks, suh," interposed Scipio, laying a great hindering hand on the arm of Tyrrell.

"I have been a prisoner in the Duske camp since yesterday," explained Andy, catching his breath. "This man Tyrrell came there last night. He is in the employ of Duske."

"What!" shouted Parks, his face growing dark.

"It's true, Mr. Parks," a.s.severated Andy. "They are in a plot to burn the _Racing Star_ and have you lose the prize."

"Do you hear what this boy says?" thundered the aeronaut, moving down on Tyrrell with threatening mien.

"It's-it's not true," declared Tyrrell, but turning pale, shrinking back, and looking about him for a chance to run.

"If you don't believe me," cried Andy, "search him."

Scipio held Tyrrell's arm in a viselike clasp. Parks ran his hand over his clothing. He drew from his pocket a parcel done up in a handkerchief. Mr. Morse took it, opened it, and revealed a bottle filled with some substance like kerosene, a small box of matches and some lint.

Quick as a flash the hand of the aeronaut shot out for the throat of Tyrrell.

"You treacherous scoundrel!" he shouted.

Boom!

"The third gun! They're off, Mr. Parks," cried Andy. "Oh, don't let the _Racing Star_ miss it."

"What can I do?"

"Send me. Men, get ready. Mr. Parks, I'll win this race!"

Andy was in no trim physically or in attire to attempt the race. At a glance the aeronaut saw this. But our hero was irresistible. He ran towards the machine, and with nimble movements he glided among the planes and reached the operator's seat. Already the other airships were sailing skywards.

"Go!" shouted Andy.

Upon the operator's seat lay the skull cap and goggles, ready for Tyrrell, and Andy hastily donned them. He heard the voice of Parks, now as excited as himself, giving orders, a tacit consent to make the start.

There was a run of scarcely a hundred feet along the gra.s.s. Andy placed a firm hand on the wheel. Then came a series of curves and sweeping arcs, which kept the crowd of spectators turning first one way and then the other in entranced silence.

The young aviator followed the popping of the motors of the contestant machines. One was fast becoming a mere speck in the sky.

"The _Moon Bird_, Duske's machine," murmured Andy.

It seemed poised in the air without motion, so direct was its course, so true its mechanism. Two of the other airships had already descended, one of them wrecked and out of the race. The forty-foot mechanical bird, the Duske machine, however, had made the lead and kept it.

The climax came in Andy's preliminary ascent. Now the _Racing Star_, light and dainty as a lark, mounted with amazing speed. A glance at three of the airships convinced Andy that they were too faulty to make a record. The _Moon Bird_, however, was a marvel. From what he had heard Mr. Parks say, Duske had been an expert balloonist, and he now showed amazing ability in the aviation line. He seemed to be putting the stolen airship idea to marked advantage.

Andy struck a level about fifteen hundred feet in the air. There was a head wind, but it was not strong. Andy put on fine speed gradually. The _Racing Star_ pa.s.sed two of the contestants, and, fully in action, he drove keen on the trail of the _Moon Bird_.

The train that acted as a pilot with an American flag on its last car, Andy kept in view as a guide. When they came to Lake Clear, the _Moon Bird_ did not follow the rounding land course, nor did Andy. Lake Clear was a shallow body of water, but of considerable extent, and dotted here and there with little islands.

Suddenly the _Moon Bird_, a machine of good utility, but, as Andy knew, of little lasting power, made a decided spurt, pa.s.sed the _Racing Star_, and at a distance of half a mile got fairly abreast of the lake. It was here that Duske met his Waterloo. Hitherto he had maintained practically a steady course. More than once Andy had got near enough to this rival to hear the loud gasping of the tube exhausts drown out the sharp chug-chug of the motor. Suddenly Duske made a sharp turn.

An appalling climax followed. In consternation and suspense Andy watched aerial evolutions that fairly dizzied him.

"He is lost!" breathed Andy, a-thrill.

In an instant he recalled what Mr. Morse had told him of the unfinished model that Duske and his crowd had stolen from him. The inventor had explained to Andy that while the suction principle involved in the rudder construction was unique and bound to increase speed, there should have been added automatic caps to close the rear ends of the suction tubes where a curve was attempted.

Of this Duske evidently knew nothing. The moment he turned the machine, however, there was a whirl. The aeroplane described a dive, then a somersault. Its lateral planes collapsed, and, tipping from side to side, it began to descend with frightful velocity.

Once it half righted, balanced, went over again, and, fifty feet from the ground, shot clear of a little islet, and went down in the water of the lake, a wreck, first spilling Duske out.

"He is killed or stunned!" exclaimed Andy.

The boy aviator saw the other airships forging ahead, indifferent to the accident. Minutes counted in the sixty-mile race to Springfield and back to the starting point, but Andy was humane. He saw clearly that, if alive, the half-submerged Duske would be suffocated in a few minutes'

time.

"I can't leave him to die," murmured Andy, and sent the _Racing Star_ on a sharp slant, landing on the island.

Andy was soon out of the airship. He waded to the spot where Duske lay, and dragged him bodily up on dry land. As he turned him on his face, Andy knew from its purple hue, the lifeless limbs and choked gasps of the man, that another minute in the water would have been his last.

A boat put out from the mainland where a crowd of spectators was watching the race. Four men jumped out as the island was reached.

"Take care of this man," ordered Andy.

"You're a pretty fair fellow to risk losing the race to save a compet.i.tor," spoke one of the men heartily.

He and his companions followed Andy's instructions the best they could in starting the _Racing Star_, and Andy shot skywards again, making up for lost time.

CHAPTER XXIII-THE GREAT RACE

"Hurrah!"

"Why, it's only a boy!"

"Parks' man-get your rest, lad, while we see to things."

Andy found himself in a whirl of motion and excitement. When he had left the island where he had sacrificed his time and risked his chances of winning the race, he had discovered that he was fourth on the programme.

The _Flash_ was becoming a distant speck, and the two other contesting biplanes were lagging after the leader.

Andy now set a pace to force the _Racing Star_ to do its utmost. His good knowledge of detail as to the machinery and his masterly manipulation of the same soon brought results. The _Racing Star_ easily pa.s.sed two of the airships ahead. Then Andy ran neck-and-neck with the pilot train for several miles.

The _Flash_, however, kept up admirable speed, but finally a wing broke or oil ran out at Wayne, and the operator descended to a relief station.

Now was Andy's chance, and he made the most of it. With those inspiriting shouts of "Hurrah! Why, it's only a boy!" and the announcement from the relay posted at Springfield by Parks that they were on hand to tank up the _Racing Star_ and adjust the machinery, Andy landed at the outskirts of the city, just half the race distance covered.