The indicator was directly in front of the pilot seat. It showed positively how the machine was flying, on the top or down bank. It comprised a cup with lines set about ten degrees, and gave a sure safety limit. Only the pendulum was movable. This was mounted on an arm always perpendicular, a small mirror reflecting the variations of the pendulum.

Climbing and banking, Dave got quite a lead on the Drifter, but the aero-hydroplane kept up a steady pursuit.

"There's something the matter besides the broken wire," spoke Dave to his anxious companion. "The oil intake is dogged or one of the planes loose. We can't take any risks."

Dave sent the Monarch II on a downward shoot. There was a single pontoon in the center of the craft, with small tanks beneath the planes to prevent tipping over in the water. Dave aimed to hit the bay near to the sh.o.r.e.

Suddenly the aircraft acted queer. It had evidently struck a hole in the air. The machine seemed fairly to drop from under its occupants, and thirty feet from the water, Dave was lifted from his seat and took a sudden plunge over-board.

He went under the surface and came up dazed and nearly stunned. As he floated, dashing the water from his eyes, he saw the Drifter, now a flying boat, cut around a point of rocks, bearing straight down upon him.

Dave looked quickly about him for the Monarch II. To his surprise, as it scudded across the waves for perhaps a hundred feet on its momentum, it lifted again free of the surface of the bay.

He made out Hiram clambering from his seat like a sailor among the riggings of a ship. He saw the machine go up on a sharp slant, clear the sh.o.r.e of the bay, and disappear beyond the high cliffs lining it.

Then something struck him. It was some light part of the rotary engined aero-hydroplane, the Drifter, cutting the water like a knife. His head dizzied, and the young aviator went under the surface of the lake with a shock.

CHAPTER XXII

DAVE A CAPTIVE

It took Dave an hour to find out just what had happened to him. He roused up to find two men carrying him, one at his feet, one at his shoulders. All that he could guess was that they were on land. How he had been fished out of the water, and what had become of the Drifter, the young aviator had no means of knowing.

The two men were rough looking fellows and reminded Dave of dock laborers or loiterers. They were big and st.u.r.dy, and as Dave stretched out and showed signs of life, one of them remarked gruffly.

"None of that--no squirming, now."

Dave's clothes were soggy and dripping. He felt somewhat sore on one side of his head, but so far as he could figure it out he was not crippled; or seriously hurt.

The young aviator cast his eyes about him to, learn that they were going through a patch of timber. Then came a meadow-like stretch, and then a thicket. They had not gone far into that before the men dropped him on the ground and stood over him.

"Can you walk?" asked one of the two.

"I think I can," replied Dave, arising quite nimbly to his feet.

The instant he did this both of the men reached, out and seized an arm. Dave was thus pinioned tightly as the men forced him along.

"Most there," growled one of them gruffly.

"Good thing," retorted the other.

Finally they came to a dense thicket that covered a rise. About half way up this, almost hidden by saplings and vines, Dave made out a grim looking patched-up building.

It was an old hut to which various additions had been made. One of Dave's companions uttered a peculiar whistle. The door of the place was opened, and a disreputable looking fellow like themselves admitted them.

"h.e.l.lo, who's this?" he spoke in a tone of curiosity.

"Oh, some one to take care of," was the short reply.

"He don't look like a revenue."

"Worse than that. Ridgely will tell you when he comes," was the indifferent retort. "Have you a place to keep him tight and safe?"

"I guess so," laughed the other, "a dozen of them."

"One will do."

Dave was led through several rooms. Then they came to a part.i.tion formed of heavy timbers. In its center was a stout door with an immense padlock.

"Get in there," spoke the most ferocious of his captors, giving Dave a push.

Then the door was closed with a crash that showed how heavy it was.

Dave could hear those outside securing the padlock.

"A prisoner, eh?" mused Dave, looking about him. "Yes, it is, indeed, tight and safe."

Dave's prison place was gruesome in the extreme. On three sides was solid rock, forming a semicircular back to the room. The part.i.tion, closed the entire front. Near its top in several places were cut out apertures, admitting air and a little light.

There were some broken boxes in the place and a heap of burlap.

Dave decided that it had been used at some time or other as a place of storage. He did not yet feel normal, so he sat down on one of the boxes and felt about his head.

"Just a bruise," he reported. "I suppose they, dragged me aboard of the Drifter from the water, but what about Hiram and the Monarch II?"

Dave started up, all weakness and dizziness disappearing as if by magic, as he thrilled over the possible peril of his comrade. With a recollection only of his last sight of Hiram grid the Monarch II, he feared what might have happened to either or both.

It worried Dave a good deal and made him restless and unhappy, but finally he figured out a theory. In some unaccountable way the Monarch II had no sooner glided along on its pontoon, than it had run straightway up into the air, as though the self starter was in perfect action. Dave recalled Hiram struggling to reach the pilot's seat. Then he had witnessed the disappearance of the Monarch II.

"I doubt if Hiram could manage the machine--I even doubt with something wrong with it, as there surely was, if he could keep it adrift," decided Dave. "What then?"

The young aviator pictured Hiram and the machine in a tangle among the trees, or dropping upset among the rocks. He had not seen anything of the Dawsons or the Drifter since he had fallen into the water of the bay. Perhaps, he reasoned, they had resumed an air chase of the fugitive.

Dave had several hours to himself. He detected no sound or movement outside of the strange room he was in. It was dreadfully dull and lonesome, and he wondered what the outcome of his present adventure would be.

It was well along in the day, when Dave from sheer weariness and worry had lain down among the heaps of burlap, that a diversion came to monotony. He started up as he heard voice outside of the door.

Then the padlock rattled, the door opened, and some one stepped across the threshold. The visitor stared about to locate Dave, and spoke the words:

"That you, Dashaway?"

The room was lighter now, with the door half open. Dave rubbed his eyes and strained his gaze, and took a good look at the speaker.

"Don't you know me?" challenged the latter.

"Oh, yes," replied Dave, "I see now. You are the gentleman we rescued from the lake at Columbus."