The four stood and gazed in wonder at the strange scene. At first the terrible cold cut them as if it was a keen knife. But they soon grew used to it, and enjoyed what little of it reached them through the opening in their fur caps. The snowflakes covered everything and the airship looked more like a craft bedecked from stem to stern with cotton batting than anything else. Jack and Mark walked around to the stern.

Suddenly Mark stumbled over something.

"What's this?" he cried.

Jack hurried to his side. As he did so the bundle gave a heave, and, breaking through the snow blanket, there was displayed the calm features of Dirola.

"Me sleep!" she announced with a smile.

And that was what she had been doing while the airship was being whirled around by the strange force! She had braced herself in a corner, pulled her furs about her face, and slumbered, even when the ship turned over.

So well braced was she that she did not tumble off.

"Well! She's a cool one!" exclaimed Mark.

"I guess you'd be too, if you slept out of doors with the temperature about seventy below zero," remarked Jack. "But let's go in and tell the professor Dirola is here. He may be worried about her."

The boys started for the cabin. They had not taken five steps before, with a sudden lurch, the airship dived like a kite without its tail.

Then the craft turned completely over!

Jack and Mark with the two helpers and Dirola were thrown from the deck, head first, toward the earth! Down and down they fell, uttering despairing cries!

CHAPTER XXI

LOST IN THE SNOW

Once more the wind blew with hurricane force. On board the _Monarch_ Washington and Professor Henderson were tossed to the ceiling again.

Then the ship righted herself.

"De boys! De boys!" cried Washington, suddenly thinking of them. "Dey hab falled off!"

"Great Scott! So they have!" exclaimed the inventor. "That is, unless they grabbed something as we went over!"

"An de Sesquitomexico woman, too!" cried the colored man, meaning Dirola.

"I guess she went with the others," said the professor. "We must take a look as soon as it is safe."

Then came a strong gust of wind that hurled the ship forward. When it had subsided Washington and the old inventor ventured outside. The boys were nowhere to be seen.

"They are lost!" cried Andy, who had crawled to the bow of the ship after the captain and Washington.

For a little while longer the airship sailed along easily, the wind no more rushing with such force. Then, all at once the craft settled down until, with a jerk, it came to rest on a big snow bank.

"We's landed!" exclaimed Washington. "We's. .h.i.t de ole north pole at last. Now I'll see what sort ob a stick it is!"

"We've landed sure enough," remarked the professor, "but I'm afraid we are not at the north pole. However, in view of all that has happened, I suppose we had better stop here for a while. Some of the machinery is wrecked by the overturning of the ship, but I guess we can fix it. I only wish I knew where the boys and the two men were."

"Don't forget Dirola," spoke up Andy. "We owe a good deal to her."

It stopped snowing about half an hour after the _Monarch_ had found lodgement on the edge of a bank of ice. From the deck and windows of the craft nothing could be seen but a big expanse of white. It was a cold, lifeless world to which the ship had brought what remained of her crew and owner.

The engine room of the _Monarch_ was once more a sorry sight, and Washington and the inventor worked like a dozen men in restoring order.

They soon had things in ship-shape, but one of the motors would require considerable repairing before it would run again. However, it was not the most important one, and the craft could run without it, though only at half speed.

Suddenly, there came from without a chorus of shouts.

"What's that?" cried the professor.

"Sounded like some one calling," ventured Andy.

"It am de boys and Tom and Bill come back to overjoy us," said Washington.

The shouts grew louder. Andy glanced from a cabin window.

"The Esquimaux! The Esquimaux!" he exclaimed. "Here they are after us again! They'll carry us back to the ice cave and eat us alive this time!"

"These are not the same ones!" cried the professor. "We are hundreds of miles from the ice cave."

"Then these are the ones the mysterious message was about," said Andy, "and we had better be on our guard!"

"Perhaps these are Dirola's friends," ventured Amos Henderson. "If they are I wish we had her here to intercede for us."

There came a rattling against the sides of the airship. It sounded like a storm of hail.

"They are firing arrows at us!" yelled Andy. "That doesn't look very friendly."

"Wait until I go out and speak to them," suggested the professor. "They will respect my gray, hairs."

He went outside. The ship was surrounded by hundreds of little men, all dressed in thick furs. At the sight of the ship's commander they gave a loud yell.

"I wisht I'd neber done come to de north pole!" groaned Washington. He grabbed up a rifle and followed Andy outside. At the sight of them the Esquimaux set up louder yells, and shot another shower of arrows.

Fortunately none of the missiles struck the white men.

"Stop firing!" said the professor, raising his hand. "We mean you no harm!"

His answer was a wilder burst of yells.

"Fire over their heads! Maybe that will teach them a little respect,"

spoke Andy.

He and Washington discharged their guns several times in rapid succession. With frightened yells the men in furs fell flat on their faces.

"We've scared them!" cried Andy.

But he reckoned without his host, for in an instant the Esquimaux had leaped to their feet and were rushing toward the ship.