As they neared the field, they saw that quite a crowd had collected since their departure. Pushing their way through the concourse about their own airplane, they were surprised to find Pete Deveaux and Chuck Crossman just jumping down from the wings. These flyers hurried away through a gap in the circle of onlookers toward their own machine before our friends could accost them. The Sky-Bird crew were considerably put out at noting this situation, for they had particularly told the Chinese guards to let no one meddle with the Sky-Bird. The Celestials were squatting unconcernedly upon the ground, one on either side of the airplane, as John rushed up and said to one of them; "Didn't I tell you not to let any strangers around this machine?" "No lettum stranger lound," protested the fellow. "Him both flylers alla samee you. Like-um see, you see; like-um see, he see." "Oh, ginger!" exclaimed John, turning to his comrades, in clear disgust, "the stupid dunce thinks those fellows belong to us and we to them, just because we all wear the same sort of flying clothes! Did you ever see the like?" Paul now took up the questioning. "What were those fellows doing up there?" he asked of the Chinaman. "No tellee me; no tellee Lee," was the response, as the fellow jerked his head in the direction of his comrade. "Just lookee over alla samee you do li'l bit ago." "Were they in the cabin?" demanded Paul. "No go in klabin." They walked around the machine giving it a cursory looking over, but could find nothing out of the way, and every one of them felt considerable relief. "I guess they were only taking a look to see if our construction was the same as theirs," suggested Bob. This seemed a plausible explanation, and they accepted it, although with some misgivings. About ten minutes later they saw the crowd over in the other side of the field scattering, and then the _Clarion_ shot up into the air. In a few minutes it was pointed down the coast and making good headway. Our friends were not quite ready, but when the other machine was a mere speck against the southwestern sky, they hopped off themselves, with Paul at the throttle. Not one of the party had any doubt but that they could catch their rivals before the latter should arrive at Para, where they were due at six o'clock that evening. It needed only that first stage of the journey from Panama to Georgetown to show them that they had either the speediest craft or the most skillful crew. Paul mounted to a height of about two thousand feet, then let the Sky-Bird straighten out in the direction of their next stop. He opened up the throttle little by little, and the machine rapidly gained momentum. But somehow the young pilot was dissatisfied. Finally he hitched the stick over to the notch which should have brought the craft into a speed of 150 miles, and watched the speedometer closely. "Humph!" he ejaculated, after fifteen or twenty minutes.