Dave did not reply. He felt new vibrations, and knew that the strain of warping the wings at the tips had caused more than one of the struts to collapse. The young aviator realized that it would be a hard drop unless he did something quickly and effectively. There was no time to think. Counterbalance was everything. Dave tried to restore the disturbed balance of the machine by bringing the left wing under the control. Then he forced the twisting on the right side. The young aviator held his breath, while his excited companion stared ahead and down, transfixed. They were going at a rapid rate, and every moment the Baby Racer threatened to turn turtle and spill them out. Dave succeeded in temporarily checking the tendency to tip. All aerial support was gone. He kept the rudder at counterbalance, threw off the power, and wondered what they were headed into. The next moment the Baby Racer crashed to the ground. CHAPTER IV A BUSINESS BOY "We've landed!" shouted Hiram in a jolty tone, plunging forward in his seat in the biplane. "Yes, but where?" Dave asked quickly. "That's so. Whew! What have we drifted into?" The Baby Racer had struck a mass soft and yielding. It drove through some substance rather than ran on its wheels. There was a dive and a joggle. Then the machine came to a halt--submerged. Whatever had received it now came up about the puzzled young aviators as might a snowdrift or it heap of hay. Dave dashed a filmy, flake-like substance resembling sawdust from eyes, ears and mouth. Hiram tried to disentangle himself from strips and curls of some light, fluffy substance. Then he cried out: "Dave, it's shavings!" "You don't say so." "Yes, it is--a great heap of shavings, a big mountain of them." "Lucky for us. If we had hit the bare ground I fear we would have had a smash up." Gradually and cautiously the two young aviators made their way out of the seats of the machine. They got past the wings. A circle of electric street lamps surrounded them on four sides. Their radiance, dim and distant, seemed to indicate that they were in the center of a factory yard covering several acres. A little way off they could discern the outlines of high piles of lumber and beyond these several buildings. The biplane lay partly on its side, sunk deep in a heap of long, broad shavings. The mass must have been fully a hundred feet in extent and fifteen to twenty feet high. They reached its side and slid down the slant to the ground. "Well!" ejaculated Dave. "Yes, and what?" inquired Hiram, brushing the loose bits of shavings from his soaked tarpaulin coat. "Business--strictly and quick," replied Dave promptly. "And leave the Racer where she is?" "Can you find a better place, Hiram?" "Well, no, but--"