Down they fell, and in an instant the rushing rain, emptied in a torrent from the clouds, swept about them, saturating their garments and beating the flying machine itself toward the distant earth. During the next few moments Jack Darrow, Mark Sampson, and their companions were in as grave peril as had ever threatened them in their eventful lives. The torrents of water all but beat the flying machine to the earth--and to be dashed down from such a height spelled death to all and destruction to the aeroplane. Jack, however, had been taught to keep cool in moments of danger, and he realized that their lives depended entirely upon his handling of the great machine. They had descended below the level of the storm-cloud at a most inopportune moment. They were caught in the midst of a veritable cloudburst. Shaken desperately by the wind, and beaten upon by tons upon tons of water, it was a wonder that the great planes, or wings, of the flying machine were not torn away. All Jack could do was to guide her the best he could, and all his companions could do was to cling to a slender hope and endure the lashing of the gale. But Jack Darrow did not propose to be cast to the ground--and the flying machine and his friends with him--without some further attempt to avert such a catastrophe. After the first breath-taking rush of the storm he diverted the course of the machine again upward. He could scarcely see, the driving rain was so blinding; nor could he observe the indicators before him with any clearness. But he was quite sure that the enemy that had driven him down into the storm-cloud could see the _Snowbird_ no better than he could see that strange aeroplane that had threatened to collide with them. So he shot the _Snowbird_ upward again at a long slant, and put on all the power of the engine to drive her onward. The flying machine shook and throbbed in every part. The power of the engines would have driven her, under other and more favorable conditions, at more than one hundred miles an hour--possibly a hundred and twenty-five. Jack himself was almost blinded and deafened. He was strapped to his seat, so could give both hands to the work of manipulating the levers. He brought the _Snowbird_ through the cloud and--with startling suddenness--they shot out of the mass of rolling moisture and into the sunlight of the dawn. But they were far off their course. The change from the chaos of the storm-cloud to the almost perfect calm of the upper ether was so great that it was almost stunning. For a minute none of the five spoke a word. Then it was Mark who shouted: "There's that 'plane again, Jack I Look out for her!" The enemy had missed them. She was some miles away, and although still on a level above, at the pace the _Snowbird_ was now traveling it would take a fast flying machine indeed to overtake her.