Perhaps he should have let Wilson drive, as the doctor had suggested. He had been too sure that he would get him through. He was almost as sure, now, that he wouldn’t! He knew that when this type of plane went to pieces it went all at once and with astonishing completeness. The wooden fuselage would buckle up like wheat straws if you put her in hard, and if the fuselage did break in two there was more than an even chance that one or both of them would get a longeron stuck through their backs! He was glad it hadn’t rained in San Antonio for several days--he wouldn’t have to worry about mud if he got down in a fresh-plowed field. He turned a little more toward the south, skirting low over the foothills that he knew were there, although he couldn’t see them. He tried to think of some way out of the predicament; he considered, presently, the wisdom of turning back to the landing-field and landing by the floodlights. But he couldn’t do that; he would be out of water long before then. The temperature gauge--the centigrade--did not show a rise for some minutes after the ship was in the air, for the morning was cold, and Nick gradually opened his shutters as the water was exhausted. But after they had been in the air a little more than twenty minutes the rise did come, slowly at first, then faster; and finally with a rush that sent the needle whirling up around the dial to the hundred mark, where it hesitated a moment and plunged back down to eighty. A minute later it rose suddenly and hit the peg again, only to drop once more. Nick knew that the next time it came up it would stay--the water would be boiling. It was time to find a place to land, although the real emergency would not come until the motor began to lose revs due to the heat. But below, wherever the ground was, there was nothing to be seen but the black nothingness of night. In the east there was no light, for the thick clouds hid the glimmer of the dawn. Nick was afraid he was still flying over the foothills. He turned sharply south, hoping that his compass was correct and that he would find an open field when the radiator forced him down. Suddenly the needle of the centigrade spun upward and struck the peg again. It dropped slightly for an instant and then slammed up and hugged the peg and stayed there. The time had come! Nick heard the faint metallic knocking of the motor above the pound of the exhaust; he smelled the stench of burning paint. He cut the gun, and when he did a piston stuck and the motor froze. They were down! But where? The first dim light of day was hardly visible in the east; below, a short thousand feet, the ground looked blank in darkness. It seemed impossible that Nick could pick out a field down there--and after he had picked it, land upon it. He muttered, grimly: “I can’t judge my distance from the ground within fifty feet! We’ll pile up sure as hell!”