“Steady now, hold her right!” Jimmie called out, as Ben pressed the starter and the wheels under the aeroplane began to revolve. “Hold her tight and steady, and push on the bottom of the seat when you get over the ocean. If you drop, whistle!” “Cut it out, you little idiot!” stormed Carl. “That’s no fool of a trick Ben’s trying to do! The air massed before and under the machine as it moves along over the ground will push over the precipice, and then the aeroplane will shoot downward, no matter if the wheels do leave the surface before she comes to the edge.” “That will be all right, if she comes up again!” Jimmie grinned. “Perhaps you wouldn’t feel so merry over the proposition if you were going in the first machine,” Carl said, impatiently. “Huh!” grunted Jimmie with an exasperating smile, “we’ve got to go over the precipice, too, haven’t we?” The _Bertha_ wheeled slowly and steadily down the slight incline toward the line of demarcation between the white sand and the open air, the Pacific pounding upon the rocks a thousand feet below. Watching the flying machine at the critical moment, Jimmie’s red hair almost lifted his cap from his head as the great planes swept for a moment below the level of the canyon floor. The planes rose again in a second, however, and lifted almost instantly into the red light of the beacon fire gleaming from the headland below. It seemed to the anxious boys that she must drop down again, but, instead, the planes lifted higher and higher until she sailed like a bird out of the limited circle of illumination. “Now for it, Carl!” shouted Jimmie, and together they sprang to their seats and started the _Louise_. Notwithstanding the fact that the _Bertha_ had made the trip into the air in safety, the young aviators felt shivers navigating their backs as they dropped down at the edge of the precipice. For an instant it seemed as if the motors would never lift the planes in time to prevent a tumble into the ocean, but at last the _Louise_ leaped upward and onward, past the light of the signal fire, and into the semi-darkness which lay over the scenery. By this time Ben was some distance away with the _Bertha_. Jimmie turned the _Louise_ in his direction and the two flying machines were soon side by side. For a moment the boys tried to converse together, but the clatter of the motors and the rush of air prevented the spoken words from reaching the ears of the others. Failing to communicate to Jimmie and Carl the thing which was on his mind, Ben lifted a hand and quickly pointed to the north. The headland in that direction still flamed red with the signal which had been observed at twilight. Although the distance was nearly two miles, the boys saw that people were moving about the fire. Straight west from the headland a second schooner lay rocking on the pulse of the waves.