“Talk to me ’bout luck,” the grateful Perk was saying to himself, “I never ran ’cross anything like _this_—they told me Jack must a been born under a lucky star, an’ now I sure b’lieves it to be the right stuff they were givin’ me, an’ no taffy either. But that was some fight, take it from me, fellers.”
Shortly afterwards Jack condescended to give him the sign that he was willing to pass up the job; whereat Perk quickly superseded him as pilot, and saw the other sink back in his cramped quarters as though unable to hold up his tired arms a second longer. Apparently the relief had come not a minute too soon, for he must have been close to the point of utter exhaustion after so long and violent a strain.
Battered as the crate had been while the gale lashed them so madly, it had stood up under the buffeting most amazingly and Perk would never have occasion to utter anything saving words of praise for the model and its makers; it must be as near perfection as aircraft are being built these days of man’s victory over the savage forces of the air.
Setting his course in what he believed to be the proper direction Perk waited until Jack seemed fairly well recovered, when he was pleased to see the other take up his head harness as though he too felt the necessity for opening up communications with his running mate, which outlook gratified Perk immensely.
There were many things he wished to have made clear, and besides, he felt more than curious to learn what Jack’s next move might turn out to be—that they had drifted far from their original course went without saying but a means must be found to recover the lost ground, after which they could take up the game again just where the sudden storm had caused such a diversion.
And then the moon peeped out through a break in the clouds overhead, as though to tell them it was all over, with decent weather once more in the offing.
“Well, that’s somehow I guess over, and I’m mighty glad,” was the way Perk voiced his feelings, when the clouds were rolling away, and the heavenly host of stars backed up the moon in lighting up the firmament.
“Same here,” echoed Jack, still more or less tired after his energetic battle with the unleashed elements.