r of
dashing into it."

"Are you going to try for it?"

"Of course," was the brief reply. Peggy slowed down the engine. The
_Golden Butterfly_ now seemed to be gliding silently through lonely
billows of white sea fog. It was an uncanny feeling. The occupants of the
machine felt a chilling sense of complete isolation.

Thanks to their barograph, however, they could judge their height above
the sea.

"Good thing we've got it," commented Jimsy; "otherwise we might have a
thrilling encounter with the topmasts of some schooner."

"I only wish we had some instrument to show us where the other aeroplanes
are," said Peggy; "it's hard to hear anything in this fog."

"Maybe it will clear off," suggested Jess hopefully.

"Not unless we get some wind," opined Jimsy; "queer how quick that wind
dropped and this smother came up."

Nobody even hinted at the deadly danger they were in. But each occupant of
the _Golden Butterfly_ knew it full well. Except for the compass, they had
no way of guiding their flight, and to turn about would have been to court
disaster. There was only one thing for it, to keep on. This Peggy did,
grimly compressing her lips.

"Hark!" exclaimed Jimsy suddenly.

Far below them they could hear a mournful sound. It was wafted up to them
in fits and starts.

"Ding-dong! Ding-dong!"

"A church bell," cried Jess, "we must be over land, Peggy!"

The other shook her head.

"That's a bell buoy, I guess," she said.

"I wish he'd tell us how to get out of here," joked Jimsy, rather wearily.

"Who?" asked Jess.

"That bell boy."

Never had one of Jimsy's jokes fallen so flat. He mentally resolved not to
attempt another one.

Presently he looked at his watch.

"Almost eleven," he said, "we must have passed the light by this time."

"I don't know," said Peggy helplessly; "if only the chart marked that bell
buoy--but it doesn't."

She again scrutinized the chart pinned before her on the sloping slab
designed for such purposes. But no bell buoy was marked on it as being
located anywhere near where they estimated they must be drifting.
Drifting, however, is not quite the correct word. An aeroplane cannot
drift. Its life depends upon its motion. The instant it stops or decreases
speed beyond a certain point, in that same instant it must fall to the
earth.

This fact is what made the position of the young sky cruisers particularly
dangerous. Although the gauge showed that they had plenty of gasoline