now that the war was over.  There was little to do but think as they scudded away, now racing a cloud, then plunging through the masses of vapor, to reappear suddenly in the sunshine beyond.  Barney had always keenly enjoyed watching the land slip by beneath him as he flew, but on this journey there was the added joy of sailing over lands unknown.  His reflections were suddenly cut short by a strange jarring rattle from the Rolls-Royce.  Instantly the thunder was cut in half, as also was their power.  Bruce had stopped the big motor.  If now something went wrong with the Liberty, they must make a forced landing.  This, with the level stretches of prairie giving place to rough, rolling swells covered with scrub timber, was not a pleasant thing to think of and even less pleasant to attempt.

The sun, sending a last yellow glow across the land, sank from sight, and soon the moon, with silvery light and black bands of shadow, was playing strange tricks with the stolid world beneath them.

All day, when duties permitted, Bruce had kept an eye open for a cabin hidden among the pines.  Now he shouted through the telephone to Barney;

“What’ll I do if I catch a square of light below?”

Barney knew he was thinking of the boy, Timmie, and La Vaune’s money he carried into the woods.  A square of light, of course, would have been a cabin window.

“Kill your engine if you see a chance to light, and explain later,” he shouted back.

But no square of light appeared, and soon the thought of it was driven from their minds, for, of a sudden, the plane shuddered like a man with a chill.  It was the second engine.  Bruce threw off the power.  Then, with a sput-sput-sput, started it again.  Once more came the shudder.  Again he tried with no better results.  Half its power was gone; something was seriously wrong.  He turned to the other engine.  It would not start at all.  Here was trouble.  They were passing over ridge after ridge, and all were roughly timbered.  Surely, here was no landing-place.  And if the second engine stopped altogether,—­Bruce’s heart lost a beat at thought of it.

He gave the engine more gas and headed the plane upward.  She climbed slowly, sluggishly, like a tired bird, but at length the keener air told him they were a safer distance above the earth.

“Better chance to pick a landing-place from here,” thought Barney.

They had scarcely reached this higher level when the engine stopped.  No efforts of the pilot availed to start it.  His companions silently watched Bruce’s mute struggles.  The Major, a perfect sport, sat stoically in his place.  Barney, knowing that suggestions were useless, also was silent.  So they volplaned slowly downward, every eye strained for a safe landing-place.  They knew what a crash would mean at such a place.  Loss of life perhaps; a wrecked plane at least, then a struggle through the woods till starvation ended it.  They were four hundred miles from the last trace of white man’s habitation.