“Then you shouldn’t try to run one,” declared Ivan.

“Now don’t get worried, Ivan,” said Chester with a laugh.  “We’ll get down again all right.”

“We’ll probably get down,” said Ivan, “but the thing that worries me is whether it will be all right or not.  I want to die with my feet on the ground and not be dashed against the earth head first.”

“I’m sure there is no danger,” said Chester.  “We’re just sinking gently.”

He cut off the engine and allowed the craft to volplane to earth more abruptly.  It came to rest on the ground as lightly as a bird.

“Well, what will we do now?” demanded Ivan.

“You have as much idea as I have,” returned Chester.  “I can’t fix this thing here in the darkness; in fact, I don’t know whether I can fix it at all.  We’ll either have to walk or stay here until I can have a look at this craft in daylight—­and maybe that won’t do any good.”

“I vote we walk,” said Colonel Anderson.  “There must be houses along here some place.  Maybe we can commandeer three horses, or an automobile or something.”

“Most likely what we’ll commandeer will be trouble,” grumbled Ivan.

“Now what are you kicking about?” demanded Chester.  “You have been hunting trouble ever since I have known you.  Maybe you’ll be satisfied this time.”

“Do you think so?” demanded Ivan eagerly.

“No, I don’t,” returned Chester.  “If I did I’d sit right here.  I don’t want to run into any trouble now if I can help it.  We’ve got business on hand, remember that.  And we’ve got to hurry.  Colonel Anderson, I guess your suggestion is a good one.  We’ll walk on a ways.”

They set out without a word.  Striking across what appeared in the darkness a large field, they eventually came to a road.  They walked south along this.

Half an hour later, in the darkness, there loomed up a house ahead of them.  A faint light glowed in the window.

“Told you there must be a house along here some place,” said Colonel Anderson.

Chester produced his watch and succeeded in reading the face after some trouble.

“Lacks five minutes to midnight,” he said.  “Rather a late hour to be making a call.”

“Necessity knows no law,” responded Colonel Anderson.  “We won’t bother them much, if they can furnish us with some means of transportation.”

“Hope they will be friendly,” said Chester.

“No reason why they shouldn’t be.  I suppose we are still in Serbia.”

“Well, I don’t know whether we are or not.  That’s what worries me,” said Chester.

“Why, where do you think we are?”

“I don’t know.  Might be Serbia, might be Greece, might be Bulgaria, or Turkey or any old place.  If the elevating apparatus on our plane was out of whack, the steering apparatus may have been, too.  Also I have mislaid my compass.  I won’t know north from south until morning.”