Doubtless he was waiting for instructions, and something
might happen any minute.
"Now, Ned, if you'll see to having some gasolene brought out here, and
the tanks filled, I'll tinker with the dynamo and get that in running
shape," said Tom. "It only needs a little adjustment of the brushes.
Then we'll be off."
Ned started for the village where there was a gasolene depot He fancied
the villagers regarded him rather curiously, but he did not stop to ask
what it meant. Another odd fact was that the usual crowd of curious
rustics about the airship was missing. It was as though they suspected
trouble might come, and they did not want to be mixed up in it.
Never, Ned thought, had he seen a man so slow at getting ready the
supply of gasolene. He was to take it out in a wagon, but first he
mislaid the funnel, then the straining cloth, and finally he discovered
a break in the harness that needed mending.
"I believe he's doing it on purpose to delay us," thought the youth,
"but it won't do to say anything. Something is in the wind." He helped
the man all he could, and urged him in every way he knew, but the fellow
seemed to have grown suddenly stupid, and answered only in French,
though previously he had spoken some English.
But at last Ned, by dint of hard work, got him started, and rode on the
gasolene wagon with him.
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