“Then kindly mind your own business,” said Monsieur Power, chewing again on his grass stem, and talking through his teeth.  “Now, Ella, time’s up!  Am I to go?”

The girl bit her lip, and seemed to struggle vainly for a reply, but the look in her eyes would have withered any man less accustomed to strife than this iron-jawed young soldier of fortune from Wall Street.  In my turn, anger seized me as I saw her hesitate.

“You will pardon a further interruption, monsieur,” I cried.  “I can permit no such madness on my flying ground, and no such discourtesy to my pupils.”

I beckoned the head mechanician.

“You will at once remove to a hangar the biplane of Monsieur Power,” I told him, “and disconnect the ignition.  Should he attempt to enter the nacelle again, you will cause him to evacuate it in march time and three movements!”

“And the first dago that tries it will get hurt,” added Monsieur Power pleasantly.

“It’s cowardly, Jack!” she cried hotly.  “It’s unworthy of you, a childish bluff like this!”

He must have been planning all the time how he would spring into his seat and start the motor, for when I looked round he was already there, and the great tractor screw was spinning as the exhaust spluttered viciously, making it impossible to reach him except from behind.  With all my legs I ran round to the tail, calling upon the mechanicians to aid me.

Too late!  The exhaust ripped out as he whipped his motor into her full horse power, and he leaped into the teeth of the wind with a swerve that almost tore off his lower plane against the ground.

“Imbecile!” I roared, but he no longer heard me.  To save myself from a violent collision with his tail planes I was compelled to cling desperately to the frail wood and wire girder of the fuselage, and it was in this position that I was carried the length of the flying ground.  The gale tore at my hair and distended my cheeks, the turf slipped away beneath me as smooth as green water in the speed of his mad attempt to force the machine into the air.

Slowly and with extreme care I edged my way inch by inch along the fuselage toward the main planes and the pilot’s seat.  Casting back a glance I saw the hangars, a mere white bar across the plain.  A few spectators who had pursued us in a desultory, ineffectual manner stood now at long intervals in our wake, and gesticulated spasmodically.

The next moment we ran into a hollow, and they were lost to view behind the grassy slope.

It was then that the young American looked behind him for the first time, and realized that he had a passenger.  Promptly he throttled down his engine into a slow splutter, and turned in his seat as the machine came to a standstill.

“I suppose you’ve had an uncomfortable minute or two,” he grinned.  “But it really wasn’t your affair.  I am perfectly entitled to fly whenever I feel like it.”