Tom tried to assume a cheerfulness he did not feel.  He realized that, in spite of his youth, both Mr. Damon and Mr. Fenwick rather depended on him, for Tom was a lad of no ordinary attainments, and had a fund of scientific knowledge.  He resolved to do his best to avoid making his two companions worry.

“Let’s get it off our minds,” suggested the lad, after a while.  “We were going to get something to eat.  Suppose we carry out that program.  My appetite wasn’t spoiled by the shock.”

“I declare mine wasn’t either,” said Mr. Damon, “but I can’t forget it easily.  It’s the first earthquake I was ever in.”

He watched Tom as the latter advanced once more toward the wreck of the airship, and noticed that the lad limped, for his right leg had been cut when the whizzer had fallen to earth.

“What’s the matter, Tom; were you hurt in the quake?” asked the eccentric man.

“No—­no,” Tom hastened to assure him.  “I just got a bump in the fall—­that’s all.  It isn’t anything.  If you and Mr. Fenwick want to get out some food from the wrecked store room I’ll see if I can haul out the gasolene stove from the airship.  Perhaps we can use it to make some coffee.”

By delving in about the wreck, Tom was able to get out the gasolene stove.  It was broken, but two of the five burners were in commission, and could be used.  Water, and gasolene for use in the airship, was carried in steel tanks.  Some of these had been split open by the crash, but there was one cask of water left, and three of gasolene, insuring plenty of the liquid fuel.  As for the water, Tom hoped to be able to find a spring on the island.

In the meanwhile, Mr. Damon and Mr. Fenwick had been investigating the contents of the storeroom.  There was a large supply of food, much larger than would have been needed, even on a two weeks’ trip in the air, and the inventor of the whizzer hardly knew why he had put so much aboard.

“But if we have to stay here long, it may come in handy,” observed Tom, with a grim smile.

“Why; do you think we will be here long?” asked Mr. Damon.

The young inventor shrugged his shoulders.

“There is no telling,” he said.  “If a passing steamer happens to see us, we may be taken off to-day or to-morrow.  If not we may be here a week, or—­” Tom did not finish.  He stood in a listening attitude.

There was a rumbling sound, and the earth seemed again to tremble.  Then there came a great splash in the water at the foot of a tall, rugged cliff about a quarter of a mile away.  A great piece of the precipice had fallen into the ocean.

“I thought that was another earthquake coming,” said Mr. Damon, with an air of relief.

“So did I,” admitted Mr. Fenwick.

“It was probably loosened by the shock, and so fell into the sea,” spoke Tom.