The third attempt set the propeller whirling in a blurred circle.

The motor woke to throbbing life again.
"Help me turn 'er first," called Bland, with a gesture to make his meaning clear.
"'Bye, Mary V! Now's your chance to get a picture--but you'll have to hurry!" Johnny climbed up, straddled into the seat ahead of Bland.

He placed his feet, pulled down his goggles, grasped the wheel and felt himself balanced--poised, with a drumming beat in his throat, a suffocating fulness in his chest.

His moment had come, he thought swiftly, as one thinks when facing a sudden, whelming event.

The biggest moment in his life--the moment that he had dreamed of--the culmination of all his hopes while he studied and worked--the moment when he took flight in an airplane of his own! "Easy on the controls, bo, till you get the feel of it." Bland leaned to shout in his ear.