exactly in front of each other.

And Frycollin? Well! Frycollin was being towed--and towed is exactly
the word, for the rope made such an angle, with the aeronef, now
going at over sixty knots an hour, that the tub was a long way behind
her.

The crew were busy in preparing for the storm, for the "Albatross"
would either have to rise above it or drive through its lowest
layers. She was about three thousand feet above the sea when a clap
of thunder was heard. Suddenly the squall struck her. In a few
seconds the fiery clouds swept on around her.

Phil Evans went to intercede for Frycollin, and asked for him to be
taken on board again. But Robur had already given orders to that
effect, and the rope was being hauled in, when suddenly there took
place an inexplicable slackening in the speed of the screws.

The engineer rushed to the central deck-house. "Power! More power!"
he shouted. "We must rise quickly and get over the storm!"

"Impossible, sir!"

"What is the matter?"

"The currents are troubled! They are intermittent!" And, in fact, the
"Albatross" was falling fast.

As with the telegraph wires on land during a storm, so was it with
the accumulators of the aeronef. But what is only an inconvenience in