CHAPTER XV

THE SHANGHAI MAKES TROUBLE


Remaining in the engine room long enough to see that all the motors and
apparatus were working smoothly, Professor Henderson made his way to
the pilot house forward, where Mark and Jack were in charge of the
steering gears. The projectile could be started and stopped from there,
as well as from the engine room, once the motor was set going.

"Well, boys, how does it feel to be in space once more?" asked the
scientist.

"Fine," answered Mark. "But while I was shut up in that old house I
feared I'd never have this chance again."

"It seems like old times again, to be flying through space," remarked
Jack. "My! but we aren't making half the speed of which the projectile
is capable. Why, we're only going about twenty miles a second," and he
spoke as if that was a mere nothing.

"Twenty miles is some speed," observed Mark.

"The earth goes around the sun at the rate of nineteen miles a second,
or about seventy-five times as fast as the swiftest cannon-ball, so you
see, Jack, you are 'going some,' as the boys say."