"Perhaps," spoke Jack. "If I had him here----"

"We are falling!" shouted Mark, looking at an indicator which marked
their speed and motion.

"Can't we start some other motor?" asked Jack.

At that instant from beneath the now silent Cardite machine there came
a prolonged crow.

"My Shanghai rooster!" shouted Washington. "He am in dar!"

A second later the rooster scrambled out, scratching vigorously. Grains
of corn were scattered about. The motor started up again, and the
projectile resumed its onward way.

"The rooster stopped it!" cried Jack. "He went under it to get some
corn, and he must have deranged one of the levers. Oh, you old
Shanghai, you nearly gave us all heart disease!"

And the rooster crowed louder than before, while his colored owner
"shooed" him out of the engine room. The trouble was over speedily, and
the _Annihilator_ was once more speeding toward the moon.




CHAPTER XVI

"WILL IT HIT US?"