"This way!" Ten minutes later, all of them were in the air, save only Gabriel, who insisted on staying till his entire squad had made a clean getaway.

Then he too rose; and now in a long, swift line, the fighting squadron straightened away to north-eastward, on the twenty-mile run to Niagara.
The night was foggy, chill and dark.

All the aviators had instructions to fly not less than 2,500 feet high, to keep a careful lookout lest they collide, and to steer by the lights of the great Air Trust plant.
For, misty though the heavens were, still Gabriel could see the dim glow of the tremendous aerial search-lights dominating Goat Island--lights of 5,000,000 candle-power, maintained by current from the Falls, incessantly sweeping the sky on the lookout for just such perils as now, indeed, were drawing near.
Momently, as he flew, Gabriel perceived these huge lights growing brighter, through the mist, and apprehension won upon him.
"Incredibly strong!" he muttered to himself, as he glanced from his barometer to the shining fog ahead.

"Even though the mist will be thicker over the Falls than anywhere else, there's a good possibility they may pierce it and pick us up--and _then_, look out for their 'planes and swift, fighting dirigibles!" He rotated the rising-plane, and now soared to 2,800 feet.

Below and on either side of him, nothing but tenuous fog.