His friend was still slumped over, but Tom noted with relief that Bud seemed to be breathing regularly. Any attempt to revive him had to be deferred until the third stage was dropped.
A moment later the gyro showed the correct angle of flight. Tom pushed the manual control button for the release of the section and held his breath. Would it drop off?
Seconds later, the couplers were wrenched apart and the dead stage was jettisoned! The rocket ship shook crazily as it was freed from the dragging thirty-foot unit and the motors of the passenger stage cut in.
“Bud!” Tom cried, slapping his friend on the back. “Wake up!”
But Bud remained slumped over. A fearful thought took hold of Tom.
Traveling at such fantastic velocity-nearly ten times as fast as sound-the effects of even relatively small bumps seemed enormously magnified and crushing to a flesh-and-blood body. Suppose Bud had been paralyzed by the sudden jolt he had received when the tail-assembly release mechanism had jammed!
Opening a compartment, Tom took out a vial of spirits of ammonia and held it near the unconscious boy’s nose for a few seconds. His friend suddenly winced and his lips twitched.
AN UNEXPECTED MISHAP 179
When Bud’s arm moved, Tom was sure that he would soon revive. Tom quickly returned to the pilot’s seat to concentrate on the delicate job of guiding the Star Spear into orbital flight on the schedule set for it.
Against the loosening grip of the earth they had risen to a point almost one thousand miles high.
The motors in the nose section should now be swinging them out in a great arc toward the North Pole. A quick glance at the flight indicator was somewhat disturbing to Tom. They had been accelerating only slowly thus far, and according to his offhand recollection of their flight plan, they should have been a great deal farther northward than they found themselves.
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