“If only we had a fire!” moaned Phyl, her teeth chattering.
“I’m getting hungry,” Sandy said wistfully.
Bud remained silent. His eyes watched the ever-darkening skies for some hopeful sign of a rescuer.
“Tom will be here,” he said. “When we don’t re-146 TOM SWIFT AND HIS GIANT ROBOT
turn on schedule, he won’t waste a minute in starting 3. search.”
As the last ray of daylight filtered out, the powerful beams of the Sky Queen’s landing lights appeared on the horizon. The huge ship thundered toward them until it was directly overhead. The Flying Lab hovered over the mesa and began to descend.
The three marooned below waved frantically. Tom, relieved to see them alive and safe, blinked his lights in answer. He held the ship motionless in the air, keeping the intense blast of the jet lifters away from the trio on the mesa.
Because of the fiery blast, a landing would be impossible.
A solution to the rescue problem soon became apparent to Tom. First he maneuvered the Sky Queen over to the edge of the precipice and then slowly permitted the ship to sink down until she was slightly above the mesa top. The doors of the bay were opened, and Sterling and Hanson hurled down a flexible metal ladder. On the third try Bud caught it and managed to hold it taut while first Phyl, then Sandy, scrambled to the safety of the Sky Queen.
With no one to anchor the ladder, Bud realized that as soon as his feet left the ground the ladder would swing under the belly of the Sky Queen and expose him to the intense heat and air blast of the jet lifters. He wondered if he would be able to climb up, hand over hand, fast enough to escape being blown off the ladder. It was a chance he would have to take.