"Yes; but they can't, I'm afraid. They may be killed, or
so securely bound that they can't get loose!"
"Can't you get the Hawk there in time to stop her?"
"I'm afraid not. By that time she'll have attained top
speed and it would be taking our lives in our bands to try
to make a flying jump, get inside, and shut off the motors."
"Then the tank's got to smash!" said Ned gloomily.
Tom did not answer for a moment. He and his chum watched
the fleeing figures running away from the war engine. What
the plotters had done, as soon as they saw the aircraft and
realized that Tom had discovered them, was to start the
motors and leap from the tank, closing the doors after them.
Whether or not they had left Koku and the others prisoners
inside remained to be seen.
But the tank was plunging her way toward the steep bank of
the river, doomed, it seemed, to great damage, if not to
destruction.
"Oh, if we could only halt her!" murmured Ned.
Tom Swift was busy with some apparatus on
the Hawk. Ned heard the hum of an electric
motor which was connected with the engine, and
there soon sounded the crackle of the wireless.
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