or
The Castaways of Earthquake Island
by Victor Appleton
Tom Swift stepped from the door of the machine shop, where he was atwork making some adjustments to the motor of his airship, andglanced down the road. He saw a cloud of dust, which effectuallyconcealed whatever was causing it.
"Some one must be in a hurry this morning," the lad remarked, "Lookslike a motor speeding along. My! but we certainly do need rain," headded, as he looked up toward the sky. "It's very dusty. Well, I mayas well get back to work. I'll take the airship out for a flightthis afternoon, if the wind dies down a bit."
The young inventor, for Tom Swift himself had built the airship, aswell as several other crafts for swift locomotion, turned to reenterthe shop.
Something about the approaching cloud of dust, however, held hisattention. He glanced more intently at it.
"If it's an automobile coming along," he murmured, "it's moving veryslowly, to make so much fuss. And I never saw a motor-cycle thatwould kick up as much sand, and not speed along more. It ought to behere by now. I wonder what it can be?"
The cloud of highway dirt rolled along, making some progress towardTom's house and the group of shops and other buildings surroundingit. But, as the lad had said, the dust did not move at all quicklyin comparison to any of the speedy machines that might be causingit. And the cloud seemed momentarily to grow thicker and thicker.
"I wonder if it could be a miniature tornado, or a cyclone orwhirlwind?" and Tom spoke aloud, a habit of his when he wasthinking, and had no one to talk to. "Yet it can hardly be that." hewent on. "Guess I'll watch and see what it is."
Nearer and neare