I'll run up
the ladder a bit." So saying, he paid another visit to the upper portion
of the Projectile and remained there awhile whistling _Malbrouk_, whilst
his companions amused themselves in looking through the floor window.
Ardan was coming down the ladder, when his whistling was cut short by a
sudden exclamation of surprise.
"What's the matter?" asked Barbican quickly, as he looked up and saw the
Frenchman pointing to something outside the Projectile.
Approaching the window, Barbican saw with much surprise a sort of
flattened bag floating in space and only a few yards off. It seemed
perfectly motionless, and, consequently, the travellers knew that it
must be animated by the same ascensional movement as themselves.
"What on earth can such a consarn be, Barbican?" asked Ardan, who every
now and then liked to ventilate his stock of American slang. "Is it one
of those particles of meteoric matter you were speaking of just now,
caught within the sphere of our Projectile's attraction and accompanying
us to the Moon?"
"What I am surprised at," observed the Captain, "is that though the
specific gravity of that body is far inferior to that of our Projectile,
it moves with exactly the same velocity.
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