Five days afterwards four of them were thrown on a desert coast, seven thousand miles from their country! But one of their number was missing, the man who was to be their guide, their leading spirit, the engineer, Captain Harding!
Et celui qui manquait, celui au secours duquel les quatre survivants du ballon couraient tout d'abord, c'était leur chef naturel, c'était l'ingénieur Cyrus Smith!