Biggles Makes Ends Meet

by W E Johns

  The only people he could see when he reached the huts were the two Chinese still standing on guard at the entrance to the place being used to hold the prisoners. Hurrying to the rear window of the workshop he looked inside. There was no one there. The window, he found, was fastened on the inside. Taking a chance, speed being important, for he was afraid the yacht might be hauled off the sand in his absence, he tapped out a pane of glass with the butt of his pistol, put in a hand and turned the fastener. Within a minute the window was open and he was inside.

  He went straight to the cans. The weight told him they were full, and having lifted the cap of one the reek of spirit told him all he needed to know. Petrol. Taking two cans, which he thought should be ample for his purpose, he put them through the window, and having helped himself to a heavy chisel, followed them out. With a can in each hand he set off back for the cove, mildly surprised that the operation should have been carried out without any difficulty whatever. But this, he realized, was due to his presence being unsuspected. In any case the Colonel couldn’t have men everywhere. He would need every hand to get the yacht afloat.

  The luck held. Dusk was closing in by the time he was in the scrub above the oil drums. The descent between rocks, as Ginger had discovered in the dark, was not easy, but he blundered on with his burden, hastened by sounds which told him that the yacht might be off at any moment. Waves were surging far up the beach. The time had come. Men shouted. The winch rattled. The hawser became taut as it took the strain. All eyes were on the yacht.

  The descent to the drums was not easy. Thrusting his way through the bushes, stumbling and sometimes falling over the rocks, Bertie made his way down, noting with satisfaction when he arrived that the place, having often been used for refuelling, already reeked of loose oil. He resolved to make sure. Using the chisel, which he had brought for the purpose, he unscrewed the cap of the nearest drum. Oil poured out in a turgid stream, across the rock and into the water. Off came the caps of the cans and petrol gushed down over it.

  Bertie saved a few drops from the second can to lay a train, and presently he was very glad that he had done so, for accustomed as he was to handling aviation spirit, the result, when he struck a match, startled him. The explosion singed his hair and eyebrows, as presently he discovered by the smell.

  The fire was greeted by the men below with a great noise of yelling. Looking back as he hastened away Bertie was delighted to see flames dancing on the water. He could not see very clearly, for smoke from burning shrubs, as well as the oil, obscured his view. He was glad to have the smoke screen to cover his retreat.

  Looking back as he retraced his steps along the edge of the airfield he was gratified to see a great cloud of black smoke, of a volume much greater than he had expected, coiling sluggishly into the sunset, while through the deepening twilight began to spread a lurid glow. “That should cramp their style for a bit,” he told himself, as he hurried on, for his work was not yet finished.

  From the rear of the huts he saw the Chinese guards, who had been joined by the cook, staring at the fire, apparently speculating as to its cause. Gun in hand he came up behind them, and so engrossed were they in the spectacle in the direction of the cove, as was understandable, that they neither saw nor heard him until he proclaimed his presence with a ferocious snarl intended to convey the impression that he only needed an excuse to shoot them. This, from their expressions, they believed. By eloquent gestures he made signs that they were to drop their rifles. Menaced by the muzzle of his gun they obeyed with alacrity. What Bertie did not know was in wiping sweat from his face in his recent labours he had streaked it with black oil in such a way as to give him a singularly bestial appearance.

  Feeling that he was doing well, as indeed he was, he shouted: “Are you there, chaps?”

  Biggles and Algy replied by popping out of the shelter in the manner of rabbits bolted by a ferret.

  “Help yourself to some rifles,” invited Bertie. “I’ve been having fun. What had we better do with this brace of yellow-hammers?”

  “As we can’t very well shoot them, and we don’t want them with us, we’d better get rid of ‘em,” decided Biggles, waving away the men in the direction of the cove.

  They backed a little way, then turned and ran for their lives.

  “Well, here we are, all bright and breezy, if you see what I mean,” announced Bertie, cheerfully. “Where’s all this bally oil coming from? I keep getting it on my glass eye.”

  “It’s all over your face,” Algy told him. “You look simply ravishing.”

  Biggles pointed at the fire, now a conflagration. “Were you responsible for that?”

  “Too true I was, old boy. I don’t mind telling you I’ve been pretty busy.”

  “So I realize. Have you set fire to the yacht?”

  “Well, not that I know of, but it could have happened. I set fire to the oil stores by way of a diversion, really to discourage them from getting the yacht afloat. Jolly good effort, don’t you think?”

  “Very good indeed,” admitted Biggles, smiling. “What was the next item on your programme?”

  “How about snaffling some tuck from the cookhouse? I’m getting kind of peckish.”

  “So are we all,” assented Biggles. “Starvation isn’t my idea of a pleasant death. It takes too long. But before we attend to that I’d feel more comfortable with my gun in my pocket. The Colonel put mine in a drawer of his desk.”

  “And mine,” said Algy.

  “Okay. Let’s get ‘em.”

  They went into the office. There was no one there. The guns were still in the drawer. Biggles collected his and passed Algy’s to him. “Now for the grub stakes,” he proposed. “We’d better get a move on. The gang will be back hot foot when those guards tell their boss that we’re on the loose here. If the Colonel was peeved before this, by now he’ll be hopping mad. He only refrained from shooting us, I fancy, because he wanted to make quite sure he could get away. But he won’t have any qualms about that if he cops us again. Come on.”

  They walked briskly to the kitchen. There was plenty of rice but nothing else. The door to an ante room, which Biggles thought might be the general store, was locked. He shot the lock out with a rifle bullet, when it was revealed that his supposition had been correct. There was not much choice in the matter of food, but they weren’t particular, and it was mostly with a good supply of biscuits that they retired to the jungle.

  “Let’s get back to the beach where we landed in case Ginger comes back,” decided Biggles. “He’ll do that as soon as he can, of course. It will be a matter of how soon he can get hold of the Otter, or whether he can get hold of it at all. Meantime, our big job will be to keep clear of the gang. It’s unlikely they’ll try to find us in the dark, but they’ll be out in force as soon as it gets light, if I know anything.”

  Night had fallen by the time they were on the beach to find a fair sea still running. A search produced a few coconuts so finding a rock for a seat they sat down to a satisfying, if not very palatable, long-delayed meal. The mosquitoes rose in swarms and they, too, made a meal, which nothing could be done to prevent.

  “I was afraid this business would develop into a sort of private war,” said Biggles, chewing steadily on a piece of coconut. “The chief won’t be too happy about it, but I don’t see what else we could have done. One can arrest an individual, but it would need a small army to round up a gang of this size.”

  “The Colonel is the head lad, and if we can pull him in it should cause the rest of the outfit to go to pieces,” opined Algy.

  “How can we pull him in while he’s surrounded by a mob of toughs? It isn’t as though we’re on our own ground. There must have been pickings in this racket for minor officials from one side of the Indian Ocean to the other, and some of ‘em may be powerful enough to raise a stink if they learn of our invasion tactics.”

  “The thing is, old boy, to get out of this bug-ridden climate, tell the Air Commodore what we know, and leave him to cl
ean up the mess,” asserted Bertie. “After all, we’ve been to quite a lot of trouble to get things sorted out—if you get my meaning.”

  “You’re not forgetting that we’re still in quite a bit of trouble, or we shall be, tomorrow morning,” said Biggles sarcastically. “With the crew of the yacht I reckon the Colonel has forty or fifty stiffs here, and there are only three of us.”

  “We should have reduced those numbers somewhat by tomorrow night,” declared Bertie, confidently.

  “I’m not thinking so much about the shooting match we’re in for as the political row that’ll blow up when it gets out that we, supposed to be civilized policemen, have landed on an island and murdered the inhabitants. That’s how they’ll put it. The Colonel has in his mob Americans, Chinese, Indians, Japanese and maybe Indonesians, all with governments to scream if we hurt their precious nationals.”

  “They can scream their blooming heads off as long as mine’s still on my shoulders,” stated Bertie, nonchalantly. “And you can bet your sweet little life, old boy, that I shall do my best to keep it there. It’s scallywags like this Colonel bloke who start wars, not us. But for him we shouldn’t be sitting here, being torn to pieces by these bally mosquitoes. You chaps get some sleep. I’ll keep an eye on things for a bit.”

  “Wake me in a couple of hours,” said Biggles, wrapping his jacket round his head and settling down on the sand.

  Dawn broke fine and clear to find them all refreshed but showing signs of the wear and tear of the last few days. Their chins were unshaven, their hair dishevelled and their tropical drill suits torn and filthy. Mosquito bites spotted their faces, hands and arms, as though with a rash. They were trying to improve matters with sea water, not very successfully, when a distant shout informed them that the hunt was up.

  “I know what an old fox feels like when he hears hounds give tongue on a fine November morning,” said Bertie. “He probably thinks as I do.”

  “And how’s that?” inquired Algy, morosely.

  “We’ll give the blighters a run for their money.”

  Biggles was looking at the sea. “It’s going down, but not very fast,” he observed. “Even if Ginger has managed to get hold of the Otter I doubt if he’d dare to risk getting down as it is, knowing that if he cracked up that’d be our last hope gone.”

  “He’ll fix something, don’t worry,” declared Algy.

  “I’m not worrying,” came back Biggles shortly. “I’m merely trying to look the thing in the face. It’s all very well for you to pretend you couldn’t care less but I happen to be in charge of this crazy operation and I carry my responsibilities with less light-hearted abandon than I did when I had only my life to lose. I’d hate the Air Commodore to lose his job through me. But instead of arguing let’s have a look round for the best position to meet the fuss when things start humming. There’s so little cover at the other end of the island that the Colonel will guess we’re up here somewhere.”

  “Why doesn’t he push off instead of bothering with us,” said Algy.

  “The answer to that, I imagine, is because he can’t,” replied Biggles. “The yacht has either been damaged by the fire or it’s still aground. Either way he won’t feel like dealing with it while we’re on the loose to upset more of his applecarts. Another thing. He knows that whoever went off in his Dakota will come back to pick us up, and we have enough evidence to make life uncomfortable for him wherever he went. Not only would he lose this base but he would be asked to explain why he kept the stores for his own use instead of reporting them to the United States government. Oh, yes, he has plenty of reasons for preventing us from talking, even if we found it difficult to prove smuggling or piracy.”

  While Biggles had been talking the three of them had been pushing their way through a mass of undergrowth that flourished between a rising formation of rocks, mostly huge boulders. Nearing the highest point Algy climbed a tree for an all round survey, and coming down reported that the whole northern end of the island was the same, a chaos of rocks that had either been thrown up by a volcanic eruption, or a mountain that had been split by one. The highest point might be a couple of hundred feet above sea level, no more.

  Smoke was still rising from the cove. He could see the heads of the Colonel’s coolies as they beat through the rough stuff that fringed the airstrip, coming towards them.

  “How about putting in a little target practice to let ‘em know we’re about?” suggested Bertie. “Discourage them from getting too enthusiastic about the job, and all that sort of thing.”

  “There’s no point in telling them exactly where we are,” answered Biggles. “They’ll find us soon enough.”

  “All the same, I hate the idea of being beaten out of cover like an old cock pheasant at a shooting party,” protested Bertie, frowning as he wiped oil and perspiration from his monocle.

  “You should know that an old cock pheasant, in his wisdom, sits tight as long as possible,” reminded Biggles.

  “True enough—true enough,” conceded Bertie.

  Biggles stopped in a slight depression, from the rim of which it was possible to look down on the beach. “I don’t see any point in blundering about in this stuff indefinitely,” he remarked. “Let’s make ourselves comfortable till the band strikes up.”

  They sat down. Biggles produced a much discoloured cigarette and lit it. “I should have asked the Colonel if he had any gaspers to spare,” he murmured, smiling faintly.

  CHAPTER XVII

  TOTAL WAR

  THE day wore on. The sun, climbing to its zenith, flayed sea and land with sultry heat, as if determined to have one last fling before being banished by the approaching monsoon. The jungle steamed. The flies and mosquitoes swarmed, biting and stinging. Sweat poured down the faces of the refugees, making little white channels through the grime. The pursuit drew steadily nearer.

  “There are times,” observed Algy with sarcastic venom,” when I feel we earn our pay. This is one of them.”

  “There are people,” said Biggles, nibbling a biscuit, “who pine for a tropic island.”

  “And sing songs about ‘em,” added Bertie.

  “They can have them all—every one,” decided Algy.

  “I have an idea,” remarked Bertie, “that the lads who are supposed to be hunting us are not infatuated with plunging about in this stinking, bug-ridden jungle. They’re a long time coming.”

  “The possibility of bumping into a lump of lead can’t exactly add zest to the fun,” asserted Algy.

  “Quit moaning, or you’ll have me in tears in a minute,” requested Biggles. “The sea’s going down. It’s still a bit choppy outside, but close in it should soon be all right for a landing in a robust job like the Otter.”

  They all knew that their survival depended on Ginger getting the amphibian.

  Presently Biggles went on. “I’d say that bonfire you started, Bertie, has made a mess of the yacht, or the Colonel would be pulling out.”

  “I can’t think why he’s going to all this trouble over us,” said Algy, wearily.

  “Revenge, old boy, revenge,” surmised Bertie.

  “What’s the use of revenge if you get scuppered at the end of it?”

  “Don’t ask me, laddie; I’m not a television wizard. The trouble with me in these tropic climes is my eyeglass keeps getting steamed up.”

  Biggles smiled. “Not so steamed up as the Colonel. I wonder who he really is. He’s no ordinary thug. I’m pretty sure he’s been a soldier.”

  “That doesn’t make him any less a crook.”

  “How about having a poop at some of these yellow birds of his?” suggested Bertie. “Keep the party going, if you see what I mean.”

  “There’ll be plenty of time for that presently,” advised Biggles.

  Shouts not far away proclaimed that the time was fast coming.

  Biggles stretched, yawning. Suddenly he started, alert in a listening posture. “Can you hear what I hear?” he asked tersely.

  “Ginger!”
cried Algy.

  “Good old goldilocks,” exclaimed Bertie. “I’ve had about enough of being a boiled egg in a saucepan.”

  “Let’s get down to the beach and make ready a smudge fire to show him where we are,” said Biggles, crisply.

  Buoyant with hope they started down towards the beach. They did not go far. All stopped dead as the aircraft, now low, swung into view. It was not the Otter. It was a Dakota. From their expressions they were all equally taken aback.

  Biggles was the first to speak. “I don’t get this,” he said wonderingly. “That’s the machine Ginger took from here.”

  “If he’s come back in it, it means he can’t find the Otter,” said Algy.

  “But he wouldn’t be such a fool as to come back here in the Dakota!”

  “If he couldn’t make it any other way he’d paddle here in a dugout canoe—you know that, old boy,” stated Bertie.

  “But what can he hope to do! Land on the airstrip when he doesn’t even know where we are?” cried Algy.

  “It looks as if that’s where he’s going to land,” said Bertie. “Hadn’t we better get a bit closer? He knows we’re bound to see him, and maybe he thinks we’ll make a run for it.”

  By this time the Dakota was making its approach with the obvious intention of landing.

  “Wait a minute!” exclaimed Biggles, with a change of tone. “We’ve got this all wrong. Ginger isn’t flying that machine. It wouldn’t make sense.”

  “But it’s the same aircraft.”

  “True. But I doubt if it has the same pilot.”

  “But that means—that something— went wrong— with Ginger,” said Algy, haltingly.

  “Of course it does,” acquiesced Biggles. “ He must have run into trouble at Kutaradja. I warned him to be careful there. But there’s still something wrong about that. If Ginger went to Kutaradja it would only be for petrol. Having got it he’d press on. He wouldn’t stay there. He must have got there before dark. If he lost the machine why has it been so long coming back? But what’s the use of guessing? I’ll make just one more. Ginger’s in that machine, but he isn’t flying it.”