by W E Johns
The machine roared on, thrusting the thin, sun-drenched air behind it, often bumping unpleasantly as it encountered up-currents and ‘sinkers’ caused by the convulsions of sun-lashed air and sand. Fifty yards to the left, Bertie in the reserve machine drove a similar uneasy course.
It seemed a long time, although actually it was less than two hours, before Biggles touched Ginger on the knee and pointed ahead, slightly to the north. Ginger knew what he meant. Thrust up for perhaps a thousand feet from the sand was a curving system of hills that could, with a little imagination, be likened to the shape of a horse-shoe.
Biggles took the machine straight to the far end of this conspicuous landmark, and then, turning, followed it southward until it broke down in a more or less flat plain that stretched east and west as far as the eye could see. Roughly in the middle, running southward towards the distant Arabian Sea, was a dried-up water-course, a little gash in the earth, which Ginger knew—as there were no others in sight—could only be the Wadi al Arwat, their objective.
Although still some way off he surveyed the place with interest and curiosity, particularly as it bore little resemblance to the sort of feature he had visualised. The foliage of the narcotic shrub had been described as grey; but he could see nothing that answered to this description. Indeed, from the air at any rate, any herbage the wadi supported—and there seemed to be very little—could only be described as dirty brown, if not actually black. Of the Arab refugees, if they were still there, he could see nothing. At all events, nothing moved, although there was a certain amount of debris scattered about that might have been anything.
He looked at Biggles, who was also staring down, having dropped his port wing for a better view. Biggles returned the glance and remarked:
“Queer.” Looking down again he went on: “I don’t get it. I don’t see much in the way of scrub growing there. Nor can I see anything that looks like a water-hole. I can’t imagine what that dark-coloured stuff could be. No matter. We’ll soon know.” So saying he cut his engine and put the nose of the aircraft down in a glide towards the object of their scrutiny.
He flew round the place twice, the first time at about two hundred feet and the second time even lower. Ginger watched closely for a movement; but he saw none.
“There are no Arabs there now or they would have shown themselves,” observed Biggles, as, correcting bumps all the time, he put the machine in to land.
Ginger relaxed with relief as the Proctor ran safely to a standstill. Then he started as, for the first time, some of the objects on the ground showed signs of life.
Half a dozen vultures flapped heavily along the ground before taking wing in a slow, spiral course towards the merciless sun.
“I don’t like the look of that,” muttered Biggles. “Those stinking birds are gorged with food. Did you notice how they took off? They were definitely overloaded.”
As Ginger jumped down the rays of the sun struck him like a blow. Heaven and earth alike seemed to glow. All around the hot air danced and trembled on the shining surface of barren, hard-baked sabkha. The silence was complete. Nothing interrupted a dreadful stillness. Even the drone of the reserve machine, circling overhead, seemed to be smothered by an overwhelming hush.
“Phew! What a dustbin!” he murmured, and then followed Biggles who began walking slowly towards the wadi, which he now saw was the usual dried-up water-course; or, more correctly, a gulley worn in the sands by storm-water during a deluge in the past. It was quite shallow. About a hundred yards wide at the rim, and thirty or forty feet deep, narrowing at the bottom, it meandered away following the fall of the ground, which was toward the south. In places it had been cut down to the bed rock but after half a mile or so it petered out to a mere sandy depression.
Reaching the object of their flight Biggles stopped and looked about him. Then he took a cigarette from his case, tapped it on the back of his hand and lighted it. “Looks as if we’ve wasted our time” he remarked evenly.
This expressed precisely what Ginger was thinking; for with the exception of one or two straggling bushes the whole area had been burnt. Where obviously the main growth of scrub had been, was now a charred area of earth from which projected a few woody stems. The dark area that had been observed from the air was now explained.
But this was not all. There were other things and they were not pretty.
Scattered about were bones, mostly complete skeletons of men and camels to which scraps of sun-dried flesh still adhered. But from the bleached condition of some of the bones it was evident that the owners of these miserable relics had been dead for some time. There were two exceptions.
Lying at the foot of a big rock in the wadi as if they had sought the meagre shade it would provide, were two Arabs, their bodies emaciated to mere skin and bones. Biggles went down to them, and a glance was sufficient to reveal that one of them at least had been dead for some days. The body had not decomposed, but had merely been shrivelled up like a mummy by the relentless sun. The other looked as if death had only recently overtaken him, and the cause was in plain view. Under the foot of a rock a hole had been scooped. The bottom, rather darker than the surrounding sand, still showed finger—marks, as if the last act of the wretched Arab had been to strive to reach the liquid that lay below. In this he had failed.
Clearly, the place was the water-hole. For all practical purposes it was dry. It looked as if the desert had claimed more victims.
Dropping on his knees, Biggles turned the body over and looked at the face. A sharp intake of breath suggested surprise at something, but he did not speak. The eyes of the Arab were closed. Biggles raised an eyelid. Then, moving swiftly, he bent low and laid an ear on the man’s chest. Suddenly he sprang up. “Water!” he snapped. “Fetch water.”
Gasping in the heat Ginger ran back to the machine and returned with a water-bottle. Without a word he handed it to Biggles who, not without difficulty, after splashing a little on the immobile face, got a small quantity between the black and shrivelled lips. He went on dabbing the lips with a wetted corner of his handkerchief. “I’m not sure that this man is dead,” he said at last, although his actions had already made this explanation unnecessary.
Ginger sat down on the skull of a dead camel and watched Biggles working on what at first they had supposed to be a corpse. It went on for some time, and he marvelled at Biggles’ patience, for he felt sure that it would all be to no purpose.
The heat was appalling, and he moved constantly so that the fierce rays did not strike his exposed skin always in one place. Then, looking again at the unconscious face, a strange feeling came over him that he had seen it before. Yet it was typical of the true desert breed, fierce, haughty, a nose like an eagle’s beak and a high, intelligent forehead. The man might have been forty, not more. He wore a small pointed black beard and a drooping moustache. His hair also was black, uncombed and glossy with oil.
“You know, Biggles,” said Ginger in a curious voice, “I’ve got a feeling I’ve seen that chap somewhere.”
“You’ve seen his photo,” said Biggles quietly, still working on the patient. “He’s one of Darnley’s men—the one named Zahar, if my memory serves me.” He splashed more water on the thin face.
“I think you might as well bring the other machine down,” he went on presently. “We may be here for some time and there’s no point in leaving Bertie up there. One machine is down all right, anyway.”
Ginger complied without enthusiasm. If the truth must be told he was by no means happy about the turn events had taken. Death stood too close.
His last victim still lay on the burning sand. If anything should go wrong they would soon be lying on the sand beside him. However, he made the necessary signal and watched the reserve machine land and taxi up to their own, where the engine was switched off.
“And what goes on, old boy?” asked Bertie as he jumped down.
“I don’t know, except that the place is a charnel-house,” answered Ginger moodily. “There’s
an Arab. Biggles thinks he’s still alive and is trying to bring him round. The gurra is all burnt out. There’s nothing here except bones. The place gives me the willies.”
They walked to the wadi to find, to Ginger’s astonishment, that Biggles’s efforts had so far been successful in that the Arab’s eyes were opened, although they still held a vacant stare.
But in ten minutes the man was able to sip a little water. A little while later he was grabbing at the cup, muttering incoherently. Slowly his eyes cleared as consciousness returned.
“Talk about snatching a bloke from the beastly jaws of death, and all that sort of thing,” murmured Bertie, polishing his eye-glass.
“It was worth trying,” remarked Biggles, satisfaction in his voice. “Apart from any other consideration, it would have been a pity had there been no survivor to tell us what happened here. If this chap can’t tell us, we shall never know.”
“Does it matter?” enquired Ginger. “I mean, the stuff is burnt. Somebody else has done the job for us. That suits me fine. It’s quite warm enough here without lighting bonfires.”
“I’m not so sure about that,” replied Biggles thoughtfully. “I have an idea that there’s more in this affair than meets the eye. While you were away I found that and had a look in it.” He pointed to a small lizard-skin bag, tied at the throat with a strip of the same material.
Ginger picked it up, untied the knot and inserted his hand. When he withdrew it, and opened it, it was to reveal a number of tiny brown pellets sticking to it. There was also a yellow object about the size of a marble. This, too, was sticky, and he had difficulty in removing it from his fingers and getting it back in the bag. It left a queer, sickly, but aromatic smell.
“You realise what that is?” asked Biggles, who was watching.
“Gurra, I imagine.”
“I don’t think there can be any doubt about it,” declared Biggles. “I’d say the little brown things are seeds of the plant that produces the stuff.”
“Then it looks as if this chap came here to collect both gum and seeds.”
“One or the other, certainly. He didn’t come alone either. There were at least two of them. I’ve been looking at his pal, the one who died, and unless I’m mistaken it’s Kuatim, another of Darnley’s camel-men from Aden. Now we know why they couldn’t be found there.”
“Absolutely,” murmured Bertie. “It looks as if they ran into a considerable spot of bother—if you see what I mean. I wonder what went wrong.”
“That’s what I’m hoping this chap will be able to tell us,” replied Biggles. “Maybe they reckoned on finding water in the water-hole, instead of which they found it dry. Maybe their camels strayed. Maybe they lit a fire, and the whole place caught fire and doped them. Anyhow, the fact remains that they got stuck here. One died, and the other was at his last gasp when we arrived. Judging from the way that the rest of the bones have been picked by vultures, I imagine the original Arabs that Darnley saw here all died long ago. Another fact that emerges is, Darnley was obviously wrong in supposing that the gurra was a secret of his own. These fellows knew about it or they wouldn’t have come back. The important question is, did they come to get some for their personal use or had they other ideas about it? That’s what I’m hoping Zahar will tell us. According to Darnley the fellow speaks English.”
At this juncture the Arab muttered something, but what he said no one knew, for the language, presummably an Arabic dialect, was unknown to any of them. “Try him in English,” suggested Ginger, as Biggles allowed the man to take a little more water.
Apparently the Arab overheard this, for he suddenly burst out with: “There is no God but God.”
“That’s better,” said Biggles smiling.
“May the sword of God strike the traitor and all his brood,” croaked Zahar.
“Who was the traitor, O Zahar?” asked Biggles quietly.
“Abu bin Hamud—may his face be blackened.”
Biggles threw a quick glance at the others, eyebrows raised. “So that was it,” he said softly. Then, to Zahar. “You came here with him, eh?”
“I did, may God forgive me.”
“Where is he now?”
“Allaha alim. God is the knower... Hamud took our camels and left us here.” The sick man’s strength was returning, and he raised himself on an elbow. “Wallah! What Arabs are you?” he demanded hoarsely.
Biggles did not smile, knowing that to an Arab all men are Arabs of one tribe or another. “We are friends of Darnley Sahib, whom doubtless you remember,” he explained.
“He is in my face,” answered Zahar, struggling into a sitting position and rolling his eyes with relish as Biggles gave him more water in small doses.
“Tell us what happened here,” requested Biggles. “Presently we will take you back to Aden.”
“Where are your camels?” demanded Zahar, looking round.
“We came in an aeroplane,” Biggles told him.
“God is great,” breathed Zahar. “ It was his will. I, and Kuatim, came here with Abu bin Hamud—may his children perish! He said there was a place he knew where there was a sort of hashish that we would sell to the ferengi1 for much money, and grow rich.”
“You have been here before?” prompted Biggles.
“That is the truth,” agreed Zahar. “At that time there were many Arabs here dying. When we came again, all were dead, and the bones of their camels had begun to whiten in the sand. That, doubtless, was the will of Allah. Then, said Abu bin Hamud—may God punish him!—we will collect this gum, and seeds of the plant, and afterwards destroy everything, so that we alone shall hold the secret. This we did. In the morning we would return to Aden. But when I awoke at the hour of the first prayer, Abu had gone, taking all the camels with him, as was written plainly in the tracks in the sand. So Kuatim and I cursed him and his mother and prepared for death, knowing there was no escape. No rain falls. The water in the hole dries up. With the vultures we ate the camels of the Arabs already dead until only bones remain. Then Kuatim died, and I lay down to die too. That is all, Sahib. From the sleep of death I awoke to find you here. It was as God willed.” The Arab was recovering his strength, but he now sank back exhausted by his effort.
“As you say, O Zahar, it was as God willed,” answered Biggles. He turned to Ginger. “Slip back to the machine and get a bar of chocolate and some Horlicks from the emergency rations.”
As Ginger went off Biggles turned again to Zahar. “And Abu bin Hamud took with him the gum you had collected?”
“There was but little, and we collected it with much labour,” answered Zahar. “The Arabs who were here had used most of it. They had used it for their fires and their camels had for long browsed on it. But that which was in my bag, and the bag of Kuatim, this Abu took.”
“And what of the seeds?” asked Biggles.
“We plucked them where we found them, but there were not many, and these Abu took also, doubtless to sell to the ferengi.”
“Why do you think he left you here?” enquired Biggles.
The Arab hesitated. “God is the knower. Perhaps so that he could keep all the money from the sale of the gurra. Perhaps he would have our camels, for mine was a nice cow. Or it may be that he feared we should finish our water too soon in the desert, and perish. Abu bin Hamud was a man who would think of such things, may God forgive him.”
“Why did you put fire to the place?” asked Biggles. “ Why was it not left, so that you could make money by it year by year?”
Zahar pondered the question. “I know not the answer. Abu said it was to prevent others from finding the secret. It may be the truth. I did as he said without giving the matter thought.”
“He did not say where he would sell the stuff?”
“No. Of this he said nothing.”
“He did not mention a ferengi by name?”
“No.”
At this point Ginger returned with the condensed food, and for the next half-hour they sat round while the Arab ate and d
rank eagerly, with obvious benefit to his condition.
At last Biggles got up. “Enough has been said here,” he told Zahar. “We will talk again in Aden.”
“Then let us depart from this place for it is accursed,” said Zahar, as with some difficulty he got to his feet.
Biggles turned to the others. “All he needs now is food. Give him a hand to get into the machine.”
* * *
1 Foreigner.
Chapter 4
Biggles Makes a Call
At six o’clock the same evening, Biggles, Ginger and Bertie, sat in a quiet corner of the Club lounge talking to Jerry Norman. Zahar had been taken home, in a car borrowed from the aerodrome, with orders to remain silent about what had happened in the desert; and it was hoped that a small sum of money, to enable him to buy food, would show him which side his bread was buttered. Not that there had been much doubt about this, for it was evident from his conversation that his main purpose in life now was to find the man who had left him to his fate; in which case something very unpleasant was likely to happen to Abu bin Hamud.
Norman had been as good as his word. He had made enquiries, but without much success. All he knew was, the three Arabs were not in Aden. Biggles, who realised that he would have to take this useful man into his confidence, was able to tell him why.
“No wonder I couldn’t find them,” muttered Norman, when the events of the desert had been narrated.
“What I’ve got to do now is to find this treacherous rascal, Hamud,” went on Biggles. “He seems to be the link in the chain between the original supply of gurra and those who are exploiting it. Of course, Hamud himself may be unaware of how far the racket has gone. It’s doubtful if he’d use the stuff himself, so he must have a market for it. What I don’t understand is why he burned the wadi. If he was getting a good price for the gurra one would have thought he’d have gone out of his way to protect his source of supply. We know he collected some seeds. What did he intend to do with them? It isn’t like an Arab to give himself extra trouble by cultivating something which Allah had already provided. But for what Zahar has told us about the stuff being burnt deliberately, I should have said it was set on fire by accident. Hamud knows the answer. That’s why I’ve got to get hold of him. It’s the fact that he’s got some seeds that worries me. Our job was to burn the stuff. Well, it’s been burnt; but while there are seeds floating loose, we can’t call the case closed. It’s a queer thought, but if what Raymond says about this stuff is true the fate of western civilisation may rest on a handful of seeds.”
