Biggles Flies South

by W E Johns

  ‘It is a volcano,’ declared Kadar, while they all stared at the blazing can of petrol which Biggles had just flung down the hillside into the faces of his pursuers. ‘It may be the end of the world,’ he added thoughtfully.

  ‘Not on your life it isn’t,’ said Algy crisply. ‘It’s petrol. He has got away and taken some petrol with him. You can see where he is. He has bolted up the hill and he has nearly reached the mouth of the cave. The crowd is after him, and he is bombing them with petrol-cans. Oh, lovely! Lovely! Frizzle, you blighters, frizzle!’

  Nothing else happened, for, as we know, Biggles had gone into the cave. Presently the watchers suspected it, and although they remained staring through the window, the excitement eased somewhat.

  ‘Well, would you believe that?’ said Ginger at last. ‘I honestly believe he has got clean away.’

  ‘And what is going to happen to him now?” asked Algy soberly.

  ‘And what is going to happen to us?’ muttered Kadar nervously.

  ‘It isn’t much use guessing,’ opined Ginger. ‘As Biggles himself would say, we shall have to wait and see, but I must say that it has put new life into me to know that he has got away. I never felt so absolutely hopeless in my life as when I saw him going down the hill.’

  ‘Some of the people are coming back, judging by the sound of it,’ observed Algy. ‘I can hear them groaning. It also sounds as if some of them are cursing, and I don’t wonder at it, for a lot of them must have got pretty badly burned.’

  ‘So shall we be, I’m afraid, when they remember that we are up here,’ murmured Kadar pessimistically.

  ‘Biggles won’t overlook that possibility,’ declared Ginger confidently. ‘He’ll see us through. While he is at large anything can happen.’

  ‘I should like to know what these Persian johnnies are thinking about the whole thing,’ muttered Algy.

  ‘They are probably having a council to decide what shall be done with us,’ suggested Kadar. ‘Having had a taste of our magic, as they will suppose Biggles’s effort to be, they’ll think very carefully before they try any more sacrifices.’

  ‘They may take the view that if one of us can kill their god by producing fire out of the sand, what might three be able to do?’ said Ginger hopefully.

  ‘I hope you’re right,’ declared Algy fervently.

  After that they fell silent, and the night wore on. None of them slept, for in their extreme peril repose was out of the question. Never to any of them had a night seemed so long. Once or twice, when one of them thought he heard a sound below, he went eagerly to the window and looked down, thinking perhaps Biggles had returned, but on each occasion the alarm proved false.

  At last the sky began to grey with the approach of dawn, and Algy yawned. ‘My goodness! I’d give something for a hot bath,’ he muttered. ‘Never in my life have I felt so filthy. Hark! Is that some one coming?’ he concluded sharply.

  A moment later footsteps could be heard coming up the stairs, accompanied by the low mutter of voices. The door was thrown open and several bearded warriors, evidently leaders of the tribe, stood on the threshold, regarding the prisoners with scowling faces. It was not difficult to guess the reason for their displeasure, for nearly all of them showed signs of the recent conflagration. One had a terrible blister on his cheek, and another had had most of his beard singed off. In their hands they carried strips of hide, evidently to be used as bonds, suggesting that they were not going to risk a repetition of Biggles’s moonlight magic.

  ‘I don’t like the look of this,’ said Algy quietly.

  Before either of the others could answer, even if they had so wished, the tribesmen came into the room, and without any more ado proceeded to tie their prisoners hand and foot. Algy and Ginger, as soon as they realized what was intended, attempted to put up a fight, but against such hopeless odds their efforts were doomed to failure from the onset. They were thrown roughly to the ground, and held securely while the thongs were adjusted. This done, they were hauled to the door like a tailor’s dummies being taken from a shop-window, and dragged down the stairs into the street, where a number of spear-armed warriors were waiting.

  ‘Can you make a guess as to what they are going to do with us?’ Ginger asked Kadar, for their heads were close together.

  ‘No, but doubtless they have decided on an unpleasant way of killing us,’ answered Kadar resignedly, and with that the assembly began to move off.

  It was only with difficulty that they could see where they were being carried. Ginger went cold all over in spite of the heat as they crossed the drawbridge, for he had not forgotten the snakes underneath; but he breathed again as the procession moved on, and presently passed under the entrance arch into a world now flushed with the pink and gold of dawn. Presently the sun would mount above the hill-tops, and it would be baking hot, but Algy was doubting whether they would live long enough to feel its heat.

  The procession passed along the side of the oasis, and as it reached the open space between the palms and the foot of the necropolis hill without showing signs of halting, Algy wondered where they could be going, for the leaders were still advancing towards the track that led to the tombs of the dead.

  It was Kadar who told them the grim truth, and he had obtained the information in an unexpected manner. To his great surprise, a guttural voice near him whispered his name; turning his head with difficulty, he saw the Tuareg marching beside him with their arms bound securely to their sides, and he realized for the first time that the tribesmen evidently intended to dispose of all their prisoners at once. The faces of the Tuareg, gallant enough in battle, were a ghastly colour; their eyes rolled, and the teeth of one of them chattered in his head.

  ‘What did you say?’ Kadar asked the Tuareg who had spoken, in his own language, for he had not quite caught all the words.

  ‘They are taking us to the tombs of the dead, to be buried alive,’ answered the Tuareg hoarsely, and Kadar passed the information on to the others.

  Ginger looked up at the blue sky which presently he would see no more, for already the procession had reached the foot of the hill. As he stared upwards a small black object soared into view; at first he thought it was a vulture, but when, a moment later, he heard the deep hum of the Tourer’s engines, he understood.

  The tribesmen heard the noise too, and the procession stopped, while a nervous mutter ran down the line.

  ‘It’s Biggles!’ yelled Algy.

  Chapter 20

  Biggles Strikes

  After taking off, Biggles had climbed swiftly to five thousand feet, and then, cutting his engines, began gliding towards the oasis, with his side window open, staring at the ground between the village and the foot of the hill.

  In doing this he was following the plan he had decided to adopt. Not that he had much choice. He had enough petrol left in his tank for, roughly, five minutes’ flying; at the end of that time he would have to come down whereever he was, and the only place that he could remember, apart from the wadi, where a landing might be made without disastrous results, was the open area between the palms and the foot of the necropolis hill. It so happened that his roving eyes had instinctively noted this piece of ground when they had walked across it, for it becomes second nature to most airmen to mark down a possible landing-ground when one is noticed. Biggles could not recall just what the surface of the ground was like, although he could not remember any serious obstructions; there were, he thought, a number of small pieces of loose rock, but none large enough to upset him. He did not relish the idea of landing there, but there was nowhere else. In any case, he could not get back to the wadi even if he had wished to— not that there would be any point in returning to the place which he had left only a few minutes before. The petrol-supply was near the pool, and since he could not hope to carry the petrol to the machine, the machine would have to be taken to the petrol, whatever the risk.

  He had not expected to see any one there; he had hoped that after the debacle of the previous night t
he place would be deserted, and a great wave of disappointment swept over him when he observed that, far from this being the case, a column of tribesmen were actually on the march across it. From the altitude at which he was flying he could not, of course, distinguish individuals, and although he noticed vaguely that the tribesmen were carrying something, it did not occur to him that it might be Algy and the others. Not unnaturally, he imagined that they were still in the place where he had left them, and he cast several glances in that direction, wondering if they could see him, and if so, what they were thinking at the reappearance of the machine in the air.

  His petrol was now nearly exhausted; willy-nilly, a landing would soon have to be made, so he resolved forthwith to fall back upon his last forlorn hope, which was that the machine would put the natives to flight and give him an opportunity of getting more petrol — at least some of it, if not all. Beyond that he did not think, for the hazards of the undertaking were such that further arrangements were uncalled for; time would come for that if he was successful.

  He had dived many machines in his time, both in peace and war, but never before had he dived one so recklessly as he dived the Tourer, for on no previous occasion had the circumstances been so desperate. With the engines full on he pushed the joystick right forward and held it there with his right hand, while with his left he picked up the signalling pistol, the modern equivalent of the war-time Very pistol. Down went the nose of the Tourer, while the tail cocked high into the air behind it. The roar of the engines became a pulsating bellow; the wind screamed through the wires and struts, while the quivering needle of the air-speed indicator crept round the dial — 200 — 300 — 350.

  At just under four hundred miles an hour Biggles began to ease the stick back, for he was getting low, and he had no desire either to dive into the ground or end matters by stripping the wings off his machine; in any case, he saw that further speed was unnecessary, for already the tribesmen were scattering like chips from a log under a woodcutter’s axe. At a hundred feet, with the engines still running on full throttle, he levelled out, his eyes running swiftly over the scene below, on the lookout for a suitable mark at which to discharge the pistol. He chose his target, and a ball of crimson fire went screaming down into the middle of a group of warriors; and it was at that moment that Algy’s white face caught his eye. So astounded was he that he stared at it for a full second, forgetting for the moment that an aeroplane travels far in that time. He snatched the stick back, and his wheels missed the palms by inches. The manoeuvre served this good purpose, however: it turned the retreat of the tribesmen into a panic-stricken rout. Some fled helter-skelter, flinging away their weapons; others flung themselves flat and covered their faces with their hands.

  If Biggles had been prepared to ‘shoot up’ the district before seeing Algy and the others, their unexpected appearance put a new zest into his actions, and he treated the savages, did they but know it, to as fine an exhibition of crazy-flying as has ever been seen at a flying-display. Round and round he tore, diving and zooming, with sometimes his wheels and sometimes a wing-tip nearly scraping the ground. On the brief occasions when he flew level he reloaded the pistol, holding the joystick between his knees, and blazed red and green fire at the now widely scattered natives. Few were, in fact, still in sight, and these he chased until their actions became ludicrous. One dropped to his knees and raised his arms in an attitude of prayer.

  Biggles was in the middle of a turn when his engines coughed, choked, and then cut out dead. Instantly the natives were forgotten as he concentrated absolutely on the tricky business of putting the machine down without damaging it. Never before had so much depended on a good landing, and he put all his skill into it. A gentle sideslip to the left brought him in line with the open area, with the nose of the machine pointing in the direction in which Algy and the others were lying. As he flattened out he wondered why they did not get up and run towards him, for his speed had not permitted him to see that they were tied; but now, as he skimmed low over them, he understood.

  Slowly the machine sank nearer to the sand, while his eyes stared at the track along which he must now land. One boulder would be all that was necessary to seal their fate, but, as it happened, although there were several small pieces of rock which caused the machine to bump and wobble dangerously, there was nothing large enough to throw it over, and it ran to a standstill, with stationary propellers, in an unaccustomed silence.

  The instant the machine stopped running Biggles was out, racing back to where the others were lying. Once he paused to snatch a sword from the hand of a warrior who had either been hit by one of his shots, or had died of fright; then he went on again, and, panting, presently dropped on his knees at Algy’s side.

  ‘Are you hurt?’ was all he said, as he cut him free.

  ‘No,’ answered Algy.

  ‘Then take this pistol and run for the petrol,’ ordered Biggles. ‘Don’t stop for anything. If any one tries to get in your way, plug him. The petrol is our only chance.’

  Algy ran off towards the trees, working his arms to restore the circulation.

  Biggles cut Ginger’s bonds, and told him to follow Algy. Then he freed Kadar, dragged him to his feet, and set off after the others. Not a soul attempted to stop them, and by the time he reached the cache the top cans were already uncovered. He snatched up two of them, and with a crisp ‘Get ‘em all out if you can manage it’, he raced back to the machine.

  It took him two or three minutes to empty the two cans into the gravity tank, but it was time well employed. Into the cabin he darted, and without bothering to close the door, he started the engines and taxied swiftly but carefully to the edge of the trees, where he switched off and jumped out.

  ‘Take this and mount guard,’ he told Kadar tersely, thrusting into his hands the signal-pistol, in which a cartridge remained. ‘If you see any one coming, let drive. Ginger, get to the machine, and fill the tanks as we pass the cans to you. Take a couple with you.’

  Perhaps never before in the history of aviation has an aeroplane been refuelled with such frantic haste. On one side of it a great pile of empty cans lay where they fell, as Ginger flung them aside after emptying them of their contents. Panting and staggering under the weight of the loads they carried, Biggles and Algy fed him with full ones, and not until only a few cans remained did he ease the pace.

  ‘We are safe!’ cried Biggles exultantly. ‘We’ve done it! Keep your eyes skinned, Kadar. Don’t let them surprise us.’

  ‘I can see a few of them coming back in the distance,’ called Kadar.

  ‘Let us know if they get close,’ replied Biggles, and went on with the work of refuelling until the last can had been emptied.

  ‘Have we got enough to get us home, do you think?’ panted Algy.

  ‘I think so, but it is impossible to be absolutely certain,’ answered Biggles. ‘We’ve a long way to go. It’s no use going merely to Semphis. It has got to be either Siwah or Dakhel. I fancy Siwah is our nearest contact-point with civilization, but not knowing just where we are, it’s impossible to be sure. We can only take a course to the north-west, hoping to strike it. If we miss it we ought to be able to pick up a caravan, or a caravan trail, since we shall be in a district where people are moving about.’

  When he had finished speaking Biggles took two spare water-bottles from the cabin and, running to the pool, filled them, a faint smile flitting across his face as he saw in daylight the scene of his adventure the previous night. Returning, he pointed out the dead, scorched body of the crocodile, still lying where he had last seen it. ‘I warmed that beauty’s tonsils for him, as I said I would,’ he smiled. ‘Hello, what’s that — over there?’ He pointed to a small dark object that lay at the foot of some rocks near the bottom of the hill.

  ‘Great Scott! I believe it’s the old hag!’ cried Algy. ‘Yes, by all that’s wonderful, so it is. She must have tumbled down the rocks and broken her neck when you dived on the crowd just now — unless she died of fright.�
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  ‘Stay here and keep your eyes skinned, Ginger,’ ordered Biggles. ‘Yell if you see any one coming.’

  ‘Ay, ay, sir,’ answered Ginger cheerfully.

  Biggles, with Algy beside him, hurried across to the body, and they saw that it was indeed the old hag. A glance told them that she was stone dead, and a jagged wound in her forehead, which looked as though it had been caused by a fall, showed how she had at last met her death. She was a dreadful looking creature, little more than a collection of bones covered by brown, wrinkled skin, and Biggles was about to turn away when Algy caught him by the arm.

  ‘What are those things?’ he asked, pointing to a little stream of what looked like semi-transparent marbles, some green and some red, that had evidently fallen out of a small goat-skin bag attached to the old woman’s girdle.

  Biggles picked one up, one of the red ones. ‘Great heaven!’ he whispered in an awed voice, ‘I wouldn’t swear to it, but I believe it’s a ruby.’

  ‘Look out, they’re coming!’ came Ginger’s voice from the machine.

  Biggles stooped swiftly, and jerking off the bag with a single tug, thrust it into his pocket, while Algy scooped up the loose stones. Then they turned and ran back to the others, hastened by shrill cries from the heart of the oasis, which suggested that the tribesmen were rallying there.

  ‘All aboard,’ cried Biggles, climbing into the cockpit. ‘They’ll change their minds about coming nearer, I fancy, when the engines open up.’ He felt for the self-starter, and as the others scrambled aboard the powerful engines sprang to life.

  Biggles taxied slowly to the extremity of the open area. Then, with his engines idling, he looked over his shoulder at Kadar. ‘This Lost Oasis that you were so anxious to find,’ he said, ‘would you like to stay here and do a bit more exploring, or would you rather come home with us?’

  Kadar smiled wanly. ‘I think I’ve seen enough of it to last me for a little while,’ he said.