Biggles Hits The Trail

by W E Johns

  ‘Just walk back to the plateau, take your seat, wait for Dickpa, Malty, and Mac to get in, and then fly up here.’

  Algy eyed the peaks that stood round the lake with misgiving. ‘I suppose I shall be able to get between those,’ he muttered.

  ‘Try hard,’ suggested Biggles sarcastically. ‘You’ve only got to hit one to settle any question of further mental strain for all of us,’ he concluded grimly.

  Algy grinned, and leaving the rifle behind, stepped over the parapet. ‘Cheerio – see you presently,’ he nodded, and set off down the path.

  Biggles looked at the prisoner, who was lying on the ground staring sullenly at the lake, and then at Ginger. ‘All we can do now is wait,’ he observed. ‘I’ll keep an eye on the path if you’ll watch this streak of purple misery.’

  ‘O.K., Chief,’ replied Ginger cheerfully.

  CHAPTER 11

  COUNCIL OF WAR

  IN less than half an hour they saw Malty, accompanied by a small escort of Chungs, walk briskly across the plateau from the direction of the cave. He went into the amphibian, reappeared a moment later with his medicine case, and then hurried back towards the cave.

  ‘They’ve got a hole through that door apparently; that’s how the blighters got up,’ observed Biggles, who, with one eye still on the path, was watching the proceedings. ‘Upon my Sam,’ he continued, as Algy appeared on the plateau and stopped to have a word with Malty as they met, ‘if this isn’t the craziest business I ever saw in my life.’

  Malty disappeared into the cave, to reappear a few minutes later on the narrow bridge at the foot of the path. With him were two stalwart Chungs who carried what appeared to be a bamboo bed. A moment or two later Dickpa and McAllister walked across the plateau to the Explorer and climbed in. Its engines opened up with a roar, and the big machine taxied round to get into the best position for a take-off.

  ‘Hello, Malty, come and do your stuff,’ greeted Biggles as he stood up and handed over his charge for medical attention, while he watched the Explorer leave the ground, climb up to the lake, make a fair landing, and taxi towards them.

  By the time the minor operation had been performed on the wounded Chung, Algy had nosed the amphibian up to the rocks a few yards from where Biggles was waiting, and switched off the engines.

  ‘How’s the patient?’ smiled Dickpa, as he jumped out.

  ‘Not so bad,’ replied Malty, wiping his hands on a piece of lint. ‘He’ll be all right in a week or two if they keep the wound clean. I’ve finished with him, anyway.’

  Biggles turned to McAllister, who had also disembarked, and jabbed his thumb towards the two porters. ‘Tell ‘em they can take young Burlington Bertie back to his daddy,’ he grinned.

  McAllister complied, and in a few seconds the Chungs were on their way down the path.

  ‘And now what?’ asked Ginger.

  ‘Don’t ask fool questions; you keep your eye on that path and tell me if you see any ray-throwers or anything moving about,’ Biggles told him.

  ‘O.K.; but I thought you might have some plan you were waiting to launch,’ answered Ginger, in a hurt voice.

  Biggles sat down on a rock and surveyed the party quizzically. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘here we are, and that’s about all there is to say as far as I can see. If anyone has a brain-wave, now is the time to air it.’

  ‘Brain-wave in what respect ?’ asked Malty.

  ‘That’s what I was wondering myself,’ replied Biggles moodily. ‘It looks as if we’re in just the same position as we were when we arrived. First we were on the plain. Then we were on the plateau. Now we’re up here. We can’t get any higher, so the next move, if any, will be downwards.’

  ‘Pretty good,’ sneered Algy. ‘That must have taken a bit of working out.’

  ‘Come, come,’ put in Dickpa quickly, ‘I’m afraid we’re all a bit upset, and after what has happened it can’t be wondered at; but it’s no good sitting here and bickering.’

  ‘That’s true enough,’ admitted Biggles. ‘But this affair is getting a bit beyond me, and it’s no use pretending it isn’t. I’m a pilot, not a conjurer. If I remember rightly, the idea of this expedition was to get a packet of radium to save the lives of half a million people who are on beds of sickness –that’s right, Malty, isn’t it? I mean, that’s why you financed the show.’

  ‘Perfectly correct.’

  ‘So far, so good,’ continued Biggles. ‘When we get here, we find that the benighted heathens who own the stuff not only refuse to part with any, but try to do us in. What is more, according to Mac, they propose to do the whole world in. Well, it doesn’t seem to be much good trying to save the lives of those sick people if they’re all going to be struck paralytic with this perishing ray in a week or two. Am I right?’

  ‘Absolutely,’ declared Ginger.

  ‘Thank you,’ bowed Biggles. ‘Very well; so if we’re going to do anything at all, it is obvious that we must lay low these swipes who are going to upset the civilized apple-cart. Having done that, we return home, having spent a lot of money, and wasted a lot of time, all for nothing.’

  ‘I shouldn’t call saving the world nothing,’ protested Dickpa.

  ‘But what recompense do we get? Who’s going to believe it? No! I defy anybody to disprove that if and when we reach home, we shall be precisely the same as when we started, except that Malty’s bank balance will have had a nasty crack.’

  ‘The ideal thing seems to be to smite these swipes, and take home a load of radium as well,’ suggested Ginger. ‘What’s wrong with that?’

  ‘Nothing. Nothing at all,’ replied Biggles. ‘In fact it looks to me as if you’ve hit the original nail on its benign head. Good for you, kid. That’s it; we do both. Strike the swipes and collar the works.’

  ‘You’ve sure said a mouthful,’ declared Ginger approvingly.

  ‘Maybe,’ admitted Biggles. ‘I’ve said it, but saying isn’t enough. How are we going to do it, that’s what I want to know? Both propositions seem to present a certain amount of difficulty.’

  ‘Well, let’s get some radium for a start. While we’re doing that we can think of a way to choke off the Chungs,’ suggested Algy, who was gazing across the rocky panorama in the direction of the Mountain of Light.

  ‘Get some radium – how?’

  Algy pointed to the mountain.

  Biggles jumped up and stared at the mile or so of forbidding landscape that separated them from their objective. It consisted of a series of razor-edged ridges, divided by screes of loose shale and masses of fallen rock, that formed a sort of connecting link between the mountain on which they stood and a point about three parts of the way up the Mountain of Light. ‘I wonder if it could be done,’ he said thoughtfully. ‘It wouldn’t exactly be a pleasure hike. D’you happen to know if it’s possible to reach the mountain from here, Mac?’ he asked.

  ‘I don’t know; I’ve never tried, and I’ve never heard of anyone else trying.’

  ‘Should we be likely to barge into any Chungs?’

  ‘Nay, ye wouldn’t do that. No one is allowed to set foot on the mountain.’

  ‘Then how do they get the radium?’

  ‘From the inside. They’ve tunnelled right into the heart of it. It’s friable stuff on the outside, not half so good as the core.’

  ‘Then we might try it,’ declared Biggles. ‘If we succeeded, than we should at least have accomplished something. But before we go, I’d like to have a look round to get our general bearings. Can we see the town from anywhere up here?’

  ‘You can, from the dam.’ McAllister pointed to a level step of rock about a quarter of a mile away towards which a vague path wound a sinuous course by the edge of the lake, which was not a lake in the ordinary sense of the word in that there was no suggestion of a beach. The water was held between banks of rock that shelved in some places, and rose sheer in others. In fact, it looked just what it was, a great volume of melted snow-water, pent up by artificial means.

  Biggles
looked at the path, and then at the dam. ‘I’d like to have a look at the place,’ he told McAllister, ‘but we’d better not all go.’

  ‘It’s time Mac was having another injection,’ Malty warned him.

  ‘He can have it when we come back,’ replied Biggles. ‘I want him to come with me and show me the layout of the place. The rest of you had better remain on guard. In any case, either Algy or myself should always be with the machine, in case of trouble. If there is anything worth looking at from the dam you can take it in turns to go and look. But we’re not out of the wood yet, remember. Come on, Mac, let’s go and have a look at the old home town.’

  They set off along the rocky pathway, picking their way with care, for there were many places where a fall would have meant a broken limb, if nothing worse. Twenty minutes’hard going brought them to the nearest point of the dam, and as he reached it, Biggles stepped back hastily. ‘My gosh!’ he ejaculated, as he found himself gazing down a sheer drop of some three to four hundred feet. ‘This is certainly no place to play blind man’s buff.’ He pointed to the sheer face of the dam, which was built of great blocks of stone fitted together without mortar or cement.

  ‘Who was responsible for that not inconsiderable feat of engineering?’ he asked. ‘If we’d built it we should call it one of the wonders of the world,’ he added.

  ‘Nobody knows,’ replied McAllister. ‘The thing dates back to pre-Chung days, although the Chungs have added to it. It used not to be so high as this, but once or twice after a quick thaw the reservoir overflowed, so the Chungs had to raise it. I believe that has happened two or three times; the Chungs were always a bit nervous about it.’

  ‘Which I can well believe,’ said Biggles slowly. ‘It would be what you might call a wet night for anybody who happened to be down below if the water got out of hand – eh ?’

  McAllister nodded. ‘Yes,’ he agreed. ‘Noah’s flood would be a puddle compared with it.’

  ‘That’s what I was thinking,’ observed Biggles reflectively, lying down to get a nearer view of the face of the dam. It dropped into a dank, sunless gorge which, a few hundred yards farther on, opened out into a round crater-like depression, not unlike the one in which the entrance to the cave of centipedes was situated, but much larger. On the rising ground on the far side was the town, which, in its erratic conception, reminded him of an illustration he had seen, as a small child, of a city of gnomes in a book of fairy tales.

  There appeared to be no streets, the houses being dotted about at all angles wherever space could be found for them, in typical Oriental fashion. In fact, the only difference between this and the other small eastern towns he had seen was in the material of which the houses were built. As McAllister had said, everything was constructed of a dull brownish-yellow glass-like substance on which, at certain angles, the sun glinted brightly. One or two people, clad in the regulation blue overalls, could be seen moving about.

  McAllister raised a finger and pointed. ‘That circular thing over there, like a small gasometer, is the varnish tank,’ he said.

  ‘Where is the power-station?’ asked Biggles.

  ‘You can’t quite see it from here. You notice how the base of the Mountain of Light comes down there on the left, right into the crater?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Well, the entrance is just round the corner there. It is, as I believe I’ve told you, actually in the mountain; and considering that is where the power is drawn from, it is the most natural place for it to be.’

  ‘Is the entrance right at the bottom or some way up?’

  ‘Right at the bottom; it’s much lower than the town.’

  Biggles thought for a moment. ‘I see,’ he said slowly.

  ‘What are you thinking about?’ asked McAllister curiously.

  ‘Oh, nothing very much,’ replied Biggles casually. ‘Well, there doesn’t seem to be anything much to look at; let’s be getting back.’

  Hardly a word was spoken during the return journey. Biggles was deep in thought, and McAllister, after a glance or two at him, decided that it would be better not to interrupt.

  CHAPTER 12

  BIGGLES DISAPPEARS

  ‘Does anybody know the time?’ asked Biggles, as they rejoined the others. ‘My watch seems to have gone crazy since we came here.’

  ‘So have the others, I’ll bet,’ smiled McAllister. ‘You’re too near the mountain. Your watch has become magnetized; you’ll be able to get it de-magnetized when you get home, but it’ll never be much more use.’

  ‘So that’s another item we’ve got to chalk up against the mountain, is it?’ growled Biggles, glancing at the sun. ‘No matter; it isn’t important. I should say it’s about half-past one. What about this trip to get some radium?’

  ‘I’m all in favour of it,’ declared Algy.

  ‘Very well. Then the sooner somebody has a shot at it, the better – before the Chungs have another crack at us. They’re not likely to just sit quietly at home and let us wander about. as we like. I think Ginger and I had better go.’

  ‘Can’t I come?’ asked Algy, in a disappointed tone.

  ‘Sorry, laddie, but I think it would be a tactical error. Suppose anything happened to us? I’m not suggesting that it will – but it might. How are the others going to get home? Ginger might be able to fly them back, but with all due respect to his ability, to expect him, with only a few hours’ solo logged, to take a big machine like the Explorer all the way to England, would be unfair both to him and his passengers. No, if you don’t mind, Ginger and I will go alone. I suggest taking Ginger because he is nimble, and the trip is going to be a tricky one if I know anything about it. We’ll take a kit-bag with us to put the stuff in — if we get any. Has anybody any other suggestion to make?’

  ‘That’s that, then,’ he continued, as there was no reply to his question. ‘Ginger, get a kit-bag out of the machine, and the two revolvers. We shall have to leave the guns here, in case the Chungs try anything. Keep your eyes skinned, Algy. I don’t trust them a yard. If it wasn’t for this invisibility trick, we could hold the pass indefinitely; as it is, anything might happen.’ He looked at the mountain, and the route they would have to take to reach it. ‘We shall be gone between two and three hours, as near as one can tell, but don’t get upset if we’re longer,’ he concluded. With a wave of his hand, he started off along the rocky causeway, with Ginger following close behind.

  For the first few hundred yards the going was easy, and they made good progress, but as the ridges became steeper they were compelled to exercise more caution. Once they were confronted by what at first appeared to be an unscalable gulch, but by hard and rather heady work they succeeded in reaching the opposite side.

  ‘I didn’t think it was as bad as this,’ confessed Biggles, as he lay panting on a wind-worn slope after a straight climb of forty feet along the edge of a crevasse. ‘We ought to have brought the rope,’ he declared.

  ‘We haven’t got it. Algy left it in the gorge,’ Ginger reminded him.

  ‘Yes, that’s true,’ nodded Biggles, rising and gazing across a terrifying scree that sloped down at an angle of forty-five degrees for a thousand feet or more. ‘It looks as if one loose stone here might start a landslide of considerable dimensions,’ he observed anxiously. ‘Take it easy, and test every rock before you trust your weight on it.’

  They went on again, feeling their way slowly and leaning well in towards the face of the slope. As careful as they were, small pieces of rock broke off from time to time and went bounding and crashing down into the depths, but after ten minutes of nerve-trying labour, during which time neither of them spoke, they reached easier country again.

  ‘That’s the worst of limestone,’ muttered Biggles, looking back over the path they had just traversed. ‘It looks safe but it’s as rotten as tinder. Treacherous stuff.’

  ‘Look, there’s the lake,’ cried Ginger.

  ‘By Jove, so it is,’ answered Biggles. ‘It isn’t more than a quarter of a mile away
, either, and looks fairly easy to reach from here. I wish I’d known it. We could have taxied across, landed over there, and saved ourselves a lot of trouble. We shall know in future. Come on, let’s keep going. My gosh! look at that, though!’ He had taken a pace forward, but stopped dead as a new hazard, made apparent by the different angle from which they were now approaching, loomed up.

  Their objective was now within easy reach, connected to the rock on which they were standing by a bow-shaped, serrated ridge; but on the left, between the mountain and the lake, was a colossal spur. At one time it had obviously been part of the mountain, but erosion or an earth tremor had torn it away from its parent, so that it became a separate mass of rock, balanced on a wholly inadequate foundation and leaning far over towards the lake. From the aeroplane, the dividing cleft had been hidden behind the spur so that the mountain appeared to be one solid mass, but from their new view-point, the real state of affairs was disclosed.

  ‘My goodness! did you ever see anything like that?’ whispered Ginger. ‘It looks as if a shove would send the whole thing crashing over.’

  Biggles eyed the mighty mass of rock apprehensively. ‘It looks as if it would fall if you breathed on it,’ he muttered. ‘By heaven, did you see that? It actually sways in the breeze. I swear I saw it move.’

  Ginger turned pale, and regarded the pile fearfully. ‘And we’ve got to pass it, too,’ he whispered.

  ‘We have – if we’re going to the mountain,’ declared Biggles. ‘I don’t think we need worry, though. It may have been standing like that for years for all we know, and may go on standing for more years. It will come down one day, of course, but it would be a bit of bad luck if it chose the very moment that we were passing, wouldn’t it?’

  ‘You’re right – it would – for us,’ agreed Ginger fervently. ‘With a hundred thousand tons of rock on us, we should take a bit of finding.’