27 Biggles - Charter Pilot

by Captain W E Johns

  I had already read the message, so I repeated it aloud. "Vamoose, gringo, or die."

  Biggles laughed. I don't know if you fellows have noticed it, but the most certain way of getting a Britisher to do a thing is to threaten him with dire consequences if he does it.

  Biggles said, "That settles it. We stay." Taking the knife, he whetted it on the palm of his hand, and then sort of tickled the prisoner under the chin with it. " Amigo " he says in Spanish, "you need a shave. Unfortunately, I'm no barber, so if my hand slips you're likely to get your throat cut. What about it?" The man looked a bit scared, but said nothing. He jumped, though, when Biggles snapped, "Who sent you to throw that stone at me—speak up?"

  There is one advantage of dealing with a fellow who is accustomed to slinging a knife about. It's this. When you hold the knife, it doesn't occur to him that you may be bluffing.

  Thus it was with this big stiff. He dropped on his knees with his hands in an attitude of prayer, and after calling on a number of saints to preserve him, asked Biggles to remember his wife and children. Biggles told him he was sorry about the family, but his only chance of ever seeing them again was to remember who had sent him to deliver the message. The man muttered, "El Cuchillo ".

  Biggles's eyes opened wide. " What-ho," says he. "So that's the kernel in the nut."

  We all knew who El Cuchillo was, because the village was plastered with notices offering five thousand pesos reward for his body, dead or alive. He was, it appeared, a tame Indian gone wild—if you get my meaning; and at that time he was Mexico's public enemy number one, making a comfortable living out of holding up trains and robbing farms. He also had a playful habit of waylaying lonely policemen, cutting off their feet and making them walk on the stumps. That's the old Indian idea of fun. From all accounts he was rather more slippery than an eel ; in fact, among the superstitious section of the half-breed population he had acquired a reputation of being first cousin to a spook. The truth was, the police didn't try very hard to catch him—they wanted to keep their feet on their ankles. Naturally Biggles asked what he had done to offend the bandit chief; but the prisoner relapsed into sulky silence and we couldn't get any more out of him.

  At this moment, who should gallop up in a cloud of dust but the captain-commandant of the local garrison, with a troop of his men behind him. This was no accident. He had come to see us. He informed us, with that great show of courtesy for which Latin-Americans are celebrated, that our papers were out of order; but this, he felt sure, could be adjusted. In other words, we had overlooked the old Spanish custom of tipping him. It is only fair to say that this has been the fashion for so long that it is no longer regarded as sharp practice, but as an accepted custom; and it pays to fall in with it, for it saves a lot of trouble in the long run.

  Biggles took the Capitan on one side and had a quiet word with him. They seemed to get on very well, and after an earnest conversation the Capitan went back to the village, taking our prisoner with him. When Biggles rejoined us he remarked, casually, that we should be leaving the ground early in the morning.

  "Looking for what ? " inquired Algy.

  "For El Cuchillo," answered Biggles. "I have come to an understanding with the Coital, so perhaps I had better explain. The idea is this. Just before dawn, the gaoler in charge of our late prisoner will allow him to escape. The fellow will, I feel sure, make a bee-line for his Indian boss. We shall be up topsides to see which way he goes."

  "Where do you suppose he'll make for—have you anywhere in mind ? " asked Algy.

  Biggles nodded. "Unless I'm very much mistaken he'll make for the volcano. That's where we shall find El Cuchillo. To look for him in the ordinary way would be like looking for a needle in a corn field. By watching the escaping brigand we ought to get a pretty good idea of the position of his hide-out."

  Donald chipped in. "But surely the man wouldn't be such an absolute lunatic as to hide in something that might blow up at any moment ? "

  Biggles grinned. I'm no betting man," he observed,

  "but I'll wager my goggles that the mountain is no more likely to blow up than this desert. My guess is that El Cuchillo is the volcano. A few sticks of dynamite and a few handfuls of sulphur would be enough to make the farmers evacuate the district in a hurry.

  Thus, the bandit would kill two birds with one stone. He would establish a safe hiding place for himself, and find food for himself and his gang at the abandoned farms. Not a bad idea."

  "Now whatever made you think of that? "says Donald. "Did you suspect it all along?"

  "No, but I suspected it when I saw herbage growing in the crater of the volcano," replied Biggles. I don't think you noticed that. I did, and as I can't imagine grass or anything else growing in the crater of an active volcano I put two and two together. That bullet sort of confirmed my opinion. When he saw our aircraft scouting round El Cuchillo got the wind up that we might see something, so he sent one of the gang to scare us away. It so happens that we're not as easily scared as all that. Well, let's turn in. I want to make an early start in the morning."

  Next day we were up before the sun, and in a few minutes we were in the air—heading away from the mountain. By the time we were at ten thousand feet the sun was just tipping the horizon. Biggles then cut the engine and came gliding back, taking care to keep the machine between the sun and the mountain. It's almost impossible to look at a desert sun when it's low in the sky, so the chances of our being seen, particularly as we made no noise, were remote. On the other hand, as the sun was shining on the mountain we could see everything clearly.

  As we glided on, Biggles divided the mountain into sections, and gave us each a section to watch, in the hope of spotting the escaping bandit. As it happened, it was my luck to see him, looking like an ant crawling up the face of the rock. I told the others where he was. Watching him, we saw him disappear into a canyon in the flank of the mountain, just below the crater, and as he didn't come out of it we reckoned we had El Cuchillo's headquarters taped. That was all we wanted to know.

  Still gliding, Biggles turned away, and presently I saw that he was steering a course for something I hadn't previously noticed. Coming across the desert at full pelt, kicking up a cloud of dust, was a troop of horse, and presently I made them out to be soldiers. They dismounted at the base of the mountain and continued on foot. Biggles dropped a message to the Capitan, and then, as it were, showed them the way. One doesn't often get a chance to watch a man-hunt from the front row of the gallery, so to speak, but this is what we did. When the troops got close to the hide-out Biggles dropped a signal flare right outside the bandit's front door. He went low to make sure, and for a minute or two things were pretty warm. By this time of course, the bandits knew what was in the wind, and they opened a brisk fire on us. When the troops came up they retreated, fighting, into the crater; but they hadn't a chance against the troops, who soon had them surrounded.

  Seeing that it was all over bar the shouting we glided back to our camp, and from there watched the surviving desperadoes, a sorry-looking gang, being marched to the local prison.

  Naturally, we thought that was the end of the business, but it wasn't. As soon as the farmers learned how they'd been bamboozled into leaving their homes on account of a few sticks of dynamite and some sulphur, and learned that we foreigners had been responsible for the round-up of the gangsters, they couldn't do enough for us. You should have seen the grub they brought in. They held a fiesta in the village at which we and the Capitan were guests of honour. The Capitan insisted that we took half the reward, and Biggles caused a sensation by accepting it and handing it over to the local hospital. After that the local hospitality became so embarrassing that we wound up the engine and set a course for home. Poor old Donald was a bit fed up that the volcano had fizzled out, but took some consolation from the fact that we had done a useful spot of work. Biggles promised to find another volcano for him another day.

  "That's all there was to it—hello ! there goes the hooter." Ginger spra
ng to his feet as the alarm sounded, and ran towards his machine. "I'll tell you—" he shouted to Henry Harcourt, but the rest was lost in the roar of his engine as it came to life.

  XI

  THE ADVENTURE OF THE HAUNTED

  CREEK

  THE officers of Biggles's Squadron looked round as the mess door opened and a stranger, in flying kit, entered. He raised his hand in a gesture of friendly salutation and joined the others at the fireside, where he dropped heavily into a chair.

  Flying-Officer Ginger Hebblethwaite rang for the mess waiter. "Have a drink ? " he invited. "Where have you dropped in from on a dirty night like this ? "

  The stranger ordered his drink and turned to Ginger. "I'm from K Squadron—night fighters. I chased a raider back over France. I got him, but with his last burst he put a hole through my tank. I thought I could just get back home, but I couldn't quite make it.

  My petrol petered out so I dropped in here. Your fellows are putting things right—take about an hour to fix me up to get home."

  "Why not stay the night ? " suggested Ginger.

  "No thanks. I'll get back if it's all the same to you. I may have to do another show."

  Ginger nodded. "From your accent I should say you're from Down Under," he observed.

  The stranger smiled. "You're right. I'm an Aussie. Melbourne's my home. What made you spot it ? "

  "I spent a week or two in Australia, once," returned Ginger.

  "What doing—holiday making?"

  "Not exactly." Ginger hesitated. "Matter of fact, I was doing a job. I say I, but Biggles, who is now the C.O. here, was in charge of the party. Algy Lacey, the fellow on your right, was there too. We were running an air charter concern at the time, and we had been hired by a scientist to take him round."

  What did he want in Australia?"

  Ginger laughed awkwardly. "It will probably sound a bit daft, but we were looking for a ghost—several ghosts."

  It was the Australian's turn to laugh. "That's a new one on me," he declared. "Where were these spooks supposed to hang out ? "

  " Dead Cow Creek, on the Cooper River."

  Enlightenment dawned in the stranger's eyes. "Now I begin to understand," he said seriously. I've never been in that part of the country, but from what I've heard it's pretty grim."

  Grim is the word. If anyone wants to make a collection .of skeletons, he can take his choice in Cooper Creek."

  "Did you find the spook?" queried Henry Harcourt.

  Yes, answered Ginger quietly. "We found several."

  There was a general titter, but it died away at the expression on the Australian's face. "

  Cooper Creek is nothing to laugh about—where I come from," he said softly.

  "Suppose you tell 'em about it, Ginger, and settle their curiosity ? " suggested Algy.

  "All right," agreed Ginger, and this is the story he told : First of all, you must try to form a mental picture of the part of Australia I'm talking about. Years ago, the Cooper was a regular river, flanked with lovely country and perfect pasture land. Stock-breeders found the place and several townships sprang up. Then, one year, the river dried up—as many of the Australian rivers are doing, which accounts for the big, unsettled areas. The water came back later, but the following year it did the same thing; and this went on year after year, gradually getting worse. Then came a year when the river didn't show up at all. This was serious, but the stock-breeders hung on. They hung on for nine ghastly years, and in all that time not one drop of rain fell from heaven, not one drop of water came down the river. The country dried out. It became a desert.

  Everything died. The trees died. The grass died. The cattle and sheep died. The people died. Nothing could be done. What few cattle and horses were left were too far gone to be driven away. So they died. The surviving settlers fled from this land of terrible despair, leaving everything just as it was. That's the official account as near as I can remember it. Years afterwards the water came back, but then it was too late.

  You can imagine what this place looked like after the settlers had left. I saw it, so I can tell you. After the drought came the wind. It blew the sand away from one place and piled it in another. The graveyard was uncovered, leaving the dried-out corpses exposed.

  The bones of thousands of cattle whitened the landscape—thousands and thousands of bones, all twisted, as though

  they were laughing at nature's last horrible joke. Round one dry water-hole we saw hundreds of cattle standing—with empty eye-sockets. They'd died on their feet. They'd been dead for years. They were just sun-dried hides stretched over bones. In some places the houses had been buried under sand; in others they were left sticking up on their foundations. The furniture was still there, left to the rats, owls and ravens. We walked through these rat-riddled ruins. They were just as their owners had left them--clothes in the wardrobes, pictures on the walls, books on the shelves, letters and papers on the tables. In one house we saw a piano; in another, a sewing machine. At night the moon shines in on broken mirrors, and a million tiny points of light that are the eyes of countless spiders. Rats are everywhere, and occasionally you see the skulking form of a cat or dog that had been left behind and had gone wild. That's how it was when we were there, and you can understand why the place got a reputation for being haunted.

  At first, nobody took any notice of these rumours of ghosts. They were only to be expected. Then strange whispers reached the outside world. It was said that these ghosts talked. The first information about this came, admittedly, from native sources. Naturally, the blacks avoided this place of death like the plague, but one night a fellow lost his way and blundered into the district. When he was next seen he was nearly insane with fright.

  All he could do was jibber about spook-talk. The fellow's boss, a white man, a gold prospector, took it into his head to check up. He, too, came back white and shaken. Not if all the gold in the world were there, he said, would he go back. He didn't see any spooks, but he heard them. And there the Matter rested until Dr. Duck decided to investigate. We went. I needn't go into details about the trip, which took a bit of organizing, but in due course we arrived and landed on the sand.

  It was about noon when we unpacked, so having nothing else to do we had a look round.

  I've already told you what we saw, and that was quite enough for me.

  I didn't mind the empty houses, but the bones gave me the creeps. Everyone was depressed. You couldn't help being depressed in such an atmosphere of tragedy. When the others went to have a look at the graveyard I went back to the machine and thought of all the cheerful things I could remember.

  Well, one doesn't expect spooks to walk in the daytime, so it was decided to try the luck in the moonlight—near the graveyard. I refused to go. The place gave me the jitters as it was, without spooks. So, after it got dark, Donald, Biggles and Algy went off; leaving me sitting by the machine. I made a bright fire, brewed a dish of tea, and tried to read a book. But it was no use. The horror of the place was in the very atmosphere, and I could only think of the poor people who had fought that terrible losing battle with nature.

  The others had been gone about an hour, and I was sitting staring into the fire, when just behind me an anguished voice said, quietly but distinctly, "They're all dead."

  I didn't move. I couldn't. I was petrified. I felt my hair curling on my head. I just sat, stiff and tense. Then another voice said, some way off this time, " Waterwater—water." This was followed by a peal of hysterical laughter right over my head. I looked up, but there wasn't a thing in sight, except the stars. That did it. I lost my head, and I may as well admit it. Taking the fire in my stride, I ran like a maniac, towards the graveyard, shouting for Biggles. And, believe it or not, something • floated over me moaning, " Biggles ". Let me tell you that voices in the air don't sound very nice after dark. I knew it couldn't be an echo, because, for one thing, it takes a background to make an echo—and there wasn't one; and for another thing, echoes don't move about, and these voices
did.

  In my wild rush I forgot all about the petrified cows at the water-hole, and I crashed into one. We went down together with a noise like a lot of dry twigs snapping. I got up breathing dust and shedding broken bones, and went on, until I could see the others coming towards me.

  Biggles grabbed me by the collar. "What's the matter with you?" he rasped.

  It took me a minute to get my breath, and then I told him.

  "You're imagining things," he sneered. "We haven't heard a thing."

  "Okay," I said sarcastically. "You come with me, and you'll hear plenty."

  As a matter of fact we didn't have to get as far as the fire, which we could still see burning in the distance. As we approached it a shadow seemed to flit between us and the light, and a hollow voice croaked, "The Cooper's coming—the Cooper's coming." Just like that. Then, like an answer, from the direction of the empty houses, came the awful laughter, and another voice screamed, "They're dead—dead—dead."

  Biggles pulled up, looking first at the fire, then towards the village. " Great Scott ! " he gasped. " This is certainly uncanny." He started running towards the machine. We all ran.

  When we got to it he went inside and came out with a twelve-bore sporting gun.

  Donald said, "What on earth are you going to do with that? "

  "I propose," says Biggles, in a nasty sort of voice, "I propose to find out what these spooks will have to say when they meet a dose of buckshot."

  "But it's no use shooting denizens of the spirit world," says Donald.

  We'll see about that," sneers Biggles. And just at that moment a voice right over our heads says," Cooper's dead."

  Biggles whips the gun to his shoulder and lets drive, blind, with both barrels—bang—