Have you anything to say to that? We shall soon know the truth.'
Shultz drew a deep breath. He shrugged. 'I might as well own up. The monkey is carrying diamonds. How did you know ? '
'Have you had a burglar in your house lately ? ' 'Yes.'
'Then you have him to thank for spoiling a neat, but nevertheless unpardonable, scheme.'
'Shall I remove the diamonds ? ' asked the surgeon. 'I think you'd better,' the Air Commodore told him.
The end of this ingenious attempt to evade Customs duties can be imagined. Shultz - the one in England - wisely chose to make a clean breast of the business, from which it appeared that there were extenuating circumstances, although these did not altogether save him. He said that his brother in Africa was a genuine research worker, and it was only recently that he had succumbed to the temptation to buy, for a mere song, the diamonds that were sometimes found by the Bushmen in the Kalahari Desert. He did not keep the money thus made, but handed it to a charitable institution in Germany devoted to the care of war-mutilated German soldiers. This was confirmed. He appeared in court the day following his arrest and was ordered to pay a heavy fine. This, taking into account that he had lost the diamonds, was considered a sufficient punishment.
His brother, in South Africa, was lucky, for had he fallen into the hands of the South African Police it would have fared badly with him. Whether he, or Leffers, became suspicious and took fright, or whether his brother sent a message that reached him before the police, was not known; but by the time the police arrived, he had gone, and neither he nor Leffers were seen again. It can be presumed that they fled to Germany in the Dornier, for which reason the monkeys in the district, although they were not to know it, have cause to be grateful to Biggles.
To-day, if you go to the Zoo, and happen to notice a grey-faced monkey with a long tail giving himself airs, it may be because he is the only one of his tribe ever to have carried a fortune in diamonds and lived to tell a tale of a real piece of 'monkey business.'
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50 Biggles and the Pirate Treasure Page 17
