by W E Johns
* Communication trench.
'A sap?' queried Biggles.
'Yes, sap!' said Bert. 'S-A-P—stuff what they put in trees—you know—trench, if you like. I wish I could come with you. Jerry'll be coming back in a minute, I espect. This is 'is property. We'd just driven 'em out when I copped this one in my knee and down I goes. Blighty** one, I 'opes. As my missus says, "Bert" she says –'
** Slang: home, therefore a wound which would mean he was sent home.
'Hold hard!' cried Biggles. 'Let's leave what she says till another day. Can you walk?'
'With no blinkin' knee-cap?' asked Bert. 'No! And I can't 'op neither, not in this muck! What do you think I am — a sparrer?'
'No. I can see you're no sparrow,' replied Biggles, looking at the man's thirteen-stone bulk. 'And I'm no Samson to carry you, much as I should like to. I'll nip across and tell our fellows you're here. Then we'll come and fetch you.'
'You'll fetch me?' repeated Bert.
'Yes,' said Biggles.
'No sprucing?' asked the wounded man.
'What's that?' asked Biggles, with a start.
'Kiddin'. I mean, do you mean it?' explained Bert.
'Of course I mean it!' replied Biggles.
'Well, you're a toff! All right, I'll wait 'ere!'
'That's right, don't run away!' grinned Biggles. 'Where's that sap you were talking about?'
'Straight over the top, about twenty yards 'arf left,' replied Bert, pointing.
Biggles peeped stealthily over the rim of the crater. In all directions stretched a wilderness of mud and water in which barbed wire, tin helmets, rifles, and ammunition boxes lay in hopeless confusion. A bullet flipped through the ooze not an inch from his face, and he bobbed down hurriedly. But he had seen the end of the shell-shattered trench.
Turning, he looked down at Bert, whose face had turned chalky-white, and Biggles knew that in spite of his casual pose the Tommy was badly wounded, and would soon die from loss of blood if medical aid was delayed.
'Stick it, Bert, I shan't be long!' he called, dragging off his coat and throwing it to the wounded man. 'Put that over you; it'll keep you warm.' Then he darted for the end of the trench.
A fusillade of shots and the chatter of a machine-gun greeted him as, crouching low, he staggered heavily through the clinging mud. Out of the trench, as he neared it, the point of a bayonet rose to meet him, but with a shrill yell of 'Look out!' he leapt aside and then flung himself into the trench.
At the last moment he saw an infantry colonel who was talking to another officer at the end of a communication trench. He did his best to avoid them, but his foot slipped on the greasy parapet, and like a thunderbolt he struck the Colonel in the small of the back. All three officers sprawled in the mud at the bottom of the trench.
The Colonel was up first. Jamming a mud-coated monocle into his left eye, he glared at Biggles furiously.
'Where the dickens have you come from?' he snarled.
'My Camel landed me in this mess,' complained Biggles bitterly.
The Colonel started violently.
'Camel?' he gasped. 'Have they brought up the Camel Corps?'
'That's right. That's why everyone's got the "hump"!' punned Biggles sarcastically. 'A Camel's an aeroplane in this war, not a dromedary!'
Further explanations were cut short by a shrill whistle and a cry of 'Here they come!'
'Who's coming?' cried Biggles anxiously to a burly sergeant who had sprung to the fire step and was firing his rifle rapidly.
'Father Christmas! Who do you think? 'Uns —the Prussian Guard —that's who!' snapped the N.C.O.*
* Non-commissioned officer, e.g. a corporal or sergeant.
'Huns! Give me a rifle, someone!' pleaded Biggles.
A bomb burst somewhere near at hand, filling the trench with a thick cloud of acrid yellow smoke, and he grabbed, gasping and choking, at a rifle that leaned against the rear wall of the trench. The din of war was in his ears—the incessant rattle of rifles, the vicious crackle of machine-guns, the dull roar of heavy artillery, and the stinging crack of hand-grenades. Near at hand someone was moaning softly.
Above the noise another voice was giving orders in a crisp parade-ground voice:
'Here they come, boys —take it steady—shoot low— pick your man!'
With his head whirling, Biggles clambered up the side of the trench, still grasping his mud-coated rifle.
'Hi! Where are you going, that man? Get down, you fool!' yelled a voice.
Biggles hesitated. From the parapet he could see a long straggling line of men with fixed bayonets approaching his position at a lumbering trot. Then a hand seized his ankle and jerked him back into the trench. He swung round and found himself staring into the frowning face of the Colonel, the monocle still gleaming in his eye.
'Who are you pulling about?' snarled the Camel pilot.
'What do you think you're doing?' grated the staff officer.
'I'm going to fetch Bert!' snapped Biggles.
The Colonel started.
'Bert! Bert who?' he asked.
'Bert, of the Twenty-third Londons,' replied Biggles. 'He's a pal of mine, and he's out somewhere in the middle by himself.'
'In the middle?' repeated the staff officer.
'Yes!' snapped Biggles. 'In the middle of the war, he says, and I reckon he's about right!'
'You're crazy!' said the Colonel. 'I can't bother about individuals—and I order you to stay where you are!'
'Order me!' stormed Biggles. 'Who do you think I am? I'm not one of your mob; I'm a flyer – '
'I don't care tuppence who you are!' replied the other. 'You're about as much good to me as a sick headache. I haven't time to argue. Another word from you, and I'll put you under close arrest for insubordination under fire!'
Biggles choked, speechless, knowing in his heart that the senior officer was well within his rights.
An orderly tumbled into the trench and handed the Colonel a note. He read it swiftly, nodded, and then blew his whistle.
'A Company retire. B Company stand fast!' he ordered crisply. And then, turning to the sergeant: 'The Boche are in on both flanks,' he went on quickly. 'Get A Company back as fast as you can. B Company will have to cover them. And you'd better get back, too!' he snapped, turning to Biggles, who, a moment later, in spite of violent protests, found himself slipping and stumbling up a narrow, winding trench.
'But what about Bert?' he pleaded to the sergeant in front of him.
'Can't 'elp 'im. We're in the soup as it is!' snarled the N.C.O.
'The trouble about this foot-slogging game is the rotten visibility!' growled Biggles. 'It's worse than flying in clouds. No altitude, no room to move —no nothing! You blokes might call this a dog-fight, but I call it a blooming worm-fight! A lot of perishing rabbits, that's all you are, bobbing in and out of holes!'
His remarks were cut short by an explosion that filled the air with flying mud and half-buried him. He struggled to his feet, to see a white-faced orderly talking rapidly to the sergeant and point in rapid succession to each point of the compass.
'Surrounded, eh?' said the sergeant.
'What with?' asked Biggles breathlessly.
The sergeant eyed him scornfully.
'Mud!' he said. 'Mud and blood and 'Uns! You ought to 'ave stayed upstairs, young feller. We're in the blinking cart, and no mistake. The 'Uns are coming in on both flanks!'
'But I'm due for another patrol at six!' protested Biggles, aghast.
'You'll be patrolling the Milky Way by that time, me lad!' growled the sergeant bitterly.
Biggles turned to the orderly.
'Are you a messenger?' he said.
'I'm a runner,' replied the lad.
'Well, let's see you do a bit of running!' snapped Biggles crisply, whipping out his notebook and writing rapidly. 'You run with that,' he went on, handing the orderly a note. 'Get through the Huns somehow, and don't stop for anyone. Grab the first motor-cyclist you see, and tell him it
's urgent!'
'What's the big idea?' asked the sergeant, as the runner departed at the double.
'I'm just saying good-bye to all kind friends and relations,' grinned Biggles. 'Hallo, here's old glasshouse turned up again!'
The Colonel, followed by a line of dishevelled, mud-coated men, staggered wearily up the communication trench.
'Line the parapets both sides!' he shouted. 'We'll get as many of them as we can before they get us! Get that gun, someone,' he snapped, pointing to a Vickers gun which, with its crew dead behind it, pointed aimlessly into the sky. 'Is there a machine-gunner here?'
'I should say so!' cried Biggles joyfully.
He dragged the gun, with its heavy tripod, clear of the mud, and mounted it on the parapet. A line of grey-clad men in coal-scuttle steel helmets was advancing stealthily up a nearby trench, and Biggles' lips parted in his famous fighting smile as he seized the spade-grips of the gun, thumbs seeking the trigger.
Rat-tat-tat-tat-tat! Rat-tat-tat-tat-tat! The grey line wilted and sagged.
'Fill some more belts for me!' shouted Biggles, ducking as a bullet cut through the loose flap of his flying-helmet.
'Here, stick that on your head!' cried the Colonel, passing him a steel helmet. 'Can you see anything?' he went on, crawling up beside him.
'I can,' replied Biggles shortly. 'Huns to the right of us, Huns to the left of us —and Huns blinking well above us! Look at that nosy parker!' he snarled, jerking his thumb upwards to where an Albatros had appeared like magic in the sky, guns spouting lead into their trench.
Biggles flung himself on his back and jerked the muzzle of the gun upwards. He knew what few infantrymen knew —the distance it is necessary to shoot in front of a rapidly-moving target in order to hit it. He aimed not at the machine, but well in front of it on its line of flight. He pressed the double thumb-piece. A stream of lead soared upwards.
The German pilot was either careless or a novice, for he did not trouble to alter his course in conditions where straight flying was almost suicidal. Straight into Biggles' line of fire he flew. The watchers in the trench saw the black-crossed machine swerve, and then, with engine roaring full on, plunge downward into the sea of mud. They could hear the crash above the noise of the battle.
'Got the blighter!' chuckled the sergeant. 'Good shooting, sir!'
'Oh, I hope he didn't land on top of poor old Bert!' gasped Biggles. 'He must have been mighty close. I can see his tail sticking up near my Camel. I wonder will that one count on my score?' he asked the Colonel. 'Although I don't suppose they'll believe it, anyway.'
'I'll confirm it,' said the Colonel vigorously. 'That is, if we get out alive. We're in a nasty hole!'
'So I see,' retorted Biggles, taking him literally. 'And I don't think much of it. I'm no mole. I like doing my fighting sitting down, and where I can see what's going on.'
'I'm afraid we haven't a hope,' went on the Colonel casually. 'The brigadier won't risk the brigade up here in broad daylight to get us out. We're for it, unless a miracle happens —and the day of miracles has passed.'
'Don't you be too sure about that,' returned Biggles, spraying a group of sprawling Boche with bullets. 'What about those?' he added, jerking his thumb upwards.
The Colonel cocked his eye towards a little cluster of black specks that had appeared high in the blue.
'What can they do?' he asked.
'Do? You watch 'em and see!' said Biggles. 'Give me a Very pistol*, so that I can fire a light to show them where we are.'
* Special short-barrelled pistol for firing signalling flares of various colours.
'Who are they?' asked the other.
'Friends of mine,' replied Biggles. 'I sent them word by a runner that their services were urgently required, and unless I'm very much mistaken, the boys in this trench are going to see a treat for tired eyes. That's Mahoney in front—you can spot his machine a mile off. And that's Mac over on the left.
'Oh!' he went on incredulously. 'What's all this coming behind them? A squadron of S.E.'s, with old Wilks leading! The CO. must have 'phoned 287 Squadron after he got my message,' he grinned, and let out a shrill whoop of triumph.
'Here, we'd better bob down a bit, or we're likely to stop something,' he went on. 'I've an idea that this locality is going to be a pretty warm spot for the next few minutes when those lads start doing their stuff. Oh—look at that!'
'That' was a line of Camels that plunged down out of the blue and scoured the ground with double lines of glittering tracer bullets. Straight along the war-torn earth they roared, guns rattling, bullets thuttering a deadly tattoo on the ground. At the end of their dive the Camels soared upwards to let the S.E.'s go by, and then, after a steep, stalling turn, came down again, raking the earth with streams of lead. The Colonel watched in stupefied amazement. Biggles slid down the parapet and caught the sergeant by the sleeve.
'Now, sergeant,' he said tersely, 'I've got you out of a hole, and I want you to help me get someone else out of one.'
'You bet I will!' cried the N.C.O. delightedly.
'Come on, then!' cried Biggles, darting down the trench towards the old front line that had been their original position. Reaching it, he did not stop, but slithered across the intervening stretch of mud towards the crater near the crashed Camel.
Bullets zipped and whined about them, and Biggles had a fleeting glimpse of a grey-clad figure rising about thirty yards in front of him, one arm raised in the act of throwing. Instinctively he flung himself full-length in the mud, dragging the sergeant with him. A moment later, a roar to their left, accompanied by a flame-hearted explosion, told them where a hand-grenade thrown by the German had struck.
Almost before the flurry of the explosion had subsided, Biggles was on his feet again, the sergeant following closely at his heels. Scrambling and slithering over the ground, they made a few more paces' headway. Then again that grey-clad figure rose up, and again the arm swung. But this time the grenade was not thrown. From somewhere behind them came the sharp crack of a rifle, and the German bomb-thrower sagged in midair in the very act of throwing.
It was the Britishers' chance —and they took it! Crouching low, they sped across to the crater where Bert was waiting, and scrambled down beside the wounded man.
Bert was sitting just as he had left him, calmly smoking a cigarette.
'Here you are!' he cried. 'I thought you'd gone without me. When I tell the missus about this she'll say, "Bert", she'll say – '
Biggles seized him unceremoniously by the scruff of the neck.
'Take his feet, sergeant,' he panted; and together they bore the wounded man to the rear.
They found the Colonel where they had left him.
'What are you up to?' he shouted, as Biggles and the sergeant came into view with their burden. 'I've been waiting for you. Couldn't make out where you'd disappeared to. The machines have opened up the communication trenches, and we can get through now. We'd better be going.' Half an hour later, Biggles was washing the grime of war from his face in a headquarters dug-out behind the support trenches. The Brass Hat, monocle still in place, was talking.
'It was jolly smart of you to hold up the Boche advance by conjuring up those machines,' he said.
'Boche advance? I didn't know they were advancing,' replied Biggles. 'All directions looked alike to me.'
'Then what on earth did you do it for?' cried the Colonel.
'So that I could go and fetch Bert. What else do you think? I promised him I would, so I had to,' replied Biggles, grinning broadly.
Chapter 11
The Dragon's Lair
The Professor touched his rudder-bar lightly with his right foot and swung outward from the leading machine of the formation in which he was flying, and which had banked steeply and unexpectedly—too unexpectedly for good formation flying.
At the same time he took a swift, anxious look around the sky for the cause of his leader's sudden manoeuvre. It was unlike Biggles—who was leading a formation of three
on an offensive patrol —to make a movement which might easily have resulted in a collision, had he—the Professor—been less alert.
Fortunately, his eyes had been glued on the leading machine, so the danger was averted almost as quickly as it had arisen. Unable to discover the cause of the quick turn, yet knowing that Biggles would not make such a move unless there was an urgent reason for it, he stared hard at Biggles' leather-covered head for a sign or signal.
Biggles must have sensed the penetrating stare at the back of his head, for he half-glanced over his shoulder and then pointed upwards. The Professor, after a quick glance at Algy, who was flying on his left, to make sure they were a safe distance apart, followed the outstretched finger with his eyes.
An aeroplane, a British Bristol Fighter, was spinning earthwards a few miles to the east, leaving a trail of smoke in its wake. Instinctively the Professor's eyes lifted, seeking the cause of the disaster. But except for a filmy white cloud drifting slowly across it, the sky was unbroken from horizon to horizon.
'That's queer!' he muttered, for he knew that things did not happen in the sky of France without reason — usually a very good one —and he returned his gaze to the Bristol, half-expecting to see the pilot make some effort to pull out of the spin. But no such thing happened.
A curious fascination held the Professor's horrified gaze, and his eyes followed the Bristol until it struck the earth with a crash that he almost fancied he could hear above the noise of his engine, about two miles behind the German Lines.
A cloud of smoke and a streamer of flame leapt upwards, and he turned away, sick at heart, to where Biggles was still probing the sky with his eyes, goggles pushed up, a puzzled expression on his face.
The Professor saw him lean over the side of his cockpit, sweep the ground with a long, penetrating stare, and then turn in the direction of the Line.
'Well, what did you make of that?' Biggles asked, after they had landed and removed their flying kit. 'I couldn't believe my eyes when he went right down like that, straight into the ground. There wasn't a Hun in the sky, and no archie, I'll swear to that. He was spinning when I first spotted him, at about six thousand feet, I should think. And there isn't a Hun machine in France that could have been so high in the sky that I couldn't have picked him out if he had been there!'
