THE CRUISE OF THE CONDOR

by W. E. Johns

IX. A NIGHT OF HORROR (Pages 107 – 139)

The next morning, Biggles agrees with Dickpa that they need to go on foot to the cave. “Smyth, armed with a heavy knife for cutting a way through the undergrowth, took the lead” (this would appear to be the picture on the cover of the Dean & Son version of the book – so it is Smyth on cover and not Biggles!). When they reach the spot where the cave should be, Dickpa is mystified. Then he realises there has been a rock fall which has buried the mouth of the cave. “It was well into the afternoon before the Inca rock carving was exposed to view”. Suddenly, our heroes hear a plane in the distance. Initially, they think it must be theirs, but Biggles recognises it as a twin engined American Curtiss flying-boat. It must be the villains, having come from New Orleans. Biggles decides they better go back to their own aircraft as they will have to hide it from aerial observation. Leaving the tools, they set off back only to find that their aircraft, the Condor, has gone! Biggles says “we’ve got to get the machine back”. “An admirable plan, but one which seems to present a little difficulty,” observed Dickpa, a trifle sarcastically. “By working really hard we might make two or three miles a day along the river bank. You can work it out yourself how long it will take us to get five hundred miles. I don’t want to appear pessimistic, but as you say, we must face the facts”. “I’m not doing any walking back,” replied Biggles shortly. Knowing they need a boat; Biggles tells his companions about the canoe he saw earlier. Dickpa makes a balsa raft and an improvised paddle to allow Biggles to cross the river. Biggles has a close shave with a crocodile when he is forced to swim the last few yards of the river crossing. Biggles then has a nerve-wracking journey towards the hut with the dead body and is frightened at that location by a black panther attracted by the body. “For the first time in his life Biggles knew the meaning of the word fear – stark, paralysing fear. He tried to move, to run, to place himself as far as possible from the accursed place, but his limbs refused to function. His mouth had turned bone dry, so dry that his tongue clove to it. He could only stare”. Realising with a shock that he was near hysteria, “This won’t do,” he snarled, furious with himself for so nearly breaking down. Biggles takes the canoe, which had been cut out of a solid tree and was about twenty feet long, but rotten in many places. Biggles canoes back to his companions and makes his plans. He thinks “Silas & Co. are somewhere downstream”. They will canoe down river until they find their plane then split into two groups. Algy and Biggles will get the aircraft back whilst Dickpa and Smyth form a shore party to make a feint attack from the shore. This plan they put into action and at 12.34 a.m. Dickpa and Smyth are dropped off. 1.30 am will be “zero hour” for the attack. Biggles and Algy make their way to the Condor and notice there is a guard on watch. Cutting the rope that moors the plane, they float off, but the Condor scrapes against the enemies Curtiss aircraft and the noise brings the sentry to his feet and he fires his gun. Biggles gets Algy to swing the prop as he turns on the petrol and the engine roars into life and they taxi away under a hail of gunfire. Seeing a tree being swept downstream, Biggles takes off to avoid it. The next thing to catch his eye is a huge water-snake that has curled up in front of the engine and Algy fights with it as Biggles tries to land the plane. (Just as the keel swished lightly on the surface there was a sudden lurch - is the illustration opposite page 136). Algy falls overboard when the snake goes into the prop and Biggles pulls Algy out of the river. “Strewth, what a night we’re having!” says Algy. (Algy’s fight with the snake can’t be found in the Dean & Son reprints of this story. When the book was first published in 1933, the original plane in the story was a biplane.  When they republished the story in the 1960’s they no doubt wanted to update the plane to appeal to children of that era so it became a monoplane. The scene removed is some four pages long and is from the words “called for much greater skill and judgment” on the John Hamilton edition at page 133 (these lines can be found as the third and fourth lines at the top of page 98 of the Dean & Co 1960’s edition). The text referring to Algy’s fight with the snake is then cut all the way until the top of page 137 of the John Hamilton edition where Algy’s words “But where are Dickpa and Smyth?” then becomes “Now where are Dickpa and Smyth?” at the start of the second paragraph on page 98 of the Dean & Son edition. I think the reason this was cut is explained by the illustration opposite page 136 of the first edition of the book. It shows Algy fighting with the snake on the body of the plane.  You simply couldn’t have a fight with a snake on the outside of a more modern aeroplane!  The crew would be safely inside). Smelling petrol, Biggles realises the main tank has been holed by a bullet and has run dry. They only have about enough for half an hour’s flying in the gravity tank. They taxi down river and pick up Dickpa and Smyth who had started on the journey back. They then taxi back to their original landing place, but moor on the opposite bank to where the Indians were. They all desperately need to sleep but they have to take turns to keep watch.