BIGGLES FLIES AGAIN

by W. E. Johns

III. THE BLUE ORCHID (Pages 50 – 66)

This story again opens with Biggles sitting on the patio of the Hotel Guibert in La Paz. “We are heroes at the moment and Bolivia belongs to us if we want it” he says to Algy. But he notes that things may change. “Then again, Algy, old son, you can’t go on flirting with Consuelo unless you intend marrying her. No, we had better get out while the band is playing jazz instead of going feet first with the band playing the Dead March”. Their conversation is interrupted by the waiter bringing a card that says the name “Professor J. T. Smilee, F.R.H.S.” and they are soon speaking with the man himself. Smilee is an orchid hunter and collector and wants to commission them to fly him to the believed location of a mysterious blue orchid. The dead body of another orchid hunter, called Mr. F. Hutson has been found in a balsa, a local craft used for river transport, and his diary gives a description of how to find the place. Four days later, the Vandal lands on a lake with an unusually large number of dead and dying trees on the bank. There is a foul smell as well. “The forest of death,” remarked Algy humorously, but the joke seemed to fall flat”. The place is also completely silent. Branches just crumble away to the touch. The Professor, Biggles and Algy go ashore and Algy and Biggles soon begin to feel sick. Here they find the orchids they seek. “They were blue. The under sepal was a deep, glowing royal blue, watered into a brilliant peacock-blue at the tip. Two orange spots, like eyes, were set at the base, and a long scarlet stigma completed the most devilishly beautiful thing that ever grew on earth. They were the size of dinner plates – and there were hundreds of them – thousands of them”. “Suddenly the air was filled with an overpowering flood of perfume, and Biggles staggered back with a hoarse cry, clutching at his throat, a grim suspicion forming in his mind. “Come on, Smilee!” he cried. “It’s poison – run for it!” They all flee but the Professor falls amongst the flowers. Biggles is overcome and collapses. He awakes to find himself lying across the lower wing of the Vandal, having been dragged towards the lake by Algy before he himself was overcome. Smyth managed to haul them both aboard and cut the mooring rope before he too was overcome. They had then floated away and come round. Biggles says “We shall have to go back and look for the Professor”. But they don’t know how long they were unconscious or which tributaries they have drifted down. By evening they had still failed to find the lake. “Frankly, I don’t think it’s much use looking for poor Smilee. We can’t just leave him though”. It is getting dark so they decide to tie up for the night and take off in the morning. The next morning, they take off to find the whole area around the lake alight. Biggles was smoking when he fell. “Your cigarette must have started the fire – the place was like tinder” says Algy. “Biggles caught Algy’s eye and shook his head; sadly, he turned the nose of the machine towards the distant mountains”.