BIGGLES
IN SPAIN
by Captain W.
E. Johns
XII. A
DESPERATE EXPEDIENT (Pages
140 – 150)
“Ginger felt Goudini
stiffen”. Ginger makes him get in the
car and tells him at the first sign of trouble he will shoot him. Ginger says that Goudini
means nothing to him, neither does their war “but I hope the side wins that
represents the majority of true Spaniards”.
Ginger tells him that to obtain his friends release he would shoot him
“and a hundred men like you” and he takes Goudini’s
revolver. Ginger drives Goudini away in his own car “and he drove fast, perceiving
that in such circumstances Goudini would not be able
to make active protest without risk of upsetting the car”. Driving out of the city to a dilapidated
stone hut, Ginger parks up and questions Goudini. Goudini has a
portfolio with him which Ginger takes.
It contains a sheaf of documents in Spanish. Ginger forces Goudini,
at gun point, to write out an order in Spanish that will allow Ginger to
interrogate the two prisoners - Biggles and Algy. Ginger says he intends to leave Goudini tied up in the abandoned stone hut. If he is successful in freeing Biggles and
Algy he will return to release Goudini. If he is unsuccessful – because of what Goudini writes, Goudini “will
probably die a miserable death from hunger and thirst”. As Ginger gets out of the car, his gun moves
away from pointing at Goudini and Goudini
leaps at him with a knife. Ginger falls
back but the knife strikes his forearm.
Ginger’s gun goes off and Goudini is
shot. Goudini
lies on the road moaning feebly and the moans die away to silence. Ginger feels his heart, it is still
beating. Ginger thinks to himself “Poor
devil, I ought to do something for him.
I can’t leave him here to die”. Ginger has a knife wound in his arm, not
very long, but deep and bleeding copiously and he uses Goudini’s
handkerchief as a bandage. Ginger is
disturbed by a line of mules with men walking besides them coming over the brow
of a hill and he decides he will have to leave them to look after Goudini. Ginger gets
in the car and tears off back towards Barcelona.