BIGGLES IN THE JUNGLE

by Captain W. E. Johns

V. THE ENEMY STRIKES (Pages 48 - 60)

Our heroes turn in for the night but are awoken by Dusky as he suspects men are in the forest and coming in their direction. They get dressed and Biggles has Algy and Ginger put the stores in the aircraft. They leave their tent up and all get in their aircraft, from where they are able to watch Bogat and his men stealthily approach their tent. Bogat calls “Come out!” and the rest raise their guns to cover the tent entrance. “Don’t move, Bogat; I’ve got you covered,” snapped Biggles. “Do you want something?” “If you do it’s waiting – a hundred rounds of nickel-coated lead. If you don’t want anything, clear out of my camp”. Bogat opens fire. Ginger fires back. “He swore afterwards that he didn’t consciously pull the trigger; he declared that the shock of Bogat’s shot caused his finger automatically to jerk the trigger”. Algy starts the engines and the Wanderer surges forward, away from the beach, with Ginger firing at the gun flashes in the darkness. (The Wanderer surged forward across the water, with Ginger firing spasmodic bursts – is the frontispiece illustration taken from a line on page 52). Biggles says "I must say that I don't like being hounded about by these dagos, but it was a case of discretion being the better part of valour. Our turn will come. From now on it’s open war". After flying away, our heroes continue exploring the jungle by air and fly onwards towards some mountains. “Cruising at three miles a minute, instead of – as Dusky assured them – three miles a day, which could be reckoned as normal progress on foot, they reached the mountains in about a quarter of an hour”. “It was necessary to fly at nearly six thousand feet to clear the highest peaks”. Ginger notices some ancient houses in the rocks and they land only to discover what appears to be an unexplored ruined city. From the city down a sheer cliff is a perilous rock path that Ginger christens "Jacob's ladder" from two feet to six feet wide running five or six miles from top to bottom. Dusky remembers clearing undergrowth from ruins in the jungle near the foot of a cliff and coming upon a flight of steps leading upwards. Biggles concludes that it is highly improbable that there can be two such stairways and believes that if they follow the steps down it will lead to, or very near to, the Tiger’s camp. After a meal and taking with them a tin of bully (beef), some biscuits, a water-bottle and their rifles, Biggles and Ginger resolve to descend the steps whilst Algy and Dusky remain with the plane.