BIGGLES IN THE JUNGLE

by Captain W. E. Johns

X. SWIFT DEVELOPMENTS (Pages 102 - 110)

The next day, Biggles plans to recover enough sunken fuel to fly back to Belize. However, rain up river is causing the river to swell and it is a difficult task. Biggles gets the raft over the spot where they were told the canoe sank and uses a rock as an anchor. It takes Biggles three dives to locate the sunken canoe and they then moor directly over it. Biggles swims down and ties a line to a petrol-can and the others haul it aboard. By the time they have seven cans the river is in full spate, bringing down with it debris of all sorts. They put the petrol they have recovered into the tanks. Algy says they won’t be able to hold the machine in this water and if she goes down the rapids “she’s a goner”. They decide to take off. “Algy went forward to cast off the mooring-rope, but seeing that he was having difficulty with it, for the Wanderer was pulling hard, Ginger went to his help. At the same time Dusky started throwing the empty cans on the bank. In view of what happened, these details are important. Actually, just what did happen, or how it happened, none of them knew – beyond the fact that the line suddenly snapped. Ginger made a despairing grab at it, slipped, clutched at Algy, and dragged him overboard with him. The Wanderer, breaking free, bucked, and Dusky caught in the act of throwing, also went overboard. All three managed to reach the bank, while the Wanderer went careering down-stream”. Biggles manages to start the engines and takes off, but he has to leave his comrades because he cannot land again. Dusky goes searching for food and whilst Algy and Ginger wait, they are rushed and captured by native Indians. “Still dazed by the suddenness of the attack they were dragged to their feet and marched away into the forest, menaced fiercely by the spears of their captors. They could do nothing but submit”. They are taken some five miles to a native village where they meet Eddie Rockwell, an American, who had financed a treasure hunt to the area only to be betrayed by his two partners and left to die in the jungle. “I saw an advertisement in a paper that a couple of guys knew where a treasure was waiting to be picked up. The map they had looked genuine enough, and I fell for it. I financed the expedition, and everything was swell until we go here. Then my two crooked partners just beat it with the stores and left me stranded”. Eddie was then captured by Indians. “An idea struck Ginger. He realised that these must be the three Americans about whom Carruthers was so concerned”. Ginger describes the two white men he has seen in the Tiger’s secret village and Eddie confirms that is them and names them as Joe Warner and Silas Schmitt. The natives appear to be celebrating the capture of the white men, when suddenly and without warning, the native village is attacked by Bogat and his men. Shots are fired, natives fall and the rest flee. Bogat finds the three men and covers them with his rifle. “It looks as if we’ve fallen out of the frying-pan into the fire,” murmured Ginger despondently. The prisoner’s hands are tied and the native huts are burnt. The prisoners are then marched into the forest. Eddie wonders where they are being taken. “I should say we’re on the way to see the King of the Forest”, returned Ginger.