BIGGLES IN THE ORIENT

By Captain W. E. Johns

IX. BIGGLES PLAYS FOX (Pages 87 - 99)

Biggles discusses Gray's death with Air Commodore Raymond and says it could be murder. Biggles sends Algy to get him some chewing gum and calls Lal Din to get him some cigarettes. He then orders Ginger and Johnny to fly two Hurricanes, X M and X T on a sortie over enemy territory. Biggles asks "Where's that heathen with my cigarettes? Ah! There you are, Lal Di. Thanks." Algy is then assigned to get something from the medical officer guaranteed to make a man sick and then drive the reserve ambulance to the practice landing-ground at Gayhar about six miles north and wait for Biggles. Biggles then goes with Ginger and Johnny to their planes and says to them in confidence that they are to fly to Gayhar, he will go with them, and they will land and just sit in their seats for a couple of hours leaving the engines running. This they do and Biggles checks on them every hour. On the second check he finds Johnny unconscious and administers the potion that Algy has got from the M.O. to make Johnny vomit. Johnny comes round and explains what happened. "I felt a queer sort of feeling coming over me. At first I thought it was the heat; then I realised it wasn't. But by that time I was too far gone to do anything about it. It was hell." Johnny continues "I thought I was dying. Everything round me was all distorted. I tried to move, to call you on the radio, but I couldn't. My bones had all gone to jelly" Then he passed out. Biggles says it was the chewing-gum he ate. But Johnny says he hadn't eaten any chewing gum. Johnny said usually Sergeant Gray put some in - free issue - but Johnny didn't like it. Ginger says there was no gum in his machine either. Biggles is surprised. He had found out that Johnny and Scrimshaw never chewed gum and thought the gum was the cause. They return to Dum Dum. Algy flies Johnny's plane as he is not fit to fly but Johnny is able to drive the ambulance back.