SERGEANT BIGGLESWORTH C.I.D.

by Captain W. E. Johns

IV. PREUSS PLAYS A CARD (Pages 32 - 41)

Biggles sees a man walking away from their aircraft and stops him. The man says he was just looking at them as he was interested. Biggles offers to take him for a joy-ride and then insists on doing so. The man breaks down and says they will both be killed if he does. He has sabotaged Biggles Spur by cutting the aileron control. The man says that Preuss made him do it. The man confesses that Renkell's two planes were there as he help fit an undercarriage on the bomber with a wheel track of four metres. Five people took them away, Renkell, Baumer, an Italian named Carlos, Gontermann and an American he didn't know. The man gives his name as Franz Schneider and his address as 40 Unterstrasse, Augsburg. Biggles tells him that he will be staying at the Colon Hotel and he wants Schneider to let him know if Preuss flies off. Schneider immediately shuts up when Preuss comes over to see what is going on. Biggles tells Algy and Bertie to check their machine and then they are to fly to the Persian Gulf to see if they can find any wheel marks of the aircraft that took the stolen pearls to America along the flat sand of the Arabian coast. When the pearls were stolen from the ship, they must have been transferred to a plane waiting on the side of the Gulf nearest America, reasons Biggles. Biggles asks Ginger to mend their sabotaged plane, the Spur, whilst he gets Howath to book them into the Colon Hotels and post a guard over the plane to prevent any other sabotage. Biggles and Ginger discuss the problems of challenging aircraft in the air and trying to stop them when they could be shot at. They are glad they have bought their automatics. "I had a feeling we might need them," murmured Biggles.