SERGEANT BIGGLESWORTH C.I.D.

by Captain W. E. Johns

V. PREUSS TRIES AGAIN (Pages 41 - 52)

At the Colon Hotel, Biggles receives a call from Schneider to say that Preuss is filling up for a long trip although he hasn't gone yet. Biggles is going to give Schneider a thousand marks to get away as Preuss suspects him of talking too much. Schneider is coming to the hotel at 8.00 pm and he will have more to tell. He has already told Biggles that Preuss has a secret supply of petrol at the aerodrome, the valve hidden under the pile of rubbish at the back of the Renkell hanger. Biggles has also rang Air Commodore Raymond to find out if the American Maz Grindler is at large. Schneider doesn't turn up and by 8.30 pm Biggles is worried enough to go looking for him. Biggles and Ginger travel to 40 Unterstrasse, Augsburg, where they find Schneider dead having had his brains bashed out with a heavy instrument. In the dead man's hand is some fair hair. Suddenly a bullet is fired at Biggles but Ginger having seen movement is able to push him out of the way just in time. Biggles and Ginger are then locked in the room with the dead body. Biggles says that Schneider must have been dead by 8.00 pm otherwise he would have met with them and it was 8.30 pm by the time they got there (this is an obvious continuity error as they didn't leave their hotel until 8.30 pm!). Our two heroes then realise that their assailant has started a fire outside of the door. They break through the flimsy wood of the door using chair legs and are able to smother the fire with a hearth-rug. Biggles and Ginger are convinced that Preuss was the assailant but realise that he will be in the air by now. They decide to return to their hotel and then go to the aerodrome and search Preuss's office while he's away. He may have made some calculations or plotted a compass course or left some clues as to where he is going. Back at the hotel, Biggles has a message from Raymond that Grindler, sometimes known as the Pike has escaped from a life sentence in New York State Penitentiary two months ago and disappeared. There is a description of him, which mentions that the little finger of his left hand is missing. Our heroes go to get some sleep and Biggles says he will wake Ginger at 3.45 am.