BIGGLES IN THE BLUE

by Captain W. E. Johns

XI. MORGAN TRIES AGAIN (Pages 156 – 172)

“It took Biggles, with Bertie and Ginger, the best part of an hour to get back to the cottage occupied by the negress, even though the costal route they followed was nothing like as bad as the cross-country compass course they had taken on the outward journey”. They have to be cautious in case of ambush by the enemy. As they approach the cottage they can hear shattering blows of metal on metal, as if someone was throwing rocks at a dustbin. They hear “So you won’t, eh?” Bang. “Yo don behave stubborn, eh?” Crash. “I show youse”. Whang. “Come back here, you”. Zonk. “How yus like dat one, huh?” Bang – crash. “Sounds as if the old crow is walloping her moke,” guesses Bertie. (‘Moke’ is slang for Donkey). “If it’s the donkey that’s getting it, it must be wearing a tin suit,” said Ginger. “Emerging from the bushes, the mystery was at once solved, and so curious was the spectacle provided that they all stopped to watch, for so far the buxom negress responsible for the dine had not seen them. Swinging an axe, she was battering an object already so mutilated that it was impossible to say what it was”. Biggles advanced between the woman and her house. “Having a little trouble, ma’am?” questioned Biggles quietly. He offers her a cigarette. “My respects to you, master,” she said, taking a light from Biggles and exhaling smoke with obvious relish. Biggles asks what she is trying to do and the woman says she is trying to open the box. The box has been battered out of shape and Ginger thinks it resembles a pressed-steel uniform case. Biggles asks where the keys are and the woman says she has lost them. “Why not tell the truth and say you never had them?” asks Biggles. The woman sighed. “Yus too smart for me, suh”. The woman says her name is Susannah Shaw and she found the box washed up on the beach. “Of course you found it,” agreed Biggles. “But where? Come on now. You don’t want me to report you to the government for stealing flamingo eggs, do you?” Biggles says “You dug it up in the hut over by the flamingos, didn’t you?” “Yes, suh.” The voice was hardly audible. “It’s all right, Susannah,” went on Biggles kindly. “We’re not going to report you, or anything like that. But we happen to be looking for a box like the one you’re trying to open. It doesn’t belong to you. It belongs to the government and you’ll have to give it up”. Biggles tells her she will get a reward. Susannah says her husband had been appointed on a small salary to watch over the flamingos and see that no one robbed the nests. He had built the hut for shelter. When he died, the money stopped coming and as a destitute widow, she had taken eggs to Mathew Town to sell them. One day, a long time ago, a man came carrying a box. He went in the hut and came out without the box. She didn’t look for it, she was not a thief. Time passed and at intervals the man appeared and went to the hut. Then came a long time when she did not see him come back and she decided to find the box. The axe was the only tool she had to try and open it. “She was ‘berry, berry, sorry” if she had done wrong, and hoped she wouldn’t be taken away from her home”. “Of course not,” Biggles hastened to assure her. Biggles counts out some notes for her and says “That should keep you going for some time. But mind, no more egg-stealing. When I get home I shall suggest to the government that you are made the guardian of the flamingos, and paid the same as your husband before he died”. Biggles says goodbye and tells Ginger and Bertie to bring the box by carrying it between them. The hear the drone of an aircraft and then the engines die as it glides down into the bay to land. They hear gunshots. Biggles tells Ginger to stay with the box and he and Bertie run to Algy’s aid. Ginger drags the box to a small hollow and throws grass, sticks and dead leaves over it to partially camouflage it. Ginger hears more shots and the roar of aircraft engines. Then the sound increases in volume as if it was returning, then engines cutting and silence. An hour passed. “He fell back on the old solace of no news being good news. But he found it unconvincing. In a case like this he felt that no news could only mean bad news. How right he was in this, fortunately he did not know”. Ginger passes the time by trying to see in the box through the gashes made by the axe. He widens one with his knife and uses a long stiff cactus thorn to pull some paper through by a few inches. He sees blue sided drawings of some mechanical device with German lettering. “That was really all he wanted to know. These were Hagen’s plans without a doubt”. Another half an hour passes and then the snap of a twig alerts Ginger. He sees a “coloured man” come into sight; it is Morgan. Ginger crouches down and tries to hide to avoid any trouble with the “murderous negro”. Morgan spots Ginger and swerves into some bushes and then fires a gun at him. Ginger fires back. Morgan shifts position and fires again. Ginger fires back and goes to fire again but his gun jams and Ginger can’t clear the cartridge. Ginger can’t run away. “He decided that he would rather be shot than have to tell Biggles that he had lost the box”. More shots come from Morgan and one ricochets with a metallic whang. Ginger tries to bluff it out. “One more step, Morgan, and I’ll shoot”, but his voice lacks conviction. Morgan charges and Ginger trips over a root and falls backwards. “As in a nightmare he saw a tall black body towering over him. A gun roared. A great weight descended on him, pressing him into the ground”.