BIGGLES’ CHINESE PUZZLE

AND OTHER BIGGLES’ ADVENTURES

by Captain W. E. Johns

VI. THE CASE OF THE MISSING CONSTABLE (Pages 135 – 152)

I have not yet been able to establish if this story was originally published elsewhere. I suspect it may have been published in the Australian “Chuckler’s Weekly” but I do not know that for sure. It may have been written purely as an additional story for BIGGLES’ CHINESE PUZZLE.

“Biggles was scanning the daily batch of aviation press cuttings as Ginger handed them to him, in the Scotland Yard office of the Special Air Police, when Inspector Gaskin walked in”. Biggles asks “How’s life?” and the reply is “Grim”. Gaskin is concerned about “this missing policeman affair”. “The newspapers have started their usual scream about inefficiency”. One paper, the Daily Courier has even offered a thousand pounds for the body, dead or alive. Biggles tells him “A reward keeps public interest alive, and the police on their toes, which is good for everybody. Be a joke if someone knocked ‘em for a thousand! If it was in my line I’d have a crack at it". Gaskin says that is what he was thinking as Biggles has “developed a knack of spotting something the rest of us miss”. The only air angle to it is that a plane had been in the habit of landing near to where the officer must have disappeared. The missing man is Edward Small, who for the last two years has had charge of the village of Elmthorpe in Hertfordshire (the village is fictional). He lived with his mother and three weeks ago she died. On Friday the fourteenth, five days after his mother’s death, Small was due to do his night duty round his beat, a matter of four miles. At ten-thirty he sees the people out of the pub at closing time. He was to have met an officer from Stevenage (a real large town in Hertfordshire) half-way, but never turned up. Something must have occurred to him on the first half of his beat. Biggles asks about the local crime in that area. He is told there has been no poaching for years, but there have been some burglaries in the big country houses round the area. There had been a burglary at Clagston Hall the very night Small disappeared, but that was six miles away. All the burglaries appeared to be the same man with the same method, getting in through an upstairs bathroom window. The police have fingerprints but there is no record of them at the Yard. Biggles asks about the plane that Gaskin mentioned and he is told that it belongs to the local rector’s brother (in this story the rector is also referred to as a parson. A parson can be either a rector or a vicar, depending on how church money is allocated). The parson at Elmsthorpe is called Dewsberry and is unmarried. He has been there twelve years. The brother is a flying instructor at Dacton Aero Club in Yorkshire (fictional, although there is a Dalton Aerodrome in Yorkshire). He flies down to see his brother and lands in the field next to the churchyard, which belongs to the rectory. It’s a day’s journey by train but can be flown in an hour. Gaskin says it sounds reasonable to him. “Biggles lit a cigarette. “May be. But the Air Ministry now frowns on these casual landings outside official airports. So do I, if it comes to that. They’re dangerous. And besides, as we know, such landings facilitate illegal practices – – Customs evasions, currency rackets, and so on”. Gaskin says “Well, I’m not suggesting that there’s anything like that in this case. But a plane has landed at Elmthorpe. I may be clutching at straws, but there seemed a vague chance that it might come into the picture, which is why I looked in to see you. As a matter of detail the plane hasn’t been down for over a month. I confirmed that in the village”. Biggles checks his files on the Dacton Club and confirms the Chief Instructor is Richard Ernest Dewsberry. He notes with concern that his licence was suspended for twelve months and he was fined fifty pounds for failing to declare a quantity of saccharin on entry into the country from France some three years ago. Ginger rings the club to ascertain that Dewsbury the instructor has been abroad for three weeks. Biggles says he will take the car down to go and have a look at the village of Elmthorpe. “If we could make the Courier cough up a thousand pounds it’d teach them to have more respect for the police” he adds. Rather less than two hours later they are at the rectory acre field. Ginger and Biggles agree that due to the trees, it would be risky to make a landing in the field unless a north-east wind was blowing. Biggles wonders why no sheep or cattle are in the field eating. It would be worth a hundred pounds a year to the rectory. Seems strange to leave it empty just so Dewsbury’s brother can drop in and say “hello” to him. In the distance, they see the parson come over the stile from the churchyard. He appears to be searching the field for something. They go to the tavern for lunch. “Biggles refrained from asking questions for fear the landlord might guess their purpose and spread the news”. They then go to the home of Police Constable Small, where they retrace his beat. As they pass a lychgate (a roofed gateway to a church yard, formerly used to shelter a coffin until the clergman’s arrival) Ginger walks past. Biggles asks him “If your mother had been buried there five days ago would you walk straight past?” Ginger answers “No”. He says “I’d stop and think about her. With the grave so close I might walk in and have a look”. Biggles replies “I’m pretty sure you would. So would anybody”. They go and find the grave of Mrs Small, tucked away in a corner near the stile that gave access to the big field, for the newly turned earth was conspicuous. Biggles finds a tree stump and two cigarette ends and dead matches. Biggles says “Something, I don’t know what, but something has happened here”. (“… but something has happened here” - is the illustration opposite page 145). Biggles suspicions are raised because he has noticed the stalk of a crushed carnation protruding from the loose earth. “Flowers are put on a grave after it has been filled in, not before” Biggles tells Ginger. Ginger sees a piece of black ribbon half buried and pulls it out to reveal a mask. Biggles thinks for a minute or two then says “Look, Ginger. I’m going back to the village to ask one or two questions. I want you to go to the Yard, find Gaskin and bring him here right away. Tell him to bring his best fingerprint man, with his equipment. Say I’d like to see the case file on the local burglaries. Oh, yes, and he might bring a bunch of skeleton keys. That’s all. Be as quick as you can. You’ll find me waiting by the grave”. In due course Ginger returns with Inspector Gaskin and Tomkins of the fingerprint department. Both of those men carrying bags. Tomkins is asked to check the handle of a nearby shed for fingerprints and then, using the keys, go inside and check a spade handle. They then go into the church and Tomkins takes fingerprints from the pulpit. Biggles says he has been into the village and spoken to the sexton (a sexton is an officer of a church charged with the maintenance of its buildings and/or associated graveyard. This office is often combined with that of verger). The sexton hasn’t been into the shed or used the spade since Mrs Small died. They return to the tree stump by the grave outside. Tomkins says the prints he has taken (from the shed and the pulpit) were all made by the same man. The prints are then compared to the those from the burglary and are found to be the same as well. Tomkins says, in astonishment, “The parson … a burglar!” “He’s worse than that,” said Biggles grimly. “I’m afraid he’s … a murderer”. He killed Small and buried him in Mrs. Small’s grave. Biggles and Ginger wait by the car whilst Gaskin digs down into the grave. Gaskin comes over to tell Biggles he was right and “The gun that killed him was on his chest”. Gaskin adds “Looks as if you’re going to touch the Courier for that thousand”. Biggles shrugged. “I’d forgotten about it". Gaskin asks Biggles how he “go on to this”. Biggles says the parson was looking for something in the field: The mask, which was not something an honest man carries around with him. After killing Small he was working in the dark, and presumably in haste, and he dropped it. He buried the mask and some of the flowers too. “Queer– almost as if Mrs Small revealed the murderer of her son from the grave” Biggles continues, that Dewsbury, as a parson, would frequently visit the big houses round about. He could go to the bathroom or lavatory and unfasten a window for return later. On his return from Clagston Hall, with the swag, he cut across the field and found Small sitting on the tree stump. No doubt he was challenged. “Dewsberry, finding himself discovered, shot Small dead, and buried the weapon with the body, using the spade which was nice and handy in the sexton’s shed. “What about the plane?” asks Gaskin. “A reasonable supposition would be that Dewsberry the pilot worked in with his brother, flying the stolen jewels to the Continent. Remember, he’s had one conviction for smuggling”. Gaskin replies “Sounds simple, the way you put it”. Biggles smiled. “That’s what Columbus said when he stood an egg on end”. (This is a reference to Columbus's egg which refers to a brilliant idea or discovery that seems simple or easy after the fact. The expression refers to an apocryphal story, dating from at least the 16th century, in which it is said that Christopher Columbus, having been told that finding a new trade route was inevitable and no great accomplishment, challenges his critics to make an egg stand on its tip. After his challenger gave up, Columbus does it himself by tapping the egg on the table to flatten its tip. The story if often alluded to when discussing creativity. It also shows that anything can be done by anyone with the right set of skills; however, not everyone knows how to do it).