BIGGLES AND THE DEEP BLUE SEA

by Captain W. E. Johns

11. COLLINGWOOD ENDS HIS TALE (Pages 117 – 125)

“It was nearly half an hour before the conversation could be resumed. All noise ended abruptly”. “We are in the middle,” announced Collingwood. “You can get this sort of calm in the centre of a cyclone”. Collingwood says that whilst stationed here, there was little to do. His men spent most of their time playing cards, whilst he, Collingwood, spent his time exploring the island. “Well, one day I was poking about in the hollow at the far end of the island when I picked up a piece of stuff that reminded me of the opal ore I’d seen at Cooper Pedy”. “In all the RAF I was probably the only man who knew anything at all about opal”. Collingwood got his chance to do a spot of gouging and dug a shaft into the steep side of the hollow. Within an hour he had struck his first piece. He never told the other lads. Then the war was over and they were all evacuated. “I would rather have stayed here, but had I suggested it some smart psychiatrist would have declared that I’d gone round the bend and I’d have been taken off, anyway, for observation”. He took a job in England but always wanted to come back. He didn’t tell the government because he would have heard nothing and he didn’t want money, he just wanted to dig for opal himself. After twelve months he met a man called Murdo Mackay at the Aero Club who was a pilot on the wartime Bonney Island run. Mackay was a pilot working for Indian Airways, based in Calcutta but he had a private plane for his own use. Collingwood asked Mackay to take him back to Bonney as he had “discovered something valuable” but he didn’t tell Mackay what it was. He promised him half if he would take him. (Seems strange to offer somebody half of something but not tell them what it is!). Collingwood had to get to Calcutta and Mackay bought him to the island with a big load of stores. Mackay was to pick him up when he had his next leave in about six months. Collingwood now expects Mackay to arrive in a week or two. Collingwood says he had only been there a month when an Arab dhow arrived. One of the men aboard was from Aden and he spoke English fairly well, having been one of the gang of labourers put ashore to clear the runway during the war. That was Ali. He stopped the others from killing Collingwood, who agreed the Arabs could do what they wanted and he wouldn’t interfere as long as they left him alone. They said they wanted to grow corn and it was the Arabs who blew a hole in the reef in order to get into the lagoon. Ali was left to tend the crop and as it grew, Ali told Collingwood frankly that it was hashish. “I’d got to know him fairly well by that time. I told him to get on with it. It was of no interest to me”. As Ali wasn’t that busy, Collingwood agreed to pay him with tins of soup or corned beef to help clear the runway. Biggles nodded. “Pity. Had you told me this earlier it would have saved us both a lot of trouble. Not being interested in either hashish or opal, anyway, as far as the island is concerned, I would have respected your confidence and left you alone. As far as I can see you weren’t doing any harm”. Collingwood offers to get his pal Mackay to take Biggles and Algy back to India if their aircraft has been destroyed in the storm and if “we can stave off these Arabs when they come back”. Collingwood intends to stay. Biggles says he will have to think about that. Biggles says he has made his own arrangements to be picked up in case of accident. Biggles asks Collingwood if he has found any opals and Collingwood shows him “a small, flat wooden box, about twelve inches by six and two inches deep. Inside, “on the velvet, carefully arranged, was what seemed to be a mass of glowing iridescent fire, ever changing colour as waves of light ran across it”. Collingwood says he will give Mackay his share and keep the rest. “At that moment a gust of wind struck the hut with enough force to make it shake. An instant later came the rattle and crash of hailstones”. “Here we go again,” shouted Collingwood adding it might last “a few hours; maybe two or three days”.