Biggles and co, p.9
Biggles And Co, page 9
part #10 of Biggles Series
Chapter 7
What Happened at Aix
When Biggles set out on his trip to Aix, with the sealed package that Cronfelt had given him in his pocket, he did not underestimate the risks he was running. Indeed, he was well aware that he was about to embark upon what was likely to prove the most desperate adventure of his career, and one that might easily be his last. Of the unscrupulous nature of the men against whom he had pitted his brains he had already had ample proof, although even yet he had not plumbed the full depth of their callous brutality.
That they would willingly release Algy in return for the gems he did not for one moment believe, but he had no other means of getting in touch with either captors or captive, so while he had accepted their terms he was prepared for any developments. He was also prepared to go to any lengths to win the round, which might, or might not, be the end of the whole undertaking.
He did not dwell upon the awkward situation that would inevitably arise if, in saving his partner, he lost the gems, particularly when it was discovered that he had made no attempt to reach Amsterdam, his avowed destination. That, he decided, was a problem to be solved if it arose. The immediate present supplied him with all the mental exercise he needed.
He kept a sharp look-out during the journey, not that he expected anything to happen, and in this his reasoning was correct, for he reached Aix without incident and without seeing another machine of any sort. With the famous continental health-resort under his left wing, he turned sharply to the right, which brought the machine on a southerly course, and forthwith began scrutinizing the country-side for the appointed rendezvous.
He was not long in finding it, and he smiled curiously when he saw a green monoplane, with its propeller ticking over, almost in the centre of the field. To say that he was not surprised when he realized that his unknown correspondent was also using an aeroplane would be incorrect. He observed the machine with genuine astonishment, because he had taken it for granted that he would be met by a motor-car, although once having perceived the aircraft he was amazed that he had not foreseen such an obvious contingency.
He noted that the machine bore no markings of any sort, but he lost no time in contemplation of this breach of international regulations. If they wished to hide the nationality of their machine, people who had proved that they were prepared to commit murder were hardly likely to let a little matter like international regulations stand in their way, he reflected, as he circled the field and then glided in to land.
Even before his wheels touched he saw three men run out of the cabin of the green machine, which, now that he was nearer he saw was of a type unknown to him. They stood beside the wing with their faces turned upward, and calmly awaited the biplane’s arrival. Nor did they move when it landed.
Biggles did not attempt any subterfuge, which, in the circumstances, would have been a waste of time. He taxied to within a few yards of the other machine, regarded the three men stonily for a moment or two, and then, leaving his engine ticking over, he jumped down and walked towards them.
‘Do we speak English?’ he inquired coldly; and then raised his eyebrows as he recognized the German with the American accent who had been spokesman when he had been forced to land in northern France. The other faces, including that of the pilot, were new to him, and he wondered vaguely why the same pilot had not been employed as on the previous occasion.
The German—for there was no doubt of his nationality in spite of his American accent—eyed him malignantly. ‘Yes, we shall get on faster,’ he retorted, with a hostility that he made no attempt to disguise. ‘You’re a smart guy, aren’t you,’ he added evilly, obviously referring to their previous encounter.
‘Let’s not waste time paying each other compliments,’ answered Biggles shortly. ‘I want my partner; you want—what I’ve got in my pocket. That, I understand, is the transaction for which this meeting has been convened. Am I right?’
‘Sure you are,’ replied the other quickly. ‘Well, pass over the stones.’
‘Not so fast. What about your part of the deal? Where is my partner? If, as I assume, he is in the cabin, trot him out.’ So saying, Biggles felt in his pocket and took out the sealed package.
‘How do I know the stones are in that?’ asked the German belligerently.
‘Do you thirds I’m a lunatic?’ snapped Biggles. ‘I didn’t imagine that you’d make the transfer without seeing the diamonds, or I’d have prepared a dummy. I give you my word that this is the packet of diamonds precisely as it was handed to me this morning by the head of my firm. A glance will assure you that the seals are unbroken.’
The other held out his hand. ‘Let me look,’ he said.
Biggles sensed a growing tension in the air, and he watched the three men collectively for the first hostile move that he felt was coming. He was prepared for it. ‘No,’ he said slowly. ‘Where is Lacey? Produce him, and the jewels are yours; but no partner, no jewels.’
The German laughed suddenly. ‘Are you telling me?’ he asked with a chuckle.
‘Yes, I’m telling you,’ returned Biggles, with every nerve quivering.
The German’s hand went to his pocket, but by the time he had withdrawn it Biggles was covering him with an automatic. ‘Careful,’ he said warningly. ‘Two can play at that game.’
The other put on a look of hurt surprise, and withdrew his hand, in which was a silver case. From it, he selected a cigarette with care. ‘Well, now, look at that,’ he said. ‘And all I wanted was a smoke.’ Suddenly his eyes narrowed and his voice changed. ‘You looking for trouble?’ he asked harshly.
‘Just as you like,’ returned Biggles, feeling that the talk had gone on long enough.
‘All right, then, you can have it,’ snarled the German. ‘Take a look behind you.’
But Biggles was not to be caught by this age-old trick. ‘No,’ he said quietly. ‘I can see all I want in front of me.’
‘Maybe, but take a look all the same,’ sneered a voice behind him.
Then Biggles knew, with a swift surge of anger, that it was no bluff. Someone was in the machine. Casually he turned and looked. Projecting through the cabin window, at a distance of not more than three yards, was the most diabolical weapon ever conceived by human ingenuity—a sawn-off double-barrelled shot-gun. He did not need telling that if fired at such a range it would blow a hole straight through him the size of a tea-plate. A bullet-wound will heal in time, but a charge of small shot, fired at point-blank range, never.
‘So it’s like that, eh?’ he said bitterly, putting his automatic back in his pocket. ‘I might have known you’d put over a dirty deal,’ he added viciously.
‘Let us not waste time paying each other compliments,’ mimicked the first speaker. ‘Step inside; the boss wants a word with you.’
‘Lacey isn’t here, then?’ asked Biggles, deeply disappointed, for although he was prepared for something on the lines of what had happened, he had hoped that Algy would be brought to the spot.
‘We’ve plenty of weight to carry without him,’ grinned the other mysteriously. ‘Take a look inside and you’ll see what happens to people who annoy the boss,’ he invited.
Wonderingly, Biggles obeyed, but as he reached the cabin door and looked inside, he stopped short with a feeling that an icy hand was clutching his heart, for stretched along the floor was the body of a man in flying-kit. He was stone dead, and had been for some time; there was no doubt of that. Biggles recognized him at once. It was the pilot of the single-seater who had forced him to land a few days previously.
‘What’s the idea of this beastliness?’ he asked icily.
‘Watch, and you’ll see,’ the German told him. ‘You’re about to witness the last journey of the redoubtable flying Ace, Major Bigglesworth.’ To this remark he added something swiftly to the others which Biggles did not catch, but they evidently understood.
As in a horrid nightmare, Biggles, still covered by the shot-gun, stood and watched the gruesome drama enacted. The body was placed in the pilot’s seat of the Cormorant. A handful of tow was thrown into the cabin. A lighted match followed. A wisp of smoke curled upwards.
He needed no explanation of the reason for the ghastly outrage. The Germans had a body to dispose of, and were killing two birds with one stone, so to speak. When the remains of the body were found it would naturally be assumed that it was he who had perished, so his disappearance would cause no comment. Evil though he knew the perpetrators of this frightful deed to be from what Cronfelt had told him during their first interview, this far surpassed in horror anything he had imagined them capable of, and as he watched the smoke curling upwards he made a mental vow that he would not rest until he had brought them to justice.
‘That’s all; let’s go. Inside, everybody,’ snapped the German.
Biggles was pushed unceremoniously into the cabin. The others followed. The man with the shot-gun, who, it now transpired, was the pilot, handed the weapon over to one of the others and took his place at the controls. The engine roared. The machine swung round into the wind, bumped for a moment over the turf, and then soared into the air.
Biggles had flown many aeroplanes in many lands, but the flight that now commenced provided a new sensation. For once he was flying as a passenger, with the control of the machine in the hands of a man whom he did not know. Moreover, he was on a flight of unknown duration to a problematical destination. He did not even know the name of the country to which he was flying, or, for that matter, over which he was flying, for without a compass to guide him he could only gather a very broad idea of direction from the angle of the sun’s rays across the cabin. Seated as he was between two of his captors, he could only just see out of the cabin windows, and from this position he was, of course, unable to look down, so the only part of the landscape visible was the distant horizon.
In these unpleasant circumstances the time passed slowly, and he began to long for the break in the regular drone of the engine that would foretell the end of the journey. An hour went by, but still there was no indication that they were nearing their objective, and he resumed his cogitations wearily.
The jewel-box had been taken from him at the beginning of the flight, and he wondered vaguely how Cronfelt and the others would feel when they heard of their loss. But the thing uppermost in his mind was the knowledge that he might soon have an opportunity of speaking to Algy, and possibly learning from him something of the men to whom they were opposed.
The monotonous purr of the engine was finally lulling him to sleep when it died away suddenly and the nose of the machine dipped downward. He was alert instantly, for it seemed that at last the end of the journey was at hand. Nor was he mistaken, and he leaned forward eagerly in the hope of catching a glimpse of the ground, only to be thrust back roughly by one of the men who sat beside him. Worse was still to come, for before the machine touched the ground a bandage had been bound over his eyes, so that when the machine ran to a standstill he was even worse off than he had been in the air, for he could see nothing at all. Naturally, he protested against this indignity, but in the face of the shot-gun argument was futile, and he submitted with the best grace he could muster.
In what followed he was guided entirely by sound and touch. He was led for some distance across yielding turf, although whether it was a regular aerodrome or a private field he had no means of knowing. Then his feet crunched for a few minutes on hard gravel, after which he was assisted into a motor-car. To his relief, the ride was of short duration, and a few minutes later, after climbing a steep gradient, the car stopped and he once more stood on a hard road. There was a sharp military word of command that might have been uttered by a sentry on duty; a door opened and the gravel under his feet was replaced by a firm stone floor. Unseen hands guided him along a corridor.
‘Pick up your feet — there are steps in front of you,’ said the voice of the German. He felt with his foot for the first one, found it, and another.
The staircase became a nightmare; it seemed to go on for ever, and one hundred and eighty winding steps he counted before he was told to stop. It struck him as odd that he should be taken upwards, for according to tradition prisoners were invariably led down to their cells.
The hands that had guided him were removed, and somewhere close at hand a heavy door slammed. Some moments he stood still, awaiting the next instructions, but as they did not come he lifted an arm tentatively. Somewhat to his surprise the silence remained unbroken, and with a queer feeling of expectancy he whipped the bandage from his eyes. For a second he stood blinking like an owl in the light, staring about him stupidly, for the scene was not in the least what he had expected to see.
He found himself in a small circular room of cold grey stone, furnished with bare necessities as a bedroom, and lighted by a single window, about thirty inches square, and some four feet from the ground, through which the afternoon sun flung a shift of white light on the massive oaken door. The furniture, which comprised a squat bed and oddly-shaped chair, was of the same material, and on both the same device, a seven-headed eagle, was carved in medieval style. The room and its equipment was obviously of great age, and, if proof of this were needed, it was supplied by the thickness of the walls, revealed by the cavity in which the window was sunk. Originally the opening had evidently been unglazed, but now a thin beading of varnished wood held a single sheet of glass in place.
So much Biggles saw at a glance as he turned his head slowly to survey his prison, and the brief inspection answered the question that was now of paramount importance. The only means of egress, except the door, was the window, and to this he now turned his attention.
Again a single glance told him all he needed to know, and he pursed his lips as he looked through the rather dirty pane of glass, for while the scene was unquestionably impressive, from his point of view it was distinctly depressing.
He saw that the room in which he was confined was situated in a turret of one of those magnificent yet forbidding castles that still raise their grey, weather-worn battlements above the sombre, ever-green forests of the Rhineland, to bear silent witness of an age of knights in armour, of dragons, and damsels in distress. It was built on a slight knoll, the lower flanks of which were clad in close-growing fir-trees whose drooping boughs cast a sable shadow over the hill-side as if in mourning for the days that were no more. In the distance they gave way to open fields and vineyards, where peasants were at work gathering the grapes in great baskets which, from time to time, were emptied into ox-carts of antiquated pattern.
The actual structure was composed of huge blocks of hand-hewn stone that rose tier upon tier for nearly a hundred feet, although the vast area of the place dispelled any impression of disproportionate height. At one end, crenellated walls ended in imposing corner turrets whose feet were planted in what had once been a moat, but was now a large pool of stagnant water with steeply sloping banks from which sprang a riot of ferns that reflected their images in the black water without giving any clue to its depth. The water ended about half-way along the side of the main building, as if an attempt had been made at some time to fill in the moat, so that the walls at the opposite end dropped into dry ground that was broken at intervals by groups of gnarled, sun-starved shrubs.
From the pile of debris which emerged from the water at the foot of the wall at the turreted end, a tangle of ivy, as old as the castle itself, flung groping, octopus-like arms upwards to the very top, and formed a nesting-place for a colony of ravens whose heads protruded, gargoyle-fashion, from the complicated mesh of branches. That was all Biala could see from his limited viewpoint, but it was sufficient to show that the window, as a means of escape, was utterly out of the question. There was not a cornice, a crevice, nor even a fingerhold within reach. Above was the sky; below, the moat. Between them was a perpendicular wall of stone, worn smooth by the winds and rains of ages. Admittedly, the top of the ivy-covered wall came to within some fifteen feet of his turret window, but it was below and to the right, and there was no possible means of reaching it.
‘Well, I needn’t waste any more time looking for a way out on this side,’ he brooded, as he gazed out over the landscape now bathed in the soft glow of evening. ‘What I should like to know is if Algy is here,’ he mused, as he turned back into the room. His eyes fell on the bed-coverings, and he examined them with a view to employing them as a rope, but they consisted only of a threadbare blanket and two flimsy sheets that would not have supported the weight of a child, and he threw them where they belonged impatiently.
There was no need to examine the walls, for they were of solid stone, broken only by the window and the door.
‘Well, there’s only one way out of this place and that’s through the door,’ was his unspoken thought, as he sat down in the chair and waited for the next move in the game that now looked like ending in drama.
He had not long to wait. After a peremptory knock, the door was pushed open and a menial, carrying a cloth-covered tray, entered. Behind him were two men in the inevitable green uniform, each with a revolver in his hand.
Biggles looked at the weapons and then at the men’s faces. ‘You’re not taking any chances, I see,’ he sneered, hoping to induce them to say something. But the ruse failed. The tray was set down on the bed and the party withdrew without a word.
Biggles removed the cloth. ‘Well, they’re not going to starve me to death, evidently,’ he thought, as his eyes fell on a pot of tea, bread and butter, jam, and several slices of home-made cake.
Half an hour later, when the servant returned with the same escort as before to remove the tray, both the tea-pot and the plates were empty, and Biggles was leaning in the window recess with his elbows resting on the broad stone ledge, gazing across the peaceful country-side in the same posture, no doubt, as many a prisoner before him had adopted. Like theirs, his thoughts ran in one channel, that of escape, and he did not even turn as the men went out again. The heavy door swung to with a dull boom; a key grated in the lock, and he was once more alone.
