Biggles (37 page)

‘You mean von Stalhein, James? Well, that's the devil of it all.
We can't be absolutely certain even now. The Huns have blanketed the whole affair with top security, but one of our agents has reported that someone was taken from the house alive.'

‘For God's sake, who?' asked Biggles quickly.

Raymond shrugged his shoulders. ‘We just don't know. Someone was admitted to the German hospital at Passy. It could have been von Stalhein, but even if it was, from the sound of things he won't be around to trouble us for quite some while. But let's just hope that it was someone else. Now, get some sleep, old boy. You look as though you need it.'

The next few days were naturally a time of hideous anxiety for Biggles. He rang Raymond's office endlessly but there was no further news from France and soon the Air Commodore was becoming just a little sick of Biggles' calls.

‘Now take it easy, James. I promise that I'll let you know the instant that there's something definite.'

Algy was getting worried now by what was happening to Biggles. Throughout the long years of their friendship he had never known him in such a state. This puzzled him, for he couldn't understand why he should be so worried if von Stalhein were alive or dead. Finally he asked him — and it was then that Biggles told him the whole story.

‘So you see, dear old chap,' concluded Biggles bitterly, ‘I've just got to know what's happened to Marie. I can't go on like this. It's torture. If she's dead, so be it, but I've got to know.'

‘But you can't blame yourself,' said Algy logically. ‘Fortunes of war, old thing. She knew what she was up to, living with von Stalhein.'

‘Oh, I know,' said Biggles. ‘I've been over it and over it and I've no illusions. But it was a dirty business all the same — not the sort of warfare you and I believe in, Algy. And I tell you one thing that's for sure. Whatever Raymond says or does in future, I'm not getting mixed up in that sort of thing again. You and I are fliers, Algy. Not bloody murderers.'

Two days later, news came through from Raymond.

‘Sorry, James. Bit of a disappointment for you, I'm afraid. It was von Stalhein who escaped. The blighter's just been taken back to hospital in Berlin. No fault of yours, of course, and I'm seeing that you're recommended for a decoration just the same.'

‘I'd rather that you didn't, sir,' said Biggles coldly.

‘Why not, James? Good Heavens man ...'

‘I'd just rather you didn't, sir,' repeated Biggles, and slammed the telephone down.

The death of Marie Janis was a turning-point in Biggles' life and it explains much of what subsequently happened, not only to him, but to Squadron 666 as well, for he was firm in his refusal to become involved again in Raymond's cloak-and-dagger world. On the surface, relations between him and the Air Commodore were much as they had always been — mutual respect and slightly wary friendship on both sides.

But that autumn, there was a stormy interview at Whitehall when Biggles flatly refused to take part in another of Raymond's plots against von Stalhein — who by then was totally recovered and was the brain behind German Intelligence in Berlin. Algy, as usual, patched things up between the two men by telling Raymond the true facts about the death of Marie Janis, and it was really as a result of this that Squadron 666 resumed its role as an active service squadron stationed out of Britain. They fought in North Africa in 1942 (described by Captain Johns in
Biggles Sweeps the Desert)
, and at the end of 1944 saw service in the Far East (a period which has been chronicled by Johns in
Biggles in the Orient).

It was not until the war in Europe drew towards its close that 666 was back in England, covered with battle honours and with Biggles finally promoted Wing-Commander. It was a splendid squadron, fighting together as ‘a band of brothers', and its members played a most distinguished part in the Normandy invasions and the subsequent attacks on Nazi Germany.

But Biggles always bore the scars of Marie's death, and for the remainder of his life she and she alone would be the woman he loved, and had lost; nobody could ever take her place.

‘Of course I'm glad it's over!' exclaimed Biggles sharply. ‘Only a homicidal maniac could possibly want the war to continue, but atom bombs, and those poor devils in Hiroshima blasted to kingdom come ... I know the Japs had asked for it, but what a way to go!'

‘Still,' said Algy, ‘they've surrendered now, and that'll save an awful lot of lives in the long run.'

‘Oh, I know, I know,' said Biggles. ‘But, good grief Algy, we can remember how it all began! It seems like only yesterday that I was chucking Mills bombs over the side of a stringbag onto the Hun cavalry on the Western Front, and now it's come to this — one bomber flying in at 20,000 feet, a single bomb that floats down on a parachute, and 30,000 simple citizens go up in a blinding flash. If that's what fighting in the air has come to, I'm glad I'm out of it.'

It was three days after the Japanese surrender, and Biggles and Algy had given themselves a day off from their duties with their Squadron, and driven across from Tangmere to have lunch at English's celebrated oyster bar in Brighton. They had called in to visit Algy's parents on the way. Both were now very old, but as spry and tiresome as ever. Lady Priscilla was in charge of the local branch of the Women's Voluntary Services, and his Lordship had several brand-new bees buzzing within his antiquated bonnet — including a plan for growing soya beans on
the home farm at Lewes, and a campaign against the use of chemical insecticides, which he insisted were endangering the wild flowers of his beloved Sussex Downs. Nothing else seemed to worry him — not even the news that his sister, Biggles' mother, was now bedridden in a nursing home in Hove — and after an hour of insecticides and soya beans, the two chums were grateful to escape to Brighton.

Perhaps it was the sight of what he called ‘those two old fogeys' — as much as the thought of Hiroshima — that had put Biggles in the dumps, and certainly the lunch itself did little to improve his humour. He still had tender memories of English's from before the war, but war had changed things drastically. Oysters were creatures of the past; instead, they were served a dried-egg omelette, followed by a fish called snoek which tasted, in Algy's memorable phrase, ‘like seaboot fried in engine oil'.

But, as Algy knew quite well, the true cause of his cousin's discontent was his feeling that an era in the air was over. Ever since the ending of the war in Europe the Squadron had been starting to run down, and Biggles knew that he would soon be facing what the other ranks called ‘Civvy Street'.

‘But you can't give up flying, just like that!' said Algy, as he bravely tackled a synthetic-cream meringue. ‘Flying's in your blood. Good grief, man, vou'd go off your head without a crate to'

Biggles looked up sharply. Age had not dealt unkindly with those boyish features, and at forty-six he still looked ten years younger — this in spite of the fatigue and tension lines around his eyes.

‘But what on earth
can
I fly, old boy? Be reasonable. It's not like after the last war when we set up Biggles and Co. together. We were so much younger then, mere boys when you come to think of it, and dear old Smyth could keep the aircraft going with fuse wire and a pair of pliers. Remember Brooklands in those days, and how easy it all was? Now you need a form to brush your teeth, and as for Brooklands, well it's finished. No, old chap, it's very kind of you to be concerned, but I have no illusions. I'm too old, Algy, and there's nothing more pathetic than an old pilot trying to keep up with the boys.'

‘Nonsense, Biggles!' Algy interjected. ‘You have what all the young whipper-snappers lack entirely — a lifetime of experience.'

‘Exactly Algy, and often it feels like a lifetime too. No, I'm retiring, dear old boy. As long as you have no objections, I think that I'll withdraw my bit of capital from the account of Biggles and Co. and find myself a little place to settle down. Dorset or Somerset perhaps. I rather like the country, and I've been thinking lately that I wouldn't mind a crack at writing. Old Bill Johns seems to do all right at the writing game — particularly with my exploits — so I honestly don't see why I shouldn't have a go myself. There's still an awful lot of good material.'

‘But Biggles, that's ridiculous,' said Algy. ‘Writing's a dog's life, and the majority of writers are as poor as church mice. If you're interested in books, for God's sake be a publisher at least.'

‘Well, I don't know, Algy. Possibly you're right. You know, I'm going to miss the Squadron terribly when we're demobilised.'

‘And how d'you think I feel, old bean?' said Algy solemnly. ‘I'm not such a moody sort of cuss as you, but my future's pretty bleak as well, unless I feel like growing soya beans. I had thought of setting up a little air charter firm but, stone the crows, the costs are astronomical.'

‘What's astronomical?' chimed in a familiar voice behind them. ‘The cost of Gordon's gin, or Biggles' thirst?'

The chums spun round, and there behind them, a dapper figures in a houndstooth check, stood Air Commodore Raymond.

‘Caught you both, eh?' he beamed. ‘Playing hookie from the Squadron? It'll never do, you know. Dreadful example for the other officers.'

‘Well, I suppose I could say the same for you, sir,' replied Biggles, brightening at once. ‘But since the war's over, Algy and I were treating ourselves to what one might term a celebration lunch.'

‘Splendid!' said Raymond breezily. ‘That makes three of us. I'm celebrating too, but not just the ending of the war. The Home Secretary's offered me a fascinating job, and to tell the truth I'm feeling just a little bucked.'

‘Congratulations, sir!' said Biggles. ‘You must tell us all about it, or is it too hush-hush for the likes of us?'

‘Good heavens, no,' said Raymond with a grin, ‘but first we must have a bottle of something suitable to celebrate.'

‘You'll have a job, sir,' replied Algy wryly. ‘Nothing in the bar except wartime gin and pale ale.'

‘Oh, I don't know,' said Raymond stroking his moustache, ‘I'm something of an habitué here, don't you know, and Fred the barman's an old friend of mine. Fred!' he cried, signalling to a burly character behind the bar. ‘Could you come here a minute, please?'

Fred lumbered up and frowned lugubriously.

‘Sir?' he groaned.

‘Fred, you must cheer up,' said Raymond. ‘Happy days are here again, and my two friends and I require a bottle of champagne. What would you recommend? Veuve Clicquot, Bollinger, Dom Perignon? Price no object.'

‘You're joking, sir, of course' replied the gloomy barman.

‘Well, possibly, but do the best you can, there's a good fellow.'

The barman muttered something and made off, but soon returned bearing, incredibly, a bottle of quite passable champagne.

‘That's a good omen, sir,' said Biggles, sipping the first champagne that he had had for several years. ‘Now what exactly is this job that all the excitement is about?'

‘Something completely new,' the Air Commodore replied. ‘At least in theory, although in fact it's not a great deal different from the sort of work that you two characters were doing for me long before the war. You see, the government are worried by the possibilities of air crime in the future. As you probably both know, there's already been a lot of smuggling by aircrews from abroad. Only a month or so ago, a transport pilot based in Germany had the nerve to bring in a complete Mercedes car by air. Just goes to show what can be done. But most of the crime's concerned with smaller stuff that's much more difficult to spot — gold bullion, diamonds, currency. It's quite an industry.'

‘One hears about these things,' said Algy drily. ‘I can't say that I approve, but on the other hand one can't exactly blame the fellows. They've been fighting while the chaps at home have all been doing very nicely thank you.'

‘That's not the point,' said Raymond sharply. ‘And what's really worrying isn't what's happening now, but what's going to happen if the trend continues. Already, the airlines are starting up their peacetime routes, and very soon there'll be a crime
explosion in the air, unless we do something positive about it.'

‘I take it that's where you come in, sir,' interjected Biggles.

Raymond nodded.

‘Right as usual, James. Yes, the Home Secretary has asked me to take charge of a small department at New Scotland Yard, dealing exclusively with airborne crime. Officially, of course, I'll be responsible to the Commissioner of Police, but in fact I'll be very much my own master. Luckily, I think I know the ropes, but I'll be building up the whole confounded shooting-match from scratch. Hell of a task, but quite exciting in its way.'

‘I'll say,' said Algy. ‘I rather envy you.'

‘Do you indeed?' replied Raymond dividing the remainder of the bottle into the empty glasses. ‘Then perhaps you can give me some advice. My biggest problem's simply personnel. Devil's own job to pick the right chaps for this sort of show, and everything depends on that. But your ordinary police detective's not much good and, frankly, the money's not sufficient to attract ambitious youngsters from the services.'

‘I shouldn't have thought the money was too big a problem,' said Biggles thoughtfully, ‘but what sort of fellows do you really want?'

‘Well,' replied Raymond with a smile, ‘without trying to flatter you too much, I'd say characters not unlike your own good selves — experienced fliers, no obvious criminal record, housetrained, reasonably healthy and able to hold their liquor like gentlemen. If there are any fellows in your Squadron you can recommend, for Lord's sake let me know.'