Captain W.E. Johns - Biggles Delivers the Goods

BIGGLES DELIVERS THE GOODS This adventure has the merit that a large pail of it is trueor at any rate, based on truth.

The man who refused to quit for the invading Japanese forces was probably not the only one.

Throughout the war, apart from the main purpose of military combat, there were employed armies of men whose task it was to provide the troops with the things they needed. Behind these again were the men who had to produce the raw materials, without which there could be no weapons, vehicles, or other equipment. One of the raw materials vital to the war effort was rubber. Our chief source of supply failed when the Japanese took Malaya. Every pound of the commodity, wherever it could be found, was precious, and had to be collected at any cost. The following story tells how Biggles found himself engaged in the precarious undertaking of snatching some of it from under the nose of the enemy. Incidentally it may be said that many pilots found themselves carrying cargoes much more strange than rubber.

AN UNEXPECTED VISITOR

WHEN BigglesSquadron Leader James Bigglesworth, D.S.O., D.F.C., to give him his proper name and rankwhen Biggles was informed by "Toddy," the Station Adjutant, that Air Commodore Raymond of Air Intelligence had been on the telephone, requesting his presence forthwith at the Air Ministry to meet an old acquaintance, he hazarded several guesses as to who it might be. None was right. In fact, as he subsequently admitted to Algy Lacey, had he Made as many guesses as an airscrew turns during a three-hour sortie, he would still have been wrong.

His arrival at Air Intelligence Headquarters was followed by a procedure so unusual as to mystify him further. Instead of being shown direct into the Air Commodore's private office, as was customary, he was taken by a messenger to an ante-room where he was requested to wait, and where, presently, Air Commodore Raymond, Deputy Director of Air Intelligence, joined him. No time was wasted in idle conversation. As soon as greetings had been exchanged, seats taken and cigarettes lighted, the Air Commodore gave Biggles the answer to the question that had exercised his mind all the way from the station to the Ministry.

"Did you ever, in your travels, meet a Chinaman named Li Chi ? " he inquired.

Biggles was so taken aback that he made no attempt to conceal his astonishment. He stared blankly at the Air Commodore for a full ten seconds before he answered. "Why

eryes... as a matter of fact I did. It was a long time ago though."

The Air Commodore nodded. "The Chinese have long memories."

"Evidently. I'd forgotten the existence of the fellow."

"He hasn't forgotten you, apparently." The Air Commodore leaned forward, eyes questioning. "What do you know about him?"

"Very little," replied Biggles cautiously. "He was educated in this country, finishing at Oxford. Speaks English as well as I dobetter, maybe. Plenty of money. He told me on the one occasion that we met that his father was a wealthy merchant in Shanghai. Li Chi was not his real name ; actually it's the name of a Chinese fruit ; but it was the name by which he was known from the China Sea to the Bay of Bengal. I won't say he was a crook because crook is an ugly word ; but he was a smuggler in a big way of business.

His special line was running opium into India. He had a nice sense of humour, understood the meaning of gratitude, and must have known the seaboards and islands of the Indian Ocean better than any man on earth.

That's all."

The Air Commodore gave Biggles a curious look. "How did you come to meet this unusual individual?"

Biggles smiled. "I don't know that I care to tell you." "Why not?"

"No man need give evidence that may subsequently be used against him."

"Don't be so infernally evasive. Just what do you mean?"

"I was once an accessoryan innocent accessory, I must say in fairness to myselfto a crime."

"What was the crime?"

"Helping a man to escape from the long arm of British law."

"A criminal !"

"No. You can't say that. He was never brought to trial, so was never convicted. Say alleged criminal, if you like."

"I imagine there wasn't much doubt about it?" said the Air Commodore dryly.

Biggles' smile broadened. You're quite rightthere wasn't."

"Tell me what happened," invited the Air Commodore. Biggles hesitated.

It's a

longish story."

"No mattertell me. I have good reasons for asking."

"Very well. Here, as brief as I can make it, is the yarn.* About 1934 or

'35speaking from memoryI was flying home front the Far East in an amphibious aircraft named the Vandal. Algy Lacey was with me, At that time we were free-lance civil pilots and had been East on a private venture. Coming up the coast of Malaya, on the run from Penang to Rangoon, we saw a raft floating on the sea, with a body on it. We went down. The body turned out to be that of a Chinaman. He wasn't dead, but he was all in. After we lad brought him round he told us that his name was Ho Sing. His junk had been sunkso he saidby the notorious pirate Li Chi. I wanted to push on to Rangoon and suggested taking him there, but he offered me five thousand Malay dollars to take him first to Penang, and then on to an island of the Mergui Archipelago, where his crew had been marooned. As you probably know, the Archipelago is strung out along the west coast of the Isthmus of Malaya and Lower Burma, so it wasn't far out of my way. I accepted his offer, put him ashore on the island, collected my fee and went on to Rangoon, where I got a nasty shock. I learned that Li Chi had been captured a few days earlier by a British sloop, the Cormorant, Captain Starkey, R.N. But Starkey couldn't hold his man. After dark Li Chi took a header into the sea and got away. He took a sporting chance with his life, for if the Vandal hadn't come along he would have died."

"You mean?"

"The man I picked up was not Ho Sing. It was Li Chi himselfno less. I swallowed his fiction story about Ho Sing like a kid sucking an orange."

"Are you sure of this ? "

"Quite sure. You see, when I left Ho Singas he called himselfhe gave me a packet, not to be opened until I reached Rangoon. When I opened it I found inside a pair of superb pink pearls, with a note thanking me for my kindness. It was signed Li Chi. Algy was therehe'll confirm it. As a matter of detail we subsequently sold the pearls in Paris for L8,000, which provided us with some badly needed pocket money. We were within our rights. The pearls were a present. The fact that the donor was a wanted man made no difference. There was no indication that the pearls had been stolen. Li Chi's legitimate business in the islands was pearling, so I was satisfied in my mind that they had come from the bed of the sea, and not from

a stolen necklace. Anyway, I ascertained that Li Chi paid the Indian government for his pearling concession. There was no humbug about that.

His smuggling activities were a sideline, and I'm inclined to think he did it as much for sport as for any other reason. He didn't really need money. Now you know what I meant when I said he had a sense or humour and appreciated gratitude. He must have laughed up his sleeve at the way the two English simpletons accepted his yarn about Ho Sing."

"What did you do about this at the time ?"

"Frankly, nothing. For one thing it was no business of mine. I was not even a serving officer, much less a policeman. And secondly, you may be sure that I did not want to advertise the fact that I'd been sold a pup.

Had the story got out I should have been the laughing stock of every aero club between London and Singapore."

"Sounds like bribery and corruption to me."