29 Biggles Fails to Return

by Captain W E Johns

  ‘Do what? What can we do? Now that notice has been posted, the Rue Marinière wil be watched by the police to make sure that Jeanette and her mother don’t try to get away.’

  Biggles lit a cigarette and flicked the match over the balustrade. ‘You’re working yourself into a sweat and the mascara is running out of your hair down your face,’ he observed. ‘Wipe it off—unless you’re trying to camouflage yourself as a zebra.’

  ‘Okay—okay. But what are we going to do?’

  implored Ginger.

  Biggles jerked his thumb towards the old vil age of Monaco, on the far side of the harbour. ‘You see that rock over there?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You see the castle on it?’

  ‘Of course.’

  Biggles turned and pointed to the east, where, at no great distance, the coast of Italy jutted out into the sea. ‘There’s a town there cal ed Ventimiglia,’ he said casual y. ‘About seven hundred years ago a lad named Francis Grimaldi lived there. One day he woke up feeling very much as you do now. You see, the bloke who lived at the castle here at Monaco, a skunk named Spinola, had pinched his girl and locked her in the tower. Grimaldi didn’t stand and swear—or if he did there’s no record of it. As soon as it was dark he put his knife in his belt, coiled a rope round his waist, and rowing up to the rock, he scaled the cliff. Slitting the throats of people who were foolish enough to ask him where he was going, he went along to the castle, where, in the main hal , Spinola was guzzling wine with a party of pals.

  Grimaldi locked the door and set the place on fire.

  With his rope he rescued his girl, lowered her into the boat and returned home. So they lived happily ever after. You may have noticed that the street through the Condamine is named Rue Grimaldi.

  Now, the point of my story is this. If Grimaldi could do a show like that and get away with it, in comparison our job of fetching Mrs and Miss Ducoste from the Rue Marinière looks easy—don’t you agree?’

  Ginger grinned sheepishly. ‘Sorry. Go ahead.’

  ‘Of course, we can’t just drop what we came here to do, so we shal have to try to do both,’ resumed Biggles. ‘Let’s get organized. It means breaking up the party. Bertie, I shal have to ask you to get al the gen about the aircraft. Go and see François and find out what he knows. I shal want you to tel me how long the machines are here for, how they are moored, if they are guarded, and so on. You’ve got an hour to do it in. In one hour from now be at the corner of the Bou des Moulins, where Mario dropped us just now. We’l pick you up there. If we’re delayed, wait. Got that?’

  Bertie nodded. ‘Absolutely.’

  ‘Fine. Get cracking.’

  Bertie turned away. ‘See you later.’

  ‘And now what do we do?’ asked Ginger anxiously.

  ‘For a start, instead of looking like a couple of tramps, we’ve got to get ourselves up to look like important people—Italian officers, for instance. Yes

  —that should be easy. I can see quite a lot of troops bathing in the harbour, and more are going down.

  Let’s join them.’

  Ginger stared. ‘Are you crazy?’

  ‘Possibly, but I hope not,’ answered Biggles.

  ‘We’re not actual y going to bathe, of course; pleasant though it would be, we’ve hardly time for that. But the idea gives us a perfectly good reason for taking off our clothes. See those two officers going down with towels? They’re just about our weight. They’l probably be in the water for half an hour. When they dive in the drink, we’l dive into their uniforms.’

  ‘And then?’

  ‘We’l go up to the Chez Rossi, get Mario to turn out his blood-wagon, proceed to the Rue Marinière, and arrest Madame and Mademoisel e Ducoste. We shal then return to Castil on, taking the ladies with us, col ecting Bertie on the way. Of course, it may not work out quite as smoothly as that, but that’s the general idea.’

  ‘Okay, let’s get going.’

  As they walked down the hil Ginger asked, ‘If we can get these uniforms, what happens if anyone speaks to us in Italian?’

  ‘We just act as if we didn’t hear ’em,’ answered Biggles calmly.

  Biggles calmly.

  The first part of the programme worked out so easily that Ginger found it hard not to smile. The two Italian officers joined the crowd of bathers on the quay and started to undress. Biggles and Ginger, taking up a position near them, fol owed suit. The Italians dived into the sea. Biggles and Ginger walked forward and dressed in their clothes. There were not fewer than a hundred Italians dressing and undressing at the time, and in such a crowd it was a simple matter to effect the change without comment.

  It was al done in less than five minutes. Without undue haste they turned away and walked up the hil .

  ‘Whatever happens, it should take those fel ows quite a while to work out that their togs have real y been pinched,’ remarked Biggles. ‘It wil probably be the last thing they think of. They’l suppose their kit has got mixed up with other people’s.’ Biggles returned the salute of two more Italian soldiers going down to bathe.

  Nobody spoke to them. Nobody appeared to take the slightest notice of them, which, as Biggles pointed out, since nobody knew them was a reasonable expectation. It would be sheer bad luck if they were accosted by an officer senior to themselves, although they were only lieutenants.

  They reached the Chez Rossi without trouble, and found Mario in the kitchen, washing dishes. He nearly dropped one when Biggles and Ginger walked in through the side door.

  ‘It’s al right, Mario, don’t get excited,’ said Biggles quietly. ‘Madame Ducoste and her daughter are to be arrested as hostages if Henri doesn’t give himself up. We’ve got to get them away before that can happen. The only place we can take them is Castil on, and the only way we can get them there is in your ambulance. Get it out. Then al you have to do is drive us straight to the Rue Marinière—that is, if you want to get your princess out of the country.’

  ‘ Si—si, signor.’ Mario nearly fel over himself in his haste to get into his uniform tunic, which he had only just taken off. It was hanging behind the door. From time to time he muttered and shrugged his shoulders as though he found it hard to keep pace with events.

  Biggles and Ginger went with him to the garage and sat with him on the front seat. Without speaking, but with a slightly dazed expression on his face, he drove to the Rue Marinière. Two soldiers were standing at the end of the street, smoking. They straightened themselves and saluted the officers as the ambulance went past without stopping. A Monégasque policeman was sitting in a chair at the door of number six. He stood up.

  ‘Tel him,’ said Biggles to Mario, ‘that we have orders to arrest the occupants of this house.’

  The gendarme did not question this. Possibly he expected it. After al , the Italians had taken charge of the principality. In fact, he looked relieved that responsibility was being taken off his shoulders.

  Ginger knocked at the door. It was opened by Madame Ducoste. Ginger went in, fol owed by Biggles. As soon as they were inside he closed the door. Madame Ducoste clutched at her throat and uttered a little cry when, looking at Ginger’s face, she suddenly recognized him.

  ‘Where is Jeanette?’ asked Ginger tersely.

  ‘She is upstairs.’

  ‘Fetch her, please. Time is short.’

  Madame ran up the stairs and returned with Jeanette, looking not a little startled. Her eyes were red as though with weeping.

  ‘Now listen careful y, madame,’ went on Ginger.

  ‘Al is wel . Don’t be alarmed.’

  ‘But we are in great trouble, monsieur,’ broke in madame.

  ‘Yes, we know al about it—that’s why we are here.

  Henri is safe. We have him with us in the mountains.’

  ‘Thank God.’

  ‘He is hurt, but not seriously. If he gives himself up he wil be shot. If he does not give himself up, you wil be shot. There is only one way of escape. Come with us and we wil take
you to him. Afterwards we shal al go to England. But this you must understand. If you decide to come with us you must be prepared to abandon everything. We have no time for baggage.

  Now, madame, the choice is yours. Shal Henri give himself up? Wil you submit to arrest, or wil you throw in your lot with us—and Henri?’

  Jeanette’s eyes were on her mother’s face. ‘Let us go,’ she breathed. ‘It is the only way.’

  ‘We wil go with you, monsieur,’ decided madame. ‘I must be with my boy. If we are to die, then we wil die together.’

  ‘Bravely spoken, madame,’ put in Biggles. ‘That is what we hoped you would say. Are you ready?’

  ‘We are in your hands, under God, monsieur.’

  ‘We are in your hands, under God, monsieur.’

  Ginger opened the door. To his alarm a little crowd had col ected, but its sympathy, as was to be expected, was with the two women—their own folk.

  ‘Say nothing, madame. Look as though you are resigned to being arrested,’ said Biggles quietly as he opened the rear of the ambulance and helped them in.

  There was some hissing and hooting. A stone was thrown.

  Ginger got in with the two prisoners. Biggles slammed the door and went round to the front, to Mario, who sat like a graven image on his seat.

  ‘Drive on, Mario,’ ordered Biggles as he got in.

  To a chorus of shouts and curses the car went down the narrow street with Mario sounding his horn to clear a path through the swiftly growing crowd before the anger of which the two Italian soldiers were beating a hasty retreat. For a moment or two it looked as though there was going to be a riot, which was something Biggles had not foreseen, and which was the last thing he wanted. However, the car got clear of the street and Mario sped on down the long ramp that leads to the Condamine. Straight through the Boulevard Albert behind the harbour he drove, and up the incline to Monte Carlo.

  ‘Stop at the place where you dropped us this morning,’ ordered Biggles. ‘We have someone to pick up.’

  A few seconds later the corner came into sight.

  Bertie was waiting, making music to an admiring gathering of urchins.

  ‘Get in the back,’ cal ed Biggles.

  Without a word Bertie got in. The door slammed.

  The car went on.

  After that, on the whole, progress was good, although there was one nasty moment in a traffic hold-up, when Biggles saw a Monégasque gendarme regarding the vehicle curiously. Mario noticed it, too. Instead of waiting, he turned out of the queue and took a turning to the right, to the lower road, at the end of which a left turn brought him back to the main thoroughfare. There was stil a certain amount of traffic coming from Italy, but it had thinned out considerably and Mario was able to maintain a good speed.

  On reaching Mentone there was another hold-up at the Sospel turning. The road, a sentry insisted, was closed. This came as no surprise. But as there was no other road within miles of Castil on, Mario had to take a chance. He did it wel .

  ‘Fool!’ he shouted. ‘Can’t you see that this is an ambulance? There has been trouble. We have orders to fetch a wounded man.’

  The sentry apologized and waved them on.

  On the long pul up the mountain road Biggles had a serious talk with Mario. He realized that the restaurant owner’s only real interest in the affair was his attachment to the princess and his secret society. He probably hated fascism, anyway, on the principle that most Sicilians hate any form of government which must inevitably exercise restraint

  —as against complete freedom of action. Hence the numerous secret societies which exist on the island.

  Biggles apologized for having got Mario involved in his affairs, pointing out frankly that he feared this latest escapade would make it difficult for him to return to Monaco.

  Mario stated with equal frankness that he was quite sure of it. It would be known that his ambulance had been used for the rescue. The police in Monaco, to say nothing of half the people, had seen him. He had also been observed by the gendarme at the traffic hold-up.

  ‘If you go back to Monaco you wil be arrested,’

  predicted Biggles.

  Mario answered—somewhat surprisingly, Biggles thought—that he had no intention of going back to Monaco. It was not outside the bounds of possibility that the secret police would discover that he had kil ed Zabani. He had always been suspected of being a Camorrista, and the paper on the dagger would tel them that the crime was an act of vengeance by the Camorra. In any case, he said, the little business he had spent years working up had been ruined by the war. ‘How,’ he asked plaintively, taking his hands off the wheel to lend expression to his words, ‘How can a man run a restaurant when there is nothing to cook?’

  Biggles admitted that as a problem the question did present difficulties.

  ‘What does it matter?’ rejoined Mario, with true Latin philosophy. ‘I would rather serve the princess. If she wil have me, I wil stay with her and go where she goes. It may be that there wil be some more traitors to kil ,’ he added hopeful y.

  traitors to kil ,’ he added hopeful y.

  This decision simplified Biggles’ immediate problem. ‘We hope the princess wil go to England with us,’ he announced. ‘Would you fol ow her there?’

  Mario drew a deep breath. ‘Yes, I would fol ow her even to England. For her I wil suffer the rain and the fog,’ he announced in a tone of voice which left Biggles in no doubt as to his opinion of the English climate.

  ‘To-night we shal try to escape in an aeroplane,’

  continued Biggles. ‘I have a plan. If we decide on it, wil you drive the party down to the sea?’

  ‘Why should I mind? There is enough petrol. There is even a spare can, not yet opened. I am told that if I open it I shal be sent to prison; but as I shal be shot now if they catch me, how can they send me to prison for opening the petrol?’

  ‘How, indeed?’ murmured Biggles. ‘It was clever of you to think of that.’

  ‘Thank you, signor,’ answered Mario simply.

  ‘The question is, what shal we do with the ambulance when we get to Castil on?’

  ‘What shal we do with it?’

  ‘That’s what I’m asking you. We can’t leave it standing on the road. Could we get up the track to the vil age?’

  ‘Who knows?’

  ‘I thought perhaps you might,’ replied Biggles softly. There were times when he found Mario’s Latin habit of answering a question with a question rather trying. ‘Wel , see what you can do about it. We’ve got to get it off the road,’ he concluded.

  Arriving at the end nearest to Castil on, Mario got the vehicle off the road by the simple expedient of charging the hil side, with a fine disregard for tyres, springs and passengers. ‘The ambulance doesn’t belong to me,’ he explained in reply to a questioning look from Biggles. With the engine racing in bottom gear the car crashed and banged its way over the rocks, and final y bounced into the vil age street.

  ‘No one wil see it here unless a person comes to the vil age,’ announced Mario carelessly. ‘If a person comes – tch,’ he touched his stiletto.

  Biggles dismounted, and going to the rear of the vehicle, found Bertie and Ginger, with their charges, getting out.

  ‘For the moment you are safe, madame,’ he said with a smile of confidence. ‘Come with me and I wil take you to Henri.’

  The others fol owed.

  Chapter 17

  Plan For Escape

  The reunion of Henri and his family, whom he had not seen for three years, gave Ginger an idea of the mental anguish hundreds of thousands of people, parted by the war and unable to get in touch with each other, were suffering. It made any risks they had taken more than worth while. After watching them for a minute, Biggles beckoned to the others to fol ow him up to the kitchen, where, without preamble, he asked Bertie to report the result of his reconnaissance at the harbour.

  ‘First I had a talk with François,’ began Bertie.

  ‘From the w
indow of his house I could see everything that was going on, so the whole show was real y a slice of pie. François, by the way, is al against these beastly fascists who have made a mucker of jol y old Monaco. He’l do anything to annoy them, and as he has the boat he may be useful. It’s my old racer, you know. I’ve told him he can have it—it’l be out of date for racing by the time the war is over.’

  ‘Does the engine stil function?’ put in Biggles.

  ‘Wel , old boy, it would if it had any petrol. François is a first-class mechanic, which is why I employed him in the old days, and as he couldn’t bear to see the engine go to bits he has kept it on the top line—if you see what I mean? Not being able to use the motor, he’s rigged up a sail for waffling up and down the coast looking after his lobster pots, which is about as much fishing as he does. By the way, he has a licence from the authorities to go fishing, so everyone is accustomed to see him pottering in and out of the harbour. We talked over the possibility of sailing to Spain, but we decided it was too far—

  eight hundred miles or thereabouts. Bluebird is purely a racer, with no keel and a very shal ow draft; without power she couldn’t live five minutes in a heavy sea. The Gulf of Lyons can be the very devil in a westerly gale, should we be caught out. Moreover, she was designed as a two-seater, but François has taken off most of the faring, so she would carry eight or nine people for a short distance in a calm sea.’

  ‘That’s useful to know,’ murmured Biggles. ‘What about the aircraft?’

  ‘There are twelve Savoias in the harbour, moored to buoys in three lines of four—as you probably saw for yourself?’ continued Bertie. ‘The leading machine of the outside line carries a pennant, so presumably it’s the C.O.’s* kite. The officers are living in the Bristol hotel, just opposite, and the crews are parked in the Beau Rivage, at the bottom of the hil . As far as I could make out there are no sentries except a headquarter guard in the custom-house; but if I know anything about the Ities they probably spend most of their time playing cards. I don’t suppose it would occur to them that someone might borrow one of the machines. There are a fair number of troops round the harbour, bathing and what not. I gather from François that it goes on half the night. I’ve saved the most important spot of news stil last. I didn’t hear this myself, but an Italian told François that the squadron leaves to-morrow for a secret destination, which I wasn’t able to discover.’