by W E Johns
They were soon aboard, and in a few minutes, with Mr Ong waving good-bye on the beach, the little country where a Communist revolution had failed was dropping away astern as the Hastings took up its course for home.
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THE CASE OF THE HAUNTED ISLAND
In considering the world-wide nature of the investigations which Biggles was called upon to undertake it might well be expected that strange stories would come his way; as, indeed, they did. But none was more remarkable than the one that went down in the Air Police records as the Haunted Atoll. It was started (as dramatic events so often are) by a rumour; a mere whisper. At the outset nothing could have been more vague. No ending could have been more conclusive, although to reach it Biggles and his crew had to cover many thousands of sea miles.
The inquiry was opened by a note from the French Colonial Office to its British counterpart, and from its tone was intended more for information than in expectation of direct action. In due course the note reached Air Commodore Raymond, head of the Air Police, for a check through his file of Missing Aircraft. He passed it on to Biggles.
It stated that for some years there had been reports in French Oceania, notably in Papeete, Tahiti, the administrative headquarters of the Islands, of a ‘mad Englishman’ being resident on Oto-Via, a remote atoll east of the Paumotu Archipelago. As far as was known this man, mad or sane, had done nothing wrong, so his alleged existence was ignored by the authorities. But now, suddenly, for no apparent reason, the small native population of the island had vanished. This had been reported by the captain of an island trading schooner who, at long intervals, had called to pick up copra and pearl shell. It was now being rumoured that the atoll was haunted, but by whom or by what could not be ascertained, since no one could be found with firsthand experience. In view of possible developments, as it appeared that a British subject was involved, it was thought that the British Government would wish to be informed.
‘In other words,’ said Biggles, when he went to discuss the matter with the Air Commodore, ‘they’re playing the old game of passing us the buck.’
‘I wouldn’t say that,’ replied the Air Commodore. ‘I’d call that the action of a friendly nation. If they suspect that a British subject is involved, possibly up to something on their property, they’re quite right to give us warning in case there should be trouble.’
‘Why don’t they get to the bottom of this rumour themselves?’
‘Why should they put themselves to a lot of trouble and expense over some fool Englishman who may or may not exist? Have we any record of an aircraft missing in that part of the world?’
‘No.’
‘Well, apparently the French Government are not going to do anything about it. No doubt there are difficulties.’
‘I can believe that,’ stated Biggles. ‘I’ve looked up the place in Findlay’s South Pacific Directory and in Admiralty Sailing Directions. Not only is the place right off the map but it’s one of those rare formations, an atoll without a passage through the reef. It’s a fair size, too, for an atoll.
Circumference about forty miles, but nowhere more than a quarter of a mile wide.’
‘That’s not as big as some. Christmas Island has a circumference of a hundred miles.’
‘Yes, but that claims to be the largest atoll in the world. But to come back to this place, Oto-Via. It can be no more than a lagoon, twelve or thirteen miles across, surrounded by a narrow, unbroken strip of coral. If there’s no opening a ship couldn’t get into the lagoon. It would have to moor on the outside, so to speak, and that could be dangerous. That, I imagine, is why the French Government haven’t done anything about it.’
‘Either that or they don’t consider the matter sufficiently important.’
‘Frankly, I don’t see anything myself to get in a flap about.’
The Air Commodore looked thoughtful. ‘I wonder could there be a castaway there? If so we can’t leave him there.’
‘But surely a castaway would make his way round the reef to the village and live with the natives until he was picked up. There would be nothing ghostly about him; certainly nothing to cause the natives to bolt. They must have seen plenty of white men.’
‘The man is reported to be mad. He may have gone off his rocker and knocked the natives about with the result that they’ve pushed off to another island.’
Biggles shrugged. ‘I suppose that is a possibility. In the tropics a white man can do daft things, particularly if he finds himself alone.’
‘Well, what do you suggest we do about it?’
Biggles reached for a cigarette. ‘I could ring up Marcel Brissac in Paris and ask him to try to dig out some further particulars—something more concrete. He knows the islands. I remember him telling me he did his overseas tour in Tahiti. When we’ve heard what he has to say we could decide whether to go on with the thing or let it drop.’
The Air Commodore nodded. ‘All right. Do that. There’s nothing urgent about it.’
He picked up his pen to resume work, leaving Biggles to return to his own office to call Paris and to tell his pilots the result of his interview with the chief.
It was three days before anything was heard from Marcel and then he turned up in person.
‘Well, what news?’ greeted Biggles.
‘Nothing to get the excitements about, old dog,’ answered the French police pilot, dropping into a chair. ‘I speak to the Colonial Office and we make a long radio message to the government office in Tahiti. But all we get back is this. For a long time there has been strange native stories about Oto-Via. First it is a mad Englishman there. Then the place is haunted by a spirit—perhaps many spirits. I don’t know. It is hard to get a Polynesian to talk of spirits.’
‘Has any white man seen this madman, or these spirits?’
‘There is only one white man who could have seen anything, for no one else goes there for years. This is Captain Dupreve, of the schooner Tarivo. He used to call for copra and pearl shell, but the place was so far and the cargo so small that often he says he will go there no more. The business was slow, too, for he must stay outside the reef while the natives bring their copra in canoes. It is he who says there is no one there now. The last time he goes no canoes come. He goes ashore, and the village it is empty. Even the Chinese man, Ah Song, who kept the little store has gone.’
‘What sort of population had the island?’
‘Perhaps a hundred. Not more.’
‘This Captain Dupreve. What sort of reputation has he?’
‘The best. The natives did not leave on his account. Had he done something bad he would have kept his mouth shut about the people going.’
Biggles nodded. ‘That’s true. Does he believe this story of a mad Englishman? He must have heard the story.’
‘But of course. No, he does not believe. He looks, but he does not see him. That was the last time he was there. If a white man is there, he says, surely he will come to him.’
‘Captain Dupreve wouldn’t see much from outside the reef, and I can’t see him walking forty miles round it, chasing a rumour. It’d be rough going if I know anything about reefs. It’s a queer affair. I feel there must have been some foundation for this rumour. Not even natives start rumours for no reason at all.’
‘And I will tell you this, mon ami,’ stated Marcel. ‘A Polynesian does not leave the island where he is born unless he is much afraid of something.’
‘He believes in ghosts?’
‘Very much. He calls them tupapaku.’
‘It takes more than a ghost to frighten a Chinaman.’
‘But if the people go he must go, for there is no trade,’ Marcel pointed out.
‘He might give us the answer if we could find him.’
‘My dear Beegles; there are more than a thousand islands in the Paumotus alone. At Tahiti we might find the captain of a trading schooner who has seen him somewhere. That is the only chance. If there is a white man on Oto-Via, now that Captain Dupreve
goes no more he will stay there till he dies. It is seven hundred miles from Tahiti. No ship passes near. Never. Ships do not like these waters, full of reefs and little islands.’
Biggles looked pensive. ‘It’s a deuce of a long way to go. Do you feel like going there?’
Marcel shrugged. ‘It would be an adventure. But it would be no use asking my government, with trouble in Africa, to spend much money looking for one lost Englishman in the Pacific.’
‘I’m not so sure that mine would jump at the idea, either. Yet I can’t help feeling that there is somebody there. What impresses me is this talk of an Englishman. It isn’t just any white man. No. He’s English. That can only mean that somebody, at some time, heard him speak.’ Biggles got up. ‘I’ll go and have a word with the Air Commodore about it. You wait here, Marcel. I shan’t be long.’
Biggles went to the Air Commodore’s office and gave him the gist of Marcel’s report.
The Air Commodore sat back with the tips of his fingers together. ‘I’m not happy about this,’ he admitted. ‘My inclination is to ignore the thing, but there’s a snag about that. Let us suppose there is an Englishman on Oto-Via. Whether he’s mad or sane, the French Government would take a poor view of it if later on it was learned that he had driven the natives, who are French subjects, out of their homes—off the island, in fact. They’d point out that they’d advised us he was there, and want to know, quite properly, why we’d done nothing about it.’
‘Why don’t they do something about it?’
‘If we start that sort of argument we shall get nowhere. Nothing will be done. In that case the thing will either fizzle out or it will explode in a row if these displaced Polynesians make a complaint. It might be better to play safe. Will you run out and get to the bottom of this if I can get authority for the trip?’
‘Of course. I’d get Marcel to come with me. Being a police official from Paris he could smooth out any difficulties that might arise with the authorities on the spot and, as I say, he knows the local gen. It will mean landing on the lagoon. There isn’t likely to be anywhere else.’
‘The Sunderland you used to go around those islands in the Indian Ocean would have the range.’
‘Just the job.’
‘All right. Give me an hour or so and I’ll let you know what has been decided at a higher level.’
‘Okay, sir.’ Biggles returned to his office, and Marcel.
They were still talking over a cup of tea two hours later when the intercom. buzzed. It was the Air Commodore.
‘I’ve spoken to the minister concerned,’ he said. ‘We’re to proceed. I’ll get you papers to see you through intermediate airports and clearance at the other end. You make your own arrangements.’
‘Very good, sir.’ Biggles hung up. ‘We’re on our way,’ he told the others. ‘Are you coming with us, Marcel?’
Marcel grinned. ‘I never refuse a pique-nique.’
‘Good, I’ll let you know when we’re ready,’ concluded Biggles.
Bertie rubbed his hands. ‘Jolly good. I’m all for a spot of the rolling deep. Coral islands, and what have you, thrown in. That’s me; every time a coconut.’
Three weeks later Bertie was having his wish. He was out over the rolling deep. Very far out.
For three hours, flying by dead reckoning, the Sunderland had been kicking the air behind it as it bored into the blue towards Oto-Via. The Paumotus, the ‘Cloud of Islands’ as the name signifies, a labyrinth of isles and reefs of every shape and size, had faded astern, and to Ginger, looking at the empty ocean, Oto-Via began to seem uncomfortably remote. Only a few fleecy white clouds climbed up over the horizon to give assurance that the world was round. It was with relief that he saw, presently, a smudge appear on the skyline ahead of them.
‘That must be it,’ said Biggles.
‘We’re dead on course,’ stated Algy, who was acting navigator.
The smudge hardened and took shape, and presently it could be seen for what it was; a vast circle of coral rock set in the eternal ocean, a wonderful example of what may be the most extraordinary phenomenon on earth, a coral atoll, even though there may be some truth in the saying that ‘when you’ve seen one you’ve seen the lot’.
As the Sunderland lost height as it glided towards the objective the details could be more plainly seen through the crystal atmosphere. The reef, a strange picture of lonely beauty, was unbroken, although in a few places, in the ceaseless war of land and water, the surf broke over it. For the most part the multi-coloured rock was bare, but spots of brilliant green showed where self-sown coconuts had secured a hold. Rarely was the coral as much as a hundred yards wide: in many places it was much less. But there were two places, some distance apart, where it widened, one bulge being perhaps a quarter of a mile across, the other less. On the larger bulge the palms grew thickly, and it was obviously here, under them, that the abandoned village was situated.
Presently it could be seen that the smaller bulge was in fact an islet, since it was separated, or almost separated, from the reef by a narrow channel. Nowhere was the land more than a few feet above sea level. The entire circumference was marked on the seaward side by a welter of pure white foam, as the ocean maintained its everlasting battering of this presumptuous invader of its realm. Outside the surf the sea was a deep, uniform blue, but within the lagoon, where the water lay tranquil, a variety of colours splotched the bottom in a wonderful pattern to show where the water deepened and shoaled.
Said Biggles, as he went on down: ‘This whole place could be swept by a big hurricane.’
‘That goes for most coral islands, certainly the Paumotus,’ answered Marcel. ‘Let’s hope it doesn’t happen while we’re here. It must have happened in the past more than once.’
‘Is that why the people have gone?’ queried Ginger.
‘No. When the big wind comes, and the surf starts to break across the reef, the Polynesian climbs a palm, cuts off the crown, and ties himself to the top of the stump. I see the village over there, on the wide part.’
‘I’ll land close to it,’ returned Biggles. ‘I don’t see a movement. There can still be no one here or the people would have run on the beach to look at us. It’s doubtful if they ever saw a plane. Well, we should soon know what all this is about.’
He went on down, engines idling. He flattened out, and to Ginger’s ears came the measured beat of the surf, filling the air with a noise like the confused roar of a great city. The keel kissed the water, two smooth waves leaping outwards from the bow, and a snow-white scar behind it. For a little way the big machine surged on, and then came quietly to rest near the strip of coral sand behind which huddled a village of palm-thatched huts. So clear was the water that the flying boat appeared to be floating on air. Biggles took the machine in a little closer and switched off. Its way carried it on until the keel scraped gently on the sand. Ginger threw the anchor overboard.
‘Well, here we are,’ said Biggles. ‘If there’s nothing here we’ve wasted our time. If there is something, man or beast, we should be able to find it. Let’s get ashore and stretch our legs.’
One by one they stepped down into the lukewarm water and waded to the dry ground. No one appeared. Not a sound came from the primitive dwellings under the palms. Only a broken canoe, some coconut shells, and a few rags of old fishing net, lay about to show that the place had been occupied in the not very distant past. They strolled up to the houses. They whistled. They hailed. There was no answer. Not that one was expected.
‘Captain Dupreve told the truth, anyway,’ said Biggles, lighting a cigarette. ‘The people have gone. Bring some grub ashore, Ginger. We might as well have something to eat while we’re thinking about this.’
‘Do we search the reef?’ asked Marcel.
‘I don’t feel inclined to walk round it; that’d be a long job,’ replied Biggles. ‘It’s getting late so I suggest we do nothing today beyond having a look round this piece of ground. If anyone’s here surely this is where he should
be. To-morrow morning we’ll taxi round the inside of the reef. If that produces nothing we’ll fly low over it. I can’t think of anything else we could do. We can at least say we’ve been here.’
Sitting on the beach overlooking the lagoon they made a meal from the canned provisions they had brought with them, for a beverage using the milk of coconuts, plenty of which lay on the ground, proof that no one had been there for some time. They then thoroughly explored that part of the atoll that had been most used by the islanders, but without finding anything to cast light on the mystery. The little store of Ah Song looked pathetic with its empty shelves. In fact, an atmosphere of melancholy seemed to hang over the whole place, as it must around homes that have been abandoned. The only sounds were the rustle of the palms in the breeze and the incessant rumble of the great Pacific combers on the windward side of the reef. The only signs of life were the gulls that drifted about like windblown paper and the occasional splash of a big fish in the lagoon.
At sundown the breeze departed, leaving the weary palms at rest. The day died as the sun sank into the horizon, and with the coming of night the lagoon became a mirror for a million stars hanging from the sombre vault of heaven like fairy lights. A little later the disc of the moon appeared to spread a path of gleaming silver across the restless ocean and paint with ink the shadows of the palms upon the beach.
‘One would think,’ said Biggles, soberly, as they sat on the still-warm sand, having divided the night into watches, ‘that if there was one place on earth beyond the reach of trouble it would be here. But no, the people go, and since they have taken their few belongings with them it looks as if they aren’t coming back. There must have been a reason for that, but what it was defeats my imagination.’
‘The only danger here,’ said Marcel, ‘would be a hurricane. But that has always existed, and one has only to five with a peril long enough to cease to be afraid. One accepts it. It was not the fear of storm that drove the people away.’