BIGGLES OF THE INTERPOL

by Captain W. E. Johns

9. A MATTER OF DEDUCTION (Pages 147 – 159)

This story was originally published in THE EXPRESS ANNUAL (1956) by Beaverbrook Newspapers Ltd and ran from pages 14 to 18 in that book. This story – unusually – had a name change for publication in BIGGLES OF THE INTERPOL. In THE EXPRESS ANNUAL it had been originally titled “BIGGLES – AND THE CRASH THAT WASN’T”. Not a particularly good title, as the story was about a crash that was.

“Biggles replaced the Air Police operations room telephone receiver, made a note on his pad, and walked over to the big wall maps of Western Europe”. “That sounded like Marcel Brissac of the Surete,” said Ginger. “It was,” confirmed Biggles. “He wants us to go over. He has a mess on his hands, and I gather he feels there’s more to it than meets the eye. Ring the secretary of the Holmwood Flying Club and tell him one of his machines, Tiger Moth GB-XKZ, is down in France, in small pieces. It didn’t catch fire so the papers are there to identify it. Get particulars. Who was in the machine when it took off and at what time did it leave the ground”. Biggles says there was one body in the front seat and according to documents in the pockets, the name was Dennis Crayford. “Algy, check the list of licence holders for the name. Bertie, you might try the Air Force List. You may find him on Reserve. If so try to get his record from the Air Ministry. Say it’s urgent. You can tell them he’s been killed in a crash. I’ll be getting the Proctor out. No need for us all to go over. I’ll take Ginger with me in case I need a second pilot”. When Biggles returns, Ginger informs him the Tiger Moth had been reported missing by the club. It had been taken up by a member called Dennis Crayford at “8.0 p.m.” the previous evening, on a solo night-flying training flight to Gatwick and back, trying for his civilian ticket. Algy reports Crayford isn’t on the register of civil pilots. Bertie says Dennis Adrian Crayford, aged twenty-nine was on Reserve. He had done three years as an air-gunner before getting his wings and then three years as a single-seater fighter pilot in service squadrons before being transferred to Reserve for medical reasons. Biggles says the pilot had no intention of going to Gatwick. It flew south as far as its fuel would take it then crash-landed not far from Provins on the main railway line south of Paris. Biggles and Ginger set off to go to their aircraft and Biggles tells Ginger that no one saw the crash, it was found by a farm labourer going to work shortly after daylight. (“It was found by a farm labourer going to work” is the illustration opposite page 156). It must have been there most of the night because if it left the ground at eight and gone straight there, it would have hit the ground at ten. “I don’t mean hit the ground literally. It ran head-on into a tree, which makes it look as if the pilot made a boob and overshot. He must have hit the tree pretty hard, too. Crayford was flying from the front seat, and the fuselage was so telescoped they had a job to get the body out”. Shortly before ten o’clock, Biggles lands at the crash site in France and meets Marcel. The body is in a blanket. The back of the skull has been crashed. Marcel says that is strange as the crash would throw the pilot forward and damage should be to the front of the head. Biggles tells Marcel that Crayford was a pilot of experience and would know it was better to let the wings take the impact and not the fuselage. Marcel says the man must have already been dead from a blow to the back of his skull. Biggles speculates that Crayford must have landed and picked up a passenger who struck him on the head and killed him, then flew until the petrol ran out and landed in the field. Then he opened the throttle on the plane to make it look like the pilot was killed in the crash. Biggles thinks the man must still be in France as his passport will have no “Entrée stamp” because he arrived illegally. That is difficult to explain when he wants to leave. Biggles thinks they should start asking questions at the nearby railway station as the man was probably following the railway tracks south when he ran out of fuel. Marcel asks the questions and they discover only three tickets were issued during the night, two to people known to the booking clerk and one to a stranger, for Nice, on the Riviera. The man was thought to be an Englishman from his accent. He was described as fair, well-built, about thirty years of age, wearing a check tweed cap, a light waterproof, and carried a leather portfolio. He arrived about half-past ten and the train he caught was not an express. It won’t arrive in Nice until four o’clock this afternoon. Biggles flies south with Ginger and Marcel and they land at the big modern airport in Nice. A taxi takes them to police headquarters, where Marcel enlists the services of two gendarmes and they go and wait at the barrier at the station for the steam train to arrive in Nice, with the two gendarmes further back. “As they stood there watching the passengers alight Ginger could imagine what a shock was in store for the man they sought should he be among them, for by this time, having put many hundreds of miles between him and his victim he would be, not without reason, congratulating himself on a clean get-away. The odd thought struck Ginger that the man who had used an aeroplane to commit a crime was now likely to be brought to justice by the same means”. A man, matching the relevant description, approaches the barrier “with the confidence of one who hasn’t a care in the world”. Marcel touches his arm and says “Excuse me, monsieur, but may I see your passport?” The man, after asking why, produces a blue and gold British passport in the name of George Bardello. Marcel asks when he entered France and is told yesterday. “How is it that your passport carries no stamp of entry?” “No one has asked me for my passport” stammers the man. Marcel asks to see what the man has in his portfolio. The man makes a desperate bid for escape and breaks through Biggles, Ginger and Marcel, only to be grabbed by the two gendarmes. When checked, the portfolio is stuffed with bundles of English one pound notes. Biggles says “We shall soon know all about it. He’ll talk when he sees he’s beaten. I know the type”.

Caught with the proceeds of a mail-bag robbery and with his fingerprints on the joy-stick of the crashed Tiger Moth, Bardello breaks down and confesses. “An ex-air gunner of the R.A.F., in which he had served under Crayford, he had on his discharge drifted into crime to become a member of a London gang of car bandits. These he had double-crossed, bolting with the proceeds of a mail-van robbery. Aware that their revenge would be swift if they caught him, his problem had been to get out of England. He had gone to Holmwood to steal an aircraft and meet Crayford, who he knew, by chance. He had asked Crayford to give him a “flip” for old times’ sake and he had been picked up from a nearby field. In the air he had struck the pilot on the head with his revolver. He declared that he had no intention of killing Crayford, just stunning him, “But this, from a man with a criminal record, cut no ice with a hard-headed jury, and in due course the man who was both thief and murderer paid the usual penalty”. (The penalty in 1957 would have been hanging, which continued in Britian up to 1964).