BIGGLES INVESTIGATES

and other stories of the Air Police

by Captain W. E. Johns

5. BIGGLES CRACKS A NUT (Pages 88 – 104)

“Biggles broke off what he was saying to Ginger when the door of Air Police Headquarters opened and their Chief, Air Commodore Raymond, walked in. He carried a large envelope. “Sit still,” he said. “I was passing your room after having a word with Gaskin of “C” Department, so I thought I’d look in instead of calling you to my office. The Yard has been given a toughish nut to crack, and as there may be an aviation angle Gaskin thinks your crackers may do the job better than his”. Raymond asks Biggles if he remembers an unidentified body being found in peculiar circumstances, in Yorkshire, but he doesn’t. Raymond says a month ago, near the little town of Mapleton in the West Riding (a fictional town, there is a Mapleton in Derbyshire but not West Riding), a gardener employed by Colonel Thurburn found the body of a young man under a tree. The pathologist said it must have been there at least a month and it is still unidentified. It has since been buried. From injuries to the body and damage to the tree the Divisional Police Inspector is convinced it fell out of the sky. “All he had on was an open shirt, a pullover, trousers, socks and shoes, all of foreign manufacture. No hat, no jacket. Hardly the way you’d expect a man to be dressed for flying”. There wasn’t a single clue that might had led to identification. The R A F has no one missing and no civil air line operator has lost a passenger. Biggles doesn’t think it is suicide. “At all events, I can’t see a man bothering to half undress if he intended to destroy himself”. “It sounds to me more like murder” says Raymond. Biggles questions that. “Why not drop it where no one was ever likely to find it – in the sea, for instance, with a weight to take it to the bottom”. Biggles asks “What do you want me to do, sir? By this time any scent there may have been will be stone-cold. The aircraft from which the man fell, if in fact he did fall, could be anywhere in the world”. The Air Commodore smiled lugubriously. “We’re expected to find out the name of this man, how the body came to be where it was discovered and who was responsible”. “I warned you it would be a tough nut to crack”. “Unless there’s a flaw in the shell it looks as if I shall need a sledge-hammer,” returned Biggles cynically. He asks for photos of the corpse and is given them. They show “the face of a man in the early twenties, good-looking in a hard sort of way. Even in death it had a touch of ‘class’ about it”. Biggles is informed there is no airfield for miles around the site, so he and Ginger will drive up. Biggles says “You could save me time by letting the inspector know we’re on our way, and ask him to book two rooms for us at a reasonable hotel”. “I’ll do that,” promised the Air Commodore, and left the room. After the door had closed behind him Ginger remarked: “This looks like being a complete waste of time”. Biggles drew gently on his cigarette. “I wouldn’t say that. All we have to do is sort out the things that don’t make sense, put them together, and there we should find the kernel of the nut”.

At ten o’clock the following morning Biggles was introducing himself to Divisional Inspector Cole at Mapleton police station. The inspector tells him that the gardener of the Grange who found the body was called Larwood. Colonel Thurburn and his wife live at the Grange. They are both getting on for seventy. When Larwood told the Colonel what he had found, the Colonel sent him straight to the inspector, who left word for a doctor and ambulance to follow and went to straight there. The inspector found the body lying spreadeagled on the ground face down. It was badly smashed up. Biggles and Ginger drive to see Larwood and hear his account. He says “The first thing I see was a face staring up at me out o’ the bracken” but he didn’t examine or touch the body. He says he told the Colonel and then went to fetch the police right away on his bike. He didn’t see or tell anyone else until he saw Sergeant Lane at the police station. When he got back, a good hour later, the Colonel had lit a bonfire and was raking up the dead leaves. “He sometimes lends a hand in the garden when he’s nothing else to do” says the gardener. Biggles and Ginger then go to see the Colonel. Biggles asks him where he was when Larwood reported finding the body. The Colonel says he was in the study writing urgent letters. He then stood in the garden until the police arrived, passing the time by doing some work in the garden. He says he didn’t go near the body. Biggles and Ginger leave and go to the pub for some lunch. Later that evening, at half past nine, Biggles and Ginger walk up to the Grange as Biggles wants to look at something in the garden. He examines the heap of bonfire ash. In the ash, Biggles finds a metal ring about three inches in diameter. “What the deuce is it?” asked Ginger. “You should know,” answers Biggles, adding “Let’s get home. I need a wash”.

Ten o’clock the next morning found them at the police station with inspector Cole. “Solved the problem yet?” asks the Inspector. His expression changed when Biggles answered evenly: “I think so. I shall be disappointed if I haven’t found someone who can tell us the name of the dead man. I’m now going to ask him. I thought you might care to come along”. Biggles says he is going to the Grange. “I’m pretty sure the gallant Colonel can tell us all we want to know”. At the Grange, Biggles tells the Colonel, “I’m sorry to trouble you again, but there’s one more question I’d like to ask”. He takes out the photo of the dead man and says “It may save trouble all round if you’ll tell us his name”. “What makes you think I might know?” asks the Colonel. “You haven’t answered my question,” reminded Biggles softly. There was no answer. “Why did you lie to the police?” asks Biggles. Biggles tells the Colonel that after Larwood reported the body in the spinney of trees, he went to look at it. “You must have recognised the man or you wouldn’t have taken the trouble to remove everything which might have led to identification. You also took away the parachute which, by failing to open, was responsible for the man’s death”. Biggles says the Colonel poured paraffin over the items and burned them in the garden, but the rip cord ring, being metal, would not burn and Biggles found it in the ash last night. The Colonel looks stricken and asks to sit down. He says the dead man was his son. The Colonel explains he was a bad boy, expelled from school and ran away from home. In South Africa he murdered a man and fled to South America and the Europe. The Colonel gave his son all he could afford. In Paris, the son wrote demanding a large sum and threatening to “come here and fetch it”. Apparently, he did that. The Colonel said he acted as he did to save his wife from any further distress and, to a lesser degree, because he hoped to avoid a scandal. The Colonel says his son must have paid someone to fly over and then parachuted out, but the parachute failed to open. Back at the police station, the inspector asks how Biggles hit on the truth. Biggles said the body was found facing up by Larwood, but facing down by the inspector. Someone must have moved it and that could only have been the Colonel. The unanswered question was “why”? Another pointer was the Colonel was writing urgent letters at the time, yet he didn’t return to finish them. Instead, he was in the garden stoking a bonfire. “It seemed to me he must have been in a hurry to burn something”. Biggles had not thought of a parachute as none was found. Larwood hadn’t seen it, as the body was in bracken and it was underneath. The Colonel took it off to get at his son’s jacket to see what was in the pockets. He couldn’t leave it there as it would have told the police the body had been interfered with, so he took it home with the jacket and burnt it. Biggles tells the inspector “What the old man did was understandable. Whether or not it was pardonable I leave to you. My own feeling is he has suffered enough without being taken to Court. The inspector nodded. “I think you’re right. The only case against him is withholding information from the police”. Biggles held out a hand. “Well, it’s all yours. We’ll be getting back to London”.