Free Biggles by John Pearson

Aisne was totally destroyed, Biggles feared that this would be the last he would ever see of the world of sabotage and Air Intelligence.
    During the weeks that followed, Biggles’ relations with the remainder of the Squadron — particularly with Major Paynter — deteriorated rapidly, although Lieutenant Way did his best to intercede for him.
    â€˜The boy’s all right,’ he’d say to Paynter. ‘He’s just a bit too eager and reckless, but the fact remains that he’s the best damned flier we’ve got.’
    But Paynter now referred to him quite openly as ‘the schoolboy wonder’, and pointedly refused to recommend him for the M.C. which Biggles had obviously earned. ‘He just thinks this war is a confounded game,’ Paynter would grumble. ‘He needs to be taught a lesson.’ Others would say he was a lunatic, a gloryseeker, an adventurer, and though Way attempted to get through to Biggles — ‘Calm down,’ he’d say, ‘just take it easy, and for God’s sake be a little tactful with the others,’ — Biggles refused to listen. The truth was that sensitivity and tact were not in his vocabulary.
    In his attempt to ‘teach the boy a lesson’, Paynter now put him on the most routine of tasks — ‘art obs’ — artillery observation, shuttling back and forth across the Lines and radioing targets for the guns. It was hazardous — the F.E.2s were sitting ducks for the German
Jagdstaffeln
in the neighbourhood — and it was also deadly boring, particularly for anyone of Biggles’ temperament. After three weeks of this he lost his temper. It had been a particularly frustrating day, with Biggles giving ‘fixes’ on a German battery, which the English Artillery continually missed. Any other pilot would have shrugged his shoulders, cursed the gunners and retired to the Mess for a Scotch and soda. But not Biggles.
    No sooner had he landed back at Base, than he shouted at Lieutenant Way, ‘I’m sick to death of this. We’re going to deal with that battery ourselves.’
    Way urged caution, which was understandable as he had to sit in the front cockpit whatever the escapade Biggles embarked on, but Biggles was emphatic.
    â€˜Refuel the old bus, and stick a pair of 112-pounder bombs on the racks. And make it snappy!’ shouted Biggles to the Flight Sergeant. While this was going on, he got on the Mess telephone to the Artillery. ‘I’m sick and tired of giving you ham-fisted idiots instructions all afternoon and then watching you bungle them,’ he shouted. ‘I’m going to deal with that blasted battery myself.’
    (It was only later that he realised he was talking to the Colonel — not that it would have made a scrap of difference in the state he was in.)
    It was a crazy venture from the start, for by this time the enemy was thoroughly alerted, and had ringed the battery with antiaircraft guns and filled the sky with fighters. But nothing would stop Biggles now. Way saw his set, white face, and decided not to argue — even though the sky seemed to be one vast inferno.
    Biggles attempted no finesse this time, but flew straight at his target, ignoring everything — the shrapnel that came zinging through the wings, the rifle fire directed from below, the threat of German Albatrosses in the sky above. After three weeks of ‘art obs’ he knew this section of the Front like his own back yard, and long before he reached the German battery he had put the F.E.2 into a straight dive from 6,000 feet.
    It was a moment of supreme excitement, the sort of moment Biggles had begun to live for, with the wind tearing past his goggles and screaming in the guy-wires of the plane. The antiaircraft fire was all around them, and Way was returning fire with his Lewis gun, scattering the German gunners from the gun-pits. Once again, time stood still and every detail etched