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Biggles winced as the Professor announced that he was recently arrived in La Paz and the talk of the town was of his exploits, but it seemed that the Professor was referring to his rescue of the President’s daughter from the bandits holding her to ransom rather than to his newer experiences with the witchdoctor so he relaxed and listened to what the Professor had to say.The Professor, he soon realised, was exactly the same type of man as his uncle: independently wealthy, obsessive in following his interests and almost completely indifferent to his personal comfort. Whereas his uncle was interested in ancient civilisations, Professor Smilee was interested in orchids. Biggles and Algy knew very little about the Victorian passion for collecting Orchids, but they knew that people did: boys at their schools and fellow officers had spoken of aged and eccentric relatives who spent a fortune on these strange plants. Rarely, they found themselves in a social situation where inspection of a host’s collection was unavoidable. More than one of these collectors had lost prized plants to unexpected frosts or hot house heating failures. Biggles and Algy’s general consensus was that someone must be several sandwiches short of a picnic to indulge in such a hobby. But Biggles, looking for a reason to leave La Paz for a while, did not inform Professor Smilee of his views on the sanity of orchid collectors but listened to his proposition.It was very straight forward. The Professor was in possession of a sketch map and diary drawn by a fellow orchid hunter whose remains had been found in a canoe drifting down the Beni river. The map and diary indicated that a fabulous blue orchid, the dried remains of one lying at the orchid hunter’s feet, was to be found near a lake at the head of a tributary of the Beni river. Biggles borrowed the Professor’s map, calculated the distance as one that was comfortably within the range of the amphibian and agreed to the job.It took very little time to prepare for the expedition, Biggles having now gained reasonable experience of the conditions found in the rainforests of South America, and four days later saw their arrival at the unnamed lake.
The lake and its immediate environs were unpleasant and unnerving. Nothing lived: not the trees, not the vegetation, not any animals. There was not even any insect life. Algy was eager to turn straight around and return but Biggles was made of sterner stuff and insisted upon their staying. A stray breeze brought them a scent, a splendidly heavy, over-whelming perfume that never-the -less added to the bilious atmosphere. Leaving Smyth in charge of the plane, they walked a short distance through the dead forest, a walk of only five minutes, feeling sicker and sicker from the stench of rotting vegetation and the transient whiffs of the glorious, stomach-churning fragrance. Algy had paused to wipe his face and take a few breaths through his handkerchief and Biggles to light a cigarette to try to quell his nausea when the Professor found the orchids. His shout brought Biggles at a run. Within a vividly, poisonously green band, were flowers, flowers bigger than his two hands held together. Beautiful, bright, radiant blue flowers ablaze in the grey landscape. Flowers with spots like devil’s eyes and a red, hungry tongue. They grew on and over the remains of everything, heaping themselves hungrily over the lifeless trees, mounding themselves, cascading in avid, azure avalanches. Biggles watched the Professor pick a flower and fling it away with an expression of disgust. It twisted and turned on the ground like a salted slug. Biggles watched it writhe, watched it with an intense visceral abhorrence, his stomach matching its gyrations. A tsunami of fragrance crashed over him and he realised.
“Come on Smilee!” he cried. “It’s poison – run for it!”Professor Smilee turned, tripped and fell, immersing himself in the bulbs and flowers. Regaining his feet and obviously disorientated, he reeled further into the virulent emerald vegetation. Helpless, Biggles tried, and failed, to shout after him, to tell him to turn around. His own vision was tunnelling, the flowers were spinning, their devilish eyes were looking and laughing at him. He floundered back towards the lake, reaching for a tree to lean on to keep himself upright. The tree collapsed into dust around his grasping hand, choking him as he tried to hang onto the last vestiges of consciousness. It took a little while for Biggles to come around and be aware of his circumstances. The shock of seeing Algy and thinking him dead roused him to efforts, thankfully quickly successful, of resuscitation and soon the aircraft was moored safely, coffee made and they had all vomited copiously. Algy had dragged Biggles close enough to the lake for Smyth to see them, before collapsing. Smyth had got Biggles and Algy on board and cut the mooring rope before passing out himself. They had drifted an unknown distance whilst unconscious, but that was incidental. The effort had to be made to find the Professor. He couldn’t be abandoned.Unfortunately, this was easier said than done. It was soon apparent that they had left the lake and drifted down a tributary, of which there were many, onto the Beni. Taxiing upstream failed to give them any clues as to their location with regard to the lake, and reluctantly Biggles ordered that they were to moor for the night as darkness was falling and they couldn’t go on using petrol at their current rate. In the morning, Biggles checked the straight stretch of river they were on for obstacles and took off. The lake was easily spotted from the air, and so was the raging inferno started by Biggles’s cigarette. It had spread for miles although in places it had already burnt itself out on contact with water and the living forest. There was no way a body, and Biggles was sure in his mind that the Professor would have died quickly from the orchids’ poison, would be recognisable as one after such a fire even if he could have gone directly to where the Professor’s remains were to collect them. Sadly, he turned the plane back to La Paz. The flight back was unpleasant. Although sure that he couldn’t have done anything other than what he did, Biggles was saddened by the death of the Professor. He hoped that none of the orchids survived the fire. Some things, no matter how beautiful, were better off not existing. The worst of the nausea and sickness had passed, purged from his body, but Biggles still felt a long way from his normal self. His stomach was turning irregular flip flops, and from the slightly green tinge he could see in Algy’s face, sat silently in the seat beside him, he suspected that he felt the same. He felt sluggish and unwell but wasn’t particularly concerned. It was only to be expected that his body wouldn’t throw off the after-effects of the poisoning quickly: it would be time to worry if he was feeling no better in a few days time. At the aerodrome, he went through the formalities of landing then onto reporting the death of the Professor in the correct quarters. Biggles wished that he’d been able to leave it longer, until he was more recovered, before doing so, for he found it taxing, but he was never one to put off unpleasantness and he knew he would rest the better for having it off his mind. Biggles didn’t realise this at the time, but his obvious suffering did him no harm at all in the eyes of the authorities, adding verisimilitude to his tale. Returning to the Hotel Guibert, Biggles found Algy freshly bathed and face down on his bed, his towel tucked around his waist. His clothes were hung to air. A trace of the orchids’ perfume hung in the warm room. It smelt unsettling but no longer sickening.Biggles lost no time in stripping off his own clothes and pulling on his dressing gown, so he, too, could avail himself of the bathing facilities.‘Don’t use any soap,’ Algy advised him, his voice muffled by the pillow. ‘It’s brought me out in a rash.’ He held up an arm for Biggles’s inspection, and Biggles saw that Algy did, indeed, have a small, bright pink, pinprick rash from his hand to his shoulder. ‘There must have been something in that foul place that got inside my clothes,’ Algy surmised, still muffled. ‘Something in all the dust kicked up from those dead trees.’‘Very likely,’ Biggles agreed. ‘Try putting some oil on it. That might soothe the inflammation.‘Mindful of Algy’s warning, Biggles rinsed and scrubbed himself as thoroughly as he could in his bath without using soap, then, wiping it out with his bath sponge, he ran another and washed himself properly. He felt filthy to his very soul and needed the clean feeling which comes from liberally soaping every inch of the body, every crevice and fold of skin, every hair. Mentally, he felt clearer after this activity, but his insides still felt unstable and his skin was hot and flushed. He thought he might use some of the oil to soothe it. He didn’t feel sore so much as overly sensitive and uncomfortable. With a sudden flash of insight, he wondered if one of the powdered herbs the yatiri had used a few days previously in the herbal love bomb had been a relative of the devilish blue orchids. Algy was still lying face down on his bed when Biggles returned from his ablutions. Biggles thought that he wouldn’t enquire why. If his idea was correct, then he didn’t want it confirming. ‘I think the dust must have had irritating fibres in it,’ he remarked, slipping off his dressing gown and reaching for the oil on the table beside Algy’s bed. ‘I feel rather raw.’Algy turned his head on his pillow to see Biggles better. His pupils were very wide and his eyes slightly unfocused.‘Did you hit your head on something yesterday?’ Biggles asked, suddenly concerned that Algy might be nursing an unsuspected concussion.‘Not that I’ve noticed,’ Algy answered. He ran his hand over his head. ‘No, there don’t seem to be any sore spots. I’m still feeling a bit funny from that poisonous perfume.’Biggles nodded in agreement. ‘We need fresh air,’ he decided. ‘Up you get and we’ll have coffee on the terrace. That should help.’ The coffee did help to settle their stomachs a little further. The presence of a pair of beautiful Spanish women at a nearby table upset other parts of Biggles’s system, though. He was acutely aware of how his nether regions were reacting to their closeness. This was unexpected and very embarrassing. He cast around for a distraction.‘Do you think mules are more intelligent than donkeys?’ he asked.‘What sort of a question is that?’ Algy said in surprise, squinting as he tried to focus on Biggles. ‘Are you thinking of trading in your wings for hooves?’Biggles shifted his chair around the table a little way. Maybe if the women weren’t quite so visible it would be easier. Algy moved to give Biggles room. This brought the women into his line of sight.‘What did you ask?’ He could focus just fine at a distance, Biggles noticed.Biggles deduced that Algy was also finding the women’s presence a distraction. Not surprising really. Algy was easily distracted by the fairer sex, he mused. Maybe he was feeling now as Algy felt all the time? That would explain quite a lot, Biggles thought.‘It doesn’t matter.’ Biggles couldn’t even remember what his question had been. He wished he hadn’t moved. It was even more distracting to wonder what the women were doing when he couldn’t see them. He heard the chink of a coffee cup being replaced on a saucer and thought about how it had touched a pair of those red lips, parted ready....Biggles flushed. He wanted to return to his room but didn’t dare stand up. Surely, everyone in the vicinity would be aware of his state if he did so. He could see Algy watching the women greedily. He kicked him on the ankle. ‘Don’t stare,’ he hissed. ‘I’m in no condition to cope if they come over here.’‘Neither am I,’ Algy agreed, turning his attention back to his coffee cup.
He attracted the notice of a waiter and requested another, loading it with sugar when it arrived. It didn’t help with what he was now feeling, but at least he could blame his shakes on the caffeine. The waiter, a slender, lithe young man, delivered Algy’s coffee then bent to pick up a piece of paper blowing untidily along the terrace, affording Biggles and Algy an excellent view of material stretched tightly across a slim, pert bottom. They swallowed hard in unison then spent a moment not meeting each other’s gaze. Chairs were moved at the adjacent table. Biggles listened to the sounds of the women preparing for their departure. Those long, slim legs were being straightened. Those beautifully manicured hands were reaching for their belongings, thin, smooth fingers tightening around, pulling close, slipping into fragranced pockets and purses. Biggles dug his fingernails into the palms of his hands to distract himself from what he was imagining those hands could be touching, what words those lips could be whispering. He looked around for another diversion.‘I think there is more snow on Mount Illimani today,’ he suggested to Algy. ‘It looks exactly the same to me,’ Algy answered, looking down at his coffee cup rather than at the mountain. Biggles realised that he was actually peering up through his lashes, watching the departure of the Spanish women from the nearby table. The women swayed gracefully from the terrace. Biggles enjoyed watching them move. A flash came into his mind of how they would look walking towards him, naked, with their soft, white skin exposed to his appreciative gaze, their smooth, shiny black hair released from tight confine on the tops of their heads and tumbling down their backs. He flushed a little more. What was he doing having thoughts like these? They disturbed him in more ways than one. Biggles turned his gaze to the short, sweaty waiter with the comic bandit moustache to encourage his thoughts to follow a more proper direction, and apart from a few stray intrusive imaginings as to how a blow job would feel when a moustache of that magnificence was involved, Biggles managed to calm down a little. He checked his watch. Half an hour and the dining room would open. ‘Fancy an early dinner?’ he asked. ‘I’d like to get back to my room sharpish and get an early night. I fancy spending the evening with my book. I don’t want to mess about going up and coming down again later.’Algy nodded. ‘I suppose I should eat something, though god knows what it might do to me. I’ll have some tonic water. That might settle things.’Biggles thought that a good idea and ordered two tonics as aperitifs, making sure he caught the eye of the short waiter with the moustache. He wasn’t sure he trusted himself to make an appropriate reply if the young, handsome one came over with his usual question of ‘What can I do for you, sir?’ The tonic was refreshing but, whilst it further settled Biggles’s stomach, it did nothing for his ability to turn off the sexual attraction he was increasingly feeling towards the younger, better looking part of creation that was passing by. There were far more comely young women and men than he normally saw perambulating past his position on the terrace. He wondered if the chemicals in his system were highlighting the attractiveness of those he saw. He rather thought that they were. He was used to taking a cerebral interest in the beauty of ladies, and whilst he noticed if a man was attractive or not, he didn’t usually have the inclination to make things physical with them. Sex was fairly inextricably mixed in his mind with procreation and wedlock and keeping urges under control. Biggles decided that he might have found another of the ingredients in the yatiri's’s powder. It was not a discovery that he was pleased about. He wanted to get away from that memory, not re-live it.Biggles and Algy were first into the dining room. Without any consultation being necessary, they had both spotted the moment when the terrace was momentarily deserted and used it to slip inside. Now they sat with their legs tucked right under the table and with napkins on their laps. Biggles wondered if sitting so close to the table might turn out to be a mistake. Whilst it afforded him the privacy he needed, it put his knees into contact with those of Algy, which made him remember all the things they had done whilst under the influence a few days previously. To his consternation – Biggles was firmly quashing the inner voice that suggested delight was a better word – Algy also looked as if he was remembering what had happened a few days previously. Pleasurably remembering. All the food was spicy in La Paz. Algy had given up trying to order food that wasn’t. The best he could hope for was ‘flavoured’ rather than mouth burning. He sipped his soup and watched Biggles with eyes that were brimful of laughter. Biggles looked back suspiciously whilst he tried to make innocuous conversation. It was an evening when every time he opened his mouth, another innuendo slipped out. Algy was having trouble keeping a straight face as he responded.‘How’s your soup?’ Biggles enquired. ‘Going down nicely?’Algy’s hand shook slightly and he spilled a drop on his shirt. ‘I’ve had better go down on me,’ he muttered, scrubbing with his napkin. Biggles pretended not to hear, as he idly watched the manager’s buxom wife sail into the dining room, her eagle eyes checking that all was correct.‘What book are you going to settle down with tonight?’ Algy asked.‘A romance. A Sale of Two Titties.’Algy swallowed the wrong way. The young waiter dashed over and enthusiastically patted Algy’s back. The older waiter provided a glass of water. Algy waved them away, ‘No, no, I’m fine. My soup went down the wrong hole.’Biggles blinked and thought about the parts of Algy that Algy had intended. The younger waiter swooped. Algy’s napkin had slipped to the floor. He picked it up, shook it out and tried to replace it on Algy’s lap.Algy was sitting too close to the table for him to do so. He grabbed the napkin and replaced it himself. ‘Thank you,’ he said firmly and dismissively. Biggles fought down visions of both replacing Algy’s napkin himself and of the young waiter replacing his own napkin, those slim brown fingers smoothing and patting the material on his lap.They had a few moments to recover before the older waiter returned.
‘I’m sorry,’ he apologised, ‘but Juan is young and forgetful. He has not asked what you would like your balls stuffed with.’Biggles took a moment to collect himself. He’d had a disturbing, tightening sensation from those words, with some pronounced physiological reactions in the parts of him currently concealed by the tablecloth.
‘What are the options?’ he asked cautiously. ‘Boiled egg or cheese.’ Biggles selected cheese. The waiter hadn’t finished. Turning to Algy, he asked ‘How would you like your sausage flavoured today?’Algy did not want his sausage flavoured at all, a decision which seemed to disappoint the waiter. Algy had learnt early in his visit that flavoured meant spicy and Algy wasn’t fond of spicy food. This hadn’t stopped the waiter from trying to persuade him to have hotter food at every mealtime.‘Why do I have to have a hot sausage?’ he grumbled to Biggles. Biggles cast an involuntary look down to the portion of Algy concealed by the table. Algy grinned. ‘Have you ever come across a sausage you didn’t like?’ he asked Biggles, his voice dripping with fake innocence.‘Not that I can recall.’Biggles answered honestly, pretending that he was only thinking about food. ‘You can have too much of a good thing, though. After a lot of meat, I like a change, something fishy perhaps.’He realised what he’d said and blushed. ‘I’m definitely not feeling myself yet.’‘You can do later,’ Algy suggested.Biggles was temporarily saved by the arrival of their main courses.‘How are your balls?’ Algy asked politely, looking at the portion of Biggles concealed by the table rather than at the Papas Rellenas on his plate. Biggles cut one open and a white liquid oozed out. Algy managed not to laugh.‘Cheesy.’ Biggles was determined to pretend that this was a normal conversation on a normal night. ‘How’s your sausage?’Algy poked his fork into the pile of sausage, onions and peppers on his plate. ‘Hard. Very hard.’Biggles managed to swallow his mouthful of food rather than spit it out, but it was a close run thing. He gestured for the waiter and ordered a carafe of wine. His mouth had gone dry with excitement, and he needed something to wash down his meal. ‘The cheese is rather salty,’ he told Algy.‘You can have something creamy to wash it down with shortly,’ Algy suggested. ‘Or would you prefer some of my sausage with your balls? It’s spicy. I think the kitchen staff is trying to make me more macho, like a cowboy.’‘I can’t imagine you as a macho cowboy,’ grinned Biggles. ‘Running around in tight trousers and leather chaps and slapping your thigh....’He shut up. He rather fancied seeing Algy in a nice, tight pair of trousers.‘I’m sure chaps’d chafe my thighs,’ Algy mused. ‘I’d have to spend all my time anointing them with oil so I could walk straight.’Biggles imagined Algy’s thighs slick with oil and hastily swallowed some more wine. ‘What did you want to be when you were a toddler?’ Biggles asked, ‘if you didn’t fancy a cowboy?’‘The army or the navy, I suppose,’ Algy shrugged. ‘I never really considered anything else. I must have a thing about uniforms. I briefly wanted a hat like Davy Crockett’s and to be King of the Wild Frontier, but that didn’t last. How about you?’Biggles thought about it. ‘I definitely wanted to lead expeditions to long lost cities and find gold, but now I’ve done a bit of treasure hunting I’m not going to do any more. Far too uncomfortable.’This reminded Biggles that he was feeling very hot and uncomfortable right now. It was hard not to shift about on his chair in search of relief. He added the hot pepper used to flavour everything to his list of aphrodisiac ingredients, gritted his teeth and continued trying to make conversation with Algy to distract himself. ‘I wanted to be a top shikari, of course, but I don’t really like killing things although you cannot let man-eating tigers rampage around unchecked. Oh, and I wanted to be a better detective than Sherlock Holmes. That had a lot of appeal.’ Another mouthful of wine and Biggles had finished his meal. ‘I need to take the taste of my sausage away,’ Algy declared. ‘Something milky to kill the burn. I wonder if they have the rice pudding thing on the menu today?’‘I expect so. They’ve had it every other day we’ve been here,’ Biggles sneered. ‘I think they make it especially for you as you can’t cope with spicy things.’‘I like some things spicy,’ Algy protested, waiting to see if Biggles would demand details. Biggles nearly did, but came to his senses in time.Algy looked at the menu card being handed to another diner.‘Cock a Leekie soup,’ he mused. ‘That’s what I’m missing. Roasted woodcock. Stuffed turkey. I like a good stuffing. Spotted dick, and sourballs to suck when flying.’Somehow they got through the rest of their dinner. Biggles could see that Algy’s pupils were enlarged. Only a thin rim of brown was showing around them. He suspected his eyes looked similar. He no longer felt unwell from the poison he’d breathed in the forest. He only felt feverishly over-excited. He’d drunk a little more than was his wont, enough that he felt reckless, but he certainly wasn’t inebriated. He grinned at Algy. ‘Nearly there. All we’ve got to do is get back to the room.’Algy nodded. He wanted to remove himself from the public gaze as much as Biggles did. The manager’s wife stepped over to their table to check that everything had been satisfactory. Algy assured her that it had. She bent over the table to arrange the condiments in a more pleasing fashion, her magnificently generous bosom moving within the confines of her gown. Biggles gritted his teeth. It would not be pleasant to bury his head within their munificence, to lick and to suckle and definitely not to blow raspberries to make them wobble. He fled to his room as soon as he could, Algy hot on his heels. Reaching the safety of their room, Biggles leaned against the door whilst Algy dropped onto his bed. The perfume from the blue orchids was still perceptible, but the scent had evolved. No longer did it have the disturbing undercurrents of corruption. Now it was heavily sensual, stimulating the body and mind to passion. ‘Why me?’ groaned Biggles, taking a deep breath to steady himself. ‘All I’m trying to do is earn an honest crust.’‘Try to think of this as being your reward,’ Algy suggested, as he lounged against his pillow, ‘for being such a good boy.’‘Reward?’ Biggles drew a blank for a moment. ‘Oh no. No, no. No, no and no. Not in a hotel bedroom. It’s too big a risk. What if someone heard us?’Algy grinned wickedly. ‘It will add to the thrill, knowing that we have to be quiet.’Biggles goggled. He’d been so focused on reaching his room as a place of safety that he hadn’t really considered what might happen when he got there. He realised that he’d been presuming that they’d both endure together, not that Algy would actively want to do something about relieving these feelings.‘I’m hexed,’ he grumbled.Algy grinned even more widely. ‘Let me offer some hexual healing.’Biggles groaned. ‘That’s so bad I’m not even going to reply.’‘Punish me?’ Algy teased, his face full of mischief. ‘I’d like that.’‘I know.’ Biggles sat on his own bed and kicked his shoes off. He swung his legs onto the bed and lay face down. Now he felt the need to rub himself against the mattress. He wasn’t a dog to dry hump everything in sight, he told himself and turned onto his side.Algy, on his bed, rubbed his arms. ‘Darned rash,’ he complained. ‘Thank goodness that I reacted to the soap instantly, otherwise it could be all over me. At least it’s only my arms that are suffering.’Biggles watched Algy stand to strip off his jacket and wrench off his tie. He slipped the links from his cuffs and started to unbutton his shirt. Biggles’s breath came faster. He gritted his teeth and forced himself to breathe more slowly.Algy shrugged out of his shirt then pulled his vest over his head. Biggles watched the muscles move in his back, sliding smoothly under his warm skin. Biggles knew what that back felt like, knew how Algy liked it to be touched. ‘Don’t suppose you’d like to rub the oil in for me?’ Algy asked, turning to face Biggles with the bottle in his hand. ‘I suppose you’re not competent to do it yourself.’ Biggles stood and began to remove his own jacket. ‘I’m only doing what’s medically necessary,’ he warned as he rolled up his sleeves. ‘Stand under the light. You might be better with something else on it.’Biggles examined Algy’s rash. It felt a little hot to the touch but not inflamed. ‘I don’t think it’s infected,’ he decided. ‘Let’s try ammonia on it as the oil didn’t work.’He rummaged in his wash bag for his small bottle of ammonia for insect bites and dabbed a little onto Algy’s arm. ‘Is that helping?’Algy shook his head. ‘No. Try my aftershave. That’s got alcohol in it. Maybe that will do the trick.’Biggles rummaged in Algy’s wash bag for his aftershave and dabbed that on. ‘Any better?’ His head was swimming from the clean, sharp scent of the aftershave and the heavy, sensual one from the orchids. He’d never come across such a long lasting scent. It clung sensuously to the garments hung up to air and refused to go. And Algy always smelled good, anyway. Even sweaty and unwashed, Algy smelled reasonable. Some men just did, Biggles had noticed. ‘I wish I could open the window and clear this fug away,’ he muttered. ‘Why don’t you?’ Algy asked.And be responsible for a town wide orgy?’ Biggles was exaggerating, but he had a point.‘Do you think it would be that bad?’ Algy was looking both intrigued and amused.‘No, but I think it would be sensible not to spread it about. There are too many witchdoctors in this city who might recognise the smell of this stuff. Let’s keep it to ourselves. Fewer consequences all around.’Algy’s lips twitched. ‘Look on the bright side. At least we can’t get pregnant.’‘There is that,’ Biggles conceded. ‘Though I wouldn’t put it past you to have twins, just to spite me.’Algy stuck his slim stomach out as far as it would go. ‘Triplets, at least.’Biggles snorted with laughter.‘But we’ve got to do something if I’m to bear your love child,’ Algy said innocently, batting his eyelids at Biggles. ‘I need to be taken advantage of.’Biggles gave in. Algy was right. They might as well have the satisfaction. He was no self-flagellant determined to deny himself all pleasures of the flesh. These were special circumstances, he told himself, and they wouldn’t happen again.He stepped forward and grasped Algy by the shoulders. ‘Well, you’d better lie back and think of England, then.’Algy had swift reactions. ‘Oh, sir, so sudden,’ he laughed, stepping forward into Biggles arms ‘and me so innocent.’Biggles choked. Algy took advantage of this to start unfastening Biggles’s buttons.He kept up the flow of patter about his supposed innocence whilst efficiently undressing Biggles. Biggles helped whilst shaking with silent laughter. He put a finger to Algy’s lips. ‘Remember. Absolute silence.’Algy nodded. ‘That’s so exciting,’ he whispered before sucking gently on Biggles’s finger.Algy was right, Biggles thought. The element of risk did make it exciting. The experience wasn’t the same as when they had got the lungful of herbs from the witchdoctor. The element of desperation wasn’t there this time. There was overwhelming desire and enhanced sensation but much more control.Still, it wasn’t long before they were both reaching an exhilarating and mutually satisfying climax, panting quietly together on Algy’s bed.Algy passed Biggles a cigarette and lit one of his own. ‘Don’t move,’ he ordered. ‘I’ll clean you up shortly. They smoked in silent contentment, then‘Hang on,’ Algy said, moving down Biggles’s body. Biggles could feel his tongue very gently lapping on his stomach and moving down to where he was exquisitely sensitive.‘What are you doing?’ he hissed‘Removing the evidence.’Biggles saw the sense of this and turned so he could do the same to Algy. It was better than using an article of clothing and then trying to wash it secretly and certainly better than having sheets smelling so strongly of sex in their room. The sensation, mingled with the drugs still in their systems, fanned the smouldering embers of their desires into flames and they explored each other a second time. The need for control intensified all the sensations. It had to be slow and silent. It was a long, long build up of delicate touches and deliberate movements, of tiny actions producing potent tingles and shivers, powerful throbs and pulses, and then the moments when control was hard but necessary until gut wrenching relief came once more. Twice was enough. They pulled their pyjamas over their tongued clean bodies and fell into deep sleep in their own beds.Morning came and they both awoke refreshed, with no trace of the lingering malaise from the orchids. Algy whistled his way to the bathroom for his morning ablutions, carefree and joyous. Biggles followed, equally light-hearted, but returned more thoughtful. He had been thinking in his bath about the herbs the witchdoctors used for their love potion and the changing properties of the blue orchid perfume from poison to aphrodisiac.Algy saw his thoughtfulness and turned questioning eyes upon him.‘It occurs to me,’ Biggles mused, ‘that very soon, if it has not already happened, it will come to the attention of the yatiri that their favourite blue orchid is no more and that we are responsible for that being the case. Wilks warned us not to upset the yatiri because they could be very dangerous, so I think that we had better read our post very carefully today and see if there is anything that we can use to get us out of here.’ They went down to breakfast zinging with good health and well being and returned to find the post had been delivered and put on the table in their room. To Biggles’s delight, job offers abounded. They had a man wanting to hire them to find a ruined city in Yucatan and another wanting live lobsters transported by air from Juan Fernandez. Alternatively, they could carry out anti-poacher patrols of the guano islands for the government or spot the eyrie of a king condor for a film company. But the letter that caught Biggles’s eye was one from an old friend, ex of 207 squadron. Accepting that offer would not only take them to Tonga, but needed them to set off the very next day.