The Adventure of the Luminous Clay is the third short story in the fifth anthology of Biggles Air Police short stories which is entitled Biggles' Chinese Puzzle. The anthology was first published in May 1955 by Brockhampton. In the anthology, this story is preceded by The Case of the Modern Pirate and followed by The Flying Crusaders.
Synopsis[]
Biggles is sent to a remote Pacific island to collect some "Blue Clay", a substance vital to atomic energy research.
Plot[]
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Raymond has another unusual mission for Biggles. This time, he has to collect a container of "blue clay", a substance which was vital to atomic research but very expensive to manufacture. The naturalist, Professor Lovejoy had apparently discovered birds on a remote Pacific volcanic islet which laid bluish luminous eggs. The eggshells had been tested and found to contain blue clay, possibly found on the ground and ingested by tbe birds.
The island had been claimed by several countries and with intense international competition to be ahead in the atomic race, there is a need for speed and the utmost secrecy. So Biggles and the Air Police crew depart for the island, which they nickname Gull Rock, accompanied by Professor Lovejoy with all due haste.
Approaching the island, Biggles senses something has gone wrong. The shape appears different from what was described by Professor Lovejoy. It also appears to have sunk lower into the water. Worse, after landing, they discover that the islet is full of natives from a nearby island apparently performing a ceremony. These natives tell them to leave: they had angered their gods. Their fire god had almost destroyed their home island and they had come to Gull Rock to placate him.
There is no choice but to wait for the natives to leave. Through the night they hear ominous rumbles. Quantities of scum appear on the water, probably lava thrown out by the volcano. By dawn it can be seen that the natives have left but island has been split into two and is even lower in the water. It may sink into the ocean entirely at any moment.
Biggles refuses to be beaten at the post. He starts the engines and taxis as near to the island as possible before clambering onto a dinghy and making a precarious landing in the soft rock. He manages to collect a container of the clay and makes it back to the Sunderland just in time, narrowly avoiding being dragged under by the vortex created as the islet slides beneath the waves.
Characters[]
The Special Air Police/Scotland Yard[]
- Air Commodore Raymond
- Biggles
- Algy Lacey
- Ginger Hebblethwaite
- Bertie Lissie
Others[]
Aircraft[]
Places[]
Visited[]
- London, Scotland Yard - Raymond's office
- Gull Rock - now clues given where this might be, except for Lovejoy saying it is an offshoot of the Galapagos Group, which would make it closer to South America than Oceania. Note that in Biggles on Mystery Island, the Sunderland expedition takes 6 weeks to get to its destination. Here, the Sunderland takes 2 weeks.