Biggles investigates the kidnapping of some highly specialised scientists. The book features Algy, Ginger and Bertie although Algy only plays a very small part in the story. A bizarre clue, involving three V’s tattooed on a man’s head, leads the team to a remote part of China. A rescue mission is mounted and this includes Chinese expert and speaker, Captain Roderick Mayne. The team locate the villains’ base and have to organise the escape of the captured scientists. Biggles and Ginger infiltrate their camp and discover the presence of an old enemy. Biggles is captured and held, watched over by a huge Mongolian and this is the event that is pictured on the cover dust jacket of the book. Helped and hindered by a strange Cossack called Colonel Alexis Petroffsky, the scientists are freed and there is a climatic battle before the team escapes.