Brighter Buccaneer (24 page)

The Saint slid back the nearest door on his side, swung himself up from the track, and stepped through the coach to the platform. A small crowd had gathered around the object of his somewhat sensational rescue, and Simon shouldered a path through them unceremoniously. He knew that one of the many sublimely intelligent laws of England ordains that any person who attempts to take his own life shall, if he survives, be prosecuted and at the discretion of the Law imprisoned, in order that he may be helped to see that life is, after all, a very jolly business and thoroughly worth living; and such a flagrant case as the one that Simon had just witnessed seemed to call for some distinctly prompt initiative.

“How d’you feel, chum?” asked the Saint, dropping on one knee beside the man.

“I saw him do it,” babbled a fat woman smugly. “With me own eyes I saw it. Jumped in front of the train as deliberate as you please. I saw him.”

“I’m afraid you’re mistaken, madam,” said the Saint quietly. “This gentleman is a friend of mine. He’s subject to rather bad fits, and one of them must have taken him just as the train was coming in. He was standing rather close to the edge of the platform, and he simply fell over.”

“A very plucky effort of yours, sir, getting him out of the way,” opined a white-whiskered military type. “Very plucky, by Gad!”

Simon Templar, however, was not looking for bouquets. The shabby man was sitting motionlessly with his head in his hands: the desperation that had driven him into that spasmodic leap had left him, and he was trembling silently in a helpless reaction. Simon slipped an arm around him and lifted him to his feet; and as he did so the guard broke through the crowd.

“I shall ‘ave to make a report of this business, sir,” he said.

“Lord-I’m not going to be anybody’s hero!” said the Saint. “My name’s Abraham Lincoln, and this is my uncle, Mr. Christopher Columbus. You can take it or leave it.”

“But if the gentleman’s going to make any claim against the company I shall ‘ave to make a report, sir,” pleaded the guard plaintively.

“There’ll be no complaints except for wasting time, Ebenezer,” said the Saint. “Let’s go.”

He helped his unresisting salvage into a compartment, and the crowd broke up. The District Railway resumed its day’s work; and Simon Templar lighted a cigarette and glanced whimsically at Patricia.

“What d’you think we’ve picked up this time, old dear?” he murmured.

The girl’s hand touched his arm, and she smiled.

“When you went after him I was wondering what I’d lost,” she said.

The Saint’s quick smile answered her; and he returned to a scrutiny of his acquisition. The shabby man was recovering himself slowly, and Simon thought it best to leave him to himself for a while. By the time they had reached Mark Lane Station he seemed to have become comparatively normal, and Simon stood up and jerked a thumb.

“C’mon, uncle. This is as far as I go.”

The shabby man shook his head weakly.

“Really, I don’t —”

“Step out,” said the Saint.

The man obeyed listlessly; and Simon took his arm and piloted him towards the exit. They turned into a convenient cafe and found a deserted corner.

“I took a bit of trouble to pull you out of a mess, uncle, and the story of your life is the least you can give me in return.”

“Are you a reporter?” asked the other wearily.

“I have a conscience,” said the Saint. “What’s your name, and what do you do?”

“Inwood. I’m a chemist and-a sort of inventor.” The shabby man gazed apathetically at the cup of coffee which had been set before him. “I ought to thank you for saving my life, I suppose, but —”

“Take it as a gift,” said the Saint breezily. “I was only thinking of our rails. I’ve got a few shares in the company, and your method of suicide makes such a mess. Now tell me why you did it.”

Inwood looked up.

“Are you going to offer me charity?”

“I never do that. My charity begins at home, and stays on with Mother like a good girl.”

“I suppose you’ve got some sort of right to an answer,” said Inwood tiredly. “I’m a failure, that’s all.”

“And aren’t we all?” said the Saint. “What did you fail at, uncle?”

“Inventing. I gave up a good job ten years ago to try and make a fortune on my own, and I’ve been living from hand to mouth ever since. My wife had a small income of her own, and I lived on that. I did one or two small things, but I didn’t make much out of them. I suppose I’m not such a genius as I thought I was, but I believed in myself then. A month or so ago, when we were right at the end of our tether, I did make a little discovery.”

The shabby man took from his pocket a small brass tube like a girl’s lipstick case, and tossed it across the table. Simon removed the cap, and saw something like a crayon-it was white outside, with a pink core.

“Write something-with your pen, I mean,” said Inwood.

Simon took out his fountain-pen and scribbled a couple of words on the back of the menu. Inwood blew on it till it dried, and handed it back.

“Now rub it over with that crayon.”

Simon did so, and the writing disappeared. It vanished quite smoothly and easily, at a couple of touches, without any hard rubbing, and the paper was left without a trace of discoloration or roughness.

“Just a useful thing for banks and offices,” said Inwood.

“There’s nothing else like it. An ink eraser tears up the paper. You can buy a chemical bleacher, and several firms use it, but that’s liquid-two re-agents in separate bottles, and you have to put on drops of first one and then the other. That thing of mine is twice as simple and three times quicker.”

Simon nodded.

“You’re not likely to make a million out of it, but it ought to have quite a reasonable sale.”

“I know that,” said Inwood bitterly. “I didn’t want a million. I’d have been glad to get a thousand. I’ve told you-I’m not such a genius as I thought I was. But a thousand pounds would have put us on our feet again-given me a chance to open a little shop or find a steady job or something. But I’m not going to get a penny out of it. It isn’t my property-and I invented it! … We’ve been living on capital as well as income. This would have put us straight. It had to be protected.”

The old man’s faded eyes blinked at the Saint pitifully. “I don’t know anything about things like that. I saw a patent agent’s advertisement in a cheap paper, and I took it to him. I gave him all my formulae-everything. That was a fortnight ago. He told me he’d have to make a search of the records before my patent could be taken out. I had a letter from him this morning, and he said that a similar specification had been filed three days ago.”

The Saint said nothing; but his blue eyes were suddenly very clear and hard.

“You see what it was?” In his weakness the shabby inventor was almost sobbing. “He swindled me. He gave my specifications to a friend of his and let him file them in his own name. I couldn’t believe it. I went to the Patent Office myself this morning: a fellow I found there helped me to find what I wanted. Every figure in the specification was mine. It was my specification. The coincidence couldn’t possibly have been so exact, even if somebody else had been working on that same idea at the same time as I was. But I can’t prove anything. I haven’t a shilling to fight him with. D’you hear? He’s ruined me —”

“Steady on, uncle,” said the Saint gently. “Have you seen this bird again?”

“I’d just left his office when-when you saw me at Charing Cross,” said Inwood shakily. “He threw me out. When he found he couldn’t bluff me he didn’t bother to deny anything. Told me to go on and prove it, and be careful I didn’t give him a chance to sue me for libel. There weren’t any witnesses. He could say anything he liked —”

“Will you tell me his name?”

“Parnock.”

“Thanks.” Simon made a note on the back of an envelope. “Now will you do something else for me?”

“What is it?”

“Promise not to do anything drastic before Tuesday. I’m going away for the week-end, but Parnock won’t be able to do anything very villainous either. I may be able to do something for you-I have quite a way with me,” said the Saint bashfully.

This was on a Friday-a date that Simon Templar had never been superstitious about. He was on his way to Burnham for a week-end’s bumping about in a ten-ton yawl, and the fact that Mr. Inwood’s misadventure had made him miss his train was a small fee for the introduction to Mr. Parnock. He caught a later train with plenty of time to spare; but before he left the elderly chemist he obtained an address and telephone number.

He had another surprise the next morning, for he was searching for a certain penny to convince his incredulous host and owner of the yawl about a statement he had made at the breakfast table, and he couldn’t find it.

“You must have spent it,” said Patricia.

“I know I haven’t,” said the Saint. “I paid our fares yesterday afternoon out of a pound note; and I bought a magazine for a bob-I didn’t spend any pennies.”

“What about those drinks at the pub last night?” said the host and owner, who was Monty Hayward.

“We had one round each, at two-and-a-tanner a time. I changed a ten-bob note for my whack.”

Monty shrugged.

“I expect you put it in a slot machine to look at rude pictures,” he said.

Simon found his bottle and silvered another penny for demonstration purposes. It was left on a shelf in the saloon, and Simon thought no more about it until the following morning. He was looking for a box of matches after breakfast when he came across it; and the sight of it made him scratch his head, for there was not a trace of silver on it.

“Is anyone being funny?” he demanded; and after he had explained himself there was a chorus of denial.

“Well, that’s damned odd,” said the Saint.

He plated a third penny on the spot, and put it away in his pocket with a piece of paper wrapped round it. He took it out at six o’clock that evening, and the plating had disappeared.

“Would you mind putting me ashore at Southend, Monty?” he said. “I’ve got some business I must do in London.”

He saw Inwood that night; and after the chemist had sniffed at the bottle and tested its remarkable properties he told the Saint certain things which had been omitted from the syllabus of Simon Templar’s variegated education. Simon paced the shabby inventor’s shabby lodging for nearly an hour afterwards, and went back to his own in a spirit of definite optimism.

At eleven o’clock the next morning he presented himself at Mr. Parnock’s office in the Strand. The inscription on the frosted-glass panel of the door informed him that Mr. Parnock’s baptismal name was Augustus, and an inspection of Mr. Parnock himself showed that there had been at least one parent with a commendable prescience in the matter of names. Mr. Parnock was so august a personage that it was impossible to think of anyone abbreviating him to “Gus.” He was a large and very smooth man, with a smooth convex face and smooth clothes and smooth hair and a smooth voice-except for the voice, he reminded Simon of a well-groomed seal.

“Well, Mr.-er —”

“Smith,” said the Saint-he was wearing a brown tweed coat and creaseless grey flannel trousers, and he looked agitated. “Mr. Parnock-I saw your advertisement in the Inventor’s Weekly-is it true that you help inventors?”

“I’m always ready to give any assistance I can, Mr. Smith,” said Mr. Parnock smoothly. “Won’t you sit down?”

The Saint sat down.

“It’s like this, Mr. Parnock. I’ve invented a method of chromium plating in one process-you probably know that at present they have to nickel plate first. And my method’s about fifty per cent cheaper than anything they’ve discovered up to the present. It’s done by simple immersion, according to a specified formula.” The Saint ruffled his hair nervously. “I know you’ll think it’s just another of these crazy schemes that you must be turning down every day, but —Look here, will this convince you?”

He produced a letter and handed it across the desk. It bore the heading of one of the largest motor-car manufacturers in the country, and it was signed with the name of the managing director. Mr. Parnock was not to know that among Simon Templar’s most valued possessions were a portfolio containing samples of notepaper and envelopes from every important firm in the kingdom, surreptitiously acquired at considerable trouble and expense, and an autograph album in which could be found the signatures of nearly every Captain of Industry in Europe. The letter regretted that Mr. Smith did not consider five thousand pounds a suitable offer for the rights of his invention, and invited him to lunch with the writer on the following Friday in the hope of coming to an agreement.

“You seem to be a very fortunate young man,” said Mr. Parnock enviously, returning the document. “I take it that the firm has already tested your discovery?”

“It doesn’t need any tests,” said the Saint. “I’ll show it to you now.”

He produced his little brown bottle, and borrowed Mr. Parnock’s brass ashtray for the experiment. Before Mr. Par-nock’s eyes it was silvered all over in a few seconds.

“This bottle of stuff cost about a penny,” said the Saint; and Mr. Parnock was amazed.

“I don’t wonder you refused five thousand for it, Mr. Smith,” he said, as smoothly as he could. “Now, if you had come to me in the first place and allowed me to act as your agent —”

“I want you to do even more than that.”

Mr. Parnock’s eyebrows moved smoothly upwards for about an eighth of an inch.

“Between ourselves,” said the Saint bluntly, “I’m in the hell of a mess.”

The faintest gleam of expression flitted across Mr. Parnock’s smooth and fish-like eyes, and gave way to a gaze of expectant sympathy.

“Anything you wanted to tell me, Mr. Smith, would of course be treated confidentially.”

“I’ve been gambling-living beyond my means-doing all sorts of silly things. You can see for yourself that I’m pretty young. I suppose I ought to have known better… . I’ve stopped all that now, but-two months ago I tried to get out of the mess. I gave a dud cheque. I tried to stay in hiding-I was working on this invention, and I knew I’d be able to pay everyone when I’d got it finished. But they found me last Friday. They’ve been pretty decent, in a way. They gave me till Wednesday noon to find the money. Otherwise -“