Saint Overboard (21 page)

“Tell us,” said Roger.

Simon told them.

2

“So that’s the story. Now …”

He sat up and looked at them through a haze of smoke, in one
of those supreme pauses when he knew most clearly
that he
would not, could not, have
changed his life for any other. It was
like old times. It was like
coming home. It was the freebooter
coming
back to the outlaw camp-fire where he belonged. He saw
their faces
across the room, Peter’s rugged young-pugilist vitality, Roger’s lean and
rather grim intentness; and under the tur
bulent
thoughts that were clouding the background of his mind
he knew an enduring and inexplicable contentment.

“As I see it, if all the evidence that’s
been collected since Ingerbeck’s
took on the case was worked up, there might
be enough
of it to put Vogel away. But that’s not good enough for
the un
derwriters, and it isn’t good enough for Ingerbeck’s. The under
writers
can’t show any dividends on gloating over Vogel sitting
in prison
for a few years. They want to recover some of the
money they’ve lost on
claims since he went into business. And
Ingerbeck’s want
their commission on the same. And we
want——
”

“Both,” said Peter Quentin
bluntly.

The Saint gazed at him thoughtfully for a
moment and did not
answer directly. Presently he said: “The argument’s
fairly sim
ple,
isn’t it? Boodle of that kind isn’t exactly ready money. You
can’t take a sack of uncut diamonds or half a ton
of bar gold
into the nearest pawnshop
and ask ‘em how much they’ll give
you
on it. It takes time and organisation to get rid of it. And it
isn’t so easy to cart around with you while your
organisation’s
functioning—particularly
the gold. You have to park it some
where. And for similar reasons you
can’t use the ordinary safe
deposit or keep
it in a sock.”

Roger nodded.
        

“Meaning if we could find this
parking-place——
”

The Saint spread out his hands.

“Find it, or find out where it is. Join Vogel’s crew and get
the
key. Follow him when he goes there to
fetch some of the boodle
out, or put
some more in. Or something …” He smiled, and
reached for his glass. “Anyway, you get the
general idea.”

They had got the general idea; and for a
minute or two they digested it in efficient silence. The magnitude of the
situation
which had been unfolded to them provoked none of the
conventional explosions of incredulity or excitement: it was only on the
same plane with what they had
come to expect from the shame
less leader
who sat there studying them with the old mocking
light of irresistible daredevilry on his dark reckless face. And it
is doubtful whether the morality of their attitude
ever troubled
them at all.

“That seems quite clear,” Peter
said at last. “Except for the
beautiful heroine.”

“She’s only trying to get at Vogel from
his soft side—if he has
one. That’s why she had to make that trip
to-day. I
…
wasn’t
in time to stop it.
Don’t know whether I could have stopped it
anyway, but I might
have tried. If she hasn’t arrived here
safely …” He
left the thought in the air; but for an instant
they saw a cold flame
of steel in his eyes. And then there was
only the glimmer of the scapegrace smile
still on his lips. “But that’s my own party,” he said.

“It looks like it,” Peter said
gloomily. “I might have known we couldn’t afford to give you a start like
this. If you’re staking
a claim on the heroine, I think I
shall
go
home.”

“Is it a claim?” asked Roger
seriously.

Simon drew the last smoke of his cigarette
deep into his lungs,
and shed the butt into an ashtray.

“I don’t know,” he said.

He stood up abruptly and prowled over to the
window, almost
unconsciously triangulating its exact position in the
exterior geog
raphy of the hotel, in case he should ever wish to find
it without using the ordinary entrances. Automatically his mind put
aside
Roger’s question, and went working on along the sternly
practical
lines for which he had convened the meeting.

“Now—communications. We can’t have a lot
of these reunions. I had to ditch a shadow to make this one; and yesterday I
did the
same in Dinard. I think I was pretty smooth both times, but if I do it much
more it’ll stop looking so accidental. There’s
just a thin chance
that Birdie is still wondering how smooth I
am, and it’s just
possible I may be able to keep him guessing for
another twenty-four
hours; which might make a lot of difference.
So we’ll go back to
splendid isolation for a while. Orace and I will get in touch with you here—one
or the other of you must
look in every hour, in case there’s a
message. If we can’t send a
message, we’ll put a bucket on the deck of
the
Corsair,
which
means you look out for signals. Remember the
old card code?
We’ll put the cards in one of the portholes. Those are
general
orders.”

“Anything more particular?”

“Only for myself, at present. To-morrow
they’re going out to
try Yule’s new bathystol—and I’ve got an invitation.”

Peter sat up with a jerk.

“You’re not going?”

“Of course I am. Any normal and innocent
bloke would jump at the chance, and until there’s any evidence to the contrary
I’ve
got to work on the assumption that I’m still supposed to be a
normal and
innocent bloke. I’ve
got
to go. Besides, I might find
out
something.”

“All about the After Life, for instance,” said Peter.

The Saint shrugged.

“That’s all in the kitty. But if it’s
coming to me, it’ll come
anyhow, whether I go or not. And if it
happens to-morrow …”
The Saintly smile was gay and unclouded as
he buttoned his coat —“I looks to you gents to do your stuff.”

Roger pulled himself off the bed.

“Okay, Horatius. Then for the time
being we’re off duty.”

“Yes. Except for general communications.
I just wanted to
give you the lie of the land. And you’ve got it. So you
can go
back to your own heroines, if they haven’t found something
better by this time; and don’t
forget your powder-puffs.”

He shifted nimbly through the door before
the other two could
prepare
a suitable retaliation, and found his way back to the bar.
His glass of beer was still on the counter; and the
sleuth who
had been watching it, who
had been mopping his brow feverishly
and
running round in small agitated circles for some time past
appeared to
suffer a violent heart attack which called for a large
dose of whisky to restore his shattered nerves.

Simon lowered his drink at leisure. It went
down to join a
deep and pervading glow that had come into being inside
him, in
curious contrast to an outward sensation of dry cold. That brief
interview
with Peter and Roger, the knowledge that they were
there to find trouble
with him as they had found it before, had
given a solid foundation to a courage
which had been sustained
until then by sheer
nervous energy. And
yet, as the feeling of
cold separateness in his limbs was there to
testify, their presence
had not
altered the problem of Loretta, or made her safe; and a
part of him
remained utterly detached and immune from the
intoxicating
scent of battle as he set out to find her.

To find her
…
if she was
to be found. But he forced that
fear ruthlessly out of his head. She would be
found—he was becoming as imaginative as an overwrought boy. If Vogel had
taken the
risk of letting her sail on the
Falkenberg
at all, he
must be
interested; and if he was interested, there would be no point in murder until
the interest had been satisfied. Vogel must
be interested—the
Saint had not watched that scene on the
Falkenberg’s
deck last
night with his eyes shut. And Vogel’s mathe
matically dehumanised brain would work
like that. To play with
the attractive toy,
guarding himself against its revealed dangers, until all its amusing resources
had been explored, before he broke it
…
Surely, the Saint told himself with relentless
insistence,
Loretta would be found.
The thing that troubled him most deeply was that he should be so afraid …

And he found her. As he walked by the harbour, looking over
the paling blue of the water at the inscrutable
curves of the
Falkenberg
as if his eyes were trying to pierce through her
hull
and superstructure to see what
was left for him on board, he
became
aware of three figures walking towards him; and some
thing made him turn. He saw the tall gaunt
aquilinity of Kurt
Vogel, the gross bulk of Arnheim, and another shape
which was
like neither of them, which
suddenly melted the ice that had
been
creeping through his veins and turned the warmth in him to
fire.

“Good evening,” said Vogel.

3

Simon Templar nodded with matter-of-faet
cheeriness. And he
wanted to shout and dance.

“I was just going to look you up,”
he said.

“And we were wondering where you were.
We inquired on the
Corsair,
but your man told us
you’d gone ashore. You had a
good crossing?”

“Perfect.”

“We were thinking of dining on shore, for
a change. By the
way,
I must introduce you.” Vogel turned to the others. “This is
my friend Mr Tombs—Miss Page
…”

Simon took her hand. For the first time in
that encounter he
dared to look her full in the face, and smile. But even
that could only be for the brief conventional moment.

“… and Mr Arnheim.”

“How do you do?”

There was a dark swollen bruise under
Arnheim’s fleshy chin,
and the Saint estimated its painfulness with invisible satisfaction
as he shook hands.

“Of course—you helped us to try and catch our robber, didn’t
you, Mr Tombs?”

“I don’t think I did very much to help you,” said the
Saint
deprecatingly.

“But you were very patient with our
disturbing attempts,”
said Vogel genially. “We couldn’t have
met more fortunately—in
every way. And now, naturally, you’ll join
us for dinner?”

The great hook of his nose curved at the Saint like a poised
scimitar, the heavy black brows arched over it with
the merest
hint of challenge.

“I’d like to,” said the Saint
easily. And as they started to
stroll on: “What about the
Professor?”

“He refuses to be tempted. He will be
working on the bathystol
for half the night—you couldn’t drag him away
from it on
the eve
of a descent.”

They had dinner at the Old Government House.
To Simon
Templar
the evening became fantastic, almost frighteningly un
real. Not once did he catch Vogel or Arnheim watching him, not
once did he catch the subtle edge of an innuendo
thrust in to prick a guilty ear; and yet he knew, by pure reason, that they
were watching. The brand of his fist on Arnheim’s
chin caught
his eyes every time they turned that way. Did Arnheim guess—
did he even
know?
—whose knuckles had
hung that pocket earth
quake on his
jaw? Did Vogel know? There was no answer to
be read in the smooth colourless face or the black unwinking
eyes.
What did they know of Loretta, and what were their plans
for her? If Murdoch had been identified while they
had him on
the
Falkenberg
she
must have been condemned already; and it
seemed too much to hope that Murdoch had not been seen by the sleuth who
had observed his blatant arrival at the Hotel de
la Mer the day before. How much had Loretta suffered al
ready?
…
He could only guess at the answers.