Saint Intervenes (18 page)

The book
was sent in again from his own address, and
consequently Peter
did not see the proofs. Simon Templar
read them himself; and his ribs were
aching long before he
had finished.

The Gay
Adventurer,
by Peter Quentin, was formally
pushed out upon a
callous world about two months later.
The
Times
did not notice it,
the library buyers did not refill
their fountain pens to sign the order
forms, Mr. James
Douglas did not take it as the text of a centre-page de
nunciation
in the
Sunday Express,
the lynx-eyed scouts of
Hollywood did not
rush in with open contracts; but never
theless it was
possible for a man with vast patience and
dogged determination
to procure a copy, by which achieve
ment Mr. Parstone had fulfilled the
letter of his contract.
Simon Templar did not need to exercise
patience and determination to obtain his copy, because the author’s presenta
tion dozen
came to his apartment; and it happened that Peter
Quentin came there on
the same morning.

Peter
noticed the open parcel of books, and fell on them
at once, whinnying
like an eager stallion. But he had scarcely
glanced over the
first page when he turned to the Saint with wrathful eyes.

“This
isn’t my book at all,” he shouted indignantly. “We’ll call it a
collaboration if you like,” said the Saint
generously. “But
I thought you might as well have the credit. My name is so famous
already——”

Peter had
been turning the pages frantically.
“But this—this is
unlawful!” he expostulated.
   
“It’s——
it’s——”

“Of
course it is,” agreed the Saint. “And that’s why you
must never
tell anyone that I had anything to do with it.
When the case conies to court, I shall
expect you to perjure yourself blue in the face on that subject.”

After the
revelations that have been made in the early
stages of this
chapter, no one will imagine that on the same
morning Mr. Herbert Parstone was pacing
feverishly up and down his office, quivering with anxiety and parental pride,
stopping every now and then to peer at the latest circulation
figures rushed in by scurrying office-boys, and
bawling frantic
orders to an excited
staff of secretaries, salesmen, shippers, clerks, exporters, and truck drivers.
As a matter of fact, even
the most
important and reputable publishers do not behave
like that. They are usually too busy concentrating on mastering that
loose shoulder and smooth follow-through which
carries the ball well over that nasty bunker on the way to
the fourteenth.

Mr.
Herbert Parstone was not playing golf, because he
had a bad cold; and he
was in his office when the Saint
called. The name on the card that was sent in to him was
unfamiliar, but Mr. Parstone never refused to see
anyone
who was kind enough to walk into his parlour.

He was a
short ginger-haired man with the kind of stom
ach without which no
morning coat and gold watch-chain
can be seen to their best advantage;
and the redness of his
nose was not entirely due to his temporary
affliction.

“Mr.
Teblar?” he said, with great but obstructed geniality.
“Please
sit dowd. I dode thig I’ve had the pleasure to beetig
you before, have
I?”

“I
don’t think so,” said the Saint pleasantly. “But any real pleasure is
worth waiting for.” He took the precious volume
which he was carrying
from under his arm, and held it up.
“Did you publish this?”

Mr.
Parstone looked at it.

“Yes,” he said,
“that is one of our publicashuds. A bost
excelledd
ad ibportad book, if I bay perbid byself to say so. A book, I bight say, which
answers problebs which are dear to every wud of us today.”

“It
will certainly have some problems to answer,” said the
Saint;
“and I expect they’ll be dear enough. Do you know the
name of the
principal character in this book? Do you know who this biography is alleged to
be about?”

“Biography?”
stammered Mr. Parstone, blinking at the
cover. “The book
is a dovel. A work of fickshud. It is clearly
explaid——
”

“The
book is supposed to be a biography,” said the Saint
“And
do you know the name of the principal character?”

Mr.
Parstone’s brow creased with thought.

“Pridcipal
character?” he repeated. “Led be see, led be
see. I ought to dough, oughtud I?” He
blew his nose several
times, sniffed,
sighed, and spread out his hand uncertainly.
“Iddn it abazing?” he said. “The dabe was od the tip of by
tug, but dow I card rebember
id.”

“The
name is Simon Templar,” said the Saint grimly; and
Mr.
Parstone sat up.

“What?” he
ejaculated.

Simon
opened the book and showed him the name in plain
print. Then he took it
away to a chair and lighted a cigarette.

“Rather
rude of you, wasn’t it?” he murmured.

“Well,
 
by
 
dear Bister Teblar,”
 
said
 
Parstone winningly.
“I trust you are dot thinkig that any
uncomblibendary refer
edds was intended. Far frob id. These
rebarkable coidcidedces
will happud. Ad yet it is dot every yug bad
of your age who
fides his dabe preserved for posterity id such a work as
that.

The hero of
that book, as I rebember him, was a fellow of
outstaddig charb——
”

“He
was a low criminal,” said the Saint virtuously. “Your
memory is
failing you, Herbert. Let me read you some of
the best
passages.”

He turned
to a page he had marked.

“Listen
to this, Herbert,” he said. ”
‘Simon Templar was
never
particular about how he made money, so long as he
made it.
The drug traffic was only one of his many sources of
income, and
his conscience was never touched by the thought of the hundreds of lives he
ruined by his insatiable avarice.
Once, in a night
club, he pointed out to me a fine and
beautiful girl on
whose lovely face the ravages of dope were
already beginning to
make their mark. “I’ve had two thousand
pounds from her since
I started her on the stuff,” he said
gloatingly, “and
I’ll have five thousand more before it kills
her.” 1 could
multiply instances of that kind by the score, and
refrain
only from fear of nauseating my readers. Sufficient, at
least, has
already been said to show what an unspeakable
ruffian was this man
who called himself the Saint.’ “

However
hard it might have been for Mr. Parstone to
place the name of
Simon Templar, he was by no means igno
rant of the Saint.
His watery eyes popped halfway out of their
sockets, and his jaw
hardened at the same time.

“So
you’re the Saind?” he said.

“Of
course,” murmured Simon.

“Id
your very own words, a low cribidal——
”

Simon
shook his head.

“Oh,
no, Herbert,” he said. “By no means as low as that.
My
reputation may be bad, but it’s only rumour. You may
whisper it to your
friends, but the law doesn’t allow you
to put it in writing.
That’s libel. And you couldn’t even get
Chief Inspector Teal
to testify that my record would justify
anything like the
language this book of yours has used about
me. My sins were
always fairly idealistic and devoted to the
squashing of beetles
like yourself—not to trading in drugs
and grinding the faces of the poor. But
you haven’t heard
anything like the whole of it. Listen to some more.”

He turned
to another selected passage.

”
‘The Saint’,”
he
read, ”
‘always seemed to derive a pecul
iar malicious pleasure from robbing and swindling those who
could least afford to lose. To my dying day, I
shall be haunted
by the memory of the
fiendish glee which distorted his face
when
he told me that he had stolen five pounds from a
woman with seven children, who had scraped and saved for
months to get the money together. He accepted the
money
from her as a fee for trying to
trace the grave of her
father, who had
been reported “missing” in 1917. Of course
he never made any
attempt to carry out his share of the bar
gain.
He played this cruel trick on several occasions, and al
ways with the same sadistic pleasure, which I
believe meant
jar more to him than the
actual cash which he derived from
it.’
“

“Is
that id the book too?” asked Parstone hoarsely.

“Naturally,”
said the Saint. “That’s what I’m reading it
from. And there are
lots more interesting things. Look here.
‘The bogus companies
floated by Templar, in which thou
sands upon thousands
of widows and orphans were de
prived——
‘ “

“Wait!”
interrupted Parstone tremblingly. “This is terrible
—a
terrible coidcideds. The book will be withdrawd at wuds.
Hardly
eddywud will have had tibe to read it. Ad if eddy
sball cobbensation I
cad give——
”

Simon
closed his book with a smile and laid it on Mr.
Parstone’s desk.

“Shall
we say fifty thousand pounds?” he suggested affably.

Mr.
Parstone’s face reddened to the verge of an apoplectic
stroke, and he
brought up his handkerchief with shaking
hands.

“How
buch?” he whispered.

“Fifty
thousand pounds,” repeated the Saint. “After all,
that’s a
very small amount of damages to ask for a libel like
this. If the case has
to go to court, I think it will be admitted
that never in the
whole history of modern law has such a
colossal libel been
put on paper. If there is any crime under the sun of which I’m not accused in
that book, I’ll sit down
right now and eat it. And there are three
hundred and
twenty pages of it—eighty thousand words of continuous
and
unbridled insult. For a thing like that, Herbert, I think fifty
thousand
pounds is pretty cheap.”

“You
could’n get it,” said Parstone harshly. “It’s the
author’s
liability ——
”

“I
know that clause,” answered the Saint coolly, “and you
may be
interested to know that it has no legal value what
ever. In a successful
libel action, the author, printer, and publisher are joint tort-feasors, and
none of them can in
demnify the other. Ask your solicitor. As a matter of
fact,”
he added prophetically, “I don’t expect I shall be
able to
recover anything from the author, anyway. Authors are usually
broke. But
you are both the printer and publisher, and I’m
sure I can collect
from you.”

Mr.
Parstone stared at him with blanched lips.

“But
fifty thousad pouds is ibpossible,” he whined. “It
would ruid
be!”

“That’s
what I mean to do, dear old bird,” said the Saint
gently. “You’ve
gone on swindling a lot of harmless idiots
for too long already,
and now I want you to see what it feels
like when it happens
to you.”

He stood
up, and collected his hat.

“I’ll
leave you the book,” he said, “in case you want to
entertain
yourself some more. But I’ve got another copy;
and if I don’t
receive your cheque by the first post on Friday
morning it will go
straight to my solicitors. And you can’t
^t
kid
yourself about what that will mean.”

For a long
time after he had gone Mr. Herbert Parstone
sat quivering in his
chair. And then he reached out for the
book and began to
skim through its pages. And with every
page his livid face
went greyer. There was no doubt about it.
Simon Templar had
spoken the truth. The book was the
most monumental libel that could ever
have found its way
into print. Parstone’s brain reeled before the
accumulation of
calumnies which it unfolded.