The Saint in London: Originally Entitled the Misfortunes of Mr. Teal (2 page)

But it was perhaps more unusual that the par’ ticular trouble he was expecting could not be blamed on any fault of his. And the queerest thing of all was that everything should hinge around the black book on his knee which was the legacy of Rayt Marius—the strangest and deadliest gift that any man ever received.

II

He WAS one of the first passengers to alight from the train at Waterloo, with his raincoat slung over his shoulder and the book in his hand; but he did not take the first available taxi. He allowed six to go by him, and boarded the seventh after taking a good look at it.

“Hyde Park Corner,” he directed it clearly and watched the traffic out of the rear window as they drove away.

Another taxi swung in behind them, and he noted the number. Five minutes later he looked back again, and it was still there. Simon pressed the button of the telephone.

“Turn right round at Hyde Park Corner and go back the way we’ve come,” he said.

He waited a short time after his instructions had been carried out, and looked back for the third time. The other taxi was plugging patiently along three yards behind, and the Saint’s teeth gleamed in a thin smile. Coincidence of destination was one thing, but coincidence of such a radical change of direction as he had ordered his driver to carry out was quite another matter.

“Now we’ll go through the Green Park and up St. James’s Street,” he said through the telephone.

The driver was so moved that he opened the door an inch and performed incredible contortions to yell back through it.

“Wot is this?” he demanded. “A game of 選‘d and seek?”

“You have no idea,” said the Saint.

The apartment he was heading for was on the north side of Piccadilly, overlooking the Green Park. It was only one of many addresses that he had had at various times, to several of which he still owned the keys; but it was the one which had been prepared for his return, and he had no intention of being prevented from going there. The only question was how the shadowing party was to be shaken off.

As they ran up St. James’s Street he looked at the meter and counted off the necessary change to pay the fare with a substantial tip. When the next traffic light reddened against them he stretched a long arm through the window and thrust the money into the driver’s hand.

“I shall be leaving you any minute now, Al-phonse,” he said. “But don’t let that stop you. Keep right on your way, and don’t look back till you get to Hyde Park Corner. And have a bob on J Samovar for the Derby.”

He had the door on the latch as they passed the Ritz, and his steel-blue eyes were watching the traffic intently. Three buses were taking on pas-sengers at the stop just west of the hotel, and as they went past the leader was edging out into the stream. Simon looked back and saw it cut out close behind him, baulking the following taxi; and that was his chance. In a flash he was out of his cab, dropping nimbly to the road, and the red side of the bus thundered by a couple of inches from his shoulder. It hid him perfectly from whoever was trailing him in the other cab, which was trying to pass the obstruction and catch up again; and he stood on the sidewalk and watched the whole futile procession trundling away westwards with a relentless zeal which brought an irresponsible twinkle of sheer urchin mischief into his eyes.

A few minutes later he was sauntering into his apartment building and nodding cheerily to the janitor.

“Anybody called while I’ve been away, Sam?” he asked, as if he had only been away for a weekend.

Sam Outrell’s beam of delight gave way to a troubled gravity. He looked furtively about him.

“There was two detectives here the other day, sir,” he said.

The Saint frowned at him thoughtfully for a moment. Although Sam Outrell was nominally employed by the management of the building, he was on Simon Templar’s private payroll as well; but no stipend could have bought the look of almost doglike devotion with which he waited anxiously for the Saint’s reaction. Simon looked up at him again and smiled.

“I expect they were the birds I hired to try and find a collar stud that went down the waste pipe,” he said and went whistling on his way to the lift.

He let himself into his apartment noiselessly. There were sounds of someone moving about ir the living room, and he only stopped to throw his hat and coat onto a chair before he went through and opened the second door.

“Hullo, Pat,” he said softly. “I thought you’d be here.”

Across the room, a tall slender girl with fair golden hair gazed at him with eyes as blue as his own. There was the grace of a pagan goddess in the way she stood, caught in surprise as she was by the sound of his voice, and the reward of all journeys in the quiver of her red lips.

“So you have come back,” she said.

“After many adventures,” said the Saint and took her into his arms.

She turned away presently, keeping his arm round her, and showed him the table.

“I got in a bottle of your favourite sherry,” she said rather breathlessly, “in case you came.”

“In case?” said the Saint.

“Well, after you wired me not to meet you at Southampton––”

He laughed, a quiet lilt of laughter that had rung in her memory for many weeks.

“Darling, that was because I was expecting an-other deputation of welcome at the same time, and it might have spoilt the fun for both of us. The deputation was there, too—but you shall hear about that presently.”

He filled the two glasses which stood beside the bottle and carried one of them over to an arm-chair. Over the rim of his glass he regarded her, freshening the portrait which he had carried with him ever since he went away. So much had happened to him, so many things had touched him and passed on into the illimitable emptiness of time, but not one line of her had changed. She was the same as she had been on the day when he first met her, the same as she had been through all the lawless adventures that they had shared since she threw in her lot irrevocably with his. She looked at him in the same way.

“You’re older,” she said quietly.

He smiled.

“I haven’t been on a picnic.”

“And there’s something about you that tells me you aren’t on a picnic even now.”

He sipped the golden nectar from his glass and delved for a cigarette. When she said that he was older she could not have pointed to a grey hair or a new line on his face to prove her statement. And at that moment she felt that the clock might well have been put back five years. The fine sunburnt devil-may-care face, the face of a born outlaw, was in some subtle way more keenly etched than ever by the indefinable inward light that came to it when trouble loomed up in his buccaneering path. She knew him so well that the lazy quirk of the unscrupulous freebooter’s mouth told a story of its own, and even the whimsical smile that lurked on in his eyes could not deceive her.

“It isn’t my fault if you develop these psychic powers, old sweetheart,” he said.

“It’s your fault if you can’t even stay out of trouble for a week now and again,” she said and sat on the arm of his chair.

He shook his head and took one of her hands.

“I tried to, Pat, but it just wasn’t meant to happen. A wicked ogre with a black guardee moustache hopped through a window and said ‘Boo!’ and my halo blew off. If I wanted to, I could blame it all on you.”

“How?”

“For just managing to catch me in Boston before I sailed, with that parcel you forwarded!”

Patricia Holm puckered her sweet brow.

“Parcel? … Oh, I think I remember it. A thing about the size of a book—it came from Monte Carlo, didn’t it?”

“It came from Monte Carlo,” said the Saint carefully, “and it was certainly about the size of a book. In fact, it was a book. It was the most amazing book I’ve ever read—maybe the most amazing book that was ever written. There it is!”

He pointed to the volume which he had put down on the table, and she stared at it and then back at him in utter perplexity.

“Her Wedding Secret?” she said. “Have you gone mad or have I?”

“Neither of us,” said the Saint. “But you wouldn’t believe how many other people are mad about it.”

She looked at him in bewildered exasperation. He was standing up again, a debonair wide-shouldered figure against the sunlight that streamed in through the big windows and lengthened the evening shadows of the trees in the Green Park. She felt the spell of his daredevil delight as irresistible as it had always been, the absurd glamour which could even take half the sting from his moments of infuriating mysteriousness. He smiled, and his hands went to her shoulders.

“Listen, Pat,” he said. “That book is a present from an old friend, and he knew what he was doing when he sent it to me. When I show it to you, you’ll see that it’s the most devilishly clever revenge that ever came out of a human brain. But before we go any further, I want you to know that there’s more power in that book for the man who’s got it than anyone else in England has today, and for that very reason––”

The sharp trill of the telephone bell cut him off. He looked at the instrument for a moment and then lifted the receiver.

“Hullo,” he said.

“This is Outrell, sir,” said an agitated voice. “Those two detectives I told you about—they’ve just bin here again. They’re on their way up to you now, sir.”

Simon gazed dreamily at the ceiling for a second or two, and his fingertips played a gently syncopated tattoo on the side table.

“Okay, Sam,” he said. “I’ll give them your love.”

He replaced the instrument and stood with his hand on it, looking at Patricia. His level blue eyes were mocking and enigmatic, but this time at least she knew enough of his system to read beyonc them.

“Hadn’t you better hide the book?” she said.

“It is hidden,” he answered, touching the gaudy wrapper. “And we may as well have a look at these sleuths.”

The ringing of another bell put a short stop to further discussion, and with a last smile at her he went out to open the door. The trouble was coming thick and fast, and there were tiny chisellings at the corners of his mouth to offset the quiet amusement in his eyes. But he only stopped long enough in the little hall to transfer the automatic from his hip pocket to a pocket in his raincoat, and then he opened the door wide with a face of seraphic tranquillity.

Two men in dark suits stood on the mat outside. Both of them wore bowler hats; neither of them carried sticks or gloves.

“Mr. Simon Templar?” queried one of them, in a voice of astounding refinement.

Simon nodded, and they moved determinedly through the door with a concerted solidity which would certainly have obstructed any attempt he might have made to slam it in their faces.

“I am Inspector Nassen,” said the genteel spokesman, “and I have a warrant to search your flat.”

“Bless my soul!” ejaculated the Saint, with his juiciest lisp. “So you’re one of our new public-school policemen. How perfectly sweet!”

The other’s lips tightened.

“We’ll start with searching you,” he said shortly.

His hands ran over the Saint’s pockets in a few efficient movements which were sufficient to assure him that Simon had no lethal weapon on his person. The Saint restrained a natural impulse to smack him on the nose and smiled instead.

“This is a great game, Snowdrop, isn’t it?” he said. “Personally I’m broad-minded, but if you did these things to a lady she might misunderstand you.”

Nassen’s pale face flushed wrathfully, and an unholy gleam came into the Saint’s eye. Of all the detectives who ought never to have called upon him, one who was so easily baited was booked for a rough passage before he ever set out.

“We’ll go over the flat now,” he said.

Simon led them into the living room and calmly set about refilling his sherry glass.

“Pat,” he explained casually, “these are two little fairies who just popped through the keyhole. They seem to want to search the place and see if it’s all cleany-weeny. Shall we let them get on with it?”

“I suppose so,” said Patricia tolerantly. “Did they wipe their tootsy-wootsies before they came in?”

“I’m afraid not,” said the Saint. “You see, they | aren’t very well-bred little fairies. But when you have a beautiful Oxford accent you aren’t supposed to need manners as well. You should just hear Snowdrop talking. Sounds as if all his teeth were loose… .”

He went on in the same vein throughout the search, with an inexhaustible resource of wicked glee, and it was two very red and spluttering men who faced him after they had ransacked every room under the running commentary with which he enlivened their tour.

“Get your hat,” Nassen said. “You’re comin| along with us.”

Simon put down his glass—they were back in the living room then.

“On what charge, Snowdrop?” he inquired.

“The charge is being in possession of informa-tion contrary to the Official Secrets Act.”

“It sounds a mouthful,” Simon admitted. “Shall I pack my powder puff as well, or will you be able to lend me one?”

“Get your hat!” Nassen choked out in a shaking voice.

The Saint put a cigarette between his lips and stroked a thumb over the cog of his lighter. He looked at Patricia through the first feather of smoke, returning the lighter to his pocket, and the carless twinkle in his eyes might or might not have been an integral part of the smile that flitted across his brown face. “It looks as if we shall have to finish our talk

later, old darling,” he murmured. “Snowdrop is in a hurry. Save some sherry for me, will you?—I shan’t be long.”

Almost incredulously, but with a sudden leap of uncomprehending fear, she watched him saunter serenely from the room, and through the open door he saw him pick up his raincoat from the hall chair and pause to adjust his soft hat to its correct piratical angle before he went out. Long after he had gone, she was still trying to make herself believe that she had seen Simon Templar, the man who had tantalized all the forces of law and order in the world for more years than any of them liked to be reminded of, arrested as easily as that.

III

Riding in a taxi between the two detectives, the Saint looked at his watch and saw that he had been in England less than four hours, and he had to admit that the pace was fairly rapid even by his exacting standards. One whiskered hold-up mer-chant, an unidentified shadower in a taxi, and two public-school detectives worked out at a reasonably hectic average for the time involved; but Simon knew that that was only a preliminary sample of the kind of attention he could expect while he re-mained the holder of Her Wedding Secret.