The Saint Meets His Match (20 page)

Thus it was that he stood
where he was, inertly ponder
ing, until the car turned
into St. James’s Street. As it did so, a woman leaned forward to throw a
cigarette end out
of the window, and the light of a
street lamp fell full
across her face.

She was hatless. He saw
straight, jet black hair, fine
straight black eyebrows,
eyes in deep shadow, carmine
lips. These things
belonged to no woman that he knew.

Thoughtfully he spat out a scrap of spearmint
in which
the flavour had ceased to last,
extracted a fresh wafer
from the
packet in his pocket, engulfed it, and chewed
with renewed enthusiasm. Then, still thoughtfully, he
proceeded on his way.

The hiatus in his memory
annoyed him, and even when
he had filled it up it
still annoyed him, for it was his
boast that he never
forgot a face. This was his first lapse in years, and he was never able to
account for it to his
satisfaction.

It was nearly an hour
later, when he was chatting to the
divisional
inspector in Walton Street police station, that
the
blind spot in Teal’s brain was suddenly uncovered.

“If you don’t mind
my saying so, sir,” remarked the
divisional
inspector, “we’ve probably been combing all
the wrong places. A man
and a woman like Templar and
Trelawney can
reckon up some nerve between them.
They’re
probably staying at some place like the Ritz——
”

Teal’s mouth flopped open,
and his small blue eyes
seemed to swell up in his face. The divisional
inspector
stared at him.

“What’s the matter,
sir?”

“The Ritz!”
groaned Teal. “Oh, holy hollerin’ Moses!
The
Ritz!”

He tore out of the
station like a stampeding alp, leaving the D.I. gaping blankly at the space he
had been occupy
ing. The back exit, a breathless
sprint down Yeoman’s Row, brought him to the Brompton Road, and he was
fortunate enough to catch a taxi without having to wait
a moment.

“The Ritz
Hotel,” panted Teal. “And drive like blazes.
I’m
a police officer.”

He climbed in, with
bursting lungs. He had left his
sprinting days behind him long ago.

He was wide awake
now—when, as he realized with
disgust it was somewhat
late in the day to have woken up.

A few minutes later he
was interviewing the manage
ment of the Ritz. The management was anxious to
be
helpful, and at the same time anxious to
preserve itself
from any of the
wrong sort of publicity. Teal was not
interested in the private
susceptibilities of the management. He made his inquisition coldly and
efficiently, and
it did not take him long
to narrow the search down to just two names on the register—the charming Mr.
and Mrs.
Joseph M. Halliday, of Boston, Mass.

Teal inspected the small
suite they had occupied, and
heard from the floor
waiter the story of how Mrs. Halliday
had been in bed with a severe cold ever
since her arrival,
and how Mr. Halliday,
like a truly devoted American hus
band,
had never left her side. This evening was the first
evening they had been out. Mrs. Halliday had felt
so
much better that Mr. Halliday had
decided that a short
spin in the
country, well wrapped up in a closed car,
might do her a lot of good.

“On a nice warm
winter’s night!” commented Teal sar
castically.
“And, of course, in the dark she could enjoy
the
scenery! Yes, that’s a very good story.”

The source of information
was understood to remark
that such eccentricities
were to be expected of wealthy
Americans.

“Yes, very wealthy
Americans,” agreed Teal.

He picked up a small
leather valise. It was empty.
Further investigation
showed that it was the one and only
item of their
property that Mr. and Mrs. Halliday had
left in the suite.

“Did they take any
rugs with them?” asked Teal.

“They borrowed two from the hotel, sir,
for the drive.”

“It’s amazing what a
lot of stuff you can carry under a
rug,” said
Teal, “if you know the trick of packing it.”

Returning downstairs to
the manager’s office, he learnt, as he expected, that the car had been ordered
by the hotel
on behalf of Mr. Halliday.

“We arrange these things,” said the
manager.

“And
sometimes,” said Teal, with a certain morose en
thusiasm, “you pay
for them, too.”

The manager was not entirely green.

“I suppose,’ he said,
“we needn’t expect them back?”

“You needn’t,”
said Teal. “That’s another eccentricity
of
these very wealthy Americans.”

He hurried back to
Scotland Yard, and by the time he
arrived there he
had decided that there was only one
place in England
where Jill Trelawney and Simon Tem
plar could
plausibly be going that night.

He tried to telephone to
Essenden, and was informed
that the line was out of
order. Then he tried to get in
touch with the assistant commissioner, but
Cullis had left
the Yard at six o’clock, and
was not to be found either
at his
private address or at his club.

Teal was left with only
one thing to do; for he had a
profound contempt for all
police officials outside the
Metropolitan area.

At ten minutes to ten he
was speeding through the west of London in a police car; and he realized,
grimly, that he
was unlikely to arrive at Essenden’s
anything less than
two hours too late.

Chapter VII

HOW JILL TRELAWNEY KEPT AN APPOINTMENT,

AND SIMON TEMPLAR WENT
PADDLING

E
SSENDEN
poured himself out another drink, and pushed
the
decanter towards the centre of the table.

It was quiet in Essenden
Towers that night. Lord Essenden
had seen to that. With
some ingenuity, and a solic
itude which hitherto he had
not been in the habit of
manifesting, he had
suggested to Lady Essenden that her appreciation of country life would be
enhanced by an
occasional visit to London, In fact,
he said, he had taken
a box at the Orpheum
Theatre, for that very night.

It was unfortunate that at
the last moment, when they had been on the point of setting out for London,
Lord
Essenden had been overcome by a violent and agonizing
attack of toothache. But he refused to allow his misfortune to
interfere with his wife’s amusement, and insisted
that
she should go to London alone. He had telephoned
to
friends and arranged for them to accompany his lady.

That was one thing. The
servants had been a second
problem. But, in the
matter of disposing of the servants,
Fate had played
kindly into his hand. That night there
was
a dance in the next village. His staff had previously
applied
to him for permission to attend, which he had
refused.
Now he repented, and, in an astonishing burst of
generosity,
he gave the evening off to every man and
woman
in Essenden Towers. The butler would have
stayed,
but Essenden packed him off with the others, say
ing
he would much rather be left alone with his ache.

Thus it had been easy for
Lord Essenden to introduce
into the house the four men who now bore him
company.

They had been carefully
chosen. Lord Essenden had
very few more criminal
acquaintances than any other suc
cessful financier, but
from the hoodlums of his acquaint
ance he had
selected those four with care and forethought.

They sat round the table, helping themselves
from the
whisky bottle which he had placed at
their disposal-
four carefully chosen
men. There was “Flash” Arne, a ferrety-faced man with a taste in
diamond rings and horsy
tweeds, a prominent member of a race gang that
many
North of England bookmakers had known
to their cost. There was “Snake” Ganning, recently released from Pentonville
; tall and lean and supple, with the sleek black
hair and long neck and beady eyes that had earned
him
his name. There was
“Red” Harver, with the permanent
scowl and the huge hasty
fists. And there was Matthew
Keld, who had
once had his face slashed from temple to
chin with a razor by a man who was never given the
chance to slash another face in his life. Four
very carefully chosen men.

Essenden spoke:

“Is everything quite
clear?”

He looked round the small
circle of faces, and the owners of the faces gazed back at him complacently.
Snake G
anning inclined his head on the end of his long neck
and
answered for them all, in his soft, sibilant voice.

“Everything’s quite clear.”

“I can’t tell you how
they’ll come in,” said Essenden.
“I do know
that there are only two of them. If I know any
thing
about them, I should say they’d probably walk up
to
the front door and ring the bell. But they may not. I’ve
worked out the posts I’ve given you in different parts of
the house so
that each one of you will easily be able to
cover
his share of the ground-floor rooms. There are
alarms everywhere, and you will all be in touch with one
another.
The man you wilt deal with as you like. The girl you will bring to me.”

It
was the fourth or fifth time that Lord Essenden had
repeated similar instructions in his fussy and hesitant
way, and the Snake’s sunken black eyes regarded their
employer with a certain contempt.

“We heard you,” he said.

“All right.”

Essenden fidgeted with his
tie, and looked at his watch
for the twentieth time.

“I think you’d better
go to your posts,” he said.

Ganning rose, uncoiling his long length like a
slowed-
up jack-in-the-box.

“C’mon,” he
said.

Arne and Keld rose to
follow him, but Red Harver sat
where he was. Ganning
tapped him on the shoulder.

“C’mon, Beef.”

Harver rose slowly,
without looking round. His eyes
were fixed intently on something behind
Essenden. Behind Essenden was a window, with the heavy curtains
drawn.

The others, looking curiously at Harver,
grasped what
he was staring at, and
followed his gaze. But they saw
nothing. Essenden himself turned, with
an abrupt jumpy
movement. Then he turned
round again.

“What’s the matter,
Harver?” he croaked.

Harver’s huge arm and fist shot out, pointing.

“Did you shut that
window?” he demanded.

“Of course I did
,”
said Essenden. “You saw me shut it.”

“You shut it properly?”

“Of course I
did,” repeated Essenden.

Harver pushed the table
out of his path with a sweep
of one arm.

“Well, if it hasn’t
blown open,” he said, “somebody’s
opened
it. I’ve just seen those curtains move!”

He stood in the centre of
the group, a red-headed giant,
and the others
instinctively checked their breath.

Essenden shifted away.

Ganning’s right hand
sidled round to his hip pocket,
and Flash Arne buttoned his
coat deliberately.

Harver stepped cautiously
forward on tiptoe.

The stealthy movement
ended in a quick rush. Harver’s
huge, ape-like arms
gathered up all the curtains in one
wide sweep, and he
held something in the enveloping
folds of the curtains like a fish in a net.

He carried his whole
capture bodily back into the
centre of the room,
tearing the curtains down as if they
had been held with
thin cotton. There he threw the
bundle down, and stood back
while the intruder strug
gled into view.