The Saint Meets His Match (She was a Lady)

 

CHIEF INSPECTOR TEAL reverently unwrapped his fourth wafer of gum. Simon Templar had bought it specially for him, and Teal was doing himself proud.

'Though why you aren't dead,' said Mr. Teal, 'is more than anyone will ever know.'

The Saint, with a bandaged head and nothing more, grinned cheerfully.

'You can't keep a good man down,' he said.

'It was sheer luck you didn't get me down,' said Teal. 'And that would have been a good man lost to the C. I. D., though I says it myself. I shall never be able to make out why none of us was hurt. It may have been because we'd almost stopped when you hit us; but our car was spun round broadside to the road—off-side front wheel knocked off as if it had been cut with a knife, chassis tied in a knot, both axles bust, gear box all over the road, and a worse shaking for all of us than any of us want to have again.'

'Will you be sending in the bill?' drawled the Saint.

They were at Upper Berkeley Mews, where they had repaired for a very late supper, but it was more like breakfast than anything else.

Then the story of Lord Essenden was told, and also the story of Waldstein, and the chief commissioner's verdict was given. He looked at the girl and smiled.

'I believe you,' he said. 'There's the Saint to back you up in the story of Essenden, and now that I know you a little better I'm not sure that I should question it even without that. As for the rest, outside of our four selves there is no one left alive who knows anything worth knowing. And I don't think any of us will ask for trouble. We've had enough of the Angels of Doom.'

He looked across at Teal for confirmation, and Chief Inspector Teal nodded drowsily. He seemed to be on the point of falling asleep.

'And the 'Wanted for Murder' business?' asked the Saint.

'That can be forgotten. Fresh evidence has come to light, and the charge has been withdrawn. That can be arranged without any fuss. And if Miss Trelawney is going back to the States——'

'I want,' said Chief Inspector Teal, with a sudden and startling loudness, 'to wash my hands.'

Three pairs of eyes revolved slowly in their sockets and centred on him with an intentness that would have shat­tered the nerve of a lesser man, but Chief Inspector Teal suffered his blushing honours without visible emotion.

And then the Saint laughed.

'But of course,' he said. 'There's a barrel of very good beer in the kitchen—you might try that. Duodecimo's out there blowing himself tight with Chianti, but Orace will move him on if you say the word. . . . Will you want any soap?'

'I think,' said Sir Hamilton Dorn mildly, 'that we shall be able to find what we want.'

The Saint watched the door close behind them; and then he loafed back to the fireplace, lighted a cigarette, and stood there with his hands in his pockets.

'Only the epilogue is left,' he said.

'And a joke to explain,' said Jill Trelawney.

Simon regarded her with his cigarette in one corner of a smiling mouth and his eyebrows aslant—rather like a blue-eyed and boyish Mephistopheles. Suddenly she un­derstood all his charm.