lips. Then something cold and metallic touched the back of his neck, and one of his fares spoke crisply: 'Gehen Sie schnell, mein Freund!'
The driver obeyed.
The fact that, having been given no destination to drive to, he was quietly steering his passengers in the direction of the nearest police station, is of no great historical interest. For when he reached the station he was without passengers; and the officials who heard his story were inclined to cast grave doubts upon that worthy citizen's sobriety, until confirmation of some of his statements arrived through another channel.
Stella Domford and the Saint had quietly left him in a convenient traffic block; for Simon had much more to do in the next twenty-four hours, and he was in no mood to be delayed by embarrassing inquiries.
7
'And if that doesn't learn you, my girl,' said the Saint, a trifle grimly, 'nothing ever will.'
They were in a room in the hotel where the girl had parked her luggage before proceeding to the interview with Einsmann. The Saint, with a cigarette between his lips and a glass tankard of dark syrupy Kulmbach on the table beside him, was sitting on the bed, bandaging his arm with two white linen handkerchiefs torn into strips. Stella Domford stood by shame facedly.
'I'm sorry I was such a fool,' she said.
Simon looked up at her. She was very pale, but this was not the pallor of anger with which she had begun the day.
'Can I help you with that?' she asked.
'It's nothing,' he said cheerfully. 'I'm never hurt. It's a gift. . . .'
He secured his effort with a safety pin, and rolled down his sleeve. Then he gave her one of his quick, impulsive smiles.
'Anyway,' he said, 'you've seen some Life. And that was what you wanted, wasn't it?'
'You can't make me feel worse than I do already.'
He laughed and stood up; and she looked round as his hands fell on her shoulders.
'Why worry, old dear?' he said. 'It's turned out all right- so what the hell? You don't even have to rack your brains to think of an unfutile way of saying 'Thank you.' I've loved it. The pleasure of shooting Jacob in the tum-tum was worth a dozen of these scratches. So let's leave it at that.' He ruffled her hair absently. 'And now we'll beat it back to England, shall we?'
He turned away, and picked up his coat.
'Are you leaving now?' she asked in surprise.
Simon nodded.
'I'm afraid we must. In the first place, this evening's mirth and horseplay is liable to start a certain hue and cry after me in this bouncing burg. I don't know that that alone would make me jump for the departure platform; but there's also a man I want to see in England-about a sort of dog. I'm sorry about the rush, but things always seem to happen to me in a hurry. Are you ready?'
They landed for a late meal at Amsterdam; and they had not long left Schiphol behind when the darkness and the monotonous roar of the engine soothed Stella Dornford into a deep sleep of sheer nervous weariness. She awoke when the engine was suddenly silenced, and found that they were gliding down into the pale half-light before dawn.
'I think there's enough light to make a landing here,' Simon answered her question through the telephones. 'I don't want to have to go on to Croydon.'
There was, at least, enough light for the Saint to make a perfect landing; and he taxied up to the deserted hangars and left the machine there for the mechanics to find in the morning. Then he went in search of his car.
In the car, again, she slept; and it is therefore not surprising that she never thought of Francis Lemuel until after the Saint had unloaded her into one of the friendliest sitting rooms she had ever seen, and after he had prepared eggs and bacon and coffee for them both, and after they had smoked two cigarettes together. And then it was Simon who reminded her.
'I want you to help me with a telephone conversation,' he said, and proceeded to coach her carefully. A few minutes later she had dialled a number and was waiting for the reply.
Then: 'Are you Piccadilly thrrree-eight thrrree-four?' she asked sweetly.
The answer came in a decorated affirmative. 'You're wanted from Berlin.'
She clicked the receiver hook; and then the Saint took over the instrument.
'Dot vos you Lemuel, no? . . . You vould like to hear about it der business, aind't it? ... Ja! I hof seddled it altogether der business. Der man yill not more trrouble gif, andt der samples I hof also received it, yes. . . .'
A couple of lines of brisk dialogue, this time in German, between the Saint and an excellent impersonator of the Berlin exchange, cut short the conversation with the Saint hurriedly concluding: 'Ja! I to you der particulars to- morrow vill wrrrite. ...'
'It's detail that does it,' murmured Simon complacently, as he replaced the receiver.
Stella Domford was regarding him with a certain awe. 'I'm beginning to understand some of the things I've read about you,' she said; and the Saint grinned. Shortly afterwards he excused himself; and when he returned to the sitting room, which was in a surprisingly short space of time, he had changed out of the characteristically conspicuous suit in which he had travelled, and was wearing a plain and unnoticeable blue serge. The Saint's phenomenal speed of dressing would have made the fortune of a professional quick-change artist; and he was as pleased with the girl's unspoken astonishment at his feat as he had been with her first compliment.
'Where are you going?' she demanded, when she had found her voice.
'To see you home, first,' he answered briskly. 'And then I have a little job of work to do.'
'But why have you changed?'
The Saint adjusted a cheap black tie.
'The job might turn into a funeral,' he said. 'I don't seriously think it will, but I like to be prepared.'
She was still mystified when he left her at the door of her apartment.
From there he drove down to Piccadilly, and left his car in St. James's Street, proceeding afterwards on foot. Here the reason for his change of costume began to appear. Anyone might have remarked the rare spectacle of a truly Saintly figure parading the West End of London at six o'clock in the morning arrayed in one of the most dazzling creations of Savile Row; but no one came forward to describe the soberly dressed and commonplace- looking young man who committed the simplest audacity of the season.
Nor could he ever afterwards have been identified by the sleepy-eyed porter who answered his ring at a certain bell in Jermyn Street; for, when the door was opened, Simon's face was masked from eyes to chin by a handkerchief folded three-cornerwise, and his hat brim shaded his eyes. So much the porter saw before the Saint struck once, swiftly, mercifully, and regretfully, with a supple rubber truncheon. . . .
The Saint closed the door behind him and unbuttoned his double-breasted coat. There were a dozen turns of light rope wound round his waist belt-fashion, and with these he secured the janitor hand and foot, completing the work with a humane but efficient gag. Then he lifted the unconscious man and carried him to the little cubicle at the back of the hall, where he left him-after taking his keys.
He raced up the stairs to the door of Lemuel's apartment, which was on the second floor. It was the work of a moment only to find the right key. Then, if the door were bolted . . . But apparently Lemuel relied on the security of his Yale lock and the watchfulness of the porter. . . .
The Saint passed like a cat down the passage that opened before him, listening at door after door. Presently he heard the sound of rhythmic breathing, and he entered Lemuel's bedroom without a sound, and stood over the bed like a ghost.
He was certain that Lemuel must have spent a restless night until the recent telephone call came through to calm his fears.
There were a bottle, a siphon, a glass, and an ash tray heaped with cigarette ends on a table by the bedside to support this assumption; but now Lemuel must be sleeping the sleep of the dead.
