Featuring the Saint

'What of her?'

'It was the Senor Shannet,' said De Villega, enjoying his moment, 'who first suggested that you were the man behind the war. We did not believe him, but now I see that he is a wise man. He left us over half an hour ago to take her as hostage. You gave me no chance to explain that when the guards entered the room just now. But I told them to remain within call for that reason-so that I could summon them as soon as you surrendered. Now it is my turn to make an offer. Stop this war, and deliver yourself and your accomplices to justice, and I will save the Senorita McAndrew. Otherwise--' Don Manuel shrugged. 'Am I answerable for the affections of the Senor Shannet?'

A throaty chuckle of devilish merriment shook him, and he bowed to the motionless Saint with a leering mock humility.

'I, in my turn, await your decision, senor,' he said.

10

The Saint leaned on his sword.

He was cursing himself for the fool he was. Never before in his career had he been guilty of such an appalling lapse. Never would he have believed that he could be capable of overlooking the probability of such an obvious counter-attack. Now his brain was whirling like the flywheel of a great dynamo, and he was considering, calculating, readjusting, summarizing every thing in the light of this new twist that De .Villega had given to the affair. Yet his face showed nothing of the storm behind it.

'And how do I know that you will keep your bargain?' he asked.

'You do not know,' replied De Villega brazenly. 'You only know that, if you do not agree to my terms, the senor Shannet will certainly take reprisals. I offer you a hope.'

So that was the strength of it. And, taken by and large, it didn't strike the Saint as a proposition to jump at. It offered him exactly nothing-except the opportunity to go nap on Don Manuel's honour and Shannet's generosity, two bets which no one could have called irresistibly attractive. Also, it involved Kelly and Sheridan, who hadn't been consulted. And it meant, in the end, that all three of them would most certainly be executed, whatever De Villega decided to do about Lilla McAndrew, whom Shannet would probably claim, and be allowed, as a reward for his share in suppressing the revolution. No. . . .

Where were Kelly and Sheridan? The Saint was reckoning it out rapidly, taking into consideration the age of Kelly's Ford and the reported abominable state of the roads between Esperanza and Santa Miranda. And, checking his calculation over, the Saint could only get one answer, which was that Kelly and Sheridan were due to arrive at any minute. They would learn of the abduction. . . .

'The Senora Kelly?' asked the Saint. 'What of her?'

De Villega shrugged.

'She is of no importance.'

Yes, Mrs. Kelly would be left behind-if she had not been shot. She was middle-aged and stout and past her attractive ness, and no one would have any interest in abducting her. So that Kelly and Sheridan, arriving at the bungalow, would hear the tale from her.

And then-there was no doubt about it-they would come storming down to the palace, guardias and sentries not withstanding, with cold murder in their hearts.

The Saint came erect, and De Villega looked up expectantly. But there was no sign of surrender in the Saint's poise, and nothing relenting about the way in which he stepped up to the minister and set the point of his sword at his breast.

'I said I came for your resignations,' remarked the Saint with a deadly quietness. 'That was no idle talk. Write now, De Villega, or, by the vixen that bore thee, thou diest!'

'Fool! Fool!' Don Manuel raved. 'It cannot help you!'

'I take the risk,' said the Saint icily. 'And do not speak so loud-I might think you were trying to attract the attention of the guards. Write!'

He thrust the sword forward the half of an inch, and De Villega started back with a cry.

'You would murder me?'

'With pleasure,' said the Saint. 'Write!'

Then there was sudden silence, and everyone was quite still, listening. For from the courtyard below the windows came the rattle of urgent hoofs.

The Saint leaped to the windows. There were three horses held by the sentries. He saw Shannet and two other men dismounting-and saw, being lifted down from Shannet's saddle bow, Lilla McAndrew with her hands tied.

He could have shouted for joy at the justification of his bold defiance. And yet, if he had thought a little longer, he might have foreseen that the girl would be brought to the palace. She was not the victim of Shannet's privateering, but an official hostage. But even if the Saint hadn't forseen it, there it was, and he could have prayed for nothing better. He saw all the trump cards coming into his hands. . . .

Then he whipped round, in time to frustrate De Villega's stealthy attack, and the minister's raised arm dropped to his side.

The Saint speared the sword into the floor and slipped the revolvers out of his sash. For the second time he dodged be hind the opening door. He saw the girl thrust roughly into the room, and Shannet followed, closing the door again behind him.

'Fancy meeting you again, honeybunch!' drawled the Saint, and Shannet spun round with an oath.

The Saint leaned against the wall, the presidential and ministerial revolvers in his hands. On his lips was a smile so broad as to be almost a laugh, and there was a laugh in his voice.

'Take that hand away from your hip, Shannet, my pet!' went on the Saint, in that laughing voice of sheer delight. 'I've got you covered-and even if I'm not very used to these toys, I could hardly miss you at this range. . . . That's better. . . . Oh, Shannet, my sweet and beautiful gargoyle, you're a bad boy, frightening that child. Take the cords off her wrists, my angel. . . . No, Senor de Villega, you needn't edge towards that sword. I may want it again myself in a minute. Gracias! ... Is that more comfortable, Lilla, old dear?'

'Oh,' cried the girl, 'thank God you're here! Where's Archie?'

'On his way, old darling, on his way, as the actress said of the bishop,' answered the Saint. 'Are you all right?'

She shuddered a little.

'Yes, I'm all right,' she said. 'Except for the touch of his filthy hands. But I was very frightened. . . .'

'Archie will deal with that when he arrives,' said the Saint. 'It's his business-he'd never forgive me if I interfered. Come here, my dear, keeping well out of the line of fire, while I deal with the specimens. I'm not the greatest revolver shot in the world, and I want to be sure that it won't matter who I hit.'

He steered her to safety in a comer, and turned to Don Manuel.

'When we were interrupted,' said the Saint persuasively, 'you were writing. The interruption has now been disposed of. Proceed, senor!'

De Villega lurched back to the table, the fight gone out of him. He could never have envisaged such an accumulation and culmination of misfortunes. It was starting to seem to him all together like a dream, a nightmare rather-but there was nothing ethereal about the revolver that was levelled so steadily at him. The only fantastic part of the whole catastrophe was the man who had engineered it-the Saint himself, in his extraordinary borrowed clothes, and the hell-for-leather light of laughing recklessness in his blue eyes. That was the last bitter pill which De Villega had to swallow. He might perhaps have endured defeat by a man whom he could understand-a cloaked and sinister conspirator with a personality of impressive grimness. But this lunatic who laughed. . . . Que diablos! It was impossible. . . .

And then, from outside, drifted a grinding, screaming, metallic rattle that could only be made by one instrument in the world.

'Quick!' said the Saint. 'Slither round behind Master Shannet, Lilla, darling, and slip the gat out of his hip pocket. . . . That's right. . . . Now d'you mind sticking up the gang for a sec. while I hail the troops? Blaze away if