The Saint Meets His Match (She was a Lady)

As the doors flew open, she looked at three complete outfits hung in a little row—a set of workman's overalls, a suit of violently purple check and a Shaftesbury Avenue nattiness, and a filthy and ragged costume such as a down-at-heels sandwichman might wear. And neatly arranged on adjacent shelves were the shirts, socks, ties, mufflers, overcoats, hats, and shoes to complete the disguises down to the last minute detail.

For a few seconds she surveyed the treasure trove; and then, with slow deliberation, she crushed out her cigarette. . . .

The outfit she contrived for herself from the materials at her disposal was a heterogeneous affair, but it was the best she could do. A shabby pair of trousers, with the ends tucked up inside the legs and secured with safety pins, fitted her passably well; but tall as she was, there was no coat in the collection that she could wear. A stained and tattered mackintosh, however, could be made to pass, with the sleeves treated in a similar manner to the legs of the trousers; and a gaudy scarf knotted about her neck would conceal the deficiencies of her costume in other respects. She pulled a tweed cap well down onto her head, tucking her hair away out of sight beneath it. From the kitchen she was able to grub out enough grime to disguise her face and hands against any casual scrutiny; her own low-heeled walking shoes were heavy enough to pass mus­ter. And then she inspected the completed work of art in a full-length mirror, and found that it was good. . . .

And thus, after one searching glance round, she went out in quest of her share of the adventure.

The only thrill she felt was not due to anything like nerves. It was simply a vast relief to be clear of the studio, in which she had been practically a prisoner for the last ten days, and to be out again on an active enterprise instead of merely sitting at home and having enigmatic information, which was really worse than no information at all, brought to her by the Saint.

The Saint, at any rate, had told her enough about Mr. Assistant Commissioner Cullis to decide her that Simon Templar's simple plan, whatever it was, could not be good enough.

It wasn't for Jill Trelawney to sit tight and wait for Cullis to come out of his hole and fight. Far from that——she was going out to meet Mr. Cullis.

A faint tingle of unleashed delight vibrated through her as she walked. She hummed a little tune; and the melancholy droop of the unlighted cigarette attached to the corner of her mouth had no counterpart in her spirits. The cool freshness of the night air went to her head; after the wearisome atmosphere of the studio, it came like a draught of wine to a parched man. Respectable restraint and Jill Trelawney definitely failed to blend. For days past she had been feeling that the enforced idleness had been crushing her into an intolerable groove, even sap­ping from her the very personality without which she would become nothing but an ordinary unadventurous woman—a ridiculous idea to anyone who had ever known her, and most intolerable of all to herself.

In her elation she hardly noticed the passage of time or distance, and picked her route almost by instinct. Almost before she realized how far she had travelled, she had passed Belsize Park Underground Station; she paused there a moment to pick up her bearings, and then, a hundred yards farther on, she struck away down a dark side street within measurable distance of her goal.

She rounded first one corner and then another, and paused under a lamppost to light her cigarette. The ac­tion was more instinctive than necessary: in the whole of her body there was not a nerve quivering for need of the sedative, but the draught of velvety smoke helped to col­lect her thoughts and lent balance to her impetuosity; and she felt, in a moment's touch of self-mockery, that it was a debonair thing to do. It was the sort of thing the Saint would have done. ...

From where she stood she surveyed the lie of the land.

It was simple enough. The house stood away from the road, exactly as the Saint had described it, in its own rather spacious grounds, and there was not a light show­ing anywhere. To find it almost without hesitation had been easy enough. The studio in Chelsea had been amply equipped for the simple preparation of any such excur­sion. There had been a telephone directory from which to discover Cullis's address, a street directory in which to find the exact location of his house, and a large-scale map from which to read the most