The Saint Meets His Match (She was a Lady)

closely written pages, under a subheading which was anything but commonplace. Indeed, that subheading must have caused many searchings of heart to the staid member of the clerical department who had had to type it out, and must similarly have bothered the man responsi­ble for the cross-indexing of the records, when he had had to print it neatly on one of his respectable little cards for the files. For that subheading was 'The Angels of Doom,' which Records Office must have felt was a heading far more suitable for inclusion in a library of sensational fiction than for a collection of data dealing solely with sober fact.

How Simon Templar came upon the scene was another matter—but really quite a simple one. For the Saint could never resist anything like that. He read of the early ex­ploits of the Angels of Doom in the rare newspapers that he took the trouble to peruse, and was interested. Later, he heard further facts about Jill Trelawney from Chief Inspector Teal himself, and was even more interested. And the day came when he inveigled Chief Inspector Teal into accepting an invitation to lunch; and when the detective had been suitably mellowed by a menu selected with the Saint's infallible instinct for luxurious living, the Saint said, casually: 'By the way, Claud Eus­tace, do you happen to remember that I was once invited to join the Special Branch?'

And Chief Inspector Teal removed the eight-inch cigar from his face and blinked—suspiciously.

'I remember,' he said.

'And you  remember my  answer?'

'Not word for word, but——'

'I refused.'

Teal nodded.

'I've thought, since, that perhaps that was one of the kindest things you ever did for me,' he said.

The Saint smiled.

'Then I want you to take a deep breath and hold on to your socks, Claud Eustace, old okapi,' he murmured, and the detective looked up.

'You want to try it?'   .

Simon nodded.

'Just lately,' he said, 'I've been feeling an awful urge towards that little den of yours on the Embankment. I believe I was really born to be a policeman. As the scourge of ungodliness, I should be ten times more deadly with an official position. And there's one particular case on hand at the moment which is only waiting for a bloke like me to knock the hell out of it. Teal, wouldn't you like to call me 'Sir'?'

'I should hate it,' said Teal.

But there were others in Scotland Yard who thought differently.

For it had long since been agreed, among the heads of that gloomy organization of salaried kill-joys which exists for the purposes of causing traffic jams, suppressing riotous living and friendly wassail, and discouraging the noble sport of soaking the ungodly on the boko, that something had got to be done about the Saint. The only point which up to that time had never been quite unani­mously agreed on was what exactly was to be done.

The days had been when, to quote one flippant com­mentary, Chief Inspector Teal would have given ten years' salary for the privilege of leading the Saint gently by the arm into the nearest police station, and a number of gentlemen in the underworld would have given ten years' liberty for the pleasure of transporting the Saint to the top of the chute of a blast furnace and quietly back-heeling him into the stew. These things may be read in other volumes of the Saint Saga. But somehow the Saint had continued to go his pleasantly piratical way unscathed, to the rage and terror of the underworld and the despair of Chief Inspector Teal—buccaneer in the suits of Savile Row, amused, cool, debonair, with hell-for-leather blue eyes and a Saintly smile. . . .

And then, all at once, as it seemed, he had finished his work, and that should