The Saint vs Scotland Yard (The Holy Terror)

'I call it a fact,' he said softly. 'And you will keep your hands away from that bell until I've finished talking. . . . You are the Scorpion, Wilfred, and you're probably the most successful blackmailer of the age. I grant you that—your technique is novel and thorough. But blackmail is a nasty crime. Your ingenuity has already driven two men to suicide. That was stupid of them, but it was also very naughty of you. In fact, it would really give me great pleasure to peg you in your front garden and push this highly desirable residence over on top of you; but for one thing I've promised to reserve you for the hangman and for another thing I've got my income tax to pay, so——Excuse me one moment.'

Something like a flying chip of frozen quicksilver flashed across the room and plonked crisply into the wooden panel around the bell-push towards which Garniman's fingers were sidling. It actually passed between his second and third fingers, so that he felt the swift chill of its passage and snatched his hand away as if it had received an electric shock. But the Saint continued his languid propping up of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, and he did not appear to have moved.

'Just do what you're told, Wilfred, and everything will be quite all right—but I've got lots more of them there missiles packed in my pants,' murmured the Saint soothingly, warningly, and untruthfully—though Mr. Garniman had no means of perceiving this last adverb. 'What was I saying? . . . Oh yes. I have my income tax to pay——'

Garniman took a sudden step forward, and his lips twisted in a snarl.

'Look here——'

'Where?' asked the Saint excitedly.

Mr. Garniman swallowed. The Saint heard him distinctly.

'You thrust yourself in here under a false name—you behave like a raving lunatic—then you make the most wild and fantastic accusations—you——'

'Throw knives about the place——'

'What the devil,' bellowed Mr. Garniman, 'do you mean by it?'

'Sir,' suggested the Saint mildly.

'What the devil,' bellowed Mr. Garniman, 'do you mean— 'sir'?'

'Thank you,' said the Saint.

Mr. Garniman glared. 'What the——'

'O.K.,' said the Saint pleasantly. 'I heard you the second time. So long as you go on calling me 'sir', I shall know that everything is perfectly respectable and polite. And now we've lost the place again. Half a minute. . . . Here we are: 'I have my income tax to pay'— '

'Will you get out at once,' asked Garniman, rather quietly, 'or must I send for the police?'

Simon considered the question.

'I should send for the police,' he suggested at length.

He hitched himself off the book-case and sauntered leisurely across the room. He detached his little knife from the bell panel, tested the point delicately on his thumb, and restored the weapon to the sheath under his left sleeve; and Wilfred Garniman watched him without speaking. And then the Saint turned.

'Certainly—I should send for the police,' he drawled. 'They will be interested. It's quite true that I had a pardon for some old offences; but whether I've gone out of business, or whether I'm simply just a little cleverer than Chief Inspector Teal, is a point that is often debated at Scotland Yard. I think that any light you could throw on the problem would be welcomed.'

Garniman was still silent; and the Saint looked at him, and laughed caressingly.

'On the other hand—if you're bright enough to see a few objections to that idea—you might prefer to push quietly on to your beautiful office and think over some of the other things I've said. Particularly those pregnant words about my income tax.'

'Is that all you have to say?' asked Garniman, in the same low voice; and the Saint nodded.

'It'll do for now,' he said lightly. 'And since you seem to have decided against the police, I think I'll beetle off and concentrate on the method by which you're going to be in­duced to contribute to the Inland Revenue.'

The slightest glitter of expression came to Wilfred Garni­man's eyes for a moment, and was gone again. He walked to the door and opened it.

'I'm obliged,' he said.