The Saint vs Scotland Yard (The Holy Terror)

and the woofling dies, so to speak, and we settle down to get acquainted. We approach the peaceful inter­lude

When the cakes and ale are over

    And the buns and beer runs dry

And the pigs are all in clover

    Up above the bright blue sky—

as the poet hath it. Do you ever write poetry?' Perrigo said nothing.

'He does not write poetry,' said the Saint.

The car stopped a few yards from the entrance of Upper Berkeley Mews, and Simon leaned forward and put his elbows on the back of the front seat. He rested his chin on his hands.

'When we were interrupted, darling,' he said, 'I was on the point of making some remarks about your mouth. It is, bar none, the most bewitching, alluring, tempting, maddening, seductive mouth I've ever kiss—set eyes on. The idea that it should ever be used for eating kippers is sacrilegious. You will oblige me by eating no more kippers. The way your lips curl at the corners when you're not sure whether you'll smile or not——'

Patricia turned with demure eyes.

'What do we do now?' she asked; and the Saint sighed.

'Teal's bloodhound saw you go out?'

'Yes.'

'Then he'd better see you go in again. It'll set his mind at rest. Bertie and I will go our ways.'

He opened the door and stepped out, Perrigo followed, constrained to do so by a grip which the Saint had fastened on the scruff of his neck. Maintaining possession of Perrigo, Si­mon leaned on the side of the car.

'When we get a minute or two to ourselves, Pat,' he said, 'remind me that my discourse on your eyes, which occupies about two hundred and fifty well-chosen words——'

'Is to be continued in our next,' said Patricia happily, and let in the clutch.

Simon stood for a moment where she had left him, watching the car swing round into the mews.

And he was realising that the warbling and the woofling were very near their end. His flippant parody had struck home into the truth.

It was a queer moment for that blithe young cavalier of fortune. Out of the clear sky of the completely commonplace, it had flashed down upon him with a blinding brightness. The lights pointed to the end. No tremendous battle had done it, no breathless race for life, no cataclysmic instant of vision when all the intangible battlements of Paradise were shown up under the shadow of the sword. Fate, in the cussedness of its own inscrutable designs, had ordained that the revelation should be otherwise. Something simple and startling, a thing seen so often and grown so tranquilly familiar that the sudden unmasking of its inner portent would sweep away all the foundations of his disbelief like a tidal wave; something that would sheer ruthlessly through all sophistries and lies. A girl's profile against the streaking backcloth of smoke-stained stone. Yellow lamp-light rippling on a flying mane of golden hair. Commedia.

On the night of the 3rd of April, at 10:30 p.m., Simon Templar stood on the pavement of Berkeley Square and looked life squarely in the eyes.

Just for that moment. And then the Hirondel was gone, and the moment was past. But all that there was to be done was done. The High Gods had spoken.

Simon turned. There was a new light in his eyes. 'Let's go,' he said.

They went. His step was light and swift, and the blood laughed in his veins. He had drunk the magic wine of the High Gods at one draught, down to the last dregs. It is a brave man who can do that, and he has his reward.

Perrigo walked tamely by his side. Simon had less than no idea what was passing in the gangster's mind just then. And he cared less than nothing. He would have taken on a hundred Perrigos that night, one after another or in two squads of fifty, just as they pleased—blipped them, bounced them, boned them, rolled them, trussed them up, wrapped them in grease­proof paper, and laid them out in a row to be called for by the corporation scavengers. And if Perrigo didn't believe it, Perrigo had only got to start something and see what hap­pened. Simon thought less of Perrigo than a resolute rhinoc­eros would think of a small worm.