luxurious tastes which had never helped him to save money, and he had insisted that this setting was necessary for the character he had to play. Happy Fred Jorman, whose liberty was not in jeopardy, was elated.
'That was just your imagination, Broads,' he said as they let themselves in. 'She was probably wishing she had a friend who sent her thousand-pound bracelets. It's just the newness of it that's upset you-you'll get used to it after you've done it a few times. I was saying to myself all the time you were practising. 'Fred,' I was saying. 'Broads Tilson rings the changes better than anyone else you've ever met in your life. You've picked the best partner --' '
Mr. Tillson poured himself out a whisky-and-soda and sank into a chair. From his breast pocket he drew a packet with one seal on it-it was the exact replica of the packet that had been mailed to Paris, as it had appeared after the first seal had been placed on it in Mr. Emberton's office.
'You'll have to fence the article, Fred,' said Mr. Tillson. 'I've never had anything to do with such things.'
'I'll fence it all right,' said Happy Fred. 'We'll get four hundred for it easily. And then what happens? That other little packet I registered at the same time blows off and sets the mailbag on fire in the train, and when they've cleared up the mess they find your bracelet is missing. Then there's just another sensational mail-bag robbery for the newspapers, and everybody's wondering how it was done; while we just collect the insurance money. That's four hundred pounds profit for a couple of hours' work, and we can turn that over every week while it lasts.'
Happy Fred slapped his thigh. 'Gosh, Broads, when I think of the money we're going to make out of that idea of mine --'
'You might live to make it,' remarked a very pleasant voice behind them, 'if you both sat quite still.'
The two men did not sit quite still. They would have been superhuman stoics if they had. They spun around as if they had each been hit on the side of the jaw with a blackjack. And they saw the Saint.
The door of Mr. Tillson's private bathroom had opened and closed while they were talking without them hearing it; and now it served as a neat white background for the lean and smiling man who was propping himself gracefully up against it. There was an automatic in his hand, and it turned from side to side in a lazy arc that gave each of them an opportunity to blink down its black uncompromising barrel.
'Possibly I intrude,' murmured the Saint, very pleasantly; 'but that's just too bad.'
On the faces of the two men were expressions of mingled astonishment, fear, indignation, horror and simple wrath, which would have done credit to a pair of dyspeptic cows that had received an electric shock from a clump of succulent grass. And then Mr. Tillson's voice returned.
'Good God!' he squeaked. 'It's the man I was telling you about --'
'The bloke I was telling you about!' ejaculated Happy Fred savagely. 'The skunk who took thirty pounds of my money in the Alexandra, and then --'
The two men's heads revolved until they looked into each other's eyes and gazed into the souls beyond. And the Saint . hitched himself off the door and came towards them.
'A very neat piece of work, if I may say so, Fred,' he remarked. 'Not so original as it might have been, perhaps, but new enough. It's very kind of you to have worked so hard for me.'
'What are you going to do?' asked Mr. Tillson weakly.
Simon took the packet out of his hands.
'Relieve you of this encumbrance, brother. It's a very pretty bracelet, but I don't think you could wear it. People might think it was rather odd.'
'I'll have the police on to you for this, you --'
Simon raised his eyebrows. 'The police? To tell them that I've stolen your bracelet? But I understood your bracelet was in the mail, on its way to your little girl in Paris? Can I be mistaken, Alfred?'
Mr. Tillson swallowed painfully; and then Happy Fred jumped up.
'Damn the police!' he snarled. 'I'll settle with this bluffer.He wouldn't dare to shoot --'
'Oh, but you're quite wrong about that,' said the Saint gently. 'I shouldn't have any objection to shooting you if you asked for it. It's quite a long time since I last shot anyone, and I often feel afraid that if I abstain for too long I may get squeamish. Don't tempt me, Fred, because I'm feeling nervous enough already.'
But the Saint's blue eyes were as steady as the gun in his hand, and it was Happy Fred's gaze that wavered.
'I shall have to tie you up while I make my getaway,' said the Saint amiably, 'so would you both mind turning around? You'll be able to undo yourselves quite quickly after I've gone.'
'You wouldn't be a part to a low insurance swindle, would you?' protested Happy Fred aggrievedly, as the Saint looped coils of rope over his wrists.
'I wouldn't be a party to any kind of swindle,' said the Saint virtuously. 'I'm an honest holdup man, and your insurance policies have nothing to do with me.'
He completed the roping of the two men, roughly gagged them with their own handkerchiefs, and retreated leisurely to the door.
The Five Thousand Pound Kiss
IT has been said that Simon Templar was a philanderer; but the criticism was not entirely just. A pretty face, or the turn of a slim waist, appealed to him no more-and not a bit less-than they do to the next man. Perhaps he was more honest about it. It is true that sometimes, in a particularly buccaneering mood, as he swung down a broad highway leading to infinite adventure, he would sing one of his own inimitable songs against the pompous dreariness of civilization as he saw it, with a chorus:
But if red blood runs thin with years, By God! If I must die, I'll kiss red lips and drink red wine And let the rest go by, my son, And let the rest go by!
