11 The Brighter Buccaneer

But there was a gesture in that, to be taken with or without salt as the audience pleased; and a fat lot the Saint cared. He was moderate in nothing that he said or did. That insurgent vitality which made him an outlaw first and last and in every­thing rebelled perhaps too fiercely against all moderation; and if at the same time it made him, to those who knew him best, the one glamorous and romantic figure of his day, that was the judgment which he himself would have asked for.

These chronicles are concerned mainly with episodes in which he provided himself with the bare necessities of life by cunning and strategy rather than daring; but even in those times there were occasions when his career hung on the thread of a lightning decision. That happened in the affair of Mrs. Dempster-Craven's much-advertised pink diamond; and if the Saint philandered then, he would have told you that he had no regrets.

'The idea that such a woman should have a jool like that keeps me awake nights,' he complained. 'I've seen her twice, and she is a Hag.'

This was at dinner one night. Peter Quentin was there; and so was Patricia Holm, who, in those days, was the lady who held the Saint's reckless heart and knew best how to under­stand all his misdeeds. The subject of the 'Star of Mandalay' had cropped up casually in the course of conversation; and it was worth mentioning that neither of Simon Templar's guests bothered to raise any philosophical argument against his some­what heterodox doctrine about the right of Hags. But it was left for Peter Quentin to put his foot in it.

Peter read behind the wistfulness of the Saint's words, and said: 'Don't be an idiot, Simon. You don't need the money, and you couldn't pinch the Star of Mandalay. The woman's got a private detective following her around wherever she goes --'

'Couldn't I pinch it, Peter?' said the Saint, very softly.

Patricia saw the light in his eyes, and clutched Peter's wrist.

'You idiot!' she gasped. 'Now you've done it. He'd be fool enough to try --'

'Why 'try'?' asked the Saint, looking round mildly. 'That sounds very much like an aspersion on my genius, which I shall naturally have to --'

'I didn't mean it like that,' protested the girl frantically. 'I mean that after all, when we don't need the money-You said you were thinking of running over to Paris for a week --'

'We can go via Amsterdam, and sell the Star of Mandalay en route,' said the Saint calmly. 'You lie in your teeth, my sweetheart. You meant that the Star of Mandalay was too much of a problem for me and I'd only get in a jam, if I tried for it. Well, as a matter of fact, I've been thinking of having a dart at it for some time.'

Peter Quentin drank deeply of the Chateau Olivier to steady his nerves.

'You haven't been thinking anything of the sort,' he said. 'I'll withdraw everything I said. You were just taking on a dare.'

Simon ordered himself a second slice of melon, and leaned back with his most seraphic and exasperating smile.

'Have I,' he inquired blandly, 'ever told you my celebrated story about a bob-tailed ptarmigan named Alphonse, who lived in sin with a couple of duck-billed platypi in the tundras of Siberia? Alphonse, who suffered from asthma and was a be­liever in Christian Science . . .'

He completed his narrative at great length, refusing to be interrupted; and they knew that the die was cast. When once Simon Templar had made up his mind it was impossible to argue with him. If he didn't proceed blandly to talk you down with one of his most fatuous and irrelevant anecdotes, he would listen politely to everything you had to say, agree with you thoroughly, and carry on exactly as he had announced his intentions from the beginning; which wasn't helpful. And he had made up his mind, on one of his mad impulses, that the Star of Mandalay was due for a change of ownership.

It was not a very large stone, but it was reputed to be flawless; and it was valued at ten thousand pounds. Simon reckoned that it would be worth five thousand pounds to him in Van Roeper's little shop in Amsterdam, and five thousand pounds was a sum of money that he could find a home for at any time.

But he said nothing about that to Mrs. Dempster-Craven when he saw her for the third time and spoke to her for the first. He was extremely polite and apologetic. He had good reason to be, for the rakish Hirondel which he was driving had collided with Mrs. Dempster-Craven's Rolls Royce in Hyde Park, and the glossy symmetry of the Rolls Royce's rear eleva­tion had been considerably impaired.

'I'm terribly sorry,' he said. 'Your chauffeur pulled up rather suddenly, and my hand-brake cable broke when I tried to stop.'

His hand-brake cable had certainly divided itself in the middle, and the frayed ends had been produced for the chauffeur's inspection; but no one was to know that Simon had filed it through before he started out.

'That is not my fault,' said Mrs. Dempster-Craven coldly. She was going to pay a call on the wife of a minor baronet, and she was pardonably annoyed at the damage to her impres­sive car. 'Bagshawe, will you please find me a taxi?'

'The car'll take you there all right, ma'am,' said the chauffeur incautiously.

Mrs. Dempster-Craven froze him through her lorgnettes.

'How,' she required to know, 'can I possibly call on Lady Wiltham in a car that looks as if I had picked it up at a second-hand sale? Kindly call me a taxi immediately, and don't argue.'

'Yes, ma'am,' said the abashed chauffeur, and departed on his errand..

'I really don't know how to apologize,' said the Saint hum­bly.

'Then don't try,' said Mrs. Dempster-Craven discouragingly.

The inevitable small crowd had collected, and a policeman was advancing ponderously towards it from the distance. Mrs. Dempster-Craven liked to be stared at as she crossed the pave­ment to Drury Lane Theatre on a first night, but not when she was sitting in a battered car in Hyde Park. But the Saint was not so self-conscious.

'I'm afraid I can't offer you a lift at the moment; but if my other car would be of any use to you for the reception tonight --'