sometimes slip through the voids of an intolerable suspense—there must be servants somewhere in the place—but it would only take him three swift movements, before they could possibly reach the door, to scrawl his sign manual on the blotter, snatch the crumple of paper from the wastebasket, and vanish through the open windows into the darkness. ...
And then a bell exploded in the oppressive atmosphere of the room like a bomb. A telephone bell.
Its rhythmic double beat sheared through the silence like a guillotine, cleaving the overstrained chord of the spell with the blade of its familiar commonplaceness; and Nather's effort collapsed as if the same cleavage had snapped the support of his spine. He shuddered once and slouched back limply in his chair, passing a trembling hand across his eyes.
Simon smiled again. His shoe resumed its gentle swinging, and he swept a gay, mocking eye over the desk. There were two telephones on it—one of them clearly a house phone. On a small table to the right of the desk stood a third telephone, obviously a Siamese twin of the second, linked to the same outside wire and intended for His Honour's secretary. The Saint reached out a long arm and brought it over onto his knee.
'Answer the call, brother,' he suggested persuasively.
A wave of his automatic added its imponderable weight to the suggestion; but the fight had already been drained out of the judge's veins. With a grey drawn face he dragged one of the telephones towards him; and as he lifted the receiver Simon matched the movement on the extension line and slanted his gun over in a relentless arc to cover the other's heart. Definitely it was not Mr. Wallis Nather's evening, but the Saint could not afford to be sentimental.
'Judge Nather speaking.'
The duplicate receiver at the Saint's ear clicked to the vibrations of a clear feminine voice.
'This is Fay.' The speech was crisp and incisive, but it had a rich pleasantness of music that very few feminine voices can maintain over the telephone—there was a rare quality in the sound that moved the Saint's blood with a queer, delightful expectation for which he could have given no account. It was just one of those voices. 'The Big Fellow says you'd better stay home tonight,' stated the voice. 'He may want you.'
Nather's eyes seemed to glaze over; then they switched to the Saint's face. Simon moved his gun under the desk lamp and edged it a little forward, and his gaze was as steady as the steel. Nather swallowed.
'I—I'll be here,' he stammered.
'See that you are,' came the terse conclusion, in the same voice of bewitching overtones; and then the wire went dead.
Watching Nather, the Saint knew that at least half the audience had understood that cryptic conversation perfectly. The judge was staring vacantly ahead into space with the lifeless receiver still clapped to his ear and his mouth hung half open.
'Very interesting,' said the Saint softly.
Nather's mouth closed jerkily. He replaced the receiver slowly on its hook and looked up.
'A client of mine,' he said casually; but he was not casual enough.
'That's interesting, too,' said the Saint. 'I didn't know judges were supposed to have clients. I thought they were unattached and impartial. . . . And she must be very beautiful, with a voice like that. Can it be, Algernon, that you are hiding something from me?'
Nather glowered up at him.
'How much longer are you going on with this preposterous performance?'
'Until it bores me. I'm easily amused,' said the Saint, 'and up to now I haven't yawned once. So far as I can see, the interview is progressing from good to better. All kinds of things are bobbing up every minute. This Big Fellow of yours, now: let's hear some more about him. I'm inquisitive.'
Nather's eyes flinched wildly.
'I'm damned if I'll talk to you any more!'
'You're damned if you won't.'
