15 The Saint in New York

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Papulos steadied the car clumsily and flashed it under the indignant eyes of a traffic cop who was deliberating the richest terms in which he could describe a coupla mugs who seemed to think they had a P.D. plate in front of 'em, and who deliberated a second too long. The trip hammer inside his ribs slowed up to a heavy, rhythmical pounding.

'I'm glad to see you,' he said, in a voice that croaked oddly in his throat. 'I was goin' out lookin' for you.'

With the glowing lighter at the end of his cigarette, Simon half turned to glance at him.

'Were you, Pappy?' he murmured pleasantly. 'What a coincidence! It seems as if we must be soul mates, drifting through life with our hearts singing in tune. Tell me some more bedtime stories, brother—I like them.'

Papulos swallowed. The Saint's almost miraculous appear­ance had caught him before he had even had time to con­sider a possible line of approach; and for the first time since he had plunged out of Charley's Place on that mad quest he became aware of the hopeless obstacles that didn't even begin to crop up until he had found his quarry. Now, unasked and uninvited, his quarry had obligingly found him; and he was experiencing some of the almost hysterical paralysis that would seize an ardent huntsman if a fox walked up to him and rolled over on its back, expectantly wagging its tail. The difference in this case was that the quarry was much larger and more cunning and more dangerous than any fox; it had a wick­edly mocking gleam in its steel-blue eyes; and under the ban­tering surveillance of that clear and glittering gaze Mr. Papulos recalled, in a most unwelcomely apt twist of reminis­cence, that on the last occasion when he had seen the quarry face to face, and there were a considerable number of armed and husky hoodlums within call, he, Mr. Papulos, had been misguided enough to poke the said quarry in the kisser. The prospects of establishing a rapid and brotherly entente seemed a shade less bright than they had appeared in his first exuber­ant enthusiasm for the idea.

'Yeah—I was lookin' for you,' he repeated jerkily. 'I thought you and me might have a talk.'

'One gathers that you were in no small hurry to exercise your jaw,' Simon remarked. 'You nearly left the back part of the bus behind when you started off. What's after you?'

Something inside the Greek rasped through to the surface under the pressure of that gentle bantering voice. His breath grated in his throat.

'If you want to know what's after me,' he blurted, 'it's a bullet. A whole raft of bullets.'

'Do they travel on rafts?' asked the Saint interestedly. 'I didn't know you were joining the navy.'

Papulos gulped.

'I'm not kidding,' he got out desperately. 'The finger's on me—on account of you. I sent you to Morrie, with that knife on you, an' they're saying I double-crossed 'em. You gotta listen to me, Saint—I'm on the spot!'

The Saint's eyebrows lifted.

'So you figure that if you go out and bring my head back in an Oshkosh they may forgive you—is that it?' he drawled. 'Well, well, well, Pappy, I'm not saying it wasn't a grand idea; but I've got a morbid sort of ambition to be buried all in one piece——'

'I tell you I'm not kidding!' Papulos pleaded wildly. 'I gotta talk to you. I'll talk turkey. Maybe we can make a bargain——'

'How much credit do you reckon to get on that sock you gave me last night?' inquired the Saint.

Papulos swallowed again and found difficulty in doing it. His eyes, mechanically picking a route through the traffic, were reddened and frantic.

'For God's sake,' he gasped, 'I'm talkin' turkey. I'm tryin' to make a deal——'

'Not for sanctuary?'

'Yeah—if that's the word for it.'

The Saint's eyes narrowed. His smile suddenly acquired a tremendous skepticism.

'That sounds like an awful lot of fun,' he murmured. 'How do we play this game?'

'Any way you like. I'm on  the level, Saint!  I wouldn't double-cross you. I'm shootin' square with you, Saint. The mob's after me. They're putting me on