15 The Saint in New York

The Saint smiled.

'We ought to have met before, Sebastian,' he murmured.

The chauffeur nodded.

'Sure, I read aboutcha. I like dat job. I been waitin' to see Morrie Ualino get his ever since I had to pay him protection t'ree years ago, when he was runnin' de taxi racket. Say, dat was some smash ya had back dere. Some guys tryin' to knock ya off?'

'Trying.'

The driver shook his head.

'I can't figure what dis city is comin' to,' he confessed. 'Ya ain't hoit, though?'

'Not the way I was meant to be,' said the Saint.

He was watching the traffic behind them now. The driver had excelled himself. After the first few hectic blocks he had reverted to less conspicuous driving, without surrendering any of the skill with which he dodged round unexpected corners and doubled on his own tracks. Any pursuit which might have got started soon enough to be useful seemed to have been shaken off: there was not even the distant siren of a police car to be heard. The man at the wheel seemed to have an instinctive flair for getaways, and he did his job without once permitting it to interfere with the smooth flow of his loquacity.

As they covered the last stretch of Lexington Avenue, he said: 'Ja rather go in here, or Forty-second Street?'

'This'll do,' said the Saint. 'And thanks.'

'Ya welcome,' said the driver amiably. 'Say, I wouldn't mind doin' a job for a guy like you. Any time you could use a guy like me, call up Columbus 9-4789. I eat there most days around two o'clock.'

Simon opened the door as the cab stopped, and pushed a twenty-dollar bill into the driver's collar.

'Maybe I will, some day,' he said and plunged into the station with the driver's 'So long, pal,' floating after him.

Taking no chances, he dodged through the subways for a while, stopped in a washroom to repair some of the slight damage which the accident had done to his appearance, and finally let himself out onto Park Avenue for the shortest ex­posed walk to the Waldorf. Once again he demonstrated how much a daring outlaw can get away with in a big city. In the country he would have been a stranger, to be observed and discussed and inquired into; but a big city is full of strangers, and nearly all of them are busy. None of the men and women who hurried by, either in cars or on their own feet, were at all interested in him; they scurried intently on towards their own affairs, and the absent-minded old gentleman who actually cannoned into him and passed oh with a muttered apology never knew that he had touched the man for whom all the police and the underworld were searching.

Valcross came in about lunchtime. Simon was lounging on the davenport reading an afternoon paper; he looked up at the older man and smiled.

'You didn't expect to see me back so early—isn't that what you were going to say?'

'More or less,' Valcross admitted. 'What's wrong?'

Simon swung his legs off the sofa and came to a sitting posi­tion.

'Nothing,' he said, lighting a cigarette, 'and at the same time, everything. A certain Mr. Papulos, whom you wot of, has been taken off; but he wasn't really on our list. Mr. Kuhl­mann, I'm afraid, is still at large.' He told his story tersely but completely. 'Altogether, a very unfortunate misunder­standing,' he concluded. 'Not that it seems to make a great deal of difference, from what Pappy was saying just before the ukulele music broke us up. Pappy was all set to shoot the works, but the works we want were not in him. However, in close cooperation with the bloke who carries a scythe and has such an appalling taste in nightshirts, we may be able to rectify our omissions.'

Valcross, at the decanter, raised his eyebrows faintly.

'You're taking a lot of chances, Simon. Don't let this—er —bloke who carries the scythe swing it the wrong way.'

'If he does,' said the Saint gravely, 'I shall duck. Then, in sober and reasonable argument, I shall