15 The Saint in New York

balance against misfor­tune. The slight feeling of hollowness in his head, the conse­quence of over-tiredness and fever, was no more than a minor discomfort. He ate hugely, thinking over the problem of se­curing the car which Fay Edwards had asked for; and sud­denly a name and number flashed up from the dim hinter­lands of reminiscence—the name and number of the garru­lous taxi driver who had driven him away from the scene of Mr. Papulos's Waterloo. He got up and went to the tele­phone, and admitted himself lucky to find the man at break­fast

'This is the Saint, Sebastian,' he said. 'Didn't you say I could call you if I had any use for you?'

He heard the driver's gasp of amazement, and then the eager response.

'Sure! Anyt'ing ya like, pal. What's it woit?'

'Twice as much as you're asking,' replied the Saint suc­cinctly. 'Meet me on the corner of Lexington and 44th in fifteen minutes.'

He hung up and returned to his coffee and a cigarette. He knew that he was taking a risk—the possibility of the chauf­feur having had a share in the betrayal of his hide-out at the Waldorf Astoria was not completely disposed of, and the pros­pect of a substantial reward might be a temptation to treach­ery in any case—but it was the only solution Simon could think of.

Nevertheless the Saint's mouth was set in a grim line when he said good-bye to Chris and walked along 45th Street to Lexington Avenue. He walked slowly and kept his left hand in his pocket with the fingers fastened round the comforting butt of Fernack's revolver. There was nothing out of the ordi­nary about his appearance, no reason for anybody to notice him—-he was still betting on the inadequacy of newspaper photographs and the blindness of the average unobservant man, the only two advantages which had been faultlessly loyal to him from the beginning. And if there was a hint of fever in the brightness of the steel-blue eyes that raked the sidewalks watchfully as he sauntered down the block to the rendezvous at 44th Street, it subtracted nothing from their unswerving vigilance.

But he saw nothing that he should not have seen—no signs of a collection of large men lounging against lampposts or kicking their heels in shop doorways, no suspiciously crawling cars. The morning life of Lexington Avenue flowed normally on and was not concerned with him. Thus far the breaks were with him. Then a familiar voice hailed him, and he stopped in his tracks.

'Hi-yah, pal!'

The Saint looked round and saw the cab he had ordered parked at the corner. And in the broad grin of the driver were no grounds for a solid belief that he was a police stool pigeon or a scout of the Big Fellow's.

'Better get inside quick, before anyone sees ya, pal,' he advised hoarsely; and the Saint nodded and stepped in. The chauffeur twisted round to continue the conversation through the communicating window. 'Where ja wanna go dis time?'

'The Vandrick National Bank on Fifth Avenue,' said the Saint.

The driver started up his engine and hauled the cab out into the stream of traffic.

'Chees!' he said in some awe, at the first crosstown traffic light 'Ya don't t'ink we can take dat joint wit' only two guns?'

'I hadn't thought about it,' Simon confessed mildly.

The driver seemed disappointed in spite of his initial skepti­cism.

'I figgered dat might be okay for a guy like you, wit' me helpin' ya,' he said. 'Still, maybe ya ain't feelin' quite your­self yet. I hoid ja got taken for a ride last night—I was t'inkin' I shouldn't be seein' ya for a long while.'

'A lot of other people are still thinking that,' murmured the Saint sardonically.

They slowed up along Fifth Avenue as they came within a block of the Vandrick Bank Building.

'Whadda we do here, pal?' asked the driver.

'Park as close to the entrance as you can get,' Simon told him. 'I'll wait in the cab for a bit. If I get out, stay here and keep your engine running. Be ready for a getaway. We may have a passenger—and then I'll tell you more.'

'Okay,' said the chauffeur