16 The Saint Overboard

that he had vanished out of his prison . . .

'The lights, sir.'

A new voice jarred into his divided attention, and he realised that it must be the helmsman speaking. He turned over on his elbow and looked out over the bows. The lights of the shore were very close now; and he saw that two new pairs of lights had appeared on the coast ahead, red and very bright, one pair off the port bow and one pair off the starboard. He guessed that they had been set by Vogel's accomplices on shore to guide the Falkenberg between the tricky reefs and shoals to its anchorage.

'Very well.' Vogel was answering; and then he was addressing Loretta: 'You will forgive me if I send you below, my dear? I fear you might be tempted to try and swim ashore, and you gave us a lot of trouble to find you last time you did that.'

'Not with the Saint?'

There was a sudden pleading tremor of fear in her voice which the Saint had never heard there before, and Simon hung over the edge again to see her as Vogel replied.

'Of course, that would be difficult for you. Suppose you go to your own cabin? I will see that you are not locked in any longer than is necessary.'

She nodded without speaking, and walked past the steward who had appeared in the doorway. Before she went, Simon had seen the mute embers of that moment's flare of fear in her eyes, and the veiled smirk which had greased through Vogel's reassur­ance of her told him the rest. Once again he stood before the open strong-room of the Chalfont Castle, twenty fathoms down under the tide, wondering why the death that he was expecting did not come; and all the questions that had been fermenting in his mind since then were answered. He could no longer shut out belief from what his brain had been telling him. He knew; and his bowels turned to water. He knew; and the understanding made his knuckles whiten where they gripped the edge of the roof, and burned in his mind like molten lead as he crushed his eyes for a moment into his arm. He was bowed down with an unutterable humility and pride.

He half rose, with the only thought of following and finding her. She at least must be free, whatever he did with his own liberty . . .

And then he realised the madness of the idea. He had no knowledge of where her cabin was, and while he was searching for it he was just as likely to open a cabin occupied by some member of the crew—even if no steward or seaman caught sight of him while he was prowling about below decks. And once he was discovered, whatever hope the gods had given him was gone again. Somehow he must still find the strength to wait, though) his muscles ached with the frightful discipline, until he had a chance to take not one trick alone but the whole grand slam.

'Will you unload the gold to-night?'

It was Arnheim's fat throaty voice; and Simon waited breath­lessly for the reply. It came.

'Yes—it will be safer. The devil knows what information this man Templar has given to his friends. He is more dangerous than all the detective agencies in the world, and it would be fatal to underrate him. Fortunately we shall need to do nothing more for a long time ... It will be a pity to sink the Falkenberg, but I think it will be wise. We can easily fit out a trawler to recover the gold ... As for disposing of it, my dear Otto, that will be your business.'

'I made the final arrangements before we left Dinard.'

'Then we have very little cause for anxiety.'

Vogel's voice came from a different quarter; and the Saint treated himself to another cautious glimpse of the interior set. Vogel had taken over the wheel and was standing up to the open glass panel in the forward bay, a fresh cigar clipped between his teeth and his aquiline black-browed face intent and complacent. He pushed forward the throttle levers, and the note of the en­gines faded with the rush of the water.

Simon glanced forward and saw that they were very near the shore. The granite cliffs loomed blackly over them, and he could see the white line of foam where they met the sea. The lights of a village were dotted up the slope beyond, and to the left and right the pairs of red lights which he had noticed before were now nearly in line. Closer still, another light danced on the wa­ter.

So unexpectedly that it made the Saint flatten himself on the roof like a startled hare, a searchlight