18 The Saint Bids Diamonds (Thieves' Picnic)

'People have tried to make me open up before-as the actress said to the bishop.'

'There's a limit to how much any man can stand --'

'That was what the bishop said to the actress,' murmured the Saint, with undiminished good humour. 'Besides, you're going the wrong way about it. You'd be much more likely to make me think twice if you just threatened to stand there and make me go on looking at that nasty little moustache and wondering what your father would think if he knew about you.'

And while he spoke he was twisting his wrists round to try and reach the hilt of the knife under his left sleeve. The cords cut into his flesh with the increased tension, but his finger tips brushed the end of the carved ivory. He relaxed for a second and then strained his muscles again, without letting a trace of the agonising effort show on his face. . . .

Then he heard the girl coming back. She carried a kitchen spoon with the handle wrapped in a cloth: the other end of it glowed dull red. Palermo took it from her carefully and held it a little way from the palm of his other hand, satisfying himself about the tempera­ture. The girl backed slowly away with wide, fright­ened eyes; but Simon knew from the sound of her footsteps that she stopped at the door of the kitchen­ette. She was directly behind him, and if he got his knife out of its sheath she would see it.

The Saint's blue eyes settled into a frozen steadiness as he watched Palermo corning towards him. The other's swarthy features were perfectly composed, as if he had been a dentist preparing for a painful operation which had got to be completed for the patient's own good.

'She's a nice girl,' he said in his conversational way. 'A bit dumb, but you can't get anything better here. But she's sentimental too.'

'Everybody seems to have that complaint except you,' Simon remarked, with an effort to make his voice sound natural.

Palermo came up on his left side; and the Saint felt the warm radiation of the spoon on his cheek.

'This is your last chance,' said Palermo.

The Saint spread his legs wider around the seat of the chair and drew his feet back a little, as though he were riding a horse. He bent his elbows and strained his shoulders back so that the circle of his arms loosened as much as possible around the back of the chair.

'You can go to hell,' said the Saint, and stood up.

The heat on his cheek became scorching as he rose, touched an instant of burning agony as he came upright. His wrists caught on the back of the chair, but he shook them free. And with a lightning turn of his body he swung his right leg round like a flail at the back of Palermo's knees.

He flung his left leg forward at the same time, in front of Palermo's feet; and as he crashed to the floor his right leg found its mark. Palermo let out an oath as he stumbled forward. His right hand was already diving into his pocket for his gun, but he had to snatch it out again to save his face as he toppled forward. He went down with a thud; and like a flash the Saint rolled over, keeping his legs in the same relative position.

Palermo gasped. He lay flat on his stomach, with his left leg held in a torturing grip which almost paralysed him. The Saint's right ankle was wedged firmly in behind Palermo's knee, and the heel of the Saint's left foot pressed remorselessly down on Palermo's instep, doubling the lower part of his leg backwards over his thigh.

The girl screamed. Palermo groped for his gun again, and the Saint put on some more pressure. Palermo screamed too. For a moment he had felt as though his knee joint was being torn out of its socket, while the tendons of his leg seemed to glow red-hot with anguish.

'Lay off that,' said the Saint grittily, 'or I'll break your leg in half!'

He turned his body a little to make another attempt to get at the knife on his forearm, but in the position in which he was lying his weight was on top of his arms. He couldn't shift it off sufficiently to reach his knife without giving Palermo a chance to escape. Meanwhile he had Palermo in a hold in which he might probably break his leg; which was all very well, but not well enough. The Saint's mouth set grimly as he went on trying to reach his knife.

Palermo pressed his eyes into his clenched fists and groaned.

'Maria!' he gasped. 'So loca-do something!'

'Maybe she isn't so sentimental after all,' said the Saint, and gave Palermo's leg another squeeze for encouragement.

He spoke a little too soon. Palermo's second yelp of torment seemed to break the spell which had held the girl gaping at them helplessly. She rushed forward and picked up the overturned chair on which the Saint had been sitting. Simon saw it hurtling down towards his head, and rolled desperately sideways. The move­ment would have broken his hold anyway, so the Saint broke it himself. He yanked his right foot free and aimed a savage kick at the back of Palermo's neck as he squirmed frantically out of the way of the falling chair. The chair crashed on the floor beside his ear, and most of its force had been lost when some other part of it caught him a glancing blow on the side of the head. Otherwise it would probably have cracked his skull-it was a good solid bourgeois wooden chair, with plenty of weight behind it.

A whole planetarium of whirling constellations swam before the Saint's vision; but at the same time he felt the toe of his shoe sog exquisitely into Pa­lermo's occiput. Palermo's pained and startled glug! prefaced another and temporarily unaccountable sharp clicking sound by a mere split second.

Simon got on to his knees and scrambled up to his feet, shaking his head to try and blink the flashing comets and swirling black mists out of his vision. The girl's fists thumped on his face and shoulders. He pushed her up to the wall and held her there by leaning his weight on her. She went on hitting wildly at him, but he paid no attention. He screwed his head round to look for Palermo and found him lying limply on the floor, face downwards. All at once he realised the meaning of that second crisp smack which had followed so closely on the impact of his toe. Palermo must have been raising his head when the kick met him, and it had banged his chin back into violent collision with the tiled floor. He was out to the wide, and he looked as if he was intending to stay out for some time.

The girl started to scream again hysterically.

'ACalla!' rapped the Saint.

He saw her take breath for another yell and jerked his head quickly down at her face. It hurt her more than it hurt him, and the scream was momentarily silenced.