18 The Saint Bids Diamonds (Thieves' Picnic)

He stuffed the letter into his pocket as he crossed the square, and made for Camacho's tourist office. The tourist trade not being what it was, the agency drummed up extra business with cigarettes and magazines.

'Hola, Jorge,' he murmured, as he strolled in; and the round face of the fat Portuguese assistant opened in a broad beam as he recognised the Saint.

'AHola, senhor! zcomo 'sta 'ste? z'Te ha vuelt' a Tenerif?'

'Yes, George, I came back. And now I want to go away again. Give me some cigarettes and then tell me what boats you've got.'

'z'Te quiere march' se ahora?' said George incredulously. 'A'Te tiene que lev' much' mas tiemp' aqui!'

The Saint shook his head with a smile.

'I've already been here too long,' he said.

George handed him a packet of cigarettes and pored for a while over the collection of shipping folders.With the vista of innumerable mananas looming in his mind, he announced presently, in his execrable mixture of Spanish and Portuguese: 'Hay un bare' que sal' de aqui el dio quins --'

'What, the fifteenth? Of next month? I tell you I want something at once.'

'z 'Te quiere salir ahora mismo?'

''The sooner the better.'

'Hay un bare' que sal' pasao manan''

'What about tonight?'

'AAy-ay-ay! A'Te ten demasiao pris'!'

George turned back to his sailing lists with a deep sigh; and while he was at it the Saint picked up a copy of the Tarde which was lying on the counter.

Apart from its own outbursts of indignation at the advent of gangsterismo in Tenerife, and amplifications of the original episode by means of interviews with every inhabitant of the town who had been within two miles of the shooting, the newspaper told of further developments which had been too late for the morning editions. It seemed that in the small hours of the morning, on the strength of the alarm which had gone round, a sentry on duty at the gasworks had started shooting at something, for no reason which anybody could discover. All the guards had turned out to join the party, all letting off their guns as fast as they could pull the trigger; it was not known what damage had been done to the nameless menace that they were shooting at, but they had successfully riddled a taxi which was passing in a neighbouring street, killing the driver and wounding the two passengers, who were returning from a merry evening at some cabaret. The only other known casualty consisted of half of another brace of guardias who were hurrying towards the sounds of firing: it appeared that he had been so impatient to get into action that he hadn't waited to draw his gun from its holster before he started shooting, with the result that he had shot himself neatly through the bottom.

Properly alarmed by these deplorable breaches of the peace, the civil governor had issued a ringing mani­festo in the same edition, in which he proclaimed his firm intention of stamping out the aforesaid gangster­ismo. With this object, he declared a state of emer­gency, and ordained (1) that all cafes, bars, cabarets, cinemas and other places of amusement should be closed by midnight until further notice; (2) that all private citizens must be in their homes by 12.30 A.M., and that anybody who was out after that hour would be liable to be shot without warning; (3) that in any case he would not be responsible for the lives of any persons who were out in the streets after dark; (4) that owing to the peril of their work the police would not be allowed to patrol in parejas, as heretofore, but would go out in squads of six; and (5) that it would be a criminal offence for any driver to let his car backfire.

It was an inspiring statement, which should have made the heart of any Tinerfeno swell with pride in contemplation of the resolute and capable hands to which he had entrusted his government. To Simon Templar, an intruder from the outer darkness of the civilised world, its train of thought seemed somewhat obscure; but he could form some idea of its conse­quences and implications. The friendly little thieves' picnic into which he had introduced himself was clearly developing a satellite public picnic of its own. For the time being their orbits were parallel; but at any moment they might start to converge, and when that happened the fun was likely to become a trifle breathless. It was just another factor that made a rapid ending seem even more important; and the Saint considered it seriously for several minutes.

'Hay un barc' que sal' esta noch' a las diez,' George informed him at last, in a rather awed voice, as if the idea of a ship leaving as early as ten o'clock that night made him feel nervous; and the Saint re­garded him admiringly.

'You ought to go to America, George,' he said. 'You've got too much natural hustle for this place. . . . Fix me two single cabins on that boat, and two more on the boat the day after tomorrow.'

He wrote down the names-the two passages for that night for Joris and Christine Vanlinden, and the two on Monday to be left open-and waited while George telephoned the agents of the line and made the arrangements.

It took some time to overcome the native prejudice against such speedy action, and even longer to get the action really acting. The tickets themselves had to be sent down from the shipping offices while George was making out bills and receipts. Simon paid in cash, which involved further delays. The fares didn't total to an even number of hundreds of pesetas, Simon was short of small change, and finding change for a hun­dred pesetas in Tenerife is rather more difficult than looking for brown-shirted Jews in Munich, for anybody who collects as much as twenty pesetas rushes off very quickly to put it in the bank before it melts. All the neighbouring shops had to be pressed into the search; and by the time everything had been settled and Simon had the tickets in his pocket nearly an hour had gone.

It meant that he was long overdue to return to the house where he had left Lauber, if he intended to obey Graner's instructions; but that could be covered by some story of having followed the man he was supposed to be watching. The same excuse might serve to explain his absence if Graner had tried to telephone him meanwhile at the number he had given. For some reason it never occurred to the Saint not to go back to Maria's apartment-he had decided that that was a risk that must be taken if he was going to try and learn something about what Lauber had done. There was also the possibility that Aliston might have left Christine somewhere else and gone back there before Lauber left.

With these reasonings going through his mind, but without any conscious volition, the Saint found himself threading his way through the streets which he had seen only twice before, and then without studying the route very closely. There were some minutes when he was afraid he had lost himself, for the brief tropical twilight was