house on the opposite side of the block also backed, and with another short drop he reached the ground level. He tried the back door of the house opposite. It was unlocked, and let him into an unlighted kitchen. The door on the far side of the kitchen opened on to a narrow hall in which lights were burning. He had got the door open half an inch when a girl came down the stairs and went into a room beside the staircase. She had no clothes on. Simon drew a long breath and tiptoed out. The girl had almost closed the door of the room she had gone into; he could hear other girls in there, talking and laughing. From what he could hear of their conversation as he moved stealthily down the hall, he gathered that he had got into the sort of house where no Saint ought to be. He decided to get out quickly, and he was just level with the door when it opened and the girl came Out again.
A couple of seconds crawled into infinity while he looked at her and she looked at him.
She nodded pleasantly.
'Buenas noches,' she said politely.
'Buenas noches,' responded the Saint, with the same old-world courtesy, and groped his way out into the street as she went on up the stairs.
After a few minutes' walking he found himself in familiar surroundings and realised that he was in the street which contained the back entrance of the Hotel Orotava. He let himself in and threaded the labyrinth of passages through to the front of the hotel, running the gauntlet of the inquisitive eyes of a chef, a waiter and a pantry boy, with the impermeable aplomb of a man for whom Fate would have to work pretty hard to devise any new ordeals.
Joris Vanlinden opened his eyes as the Saint entered the room, but he did not stir. Simon went up to the bed, and the old man watched him without any expression.
'How are you feeling?' Simon asked quietly.
Vanlinden's lips moved fractionally, so that without uttering a word his face answered that he was quite contented, that he was grateful that someone was being kind to him, that he had nothing on his mind.
'You're going to see Christine,' said the Saint.
A slow smile came to the old man's lips, and a little life came back into his gaze.
'When?' he whispered.
'Very soon.' Simon saw the intelligence beginning to fade again, and went on quickly: 'You're going away from here. On a ship. With Christine. Tonight. You and Christine are going away together.'
'Now?'
'Yes.'
Vanlinden nodded and tried to rise. The Saint helped him and kept an arm round him all the way down the stairs. It was like leading a man in a trance: Vanlinden would go where he was taken, once the stimulus of Christine's name had started him moving, but if Simon stopped the other stopped also, waiting for him with the patience of a man for whom time and initiative have lost all meaning.
In the hall, Simon called the conserje from behind his desk.
'This gentleman is sailing on the Alicante Star tonight. You will take him down to the boat.'
'Pero senor,' protested the boy, 'I cannot leave the hotel --'
Simon made another contribution to the banana fund.
'You will take him down and see him into his cabin,' he said. 'He is not very well, and you must be careful with him. If he gives any trouble, remind him that he is going to see the Senorita Cristina. Here are the tickets. You will start as soon as I have left the hotel.'
'Bueno,' said the boy obediently; and the Saint turned to Vanlinden.
'He's going to take you to the boat,' he said. 'You stay with him and do just what he tells you. Then you wait for Christine on board-she won't be long now.'
The old man smiled at him again with the same tranquil faith, and Simon turned quickly away before his own face betrayed him. If he failed that childish trust, Vanlinden's mind might never be restored. He would go on sinking deeper and deeper into that protective oblivion, while his vital forces gradually ebbed like a falling tide until one day he made the easy crossing from dusk to eternal darkness. No medical skill could do anything for him. Only one thing could bring him back to the light; and only the Saint knew what a fantastic task he had undertaken to conclude in the time he had set for himself.
He looked at his watch as he went down the steps, and saw that he had just about three and a half hours left.
For a few moments he stood on the pavement outside the hotel, leisurely lighting a cigarette. Then he set off diagonally upwards across the square. If anyone was watching the hotel now, they could take a walk with him while Joris was getting clear.
He sauntered round the Casino block, stopped to inspect the photographs of homely and buxom artistes displayed outside the Cafe Zanzibar, stopped again to examine every article in the window of a tobacconist's on the next corner, and only turned into the German Bar when he estimated that Joris and the wavy-haired boy had had time to get out of sight.
The first thing he noticed was that Hoppy Uniatz was not there.
Simon frowned as he sat down. He had given Hoppy directions which should have been explicit enough, although it was difficult to set limits to Mr Uniatz' capacity for getting his orders mixed up. Unless a slight discrepancy between their watches had sent Hoppy back to the hotel while he had been walking round the block, or unless Hoppy had consumed all the whiskey on the premises and gone elsewhere to look for more, or unless even more natural causes had dictated a temporary absence from which Hoppy might return at any moment.
The Saint ordered a drink and decided to wait for a few minutes. He had several things to think about for which he could use a little solitude.
The rising temperature of police excitement of which he had been reminded at Camacho's not long ago had taken another upward lift. Simon wondered whether the girl Maria had been prompted to bring in the police by
