18 The Saint Bids Diamonds (Thieves' Picnic)

After all, they could have shot him in the first place, instead of keeping their guns in their pockets till we were driving away.'

'I don't know. I don't know if they meant to kill him then --'

'But if they never let him have any money, you couldn't have got very far.'

She looked at him with her lip quivering; and again he saw that oddly watchful uncertainty creep into her gaze. He knew at once that she was weighing her an­swer, and knew also that she was going to lie.

Then he happened to glance at the old man. Joris Vanlinden had sunk back into such a stillness, and for a time they had been so carried away by other things, that they had not been noticing him. But now Simon saw that the old man's eyes had opened, quite quietly, as if he had awakened out of a deep sleep.

Simon touched the girl's arm.

'Look,' he said.

He stood up and went to pour some more whiskey; and Mr Uniatz watched the performance wistfully, chewing the extinct butt of his cigar. The greater part of the dialogue had passed harmlessly over Mr Uniatz' head, which was only equipped to assimilate short and simple speeches very carefully addressed to him in the more common words of one syllable; and he had long ago started to flounder out of his depth and eventually given up the effort, seeing no reason to exhaust himself with agonising mental labour when, in the fulness of time, everything that it was good for him to know would be duly explained to him by the Saint. Besides, there was a much more urgent problem which had been occupying all his attention for some time.

'Boss,' said Mr Uniatz plaintively, as if pointing out an incomprehensible oversight, 'ya left a toid of de bottle.'

'Okay,' said the Saint resignedly. 'You find a home for it.'

He went back to the bedside. The old man was touching the girl's face and hair with nervously twitching fingers, speaking in a weak husky voice: 'Where are we, Christine ? . . . How did we get here? . . . What happened?'

'It's all right, darling. Darling, it's all right. You've just got to rest.'

The old man's eyes went back to the Saint, and his hand clutched at the girl's arm.

'Who are these people, Christine? I haven't seen them before. Who are they?'

'Lie still, darling.' She was comforting him with a kind of motherly tenderness, as if he was a feverish child. 'They won't hurt you, Joris. They came and saved you when the others were fighting you.'

'Yes, they were fighting. I remember. I never could fight very much. You remember, Christine-that other time ? Did they hurt you, Christine ?'

'No, darling. Not a bit.'

The old man's eyes closed again, and for a moment he relaxed, as if the strain of talking had been too much for him. And then, suddenly, his eyes opened again.

'Did they get it?' he asked hoarsely.

'Hush, Joris. You must be quiet.'

'But did they get it?'

Vanlinden's voice was louder, and his eyes were staring. She tried to press him back on the bed, but he flung off her hands. He began to feel in his breast pocket, unsteadily at first, and then more wildly; then he was feeling in all his pockets, turning them out again and again, in a pitiful sort of frenzy.

'No, no,' he muttered incoherently. 'Not there. No. It's gone!' His voice rose and broke on some­thing like a scream. 'It's gone!' He stared at the Saint. 'Did you take it?'

'Take what?' asked the Saint helplessly.

'My ticket!'

'Oh, a ticket. No, I haven't seen it. D'you mean your ticket for going away from here? I shouldn't worry about that. If you go and explain things to the shipping company or whatever it is --'

'No, no, not that!' Vanlinden's voice had a despairing shrillness that made the Saint's flesh creep. 'My lottery ticket!'

'What?'

Christine got up suddenly from the bed. She faced the Saint like a tigress though her head barely reached his shoulder.

'Yes,' she said fiercely. 'Did you take it ?'

'Me?' said the Saint blankly. He spread out his arms. 'Search me and strip me if you want to. Take me apart and put me together again. I never saw his lottery ticket in my life.'

She swung round and pointed at Hoppy Uniatz.

'He was sitting in the back of the car with Jon's all the time. Did he take it?'

'Did you take it, Hoppy?' snapped the Saint.

Mr Uniatz swallowed nervously.

'Yes, boss.'

'You took it ?' snapped the Saint incredulously.

Hoppy gulped.