a general in a few years.'
'Just like that,' said the Saint. 'And how will you set about it?'
She shrugged.
'It oughtn't to be very difficult. I mean, I know all the right people, and he knows all the right people, and he's rather stupid in the right sort of way, and I'm rather clever, and if a man's stupid in the right sort of way, and his wife's rather clever, and they both know all the right people, it isn't very difficult for him to be made a general.'
Simon regarded her with honest admiration.
'You know, I'm beginning to believe you really are clever,' he said. 'And if he's as stupid as you think he is —in the right sort of way, of course—I'm sure you'll make him very happy.'
He ordered another drink and considered her speculatively.
'Have you by any chance started making him happy by allowing him to buy you that nice bit of fur?' he asked.
'Oh no,' she said. 'I bought this myself with my own hard-earned money.'
Simon sat up with impudently interrogative eyebrows.
'What hard-earned money?'
'The money from my memoirs,' she said simply. 'You see, I thought it would be a good idea to write my memoirs and sell them to one of the Sunday papers. They'd have been awfully thrilling, with all about you and Luker and Algy and everybody and all our adventures, and I thought they'd be a great success. I told Algy about it, and he thought so, too. In fact, he offered to buy them from me himself.'
'Oh, did he?' said the Saint. 'And how much did he give you for them?'
'He's given me ten thousand so far,' she said artlessly,'but I expect he'll give me quite a generous wedding present as well. It's saved me a lot of trouble, too, because he doesn't actually want me to write them just yet, and I must say I wasn't looking forward to that because my spelling is lousy.'
For several moments the Saint glared at her speechlessly.
'Damn you, young woman,' he exploded. 'Do you realize that Algy was my only chance of collecting any boodle out of this party? And after all I've done for you, you have the nerve to step in and knock him off under my nose!'
'I don't know about that,' she said diffidently. 'After all, I did find him first.'
Simon Templar surrendered. He lay back and laughed helplessly.
'You win,' he said. 'You know, I'm beginning to think that Luker and Marteau and company made a pretty clean getaway after all. If they'd been left at large, they'd probably have found that they'd fallen into the arms of a monster that would have made them suffer a lot more. Algy is the really unlucky guy.'
She lowered her eyes demurely.
'If by a monster you mean me, I can tell you that there are quite a lot of men who wouldn't consider themselves a bit unlucky to fall into my arms.'
'The trouble is,' said the Saint, 'I'm afraid I could almost be one of them.'
