matter of fact, he had been fatalistically expecting it for some hours. But he allowed his eyebrows to go up in genial surprise when the opening door revealed Teal's freshly laundered face like a harvest moon under a squarely planted bowler hat.
'Hail to thee, blithe spirit,' he greeted the detective breezily. 'I was wondering where you'd been hiding all these days. Come in and tell me all the news.'
Teal came in like an advancing tank. There was an aura of portentous somnolence about him, as if he found the whole world so boring that it was hardly worth while to keep awake. Simon knew the signs like the geography of his own home. When Chief Inspector Teal looked as if he might easily fall asleep in a standing position at any moment it meant that he had something more than usually heavy weighing on his mind; and on this particular morning it was not insuperably difficult for the Saint to guess what that load was. But his manner was seraphically conscience free as he steered the detective into the living room.
'Have some breakfast,' he suggested convivially.
'I had my breakfast at breakfast time,' Teal said with dignity.
He stood rather stiffly and sluggishly, holding his sedate black derby over his navel.
Simon lifted his shoulders in regret.
'There are times when you have an almost suburban smugness,' he said deploringly. 'Never mind. You'll excuse me if I go on with mine, won't you? Sit down, Claud. Take off your boots and make yourself at home. Why should these little things come between us?'
Teal sank heavily into a chair.
'I suppose you were up late last night,' he said ponderously. 'Is that why you're having breakfast so late this morning?'
'I don't know.' The Saint punctured his second egg. 'That wouldn't be a bad excuse; but why should I make excuses?' The Saint waved his fork oratorically. 'One of the many troubles of this cockeyed age is the glorification of false virtues. The bank clerk gets up early because he has to. And consequently dozens of fortunate people who don't need to get up early drag themselves out of bed at insanitary hours because it makes them feel as virtuous as a bank clerk. Instead of aspiring towards freedom and emancipation, we make a virtue of assuming unnecessary restrictions. A man spends his life working to the position where he doesn't have to get to the office at nine o'clock, and then he boasts that he still gets up at seven-thirty every morning. Well, then, what was he working for? Why didn't he save his energy and remain a clerk? You might build an indictment of all our accepted values on that. Poor men nibble a crust of bread because that's all they've got, and millionaires go on a diet of dry crusts and soda water——'
'What were you doing last night?' asked the detective implacably.
Simon looked shocked.
'Really, Claud! Have you no discretion? Or have you by any chance become a gossip writer?'
'I just want to know where you were last night,' Teal said immovably. 'I know you've got one of your usual alibis, but I'd like to hear it. And then perhaps you'll tell me why you did it.'
'Did what?'
'You know what I'm talking about.'
'I wish I did. It sounds so intriguing.'
'What were you doing last night?'
Simon buttered a slice of toast.
'So far as I recollect, I spent a classically blameless evening. An archbishop could have followed in my footsteps without getting a single speck of mud on his reverend gaiters. Preceded by massed choirs in white surplices, and marshalled by a fatigue party from the Salvation Army——'
