Follow the Saint

'I'm not going to need to collect any more,' Teal said grimly. 'You went too far when you left your mark on the dead man you threw out of your car in Richmond Park this afternoon. I'm taking you into custody on a charge of wilful murder!'

X

SIMON TOOK Mr Teal by the arm and led him back to a seat. He was probably the only man in the world who could have got away with such a thing, but he did it without the faintest sign of effort. He switched on about fifty thousand watts of his personality, and Mr Teal was sitting down beside him before he recovered from it.

'Damn it, Templar, what the hell do you think you're doing?' he exploded wrathfully. 'You're under arrest!'

'All right, I'm under arrest,' said the Saint accommodat­ingly, as he stretched out his long legs. 'So what ?'

'I'm taking you into custody——'

'You said that before. But why the hurry ? It isn't early closing day at Vine Street, is it ? Let's have our tea first, and you can tell me all about this bird I'm supposed to have moidered. You say he was thrown out of a car——'

'Your Hirondel!'

'But why mine? After all, there are others. I don't use enough of them to keep the factory going by myself.'

The detective's jaws clamped on his chewing gum.

'You can say all that to the magistrate in the morning,' he retorted dourly. 'It isn't my job to listen to you. It's my job to take you to the nearest police station and leave you there, and that's what I'm going to do. I've got a car and a couple of men at each of the entrances, so you'd better not give any trouble. I had an idea you'd be here at four o'clock ——'

'So I spent the afternoon moidering people and chucking them out of cars, and then rush off to meet you so you needn't even have the trouble of looking for me. I even use my own famous Hirondel so that any cop can identify it, and put my trademark on the deceased to make everything easy for the prosecution. You know, Claud,' said the Saint pen­sively, 'there are times when I wonder whether I'm quite sane.'

Teal's baby blue eyes clung to him balefully.

'Go on,' he grated. 'Let's hear the new alibi. It'll give me plenty of time to get it torn down before you come up for trial!'

'Give me a chance,' Simon protested. 'I don't even know what time I'm supposed to have been doing all these exciting things.'

'You know perfectly well——

'Never mind. You tell me, and let's see if we agree. What time did I sling this stiff out of my car?'

'A few minutes after three—and he was only killed a few minutes before that.'

The Saint opened his cigarette case.

'That rather tears it,' he said slowly; and Teal's eye kindled with triumph.

'So you weren't quite so smart——'

'Oh, no,' said the Saint diffidently. 'I was just thinking of it from your point of view. You see, just at that time I was at the Hirondel factory at Staines, talking about a new blower that I'm thinking of having glued on to the old buzz-wagon. We had quite a conference over it. There was the works manager, and the service manager, and the shop foreman, and a couple of mechanics thrown in, so far as I remember. Of course, everybody knows that the whole staff down there is in my pay, but the only thing I'm worried about is whether you'll be able to make a jury believe it.'