in the air. His knuckles hit the Saint's cheekbone near the eye, sending a shower of sparks across Simon's vision.
Simon might have stopped to reason with him, to persuasively point out the manifest arguments in favour of adjourning to a less hectic neighbourhood; but he had no time. No more shots had been fired, doubtless because it had been borne in upon the ungodly that they stood a two to one chance of doing more damage to each other than to him, but he could hear them blundering in search of him. The Saint raised his gun and brought the barrel down vigorously where he thought Verdean's head ought to be. Mr Verdean's head proved to be in the desired spot; and Simon ducked a shoulder under him and lifted him up as he collapsed.
The actual delay amounted to less than three seconds. The ungodly were still blinded by the dark, but Simon launched himself at the window with the accuracy of a homing pigeon.
He wasted no time fumbling with catches. He hit the centre of it with his shoulder—the shoulder over which Verdean was draped. Verdean, in turn, hit it with his hams; and the fastening was not equal to the combined load. It splintered away with a sharp crack, and the twin casements flew open crashingly. Verdean passed through them into the night, landing in soft earth with a soggy thud; and the Saint went on after him as if he were plunging into a pool. He struck ground with his hands, and rolled over in a fairly graceful somersault as a fourth shot banged out of the room he had just left.
A gorilla paw caught him under the arm and helped him up, and Mr Uniatz's voice croaked anxiously in his ear.
'Ya ain't stopped anyt'ing, boss ?'
'No.' Simon grinned in the dark. 'They aren't that good. Grab hold of this bird and see if the car'll start. They probably left the keys in it.'
He had located Mr Verdean lying where he had fallen. Simon raised him by the slack of his coat and slung him into Hoppy's bearlike clutch, and turned back towards the window just as the lights of the living-room went on again behind the disordered curtains.
He crouched in the shadow of a bush with his gun raised, and said in a much more carrying voice: 'I bet I can shoot my initials on the face of the first guy who sticks his nose outside.'
The lights went out a second time; and there was a considerable silence. The house might have been empty of life. Behind him, Simon heard an engine whine into life, drop back to a subdued purr as the starter disconnected. He backed towards the car, his eyes raking the house frontage relentlessly, until he could step on to the running-board.
'Okay, Hoppy,' he said.
The black sedan slid forward. Another shot whacked out behind as he opened the door and tumbled into the front seat, but it was yards wide of usefulness. The headlights sprang into brilliance as they lurched through an opening ahead and skidded round in the lane beyond. For the first time in several overcrowded minutes, the Saint had leisure to get out his cigarette case. The flame of his lighter painted jubilantly mephistophelian highlights on his face.
'Let's pick up our own car,' he said. 'Then we'll take our prize home and find out what we've won.'
He found out sooner than that. He only had to fish out Mr Verdean's wallet to find a half-dozen engraved cards that answered a whole tumult of questions with staggering simplicity. They said:
v
PATRICIA HOLM put two lumps of sugar in her coffee and stirred it.
'Well, that's your story,' she said coldly. 'So I suppose you're sticking to it. But what were you doing there in the first place?'
'I
