subject.
'I found him without any difficulty in his suite at the Waldorf. The Robin Hood of the modern underworld, who was once the favourite target of gangsters and police alike on account of his ruthless free-lance campaign against the criminals whom the law could not or would not touch, listened with his laziest smile while I read over Lieutenant Corrio's statements to him.
'I asked him if he had any answer to make.
'The Saint uncoiled his six feet two of steel-and-leathery length from the armchair where he had been sitting, and his clear blue eyes twinkled maliciously as he showed me to the door.
' 'I think Lieutenant Corrio will put Clark Gable out of business one of these days,' he said.'
If there was anything that could have been guaranteed to increase Inspector Fernack's long-established secret sympathy for the Saint, it was this climax of a quotation. It is true that he would have preferred to have originated it himself, but the other compensations far outweighed this minor disadvantage.
Lieutenant Corrio's face reddened. He was particularly proud of his presidency of the Merrick Maskers, and he had never been able to see anything humorous in his confirmed conviction that his destined home was in Hollywood and that his true vocation was that of the dashing hero of a box-office-shattering series of romantic melodramas.
Having dealt comprehensively with these lighter points Fernack opened his shoulders and proceeded to the meatier business of the conference in a series of well-chosen sentences. He went on to summarize his opinion of Lieutenant Corrio's ancestry, past life, present value, future prospects, looks, clothes, morals, intelligence and assorted shortcomings, taking a point of view which made up in positiveness and vigour for anything which it may have lacked in absolute impartiality.
'An' get this,' he concluded. 'The Saint hasn't come here to get into any trouble. I know him an' he knows me, an' he knows me too damn well to try to pull anything while I'm still gettin' around on my own feet. An' what's more, if anybody's got to take care of him I can do it. He's a man-sized proposition, an' it takes a man-sized cop to look after him. An' if any statements have to be made to the papers about it, I'll make 'em.'
Gorrio waited for the storm to pass its height, which took some time longer.
'I'm sure you know best, sir--especially after the way he helped you on that Valcross case,' he said humbly, while Fernack glared at him speechlessly. 'But I have a theory about the Saint.'
'You have a what?' repeated Fernack as if Corrio had uttered an indecent word.
'A theory, sir. I think the mistake that's been made all along is in trying to get something on the Saint after he's done a job. What we ought to do is pick out a job that he looks likely to do, watch it, and catch him red- handed. After all, his character is so well known that any real detective ought to be able to pick out the things that would interest him with his eyes shut. There's one in that paper on your desk--I noticed it this morning.'
'Are you still talking about this?' Fernack demanded unsympathetically. 'Because if so----'
Corrio shook his head.
'I mean that man Oppenheim who owns the sweatshops. It says in the paper that he's just bought the Vanderwoude emerald collection for a million and a half dollars to give to his daughter for a wedding present. Knowing how Oppenheim got his money, and knowing the Saint's line, it's my idea that the Saint will make a play for those jewels.'
'An' make such a sucker play that even a fairy like you could catch him at it,' snarled Fernack discourag- ingly. 'Go back and do your detecting at the Merrick Playhouse--I hear there's a bad ham out there they've been trying to find for some time.'
If he had been less incensed with his subordinate Fernack might have perceived a germ of sound logic in Corrio's theory, but he was in no mood to appreciate it. Two days later he did not even remember that the suggestion had been made; which was an oversight on his part, for it was at that time that Simon Templar did indeed develop a serious interest in the unpleasant Mr Oppenheim.
This was because Janice Dixon stumbled against him late one night as he was walking home along Forty- eighth Street in the dark and practically deserted block between Sixth and Seventh avenues. He had to catch her to save her from falling.
'I'm sorry,' she muttered.
He murmured some absent-minded commonplace and straightened her up, but her weight was still heavy on his hand. When he let her go she swayed towards him and clung onto his arm.
'I'm sorry,' she repeated stupidly.
His first thought was that she was drunk, but her breath was innocent of the smell of liquor. Then he thought the accident might be only the excuse for a more mercenary kind of introduction, but he saw that her face was not made up as he would have expected it to be in that case. It was a pretty face, but so pale that it looked ghostly in the semidarkness between the far-spaced street lamps; and he saw that she had dark circles under her eyes and that her mouth was without lipstick.
'Is anything the matter?' he asked.
'No--it's nothing. I'll be all right in a minute. I just want to rest.'
'Let's go inside somewhere and sit down.'
There was a drugstore on the corner and he look her into it. It seemed to be a great effort for her to walk and another explanation of her unsteadiness flashed into his mind. He sat her down at the counter and ordered two cups of coffee.
'Would you like something to eat with it?'
Her eyes lighted up and she bit her lip.
'Yes. I would. But--I haven't any money.'
'I shouldn't worry about that. We can always hold up a bank.' The Saint watched her while she devoured a sandwich, a double order of bacon and eggs and a slice of pie. She ate intently, quickly, without speaking. Without seeming to stare at her, his keen eyes took in the shadows under her che'ekbones, the neat patch on one elbow of the cheap dark coat, the cracks in the leather of shoes which had long since lost their shape.
'I wish I had your appetite,' he said gently, when at last she had finished.
She smiled for the first time, rather faintly.
'I haven't had anything to eat for two days,' she said. 'And I haven't had as much to eat as this all at once for a long time.'
Simon ordered more coffee and offered her a cigarette. He put his heels up on the top rung of his stool and leaned his elbows on his knees. She told him her name, but for the moment he didn't answer with his own.
'Out of a job?' he asked quietly.
She shook her head.
'Not yet.'
'You aren't on a diet by any chance, are you?'
'Yes. A nice rich diet of doughnuts and coffee, mostly.' She smiled rather wearily at his puzzlement. 'I work for Oppenheim.'
'Doesn't he pay you?'
'Sure. But maybe you haven't heard of him. I'm a dressmaker. I work with fifty other girls in a loft down near the East River, making handmade underwear. We work ten hours a day, six days a week, sewing. If you're clever and fast you can make two pieces in a day. They pay you thirty cents apiece. You can buy them on Fifth Avenue for four or five dollars, but that doesn't do us any good. I made three dollars last week, but I had to pay the rent for my room.'
It was Simon Templar's first introduction to the economics of the sweatshop; and hardened as he was to the ways of chiselers and profiteers, the cold facts as she stated them made him feel slightly sick to his stomach. He realized that he had been too long in ignorance of the existence of such people as Mr Oppenheim.
'Do you mean to say he gets people to work for him on those terms?' he said incredulously. 'And how is it possible to live on three dollars a week?'
'Oh, there are always girls who'll do it if they can't get anything else. I used to get forty dollars a week doing the same work on Madison Avenue, but I was sick for a couple of weeks and they used it as an excuse to let me go. I didn't have any job at all for three months, and three dollars a week is better than nothing. You learn how to live on it. After a while you get used to being hungry; but when you have to buy shoes or pay a dentist's bill, and the rent piles up for a couple of weeks, it doesn't do you any good.'
