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  The Saint Meets the Tiger

  ( Saint - 1 )

  Leslie Charteris

  Leslie Charteris

  The Saint Meets the Tiger

  Introduction

  This reprint will probably bring great joy to a number of Saint fans who have been trying for some decades to get a glimpse of the very first volume of the Saga, a book which was never expected at the time to launch a series.

  It has been out of print for more years than I can guess at, and with no complaints from me. Personally I would have been very happy to leave it quietly in limbo: I was still under 21 when I wrote it, more than fifty years ago, and I am no more anxious to parade it than any other youthful indiscretion. Looking at it now, with absolute objectivity, I can see so much wrong with it that I am humbly astonished that it got published at all. In extenuation, it was only the third book I'd written, and the best I would say for it is that the first two were even worse.

  However, I can't deny writing it, its existence is a historical fact, and I suppose that anyone who is interested enough in backtracking into Simon Templar's and my own adolescent beginnings has a right to access to the awful truths.

  "Adolescent", of course, is not literally accurate in Simon's case. Cleverly judging that no adult reader would accept a swashbuckling hero of my own age, I started the Saint out at 25, giving him a head start on myself which would forever haunt me. For it would be even harder today to put over in a contemporary setting a Simon Templar four years more ancient even than I.

  Well, to clutch at a cliche, that is all water under the bridge. If there were to be any Saint books at all, obviously there had to be a first, and this is it. And I still think it was a good thing to have started. And that the fiction world today needs a Saint more than it ever did.

  For too many years now that scene has been dominated by the "anti-heroes" — those grim gray operators in a sunless sub-culture where global issues are worked out with totally unemotional pragmatism, those hapless uninspired puppets manipulated and expended by ruthlessly dedicated little brothers of Big Brother. It made morbidly fascinating narrative, but it never gave anyone a lift until it climaxed in the hypergadgeted parodies of 007 extravaganzas.

  I was always sure that there was a solid place in escape literature for a rambunctious adventurer such as I dreamed up in my own youth, who really believed in the oldfashioned romantic ideals and was prepared to lay everything on the line to bring them to life. A joyous exuberance that could not find its fulfilment in pinball machines and pot. I had what may now seem a mad desire to spread the belief that there were worse, and wickeder, nut cases than Don Quixote.

  Even now, half a century later, when I should be old enough to know better, I still cling to that belief. That there will always be a public for the old-style hero, who had a clear idea of justice, and a more than technical approach to love, and the ability to have some fun with his crusades.

  That is how and why the Saint was born, and why I hope he may eventually occupy a niche beside Robin Hood, d'Artagnan, and all theother-immortal true heroes of legend.

  Anyway, on this date, I can say that I'll always be glad I tried.

  Leslie Charteris

  St Jean — Cap Ferrat

  21 March 1980

  Chapter I

  THE PILL BOX

  Baycombe is a village on the North Devon coast that is so isolated from civilization that even at the height of the summer holiday season it is neglected by the rush of lean and plump, tall and short, papas, mammas, and infants. Consequently, there was some sort of excuse for a man who had taken up his dwelling there falling into the monotony of regular habits — even for a man who had only lived there for three days — even (let the worst be known) for a man so unconventional as Simon Templar.

  It was not so very long after Simon Templar had settled down in Baycombe that that peacefully sedate village became most unsettled, and things began to happen there that shocked and flabbergasted its peacefully sedate inhabitants, as will be related; but at first Simon Templar found Baycombe as dull as it had been for the last six hundred years.

  Siman Templar — in some parts of the world he was quite well known, from his initials, as the Saint —was a man of twenty-seven, tall, dark, keen faced, deeply tanned, blue eyed. That is a rough description. It was not long before Baycombe had observed him more closely, and woven mysterious legcnds about him. Baycombe did that within the first two days of his arrival, and it must be admitted that he had given some grounds for speculation.

  The house he lived in (it may perhaps be dignified with the title of "house," since a gang of workmen from Ilfracombe had worked without rest for thirty-six hours to make it habitable) had been built during the war as a coast defence station, at a time when the War Office were vaguely alarmed by rumours of a projected invasion at some unlikely point. Possibly because they thought Baycombe was the last point at which any enemy strategist would expect them to look for an invasion, the War Office had erected a kind of Pill Box on the tor above the village. The work had been efficiently carried out, and a small garrison had been installed; but apparently the War Office had been cleverer than the German tacticians, for no attempt was made to land an army at Baycombe. In 1918 the garrison and the guns had been removed, and the miniature concrete fortress had been abandoned to the games of the local children until Simon Templar, by some means known only to himself, had discovered that the Pill Box sand the quarter of a square mile of land in which it stood were still the property of the War Office, and in some secret way had managed to persuade the said War Office to sell him the freehold for twenty-five pounds.

  In this curious home the Saint had installed himself, together with a retainer who went by the name of Orace. And the Saint had been so overcome with the dullness of Baycombe that within three days he was the victim of routine.

  At 9 a. m. on this third day (the Saint had a rooted objection to early rising) the man who went by the name of Orace entered his master's bedroom bearing a cup of tea and mug of hot water.

  "Nice morning, sir," said Orace, and retired.

  Orace had remarked on the niceness of the morning for the last eight years, and he had never allowed the weather to change his pleasant custom.

  The Saint yawned, stretched himself like a cat, and saw with half-closed eyes that a stream of sunlight was pouring in through the embrasure which did duty for a window. The optimism of Orace being justified, Simon Templar sighed, stretched himself again, and after a moment's indecision leaped out of bed. He shaved rapidly, sipping his tea in between whiles, and then pulled on a bathing costume and went out into the sun, picking up a length of rope on his way out. He skipped energetically on the grass outside for fifteen minutes. Then he shadow-boxed for five minutes. Then he grabbed a towel, knotted it loosely round his neck, sprinted the couple of dozen yards that lay between the Pill Box and the edge of the cliff, and coolly swung himself over the edge. A hundred and fifty foot drop lay beneath him, but handholds were plentiful, and he descended to the beach as nonchalantly as he would have descended a flight of stairs. The water was ripplingly calm. He covered a quarter of a mile at racing speed, turned on his back and paddled lazily shoreward, finishing the last hundred yards like a champion. Then he lay at the edge of the surf, basking in the strengthening sun.

  All these things he had done as regularly on the two previous mornings, and he was languidly pondering the deadliness of regular habits when the thing happened that proved to him quite conclusively that regular habits could be more literally deadly than he had allowed for.

  Phhhew-wuk!

  Something sang past his ear, and the pebble at which he had been staring in an absent-minded sort of way leaped si
deways and was left with a silvery streak scored across it, while the thing that had sung changed its note and went whining seaward.

  "Bad luck, sonny," murmured the Saint mildly. "Only a couple of inches out...."

  But he was on his feet before the sound of the shot had reached him.

  He was on one of the arms of the bay, which was roughly semicircular. The village was in the centre of the arc. A quick calculation told him that the bullet had come from some point on the cliff between the Pill Box and the village, but he could see nothing on the skyline. A moment later a frantic silhouette appeared at the top of the tor, and the voice of Orace hailed down an anxious query. The Saint waved his towel in response and, making for the foot of the cliff, began to climb up again.

  He accomplished the difficult ascent with no apparent effort, quite unperturbed by the thought that the unknown sniper might essay a second round. And presently the Saint stood on the grass above, hands on hips, gazing keenly down the slope toward the spot from where the bullet had seemed to come. A quarter of a mile away was a broad clump of low bushes; beyond the copse, he knew, was a cart track leading down to the village. The Saint shrugged and turned to Orace, who had been fuming and fidgeting around him.

  "The Tiger knows his stuff," remarked Simon Templar with a kind of admiration.

  "Like a greenorn!" spluttered Orace. "Like a namachoor! Wa did ja expect? An' just wotcha deserved — an' I 'ope it learns ya! You ain't 'urt, sir, are ye?" added Orace, succumbing to human sympathy.

  "No — but near enough," said the Saint.

  Orace flung out his arms.

  "Pity he didn't plug ya one, just ter make ya more careful nex' time. I'd a bin grateful to 'im. An' if I ever lay my 'ands on the swine 'e's fore it," concluded Orace somewhat illogically, and strutted back to the Pill Box.

  Orace, as a Sergeant of Marines, had received a German bullet in his right hip at Zeebrugge, and had walked with a lop-sided strut ever since.

  "Brekfuss in narf a minnit," Orace flung over his shoulder.

  The Saint strolled after him at a leisurely pace and returned to his bedroom whistling. Nevertheless, Orace, entering the sitting room with a tray precisely half a minute later, found the Saint stretched out in an armchair. The Saint's hair was impeccably brushed, and he was fully dressed — according to the Saint's ideas of full dress — in shoes, socks, a dilapidated pair of gray flannel trousers and a snowy silk tennis shirt. Orace snorted, and the Saint smiled.

  "Orace," said the Saint conversationally, lifting the cover from a plate of bacon and eggs, "one gathers that things are just about to hum."

  " 'Um," responded Orace.

  "About to 'urn, if you prefer it," said the Saint equably. "The point is that the orchestra are in their places, the noises off have hitched up their hosiery, the conductor has unkemped his hair, the seconds are getting out of the ring, the guard is blowing his whistle, the skipper has rung down for full steam ahead, the — the — — — "

  "The cawfy's getting cold," said Orace. The Saint buttered a triangle of toast. "How unsympathetic you are, Orace!" he complained. "Well, if my flights of metaphor fail to impress you, let us put it like this: we're off."

  '"Um," agreed Orace, and returned to the improvised kitchen.

  Simon finished his meal and returned to the armchair, from which he had a view of the cliff and the sea beyond. He skimmed through the previous day's paper (Baycombe was at least twenty-four hours behind the rest of England) and then smoked a meditative cigarette. At length he rose, fetched and pulled on a well-worn tweed coat, picked up an unwieldy walking stick, and went to the curtained breach in the fortifications which was used for a front door.

  "Orace!"

  "Sir!" answered Orace, appearing at the threshold of the kitchen.

  "I’m going to have a look round. I’ll be back for lunch."

  "Aye, aye, sir.... Sir!"

  The Saint was turning away, and he stopped. Orace fumbled under his apron and produced a fearsome weapon — a revolver of pre-war make and enormous calibre — which he offered to his master.

  "It ain't much ter look at," said Orace, stroking the barrel lovingly, "and I wouldn't use it fer fancy shooting; but it'll make a bigger 'ole in a man than any o' those pretty ortymatics."

  "Thanks," grinned the Saint. "But it makes too much noise. I prefer Anna."

  '"Um," said Orace.

  Orace could put any shade of meaning into that simple monosyllable and on this occasion there was no doubt about the precise shade of meaning he intended to convey.

  The Saint was studying a slim blade which he had taken from a sheath strapped to his forearm, hidden under his sleeve. The knife was about six inches long in the blade, which was leaf-shaped and slightly curved. The haft was scarcely three inches long, of beautifully carved ivory. The whole was so perfectly balanced that it seemed to take life from the hand that held it, and its edge was so keen that a man could have shaved with it. The Saint spun the sliver of steel high in the air and caught it adroitly by the hilt as it fell back; and in the same movement he returned it to its sheath with such speed that the knife seemed to vanish even as he touched it.

  "Don't you be rude about Anna," said the Saint, wagging a reproving forefinger. "She'd take a man's thumb off before the gun was half out of his pocket."

  And he went striding down the hill toward the village, leaving Orace to pessimistic disgust.

  It was early summer, and pleasantly warm — a fact which made the Saint's selection of the Pill Box for a home less absurd than it would have seemed in winter. (There was another reason for his choice, besides a desire for quantities of fresh air and the simple life, as will be seen.) The Saint whistled as he walked, swinging his heavy stick, but his eyes never relaxed their vigilant study of every scrap of cover that might hide another sniper. He walked boldly down to the bushes which he had suspected that morning and spent some time in a minute search for incriminating evidence; but there had been no rain for days, and even his practised eye could make little of the spoor he found. Near the edge of the cliff he caught a golden gleam under a tuft of grass, and found a cartridge case.

  "Three-one-five Mauser," commented the Saint. "Naughty, naughty!"

  He dropped the shell into his pocket and studied the ground closely, but the indistinct impressions gave him no clue to the size or shape of the unknown, and at last he resumed his thoughtful progress toward the village.

  Baycombe, which is really no more than a fishing village, lies barely above sea level, but on either ; side the red cliffs rise away from the harbour, the hills rise behind, so that Baycombe lies in a hollow opening on the Bristol Channel. Facing seaward from the harbour, the Pill Box would have been seen crowning the tor on the right, the only 1 building to the east for some ten miles; the tor on the left was some fifty feet lower and was dotted with half-a-dozen red brick and gray stone houses belonging to the aristocracy. The Saint, via Orace, who had drunk beer in the public house by the quay to some advantage, already knew the names and habits of this oligarchy. The richest member was one Hans Bloem, a Boer of about fifty, who was also reputed to be the meanest man in Devonshire. Bloem frequently had a nephew staying with him who was as popular as his uncle was unpopular: the nephew was Algernon de Breton Lomas-Coper, wore a monocle, was one of the Lads, and, highly esteemed locally for a very pleasant ass. The Best People were represented by Sir Michael Lapping, a retired Judge; the Proletariat by Sir John Bittle, a retired Wholesale Grocer. There was a Manor, but it had no Lord, for it had passed to a gaunt, grim, masculine lady. Miss Agatha Girton, who lived there, unhonoured and unloved, with her ward, whom the village honoured and loved without exception. For the rest, there were two Indian Civil Servants who, under the prosaic names of Smith and Shaw, survived on their pensions in a tiny bungalow; and a Dr. Carn.

  "A very dull and ordinary bunch," reflected Simon Templar, as he stood on the top of the village street pondering his next move. "Except, perhaps, the ward. Is she the luvverly 'eroine of this
blinkin' adventure?"

  This hopeful thought directed his steps toward the Blue Moon, which was at the same time Baycombe's club and pub. But the Saint did not reach the Blue Moon that morning, because as he passed the shop which supplied all the village requirements, from shoes to ships and sealing wax, a girl came out.

  "I'm so sorry," said the Saint, steadying her with one arm.

  He retrieved the parcel which the collision had knocked out of her hand, and in returning it to her he had the chance of observing her face more closely. He could find no flaw there, and she had the most delightful of smiles. Her head barely topped his shoulder.

  "You must be the ward," said Simon. "Miss Pat — the village doesn't give you a surname."

  She nodded.

  "Patricia Holm," she said. "And you must be the Mystery Man."

  "Not really — am I that already?" said the Saint with interest, and she saw at once that the desire to hide his light under a bushel was not one of his failings.

  It is always a question whether the man inspires the nickname or the nickname inspires the man. When a man is known to his familiars as "Beau" or "Rabbit" there is little difficulty in supplying the answer; but a man who is called "Saint" may be either a lion or a lamb. It is doubtful whether Simon Templar would have been as proud of his title as he was if he had not found that it provided him with a ready-made, effective, and useful pose; for the Saint was pleasantly egotistical.

  "There are the most weird and wonderful rumours," said the girl, and the Saint looked milder than ever.

  "You must tell me," he said.

  He had fallen into step beside her, and they were walking up the rough road that led to the houses on the West Tor.

  "I'm afraid we've been very inhospitable," she said frankly. "You see, you set up house in the Pill Box, and that left everybody wondering whether you were possible or impossible, Baycombe society is awfully exclusive.''