The Saint and the Happy Highwayman s-21 Read online

  The Saint stood up also, and smoothed the clothes over his sinewy seventy-four inches. His lazy blue eyes twinkled.

  "That sounds almost like a challenge."

  "You can take it as one if you like."

  "I happen to know that your necklace isn't insured --no company in the country will ever carry you for a big risk since that fraudulent claim that got you a suspended sentence when you were in the Follies. Insurance company black lists don't fade."

  Her thin smile broadened.

  "I got ten thousand dollars, just the same, and that's more than covered any losses I've had since," she said calmly. "No, Mr Templar, I'm not worried about insurance. If you can get what you're after I'll be the first to congratulate you."

  Simon's brows slanted at her with an impudent humour that would have given her fair warning if she had been less confident. He had completely recovered from the smithereening of his first ingenious plans, and already his swift imagination was playing with a new and better scheme.

  "Is that a bet?" he said temptingly.

  "Do you expect me to put it in writing?"

  He smiled back at her.

  "I'll take your word for it. ... We must tell the newspapers."

  He left her to puzzle a little over that last remark, but by the time she went to bed she had forgotten it. Consequently she had a second spell of puzzlement a couple of mornings later when she listened to the twittering voice of one of her society acquaintances on the telephone.

  "My dear, how too original! Quite the cleverest thing I ever heard of! ... Oh, now you're just playing innocent! Of course it's in all the papers! And on the front page, too! . . . How did you manage it? My dear, I'm madly jealous! The Saint could steal anything I've got, and I mean anything! He must be the most fascinating man--isn't he?"

  "He is, darling, and I'll tell him about your offer," said the countess instinctively.

  She hung up the microphone and said: "Silly old cow!" There had been another ball the night before, in aid of a seamen's mission or a dogs' hospital or something, and she had had to deal with the usual charitable ration of champagne and brandy; at that hour of the morning after her reactions were not as sharp as they became later in the day. Nevertheless, a recollection of the Saint's parting words seeped back into her mind with a slight shock. She took three aspirins in a glass of whisky and rang for some newspapers.

  She didn't even have to open the first one. The item pricked her in the eyes just as the sheet was folded:

  SAINT WILL ROB COUNTESS

  FOR CHARITY

  "It's a Bet," says Society Hostess

  new- YORK, October 12.-- Simon Templar, better known as "The Saint," famous 20th-century Robin Hood, added yesterday to his long list of audacities by announcing that he had promised to steal for charity the $100,000 necklace of Countess Jannowicz, the well-known society leader.

  But for once the police have not been asked to prevent the intended crime. Templar called on the countess personally last Tuesday to discuss his scheme, and was told that she would be the first to congratulate him if he could get away with it.

  The twist in the plot is that Countess Jannowicz is herself an indefatigable worker for charity, and the organizer of countless social functions through which thousands of dollars are annually collected for various hospitals and humane societies.

  Those who remember the countess' many triumphs in roping in celebrities as a bait for her charities believe that she has surpassed herself with her latest "catch." It was whispered that the sensational stunt launching of some new

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  The countess read it all through, and then she put her head back on the pillows and thought about it some more and began to shake with laughter. The vibration made her feel as if the top of her head was coming off but she couldn't stop it. She was still quivering among her curlers when the telephone exoloded again.

  "It's someone from Police Headquarters," reported her maid. "Inspector Fernack."

  "What the hell does he want?" demanded the countess.

  She took over the instrument.

  "Yes," she squawked.

  "This is Inspector Fernack of Centre Street," clacked the diaphragm. "I suppose you've seen that story about the Saint and yourself in the papers?"

  "Oh yes," said the countess sweetly. "I was just reading it. Isn't it simply delightful?"

  "That isn't for me to say," answered the detective in a laboured voice. "But if this is a serious threat we shall have to take steps to protect your property."

  "Take steps----Oh, but I don't want to make it too easy for him. He always seems to get away with everything when the police are looking out for him."

  There was a strangled pause at the other end of the wire. Then:

  "You mean that this is really only a publicity stunt?"

  "Now, now," said the countess coyly. "That would be telling, wouldn't it? Good-bye, Inspector."

  She handed the telephone back to her maid.

  "If that damn flatfoot calls again, tell him I'm out," she said. "Get me some more aspirin and turn on my bath."

  It was typical of her that she dismissed Fernack's offer without a moment's uneasiness. After she had bathed and swallowed some coffee, however, she did summon the sallow and perspiring Mr Ullbaum who lived a feverish life as her press agent and vaguely general manager.

  "There'll be some reporters calling for interviews," she said. "Some of 'em have been on the phone already. Tell 'em anything that comes into your head, but keep it funny."

  Mr Ullbaum spluttered, which was a habit of his when agitated, which was most of the time.

  "But what's so funny if he does steal the necklace?"

  "He isn't going to get the necklace--I'll take care of that. But I hope he tries. Everybody he's threatened to rob before has gone into hysterics before he's moved a finger, and they've been licked before he starts. I'm going to lick him and make him look as big as a flea at the same time--and all without even getting out of breath. We'll treat it as a joke now, and after he's made a fool of himself and it really is a joke, it '11 be ten times funnier. For God's sake go away and use your own brain. That's what I pay you for. I've got a headache."

  She was her regal self again by cocktail time, when the Saint saw her across the room at the Versailles with a party of friends, immaculately groomed from the top of her tight-waved head to the toes of her tight-fitting shoes and looking as if she had just stepped out of an advertisement for guillotines. He sauntered over in answer to her imperiously beckoning forefinger.

  "I see your press agent didn't waste any time, Mr Templar."

  "I don't know," said the Saint innocently. "Are you sure you didn't drop a hint to your own publicity man?"

  She shook her head.

  "Mr Ullbaum was quite upset when he heard about it."

  The Saint smiled. He knew the permanently flustered Mr Ullbaum.

  "Then it must have been my bloke," he murmured. "How did you like the story?"

  "I thought it was rather misleading in places, but Mr Ullbaum is going to put that right. . . . Still, the police are quite interested. I had a phone call from a detective this morning before I was really awake."

  A faint unholy glimmer crossed the Saint's eyes.

  "Would that be Inspector Fernack, by any chance?"

  "Yes."

  "What did you tell him?"

  "I told him to leave me alone."

  Simon seemed infinitesimally disappointed, but he grinned.

  "I was wondering why he hadn't come paddling around to see me and add some more fun to the proceedings. I'm afraid I'm going to miss him. But it's nice to play with someone like you who knows the rules."

  "I know the rules, Mr Templar," she said thinly. "And the first rule is to win. Before you're finished you're going to wish you hadn't boasted so loudly."

  "You're not worried?"

  She moved one jewel-encrusted hand indicatively.

  "Did you notice those two men at that table
in the corner?"

  "Yes--have they been following you? I'll call a cop and have them picked up if you like."

  "Don't bother. Those are my bodyguards. They're armed and they have orders to shoot at the drop of a hat. Are you sure you aren't worried?"

  He laughed.

  "I never drop my hat." He buttoned his coat languidly, and the impudent scapegrace humour danced in his eyes like sunlight on blue water. "Well--I've got to go on with my conspiring, and I'm keeping you from your friends . . ."

  There was a chorus of protest from the other women at the table, who had been craning forward with their mouths open, breathlessly eating up every word.

  "Oh no!"

  "Countess, you must introduce us!"

  "I've been dying to meet him!"

  The countess' lips curled.

  "Of course, my dears," she said, with the sugariness of arsenic. "How rude of me!" She performed the introductions. "Lady Instock was telling me only this morning that you could steal anything from her," she added spikily.

  "Anything," confirmed Lady Instock, gazing at the Saint rapturously out of her pale protruding eyes.

  Simon looked at her thoughtfully.

  "I won't forget it," he said.

  As he returned to his own table he heard her saying to a unanimous audience: "Isn't he the most thrilling----"

  Countess Jannowicz watched his departure intently, ignoring the feminine palpitations around her. She had a sardonic sense of humour, combined with a scarcely suppressed contempt for the climbing sycophants who crawled around her, that made the temptation to elaborate the joke too attractive to resist. Several times during the following week she was impelled to engineer opportunities to refer to "that Saint person who's trying to steal my necklace" ; twice again, when their paths crossed in fashionable restaurants, she called him to her table for the express pleasure of twitting him about his boast. To demonstrate her contempt for his reputation by teasing him on such friendly terms, and at the same time to enjoy the awed reactions of her friends, flattered something exhibitionistic in her that gave more satisfaction than any other fun she had had for years. It was like having a man-eating tiger for a pet and tweaking its ears.

  This made nothing any easier for Mr Ullbaum. The countess was already known as a shrewd collector of publicity and the seeds of suspicion had been firmly planted by the opening story. Mr Ullbaum tried to explain to groups of skeptical reporters that the Saint's threat was perfectly genuine but that the countess was simply treating it with the disdain which it deserved; at the same time he tried to carry out his instructions to "keep it funny," and the combination was too much for his mental powers. The cynical cross-examinations he had to submit to usually reduced him to ineffectual spluttering. His disclaimers were duly printed, but in contexts that made them sound more like admissions.

  The countess, growing more and more attached to her own joke, was exceptionally tolerant.

  "Let 'em laugh," she said. "It'll make it all the funnier when he flops."

  She saw him a third time at supper at "21" and invited him to join her party for coffee. He came over, smiling and immaculate, as much at ease as if he had been her favourite nephew. While she introduced him --a briefer business now, for he had met some of the party before--she pointedly fingered the coruscating rope of diamonds on her neck.

  "You see I've still got it on," she said as he sat down.

  "I noticed that the lights seemed rather bright over here," he admitted. "You've been showing it around quite a lot lately, haven't you? Are you making the most of it while you've got it?"

  "I want to make sure that you can't say I didn't give you plenty of chances."

  "Aren't you afraid that some ordinary grab artist might get it first ? You know I have my competitors."

  She looked at him with thinly veiled derision.

  "I'll begin to think there is a risk of that, if you don't do something soon. And the suspense is making me quite jittery. Haven't you been able to think of a scheme yet?"

  Simon's eyes rested on her steadily for a moment while he drew on his cigarette.

  "That dinner and dance you were organizing for Friday--you sent me an invitation," he said. "Is it too late for me to get a ticket?"

  "I've got some in my bag. If you've got twenty-five dollars----"

  He laid fifty dollars on the table.

  "Make it two--I may want someone to help me carry the loot."

  Her eyes went hard and sharp for an instant before a buzz of excited comment from her listening guests shut her off from him. He smiled at them all inscrutably and firmly changed the subject while he finished his coffee and smoked another cigarette. After he had taken his leave, she faced a bombardment of questions with stony preoccupation.

  "Come to the dance on Friday," was all she would say. "You may see some excitement."

  Mr Ullbaum, summoned to the Presence again the next morning, almost tore his hair.

  "Now will you tell the police?" he gibbered.

  "Don't be so stupid," she snapped. "I'm not going to lose anything, and he's going to look a bigger fool than he has for years. All I want you to do is see that the papers hear that Friday is the day--we may sell a few more tickets."

  Her instinct served her well in that direction at least. The stories already published, vague and contradictory as they were, had boosted the sale of tickets for the Grand Ball in aid of the National League for the Care of Incurables beyond her expectations, and the final announcement circulated to the press by the unwilling Mr Ullbaum caused a flurry of last-minute buying that had the private ballroom hired for the occasion jammed to overflowing by eight o'clock on the evening of the twentieth. It was a curious tribute to the legends that had grown up around the name of Simon Templar, who had brought premature grey hairs to more police officers than could easily have been counted. Everyone who could read knew that the Saint had never harmed any innocent person, and there were enough sensation-seekers with clear consciences in New York to fill the spacious suite beyond capacity.

  Countess Jannowicz, glittering with diamonds, took her place calmly at the head table beside the chairman. He was the aged and harmlessly doddering bearer of a famous name who served in the same honorary position in several charitable societies and boards of directors without ever knowing much more about them than was entailed in presiding over occasional public meetings convened by energetic organizers like the countess; and he was almost stone deaf, an ailment which was greatly to his advantage in view of the speeches he had to listen to.

  "What's this I read about some fella goin' to steal your necklace ?" he mumbled, as he shakily spooned his soup.

  "It wouldn't do you any good if I told you, you dithering old buzzard," said the countess with a gracious smile.

  "Oh yes. Hm. Ha. Extraordinary."

  She was immune to the undercurrents of excitement that ebbed and flowed through the room like leakages of static electricity. Her only emotion was a slight anxiety lest the Saint should cheat her, after all, by simply staying away. After all the build-up, that would certainly leave her holding the bag. But it would bring him no profit, and leave him deflated on his own boast at the same time; it was impossible to believe that he would be satisfied with such a cheap anticlimax as that.

  What else he could do and hope to get away with, on the other hand, was something that she had flatly given up trying to guess. Unless he had gone sheerly cuckoo, he couldn't hope to steal so much as a spoon that night, after his intentions had been so widely and openly proclaimed, without convicting himself on his own confession. And yet the Saint had so often achieved things that seemed equally impossible that she had to stifle a reluctant eagerness to see what his uncanny ingenuity would devise. Whatever that might be, the satisfaction of her curiosity could cost her nothing--for one very good reason.

  The Saint might have been able to accomplish the apparently impossible before, but he would literally have to perform a miracle if he was to open the vaults of the Vandrick National
Bank. For that was where her diamond necklace lay that night and where it had lain ever since he paid his first call on her. The string she had been wearing ever since was a first-class imitation, worth about fifty dollars. That was her answer to all the fanfaronading and commotion--a precaution so obvious and elementary that no one else in the world seemed to have thought of it, so flawless and unassailable that the Saint's boast was exploded before he even began, so supremely ridiculously simple that it would make the whole earth quake with laughter when the story broke.

  Even so, ratcheted notch after notch by the lurking fear of a fiasco, tension crept up on her as the time went by without a sign of the Saint's elegant slender figure and tantalizing blue eyes. He was not there for the dinner or the following speeches, nor did he show up during the interval while some of the tables were being whisked away from the main ballroom to make room for the dancing. The dancing started without him, went on through long-drawn expectancy while impatient questions leapt at the countess spasmodically from time to time like shots from ambush.

  "He'll come," she insisted monotonously, while news photographers roamed restively about with their fingers aching on the triggers of their flashlights.

  At midnight the Saint arrived.

  No one knew how he got in; no one had seen him before; but suddenly he was there.

  The only announcement of his arrival was when the music stopped abruptly in the middle of a bar. Not all at once, but gradually, in little groups, the dancers shuffled to stillness, became frozen to the floor as the first instinctive turning of eyes towards the orchestra platform steered other eyes in the same direction.

  He stood in the centre of the dais, in front of the microphone. No one had a moment's doubt that it was the Saint, although his face was masked. The easy poise of his athletic figure in the faultlessly tailored evening clothes was enough introduction, combined with the careless confidence with which he stood there, as if he had been a polished master of ceremonies preparing to make a routine announcement. The two guns he held, one in each hand, their muzzles shifting slightly over the crowd, seemed a perfectly natural part of his costume.