Saint Errant (The Saint Series) Page 3

  On the top of a massive ladder of bookshelves beside the door, Simon Templar rose like a panther from his prone position and dropped downwards. He fell squarely behind Northwade, easing his fall with a hand applied to the crown of Northwade’s head, which drew from the tycoon a sudden squeal of terror. The same hand pushed Northwade violently forward, and the candle which supplied the only illumination of the scene flickered and went out.

  In the darkness the door banged.

  “We might even get back in time to have a dance somewhere,” said the Saint.

  He materialized out of the gloom beside her like a wraith, and she gasped.

  “Did you have to scare me?” she asked, when she had got her breath.

  He chuckled. Back towards the Northwade mansion there were sounds of muffled disturbance, floating down to his ears like the music of hounds to an old fox. He slipped into the driving seat and touched the starter. The engine purred unprotestingly.

  “Did something go wrong?” she asked.

  “Nothing that wasn’t taken care of.”

  The car gathered speed into the blaze of its own headlights. Simon felt for a cigarette and lighted it from the dashboard gadget.

  “Did you get everything?” she asked.

  “I am the miracle man who never fails, Judith,” he said reproachfully. “Hadn’t I explained that?”

  “But that noise—”

  “There seems to have been some sort of alarm that goes off when the safe is opened, which you didn’t know about. Not that it mattered a lot. The ungodly were fatally slow in assembling, and if you’d seen their waist measurements you wouldn’t have been surprised.”

  She caught his arm excitedly.

  “Oh, I can’t quite believe it!…Everything’s all right now. And I’ve actually been on a raid with the Saint himself! Do you mind if I give way a bit?”

  She reached across him to the button in the middle of the steering wheel. The horn blared a rhythmic peal of triumph and defiance into the night: “Taaa ta-ta, taaa ta-ta, taaa ta-ta!” Like a jubilant trumpet. Simon smiled. Nothing could have fitted better into the essential rightness of everything that had happened that evening. It was true that there had been a telephone in the library, and if there was an extension upstairs there might be gendarmes already watching the road, but they would be an interesting complication that could be dealt with in its proper turn.

  Then he coaxed the car around a sharp bend and saw a row of red lights spring up across the road. He dropped his hand thoughtfully to the brake.

  “This wasn’t here when we came by first,” he said, and realized that the girl had gone tense and still.

  “What do you think it is?” she whispered.

  The Saint shrugged. He brought the car to a standstill with its bumper three yards from the red lights, which appeared to be attached to a long plank rigged squarely across his path—he could not see what was beyond the plank.

  Then he felt a hard cold jab of metal in the side of his head, and turned quickly. He looked down the barrel of a gun in the hand of an overcoated man who stood beside the car.

  “Take it easy,” advised the man with grim calmness.

  The Saint heard a rustle of movement beside him, and glanced around. The girl was getting out. She closed the door after her, and stood on the running board.

  “This is as far as I ride, stranger,” she said.

  “I see,” said the Saint gently.

  The man with the gun jabbed again.

  “Let’s have those papers,” he ordered.

  Simon took them from his breast pocket. The girl received them, and turned on the dashboard light to squint down the roll of plans and read the inscription on the long envelope. Her golden-yellow hair stirred like a shifting halo in the slight breeze.

  “Burt Northwade hasn’t got a brother who’s a professor at Toronto,” she explained, “and I’m no relative of the family. Apart from that, most of what I told you was true. Northwade bought this invention from a young Rumanian inventor—I don’t know what sort of a price he gave for it, but he bought it. Actually there’s no patent on it, so the biggest value to a manufacturer is in keeping it secret till he can come out with it ahead of the others. He was going to sell it to Ford, as I told you.”

  “What are you going to do with it?” inquired the Saint curiously.

  “We’ve got an unwritten offer from Henry Kaiser.”

  She went forward and swung back the plank with the red lights, so that the road was clear again. Then she came back. The gray eyes were as frank and friendly as before.

  “We’ve been planning this job for a week, and we should have done the job ourselves tonight if I hadn’t seen your photograph in the paper and recognized you at the Windsor. The rest of it was an inspiration. There’s nothing like having the greatest expert in the profession to work for you.”

  “What paper do you read?” asked the Saint.

  “I saw you in La Presse. Why?”

  “I bought an imported New York paper,” said the Saint, conversationally.

  She laughed quietly, a friendly ripple tinged with a trace of regret.

  “I’m sorry, stranger. I liked you so much.”

  “I’m rather sorry too—Judith,” said the Saint.

  She was still for an instant. Then she leaned over and kissed him quickly on the lips.

  The gun jabbed again.

  “Drive on,” ordered the man. “And keep driving.”

  “Won’t you be wanting your car?” murmured the Saint.

  A harsher chuckle came from the depths of the dark overcoat.

  “We’ve got our own. I rented that one and left it at a garage for you when I had a phone call to say you were hooked. Get moving.”

  Simon engaged the gears, and let in the clutch. The girl jumped down from the running board. “Good-bye, stranger!” she cried, and Simon raised one hand in salute, without looking back.

  He drove fast. Whoever the girl was, whatever she was, he knew that he had enjoyed meeting her far more than he could ever have enjoyed meeting the real Judith Northwade, whose unfortunate motor accident had been featured, with portrait, on the front page of the New York Daily Gazette, alongside his own two columns. She could never have looked anything but a hag. Whereas he still thought that her impostor was very beautiful. He hated to think what she would say when she delved deeper into the duplicate envelope and dummy roll of plans which he had so rapidly prepared for her in Burt Northwade’s library. But he still drove fast, because those sad things were a part of the game and it was a longish way to Willow Run.

  IRIS

  Of Simon Templar it could truly be said that to him all the world was a stage, and all the men and women merely players in an endless comedy drama designed for his especial entertainment and incidentally his cut at the box office.

  To Mr Stratford Keane, all the world was also a stage, with the difference that he was the principal player and all the other men and women merely audience. This attitude persisted in spite of the fact that it was many years since the public had last shown any great desire to see him behind the footlights, and his thespian activities had been largely restricted to giving readings from Shakespeare to women’s clubs and conducting classes in The Drama in the more obscure summer-theater colonies. In spite of these slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, however, he still maintained the fur-collared overcoats, the flowing ties, the long white locks, and the sweeping gestures of his departed day, and wherever he might be, the fruity resonance of his voice was still pitched to the second balcony in rounded periods from which every traditional caricature of a Shakespearean ham might have been taken.

  Simon saw him advancing through the Pump Room, not in a perfectly straight line, for one of the causes of Mr Keane’s eclipse was a weakness for the stuff that maketh glad the heart of man, but nevertheless with an unmistakable destination, and the attractions of Chicago fell under a slight cloud.

  “Don’t look now,” he said to Patricia Holm, “b
ut we are on the brink of another recital.”

  The main attraction of Chicago at the moment glanced up.

  “Poor old Stratford,” she said. “He’s a good-hearted old bore. And not such a fool as you think, or why do you think he got the job of directing this new production of Macbeth?”

  “Probably it was the only way they could get rid of him,” Simon suggested. “So long as he’s locked up in a theater in rehearsal he can’t be out boring people anywhere else.”

  “You and your big heart,” Patricia said. “It’s a wonderful break for him, and he must have needed it badly.”

  “I’m thrilled to death at Stratford Keane getting a break,” Simon assured her. “And I should be almost ecstatic if you’d never introduced him to me.”

  It was a little late to dream along those lines, for Mr Keane was already upon them and fully determined to make the most of their acquaintance. He held a half-filled glass over his heart and bowed deeply.

  “Ah, Miss Holm! And Mr Templar,” he boomed, causing people several tables away to look up and try to locate the loudspeaker. “Well met, well met!”

  Patricia smiled.

  “How are you this evening, Mr Keane?—Won’t you sit down?” she added hastily, as Mr Keane leaned rather heavily on the table and shook a few drops out of their cocktails.

  “A pleasure,” Mr Keane sat down, and heaved a vast and doleful sigh. “Ah, this is indeed a haven in a world where every man must play a part—and mine a sad one…”

  “Why, what’s the matter?”

  “I have just returned from the theater,” stated Mr Keane tragically, as if he were announcing the end of the world. “We went through one of our final rehearsals.”

  “Was that bad?” Simon asked.

  Stratford Keane surveyed him pityingly.

  “Young man,” he said, “to use the word ‘bad’ in that connection is to scorn all the resources of the English tongue. As a masterpiece of understatement, however, it might have some merit.”

  “You mean you won’t be able to open on schedule?” Patricia asked sympathetically.

  “On the contrary,” said Mr Keane. “I’m afraid we shall.”

  Simon raised his eyebrows. “Afraid?”

  “My dear boy,” said Mr Keane heavily, “the success of Shakespeare in the emasculated theater of today is uncertain even with the most brilliant of performers, but when the lines of the Bard are assaulted by a gang of bellowing buffoons and dizzy doxies such as have been thrust upon me, the greatest play of all time would be doomed before the curtain rose.”

  “But isn’t Iris Freeman a good actress?” Patricia asked.

  “As a soubrette, yes. But as Lady Macbeth—” Mr Keane made an expressive gesture which swept an ash tray off the table. “Still, I could almost bear with her if only she would not insist on putting all her friends in the cast regardless of their incompetence—and most especially that tailor’s dummy, Mark Belden, whom she picked as her leading man.”

  “I never heard of him,” Simon admitted.

  “Would that I shared your happy ignorance. Unfortunately, I have been condemned to get to know Mr Belden so well that his voice will ring in my ears until they sink into the merciful silence of the grave. A vaudeville hoofer who murders Shakespeare with every breath he takes!”

  “But aren’t you the director?” Patricia put in. “Don’t you have anything to say about the cast?”

  Stratford Keane glowered at her despondently. “My dear, your innocence is equaled by nothing but your beauty. The only voice which has anything to say about the cast is the voice of the money which is backing the production, which happens to belong to Miss Freeman.”

  “Shouldn’t you have said that it belonged to Rick Lansing?” Simon put in shrewdly.

  Patricia turned to him with a tiny wrinkle forming between her brows.

  “Miss Freeman’s latest husband,” Simon answered. “Better known to his business associates as Rick the Barber. Only it probably wouldn’t be tactful to mention that when she’s around.” He shifted his eyes. “Which means starting about now.”

  He had seen enough advance publicity pictures of Iris Freeman to recognize her as she came towards the table. It would have been impossible in any event not to notice her, for the furs and jewels which trimmed a face and figure that could have attracted quite enough attention without any artificial adornment at all were obviously worn for the secondary function of practically forcing the observer to ask who they belonged to. And the unhesitating way in which her path was headed for Stratford Keane established a connection between them that was almost enough clue by itself.

  “Stratford, darling!” she cried. “I was just betting Mark that we’d find you here as usual.”

  “A feat of unparalleled perspicacity on your part,” said Keane. He struggled halfway to his feet, rocking the table dangerously. “May I present two dear friends of mine—Miss Patricia Holm and Mr Simon Templar. This is Miss Iris Freeman, whom I was just telling you about. And—er”—he winced slightly at the exquisitely tailored male who appeared from behind Miss Freeman’s patina—“Mr Belden.”

  Iris Freeman’s beautiful dark eyes found Simon and grew wide and worshipful.

  “Simon Templar?” she repeated. “You don’t mean—the Saint?”

  Simon nodded resignedly. It was not always convenient to be identified so readily with the paradoxical alias under which his identity had once upon a time been concealed, but those days were pretty far in the past, and few people who read newspapers were unaware of the almost legendary career of brigandage which his name stood for. He was getting more used to it all the time, and certainly there was nothing much else to do except make the best of it. Which was not always so bad, either, especially when the vague associations of his name made beautiful women look at him in that excited and expectant way.

  He smiled.

  “That was the name,” he said, “before I saw the error of my ways.”

  Belden said, “This is wonderful. You know, Iris is one of your most devoted fans, Mr Templar. She’s crazy about you.”

  Simon restrained an impulse to empty the remains of a Martini over him, and said, “I think that’s a wonderful way to be crazy. But of course I’m prejudiced.”

  “I was just telling Mark the other day that the only person in the whole world whose autograph I’d really like to have was the Saint,” Iris Freeman said.

  “Isn’t that sort of turning the tables on your public, Miss Freeman?” murmured Patricia sweetly.

  The actress laughed gaily, with every note beautifully modulated for imaginary microphones.

  “Hardly a habit of mine. But we all have our weaknesses, don’t we? And the Saint’s also one of mine, darling…Mark, do you have a piece of paper?”

  Belden fumbled in his pockets and produced a folded sheet.

  “Here you are.”

  “I suppose if I had more practice I could take these situations in my stride,” said the Saint.

  “You’ll do all right,” said Patricia. “Sign the paper and satisfy your adoring public.”

  Simon took out a pen and scribbled his name.

  “And you must draw the Saint figure,” Iris Freeman insisted. “It wouldn’t be complete without that.”

  The Saint patiently sketched his trademark—the straight-line skeleton figure crowned with the conventional halo which had once been enough to give the most hardened citizens an uneasy qualm at the pit of their stomachs—and reflected that a lot of things had changed. Or had they?

  “That’s simply wonderful,” Iris Freeman gushed. “You’ll never believe what a thrill this is for me. I only wish I could stay and talk to you for hours, but Mark and I have to run. How would you like to come to our rehearsal tomorrow?”

  “He’d love to,” Patricia said firmly. “But I’m afraid he has another engagement.”

  “Oh…I see.” The actress bit her lip. “Well, I’ll be sure and send you some tickets for the opening, Saint. And you must come t
o the party afterwards, I’ll manage to get you off to myself somehow—Come along, Mark.”

  “Yes, dear.” Belden gave Simon one of those unnecessarily hearty handshakes. “It’s been a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Templar. And you, Miss Holm. So long, Stratford. Don’t let it get you down.”

  They made an exit which should have had an orchestral background, and Stratford Keane stared after them rudely.

  “The only party after the opening,” he said, “should be a wake, with those two as the guests of honor.”

  “I don’t think Simon agrees with you,” Patricia said. “He’s discovered that there are things in Iris’s favor which you never mentioned in your description.”

  Simon reached for her glass and finished her drink for her.

  “You’re very unfair to the wench,” he said. “If it’s a crime to be fascinated by me, what are you doing here?”

  He produced folding money and handed it to a hopeful waiter.

  “Buy Mr Keane another drink,” he said. “And a taxi afterwards, if he needs it.” He stood up. “I’m sorry we have to rush off, but I have to buy Pat some dinner. She doesn’t talk back so much with her mouth full.”

  Mr Keane nodded broodingly.

  “Good night,” he said. “I shall see thee—at Philippi.”

  They made their escape, Simon hoped, before Mr Keane was reminded that the Pump Room was also in the business of serving food.

  The encounter was typical of many similar incidents in the Saint’s life—coincidental, casual, and apparently pointless, and yet destined to lead into unsuspected complications. Adventure, for him, moved in a mysterious way. Nothing ever seemed to happen to him that was completely unimportant, or that led nowhere. He had come to accept it as part of an inscrutable fate, like the people who are known to insurance companies as “accident prone”: regardless of whether he took the initiative or not, something was always happening to him. He seldom thought about it much anymore, except that it may have subconsciously contributed to a pleasantly persistent euphoria, an almost imperceptible but continuous excitement which made the colors of his world just a little brighter than anyone else’s.