The Saint Steps In s-24 Read online

  "I know, darling," he said. "That isn't the problem. The job that's going to keep me busy is trying to make sure that you and your father are allowed to live that long."

  2. How Simon Templar interviewed Mr. Imber­line,

  and was Interviewed in his Turn.

  A change of expression flickered over her face, that started with a half smile and ended with half a frown; but under the half-frown her brown eyes were level and steady.

  "Now are you giving me what you thought I was asking for, or do you mean that?"

  "Think it out for yourself," he said patiently. "Somebody was interested enough to make your father a present of two explosions and a fire—according to what you told me. Some­body followed you long enough to know you'd been trying to see Imberline. Somebody thought it was worth while calling you and making a phony appointment, and then sending you a threatening note to see how easily you'd scare off. Somebody even thought it was worth while trying another note on me, after they'd seen us talking."

  "You don't know how it got into your pocket?"

  "No more than you know how yours fell into your lap. But I was bumped into rather heavily on two occasions, so it was on one of those occasions that the note was planted. The face of Walter Devan and the tall man who had been in Imberline's entourage passed through the Saint's memory. "Anyway, since you didn't scare, there was an ambush waiting for you on the way. If you'd taken a cab it doubtless would have been run off the road."

  She was neither frightened nor foolish now. She simply watched his face estimatingly.

  "What do you think they meant to do?"

  "Your guess is as good as mine. Maybe they were just told to rough you up a bit to discourage you. Maybe it was to be a straight kidnaping. Maybe they thought you could be used to keep your father quiet. Or maybe they thought you might be able to tell them his process if they persuaded you enough. By the way, could you?"

  She nodded.

  "It's very simple, once you know it; and I've been helping Father in his laboratory ever since he started working on it again."

  "Then you don't need to ask me questions about what they might have had in mind."

  She glanced at her drink.

  "It's silly, isn't it? I hadn't thought of it that way."

  "You'd better start thinking now. In times like these, any­body who can pour a lot of sawdust, old shoelaces, tomato ketchup, and hair tonic into a bathtub and make rubber is hotter than tobasco. The only thing I can't understand is why the FBI didn't have you both in a fireproof vault long ago."

  "I can answer that," she said wearily. "Have you any idea how many new synthetic rubber inventors are pestering peo­ple in Washington every day? Only about a dozen."

  "But if your father's reputation is as good as you say it is ——"

  "All sorts of crackpots have some kind of reputation too. And to the average dollar-a-year man, any scientist is liable to be a bit of a crackpot."

  "Well, they can test this stuff of yours, can't they?"

  "Yes. But that takes a lot of time and red tape. And it wouldn't necessarily prove anything."

  "Why not?"

  "The specimen might be any other kind of worked-over or reclaimed rubber."

  "Surely it could be detected."

  "How?"

  "Analyse it."

  She laughed a little.

  "You're not a chemist. Any organic or semi-organic concoction—like this is—is almost impossible to analyse. How can I explain that? Look, for instance, you could grind up the ashes of a human arm, and analyse them, and find a lot of ingredients, but that wouldn't prove whether you'd started with a man or not. That's putting it very clumsily, I know, but——"

  "I get the idea."

  He lighted a cigarette and tightened his lips on it. These were ramifications that he hadn't had time to think out. But they made sense within the limits of his knowledge.

  He went back to the concrete approach that he understood better.

  "Has your father patented his formula?"

  "No. That would have meant discussing it with attorneys and petty officials and all kinds of people. And I tell you, it's so simple that if one wrong person knew it, all the wrong people could know it. And after all—we are in the middle of a war."

  "He didn't want any commercial protection?"

  "I told you that once, and I meant it. He doesn't need money; doesn't want it. Really, we're horribly comfortable. My grandfather bought a gold mine in California for two old mules and a can of corned beef. All Father is trying to do is to give his process to the right people. But he's been soured by his experiences here in Washington, and of course he can't just write a letter or fill out a form, and tell all about it, be­cause then it would be sure to leak out to the wrong people."

  "Something seems to have leaked out already," Simon ob­served.

  "Maybe some people have more imagination than others."

  "You haven't anyone special in mind?"

  She moved her hands helplessly.

  "The Nazis?" she suggested. "But I don't know how they'd have heard of it . . . Or the Japs. Or anyone . . ."

  "Anyone," said the Saint, "is a fair guess. They don't neces­sarily have to be clanking around with swastikas embroidered on their underwear and sealed orders from the Gestapo up their sleeves. Anyone who isn't as big-hearted as your father, but who believes in him, might be glad to get hold of this rec­ipe—just for the money. Which would make the field a good bet on any mutuel." He smiled and added: "Even including that human also-ran, Mr. Sylvester Angert—the funny little man."

  He put down his glass and strolled around the room, his hands in his pockets and his eyes crinkled against the smoke of the cigarette slanted between his lips.

  It began to look like a nice little situation. The FBI wouldn't have any jurisdiction unless somebody Higher Up—such as Frank Imberline, perhaps—brought it to Mr. Hoover's atten­tion that the protection of Calvin Gray and his daughter was a matter of national importance. Imberline might do just that, doubtless adding something like: "A stitch in time saves nine." But would he? Would the dollar-a-year man who had been the head of Consolidated Rubber go to any great lengths to protect the life of an inventor of a process which could make synthetic rubber out of old bits of nothing much? Might not Imberline, like too many others in Washington, be looking beyond the end of the war? Walter Devan had said something pat about life preservers, but wasn't it a fact, still, that when the war was over, the old battle might start again; the battle between the old and the war-born new?

  Imberline was an unknown quantity, then, which left only the local gendarmerie to appeal to. Simon knew nothing at all about them; but even if they were extremely efficient, he sur­mised that they were also liable to be very busy. He didn't know for how long they would be likely to detach three able-bodied officers for the sole job of providing a full-time personal bodyguard for Madeline Gray. And in any case, they couldn't stay with her if she left the city.

  "Where is your father now?" he asked.

  "At home—in Connecticut."

  "Where?"

  "Near Stamford."

  The DC police couldn't do anything about that. And the Stamford cops would be even less likely to have men to spare for an indefinite vigil.

  "Maybe you ought to hire some guards from a detective agency," he said. "I gather you could afford it."

  She looked him in the eyes.

  "Yes. We could afford it."

  He had made a reasonable suggestion and she had considered it in the same reasonable way. Even that steady glance of hers didn't accuse him of trying to evade anything. It would have had no right to, anyway, he told himself. It was his own con­science. He didn't owe her anything. He had plenty of other things to think about. There certainly must be some proper legal authority for her to take her troubles to—he just hadn't been able to think what it was. And anyhow, what real basis did he have for deciding that Calvin Gray's invention was practical and important? There were highly tra
ined ex­perts in Government offices who were much more competent to judge such matters than he was.

  And just the same he knew that he was still evading, and he felt exasperated with himself.

  He asked: "What was your idea when you did see Imber­line?"

  "Get him to come to the laboratory himself, or send some­one who was absolutely reliable. They could watch us make as much rubber as they'd need for their tests, and then they could be sure it was a genuine synthetic."

  "But eventually other people would have to be in on it—if it were going to be manufactured in any quantity."

  "Father has that all worked out. You could have a dozen different ingredients shipped to the plant and stored in tanks. Three of them would be the vital part of the formula. The other nine would mean nothing. But they'd all be piped down through a mixing room that only one man need go into. The unnecessary ingredients would be destroyed by acids and run down the drain, so that no checkup would be possible. The real formula would be piped from the mixing room direct to the vats. One man could control a whole plant by just working two or three hours a day. I could control one myself. But even if anyone on the outside knew every chemical that was brought in and used, it would take them years to try out every combina­tion and proportion and treatment until they might hit on the right one." -

  It was a sound answer. But it had the tinge of being a pat answer, too. As if it had been rehearsed carefully to reply to embarrassing questions.

  Or maybe he still had a hangover of his own first skepticism.

  He made a decision with characteristic abruptness.

  "Suppose," he suggested, "you go to your room. Lock and night-lock the door and don't open it to anyone, except me."

  He went to the desk, scrawled a word on a slip of paper, folded it and handed it to her. She looked at it and nodded. He took the paper back and touched a match to it. As the ashes crumbled, they took into nothingness the word he had written, the word he was to say when he called her.

  He was taking no chances that Mr. Sylvester Angert's cousin might be looking for his room in the hall outside, complete with a little tube that heard through doors.

  "Will you be long?" she asked.

  "I hope not. I'll take you to your room, if you don't mind."

  "I'd appreciate it."

  He escorted her to the elevators, rode up five floors, and saw her safely to her door. He waited until the night latch clicked and then returned to the elevators. He rode to the main lobby and spent a few minutes looking into the dining room. It was virtually deserted—for Washington—and the man he was looking for wasn't there.

  Simon left the hotel and bought a taxi driver for the second time that night.

  He leaned back on the cracked-leather upholstery and reached for a cigarette.

  "Take me to a street that enters into Scott Circle," he directed. "One that hits the circle near the low numbers."

  "You got any special number in mind, Chief?"

  "Yeah, bud. I got me a number in mind, but just do like I told you, see?"

  "Okay, okay. I just wanted to know."

  He lit his cigarette, wondering if his tough-guy talk would convince a radio casting director, in a pinch. He decided that it wouldn't. He hadn't used it for quite a while, and he was out of practice. He made a mental note to polish up on it.

  The cab drifted to a street corner on the rim of the circle, and the hackman turned.

  "How's this, Cap?" he asked.

  "This is swell."

  He paid off the driver, waited until the cab drove away, and waited a few minutes more to make certain that the cabbie was not too curious. He surveyed the dimned-out houses on the circle and picked out the mansion which he had already visited once this evening.

  There was a light in the downstairs hallway and lights in a second-floor room that must be a bedroom. As he watched, Simon saw a bulky shadow pass the drawn shade. The shadow was of proportions that hardly could have belonged to anyone else but Frank Imberline.

  The downstairs light went out. The Saint moved along the sidewalk enough to see a tiny window in the back of the house go on. That meant that the colored butler must be going to bed.

  Walking in the deep shadows, Simon Templar made his way to the front door of the house that surely must have been built as an ambassadorial dwelling. He worked on the lock for about a minute with an instrument from his pocket, and it ceased to be an obstruction.

  "Now," he told himself, "if there's no burglar alarm, and if there's no bolt, we might get to see Comrade Imberline in person."

  There was neither alarm nor bolt. Simon let himself noise­lessly into the front hall and closed the door gently behind him. A circular staircase wound its way up toward the second floor, and there was no creak of a loose joist as the Saint made his way aloft. A crack of light under a door told him that Frank Imberline was still awake.

  Simon pushed open the door and calmly walked into the great man's bedroom.

  Imberline was seated at a desk, scanning a sheaf of papers. He was clad in maroon and gold pajamas that made the Saint blink for a moment. As Simon stepped into the room, the rub­ber tycoon swung his heavy head in his direction and popped his eyes, the unhealthy ruddiness slowly ebbing from his face.

  "Who are you?" he croaked.

  "Don't be alarmed, Mr. Imberline," said the Saint sooth­ingly. "I'm not a hold-up man, and I'm not an indignant tax­payer proposing to beat you up."

  "Then who the devil are you, and what do you want?"

  "My name is Simon Templar, and I just wanted to talk to you."

  "How did you get in here?"

  "I walked in," said the Saint, "through the front door."

  "You broke in!"

  Simon shook his head.

  "I didn't break anything," he said innocently. "I just used one of my little tricks on the lock. Really. I did no damage at all."

  Imberline made gargling noises in his throat.

  "This is—this is——"

  "I know," said the Saint wearily. "I know. I should have ap­plied for an audience through the usual channels, and filled out half a dozen forms in quintuplicate. But after all there is a war going on—to coin a phrase—and it just occurred to me that this might save us waiting a few months to meet each other."

  The red came back into Frank Imberline's square face and he seemed to swell within his gorgeous pajamas.

  "I'll have you know," he said, in a half-bellow, "that such high-handed tactics as this—these—must be dealt with by the proper authorities I I will not be intimidated, sir, by any high handed——"

  "You said that before," Simon reminded him politely. "Well—what in hell do you want?"

  "I want to talk to you about a man who has invented a syn­thetic rubber process. One Calvin Gray."

  Imberline drew his heavy brows down over his little eyes. "What about Calvin Gray?" he demanded.

  "I'm interested in Mr. Gray's process," said the Saint, "and I'm wondering why the man can't get a hearing with you."

  Imberline waved a pudgy hand in a disdainful gesture.

  "A nut, Mr.—er—Templar," he said. "A nut, pure and sim­ple. From what I've heard, he claims he can make rubber out of rhubarb, or something. Impossible, of course. I hope you haven't invested any money in his invention, sir."

  "A fool and his money are soon parted," Simon said wisely.

  "Yes," Imberline grunted. "Quite so. But this outrageous breaking into a man's house—a man's house is his castle, you know—you really have no excuse for that."

  The big man got out of the chair by the desk and stalked over to the bureau. He took a fat cigar from the box on the bureau top and rammed it into his mouth. Simon's eyes were watchful. But Imberline's hand did not move toward the han­dle of any drawer that might have contained a gun. He marched back across the room and slumped down into a deep easy chair.

  "Okay," he said over his cigar. "So you broke in here to talk to me about Gray's invention. I could throw you out or have you arrested
, but instead I'll listen to what you have to say."

  "Very kind of you," Simon murmured. "A soft answer turneth away stuff."

  "What is it you want to know?" Imberline asked bluntly. "I'm a busy man, and every minute counts."

  "While time and tide wait for no man."

  "Get to the point. Why are you here?"

  Simon placed a cigarette between his lips and snapped his lighter. He was aware of Imberline's gimlet eyes watching his every movement. He exhaled a long plume of smoke and sat on the end of the bed.

  "Have you ever seen Gray's product?" he asked.

  "Once—or maybe twice."

  "And what was your opinion?"

  If it were possible for the hulking shoulders of Frank Im­berline to shrug, they would have.

  "It's something that could be synthetic—and it's something that could be made-over rubber, cleverly disguised."

  "You investigated it thoroughly, I suppose?"

  "I had my staff investigate it. Their report was bad. That man Gray pestered me for weeks, trying to get to see me, and finally gave up. I hear his daughter is in town now, still trying to waste my time."

  "You haven't made an appointment with her?"

  "Certainly not. There are only so many hours in the day——"

  "And so many days in the week——"

  "Young man," said Mr. Imberline magisterially, "I am a public servant. I have the most humble respect for the trust which has been placed in me, and my daily responsibility is to make sure that not one hour—not one minute—of my time shall be frittered away on things from which the Community cannot benefit."

  "You couldn't by any chance have made an appointment with her for tonight and forgotten it?" Simon asked, unawed by that resounding statement.

  Imberline drew his chins together.

  "Certainly not! I never forget an appointment. Punctuality is the politeness of princes——"

  "You really ought to have seen her. She's quite something to look at."

  There seemed to be a flicker of interest in the close-set eyes. Suddenly, the middle-aged lecher was there for Simon to see. The big man grinned nauseatingly.