The Saint in Europe (The Saint Series) Read online

  “My passport is at the hotel,” said the Saint.

  “Something, perhaps, from the magazine you write for?”

  “I don’t write for any particular magazine. I just peddle my stuff wherever I can.”

  “You must have something on you, some evidence of identity,” said the blond man patiently. “Please.”

  He did not openly suggest that if none were produced, the matter could be continued at headquarters. That would have been superfluous.

  Simon produced his wallet, and watched interestedly while Zuilen glanced at the contents. The detective’s eyes snapped from the first card that caught them to the Saint’s face as if a switch had been flicked, but his manner remained painstakingly correct.

  “Mr Templar,” he said, “I did not hear that you were a writer.”

  “It’s a new racket,” said the Saint easily.

  The blond man handed the wallet back.

  “You would do well to search for your material somewhere else,” he said. “There is nothing to interest you here.”

  “Now wait a minute,” Simon argued. “I’m not making any trouble. I was told on the best authority that Mr Jonkheer had received a diamond called the Angel’s Eye to re-cut. I simply asked him about it. That isn’t a crime.”

  “I am glad there is no crime,” said the burly man stolidly. “We do not like to have crime from foreigners, especially during the tourist season. Mr Jonkheer does not have any such diamond. Also he does not wish to be bothered. It is better that you do not make any trouble.” He held the door firmly open. “Good day, Mr Templar.”

  A few moments later, without a harsh word having been spoken or an overt threat having been uttered, the Saint found himself indisputably out on the sidewalk, blinking at the noonday sunshine and listening to the rattle of chain and bolts being refastened on the inside of the old oak door.

  4

  “It was a lovely job,” Simon told the Upwaters. “I never had a chance of getting to first base.”

  They sat around a lunch table in one of the crypt-like rooms of the d’Vijff Vliegen, that quaintly labyrinthine restaurant on the Spuistraat, where they had arranged to meet, although only the Saint seemed to have much appetite for the excellent kalfoesters, thin fillets of veal browned in butter and lemon juice, with stewed cucumbers and brown beans, which he had ordered for what he considered fairly earned nutriment.

  “That policeman, too,” said Mrs Upwater indignantly. “That Jonkheer really must have the wool pulled over their eyes.”

  “Or else they’re all in the swindle up to the neck with him,” Mr Upwater said bitterly.

  “However it goes,” said the Saint, “the place is pretty well guarded. And I haven’t the faintest doubt that the Angel’s Eye is there. They were so grimly determined to deny it. I could see it gave Jonkheer a good jolt when I asked about it. I bet they’re still worrying about what my angle is, if that’s any help to you.”

  “It’s there, all right,” Upwater said gloomily. “Did you see his safe?”

  “Oh, yes. In his office.”

  “I didn’t see it. I was taken right into his workshop, the first time, and the second time I didn’t get any further than the hall. If I’d seen the safe, I might have been able to have the policeman make him open it.”

  “His office is on the ground floor, at the back of the hall.”

  “The diamond probably isn’t there now, anyway,” said Mrs Upwater.

  Simon took a deep pull at his beer.

  “How big is this diamond?” he asked. “You said it was as big as the Hope. How big is that?”

  “About a hundred carats,” Upwater said. He put the tips of his thumb and forefinger together, forming a circle, “About so big. It’d be easy to hide anywhere.”

  Simon forked together the last remnants of food on his plate, and ate them with infinite enjoyment. Any lingering doubts that he might have had were gone. He knew that this was going to be an adventure to remember.

  “I told you, I’m certain the Angel’s Eye is at Jonkheer’s,” he said. “That’s why the cop is staying on the premises. But I don’t think it’s hidden. I think they figure it’s well enough guarded. And an old-fashioned conservative type like Jonkheer would have complete confidence in an old-fashioned safe like that, just because it weighs a few tons and he’s had it ever since he went into business. He wouldn’t believe that any up-to-date expert could go through it like a coffee-can.”

  The man and woman gazed at him uncertainly.

  “What good does that do us?” Mr Upwater asked at length. “I’m no safe-cracker.”

  “But I am,” said the Saint.

  There was another long and pent-up silence.

  “You’d burgle it?” Mrs Upwater said.

  “I think you knew all along,” said the Saint gently, “that I would.”

  Mrs Upwater began to cry.

  “You can’t do that,” Mr Upwater protested. “That’s robbery!”

  “To take back your own property?”

  “But if you got caught—”

  “If I only take the Angel’s Eye, which Jonkheer isn’t supposed to have anyway, how is he going to phrase his squawk?”

  Mr Upwater clutched his wife’s hand, staring at the Saint with a pathetic sort of devotion.

  “I never thought I’d find myself siding with anyone about breaking the law,” he said. “But you’re right, Mr Templar—Jonkheer’s got us by the short hairs, and the only way we can ever get even is to steal the diamond back, just about the same way that he got it. Only I could never’ve thought of it myself, and it beats me why you’d take a chance like that to help a total stranger.”

  Simon lighted a cigarette.

  “Well,” he said, and his smile was happily Mephistophelian, “suppose I did just happen to take something else besides your diamond—by way of interest, you might say—would you feel it was your duty to tell the police about me?”

  “I wouldn’t,” said Mrs Upwater promptly, dabbing her eyes. “A man like Jonkheer deserves to lose everything he’s got.”

  “Then that’s settled,” said the Saint cheerfully. “How about some dessert? Some oliebollen? Or the flensjes should be mildly sensational.”

  Mr Upwater shook his head. He was still staring at the Saint much as a lost explorer in the Sahara would have stared at the approach of an ice wagon.

  “I’m too nervous to eat,” he said. “I’ll be in a sweat until this is over. When will you do it?”

  “On the stroke of midnight,” said the Saint. “I’m superstitious about the witching hour—it’s always been lucky for me. Besides, by that time our friend Jonkheer will be sound asleep, and even the police guard will be drowsy. I’m pretty sure Jonkheer lives over the shop, and he’s the type who would go to bed about ten.”

  “Isn’t there anything I can do, Mr Templar? I wouldn’t be much of a hand at what you’re planning, but—”

  “Not a thing. Take Mrs Upwater sightseeing. Have dinner. Go to your room, break out some cards, and send for a bottle of schnapps. When the waiter brings it, make like I’ve gone to the bathroom. If anything goes wrong, you’ll be my alibi—we were all playing cards. I’ll see you soon after midnight, with your diamond.” Simon looked at his watch. “Now, if you’re through, I’ll run along. I’ve got to shop for a few things I don’t normally carry in my luggage.”

  He spent an interesting afternoon in his own way, and got back to the Hollandia about six o’clock with no particular plans for the early part of the evening. But that state of tranquil vagueness lasted only until he turned away from the desk with his key. Then a hand smacked him violently between the shoulder-blades, and he turned again to meet the merry dark horn-spectacled eyes of a slight young man who looked more like a New Yorker than any New Yorker would have done.

  “Simon, you old son-of-a-gun!” cried Pieter Liefman. “What shemozzle are you up to here?”

  The scion of Amsterdam’s most traditionalistic brewery had spent some ye
ars in the United States, and prided himself on his complete assimilation of the culture of the New World.

  “Pete!” The Saint grinned. “You couldn’t have shown up at a better moment.”

  “I’ve been out in the sticks,” Liefman said. “I just got back in town and got your message, and I came right over to try and track you down. What’s boiling?”

  “Let’s get a drink somewhere and I’ll tell you.”

  “My hot-shot’s outside. We can drive out to Scherpenzeel, to the De Witte.”

  “Good enough. The way you drive, you can get me back in plenty of time for what I want to do later.”

  As Pieter Liefman needled his Jaguar through the sparse evening traffic with an ebullient disregard for all speed laws and principles of safety that would have had most passengers gripping the seat and muttering despondent prayers, Simon Templar leaned back with a cigarette and reflected gratefully on his good fortune. Pieter’s timely arrival had made his project even neater than he had hoped.

  “I guess you rate pretty high in this town, Pete,” he remarked.

  “If you mean I should get a ducat for speeding, you don’t know the quarter of it. They throw the books at me about once a week.”

  “But in any serious case, I imagine you’d be as influential a witness as any guy could want.”

  “Quit holding up on me,” Liefman implored. “Is the Saint on the war-path again?”

  Simon began his tale at the beginning.

  5

  The return from Scherpenzeel, after a gargantuan repast devoured with respectful deliberation, was made at the same suicidal velocity, but so coolly timed that clocks were booming the hour that Simon had fixed in his mind as the Jaguar purred to a stop in the street where Hendrik Jonkheer plied his trade, but several doors away from the house itself. The short street was deserted except for one other car parked at the opposite end.

  “I only hope you’ve figured this on the button,” Pieter Liefman said.

  “I am the world’s greatest practical psychologist,” said the Saint. “Go ahead with your part of the act.”

  He slipped out of the car and strolled unhurriedly down the street to Jonkheer’s door. The building was dark and wrapped in silence. He turned the door handle experimentally. The door started to yawn at his touch, and no inside chain stopped it.

  Simon stepped in, closing it swiftly and silently behind him. With a pencil flashlight smothered in his hand so that the bulb was almost covered by his fingers, he let a dim glow play momentarily over the inside of the frame. The chain was dangling, the hasp at one end still attached to it with fragments of freshly torn wood adhering to the screws, testifying to the inherent weakness of such devices which was no surprise to him.

  He turned the same hardly more than phosphorescent illumination around the hall, and at the foot of the stairs he saw the burly bodyguard, Zuilen, lying on the floor, the wrists and ankles expertly bound and tied together and his mouth covered with adhesive tape. The big policeman seemed uninjured, except probably in his dignity, to judge by the lively glare of wrath that smouldered in his eyes.

  Simon went past him without pausing for any social amenities, moving with the fluid soundlessness of a disembodied shadow.

  The door of the back office was ajar, outlined with the faint luminosity of a well-shaded light within. Simon pushed it with his fingertips, and it swung wider without even an uncooperative creak.

  Inside, he saw that the light came from a small professionally shrouded electric lantern on the floor beside the massive safe. The safe was open, and the means of its opening were evident in an assortment of shining tools spread on a velvet cloth in front of it.

  Between Simon and the safe stood a man with a large handkerchief knotted loosely around his throat, obviously serving as an easily replaceable mask, who was in the act of stuffing a handful of small tissue-paper packages into his pocket.

  “Good evening,” said the Saint, because it seemed as tactful a way of drawing attention to himself as he could think of.

  He said it very quietly, too, in case his audience had a weak heart, but just the same the man spun around like a puppet jerked with a string.

  The movement stopped there, because Simon was playing the beam of his flashlight pointedly on the gun in his right hand, to discourage any additional reaction. But there was enough general luminance, between that and the shielded lamp on the floor, for each of them to see the other’s face.

  Mr Upwater stared at him pallidly, and licked his lips.

  “You weren’t supposed to be here for an hour,” he said stupidly.

  “That’s what I told you,” said the Saint calmly, “so that I’d know about what time you’d be here. Naturally you wanted to have comfortable time to do the job before I arrived, but you wouldn’t want to be too long before, in case it was discovered too soon for me to walk in and take the rap. You did the groundwork very cleverly—getting me to come here this morning and case the joint for you, while at the same time establishing myself as a prime suspect. The only thing I was a little worried about was whether you meant to really let me do the job myself, and hijack the boodle afterwards. But I decided you wouldn’t take that big a chance—you couldn’t be quite sure that with so much loot in my pockets I mightn’t yield to temptation and double-cross you. When you said yourself that every man has his price, you gave me a fix on your thinking.”

  Mr Upwater’s eyes were wild and haggard.

  “You’ve got it all wrong,” he said feverishly. “I was afraid you were just kidding me—that you wouldn’t really do it at all—so I made up my mind to do it myself.”

  “And not like any amateur, either,” said the Saint approvingly. “Those tools of yours are first class. I suppose you wouldn’t like to tell me how you got wind of the Angel’s Eye being re-cut here? They were certainly doing their best to keep it quiet, to try and avoid having any trouble with people like us, as I could tell by the reception I got when I started to ask questions. It was nice work of yours to locate it, but you must have thought you were really in luck when you heard I was in town, all ready to be the fall guy.”

  “So help me, Mr Templar, I told you the truth—”

  “Oh, no, you didn’t. Not from the word Go. I knew you were lying from the moment you said you delivered the Angel’s Eye the day before yesterday and the cutting was supposed to start yesterday. Anyone who knows anything about diamonds knows that a cutter would study an important stone like that for weeks, maybe even months, before he made the first cut, because if he made any mistake about the grain he might break it into a lot of worthless fragments. And I was doubly sure that you didn’t work for any big-time jewelers when you said that the Angel’s Eye was as big as the Hope diamond and weighed about a hundred carats. For your information, the Hope diamond, good as it is, is only forty-four and a quarter. It’s my business to know things like that, and it ought to be yours.”

  Upwater swallowed.

  “Can’t we call it quits?” he said desperately. “There’s plenty for both of us.”

  “Thank you,” said the Saint, “but this time I’ll be happy to collect a legitimate reward, with no headaches.”

  “Nobody’ll believe you,” Upwater said viciously. “I’ll say you were in it with me, right up to now.”

  “I’m sorry,” said the Saint, “but I’ve taken care to prove otherwise.”

  There was a sudden rush of feet, and the lights went on.

  Two uniformed men stood in the doorway, with Pieter Liefman crowding in past them. Pieter put an arm around the Saint’s shoulders and spoke rapidly to the policemen in Dutch, and Upwater wilted as he realized that the trap was closed.

  Some time later, as they all went out into the street, with Upwater handcuffed between the two officers, Simon looked for the car that had been parked on the far corner. It was no longer there.

  Pieter intercepted the glance.

  “It took off when I came back with the flatfeet,” he said.

&nbs
p; Simon read the mute entreaty in Upwater’s white face, and shrugged.

  “Okay,” he said. “We won’t say anything about Mabel. After all, she was the one who really brought me into this.”

  On second thought, after he saw Mr Upwater’s next expression, he wondered if that was quite the right thing to mention.

  THE RHINE: THE RHINE MAIDEN

  1

  Simon Templar always thought of her as the Rhine Maiden for the simple reason that he met her on his way down the Rhine. He had never found the time or the inclination to sit through Wagner’s epic on the subject, but he surmised that the Rhine Maidens of the operas would probably have been in keeping with the usual run of half-pint Siegfrieds and 200-pound Brünnhildes. The girl on the train was what Simon, in a mood of poetic fancy, would have liked a Rhine Maiden to be, and he didn’t care whether she could sing top F or not.

  Simon took the train because he had made the trip from Cologne to Mainz by boat before, and had announced himself a Philistine unimpressed. Reluctantly, he had summarized that much-advertised river as an enormous quantity of muddy water flowing northwards at tremendous speed under a litter of black barges and tugboats and pleasure steamers, with a few crumbling ruins on its banks shouldering awkwardly between clumps of factory chimneys. Scenically, it had been scanned and found wanting by the keen and gay blue eyes that had reflected every great river in the world from the Nile to the Amazon, even though he found the ruins a little pitiful, as if they had only asked to be left in the peace of years and had been refused. Also Simon took the train because it was quicker, and he had unlawful business to conclude in Stuttgart, which was perhaps the best reason of all.

  For the saga of any adventurer take this: an idea, a scheme, action, danger, escape, and perhaps a surprise somewhere. Repeat indefinitely, with irregular interludes of quiet. Flavor it with the eternal discontent of unattainable horizons, and the everlasting content of an eagle’s freedom. That had been Simon Templar’s life since the day when he was first nicknamed the Saint, and it was his one prayer that he might be spared many years more in which to demonstrate the peculiar brand of saintliness which he had made his own. With valuable property burgled from an unsavoury ex-collaborationist’s house near Paris in his valise, and his fare paid out of a wallet picked from the pocket of a waiter who had made the mistake of being rude to him, the Saint lighted a cigarette and leaned back in his corner to be innocently glad that the lottery of travel could still shuffle a girl like that into the compartment chosen by a voyaging buccaneer.