It had amazed him that she could discuss a crime so calmly. Lovely to look upon, exquisitely dressed, lounging at her ease in a deep chair, with a cigarette between white fingers that would have served the most fastidious sculptor for a model, she looked as if she should have been discussing, delightfully—anything but that.
Of his own feelings he had said nothing. He kept them out of his face, out of his eyes, out of his voice and manner. His dispassionate calm rivalled her own.
He dared hold no other pose. The reeling tumult of his thoughts could only be masked by the most stony stolidness. Some of the turmoil would inevitably have broken through any less sphinx-like disguise.
He was trying to get her in her right place—and, in the attempt, he was floundering deeper and deeper in the mire of mystification. There was about her none of the hard flashiness traditionally supposed to brand the woman criminal. For all her command, she remained completely feminine, gentle of voice, perfectly gracious. The part of the Countess Anusia Marova, created by herself, she played without effort, and, when she was alone, there was no travesty to take off. The charmingly broken English disappeared—that was all. But the same woman moved and spoke.
If he had not known, he would not have believed. But he knew—and it had rocked his creed to its foundations.
There had only been one moment, that evening, when he had been in danger of stumbling.
“If we bring this off,” she had said, “you’ll get your quarter share, of course. Two hundred and fifty thousand dollars. Fifty thousand pounds of your money. You need never do another job as long as you live. What will you do?”
“What will you do with yours?” he countered.
She hesitated, gazed dreamily into a shadowy corner as though she saw something there. Then: “Probably,” she said lightly, I’ll buy a husband.”
“I might buy a few wives,” said Dicky, and the moment was past.
Now he looked down into the blue Mediterranean and meditated that specimen of repartee with unspeakable contempt. But it had been the only thing that had come into his head, and he’d had to say something promptly.
“Blast it all,” thought Dicky, and straightened up with a sigh.
The tender had nosed up to the gangway, and Sir Esdras Levy, in the lead, was helping Lady Levy to the grating.
Mr George Y. Ulrig stood close behind. Dicky caught their eye. He smiled with his mouth and saluted cheerily.
He ought to have known them, for he himself had been the means of introducing them to the house in Park Lane. That had been his job, on the Continent, under Hilloran, for the past three months—to travel about the fashionable resorts, armed with plenty of money, an unimpeachable wardrobe, and his natural charm of manner, and approach the unapproachables when they were to be found in holiday moods with their armour laid aside.
It had been almost boringly simple. A man who would blow up high in the air if addressed by a perfect stranger in the lounge of the Savoy Hotel, London, may be addressed by the same stranger with perfect impunity in the lounge of the Helipolis Hotel, Biarritz. After which, to a man of Dicky Tremayne’s polished worldliness, the improvement of the shining hour came automatically.
Jerking himself back to the realities of immediate importance, he went down to help to shepherd his own selected sheep to the slaughter.
Audrey Perowne stood at the head of the gangway, superbly gowned in a simple white skirt and coloured jumper—superbly gowned because she wore them. She was welcoming her guests inimitably, with an intimate word for each, while Hilloran, in uniform, stood respectfully ready to conduct them to their cabins.
“Ah, Sir Esdras, ve ’ardly dare expec’ you. I say, ’E vill not com to my seely leetle boat. But ’e is nize, and ’e come to be oncomfortable to please me…And Lady Levy. My dear, each day you are more beautiful.” Lady Levy, who was a fat fifty, glowed audibly. “And MrsMrs Ulrig. Beefore I let you off my boat, you shall tell me ’ow eet iss you keep zo sleem.” The scrawny and faded Mrs George Y. Ulrig squirmed with pleasure. “George Y.,” said the Countess, “I see you are vhat zey call a sheek. Ozairvize you could not ’ave marry ’er. And Mrs Sankin—”
Dicky’s task was comparatively childish. He had only to detach Sir Esdras Levy, Mr George Y. Ulrig, and Matthew Sankin from their respective spouses, taking them confidentially by the arm, and murmur that there were cocktails set out in the saloon.
Luncheon, with Audrey Perowne for hostess, could not have been anything but a success. The afternoon passed quickly. It seemed no time before the bell rung by the obsequious Hilloran indicated that it was time to dress for dinner.
Tremayne went below with the rest to dress. It was done quickly, but the girl was already in the saloon when he arrived. Hilloran was also there, pretending to inspect the table.
“When?” Hilloran was asking.
“Tomorrow night. I’ve told them we’re due at Monaco about half-past-six. We shan’t be near the place, but that doesn’t matter. We’ll take them in their cabins when they go below to change.”
“And afterwards?” questioned Dicky.
“We make straight across to Corsica during the night and land them near Calvi the next morning. Then we make round the south of Sicily, and lose ourselves in the Greek Archipelago. We should arrive eventually at Constantinople—repainted, re-christened, and generally altered. There we separate. I’ll give the immediate orders tomorrow afternoon. Come to my cabin about three.”
Hilloran turned to Dicky.
“By the way,” he said, “this letter came with the tender. I’m afraid I forgot to give it to you before.”
Dicky held the man’s eyes for a moment, and then took the envelope. It was postmarked in London. With a glance at the flap, he slit it open.
The letter was written in a round feminine hand.
Darling,
This is just a line to wish you a jolly good time on your cruise.
You know I’ll miss you terribly. Six weeks seems such a long time for you to be away. Never mind. I’m going to drown my sorrows in barley-water.
I refuse to be lonely. Simple Simon, the man I told you about, says he’ll console me. He wants me to go with a party he’s taking to the Aegean Islands. I don’t know yet if I shall accept, but it sounds awfully thrilling. He’s got a big aeroplane, and wants us to fly all the way.
If I go, I shall have to leave on Saturday. Won’t you be jealous?
Darling, I mustn’t pull your leg any more. You know I’m always thinking of you, and I shan’t be really happy till I get you back again.
Here come all my best wishes, then. Be good, and take care of yourself.
It’s eleven o’clock, and I’m tired. I’m going to bed to dream of you. It’ll be twelve by the time I’m there. My eyes are red from weeping for you.
You have all my love. I trust you.
Patricia.
Tremayne folded the letter, replaced it in its envelope, and put it in his pocket.
“Does she still love you?” mocked Audrey Perowne, and Dicky shrugged.
“So she says,” he replied carelessly. “So she says.”
5
Much later that night, in the privacy of his cabin, Dicky read the letter again.
The meaning to him was perfectly obvious.
The Saint had decided to work his end of the business by aeroplane. The reference to the Aegean Islands, Tremayne decided, had no bearing on the matter—the Saint could have had no notion that the Corsican Maid’s flight would take her to that quarter. But Saturday—the next day—was mentioned, and Dicky took that to mean that the Saint would be on the look-out for signals from Saturday onwards.
“Take care of yourself,” was plain enough.
The references to “eleven o’clock” and “twelve” were ambiguous. “It’ll be twelve by the time I’m there” might mean that, since the aeroplane would have to watch for signals from a considerable distance, to avoid being betrayed by the noise of the engines, it would be an hour from th
e time of the giving of the signal before the Saint could arrive on the scene. But why “eleven o’clock” and “twelve” instead of “twelve o’clock” and “one”—since they had previously arranged that signals were to be made either at midnight or four o’clock in the morning?
Dicky pondered for an hour and decided that either he was trying to read too much between the lines, or that a signal given an hour before the appointed time, at eleven o’clock instead of twelve, would not be missed. “My eyes are red from weeping for you.” He interpreted that to mean that he was to signal with a red light if there seemed to be any likelihood of their having cause to weep for him. He had a pocket flashlamp fitted with colour screens, and that code would be easy to adopt.
It was the last sentence that hit him fairly between the eyes.
“I trust you.”
A shrewd blow—very shrewd. Just an outside reminder of what he’d been telling himself for the past three days.
Simon couldn’t possibly understand. He’d never met Audrey Perowne. And, naturally, he’d do his level best to keep Dicky on the lines.
Dicky crumpled the paper slowly into a ball, rolling it thoughtfully between his two palms. He picked up the envelope, and rolled that into the ball also. Hilloran had steamed open that envelope and sealed it again before delivering the letter—Dicky was sure of that.
He went to the porthole and pitched the ball far out into the dark waters.
He undressed and lay down in his bunk, but he could not compose his mind to sleep. The night was close and sultry. The air that came through the open porthole seemed to strike warm on his face, and to circulate that torrid atmosphere with the electric fan was pointless. He tried it, but it brought no relief.
For an hour and a half he lay stifling, and then he rose, pulled on his slippers and a thin silk dressing-gown, and made his way to the deck.
He sprawled in a long cane chair, and lighted a cigarette. Up there it was cooler. The ghost of a breeze whispered in the rigging and fanned his face. The soft hiss and wash of the sea cleft by the passage of their bows was very soothing. After a time, he dozed.
He awoke with a curious sensation forcing itself through his drowsiness. It seemed as if the sea was rising, for the chair in which he lay was lurching and creaking under him. Yet the wind had not risen, and he could hear none of the thrash of curling waves which he should have been able to hear.
All this he appreciated hazily, roused but still half asleep. Then he opened one eye, and saw no rail before him, but only the steely glint of waters under the moon. Looking upwards and behind him he saw the foremast light riding serenely among the stars of a cloudless sky.
The convulsive leap he made actually spread-eagled him across the rail, and he heard his chair splash into the sea below as he tumbled over on to the deck.
Rolling on his shoulder, he glimpsed a sea-boot lashing at his head. He ducked wildly, grabbed, and kept his hold. All the strength he could muster went into the wrench that followed, and he heard the owner of the boot fall heavily with a strangled oath. An instant later he was on his feet—to find Hilloran’s face two inches from his own.
“Would you!” snapped Dicky.
He slipped the answering punch over his left shoulder, changed his feet, and crammed every ounce of his weight into a retaliatory jolt that smacked over Hilloran’s heart and dropped the man as if his legs had been cut away from beneath him.
Dicky turned like a whirlwind as the man he had tripped up rose from the ground and leapt at him with flailing fists.
Scientific boxing, in that light, was hopeless. Dicky tried it, and stopped a right swing with the side of his head. Three inches lower, and it would probably have put an end to the fight. As it was, it sent him staggering back against the rail, momentarily dazed, and it was more by luck than judgment that his shoulder hunched in the way of the next blow. He hit back blindly, felt his knuckles make contact, and heard the man grunt with pain.
Then his sight cleared.
He saw the seaman recover his balance and gather himself for a renewed onslaught. He saw Hilloran coming unsteadily off the deck, with the moonlight striking a silvery gleam from something in his right hand. And he understood the issue quite plainly.
They had tried to dump him overboard, chair and all, while he slept. A quiet and gentle method of disposing of a nuisance—and no fuss or mess. That having failed, however, the execution of the project had boiled down to a free fight for the same end. Dicky had a temporary advantage, but the odds were sticky. With the cold grim clarity of vision that comes to a man at such moments, Dicky Tremayne realized that the odds were very sticky indeed.
But not for a second could he consider raising his voice for help. Apart from the fact that the battle was more or less a duel of honour between Hilloran and himself—even if Hilloran didn’t choose to fight his side single-handed—it remained to be assumed that, if Hilloran had one ally among the crew, he was just as likely to have half a dozen. The whole crew, finally, were just as likely to be on Hilloran’s side as one. The agreement had been that Audrey, Hilloran, and Dicky were to divide equally three-quarters of the spoil, and the crew were to divide the last quarter. Knowing exactly the type of man of which the crew was composed, Tremayne could easily reckon the chance of their falling for the bait of a half-share to divide instead of a quarter, when the difference would amount to a matter of about four thousand pounds per man.
And that, Tremayne realized, would be a pretty accurate guess at the position. He himself was to be eliminated, as Audrey Perowne’s one loyal supporter and a thorn in Hilloran’s side. The quarter share thus saved would go to bribe the crew. As for Hilloran’s own benefit, Audrey Perowne’s quarter share…
Dicky saw the whole stark idea staring him in the face, and wondered dimly why he’d never thought of it before. Audrey Perowne’s only use, for Hilloran, had been to get the millionaires on board the yacht and out to sea. After that, he could take his own peculiar revenge on her for the way she had treated him, revenge himself also on Tremayne for similar things, and make himself master of the situation and half a million dollars instead of a quarter. A charming inspiration…
But Dicky didn’t have to think it all out like that. He saw it in a flash, more by intuition than by logic, in the instant of rest that he had while he saw also the seaman returning to the attack and Hilloran rising rockily from the ground with a knife in his hand.
And therefore he fought in silence.
The darkness was against him. Dicky Tremayne was a strong and clever boxer, quicker than most men, and he knew more than a little about ju-jitsu, but those are arts for which one needs the speed of vision that can only come with a clear light. The light he had was meagre and deceptive—a light that was all on the side of sheer strength and bulk, and all against mere speed and skill.
He was pretty well cornered. His back was against the rail. Hilloran was on his left front, the huge seaman on his right. There was no room to pass between them, no room to escape past either of them along the rail. There was only one way to fight: their own way.
The seaman was nearest, and Dicky braced himself. It had to be a matter of give and take, the only question being that of who was to take the most. As the seaman closed in, Tremayne judged his distance, dropped his chin, and drove with a long left.
The sailor’s fist connected with Dicky’s forehead, knocking back his head with a jar that ricked his neck. Dicky’s left met something hard that seemed to snap under the impact. Teeth. But Dicky reeled, hazed by the sickening power of the two tremendous blows he had taken, and he could hardly see for the red and black clouds that swam before his eyes.
But he saw Hilloran and dropped instinctively to one knee. He rose again immediately under Hilloran’s knife arm, taking the man about the waist. Summoning all his strength, he heaved upwards, with some mad idea of treating Hilloran to some of his own pleasant medicine—or hurling the man over the rail into the glimmering black sea. And almost at once he realized that
he could not do it—Hilloran was too heavy, and Dicky was already weakened. Nor was there time to struggle, for in another moment Hilloran would lift his right arm again and drive the knife into Dicky’s back.
But Tremayne, in that desperate effort, had Hilloran off his feet for a second. He smashed him bodily against the rail, hoping to slam the breath out of him for a momentary respite, and broke away.
As he turned, the seaman’s hands fastened on his throat, and Dicky felt a sudden surge of joy.
Against a man who knows his ju-jitsu, that grip is more than futile: it is more than likely to prove fatal to the man who employs it. Particularly was this fact proven then. For most of the holds in ju-jitsu depend on getting a grip on a wrist or hand—which, of course, are the hardest parts of the body to get a grip on, being the smallest and most swift-moving. Dicky had been hampered all along by being unable to trust himself to get his hold in that light, when the faintest error of judgment would have been fatal. But now there could be no mistake.
Dicky’s hands went up on each side of his head, and closed on the seaman’s little fingers. He pulled and twisted at the same time, and the man screamed as one finger at least was dislocated. But Dicky went on, and the man was forced sobbing to his knees.
The surge of joy in Dicky’s heart rose to something like a shout of triumph—and died. Out of the tail of his eye, he saw Hilloran coming in again.
Tremayne felt that he must be living a nightmare. There were two of them, both far above his weight, and they were wearing him down, gradually, relentlessly. As fast as he gained an advantage over one, the other came to nullify it. As fast as he was able temporarily to disable one, the other came back refreshed to renew the struggle. It was his own stamina against their combined consecutive staminas—and either of them individually was superior in brute strength to himself, even if one left the knife out of the audit.
Enter the Saint (The Saint Series) Page 21