“Wait!” interrupted Parstone tremblingly. “This is terrible—a terrible coidcideds. The book will be withdrawd at wuds. Hardly eddywud will have had tibe to read it. Ad if eddy sball cobbensation I cad give—”
Simon closed his book with a smile and laid it on Mr Parstone’s desk.
“Shall we say fifty thousand pounds?” he suggested affably.
Mr Parstone’s face reddened to the verge of an apoplectic stroke, and he brought up his handkerchief with shaking hands.
“How buch?” he whispered.
“Fifty thousand pounds,” repeated the Saint. “After all, that’s a very small amount of damages to ask for a libel like this. If the case has to go to court, I think it will be admitted that never in the whole history of modern law has such a colossal libel been put on paper. If there is any crime under the sun of which I’m not accused in that book, I’ll sit down right now and eat it. And there are three hundred and twenty pages of it—eighty thousand words of continuous and unbridled insult. For a thing like that, Herbert, I think fifty thousand pounds is pretty cheap.”
“You could’n get it,” said Parstone harshly. “It’s the author’s liability—”
“I know that clause,” answered the Saint coolly, “and you may be interested to know that it has no legal value whatever. In a successful libel action, the author, printer, and publisher are joint tortfeasors, and none of them can indemnify the other. Ask your solicitor. As a matter of fact,” he added prophetically, “I don’t expect I shall be able to recover anything from the author, anyway. Authors are usually broke. But you are both the printer and the publisher, and I’m sure I can collect from you.”
Mr Parstone stared at him with blanched lips.
“But fifty thousad pouds is ibpossible,” he whined. “It would ruid be!”
“That’s what I mean to do, dear old bird,” said the Saint gently. “You’ve gone on swindling a lot of harmless idiots for too long already, and now I want you to see what it feels like when it happens to you.”
He stood up, and collected his hat.
“I’ll leave you the book,” he said, “in case you want to entertain yourself some more. But I’ve got another copy, and if I don’t receive your cheque by the first post on Friday morning it will go straight to my solicitors. And you can’t kid yourself about what that will mean.”
For a long time after he had gone Mr Herbert Parstone sat quivering in his chair. And then he reached out for the book and began to skim through its pages. And with every page his livid face went greyer. There was no doubt about it. Simon Templar had spoken the truth. The book was the most monumental libel that could ever have found its way into print. Parstone’s brain reeled before the accumulation of calumnies which it unfolded.
His furious ringing of the bell brought his secretary running.
“Fide me that proof-reader!” he howled. “Fide be the dab fool who passed this book!” He flung the volume on to the floor at her feet. “Sed hib to be at wuds! I’ll show hib. I’ll bake hib suffer. By God, I’ll—”
The other things that Mr Parstone said he would do cannot be recorded in such a respectable publication as this.
His secretary picked up the book and looked at the title.
“Mr Timmins left yesterday—he was the man you fired four months ago,” she said, but even then Mr Parstone was no wiser.
THE NOBLE SPORTSMAN
It would be difficult to imagine two more ill-assorted guests at a country house party than Simon Templar and Chief Inspector Teal. The Saint, of course, was in his element. He roared up the drive in his big cream and red sports car and a huge camel-hair coat as if he had been doing that sort of thing for half his life, which he had. But Mr Teal, driving up in the ancient and rickety station taxi, and alighting cumbrously in his neat serge suit and bowler hat, fitted less successfully into the picture. He looked more like a builder’s foreman who had called to take measurements for a new bathroom, which he was not.
But that they should have been members of the same house party at all was the most outstanding freak of circumstance, and it was only natural that one of them should take the first possible opportunity to inquire into the motives of the other.
Mr Teal came into the Saint’s room while Simon was dressing for dinner, and the Saint looked him over with some awe.
“I see you’ve got a new tie,” he murmured. “Did your old one come undone?”
The detective ran a finger round the inside of his collar, which fitted as if he had bought it when he was several years younger and measured less than eighteen inches around the neck.
“How long have you known Lord Yearleigh?” he asked bluntly.
“I’ve met him a few times,” said the Saint casually.
He appeared to be speaking the truth, and Mr Teal was not greatly surprised—the Saint had a habit of being acquainted with the most unlikely people. But Teal’s curiosity was not fully satisfied.
“I suppose you’re here for the same reason as I am,” he said.
“More or less, I take it,” answered Simon. “Do you think Yearleigh will be murdered?”
“You’ve seen the anonymous letters he’s been receiving?”
“Some of ’em. But lots of people get anonymous threatening letters without getting a Chief Inspector of Scotland Yard sent down as a private pet.”
“They aren’t all MPs, younger sons of dukes, and well-known influential men,” said the detective rather cynically. “What do you think about it?”
“If he is murdered, I hope it’s exciting,” said the Saint callously. “Poison is so dull. A hail of machine-gun bullets through the library window would be rather diverting, though…What are you getting at, Claud—are you trying to steal my act or are you looking for an alliance?”
Mr Teal unwrapped a wafer of chewing gum and stuck it in his mouth, and watched the Saint fixing buttons in a white waistcoat with a stolid air of detachment that he was far from feeling. It was sometimes hard for him to remember that that debonair young brigand with the dangerous mouth and humorous blue eyes had personally murdered many men, beyond all practical doubt but equally beyond all possibility of legal proof, and he found it hard to remember then. But nevertheless he remembered it. And the fact that those men had never died without sound reason did not ease his mind—the Saint had a disconcerting habit of assassinating men whose pollution of the universe was invisible to anyone else until he unmasked it.
“I’d like to know why you were invited,” said Mr Teal.
Simon Templar put on his waistcoat, brushed his tuxedo, and put that on also. He stood in front of the dressing-table, lighting a cigarette.
“If I suggested that Yearleigh may have thought that I’d be more use than a policeman, you wouldn’t be flattered,” he remarked. “So why worry about suspecting me until he really is dead? I suppose you’ve already locked up the silver and had the jewels removed to the bank, so I don’t see how I can bother you any other way.”
They went downstairs together, with Chief Inspector Teal macerating his spearmint in gloomy silence. If the Saint had not been a fellow-guest he would have taken his responsibilities less seriously, and yet he was unable to justify any suspicion that the Saint was against him. He knew nothing about his host which might have inspired the Saint to take an unlawful interest in his expectation of life.
The public, and what was generally known of the private, life of Lord Thornton Yearleigh was so far above reproach that it was sometimes held up as a model for others. He was a man of about sixty-five with a vigour that was envied by men who were twenty-five years his junior, a big-built natural athlete with snow-white hair that seemed absurdly premature as a crown for his clear ruddy complexion and erect carriage. At sixty-five, he was a scratch golfer, a first-class tennis player, a splendid horseman, and a polo player of considerable skill. In those other specialised pastimes which in England are particularly dignified with the name of “sport,” hunting, shooting, and fishing,
his name was a by-word. He swam in the sea throughout the winter, made occasional published comments on the decadence of modern youth, could always be depended on to quote “mens sana in corpore sano” at the right moment, and generally stood as the living personification of those robust and brainless spartan ideals of cold baths and cricket which have contributed so much to England’s share in the cultural progress of the world. He was a jovial and widely popular figure, and although he was certainly a member of the House of Commons, the Saint had not yet been known to murder a politician for that crime alone—even if he had often been known to express a desire to do so.
There was, of course, no reason at all why the prospective assassin should have been a member of the party, but his reflections on the Saint’s character had started a train of thought in the detective’s mind, and he found himself weighing up the other guests speculatively during dinner.
The discussion turned on the private bill which Yearleigh was to introduce, with the approval of the Government, when Parliament reassembled during the following week, and Teal, who would have no strong views on the subject until his daily newspaper told him what he ought to think, found that his role of obscure listener gave him an excellent chance to study the characters of the others who took part.
“I shouldn’t be surprised if that bill of mine had something to do with these letters I’ve been getting,” said Yearleigh. “Those damned Communists are capable of anything. If they only took some exercise and got some fresh air they’d work all that nonsense out of their systems. Young Maurice is a bit that way himself,” he added slyly.
Maurice Vould flushed slightly. He was about thirty-five, thin and spectacled and somewhat untidy, with a curiously transparent ivory skin that was the exact antithesis of Yearleigh’s weather-beaten complexion. He was, Teal had already ascertained, a cousin of Lady Yearleigh’s; he had a private income of about 800 pounds a year, and devoted his time to writing poems and essays which a very limited public acclaimed as being of unusual worth.
“I admit that I believe in the divine right of mankind to earn a decent wage, to have enough food to eat and a decent house to live in, and to be free to live his life without interference,” he said in a rather pleasant quiet voice. “If that is Communism, I suppose I’m a Communist.”
“But presumably you wouldn’t include armed attack by a foreign power under your heading of interference,” said a man on the opposite side of the table.
He was a sleek well-nourished man with heavy sallow cheeks and a small diamond set in the ring on his third finger, and Teal knew that he was Sir Bruno Walmar, the chairman and presiding genius of the Walmar Oil Corporation and all its hundred subsidiaries. His voice was as harsh as his appearance was smooth, with an aggressive domineering quality to it which did not so much offer argument as defy it, but the voice did not silence Vould.
“That isn’t the only concern of Yearleigh’s bill,” he said.
The Right Honourable Mark Ormer, War Minister in the reigning Government, scratched the centre of his grey moustache in the rather old-maidish gesture which the cartoonist had made familiar to everyone in England, and said, “The National Preparedness Bill merely requires a certain amount of military training to be included in the education of every British boy, so that if his services should be needed in the defence of his country in after life, he should be qualified to play his part without delay. No other eventuality has been envisaged.”
“How can you say that no other eventuality has been envisaged?” asked Vould quietly. “You take a boy and teach him the rudiments of killing as if they were a desirable thing to know. You give him a uniform to wear and impress upon him the fact that he is a fighting man in the making. You make him shoot blank cartridges at other boys, and treat the whole pantomime as a good joke. You create a man who will instinctively answer a call to arms whenever the call is made, and how can you sit there tonight and say that you know exactly and only in what circumstances somebody will start to shout the call?”
“I think we can depend on the temperament of the English people to be sure of that,” said Ormer indulgently.
“I think you can also depend on the hysteria of most mobs when their professional politicians wave a flag,” answered Maurice Vould. “There probably was a time when people fought to defend their countries, but now they have to fight to save the faces of their politicians and the bank balances of their business men.”
“Stuff and nonsense!” interjected Lord Yearleigh heartily. “Englishmen have got too much sense. A bit of military training is good for a boy. Teaches him discipline. Besides, you can’t stop people fighting—healthy people—with that watery pacifist talk. It’s human nature.”
“Like killing your next-door neighbour because you want to steal his lawn mower,” said Vould gently. “That’s another primitive instinct which human nature hasn’t been able to eradicate.”
Yearleigh gave a snort of impatience, and Sir Bruno Walmar rubbed his smooth hands over each other and said in his rasping voice, “I suppose you were a conscientious objector during the last war, Mr Vould?”
“I’m sorry to disappoint you,” said Vould, with a pale smile, “but I was enjoying the experience of inhaling poison gas when I was sixteen years old. While you, Ormer, were making patriotic speeches, and you, Walmar, were making money. That’s the difference between us. I’ve seen a war, and so I know what it’s like, and I’ve also lived long enough after it to know how much good it does.”
“What’s your opinion, Mr Templar?” asked Yearleigh. “Don’t you think Maurice is talking like one of these damned street-corner Reds?” The Saint nodded.
“Yes, I do,” he said. There was a moment’s silence, and then he added thoughtfully, “I rather like these street-corner Reds—one or two of them are really sincere.”
Chief Inspector Teal nibbled a crust of bread secure in his voluntary self-effacement, while Mrs Ormer made some twittering remark and the thread of conversation drifted off into a less dangerously controversial topic. He had, he admitted, failed dismally in his little solitaire game of spotting the prospective murderer. A Cabinet Minister, a multi-millionaire, and a poet did not seem to comprise a gathering amongst whom a practical detective could seek hopefully for felons. The only suspect left for him was still the Saint, and yet even when the meal was finished, after the ladies had retired and the port and cigars had been passed around, he had no reason, actual or intuitive, to believe that Simon Templar was meditating the murder of his host.
Yearleigh rose, and there was a general pushing back of chairs. The noble sportsman caught the detective’s eye, and for the first time since Teal’s arrival the object of his invitation was brought up again.
“I’ve had another of those damned letters,” he said.
He produced it from his pocket, and held it out in a movement that was a general announcement that anyone who cared to might peruse it. Vould and the Saint, who were nearest, shared it with Mr Teal.
The message contained two lines in laboured script.
Since you have ignored my previous warnings,
you will learn your lesson tonight.
There was no signature—not even the skeleton haloed figure which Teal had half expected to see.
The detective folded the letter and put it away in his wallet. His faded sleepy eyes turned back to his host.
“I’d like to have a talk with you later on, sir,” he said. “I have some men in the village, and with your permission I’d like to post special guards.”
“Certainly,” agreed Yearleigh at once. “Have your talk now. I’m sure the others will excuse us.… Wait a moment, though.” He turned to Maurice Vould. “You wanted to have a talk with me as well, didn’t you?”
Vould nodded.
“But it can wait a few minutes,” he said, and both Teal and the Saint saw that his pale face was even paler, and the eyes behind his big glasses were bright with sudden strain.
“Why should it?” exclaim
ed Yearleigh good-humouredly. “You modern young intellectuals are always in a hurry, and I promised you this talk three or four days ago. You should have had it sooner if I hadn’t had to go away. Inspector Teal won’t mind waiting, and I don’t expect to be murdered for another half-hour.”
Simon fell in at Teal’s side as they went down the hall, leaving the other two on their way to Yearleigh’s study, and quite naturally the detective asked the question which was uppermost in his mind.
“Have you any more ideas?”
“I don’t know,” was the Saint’s unsatisfactory response. “Who were you most interested in at dinner?”
“I was watching Vould,” Teal confessed.
“You would be,” said the Saint. “I don’t suppose you even noticed Lady Yearleigh.”
Teal did not answer, but he admitted to himself that the accusation was nearly true. As they went into the drawing-room his sleepy eyes looked for her at once, and saw her talking to Ormer on one side of her and Walmar on the other. He suddenly realised that she was young enough to be Yearleigh’s daughter—she might have been thirty-five, but she scarcely looked thirty. She had the same pale and curiously transparent complexion as her cousin Vould, but in her it combined with blue eyes and flaxen hair to form an almost ethereal beauty. He could not help feeling the contrast between her and her husband—knowing Yearleigh only by reputation, and never having visited the house, he would have expected Lady Yearleigh to be a robust horsey woman, at her best in tweeds and given to brutal bluntness. Mr Teal had never read poetry, but if he had, Rossetti’s “Blessed Damozel” would have perfectly expressed what he felt about this Lady Yearleigh whom Simon Templar had made him notice practically for the first time.
“She’s very attractive,” said Teal, which was a rhapsody from him.
“And intelligent,” said the Saint. “Did you notice that?”
The detective nodded vaguely.
“She has a wonderful husband.”
Simon put down his cigar-butt in an ashtray and took out his cigarette-case. Teal knew subconsciously that his hesitation over those commonplace movements was merely a piece of that theatrical timing in which the Saint delighted to indulge; he knew that the Saint was about to say something illuminating, but even as Simon Templar opened his mouth the sound of the shot boomed through the house.
The Saint Intervenes (The Saint Series) Page 12