Hoppy crouched beside him, his big black automatic clutched in a hairy fist resting on the window-sill, and stared lynx-eyed at the canopied building entrance eighteen floors below. Presently he rasped in an awful tide of anxiety, “Boss, maybe he goes out de back—”
He broke off as a man darted out from under the canopy — a figure reduced to miniature, scurrying towards the parked sedan. Mr Uniatz raised his gun and was aiming carefully when Simon’s hand clamped on his wrist in a grip of iron.
“No!” he ordered. “We’ll only have Fernack back — and next time he won’t be so easy to get rid of.”
“Chees, boss!” Hoppy complained mournfully, staring at the sedan roaring down the street. “I had a bead on him.”
“In the dark? Shooting downward at that distance?” Simon snapped. He turned away, crossing the living-room. “Don’t be a goddam fool. Besides” — he stepped out of the darkness of the living-room into the hallway — “there’s been enough noise for one night.”
Hoppy shuffled after him, muttering indignantly, “Nobody can gimme de business an’ get away wit’ it.”
The Saint looked at him resignedly.
“Don’t blame him! Grabbing that door-knob after I’d wired it was your own damn fault.”
“I wouldn’a done it if it wasn’t for him,” Hoppy insisted sullenly. “Besides, how do I know he can run like dat? All de zombies I ever see in pitchers move slower dan Bilinski. Dis musta bin a new kind, boss. Maybe somebody gives him a hypo.”
“Maybe somebody does,” Simon agreed. “And the doc’s name could be Spangler.”
He switched the lights on at the entrance and looked around. The loose rug that had been involved in Hoppy’s downfall was a tousled heap in the middle of the floor, and as he lifted one corner to straighten it he saw the gun underneath it.
He picked it up gingerly — a heavy “banker’s-model” revolver with a two-inch barrel.
“Chees,” Hoppy said. “De lug forgets his equaliser. Now all we gotta do is find out who it belongs to, an’ we know who he is.”
“That peace of logic,” said the Saint, “has more holes in it than Swiss cheese. However—”
He broke off as he became aware that the elevator doors were opening in front of him. For one instant he was tense, with his forefinger curling instinctively on the trigger of the weapon in his hand. Then he saw the passenger clearly.
He was a rabbity little man draped in a flowered bathrobe, with pince-nez supporting a long black ribbon.
“I,” he enunciated pompously, “am your neighbour downstairs, Mr Swafford. Has there been any trouble?”
He stepped back suddenly, with his eyes popping, as Hoppy moved into full view from behind the Saint.
“Trouble?” Simon inquired politely. “What sort of trouble?”
Mr Swafford seemed hypnotised by the baleful apparition glaring at him over the Saint’s shoulder.
“I,” he swallowed. “I... Please forgive me,” he said hastily, “but there was some rumour — about a shot, I think it was. Some people in the building seem to think it came from up here.”
Simon turned to Hoppy.
“Did you hear a shot?”
Mr Uniatz fixed Mr Swafford with a basilisk glare. He growled, “Boss, dis guy must be nuts!”
Mr Swafford gulped and amended hastily, “Of course I don’t say it came from your apartment. It was just what some of the tenants thought. They seem to have jumped to the conclusion that someone was being shot, but I assure you—”
“I’m sure,” the Saint broke in pleasantly, “that there must be a more productive form of exercise than jumping to conclusions, don’t you think, comrade?”
Mr Swafford retreated another step, his eyes bulging wider as they confirmed their impression of the gun in the Saint’s hand and the fallen shower of plaster from the ceiling.
“Oh, yes, of course,” he said weakly. “I never—”
“I’m sorry you were disturbed.” said the Saint benevolently. “My friend here is just in from Montana, where men are men and have notches in their guns to prove it. When they’re having fun, they just blaze away at the ceiling. I’ve just taken his six-shooter away and tried to explain to him—”
“Scram before I step on ya like a roach!” Hoppy bellowed, squeezing past the Saint.
Mr Swafford stumbled backwards, his pince-nez dropping from his long nose and dangling by their ribbon; he turned and scurried precipitately back into the elevator.
“Good night, Mr Swafford,” Simon called breezily, as the closing elevator doors blotted out the little man’s pallid stare.
He turned back into the apartment, shutting the door behind him.
“Boss,” Hoppy said, following him. “Dis is getting’ monogamous. Just one t’ing after anudder.”
“That sounds almost bovine to me,” said the Saint. “But it’ll probably get worse before it gets better.”
He was sure that he had recognised the squat silhouette of Spangler’s henchman, Max, fleeing from the building toward the waiting sedan. But he was still wondering, as he fell asleep, just why Doc Spangler had sent him.
Chapter six
Hoppy was in the penthouse kitchen frying bacon with concentrated absorption late the next morning when the doorbell rang, The Saint, seated in the adjoining breakfast alcove, put down the morning paper and stood up.
“I’ll get it, boss,” Hoppy offered, laying down the fork in one hand and the comic section clutched in the other.
“Never mind,” Simon strode across the kitchen. “I don’t want to take your mind off Dick Tracy.”
The opening door revealed a vision in daffodil yellow with hair to match and a quizzical smile.
“Pat!” Simon drew her in and held her at arm’s length, boldly admiring. “You’re a sight to be held!”
He suited the action to the word.
She laughed breathlessly, pulling away.
“Darling, you have one of the most elemental lines since Casanova.”
His eyes caressed her figure. “The most elemental lines,” he said, “are never spoken. They’re looked at.”
“Do I look as good as Connie?” she inquired with arched eyebrows.
“Much better.” He took her hand and led her toward the kitchen. “Hoppy!” he called. “Bring on the vitamins.”
“Coming up, boss!” Hoppy sang out, and came around to deposit a glass of pale amber liquid in front of her as she sat down. “Vitamins,” he grinned, and retreated back to his stove.
“Thank you.” Pat smiled and lifted the glass.
“Wait.” Simon reached over and took the glass from her. He sniffed it. “I thought so!”
“What’s the matter?” Pat asked. “Isn’t it all right?”
He pushed the glass back.
“Smell it.”
Hoppy’s head appeared over the top of the alcove partition.
“Whassamatter, boss?”
“Thanks for the compliment,” said Patricia, “but I’m not quite up to your kind of fruit juice.”
Mr Uniatz’s brow furrowed in hurt bewilderment.
“It’s from grapes, ain’t it? Grapes is fruit, ain’t it?” He reached behind him and raised up the bottle for all to behold. “It says so, right here on de bottle.”
The Saint waved him away in despair.
“Never mind,” he said. “Bring on the solid food.”
“Okay, boss.” Hoppy removed the offending liquor and drained it at a gulp. He went back into the kitchen and looked over the partition on to the top of Pat’s blonde head. “Dijja read about de fight in de paper dis morning?” he asked.
“They arrested the Masked Angel, didn’t they?”