“Chees,” Hoppy said in admiration, “I hit it right in de middle. Dey musta felt de breeze when it goes by.”
“I hope it gave them as bad a chill as theirs gave us,” said the Saint.
They walked back to the house and went up the broad stone steps and rang the bell. After a while the door opened a few inches. Simon leaned on it and opened it the rest of the way. It pushed back a long lean beanpole of a man with a sad horse face and dangling arms whose wrists stuck out nakedly from the cuffs of his sweater. And as he saw him, a gleam of recognition shot through the Saint’s memory.
The tall man’s recognition was a shade slower, perhaps because his faculties were slightly dulled by the surprise of feeling the door move into his chest. He exhaled abruptly, and staggered back, his long arms flying loosely as though dangling on strings. As he recovered his balance he took in Hoppy’s monstrous bulk, and then the slim supple figure of the Saint closing the door after him and leaning on it with the poised relaxation of a watchful cat, the gun in his hand held almost negligently... Slowly, the long bony wrists lifted in surrender.
The young pawnbroker’s description repeated itself in the Saint’s memory. Also he recalled Mike Grady’s office and a tall thin character among the loiterers in the reception. This was the same individual. The odyssey of the gun was beginning to show connections.
“Who are you, chum?” Simon asked, moving slightly towards him.
“I know him, boss,” Hoppy put in. “De name is Slim Mancini. He useta be a hot car hustler.”
“I work here,” the beanpole said in a whining nasal tenor that had a distinct equine quality about it. He sounded, the Saint thought, just like a horse. A sick horse. “I’m the butler,” Mancini added. He glanced back at a door down the hall and opened his mouth a fraction of a second before the Saint stepped behind him and clamped a hand over it.
“No announcements, please,” the Saint said, his other arm curving about Mancini’s neck like a band of flexible steel. “This is strictly formal. You understand, don’t you?”
The man nodded and gasped a lungful of air as the Saint removed the pressure on his throat.
“Slim Mancini — buttlin’!” Hoppy sneered hoarsely. “Dat’s a laugh.” He grunted suddenly as Simon jabbed a warning elbow into his stomach.
The muffled voices in the room down the hall had gone silent. “Walk ahead of us to that door,” the Saint whispered to Spangler’s cadaverous lackey, “and open it and go in. Don’t say anything. We’ll be right behind you. Go on.”
Mancini’s sad eyes suddenly widened as he stared over the Saint’s shoulder, apparently at something behind him.
Simon rather resented that. It implied a lack of respect for his experience, reading background, and common intelligence that was slightly insulting. However he was accommodating enough to start to turn and look in the indicated direction. It was only a token start, and he reversed it so quickly that Mancini’s hand was still inches from his shoulder holster when the Saint’s left exploded against his lantern jaw.
Simon caught the toppling body before it folded and lowered it noiselessly to the carpet.
Mr Uniatz kicked it carefully in the stomach for additional security.
“De noive of de guy,” he said. “Tryin’ a corny trick like dat. Whaddas he t’ink we are?”
“He’ll know better next time,” said the Saint. “But now I suppose we’ll have to open our own doors—”
Blam!
The stunning crash of a heavy-calibre pistol smashed against their eardrums and sent them diving to either side of the hallway.
The Saint lay there, gun at the ready, waiting. The shot had come from the room ahead, where they’d heard the voices, but he noticed that the door was still shut... Seconds passed... A weak moan, muffled by the closed door, punctuated the silence.
Simon signalled Hoppy with a lift of his chin, and they stood up again and advanced noiselessly. He motioned Hoppy back into the shadows as they reached the door. Then he turned the knob, kicked the door open, and stayed to one side, out of reach of possible fire.
There was silence for a moment. All he could see in the sunlit portion of the room visible to him was a huge fireplace and a corner of a desk... Then from within came a challenge in an accent that was unmistakable.
“Well?” Dr Spangler barked impatiently. “Come in!”
The Saint stood there a moment, looking into the triangle of the interior visible to him, estimating his chances of meeting a blast of gunfire if he showed himself. In the two seconds that he stood there, weighing the odds, he also realised that an unexpected diversion had taken place. What it was he didn’t know. But it did lend some excuse for hoping his presence might yet be miraculously undiscovered... It was a flimsy enough hope, but he decided to gamble on it. He signalled Hoppy to stay back and cover him as best he could, and stepped into the room.
Doc Spangler was seated at the desk, leaning forward, his arms on the desk, staring at him. Beyond him in a corner of the big room was Karl, down on one knee beside the prostrate body of a man whose head was concealed by the squat body of Spangler’s ursine lieutenant. There was a gun in his hand, pointed at the Saint from his hip, as if he had been interrupted in his examination of the man he had apparently just shot.
For one second it was quite a skin-prickling tableau, and then Simon took a quick step to one side which placed Spangler’s body between him and Karl’s gun muzzle.
“Better tell your baboon to lay his gun on the floor, Doc,” he suggested, and his smile was wired for sudden destruction. “You might get hurt.”
Spangler half turned in his swivel chair toward Karl.
“You imbecile!” he spat, his usual fat complacency temporarily disconnected. “I told you to put up that gun! It’s gotten me into enough trouble for one day. Put it on the floor as he says.”
Karl laid the gun down slowly, grudgingly, glooming balefully past Spangler at the Saint.
“Thank you,” said the Saint. “Now get up and stand away.” Karl rose to his feet slowly and shuffled aside as the Saint stepped around the desk and came to a startled halt. He was looking down incredulously at the face of the man lying on the floor. One side of it was caked with blood and the hair was red with it, but that presented no obstacle to recognising the owner. It was Whitey Mullins.
Chapter eleven
Mr Uniatz’s heavy breathing reverberated in Simon’s ear.
“Dey got Whitey!” His head jerked up suddenly at Karl and Spangler, his gun lifting. “Whitey was me pal!” he snarled. “Why you—”
Simon stopped him.
“Don’t shoot the Doc — yet. Whitey may need him.” The Saint’s eyes were cold blue chips. “Let’s have the score, Spangler, and make it fast.”
“He isn’t dead,” wheezed the fat man damply. “It’s only a graze. He brought it on himself, coming here to my home to assault me. Karl had to stop him, but he didn’t hurt him much. You can see that for yourself. The bullet just grazed his scalp and went into the wall there — see?”
He pointed a plump finger to a hole in the wall above Mr Mullins’s prostrate form.
Whitey moaned and opened his eyes.
“Saint!” he mumbled feverishly.
Simon pocketed his automatic and bent over him.
“Take it easy, Whitey. It’s okay.” He went on without turning his head, “Doc, I’ll bet you a case of Old Forester that Karl doesn’t live to draw that gun he’s trying to sneak out of his pocket.”