Simon lay back and listened. In the distance he heard the growl of a truck labouriously gearing up from a crawl to higher speeds. Then he heard a rattle at the door and quickly closed his eyes. His captors wouldn’t be so likely to give him another sleeping shot if he seemed to be still out.
He could hear the door open, and the footsteps of one man stepping inside the room, pausing, then retreating. Simon waited and at the last moment raised his eyelids just enough to get a glimpse of a broad-backed giant — standard-issue size of the Supremo’s army — retreating over the threshold. He closed his eyes completely again as the guard started to turn and lock the door behind him.
At almost the same moment Simon heard a new sound: the whistle of a tugboat shrilling its work-signals to another, which replied with a quick pair of toots. So he had to be somewhere down by a river or a harbour. The watery neighbourhood conjured up an unpleasant picture of Simon Templar clad in a cement suit, sinking swiftly to a muddy end in the company of old tires, slime-covered bottles, and abandoned bedsprings.
Being very fond of Simon Templar, Simon Templar wanted to do his best to save him from such an unglamourous fate. One possibility was to talk himself out of the situation. He was still, after all, the ostensible representative of that great power West Coast Kelly — unless he had since been identified as the Saint. But even that would not have automatically ruled out the possibility that he could be connected in some pragmatic way with West Coast Kelly. That is, if Kelly had not yet disclaimed any connection. Or even — such being the Machiavellian ways of gangland — if he had...
But what if nobody would listen? What if there was nobody to listen, except some pinheaded baboon blindly carrying out orders for completing the liquidation of his prisoner?
It seemed prudent not to depend entirely on diplomatic skills, but to start looking for a more direct way to get out of the mess. A man bound hand and foot does not have much bargaining power if the higher-ups have already consigned him to the disposal unit.
Simon, hoping that his luck would prevent the guard from coming back too soon, began to search for some way of freeing himself. His mind always worked fast, leaping fences on the mount of intuition while logical processes trotted obediently along in the rear. It was the packing cases that would save him. He began to roll and squirm across the floor towards the nearest of them, and already he could see the points of the nails which he had known must have been left protruding when the crates were pried open. Getting his wrists up against one of the nails, he could painstakingly pick away at the ropes, fibre by fibre, until he was free.
Then he saw that fortune had been even kinder than he had imagined: The nearest crate had been reinforced on the outside by binding it with straps of thin flexible metal, whose edges, along the open side of the box, where they had been cut through, stood clear of the wood. The strip of steel, or whatever it was, would not be as sharp as a knife blade by any means, but it could, given enough time, serve the same purpose.
The Saint’s sense of balance had not been helped by the thump he had taken on his head or the drug that had been administered to keep him asleep, but he managed to get himself into a sitting position with his back to the packing case. Then his fingers, numb for lack of circulation, sought the metal strip. The edge was disappointingly dull. He anxiously fumbled for some ragged spot which would speed up the work but found none. All he could do was move the binding of rope patiently up and down against the metal, rocking his body forward and back to increase the motion.
He could hear rather than feel his progress. After about five minutes his wrists were still as immobilised as ever, but his ears could detect the occasional snapping of a taut strand of rope fibre as it gave way to the friction of the metal. Another five minutes, same situation. How much progress had he made? He had no way of telling.
Then there were footsteps outside the door. He hurled himself away from the crate, rolled over so that his back and arms and the partially severed rope could not be seen from the entrance to the room. There was no time to get back to the spot where his captors had originally left him, which meant that he could not pretend to be still unconscious. Momentarily he experienced a sinking feeling of despair. He had come so close.
But the door did not open. The sound of shoes on wood moved away. Now there had to be another inchworm trip to the crate. Once more Simon got himself into a sitting position and resumed the scraping of his bonds against the strip of metal. Now he worked faster, his body pumping forward and back like an engine under a full head of steam. Sweat ran from his forehead into his eyes. Dust tickled his nose and forced him to struggle continually not to sneeze — a sound that might bring the guard hurrying to look in on him.
At last he felt a loosening of the pressure on his wrists. Ferociously he dragged the last strands of rope up and down against the metal until he felt them break completely.
His arms were free. Shaking the rope away, he worked his fingers to restore the warmth and feeling and strength to them. On his wrists were the white, bloodless indentations the bonds had made. In another minute he had untied the rope that had held his ankles together. It was like coming from a black and airless cave out into the light.
But he still had a long way to go. He tossed the wrist rope behind the packing case and got to his feet, testing his unsteady legs as he went back to the place where he had been lying when he regained consciousness. Should he lie down, loosely wrap the rope back round his ankles, and try to take the guard or guards by surprise when they came for him? Or should he wait by the door and launch an attack the instant it opened?
It would have taken him only a few seconds to make the decision; but in even less time than that, without any warning, the door abruptly opened and the huge guard walked into the room.
A direct quotation of what the guard said when he saw Simon Templar untied in the middle of the room is fortunately not essential to the substance of this history. Simon did not bother to reply. All his attention and energy were concentrated on getting to the guard before the guard’s beefy hand could get to the gun that hung in harness over his heart.
The Saint did manage that, but he had not reckoned with the stiffness of his legs after their long confinement, and his movements were comparatively slow and clumsy. The fist he threw at the guard’s Neanderthal jaw was parried by a tree-trunk arm, while the man’s other hand slammed out awkwardly at the Saint’s chest. If the gorilla had not himself been taken aback with startlement, it might have shaped into a counter-punch that could have put Simon out again, but instead of launching a counter-attack against him, Simon’s prognathous opponent was only trying to fend him off, shouting: “Hey, hold on! I come to let you loose!”
“You’re what?” Simon whooped.
“Yeah! I just come to let you loose!”
The big lug was making no effort to go for his gun. Backing off a little, with both hands out in front of him, he could have passed for a professional wrestling villain going through the melodramatics of pleading for mercy.
Simon relaxed just a little.
“You mean I can leave?” he asked.
“Yeah. That’s right. Yeah.”
“Under my own power? I can go where I want?”
The guard nodded. “You can go.”
They stood facing one another in silence.
“Well,” the guard said, “go on and go.”