Their eyes met and there was a momentary twist of humour in each gaze.
"We appear," observed the prince politely, "to be in the position of two men who are fighting with invisible weapons. We are both equally at a disadvantage."
"Not quite," said the Saint.
The prince fluttered a graceful hand.
"It is agreed that you are an obstacle in my path which I should be glad to remove. I might hand you over to the police—"
"But then you might have some embarrassing questions to answer."
"Exactly. And as for any private action—"
"Difficult—in the Ritz Hotel."
"Exceedingly difficult. Then, there is reason to believe that you are—or were—temporarily in possession of a property which it is necessary for me to recover."
"Dear old Heinrich's uncle."
"Whereas my property is the knowledge of why it is necessary for me to recover—your property."
"Perhaps."
" And an exchange is out of the question."
"Right out."
"So that the deadlock is complete.''
"Not quite," said the Saint again.
The prince's eyes narrowed a fraction. '
"Have I forgotten anything?"
"I wonder!"
There was another moment of silence; and, in the stillness, the Saint's amazingly sensitive ears caught the ghost of a sound from the corridor outside the room. And, at that instant, with the breaking of the silence by the perfunctory knock that followed on the door, the grim mirth that had been simmering inside the Saint for minutes past danced mockingly into his eyes.
"Highness—"
It was Marius, looming gigantically in the doorway, with a flare of triumph in the face that might have served as a model for some hideous heathen idol, and triumph in his thin rasping voice.
And then he saw the Saint and stopped dead.
"You see that our enterprising young friend is with us once more, my dear Marius," said the prince suavely; and Simon Templar rose to his feet with his most seraphic smile.
3
"MARIUS—my old college chum!''
The Saint stood there in the centre of the room, lean and swift and devil-may-care, his hands swinging back his coat and resting on his hips; and all the old challenging hints of lazy laughter that both the other men remembered were glinting back through the tones of his voice. The reckless eyes swept Marius from head to foot, with the cold steel masked down into their depths by a shimmer of gay disdain.
"Oh, precious!" spoke on that lazy half-laughing voice. "And where have you been all these months? Why haven't you come round to hold my hand and reminisce with me about the good old days, and all the fun we had together? And the songs we used to sing . . . And do you remember how you pointed a gun at me one night, in one of our first little games, and I kicked you in the—er— heretofore?"
"Marius has a good memory," said the prince dryly.
"And so have I," beamed the Saint, and his smile tightened a little. "Oh, Angel Face, I'm glad to meet you again!''
The giant turned and spoke harshly in his own language; but the prince interrupted him.
"Let us speak English," he said. "It will be more interesting for Mr. Templar.''
"How did he come here?"
"He walked up."
"But the police—"
"Mr. Templar and I have already discussed that question, my dear Marius. It is true that Dussel had to make certain charges in order to cover himself, but it might still be inconvenient for us if Mr. Templar were arrested.''
"It is awkward for you, you know," murmured Simon sympathetically.
The prince selected a fresh cigarette.
"But your own news, my dear Marius? You seemed pleased with yourself when you arrived—"
"I have been successful."
"Our friend will be interested."
Marius looked across at the Saint, and his lips twisted malevolently. And the Saint remembered what lay between them. ...
"Miss Delmar is now in safe hands," said the giant slowly.
Simon stood quite still.
"When you rang me up—do you remember?— to boast—I asked the exchange for your number. Then the directory was searched, and we learned your address. Miss Delmar was alone. We had no difficulty, though I was hoping to find you and some of your friends there as well—''
"Bluff," said the Saint unemotionally.
"I think not, my dear Mr. Templar," said the prince urbanely. "Dr. Marius is really a most reliable man. I recollect that the only mistake we have made was my own, and he advised me against it."
Marius came closer.
"Once—when you beat me," he said vindictively. "When you undid years of work—by a trick. But your friend paid the penalty. You also—''
"I also—pay," said the Saint, with bleak eyes.
"You—"
"My dear Marius!" Once again the prince interrupted. "Let us be practical. You have succeeded. Good. Now, our young friend has elected to interfere in our affairs again, and since he has so kindly delivered himself into our hands—"
Suddenly the Saint laughed.
"What shall we do with the body?" he murmured. "Well, souls, I'll have to give you time to think that out. Meanwhile, I shouldn't like you to think I was getting any gray hairs over Marius's slab of ripe boloney about Miss Delmar. My dear Marius, that line of hooey's got wheels!"
"You still call it a bluff?" sneered the giant.
"You will find out—"
"I shall," drawled Simon. "Angel Face, don't you think this is a peach of a beard? Makes me look like Abraham in a high wind. ..."
Absent-mindedly the Saint had picked up his disguise and affixed the beard to his chin and the dark glasses to his nose. The hat had fallen to the floor. Moving to pick it up, he kicked it a yard away. The second attempt had a similar result. And it was all done with such a puerile innocence that both Marius and the prince must have been no more than vaguely wondering what motive the Saint could have in descending to such infantile depths of clowning—when the manoeuvre was completed with a breath-taking casualness.
The pursuit of his hat had brought the Saint within easy reach of the door. Quite calmly and unhurriedly he picked up the hat and clapped it on his head.
"Strong silent man goes out into the night," he said. "But we must get together again some time. Au revoir, sweet cherubs!"
And the Saint passed through the sitting-room door in a flash; and a second later the outer door of the suite banged.
Simon had certainly visited the prince with intent to obtain information; but he had done so, as he did all such things, practically without a plan in his head. The Saint was an opportunist; he held that the development of complicated plans was generally nothing but a squandering of so much energy, for the best of palavers was liable to rocket onto unexpected rails—and these surprises, Simon maintained, could only be turned to their fullest advantage by a mind untrammelled by any preconceived plan of campaign. And if the Saint had anticipated anything, he had anticipated that the arrival of Rayt Marius in the role of an angel-faced harbinger of glad tidings would result in a certain amount of more or less informative backchat before the conversation became centered on prospective funerals. And, indeed, the conversazione had worn a very up-and-coming air before the prince had switched it back into such a very practical channel. But Prince Rudolf had that sort of mind; wherefore the Saint had chased his hat. . . .
4
IT HAD BEEN a slick job, that departure; and it was all over before Marius had started to move. Even then, the prince had to stop him.
"My dear Marius, it would be useless to cause a disturbance now."