The self-starter whirred under Roger's foot, and he listened for a moment to the smooth purr of the great engine; and then he turned again to the Saint.
"I'll be carrying on," he said quietly.
"I know," said the Saint, in the same tone. "And if you don't find that note, it mayn't really be so bad as all that—it may only mean that I've had an attack of writer's cramp, or something. But it'll still be your call. So don't think you're being elbowed out—because you're not. Whatever else happens, you're more than likely to have to stand up to the worst of the bowling before we draw stumps, and the fate of the side may very well be in your hands. And that does not mean maybe." He clapped Roger on the shoulder. "So here's luck to you, sonny boy!"
"Good luck, Saint!"
"And give 'em hell!"
And Simon stepped back, with a light laugh and' a flourish; and the Hirondel leaped away like an unleashed fiend.
CHAPTER SIX
How Templar threw a stone,
and the Italian Delegate was unlucky
FOR A MOMENT the Saint stood there, watching the tail light of the Hirondel skimming away into the darkness. He knew so well—he could not have helped knowing—the hideous doubts that must have tortured Roger's brain, the duel between jealousy and friendship, the agony that the struggle must have cost. For Roger could only have been thinking of the ultimate destiny of the girl who had been pitchforked into their lives less than twelve hours ago, who was now a prisoner in the house beyond the trees, from whom the Saint had already plundered such a fantastic allegiance. And Simon thought of other girls that Roger had known, and of other things that had been in their lives since they first came together, and of his own lady; and he wondered, with a queer wistfulness in the eyes that followed that tiny red star down the road.
And then the red star swept out of sight round a bend; and the Saint turned away with a shrug, and glanced down again at the sea, where lay another red star, with a green one beside it.
In that, at least, he had deliberately lied... . The ship, he was sure, had been within a mile of the shore when he spoke; and now it had ceased to move. The rattle of a chain came faintly to his ears, and then he heard the splash of the anchor.
They had run their time-table close enough! And Roger Conway, with about a hundred and eighty miles to drive, to London and back, and a job of work to do on the way, had no mean gag to put over—even in the Hirondel. The Saint, who was a connoisseur of speed, swore by that car; and he knew that Roger Conway, for all his modesty, could spin a nifty wheel when he was put to it; but, even so, he reckoned that Roger hadn't a heap to beef about. Any verbiage about Roger having nothing to do that night would be so much applesauce. ...
"And pray Heaven he doesn't pile that bus up on its front bumpers on the way," murmured Simon piously.
As he slipped into the shadows of a clump of trees, his fingers strayed instinctively to his left sleeve, feeling for the hilt of Belle, the little throwing-knife that was his favorite weapon, which he could use with such a bewildering speed and skill. Once upon a time, Belle had been merely the twin sister of Anna, who was his darling; but he had lost Anna three months ago, in the course of his first fight with Marius. And, touching Belle, in her little leather sheath strapped to his forearm, the Saintly smile flickered over his lips, without reaching his eyes....
Then, beyond the clump of trees, he stood beside the wooden fence that walled off the estate. It was as tall as himself; he stretched up cautious fingers, and felt a thick entanglement of rusty barbed wire along the top. But a couple of feet over his head one of the trees in the clump through which he had just passed extended a long bare branch far over the fence. Simon limbered his muscles swiftly, judged his distance, and jumped for it. His hands found their hold as smoothly and accurately as if he had been performing on a horizontal bar in a gymnasium; and he swung himself back to the fence hand over hand, pulled up with his arms, carried his legs over, and dropped lightly to the ground on the other side.
Fastidiously settling his tie, which had worked a fraction of an inch out of place during the performance, he stepped through the narrow skirting of forestry in which he had landed, and inspected the view.
In front of him, and away round to his right, spread an expanse of park land, broken by occasional trees, and surrounding the house on the two sides that he could see. Also surrounding the house, and farther in, lay the gardens, trellises and terraces, shrubberies and outbuildings, dimly visible in the gloom. On his left, crowning a steady rise of ground, a kind of balustraded walk cut a clean black line against the sky, and he guessed that this marked the edge of the cliffs.
In this direction he moved, keeping in the sheltering obscurity of the border of trees for as long as he could, and then breaking off at right angles, parallel with the balustrade, before he had mounted enough of the gentle slope for his silhouette to be marked against the skyline. He felt certain that his entrance upon the estate was not yet public knowledge, and he was inclined to stay cagey about it: the number and personal habits of the household staff were very much of an unknown quantity so far, and the Saint was not tempted to run any risk of provoking them prematurely. Swiftly as he shifted through the faint starlight, his sensitive ears were alert for the slightest sound, his restless eyes scanned every shadow, and the fingers of his right hand were never far from the chased ivory hilt of Belle. He himself made no more sound than a prowling leopard, and that same leopard could not have constituted a more deadly menace to any member of the opposition gang who might have chanced to be roaming about the grounds on Simon Templar's route.
Presently the house was again on his right, and much nearer to him, for he had travelled round two sides of a rough square. He began to move with an even greater caution. Then, in a moment, gravel grated under his feet. He glanced sharply to his left, to see where the path led, and observed a wide gap in the balustrade at the cliff edge. That would be the top of a flight of steps running down the cliff face to the shore, he figured; and beside the gap he saw a tree that would provide friendly cover for another peep at the developments on the water below.
He turned off the path and melted into the blackness beneath the tree. This grew on the very edge of the scarp; and the break in the balustrade meant what he had thought it meant—a rough stairway that vanished downwards into the darkness.
Looking out, Simon saw a thin paring of new moon slithering out of the rim of the sea. It wouldn't be much of a moon even when it was fully risen, he reflected, with a voiceless thanksgiving to the little gods that had made the adventure this much easier. For all felonious purposes, the light was perfect—nothing but the soft luminance of a sky spangled with a thousand stars—light enough for a cat-eyed shikari like Simon Templar to work by, without being bright enough to be embarrassing.
He switched his eyes downwards again, and saw, midway between the anchored ship and the thin white ribbon of sand at the foot of the cliff, a tiny black shape stealing over the waters. Motionless, instinctively holding his breath and parting his lips—the Saint's faculties worked involuntarily, whether they were needed or not—he could catch shreds of the sound of grating rowlocks.
And then he heard another sound, behind him, that was much easier to hear—the gritting of heavy boots on the gravel he had just quitted.
2
HE MERGED a little deeper into the blackness of his cover, and looked round. A lantern was bobbing down the path from the house, and three men tramped along by its light. In a moment their voices came to him quite plainly.
"Himmel! I shall vant to go to bet. Last night— to-night—it iss never no sleep for der mans."