"A penny for them," he said at last.
She turned on him with sudden fury and looked him wrathfully up and down.
"You make me sick!" She flared.
The Saint's eyebrows rose one reproachful notch.
"Me?" he protested aggrievedly. "But why, at the moment? What have I done now?"
She shook her shoulders fretfully.
"Oh… nothing," she said. "I'm fed up, that's all."
"I'm sorry," said the Saint gravely. "Perhaps you've had a dull evening. You ought to get about more — go places, and meet people, and see things. It makes a tremendous difference."
"You think you're very funny, don't you?" she flashed. "You and your blonde girl friend — the world's pet hero and heroine!" She paused, savouring the sting of her own acid. "She is nice looking — I'll give her that," she went on grudgingly. "But I just wish she'd never been born… Oh well, perhaps we can't all be heroines, but there's no reason why the rest of us shouldn't have a pretty decent time. You'll be a bit fed up yourself when Algy and Luker get those papers, won't you?"
"Are you quite sure you aren't going to give them to me?" he said.
She laughed.
"I suppose you think I ought to give them to you for saving my life," she jeered extravagantly. "With tears of gratitude streaming down my cheeks, I should stammer: 'Here they are — take them.' That's why you make me sick. You go about the place rescuing people and being the Robin Hood of modern crime, and then you go back to your blonde girl friend and have a grand time being told how wonderful you are. So you may be; but it just makes me sick."
"Well, if you feel sick, don't keep on talking about it — be sick," said the Saint hospitably. "Don't worry about the car — we can always have it cleaned."
She gave him a withering glare and turned ostentatiously away. She seemed to want to make it quite clear that his conversation was beneath her contempt and that even to endure his company was a martyrdom. She huddled as far away from him as the width of the seat permitted and resumed her scowling out of the window.
The Saint devoted himself to the tranquil enjoyment of his cigarette and waited contentedly for the climax which he knew must come before long.
It came after another five minutes.
All at once her eyes, fixed vacantly on the window, froze into a strange expression. She sat bolt upright.
"Here," she blurted. "What the… Where are we going? This isn't the way to the Carlton!"
Obviously it wasn't; they were down at the Chelsea end of the Embankment, heading west.
"Have you noticed that already?" said the Saint imperturbably. "How observant you are, darling. Now I suppose I can't keep my secret any longer. The fact is, I'm not taking you to the Carlton."
She caught her breath.
"You — you're not taking me to the Carlton? But I want to go to the Carlton! Take me there at once! Tell the chauffeur to turn round—"
She leaned forward and tried to hammer on the glass partition. Quite effortlessly the Saint pushed her back.
"Shut up," he said calmly. "You make me sick."
"W-what?" she said.
She stared at him with solemn wide-open eyes as if he were some strange monster that she was seeing for the first time.
"It's no use both of us being sick," he pointed out reasonably. "It would be a deafening duet."
"I don't know what good you think this is going to do you," she said haughtily. "If you think you're going to protect me, or anything like that—"
"Protect you?" he said, with bland incomprehension. "Who — me? Darling, that would never enter my head. I know you can look after yourself. But I want to take care of you for my own sake. You see, it wouldn't suit me at all if you sold those papers to Fairweather or Luker. I want them too much myself. So I just want to keep an eye on you until I get them."
"You — you mean you're kidnapping me?" she got out incredulously.
But somehow she did not sound quite so indignant.
"That's the idea," he said equably. "And it's my duty to tell you that if you try to scream or kick up any sort of fuss I shall have to take steps to stop you. Quite gentle steps, of course. I shall just knock you cold."
"Oh!" she said.
She was sitting up very straight, one hand on the seat beside her, the other clutching the armrest at her side. Simon lounged at ease in his own corner, but he was watching her like a hawk and his hands were ready for instant action. He had no wish to use violence, but he would have had no compunction about it if it became necessary. He was fighting for something bigger than stereotyped chivalry, something bigger than the incidental hurt of any individual. He was the point of a million bayonets.
For a long moment she went on staring at him, and there was something in her face that he could not understand.
Then her muscles relaxed and she sank limply back.
"I think you're an unspeakable cad," she said.
"I am," said the Saint cheerfully. "And I fairly wallow in it."
Her mouth moved slightly, so that by the dim light of passing street lamps it almost looked for one fleeting moment as though she were trying to stifle a smile. He reached over to crush his cigarette in the ash tray so as to glance at her more closely, but she moved further away from him, and the expression on her face was surly and disdainful. He lay back and stretched out his legs and appeared to go to sleep.
But he was awake and vigilant for every minute of the drive, while the car whispered out of Putney and out on to the Portsmouth Road and down the long hill into Kingston. They went on to Hampton Court, and turned off over the bridge along the road by Hurst Park; in Walton they turned right again, and a few miles later they turned under a brick archway into what seemed like a dense wood. A few more turns, and the car swung into a circular drive and swept its headlights across the front of a big weather-tiled house set in a grove of tall pines and silver birches.
They pulled up with a crunch of gravel, and Simon opened the door.
"Here we are, darling," he said. "This is my nearest country seat. Thirty minutes from London if you don't worry about speed cops, and you might as well be in the middle of the New Forest. You'll like the air, too, it has oxygen in it."
He picked up her valise and stepped out. As she got out after him she saw Patricia coming round the front of the car, pulling off her gloves, and her face went stony.
The Saint waved a casual hand.
"You remember Pat, don't you?" he murmured. "The girl with the wardrobe you liked so much. She'll chaperon you while you're here and see that you have most of the things you want. Come along up and I'll show you your quarters."
He led the way into the house, handing over the valise to Orace, who was standing on the steps. Without saying a word Lady Valerie followed him up the broad oak staircase.
Upstairs, at the end of one wing, there was a self-contained suite consisting of sitting room, bedroom and bathroom. Simon indicated it all with a generous gesture.
"You couldn't do better at the Carlton," he said. "The windows don't open and they're made of unbreakable glass, but it's all air-conditioned, so you'll be quite comfortable. And any time you get tired of the view, you've only got to tell me where that cloakroom ticket is and I'll take you straight back to London."
Orace put down the valise and went out again with his peculiar strutting limp.
Lady Valerie turned round in a quick circle and stood in front of the Saint. Her face was blazing.
"You," she said incoherently. "You…"
She took a swift step forward and struck at him with her open hand. His cheek stung with the slap. Instinctively he grasped her wrist and held it, but she struggled in his arms like a wildcat, wriggling and kicking at his shins.