"That's the question I've been asking myself all day. They're just 'person or persons unknown' at present; but I feel that we shall get to know each other better before long. And that ought to be amusing. Let's see what Claud Eustace is worrying about."
He picked up the telephone and dialled Scotland House. Instructions must have been left with the switchboard operator, for he had scarcely given his name when he heard Teal's sleepy voice.
"Were you serious about getting a bomb last night, Templar?"
"Mr. Templar to you, Claud," said the Saint genially. "All the same, I was serious."
"Can you describe the bomb again?"
"It was built into a small fibre attache-case-I didn't take it apart to inspect the works, but it was built to fire electrically when the door was opened."
"You haven't got it there, I suppose?"
Simon smiled.
"Sure-I wouldn't feel comfortable without it. I keep it on the stove and practise tap-dancing on it. Where's your imagination?"
Teal did not answer at once.
"A bomb that sounds like exactly the same thing was found in Lord Ripwell's house at Shepperton today," he said at last. "I'd like to come round and see you, if you can wait a few minutes for me."
III THE detective arrived in less than a quarter of an hour, but not before Simon had sent out for a packet of spearmint for him. Teal glanced at the pink oblong of waxed paper sitting up sedately in the middle of the table, and reached out for it with a perfectly straight face.
"Ripwell-isn't he the shipping millionaire?" said the Saint.
Teal nodded.
"It's very nearly a miracle that he isn't 'the late' shipping millionaire," he said.
Simon lighted a cigarette.
"Did you come here to tell me about it or to ask me questions?"
"You might as well know what happened," said the detective, unwrapping a wafer of his only vice with slothful care. "Ripwell intended to go down to his river house this evening for a long week-end, but during the morning he found that he wanted a reference book which he had left down there on his last visit. He sent his chauffeur down for it, but when the man got there he found that he'd forgotten to take the key. Rather than go back, he managed to get in through a window, and when he came to let himself out again he found the bomb. It was fixed just inside the front door, and would have been bound to get the first person who opened it, which would probably have been Ripwell himself-apparently he doesn't care much about servants when he uses the cottage. That's about all there is to tell you, except that the description I have of the bomb from the local constabulary sounded very much like the one you spoke of to me, and there may be some reason to think that they were both planted by the same person."
"And even on the same day," said the Saint.
"That's quite possible. Ripwell's secretary went down to the house the day before for some papers, and everything was quite in order then."
The Saint blew three perfect smoke-rings and let them drift up to the ceiling.
"It all sounds very exciting," he murmured.
"It sounds as if you may have been right about Mrs. Ellshaw, if all you told me was true," said Teal grimly. "By the way, where was it she saw her husband?"
Simon laughed softly.
"Claud, that 'by the way' of yours is almost a classic. But I wouldn't dream of keeping a secret from you. She saw him at number six, Duchess Place, just round a couple of corners from here. I know he was there, because I saw him myself a little while ago. But you won't find him if you go round now."
"How do you know that?"
"Because he's pulled his freight-he and another guy who tried to blip me over the head."
Teal chewed out his gum into a preoccupied assortment of patterns, gazing at him stolidly.
"Is that all you mean to tell me?"
Simon cocked an abstracted eyebrow at him.
"Meaning?"
"If an attempt was made to murder you, there must be a reason for it. You may have made yourself dangerous to this man, or this gang, in some way, and they want to get rid of you. Why not let us give you a hand for once?"
Pride would not let Mr. Teal say any more; but Simon saw the blunt sincerity in the globular pink face, and knew that the detective was not merely putting on a routine blarney.
"Are you getting sentimental in your old age, Claud?" he protested, in a strain of mockery that was kinder than usual.
"I'm only doing my job." Teal made the admission grudgingly, as if he was afraid of betraying an official secret. "I know you sometimes get on to things before we hear of them, and I thought you might like to work in with us for a change."
Simon looked at him soberly. He understood the implications of everything that Teal had left unsaid, the unmentioned vials of acid comment which must have been decanted on that round lethargic head as a result of their last contest; and he sympathised. There had never been any malice behind the ebullitions of Tealbaiting which enlivened so many chapters of his scapegrace career.
He hooked one leg over the arm of his chair.
"I'd like to help you-if you helped me," he said seriously. "But I've damned little to offer."
He hesitated for a moment, and then ran briefly over the events which had made up the entertainment in Duchess Place.
"I don't suppose that's much more use to you than it is to me," he ended up. "My part of it hangs together, but I don't know what it hangs on. Mrs. Ellshaw was killed because she'd seen her husband, and I was offered the pineapple because I knew she'd seen him. The only thing I don't quite understand is why they didn't try to kill me when they had me in Duchess Place; but maybe they didn't want to hurry it. Anyway, one gathers that Ellshaw is a kind of unhealthy guy to see-I wonder if Ripwell saw him?"
"I haven't seen Ripwell myself yet," said Teal. "He's gone down to Shepperton to look at things for himself, and I shall have to go down tonight and have a talk with him. But I thought I'd better see you first."
The Saint fixed him with clear and speculative blue eyes for a few seconds, and then he drawled: "I could run you down in the car."
Somehow or other, that was what happened; Mr. Teal was never quite sure why. He assured himself that he had never contemplated such a possibility when he set out to interview the Saint. In any case on which he was engaged, he insisted to this sympathetic internal Yes-man, the last thing he wanted was to have Simon Templar messing about and getting in his way. He winced to think of the remarks the Assistant Commissioner would make if he knew about it. He told himself that his only reason for accepting the Saint's offer was to have both his witnesses at hand for an easier comparison of clues; and he allowed himself to be hurled down to Shepperton in the Saint's hundred-mile-an-hour road menace with his qualms considerably soothed by the adequacy of his ingenious excuse.
They found his lordship pottering unconcernedly in his garden-a tall spare vigorous man with white hair and a white moustache. He had an unassuming manner and a friendly smile that were leagues apart from the conventional idea of a big business man.
"Chief Inspector Teal? I'm pleased to meet you. About that bomb, I suppose-a ridiculous affair. Some poor devil as mad as a hatter about capitalists or something, I expect. Well, it didn't do me any harm. Is this your assistant?"
His pleasant grey eyes were glancing over the Saint; and Teal performed the necessary introduction with some trepidation.
"This is Mr. Templar, your lordship. I only brought him with me because----"
"Templar?" The grey eyes twinkled. "Not the great Simon Templar, surely?"
"Yes, sir," said Teal uncomfortably. "This is the Saint. But----"
He stopped, with his mouth open and his eyes starting to protrude, blinking speechlessly at one of the most astounding spectacles of his life. Lord Ripwell had got hold of the Saint's hand, and was pumping it up and down and beaming all over his face with a spontaneous warmth that was quite different from the cheerful courtesy with which he had greeted Mr. Teal himself.