He drove instead to a tobacconist's shop round the corner, and there he discharged the taxi. He went in and bought a packet of cigarettes, and then he showed his police identity card.
"Do you live in the rooms over here, or do they belong to someone else?"
"No, sir. I live there."
"I'll go right up," said the Saint. "Don't bother to show me the way. You stay right here and carry on business as usual. I shan't come back by this route, so don't wait up late for me."
He went through the shop and up the stairs.
From a window on the landing of the first floor he was able to survey the battleground.
It was unpromising. Donnell's house formed, as has been explained, a kind of island site in the centre of the block, separated by a matter of about fourteen feet from the houses that surrounded it. The four pairs of walls which surrounded the square canyon thus formed were bare of any convenience for passing between them except the solid ground at the bottom. And that was certain to be watched and covered from the windows of Donnell's house. From the window where he looked out, Simon Templar might, if he had been that kind of a lunatic, have considered the possibility of running a plank across to the window opposite and entering the house that way. It is interesting to record that he was not that kind of lunatic — he had, amongst other weaknesses, a distinct urge towards being buried in one piece, when his time came.
There was, however, one other solution.
He went on up the stairs. On the third floor the stairs came to an end, but above his head were a trap-door and a swinging ladder. He pulled the ladder down and mounted it.
He found himself in a kind of attic, lumbered with boxes and odds and ends of broken furniture. It had one cobwebbed window, barely wide enough for a man to squeeze through; but Simon squeezed through it and emerged on the leads. At that point, from where he stood with his heels in the gutter, leaning back against the tiles of the roof with a sixty-foot drop in front of him, the flat roof of Donnell's house, with a high embrasured wall running round it and a kind of penthouse in the centre, was about six feet below him, and still fourteen feet away. But it was in the convenient position of not being overlooked by any of the windows from which his attack was likely to be watched for.
The Saint bent his knees and braced himself. He tested the strength of the gutter, found it firm, and without further hesitation launched himself into space.
He cleared the wall and landed on the flat concrete of Donnell's roof, stumbling forward and saving himself with his hands. Then he picked himself up and released the safety catch of his automatic.
He circumnavigated the penthouse warily. It was square and solidly built, with narrow barred windows, and had obviously been designed as a point of vantage from which any attempt to reach the house over the roofs could be repelled. On that occasion, however, the possibility seemed to have been overlooked, for no shots came from it to greet him.
He worked his way round it and came to a massive door faced with iron. There was no handle on the outside, and the Saint tried to open it without success.
He gave up the task after a few seconds, and went and looked over the wall down the face of the building.
There was a window directly below him, about six feet down, at the point where he had chanced to look over. He climbed up on the wall and looked down at it, considering the lie of the land.
The wall was about five feet high. Lowering himself over it, he was able to rest his toes on a ledge about three inches wide which ran round the outside. Then he had to stoop quickly and allow himself to fall literally into space, catching at the ledge with his fingers as he did so. For one hair-raising second he, had the awful sensation of hurtling downwards to certain death; but Simon Templar's nerves were like ice, and he knew the strength of his hands. His hooked fingers on the ledge brought him up with a jerk at the full stretch of his arms, and he hung there for a few seconds while he recovered his breath. His feet were then, he judged, at the level of the centre of the window which he had made his objective. And then he had to let go his hold again and drop another couple of feet down the side of the building, landing on his toes on the out-jutting sill and clutching at the window frame to recover his balance. He did so.
Then stooping a little, he was able to pull down the upper sash as quietly as it could be done, and climb down into the room.
There was no one there. He had not seriously expected that there would be, for the attention of the garrison would naturally be concentrated on the ways by which he might more ordinarily have been expected to attempt to enter. Certainly if there had been anyone in the room it would have meant the end of Simon Templar's useful career, for he could hardly have made any active resistance against being pushed off his unstable foothold into space. But there had been no one there to do it.
He crossed the room cautiously in the semidarkness, placing his feet with infinite precautions against making a noise which might be heard by anyone in a room below, and thus gained the door. The door was ajar. He opened it a little farther, slowly and with respect for its creaking hinges, and crept out onto the narrow landing.
The stairs faced him. He went down them like a cat, keeping close to the wall, where he would be least likely to make a loose board creak. In that way he came down to the second floor, and there the choice of four doors was open to him. He selected one at random, turned the knob silently, and entered with a rush that was swift and sudden without being noisy.
There was no one there. He saw that in his first lightning glance round. Then, reassured upon that point, his interest was taken by the sight of the open cupboard that seemed to lead through to a lighted flight of stairs.
This was not quite what he had expected — he had not credited Donnell with the provision of any such melodramatic devices as concealed doors and secret passages. And the look of things seemed to indicate that someone had recently passed that way in a hurry — and in such a hurry that he had forgotten to disguise his retreat by closing the cupboard doors behind him.
The Saint went quickly through to the hidden stairway, his gun in his hand.
He listened there and heard nothing. And then he went down into the darkness, and came at length upon the tunnel which Weald had found.
He could see no one ahead, and his steps quickened. Presently he came to the fork at which Weald had hesitated. As he paused there irresolute, his eye fell on something that sparkled on the stone flags. He bent and picked it up. It was a small drop earring.
And he was putting it in his pocket when he heard a muffled cry come faintly down the branch on his right. The Saint broke into a run.
Stephen Weald, with his back to the door, and so intent upon the object of his madness that he could notice nothing else, did not hear the Saint's entrance; and, indeed, he knew nothing whatever of the Saint's arrival until two steely hands took him by the scruff of the neck and literally bounced him off his feet.
Then he turned and saw the Saint, and his right hand dived for his pocket. But Simon was much too quick. His fist crashed up under Weald's jaw and dropped him in his tracks.
He turned to find the girl beside him. "Did you hear what he said — that he was Waldstein?" The Saint nodded.
"I did," he said, and bent and seized Weald by the collar and jerked him half upright. Then he got his arms under the man's limp body and hoisted him up in a lump, as he might have picked up a child. "Where are you going?"
The girl's voice checked him on his way to the door, and Simon glanced back over his shoulder.