The Saint and Mr Teal (Once More the Saint)

Stride had heard that before, and he did not take much notice.

"And so," continued Osman, "I make you the very fine offer of your liberty; and in return for that you retire from business and I marry Miss Laura."

Stride started up.

"That's not what you said!" he blurted. "You said if I-if I gave you Laura-you'd retire from Turkey and --"

"I changed my mind," said Osman calmly. "Why should I give? I was foolish. I hold all the cards. I am tired of arguing. As soon as this Simon Templar is on board I wish to leave-the year is getting late, and I can't stand your winters. Why should I make con­cessions?" He spat-straight to the priceless carpet, an inch from his visitor's polished shoes. "Stride, you were a fool to meet me yourself. If you had dealt with me through your clever Mr. Almido I might have had some respect for you. You are not sufficiently important to look at-it shows me too plainly which of us is going to get his own way."

He spoke curtly, and, oddly enough for him, with a lack of apparent conceit that made his speech deadly in its emphasis. And Stride knew that Osman spoke only the truth. Yet, even then, if certain things had not happened ...

"You are afraid of the Saint, Stride," said Osman, reading the other's thoughts. "You are more afraid of him perhaps than you are of prison. You did not know that he knew you, but now that you know, you want nothing more than to run away and hide in some place where he can't find you. Well, you can go. I shouldn't stand in your way, my dear Stride."

The other did not answer. Something had broken in the core of his resistance-a thing which only a psychologist who knew the workings of his mind, and the almost superstitious fear which the name of the Saint could still drive into many consciences, could have understood. He sat huddled in a kind of collapse; and Osman looked at him and chuckled again.

"I shall expect a note to tell me that you agree by ten o'clock tonight. You will send it across by hand- and who could be better employed to deliver it than Miss Laura?"

Galbraith Stride stood up and went out without a word

CHAPTER VI

SIMON TEMPLAR saw young Harry Trape and his com panion carrying their suitcases down to the quay and thought they were trying to catch the Scillonian, which was scheduled to sail for the mainland at 4:15. He watched their descent rather wistfully, from the hillside where he was walking, for it was his impression that they had got off much too lightly. He was not to know that Abdul Osman had himself decided to dispense with their existence according to the laws of a strictly oriental code by which the penalty of failure was death; but if he had known, the situation would have appealed to his sense of humour even more than the memory of his recent treatment of young Harry.

At the same time, their departure solved at least one problem, for it definitely relieved Mr. Smithson Smith of further anxiety about the good name of has hotel.

It was past six o'clock when the Saint came back to the village, for the solution of the mystery of an over­loaded basket of towels had suddenly dawned on him, and he had set out to visit a few likely spots on the coast in the hope of finding further evidence. He had failed in that, but he remained convinced that his surmise was right.

"It was an ingenious method of smuggling dope," he told Patricia. "Nobody's thinking about anything like that here-if they see a strange ship loafing around, their only suspicion is that it may be another French poacher setting lobster pots in forbidden waters, and if the boat looked ritzy enough they simply wouldn't think at all. The sea party would dump sacks of it some­where among the rocks, and the Heavenly Twins would fetch it home bit by bit in their basket without attract­ing any attention. Then they pack it in a suitcase and take it over to Penzance with their other stuff, and there isn't even a customs officer to ask if they've got a bottle of scent. Which is probably what they're doing now-I wish we could have arranged a sticky farewell for them."

He had been much too far away to think of an attempt to intercept the evacuation, and the idea of telegraphing a warning to the chief of police at Pen­zance did not appeal to him. Simon Templar had no high idea of policemen, particularly provincial ones. And as a matter of fact his mind was taken up with a graver decision than the fate of two unimportant intermediaries.

He walked along from the lifeboat station with the details of his plan filling themselves out in his imagi­nation; and they were just about to turn into Holgate's, the hotel at the other end of the town, when his rumi­nations were interrupted by a figure in uniform that appeared in his path.

"I've been looking for you, sir," said the law.