Simon gazed morosely at the closed safe and wondered if it would relieve his emotions to weep tenderly over it for a while. The occasion seemed to call for something of the sort. Within its unresponsive steel sides there was enough boodle to satisfy the most ambitious buccaneer, a collection of concentrated loot that deserved to be ranked with Vanlinden’s lottery ticket, but for all the good it seemed likely to do him it might just as well have been a collection of empty beer bottles.
He went to the window and examined it. The bars were set solidly into the concrete of the walls—it might be possible to dig them out, but it would certainly take a good deal of time. And in any case he knew already that there was a sheer drop of thirty feet underneath it. Still, the road ran below…It was the first ray of hope he had seen since he entered the house. When he had been in Tenerife before he had made a number of incidental friends who might be useful; although if he met any of them when he was with Graner they might prove more dangerous than helpful. But that would have to be faced when the time came…
He took a piece of paper from his pocket and tore it in half. On one piece he wrote rapidly, in English:
Come and stand under the window of Las Mariposas on the La Laguna road at four o’clock. I will drop a message to you out of the window. If I’m unable to do this within half an hour, go away and come back at seven. Wait the same time. If nothing happens then, come back at nine-thirty and wait till you hear from me. This is a matter of life and death. Say nothing to anyone.
He read the message over again and grinned ruefully. It certainly read like something out of a melodrama, but that couldn’t be helped. Maybe it was something out of a melodrama—his stay in Tenerife was beginning to look like that.
He signed his name to it, and on the second scrap of paper he wrote a translation in Spanish. He folded each piece of paper inside a twenty-five-peseta note and put the notes in separate pockets; he had just finished when he heard Graner’s footstep again on the stairs.
Graner hardly glanced at his attempts to adjust the diamond in the copper cup under the machine.
“You can leave that for now,” he said. “We will go down and collect your luggage.”
His voice was sharper than it had been before, and Simon wondered what else had happened to put that grating timbre into it. There were things going on all the time that he knew nothing about, and the strain of trying to make sense of them took half the relief out of this second reprieve. Graner said nothing as they went downstairs, and all that the Saint could deduce of his state of mind had to be more intuitive than logical, which was not much satisfaction.
Through the door of the living room he had a glimpse of Aliston’s boneless back while Graner stood in front of the mirror fitting on his purple hat like a woman. Presumably Aliston, and probably the natty Mr Palermo as well, had been out in the car that had returned a little while ago. Possibly it had been one or the other of them who had telephoned Graner during breakfast. It was a fairly obvious deduction that they had been scouring the town for a trace of Joris Vanlinden, and in that case the meaning of what he had overheard of the telephone conversation, and Graner’s agitation, became easier to understand. But the Saint still had a queer feeling that there were gaps in the theory somewhere, a feeling that came from some kind of sixth sense for which he could not intelligently account, which told him that although the pieces of the jigsaw appeared to fit together so neatly there was something not quite right about the complete picture that they made up.
“Tombs!”
Graner’s acrid voice jerked him out of the brown study, and they went outside to where the car was waiting. The chauffeur who stood beside it was unmistakably Spanish, and part of his villainous aspect might have been due to the fact that it was still only Saturday morning and the traditions of his country required him to shave only on Saturday afternoons, but the Saint doubted it. He wondered how many more of Graner’s menagerie he had still to meet.
“What hotel did you go to?”
“The Orotava,” answered Simon, and Graner’s passionless black eyes rested on him a second or two longer before he passed the order on to the driver.
It was another of those puzzling rough edges in the smooth outline of the Saint’s theory.
Simon pulled himself together with an abrupt effort. He told himself that his nerves must have been getting the better of him—he was beginning to imagine threats and suspicions in every trivial incident. After all, there were only about three hotels in Santa Cruz that could be called at all inviting, and the Orotava was the nearest to the harbour and the easiest choice for a man looking vaguely around for some place to stay. Why should the mention of it make any particular impression?
He knew that there could be only one reason, and felt as though a cold wind lapped his spine for a moment before he insisted to himself that it was absurd.
There was still a brace of guardias de asalto and a brace of guardias civiles mounting guard over the scene of the previous night’s outbreak of gangsterismo, although they did not stop the car, and the Saint’s mind switched back to the newspaper story he had read. That had at least explained a good many things to him without introducing any new riddles. It explained the way he had been stopped on the road when he was driving up to Graner’s, and incidentally also explained the scattered volley which he had heard in the distance sometime earlier when he was driving away with Joris Vanlinden. What else it might lead to he had still to decide, but the humorous thought crossed his mind that he was probably even then riding in the very car for which the whole detective genius of Santa Cruz was at that moment searching. Only, of course, they were considerably handicapped by none of the guardias having remembered the number…
The car stopped at the hotel, and they got out. As they went up to the desk, which was now in the charge of a beautiful boy with the sweetest wave in his hair, Graner turned to the Saint.
“You will remember to cancel your luncheon engagement,” he said.
“Of course,” said the Saint, who had never forgotten it since they left the house. “Would you ask the Fairy Queen to see if he can get me room fifty? I don’t think he speaks English.”
Graner interpreted, and Simon lounged quietly against the counter while the youth went to the telephone switchboard.
His pulses were ticking over like clockwork. Now, if only by some miracle he could make Hoppy grasp the idea…He would be able to say nothing that Reuben Graner didn’t overhear, and Mr Uniatz’s alertness to subtlety and innuendo was approximately as quick-witted as that of a slightly imbecile frog. It was a flimsy enough chance, but it was a chance. He wished he could have called Christine, but he dared not take the risk of drawing attention to a room so close to his own…The youth seemed to be taking a long time…
He came back at last, and what he said made the Saint feel as though he had been jolted under the chin.
“No contestan.”
Simon didn’t move. With every trace of emotion schooled out of his face, he looked enquiringly at Graner.
“They don’t answer,” Graner translated.
The Saint placed his cigarette between his lips and drew at it steadily. He knew that Graner was watching him, but for once he wasn’t worried about his own reaction. He knew that he couldn’t be giving anything away, for the simple reason that he had nothing to give. A dull haze seemed to have filled his brain, through which one or two futile questions could only rise blurrily into his consciousness. Could it only have been that Hoppy was sleeping his usual log-like sleep? But the boy must have been ringing the room for a long time. Besides, there was Joris Vanlinden, and there could hardly be two people in the world who slept as heavily as Hoppy Uniatz. What else could have happened? Graner had been agitated before, but none of it had looked for an instant like the kind of agitation that springs from an excess of rejoicing. Besides which, he hadn’t batted an eyelid when the Saint mentioned the number of the room, which he would certainly have done if…Besides which, there wasn’t even a flickeri
ng indication of triumph in his attitude now. Besides which, there was the telephone call at breakfast time. Besides which…
“You had better write them a note,” Graner was saying.
Simon nodded and walked through the lounge like an automaton to one of the writing desks. His mind was reeling under such a disordered inrush of questions that none of them made any individual impression. Presently he would be able to restore some sort of order and tackle them one by one, but that first insane confusion left him in a daze.
He sat down and drew a sheet of paper towards him, aware that Graner had followed him and was standing over him while he wrote. He unscrewed his fountain pen, and gained a few seconds’ respite while he addressed an envelope to Miss H. Uniatz, hoping that the wavy-haired boy’s knowledge of English was as incomplete as he reckoned it to be. Then he wrote:
Dear Miss Uniatz:
I’m terribly sorry that I shall have to break our appointment for lunch today. As you know, I am not here on a pleasure trip, and the firm I am employed by insists that I must start at once.
I’m sorry, too, that I shan’t have time to help you find an apartment as I had promised; although I still think it would be the best thing for you to do. Your best plan would be to ask Camacho’s Excursions about it—they are the local Cook’s agents, and very useful people. I hope you’ll soon be successful, because I quite see that you won’t want to stay at a hotel any longer than you have to.
With more apologies, and all good wishes,
Sincerely yours,
S. TOMBS.
He sealed the envelope and gave it to the boy at the desk with a silent prayer that some of its insinuations would percolate into the globe of seasoned ivory on which Mr Uniatz wore his hat—or, if they didn’t, that he would ask Christine what she made of it.
“The gentleman is leaving today,” Graner explained in Spanish. “Will you make out his bill and send someone up for his luggage?”
“En seguida.”
Graner rode up with Simon in the elevator, which had apparently been induced to function again since the previous night. The cigar burned down evenly in the amber holder clipped between his teeth. Simon studied him inconspicuously and found it incredible that, if there was any secret jubilation going on in Reuben Graner’s mind, there should be so little sign of it on his face. Besides, if Graner’s suspicions had been so aroused, would he be taking the risk of going up alone to a room where he could so easily be silently and efficiently knocked over the head? Or would he have let the Saint come there at all, where he could so easily announce that he intended to stay—where Graner could do nothing to prevent him? But there was still the inexplicable failure of Hoppy Uniatz to answer the telephone…The Saint felt as if his brain was being torn apart with unanswerable questions.
They came to the door of his room, and he turned the handle and walked in—he hadn’t even troubled to lock the door when he went out to put the Hirondel away the night before. And he was inside the room before he saw that Christine Vanlinden was sitting on the bed.
CHAPTER FOUR:
HOW SIMON TEMPLAR ROSE TO THE OCCASION, AND THE THIEVES’ PICNIC GOT FURTHER UNDER WAY
1
It was so unexpected that the Saint had no chance to do anything. He was too far into the room to draw back, and Graner was so close behind him that he knew Graner must have seen. He wondered if there was still time to pretend he had blundered into the wrong room—but then, there was his luggage. And Graner wouldn’t leave it at that, anyhow, whether it was the wrong room or the right one.
Simon stared at the girl blankly.
“What are you doing here?” he demanded.
It was simply the first thing that came into his head, but the instant he had said it he knew that his instinct must have worked faster than his brain.
“I think you must have lost your way,” he said coldly.
He heard the door close softly behind him, and was aware that Graner had moved up to his side. He felt something round and hard jab into his waist, and knew exactly what it was. But for the moment he pretended not to notice it.
Christine had stopped looking at him. Her eyes were fixed on Graner, and they were growing wider with terror.
“Yes, Christine.” There was a cat-like purr in Graner’s precious accents. “You did lose your way, didn’t you?”
Simon swung round on him.
“Do you know her?”
The other barely glanced at him.
“An excessively stupid question,” he said drily.
“Then what’s the game?” Simon shot back at him raspily. “Did you send her here?”
Graner looked at him a second time, swinging his thin little malacca cane in his left hand. His right hand bulged in the side pocket of his coat. But this time his small beady eyes didn’t switch away again at once. The Saint read something in them that even Graner’s self-control couldn’t conceal, and at that instant he knew that nothing less than his own overworked guardian angel could have put into his head the wild inspiration on which he had acted. His unhesitating comeback had thrown Graner completely off his balance. For the first time since they had met, the other was actually at a disadvantage.
Simon drove on into the breach that his counterattack had opened up in Graner’s guard.
“Is she supposed to be seeing what I’ve got in my luggage, or what’s she doing?” he insisted furiously. “I’m telling you, Graner—there are too damn many fishy things about this job to suit me. I’ll put up with a lot, but if you’re not playing square with me, we’re through!”
Graner’s stick swung a little more jerkily.
“You have nothing to worry about,” he replied harshly, as if that was intended to dismiss the subject, but the bluff lacked force.
“Well, what’s she doing?”
“I have no idea.”
“Then how did you know she’d lost her way?”
“That is not your business.”
“Then why d’you have to stick that gun in my ribs when you find her here?”
“Be quiet!”
Simon leaned one shoulder on the wall and looked down contemptuously at the gun that was still stretching Graner’s pocket out of shape.
“What are you playing with it for?” he jeered. “If you want it to shut me up, you’ve got to use the trigger. Of course you’re not at home now, so it might be a bit awkward for you.”
“I’m trying to prevent you making a scene,” said Graner, and his voice was not as steady as it had been. “If you will stop making so much noise, we shall be able to get this straightened out.”
He turned away abruptly, and Christine Vanlinden’s eyes flashed from one face to the other like the eyes of a hunted animal. Her lips were parted, and one hand was crushed against her breast as if it hurt her.
Graner began to step towards her.
“It is fortunate that we found you so soon,” he said silkily. “Santa Cruz is not a good place for you to be put on your own. I trust you are ready to come home now?”
She sprang suddenly to her feet.
“No!”
“My dear Christine! You must not let yourself get hysterical. Where is Joris? Perhaps we can take him as well.”
“No!” she sobbed. “I won’t go back! I’m never going back. You can’t take me—”
His claw-like hand made a snatch and caught her wrist.
“Perhaps you have Joris’s ticket?” he snarled.
She shrank back until the wall stopped her, staring at him as if she had been hypnotised by a snake, with the breath labouring in her throat. And at that moment there was a knock on the door.
Involuntarily her eyes turned towards the sound. Simon saw her take a quick breath that could have only one purpose, and flung himself off the wall against which he had been lounging as if a spring had been released behind him.
In three strides he was across the room and between Graner and the girl. He clapped one hand over her mouth and spun her round. His other
arm whipped round her waist and lifted her off her feet. The bathroom door was ajar, and he moved on towards it almost without a check.
“Tell ’em to come back presently,” he snapped over his shoulder.
In another second he was inside the bathroom and kicking the door shut behind him.
He still held the girl, but the feel of her slim young body under his arm pressed against him fought a duel with his resolution that she could never have been aware of. He bent his head so that his lips touched her ear, and the smell of her hair filled his nostrils.
“For heaven’s sake don’t give me away!” he whispered. “This is a gag—d’you understand?”
He had no idea how much she understood or believed, but he had no chance to say more. He heard the closing of the outer door of the room, and a moment later the bathroom door opened.
“All right,” said Graner.
Simon carried the girl out and let her go. He straightened his coat and opened his cigarette case.
“Now, Graner,” he said, “we’ll hear from you.”
Graner looked at him unblinkingly. His right hand still rested in his jacket pocket, but the Saint’s keyed-up senses registered every fraction of the change in his manner. The man was still intrinsically the same, but for the time being, at any rate, he had been bluffed over one point in the game. The Saint’s trick of hitting back at a catastrophe with a riposte of such incredible audacity that his opponent could never make himself believe that it was nothing but the last desperate resource of a cornered man had worked for the latest of countless similar occasions in his life; even if it really provided no more than a spidery tightrope on which the abyss had still to be crossed. But it had worked, and his swift, decisive action in silencing the girl must have driven it home.
The Saint Bids Diamonds (The Saint Series) Page 8
