The Saint in Trouble (7 page)

But with all that, his tactical instincts, as lively as those of any pirate, suggested a possibly profitable switch. The Saint made it without consciously examining his decision.

With a touch of the wheel, he sent the speedboat veering to port, out of its direct trail of the launch that carried Maclett.

The launch continued on its way into the channel between the islands, while the Saint’s speedboat swept into a parallel course opposite Ste. Marguerite. In a moment they were cut off from sight of each other. But the Saint figured that he had enough speed in hand to reach the eastern end of the island well ahead of the launch, swing around it, and meet the launch in the channel from an unexpected and apparently accidental head-on direction. Whatever the purpose of the party in the launch might be, his interception of it should take them completely by surprise.

He scanned the speedboat’s cockpit for anything that might prove useful once he made the encounter. His glance fell on a metal box bolted to the side under the dashboard, and he leaned over and flicked it open, to find it contained a Very pistol and distress flares. Guiding the boat with only an occasional touch, he carefully fitted a cartridge and placed the pistol on the ledge behind the windshield.

Up to a point, his plan worked out exactly as he had envisioned it. He kept the speedboat headed towards Cap d’Antibes until well past the end of Ste. Marguerite, to stay safely away from the irregular reef which projects eastwards under water from the island, before making his U-turn back into the channel where the big yachts were parking for the day. And almost at once he saw the launch that he had previously been following, rushing towards him and away from the assemblage of statelier pleasure barges in the most sheltered center of the notch.

Simon cut his engine to a mere tick-over, and as the speedboat slumped in the water he slewed it directly across the path of the launch. He stood up in the cockpit, waving his arms in an unmistakeable request for communication.

Without slackening speed by a knot, the launch veered to miss him, but so closely that its water almost capsized the speedboat, and only the Saint’s fantastic reflexes and co-ordinating muscles saved him from being thrown down into or bodily out of the bucking cockpit.

As he recovered some semblance of vertical balance, he saw that the launch was resuming its course, unchecked, and with the clearest intention of declining to be detained. Three silhouettes against the now glaring sunlight looked back, it seemed with callous derision.

The Saint seldom lost his temper, but something about that exercise in nautical boorishness got under his skin. With something akin to the conditioned response of a Western gunfighter, he snatched up the Very pistol from the ledge in front of him and fired. The flare sped across the water like a coloured comet and exploded as it landed in the open stern of the launch.

Billows of smoke engulfed the launch, and with great satisfaction he heard the engine splutter and die. He loaded another cartridge into the pistol and held it at the ready as he brought the speedboat alongside.

As he did so he realised he had been fooled, beautifully lured and brilliantly snared.

There were three men in the launch. They wore the rough denims of fishermen, and their language was as colourful as the flare that one of them was busy stamping out. But Professor Maclett was definitely not one of them.

The Saint did not stop to join an altercation but simply gunned the speedboat around and headed back out of the channel.

It had been a very slick operation, and he had outsmarted himself with his own clever maneuver to help it to succeed. While out of his sight behind the island, the launch had simply drawn alongside one of the big yachts anchored there and stopped to allow one of the fishermen he had seen to replace Maclett. Which testified to an impressive degree of organisation.

He would have dearly loved to have cruised on through the channel in the hope of identifying the boat that now had Maclett aboard, but he could not have done that without blatantly exposing himself. But as he circled back towards Cannes, his mind was racing back to the ridiculous theory that had been hatched during his return from the Port Canto that afternoon, which began to seem a great deal more sane and logical.

He nudged the speedboat alongside the wharf from which he had taken it, and had scarcely picked up the mooring when he became aware of a reception committee on the quayside.

A small dapper figure stepped forward.

“Monsieur Templar, I am Inspector Lebeau. You are under arrest for the kidnapping of Professor Andrew Maclett.”

8

It was a little different from what the Saint had expected, but he accompanied Lebeau to the waiting car and allowed himself to be driven to the police station without protest.

He demanded a lawyer, and was told that he would have that privilege at the proper time. He asked for a consul to be contacted, and was assured that every formality would be ob served. A request or permission to collect some things from his hotel was politely refused.

He could imagine how hot the telephone lines would soon become as the news of his arrest reached Paris and then London in time for the first editions of the evening papers, “SAINT ARRESTED!” He could almost see the headlines.

Lebeau was obviously pleased with his catch, for he personally conducted the Saint to his cell, even apologising for the quality of the accommodation and expressing a hypocritical hope that the unfortunate situation would soon be sorted out and all the truths established.

In France, under the still sacred Code Napoleon, a man is guilty until proven innocent, and therefore there is no reason why the amenities supplied while he awaits confirmation of that assumption should be anything above the minimum as far as comfort is concerned. The cells of the average city police station in Britain would rate as starred hotels compared with their counterparts across the Channel.

The Saint found himself in a room barely ten feet square, with rough concrete walls and a flagstone floor. Air came via a small barred window set high up in the wall opposite the door, and light from an unshaded bulb which, despite the smallness of the room, still managed to leave the corners in shadow. Two bunks hung couchettelike from one wall. A plain deal table and a couple of chairs, and a slop pail, were the only other furnishings.

Both bunks were occupied, and a third inmate sat huddled in a comer, head on knees and snoring loudly. The cuts and bruises on the faces of all three, and the stale smell of cheap wine, were silent evidence of the reasons for their presence.

Simon settled himself in the comer opposite the snorer. He took off his jacket and folded it to make a headrest. He had never before tasted the official hospitality of the Republic, but he possessed an almost mystical ability to relax completely in any situation where sound and fury would achieve nothing, conserving his energy for the moment when it could be exploded with the maximum effect.

The grating of a key in the lock interrupted his inventing of transcendental meditation, and he stood up and stretched his limbs hopefully. The visit, however, was not for him: the agent who came in ungently roused his cellmates and herded them into the corridor outside, where two more officers waited.

Simon watched as they were marched away, and protested: “If this is lunchtime, why am I left out?”

The warder, who had cautiously kept a safe distance from the Saint, replied with ponderous joviality: “This is not the Hotel Negresco, but I will ask the room service waiter not to forget you.”

The door slammed, and another half hour passed before it was opened again.

t was the same agent, with the same sense of humour.

“If you have a moment, the management would like a word with you.”

“I have been saving a word for them,” said the Saint pleasantly. “But I shall not sully your delicate ears with it.”

With the reinforcement of two more agents, the Saint was delivered to Lebeau’s office.

Sir William Curdon sat on Lebeau’s right. He glared as Simon entered and coolly seated himself in the vacant chair opposite the inspector.

Lebeau smiled.

“Good morning again, Monsieur Templar, I hope you have found our facilities comfortable.”

“Fabulous,” said the Saint. “I shall be writing about them to the Guide Michelin.”

Curdon’s fist thudded against the desktop and his voice shook.

“Damn this nonsense! Where is Maclett, Templar? What was that little boat ride ail about?”

“Well, Willie, the fact is that swimming often damages the clothing, so I thought perhaps using a boat might-“

Lebeau cut him short.

“Your personal differences aside, Monsieur Templar, you were in the suspected vicinity. You arrived back, Professor Maclett did not.”

The Saint shrugged.

“Inspector, I deeply regret arriving back.”

“Lebeau, I want this man safe and sound in a jail cell until he tells us where he’s got Maclett stashed!”

Curdon seemed about to turn into a cloud of steam, and Lebeau turned to the Saint with an apologetic gesture.

“I regret, but I am obliged to feel in favour of British intelligence.”

“And I regret,” said the Saint honestly, “that I haven’t the faintest idea where Professor Maclett is now. Why doesn’t British Intelligence know?”

“Lock him up again!” Curdon bellowed. “We’ll get the truth out of him soon enough, however we have to do it. Let’s talk again privately, Lebeau.”

At a sign from Lebeau, the two escorting agents stepped forward, and the Saint stood up.

“I must let you into a state secret, Inspector,” he said. “Where British Intelligence ought to be, there is apparently a boiled potato.”

He tapped his head. Lebeau stared at him stonily. Simon smiled into Curdon’s face.

“See you later, Willie.”

The policeman held the Saint’s arms as they walked back down the stairs towards the cells. The Saint offered no resistance until they reached the ground floor and were nearing the junction of two corridors. Ahead of them, a window ran from the floor almost to the ceiling. He had had a good look at it on his way up to the interview with Curdon and Lebeau and knew exactly what he had to do.

The Saint started to run, his arms closing around the waist of his escort and forcing them to do the same. Taken off their guard, the men had no alternative but to comply. The Saint charged towards the window with the force of a wounded bull, throwing himself forward at the last moment and shaking off their grip. Arms crossed over his face, shoulder turned to take the brunt of the impact, he launched himself at the glass.

The window dissolved into a thousand tiny knives that could have torn him to shreds, but he had learned in a hard school that the trick of passing through windows in that unorthodox fashion was to hit them with exactly the speed that would deflect the fragments before they could claw at the passing body.

He landed unscathed on the gravel-coated car park in a rolling somersault, his knees pulled high into his chest, arms still shielding his face and head. The sharp stones bit through the thin cotton of bis shirt, grazing the skin beneath, but the Saint had no time to worry about a few trivial abrasions. He scarcely felt them, in the surge of excitement that came with his return to freedom.

He rolled over once before springing upright and racing towards the line of cars parked on the far side of the courtyard. A prowl car was backing into the centre of the quadrangle, and the Saint sprinted to head it off. Behind him, he could hear a chorus of confused shouts merging into the pounding of running feet. A flung baton hit him behind the knees and almost felled him, but the Saint split his stride like a hurdler and increased his speed.

The police car braked as its occupants, a plainclothes detective and his uniformed driver, became aware of the commotion. The offside door was flung open and the detective jumped out, running around the car towards the Saint, his hand grabbing for the holster inside his jacket. Simon jumped high, straightening in the air, his body becoming as rigid as an arrow. His heels landed squarely in the center of the man’s chest, hurling him off his feet. The detective’s mouth opened, but no sound emerged. With an expression of surprise still frozen on his face, he pitched backwards and lay still.

The Saint landed a yard from the car. The driver was halfway out of the door, a revolver in his hand. The Saint sprang forward, throwing every ounce of his weight against the door. The driver screamed as the metal sliced into him: his arm jerked upwards, and his gun barked harmlessly at the sky. Simon grasped his wrist and smashed his hand against the car, sending the revolver clattering away across the roof.

Still keeping his hold, the Saint stepped back, taking the driver with him, as his fist whipped around in a right cross to the chin. The man crumpled, and Simon slid in behind the wheel, flicking the gears into reverse and stamping on the accelerator to send the car bucking backwards. Then he skidded the car around and out of the quadrangle.

The scream of the engine drowned the sound of a shot, and the glass of the rear window seemed to shiver for an instant before exploding. Simon kept his foot pressed to the floor, holding the car on course as if such interventions were merely to be expected.

A pair of heavy wrought-iron gates hung at the arched entrance. Two guards were valiantly trying to pull them together, and they were already partly closed when the Saint reached them. He snaked between them, scraping one as he heeled over in a two-wheeled skid onto the road outside.

9

One hand searched the switches on the dashboard until he found the one which controlled the siren, and its insistent two-toned hooting split the air. The whole operation, from the time he had charged for the window to the moment he hit the road, had taken less than a minute but already another police car was swinging out of the station less than a hundred yards behind, and in the rear-view mirror he saw it overtaken by a powerful motorcycle that slipped through the traffic on the wrong side of the road.

Simon switched on the radio and listened to the unemotional voice of the central despatcher relaying the news of his escape and ordering road blocks to be set up on the major routes out of town. But the Saint had already decided that his best chance lay in drawing the chase through the narrow back streets until he could shake it off.