Leslie Charteris - The Saint in the Sun

"It licked him?"

"He told me to get out and come back in the morning for the contract. He even let me take his car to go home and come back in."

"So that's where you were when I called."

She nodded.

"Of course I was afraid he'd have changed his mind. But he hadn't. He said if he'd had a sister who would have been ready to do as much for him, he might have felt a lot differently about women. It was a real tear-jerker. But he signed the contract, and that was that. I mailed it to my agent and came looking for you."

"Did he say you could play Messalina?"

"No. But it has to be a big part, for what they're paying. And however it turns out, I'll get the money, and that's the most important thing to me."

The Saint stood up, grinning, and put out a hand to help her to her feet.

"Then we've got something to celebrate. Let's go to the Voile d'Or at St Raphaël and introduce you to Monsieur Saquet's bourride. It's only the best on the whole Coast."

"Yes. I'm starving. You always have the most wonderful ideas."

As they trudged towards the road he asked: "Do you still have Undine's car?"

"No. I was glad to return it. Do you know, it's a Rolls Royce painted exactly like his speedboat, including the big monogram on the side. I took a taxi."

"In that outfit?"

She laughed.

"I'm afraid I'm not quite emancipated enough for that." She opened the plastic zipper bag she carried and took out a roll of cloth not much bigger than his fist, which shook out into a one-piece play-suit of some wrinkle-proof synthetic. In five seconds she was what daytime St Tropez would have considered almost overdressed. "See?"

"What won't they make next," said the Saint admiringly. "So we can head straight for the fish kettle, without any footling about."

Thus it was that they made no stop in St Tropez until mid-afternoon, and had no preliminary intimation of the mystery which was going to climax Sir Jasper Undine's career with its last headlines.

Maureen Herald said she would have to find a travel agency in the town to check on her return flight to London, so the Saint stopped in the parking lot near the Casino and walked with her to the Quai de Suffren. And there they ran into, or more literally were run into by a hustling and vaguely frantic Wilbert.

"Oh, it's you," he said brilliantly, when the fact had registered. "Do you know anything about Sir Jasper?"

"Several things," said the Saint. "And nearly all of them are uncomplimentary. What aspect would you like to hear about?"

"I mean, have you seen him, or anything?"

"I saw him making his usual prowl in the speedboat this morning. But he went off without any passengers. That was about a quarter to eleven. Why, what's the excitement?"

"Hadn't you heard?" spluttered the tycoon's stooge. "Sir Jasper has disappeared!"

Simon raised his eyebrows.

"Theoretically, I'd say that was impossible," he murmured. "He must be easily the most visible man in this hemisphere. He's probably even luminous in the dark."

"But he has! The Chris-Craft was found forty miles out at sea, with nobody in it. I just got a message that a French Navy patrol boat had brought it in."

"You're headed the wrong way," Simon said. "The Navy jetty is on the north side of the port, that-a-way. Let's go and view the salvage."

As they went, Wilbert managed to calm down sufficiently to supply some details.

"He had an engagement for lunch with the manager of one of his Italian subsidiaries who was coming specially from Rome, but he never got back for it. I know it was an important meeting and nothing but an accident would have kept him away. Of course, I was a bit surprised that he'd already taken the boat out alone when I arrived at ten-thirty, he's never done that before—"

"You don't sleep at the villa?"

"No, I'm staying at a hotel in town."

"Did he say anything to the servants?"

"They don't sleep in, either. They come in at two o'clock. Sir Jasper doesn't like anyone in the house at night, except people he might invite. You know. "

The Saint thought he knew, but he avoided catching Maureen's eye.

A Naval rating and a police sergeant were jointly standing guard over Sir Jasper's effulgent sampan when they arrived and Wilbert identified himself. Both representatives of the State promptly produced notebooks and began jabbering at him at once, and Simon had to step in as interpreter. It appeared that the Navy was putting a lien on the boat for the cost of bringing it in, and at the same time considering the possibility of prosecuting the owner for endangering navigation by abandoning it on the high seas, while the Police were convinced that someone should be arrested but were trying to decide who and for what. Simon cheerfully assured them that Wilbert would take full responsibility for everything, and they were finally allowed on board.

In an open runabout of that kind there was not much to examine that could not have been seen from the wharf, but Simon switched on the ignition and pressed the starter buttons one after the other. Each engine turned over vigorously but did not fire, and he saw that the needle of the fuel gauge remained at zero.

"Ran out of gas," he remarked. "Do you suppose he tried to swim back for some?"

"He could only swim a few strokes," Wilbert said, "and the boat was forty miles out!"

"He could have been picked up by another boat," Maureen said.

"Then they'd have brought him home before this," said the Saint. "Or if it was a liner that couldn't just turn around, they'd have a radio, and he'd 've got through to Wilbert right away."

"Suppose he was kidnapped?" Wilbert suggested.

Simon rubbed his chin.

"I guess you can suppose it. But who on earth would pay anything to get him back?"

Any fingerprints that might be found on the boat would be hopelessly confused by all the sailors who must have handled it, but there were no immediately visible traces of the salvage operation, or of any unusual behavior on board. In fact, everything was commendably neat and clean, as Simon pointed out.

"I hosed her down and tidied up myself when we came in yesterday," Wilbert said. "It's one of my jobs."

The Saint frowned thoughtfully.

"I suppose he made a lot of mess with those cigars?"

"Yes — ashes everywhere—" The carroty young man caught his breath, and his Adam's apple bobbed. He looked around the boat in a startled way. "Good heavens! You mean—"

"I don't see any ashes," said the Saint.

Maureen bit her lip.

"This is fascinating," she said. "Just like playing detectives. Listen. Sir Jasper was really quite plastered last night. He must have had an awful hangover this morning. That would account for him not being in the mood to pick any girls up. And if his tummy was upset he probably couldn't stand to light a cigar. Was his cigar alight, Simon?"

"I'm damned if I know," said the Saint. "He didn't come in close enough. And who would 've noticed, anyhow?"

Then there was a new commotion on the dock, and they looked up and saw Lee Carozza and Dominique chattering with the guard detail. There was nothing more worth staying on the Chris-Craft for, and Simon and Maureen climbed back up and joined them, with Wilbert following.

"They told us at the Pinède," Carozza explained. "We were having the siesta, and they woke us up. But it's hard to believe he's been murdered."

Who said he was?" Simon asked.

"That was the rumor. It is not true?"

Wilbert repeated the facts, very precisely, with the addition of what they had observed and discussed in the boat, like a new member of an undergraduate committee making his first report.

"I am not a criminal expert," Carozza said at the end, looking very significantly at the Saint, "but how can it be anything but murder? I knew him, and he was not a man who would take a boat forty miles towards Africa by himself, with no one to admire him. He was taken out by someone who killed him and threw him overboard, and escaped in another boat."