Leslie Charteris - Send for the Saint

“The guns are going to Korea?”

“North Korea,” said the Saint quietly. “American weapons, being exported for use against the Americans themselves in the war. And, of course, against the South Koreans.”

“Couldn’t they be going to the South?” He shook his head.

“There’d be no reason to hide them if they were. No, this little lot’s bound for North Korea all right, you could bet your life on that. And so are those other five ships, no doubt. Mystery solved.” He paused thoughtfully and then added: “But not the immediate problem.”

“What is that?”

“How to stop this shipment.”

“We will tell Mr Patroclos, and he will tell the police.”

“There’s no law against exporting arms. And the crew would swear that they knew nothing about it, anyhow — whether they did or not. Besides, there are the five ships that’ve already sailed. They’ve got to be stopped.”

“Mr Patroclos could radio them and order them to turn back.”

“Could — but would he?” Simon’s expression was sardonic. “Dio may not be as unscrupulous as some people say he is, but I never heard of him having a reputation as a great philanthropist. Having those ships turned back and unloaded now, and maybe tied up for months in some official investigation, would cost him a small fortune in overheads and lost time and freights. No, I’m afraid that with his impostor disposed of he’d be liable to think it more practical to just let this operation take its course.”

Ariadne looked troubled and uncertain. “Those other five ships have got to be intercepted, by force if necessary.” The Saint was frowning as he virtually went on thinking aloud. “But that’s a major naval operation, and nobody’s going to launch it just on our say-so. Someone pretty big has got to verify what we’ve seen here. Like, someone from the American Embassy.” He gripped the girl suddenly by the shoulders.

“Ariadne, will you help me?”

“How?”

“Go and phone the Ambassador. Say it’s a red-alert United Nations emergency. Give my name. It may not shine like a bishop’s, but I think it’s got enough clout to make him listen. Have him send someone responsible down here, preferably his naval attaché, at flank speed. You meet him, and bring him aboard.”

She stared up at him searchingly, hesitating, and finally nodded.

“Yes, I will do it. But what about you?”

He smiled a reckless smile, and the blue eyes danced.

“I’ll stay here and make sure, somehow, that they don’t sail before he gets here. Also, my curiosity’s killing me, and I want to see what other little surprises they’ve got stashed away in these boxes.”

He climbed to the top of the hatchway stepladder, peered cautiously over the coaming and around the deck, and was back almost instantly, dropping lightly to the floor.

“All clear,” he whispered; and then he gripped her shoulders lightly again and kissed her on the cheek. “Good luck, Ariadne.”

“And you... Simon. And when Mr Patroclos finds out what I have done, I hope you can find me another job.”

Then she was gone.

And the Saint soon became so absorbed in his discoveries that he failed altogether to notice that a pair of dark eyes had begun to watch him from the hatchway above.

It was only when three burly Greek seamen had already begun to descend the stepladder that the slight scuffing sound of their bare feet alerted him, and he whirled around just in time to see the first one launching himself off the ladder towards him.

In the circumstances it was a reasonably promising move on the seaman’s part, since any ordinary man would have reacted too slowly to avoid the approximately two hundred pounds of foot-first Greek that hurtled towards Simon Templar’s head. But the Saint was no ordinary man; which was unfortunate for the Greek seaman, who like many before him could never afterwards fully fathom how it was that when he reached the area of space occupied by his target, there was nothing but emptiness where Simon Templar ought by all ordinary laws to have been. The sailor’s heels hit the side of one crate, splitting it open and shunting it a couple of feet along the floor of the hold; and the crate that was stacked on top of it lost just enough of its support to topple over on to the man’s prone body before he could move. There was a sharp painful omph as the breath was knocked out of him, and what sounded like the cracking of a few ribs.

Simon ducked behind a taller pile of crates, and waited with every nerve fibre taut like piano wire as the other two seamen dropped off the ladder and began cautiously circling towards him from opposite directions. One of them shouted loudly in Greek, presumably to summon reinforcements; and then suddenly he began a rush. But the Saint toppled a crate over in his path, and then whirled to face the other man’s charge. He took a heavy but clumsy blow to the chest, and countered with a long hard straight left which he planted with immediately visible effect square in the centre of the seaman’s already bulbous nose. The man sat down hard on his tail-bone, clutching his injured proboscis with tender fingers through which a stream of blood instantly began to flow.

Meanwhile his shipmate had scrambled around the obstructing crate, and threw himself on to Simon’s back. But to Simon’s judo training this was about as effective as a novice equestrian leaping on to the back of a skittish bronco, and the man found himself sailing through the air on to the top of a crate.

“Stop, you fools! It’s Templar!” Suddenly the voice of Diogenes Patroclos cut raspingly across the hold. “He works for me. Stop it!”

The crewmen pulled themselves awkwardly together and backed sullenly off as Patroclos and another man in the uniform of a snip’s captain descended the ladder.

“Well, if it isn’t good old Dio Two — or is it One?” murmured the Saint. “Do you realise that you’re breaking up the best workout I’ve had for about four days?”

“Templar, I’m sorry. Those idiots didn’t realise—”

“They realised, all right. Just look around.”

Simon indicated the open crates, then casually reached inside one, took out a rifle, and threw it down with a clatter at Patroclos’ feet. Patroclos seemed utterly astonished. He picked up the rifle and examined it, peered into the open cases, and then turned to the ship’s captain.

“What is the meaning of this?” he snapped.

The captain shrugged sullenly and said nothing. Simon rested one foot on a crate, folded his arms, and slowly shook his head in wonderment. And he laughed.

“I’ll be happy to explain on the Captain’s behalf, Dio” he began. “Singapore was just a paper destination — to satisfy the authorities. All that nonsense about the ships being diverted! They weren’t diverted at all. From the outset they were bound for North Korea.”

Patroclos swore fluently in Greek.

“American arms for North Korea?... If this is true, then it must be that impostor who—”

“There is no impostor,” said the Saint coolly. “And there never has been. You manufactured him. It was you all the time.”

In the ensuing silence all the muscles of Patroclos’ face and neck seemed to be working; the black musketball eyes burned with anger; and for the first time, the shadow of something like fear flitted across the strong swarthy face. Patroclos flicked a nervous tongue over his lips, which had suddenly turned pale. At last he found his voice.

“Then why would I hire you?” he demanded harshly.

“You needed an impartial witness to prove that this other man — this scapegoat-to-be — existed.”

“Which you are.”

“I might have been,” Simon conceded. “I’ll admit you had me flummoxed at first. Your planning was tremendous — and your psychology was pretty good too... The girl at the airport... The heavies at the hotel to warn me off — you knew that was the one sure way to get me on the hook... The quick dash to London — in your private plane, you were probably there before I was... The slightly altered appearance and voice... The briefing of your staff at this end... The invented detail—”