Лесли Чартерис - Capture the Saint

“But it’s a COMEDY, Saint, a COMEDY!” Krogstad laughed loudly, the only way he knew how to.

“I realize that, Karl,” replied Simon, playfully picking a napkin from the piano top and using it to daub his eyes, “that’s what broke my heart.”

Krogstad popped a complimentary cookie into his mouth, unaware of Simon’s attention being more directed towards the door than the refreshments and atmosphere.

“Is Beck with you?” asked Karl as he chewed a macaroon, “She made tentative plans to join me here before the first feature, but she hasn’t shown up.”

“No, the last time I saw her was at the hotel,” said Simon, dismissing the probability of Kathryne being a damsel in distress. “She might have called it a night. After all, she had three book signings today in addition to the media reception.”

Karl nodded as the lobby’s lights blinked a summons to the second feature.

“Winning the Pulitzer does wreck havoc on your social life,” remarked Krogstad with a straight face.

“Are you sitting with someone special, or will you join our little party? There is someone here that I am doing my best to impress.”

The Saint pulled him gently aside as the other patrons moved towards the auditorium.

“Actually, I came in here purely on impulse to avoid potential contact with a contingent of the ungodly. I left one of them unconscious in front of Jimmy Woo’s. Finding you here is a fortunate bonus.”

Krogstad loosed another thunderous laugh.

“Really! Simon, how exciting. But tell me,” Karl chuckled, “who’s directing this adventure?”

“You can direct me to your car and loan me the keys; I’ll cover the cost of your taxi. If my evening’s escapades ever become a movie, the rights will be yours.”

“Yeeee,” gasped Krogstad, “One of those direct to video releases, no doubt. While I would love my fame assured, I don’t have a car tonight. We decided the designated driver should have a meter on his dashboard. Sorry. Here, take a macaroon for the road.”

Before Simon could stop him, Karl swept a chocolate cookie from a nearby tray and thrust it into the Saint’s jacket pocket. Krogstad’s hand recoiled as if it had encountered a scorpion.

“My God, Templar,” rasped Krogstad dramatically, “that’s a GUN! A real GUN!”

“Shhhh,” admonished Simon, “take it easy.”

Little beads of perspiration glistened on Krogstad’s reddened forehead.

“Listen, Saint, this is Seattle. We don’t carry guns into theaters. Espresso, yes; guns, no. There’s always the danger that someone who doesn’t like the film will shoot the projectionist.”

“An honest concern,” concurred the Saint, putting an arm around the hyperkinetic filmmaker, “And who knows what they would do if they knew there was a director in the house?”

Krogstad glanced about as if expecting an outburst of machine-gun fire, sighed nervously, and attempted to conceal his agitation.

“Wonderful,” mused Karl, “Enter the Saint and our lives are imperiled. Listen, Templar, don’t go shooting up the theater and terrorizing the patrons. I have an important potential financial backer in the audience teetering on the brink of signing a large check.”

“Finacial backer? I thought Barney Malone paid you a king’s ransom to direct The Pirate,” chided Simon.

“Yeah, it was a King’s ransom — a small, Balkan king, but a king nonetheless — but the trick in this business is to never invest your own money in dicey ventures.”

Karl elaborated as they walked towards the crowded autitorium.

“I have envisioned an international independent filmmakers conference and competition which would allow others the opportunity to become as reputable and mainstream as I by offering them high-profile exposure. There is, of course, entrance fees and attendance fees, and workshop fees, and material fees...”

“And you have a heart of gold, Karl,” added Simon with minimal facetiousness.

“Yes, I have a heart of gold and my potential backer has deep pockets, a law degree, and several beautiful maidens absurdly eager to have a career in showbusiness.”

Simon Templar did not stop cold, but he did stop.

“Money, maidens, and a law degree?”

Karl smiled a broad affirmation. “It is almost too good to be true,” confided Krogstad, “We’re talking big bucks, Saint. Big bucks and buxum babes all tied together with the kind of loot only a lawyer can manipulate.”

The floor seemed to ripple beneath Simon’s feet, and for the second time that evening he felt detatched from reality’s reference points.

“Karl, does the phrase ‘Good Time Arcade’ mean anything to you?”

Krogstad almost burst with joy.

“Yes! Templar you amaze me. No wonder you’re famous, you know everything. Of course I know the Good Time Arcade. That’s the guy, them’s the dames, and that’s the source of my backer’s money. You walked right by him when you came in. He was standing at the snack bar yaking to some client on his cellular phone. Lawyers are always on the phone, which is the best time to put a pen in their hand ’cause sometimes they’ll sign anything simply out of habit.”

“Interesting habits, indeed,” said the Saint as he glanced back towards the snack bar, “I trust you will introduce us.”

“You’re not going to shoot him, are you?” asked Karl, unsure of his own seriousness.

“Heaven forbid,” stated Simon reassuringly, “I would never shoot a potential financial backer, at least not in this chapter.”

Krogstad stared at the Saint as if increased visual acuity could impart clarity of comprehension.

“Well, that’s a relief,” mumbled Karl pointing his thumb toward the snack bar, “as soon as he gets off the phone, he’ll be heading this way.”

Simon turned to get a look at Karl’s prospective sugar daddy, fully prepared to squeeze the slimy fingers of a pin-striped, Brilliantine dipped, shifty-eyed insult to the legal profession. Instead, the Saint saw a youthful Mount Rushmore of a man bedecked in a bright canary yellow sweater and beige slacks walking briskly toward them. Arthur Rasnec’s face looked less than thirty, and his bright blond hair was razor-shaped in the most contemporary style, but tiny lines accenting his hazel eyes implied an added decade.

Introductions exchanged and hands well-shook, the Saint searched Arthur Rasnec’s facial expressions and body language for tell-tale signs of predatory underpinnings. Rasnec’s emotional infra-structure remained an impregnable fortress of self-containment.

“There’s always something,” said Rasnec, shaking his head in mild dismay as he pocketed his blatantly expensive and stylishly unobtrusive cellular phone, “Someone pilfered my office tonight and made off with my little .22.”

Krogstad, remembering the cold steel in Simon’s pocket, laughed nervously.

“The Saint didn’t do it,” insisted Karl jokingly, “He has an alibi, don’t you Simon?”

“Absolutely,” responded the Saint, “I was drinking beer with Detective Dexter Talon of the Seattle PD until only minutes ago.”

Again, Simon searched the lawyer’s boyish visage for reaction, but saw only an inscrutable mask of practiced social graces. What the Saint next perceived caused him to momentarily catch his breath — a vision of feminine beauty gliding effortlessly towards the three men. Karl poked him in the ribs.

“Here she comes.”

If a woman can make an entrance when she is already in the room, that is exactly what she did. Had there been an orchestral overture accented by the sudden illumination of a single spotlight, her arrival could not have been more enrapturing of male attention.

Perched upon exquisite heels, she embodied every cliched attribute of the hackneyed phrase, “drop-dead gorgeous”. From the fine points of her precision nails to the lustrous tips of the reddish-golden-brown hair cascading down to her shoulders; from her well turned ankles to her lightly rouged high-boned satin cheeks, she was deft and dazzling testimony to natural beauty brought to perfection by cosmetic artistry.