Лесли Чартерис - Salvage for the Saint

The Coroner pursed his lips and brought two sets of five fingertips carefully together.

“Well, perhaps you can assist us by saying whether you formed the impression that Fournier was his true name?”

“No, I formed no impression about that. I had no reason to question whether it was his true name.”

“And what is your impression in retrospect, in view of the fact that the French authorities say that no Maurice Fournier is known to them?”

Arabella shrugged, making no particular effort to hide her impatience.

“Authorities can be wrong,” she told him. “And anyway he could easily have been Swiss or Belgian or something. But I really don’t see that his name matters. He, and my husband, are both dead.”

The Coroner winced visibly at the nakedness of her words, as if he would have liked to substitute something more bland and bloodless like “passed on” or “deceased”. Simon Templar, who was also in court, smiled at the thought of the interior battle that the Coroner must have been waging with himself at that juncture — a battle between, on the one hand, the legal ego, which hates to let anyone get away with robbing it of the initiative in argument as she had just done, and on the other the well-brought-up conservative gentleman whose sympathy for a newly widowed woman makes him a bottomless fount of indulgent tolerance.

The gentleman won on points, even if his fount did emerge as unmistakably non-bottomless. Its visible bottom took the form of a restrained concession to the legal ego; the Coroner swallowed hard — a species of exertion that caused his protuberant Adam’s apple to twitch the knot of the spotted tie — and said with forced pleasantness:

“You must allow me to be the judge of what matters in this case, Mrs Tatenor. But I realise how distressing all this must be for you. I am sure you have the sympathy and good wishes of everyone present in the court, and I hope we shall now be able to conclude this inquiry quickly. You may stand down now.”

She made a movement that just barely feinted at being a hint of a half-bow that she’d thought better of, and went back to her seat, which was next to the Saint’s in the second row of the block reserved for witnesses and members of the public.

In the front row of the same block sat the press-men, taking up their full allocation; on the Saint’s other hand sat Vic Cullen, and every other seat in the small Ryde courtroom was occupied too. Among the assembled faces Simon recognised at least half a dozen of the other race drivers; the rest were mostly holidaymakers who happened to be on the island at the time and who for reasons of their own considered a Coroner’s Inquest a good afternoon’s entertainment.

The Saint had half-turned in his seat to survey the spectators with casual interest, and his gaze had just stopped thoughtfully at two vaguely familiar-looking men whom he couldn’t for the moment place in either the boat-racing or the holiday-making group — both were overdressed and one was unusually fat, with a drooping moustache — when the Coroner spoke again.

“Mr Simon Templar — will you take the stand now, please?”

The Saint stood up, took the stand, and went through the usual initiation ritual.

The Coroner eyed him with evident distrust. The Saint resisted the urge to stick his tongue out, and contented himself with returning the Coroner’s cold stare in kind.

“You are the man they call the Saint?” asked the Coroner.

“The same.”

The Coroner sniffed, and made a nervous adjustment to the knot of the spotted tie which left it in exactly the same position as before.

“Mr Templar, your reputation is well known. You have often been described as a common criminal, and I have to say that you are by no means the sort of witness with whom I should have preferred to have to deal in this court.”

The Saint smiled. He didn’t intend losing sight of the seriousness of the occasion, but the opportunity was too good to miss.

“That’s quite all right,” he replied generously. “To be frank, you’re by no means my favourite type of coroner, either.”

There was a brief eruption of laughter, started by a couple of reporters. The Coroner glared at them and went three shades pinker. The Adam’s apple and spotted tie wiggled as he struggled to get control of himself.

“However,” he went on, heroically abstaining from comment on the Saint’s riposte, “I am told that your knowledge of power-boating matters is sound, Mr Templar, and I understand that you and your co-driver Mr... ah... Cullen were the first on the scene after the explosion.”

“That is correct,” agreed the Saint in a businesslike tone.

“I have here your eyewitness report, taken by the police at the time.” The Coroner indicated the document in front of him. “Perhaps you will help us by expanding on one or two points.”

“If I can,” said the Saint.

“One thing puzzles me in particular. Mr Tatenor’s boat suddenly changed course and began heading for the beach at...” — the Coroner peered at the papers — “... Hengistbury Head. You and Mr Cullen could hardly help being aware of this sudden turn, since the boat cut right across your own course.”

“Correct.”

The Coroner leaned forward.

“But having changed course in that abrupt manner, the boat then continued in the new direction, still heading straight for the shore, for a distance of approximately half a mile?”

“As you say — approximately.”

“Does that not seem to you a little odd, Mr Templar?”

It seemed to the Saint decidedly odd, but he hadn’t the slightest conscience about pretending otherwise to the Coroner.

“Not in the least odd,” he said in a tone of conviction.

“But how would you explain it?”

“What seems to me the most likely explanation,” Simon lied, picking his words with care, “is that the boat hit a big wave, and that as a result both men lost their footing, hit their heads and were knocked cold.”

“Leaving no one at the wheel?”

“That’s right. It could easily happen. It was a very choppy sea.”

“But with nobody at the wheel,” persisted the Coroner, “wouldn’t you have expected the boat to follow a rather erratic course, instead of travelling a good half mile or more in a straight line?”

It was a question the Saint had expected and one that had, somehow, to be answered. He took a deep breath.

“I suggest,” he said with a magnificent airy confidence that made everything seem much simpler than it was in his real thoughts on the matter, “that one of those unconscious bodies became slumped or wedged against the wheel just after they hit the big wave. The rudder would probably have found its approximate straight-ahead position very quickly in any case, on the principle of least resistance, and the wheel would have gone back with it, rather like the wheels of a car straighten up and take the steering wheel back after you round a bend. If one of the two men then fell against the Candecour’s wheel, as I think must have happened, that would have kept the boat on a roughly straight-ahead course.”

“Thank you, Mr Templar.”

There was a begrudging note in the Coroner’s voice but he continued to nod sagely as if to imply that of course he had seen all this for himself and now had come to the really difficult question. He posed it triumphantly.

“Yet, just before the impact, according to your evidence, the boat made another abrupt turn, and then once again straightened up.” The Coroner paused for effect. “You’re not seriously suggesting, Mr Templar, that the whole exact and rather unusual sequence of events which you have postulated was repeated?”

“No,” said the Saint with patient civility, “I’m not suggesting that. The explanation’s far simpler. When the Candecour got near the head, she hit the rip tide — that’s all.”