Leslie Charteris - The Saint 49 Count On The Saint

The last segment of the puzzle slotted neatly into place.

“I think you should know,” said the Saint deliberately, “that these murders you’ve been hearing about just happen to have eliminated Sir Basil’s backers. With one remaining exception, so far as I’ve been able to find out.”

His lordship might have been regarded by many as a stuffed shirt, but there was no doubt that it was a stuffing of excellent quality. He eyed the Saint with a calmly speculative expression.

“So you think this maniac who’s murdered the others will have a go at me too?” he said at length.

“I’m sure of it,” Simon replied firmly. “I’d like your permission to search the house, and to hang around for a while.”

Lord Grantchester pondered the request.

“Damn inconvenient,” he muttered. “The family are here already and the first guests will be arriving soon. Don’t want to alarm people.”

“I promise not to alarm people,” Simon told him. “But I do think that it’s necessary. This man isn’t a maniac. He’s a cold calculating killer, and a fancy-dress ball would give him a perfect opening.”

Lord Grantchester recognised the strength of the Saint’s argument. He stood up.

“Very well. But please be as discreet as you can.” He stopped at the door. “I’ll tell the staff you’re a surveyor.”

“A surveyor?” the Saint repeated rather blankly.

“That’s right. From the insurance company. The west wing is practically falling down. Been locked up for years because it’s unsafe. Got to do something about it.”

Simon smiled and promised to pose as a surveyor. What a surveyor would be doing working so late on Christmas Eve might be a difficult question to answer if he was challenged, but with luck it wouldn’t be asked.

So the west wing, the oldest part of the house, was unsafe. So it was probably the best place for a break-in. So nobody went there any more, so it was safe as a hiding place. So he would start in the west wing. He told Lord Grantchester his intention and was given directions.

As he traversed the house towards the west wing he tried to put himself in the murderer’s place. Would he break in early, hide, and wait for the fancy-dress ball to start, and then mingle with the guests until he saw an opportunity to strike? Or would he arrive among other guests, in costume, and hope to sneak in unchallenged?

The Saint decided that, since the weather might drastically reduce the numbers present, he’d opt for the first choice. If necessary, he could still hide and get at his victim when the household had gone to sleep.

He entered the west wing by a door on the ground floor, the only one, Lord Grantchester had told him, that was not kept locked.

In the manner of houses of its period, the ground floor was served by one long corridor that ran between all the rooms until it reached the far end of the wing. In the centre it spread out into a square-shaped hall with a flight of wooden stairs leading straight up to a balustraded gallery.

What little furniture remained in the rooms was shrouded in dust sheets which in the half-light looked like slumbering ghosts. The air was heavy with the smell of mould and damp and rotting woodwork. The Saint refrained from announcing his presence by switching on the lights or using his torch and made do with the moonlight that was helped by being reflected from the snow outside.

He checked all the downstairs rooms and returned to the hall. He climbed to the landing at the top of the stairs and considered his next move. From the gallery ran two passages, one towards the centre of the house, the other to the opposite end. He flipped a mental coin and came down in favour of the latter.

Here the corridor ran between other rooms and was so dark that he had no alternative but to switch on his flashlight. It was the shape and size of a fountain pen, with the small beam further restricted by silver foil pasted over the lens. It emitted only a pencil-thin ray, but his night vision was as keen as any cat’s and it was enough.

He moved slowly and cautiously along the passage, his ears straining to pick up any sound that might betray the presence of another intruder. He checked the rooms as he passed them without finding anyone. Of course there was no certainty that the killer was yet on the premises. And then the creak of a floorboard made him freeze.

He waited for what seemed minutes but was in reality no more than a few seconds. The sound came again, louder this time. His ears guided his eyes to the far end of the corridor where it formed a T junction with a similar passage leading towards the rear of the house, and in the deep gloom down there a hooded figure moved.

Simon smiled blissfully as he watched the dim shape of a Santa Claus disappear around the corner. And then he followed. Making less sound than a scavenging mouse, he reached the junction in time to see the figure enter a room a few yards to his right.

He edged along the wall towards the door, passing another as he did so, keeping close to the wall where the boards were less likely to creak.

Standing outside the door which he had seen the Santa Claus use, he listened to try and pinpoint whereabouts in the room the man was. By the time he heard the sound behind him it was already too late.

He felt the cold bluntness of a gun barrel against his neck.

“Inside,” said a voice in his ear.

The Saint opened the door and stepped into the room. He had been caught bending in the past but he would have been prepared to admit that he had never been quite as doubled up as then.

He glanced around the room and saw that it had two doors, the one he had just come through and another a few feet away which he had ignored in his haste to reach the door the Santa had used. It made the most beautifully simple setup for an ambush, and he was sportsman enough to acknowledge it.

“Very, very clever,” he said as he turned slowly to face his captor, being careful to make no sudden movement that might precipitate a bullet.

The Santa Claus was standing beside the now closed door. He reached out and switched on the light. He wore a full Santa Claus mask, from bushy white eyebrows to ruddy cheeks to white moustache and beard, but the Saint was not deceived.

“Merry Christmas, Godfrey,” he said.

Nyall’s eyes blinked through the holes in his mask. In his hand was a .38 revolver and it was levelled unwaveringly at the Saint’s abdomen.

Simon looked at the gun with polite interest.

“A war souvenir?” he enquired pleasantly.

“That’s right,” said Nyall in an equally matter-of-fact tone. “Not as accurate as Denzil’s match pistol, but good enough at this distance.”

“I don’t doubt it,” Simon said.

The two men considered each other warily. The Saint had no illusions about the danger he faced, but the smile never left his lips even if it had left his eyes. Godfrey Nyall was the tenser of the two. He would obviously have to kill the Saint but his curiosity needed to be satisfied.

“You must be as clever as they say you are,” he said. “How did you guess it was me?”

“I am even cleverer than they say I am,” Simon replied. “I had my suspicions when I remembered that photo in your office and thought about how Casden had been killed. Then I thought it strange that the police should find the pistol in Rosco’s room. It wasn’t there when I looked, but of course you were going to replace it when I bumped into you in the corridor.”

He paused. Nyall said nothing but continued to blink steadily at him. The Saint went on:

“I still couldn’t find a motive. But there was Darslow’s crack about economists. And that made me think back to those papers on your desk and the stories that had been ringed. Gilts and blue chip shares, you’d said. But those stories would have affected commodities, and they’re too risky for a college to speculate in. Doing some dabbling on your own? Then his lordship mentioned an upcoming audit, and suddenly I saw the light.”