Leslie Charteris - The Saint in Miami

Simon took out his cigarette-case and offered it to Karen, as easily as if they had been standing in the foyer of a New York night club waiting for a table, while men leaped out of the speedboat, ran down the pier, and fanned out at the double into a wide semicircle with the efficient precision of trained storm troops — which, he reflected ironically, was what they probably were. But without giving them a glance he struck a match and held it for Karen. Their eyes met over the flame in complete understanding.

"We did have fun, anyway," he remarked.

"We did." Her voice was as steady as his; and he never wanted to forget the unchanged loveliness of her proud pale face, and the cool violet of her eyes, and the tousled flame of her hair. "And thanks for everything — Saint."

He touched the match to his own cigarette and flipped it away; but the light still dwelt on them. It came from the converging beams of three flashlights in the ring that was closing in on them.

Simon looked round the circle. Some of the men were in German naval uniforms, others, in ordinary seaman's dungarees, but they all had the square dry-featured brutalised faces which Nazi ethnology had set up as the ideal of Nordic superiority. They were armed with revolvers and carbines.

Another man ran around the outside of the group, beyond range of the lights, and said:

"Verzeihen Sie, Herr Kapitan. Die Gefangene sind verschwunden."

"Danke."

The second voice was Friede's. He strode through into the light. His heavy-jawed face was hard and arrogant, the flat-lipped mouth clamped in an implacable line that turned down slightly at the corners. His stony eyes swept quickly and unfeelingly over his three captives, ending with the Saint.

"Mr Templar, this is not all your party."

"You may have noticed a guy on the dock with his head blown open," said the Saint helpfully. "He was liquidated quite early in the proceedings. In fact, we did that ourselves. He didn't seem to be able to make up his mind which side to be on, so we put him into permanent neutrality."

"I mean the Gilbecks. Where are they?"

"How are your ears?"

The captain did not move his head. But through the stillness everyone could hear the monotonous putter of the motorboat engine far out in the sweltering night.

Friede's pebbly stare pored over the Saint from under lowering lids for long crawling seconds.

Then he turned and rasped fresh orders at his men. Carbines prodded the Saint, driving him with Karen and Hoppy towards the barred lodge room from which he had released Gilbeck and Justine. Somebody went in ahead and turned on the light again as they were herded in. Outside, there was an exclamation and some throaty muttering as the dead body of the guard was discovered, cut short by another of the captain's wolfish commands. The storm troopers who had followed into the prison room cleared the doorway for Friede to march through. He stood back, but the lane stayed open.

After a very brief pause of intense silence, Patricia and Peter were hustled through, to be pushed over with Simon and Karen and Hoppy into the back centre of the room.

Peter said casually: "Hullo, Chief. It's a funny thing. I've never been able to make out where you collect such an ugly-looking bunch of boils to play with."

Patricia Holm went straight to the Saint. He kissed her quickly, and his left arm still lay along her shoulders as he turned back to smile genially at Captain Friede.

"Well, Heinrich, dear carbuncle," he murmured, "this makes a very cosy little get-together. Now what shall we do to amuse ourselves? If we only had some old treaties we could cut paper dolls. Or there's nearly enough of us to form a glee club and sing the pig trough or Horse Vessel song."

But one more man still had to arrive to make the get-together truly complete, and he came last through the doorway as two of the seamen moved back to close it.

Randolph March's weakly handsome face was a little drawn with strain, and his fair hair was pushed just a lock or two out of its usual clean smooth grooming. In the same way, his soft white collar was just a little crumpled at the neck. The symptoms were insignificant in themselves, and yet taken together with the equally unexaggerated wildness of his eyes they made a definite picture of a man whose nerves were falling infinitesimally short of the standard of discipline that circumstances were demanding of them.

"The Gilbecks," he said to Friede; and his voice was roughened to just the same slight but revealing extent. "If they got away in the motorboat—"

"I know," said the captain.

"Why don't you send someone after them?"

"Who?"

"Well, you've got plenty of men, haven't you? There are two speedboats—"

"And no pilots. No one here could find his way very far outside of our own channel. You know what these creeks are like. We chose this place for that reason."

"Then they're bound to get stuck themselves, and we can catch them."

"I'm afraid," said the captain, "it may not be so easy. Our friend Templar and his party got here. They must have been guided. Unless Miss Leith…"

Both the men looked at Karen; and as if the full force of things that had been temporarily eclipsed by more immediate alarums rushed back on him as he studied her, Randolph March took a half step towards her with his mouth growing tight and ugly.

"You treacherous little bitch!"

"One moment." The captain's intervention had no hint of chivalry — it was plainly and practically dictated by nothing but cold-rolled efficiency. Recriminations were a waste of time; therefore he had no time for them. "Let Miss Leith tell us."

Karen gazed at him with calm contempt.

"It's always so nice to deal with gentlemen," she said satirically. "You wouldn't be rude, would you? You'd just fetch some hot irons and get on with it… Well, as far as this goes I can save you the trouble. I didn't bring them here. We met accidentally, on the way. And they had a very good guide of their own."

"Who was it?"

"An Indian."

Simon Templar flicked ashes peacefully on the floor.

"Let me help," he suggested affably. "After all, there should be no more secrets between any of us. To be exact, he was a bird from the Seminole Escort Bureau, by the name of Charlie Halwuk. A great hunter, I'm told, and certainly a wonderful pathfinder. After the way he brought us here, I'd back him against any homing pigeons you can trot out. So we sent him off with the Gilbecks. He seemed quite sure he could leave anybody who chased him high and dry on a sandbank for the mosquitoes and crocodiles to finish; but of course I don't want to stop you trying."

Friede stared at him for a second longer, and then turned back to Karen. The mask that he had worn in the first meeting on the March Hare had been dropped like an old coat. No one could have had any doubt now as to who was in command. Randolph March, gnawing his moustache by the doorway, had become a relative nonentity pillared by his captain's emotionless authority.

"Miss Leith, why were you trying to run away from here?"

"I got bored with the company."

"Perhaps," said Friede, "you were not taking yourself seriously enough in the observation you made just now."

The girl regarded him with unwavering eyes, and her red lips curled.

"I just don't want you to think you frighten me," she said. "As it happens, that's another thing I'll be glad to tell you. I was on my way out to tell the world about this submarine base of yours, and how it hooks up with Randy's Foreign Investment Pool."

"You are an inquisitive journalist, an ally of Templar, a blackmailing adventuress, or an agent of the Department of Justice?"

"Guess once more."

"You are some kind of Government agent."

"That's right," she said calmly. "And I mean the British Government."