Leslie Charteris - Prelude for War

"That doesn't follow at all," Fairweather said firmly. "But — er — you know that I'd see you didn't lose by it, in any case. Now, will you let me know directly you hear from Celia Mallard, or as soon as you remember what you did with them? And — um — well, if it's a matter of money, you did tell me once that you needed a car to go with that fur coat, didn't you?"

"How could you?" she said pathetically. "To talk about that fur coat now, and remind me of poor Johnny… Please don't talk to me about it any more; I don't think I can ever bear to hear it mentioned again. You're making me feel dreadfully morbid, Algy, and I've had such a tiring day. I think I'd better ring off now before I break down altogether. Good-bye."

The receiver clicked.

"Wait a minute," Fairweather said suddenly.

There was no answer.

Lady Valerie Woodchester was walking back across the bright modernistic sitting room of her tiny apartment on Marsham Street. She fitted a cigarette into a long holder and picked up the drink that she had put down when she telephoned. Over the rim of the glass she looked across to a small book table where there was propped up the cheap unframed photograph of a dark and not unhappily serious young man.

"Poor old Johnny!" she said softly. "It was a lousy trick they played on you, my dear…"

Mr Algernon Sidney Fairweather jiggled the receiver hook. He took a coin out of his pocket and poised it over the slot; and then he hesitated, and finally put it back in his pocket. He left the booth and made his way to the bar, where he downed a double brandy with very little dilution of soda. His plump cheeks seemed to have gone flabby and his hands twitched as they put down the glass.

Twenty minutes later he was waddling jerkily up and down the carpet of a luxurious room overlooking Grosvenor Square, blurting out his story under a coldly observant scrutiny that made him feel somehow like a beetle under a searchlight.

"Do you believe Her when she says that she's lost this cloakroom ticket?" Luker asked.

He was as calm as Fairweather was agitated. He sat imperturbably behind the huge carved oak desk where he had been writing when Fairweather blundered in and toyed with his fountain pen. The expression in his eyes was faintly contemptuous.

"I don't know what to believe," said Fairweather distractedly. "I — well, thinking it over, I doubt it. I've had enough dealings with her to know what her methods are, and personally I think she's fishing to see how much we're prepared to pay."

"Or how much Templar is prepared to pay," said Luker phlegmatically. "Did you know that she had dinner with him tonight at the Berkeley?"

Fairweather blinked as if he had been smacked on the nose.

"What?" he yelped. His voice had gone back on him again. "But I particularly told her to have nothing more to do with him!"

"That's probably why she did it," Luker replied unsympathetically. "I had an idea that something like this might happen — that's why I've been having them watched. For all you know, he may have put her up to this."

Fairweather swallowed.

"How much do you think she'll want?"

"I don't know. I don't think I care very much. It doesn't seem to be very important. Money is a very temporary solution — you never know how soon you may have to repeat the dose. This cloakroom story may be a myth from beginning to end. She might easily have these papers in her dressing-table drawer. She might easily have no papers at all. Her attitude is the thing that matters; and with this man Templar in the background it would be unwise to take chances." Luker shrugged. "No, my dear Algy, I'm afraid we shall have to take more permanent steps to deal with both of them."

"W-what sort of steps?" stammered Fairweather feebly. "H-how can we deal with them?"

That seemed to amuse Luker. The ghost of a smile dragged at the corners of his mouth.

"Do you really want to know?" he asked interestedly.

"You mean…" Fairweather didn't seem to know how to go on. His collar appeared to be choking him. He tugged at it in spasmodic efforts to loosen it. "I–I don't think so," he said. "I…"

Luker laughed outright.

"There's a sort of suburban piousness about you and Sangore that verges on the indecent," he remarked. "You're just like a couple of squeamish old maids who hold shares in a brothel. You want your money, but you're determined not to know how it's obtained. If anything unpleasant or drastic has to be done, that's all right with you so long as you don't have to do it yourselves. That's how you felt about getting rid of Kennet. Now it's Templar and Lady Valerie. Well, they've got to be murdered, haven't they?"

Fairweather wriggled, as if his clothes were full of ants. His face was glistening with sweat.

"I — Really, I don't—"

"I expect you think I'm excessively vulgar," Luker continued mercilessly. "I've got such a shockingly crude way of putting things, haven't I? I suppose you felt just the same when I offered you a place on the board of Norfelt Chemicals in return for certain items of business when you were secretary of state for war. That's quite all right, my dear fellow. Go home and hare a nice cup of tea and forget about it. There's no need for me to tell you to keep your mouth shut, is there? I know you're a worm, and you know you're a worm, but we won't let anybody else know you're a worm."

Fairweather gobbled.

"Really, Luker," he spluttered indignantly, "I–I—"

"Oh, go away," said Luker. "I've got work to do."

He spoke without impatience; if his voice carried any particular inflection, it was one of good-humoured tolerance. But there was no further argument. Fairweather went.

Luker remained sitting at the great carved desk after he had gone. Fairweather's emotional antics had made no impression on him at all. He had no illusions about his associates. He had long been familiar with the partiality that politicians, generals and captains of industry have for squirming out of uncomfortable situations, with an air of being profoundly shocked by what has happened, and leaving somebody else to face the music. But that failing had its own compensation for him. Once started, the more drastic the measures he had to take, the stronger became his hold on them and the more blindly they would have to support him in whatever he did, as his safety became the more necessary to their own safety. The problems that he was considering were purely practical. He sat there, idly turning his fountain pen between his strong square fingers, until he had thought enough; and then he picked up the telephone and began to issue terse, incisive orders.

"Did you have a nice dinner?" asked Patricia Holm. "And how was the new candidate for your harem?"

Simon Templar peeled off his coat, unbuttoned his shirt to the waist and deposited himself at a restful angle on the chesterfield under the open windows. Through the curtains came the ceaseless grind of Piccadilly traffic and a stir of sultry air tainted with petrol fumes and grime, too thick and listless to be properly termed a breeze; but in spite of that the spacious apartment in Cornwall House which was the Saint's London headquarters attained an atmosphere of comparative peace and freshness.

"There are mugs of all kinds, but there are very special and superlative mugs who do their mugging in London; and we are it," he said gloomily. "I had a beautiful dinner, thanks. The truites au bleu were magnificent, and the pigeons truffйs in aspic were a dream. The candidate was looking her best, which is pretty good. She went home early. Since then I've been drowning my sorrows at the Cafe Royal."

Patricia contemplated him discerningly.

"The dinner was beautiful, and the candidate was looking her best, and she went home early," she repeated. "What was the matter with her?"