Leslie Charteris - The Saint and Mr. Teal

"Well, what are you getting at?" grated the big man.

"Just checking up," said the Saint equably. "So you know how we got here. And I found that King's Messenger in the other room — that's what first confirmed what we were up against. Anyone making gold is one of the things the Secret Service sits and waits for all year round: one day the discovery is going to be genuine, and the first news of it would send the international exchanges crazy. There'd be the most frightful panic in history, and any government has got to be watching for it. That King's Messenger had the news — you were lucky to get him."

The big man was silent again, but his face was pale and pasty.

"Two murders, Jones, that were your very own handiwork," said the Saint. "And then — the professor. Accidental, of course. But very unfortunate. Because it means that you're the only man left alive who knows this tremendous secret."

Simon actually looked away. But he had no idea what he looked at. The whole of his faculties were concentrated on the features which were still pinned in the borders of his field of vision, watching with every sense in his body for the answer to the question that he could not possibly ask. That one thing had to be known before anything else could be done, and there was only one way to know it. He bluffed, as he had bluffed once before, without a tremor of his voice or a flicker of his eyes…

And the most expressive thing about the big man's expression was that it did not change. The big man took the Saint's casual assertion into his store of knowledge without the slightest symptom of surprise. It signified nothing more to him than one more superfluous blow on the head of a nail that was already driven deep enough. He glared at the Saint, and the gun in the Saint's hand, without any movement beyond a mechanical moistening of his lips, intent only on watching for the chance to fight that seemed infinitely improbable… And the Saint tapped the ash from his cigarette and looked at the big man again.

"I got nearly everything out of Dr. Quell before you interrupted us," he said, clinching the assertion for utter certainty. "It was clever of you to wheedle Quell's process out of him bit by bit — and very useful that you had enough scientific knowledge to understand it. I suppose Quell's sphere of service was running out about this time, anyway — you'd have got rid of him yourself even if there'd been no accident. A very sound and prudent policy for a Master Mind, Jones, but just a shade too dangerous when the scheme springs a leak like me."

"Cut it short," snarled the big man. "What more d'you want? The gold's there—"

"Yes, the gold's certainly there," said the Saint dispassionately. "And in about ten minutes the police will be here to gape at it. I'm afraid that can't be helped. I'd like to get rich quick myself, but I've realized tonight that there's one way of doing it which is too dangerous for any man to tackle. And you don't realize it, Jones — that's the trouble. So we can't take any risks."

"No?"

"No." Simon gazed at the big man with eyes that were very clear, and hard as polished flints. "You see, that secret's too big a thing to be left with you. There's too much dynamite tied up in it. And yet the police couldn't do anything worth a damn. They're bound by the law, and it's just possible you might beat a murder rap. I don't know how the evidence might look in front of a jury; and of course my reputation's rather shopsoiled, and you may be a member of parliament for all I know… Are you following me, Jones? The police couldn't make you part with your secret—"

"Neither could you."

"Have your own way. As it happens, I'm not trying. But with a reputation like mine it'd be bad business for me to shoot you. On the other hand, there could always be another accident — before the police arrived."

The man called Jones stood with his arms hanging loosely at his sides, staring at the Saint unblinkingly. In those last few minutes he had gone suddenly quiet: the snarl had faded out of his voice and left a more restrained level of grim interrogation. His chin was sunken tensely on his powerful chest, and under the thick black eyebrows his eyes were focussing on the Saint with the stony brightness of brown marbles.

He hunched his muscular shoulders abruptly — it was the only movement he made.

"Is that a threat?" he asked.

"No." Simon was just as quiet. "It's a promise. When the police arrive they're going to find that there's been another accident. And the fact will be that you, Jones, also fell against that machine."

THE BIG MAN leapt forward as he finished speaking. Simon knew that that was coming — he was ready and waiting for it. There was no other way about it; and he had been prepared for it ever since one question had been answered. He had never intended to shoot after they returned to the laboratory, whatever happened; but he snatched his gun away out of range of the wild grab that Jones made for it, and tossed it neatly across to Patricia. She caught it at her knees; and the Saint slipped under the big man's arms and jammed him against the door. For an instant they strained against each other face to face; and the Saint drew a deep breath and spoke over his shoulder.

"Don't shoot, Pat," he said. "Get over in the corner and stay out of the way. The gun's for you to get out with if anything goes wrong."

The big man heaved up off the door in a mighty jerk and hurled the Saint back with all the impetus of his superior weight. He shook off the Saint's grip with a writhing effort of his arms — Simon felt the man's biceps cording under his hands before the grip was broken, and knew that he was taking on nothing easy. The force of his opponent's rush drove him to within a yard of the deadly steel dome; then he recovered his balance and stopped the man with a couple of half-arm jolts to the stomach that thudded into their mark like pistons hitting a sandbag. Jones grunted and went back on his heels, dropping his hands to guard; and the Saint shot out a snake-like left for the exposed chin. The big man took it on the side of his jaw, deliberately, and snatched at the flying wrist as the blow landed.

His fingers closed on it like iron clamps, twisting spitefully. He had every ounce of the strength that his build indicated, and he was as hard as teak all over — the Saint had felt that when he landed with those two staggering blows that would have broken most men in the middle. What was more, he had been trained in a school of fighting that knew its stuff: he never gave the Saint a chance to make a boxing match of it. Simon swerved away from the dome and kicked up his knee, but the big man edged back. The Saint's left arm was clamped in an agonizing armlock, and he was wrenched ruthlessly round again towards the dome. The leverage of the hold was bearing him down to his knees; then with a swift terrific kick he straightened his legs under him and swung his right fist over in a smashing blow at the back of the man's neck. The man coughed, and crumpled to his hands and knees; and Simon tore his wrist out of the grip and fell on top of him.

They rolled over together, with the Saint groping for a toehold. One of the big man's insteps came under the palm of his hand, and he hauled it up and bent it over with a brutal efficiency that made his victim gasp. But the big man was wise to that one — the hold only hurt him for a couple of seconds, before he flung it off with a mighty squirm of his body that pitched the Saint over on his face. In an instant the big man's legs were scissoring for a clasp round the Saint's neck and shoulders, and his hands were clamping again on the Saint's wrist. Simon heard his muscles creaking as he strained against the backward pressure that was slowly straightening his arm. Once that arm was locked out straight from the shoulder, with the elbow over the big man's knee joint, he would have to move like a supercharged eel to get away before a bone was snapped like dry wood. He fought it desperately, but it was his one arm against the big man's two; and he knew he was losing inch by inch. His free hand clawed for a nerve centre under one of the thighs that were crushing his chest: he found it, and saw the big man wince, but the remorseless straightening of his arm went on. In the last desperate moment that he had, he struggled to break the nutcracker grip around his upper body. One of the big man's shoes came off in his hand, and with a triumphant laugh he piled all his strength into another toetwist. The man squeaked and kicked, and Simon broke away. As he came up on all fours, the other rolled away. They leapt up simultaneously and circled round each other, breathing heavily.