Leslie Charteris - The Saint Returns

Before the sentry’s widening arc of survey could swing around far enough to find him, Simon lobbed one of his pebbles straight ahead. The sound of its landing in the underbrush opposite riveted the guard’s eyes in that direction; the second pebble, tossed the same way, brought the man a step outside the door, his pistol at the ready.

It was as much space as the Saint needed. He stepped across in one long stride, swinging his stick numbingly into the watchman’s larynx, and then bringing him down with one swift karate chop to the back of the neck.

Simon picked up the pistol and checked it quickly. As an afterthought, he also took the guard’s forage cap and put it on — if any others should see him before he saw them, it might in near-darkness be just enough to disguise him for a few seconds that could make vital differences. Then he stepped in through the great doorway and pushed the door shut behind him until it just touched its mate without latching.

The courtyard was dark and deserted, but not all the windows that opened on to the interior were blacked out. The Saint moved on tiptoe towards the nearest one, which he recalled as belonging to the refectory. As soon as he was close enough to look in, he had complete and startling confirmation of what had only been a vague impression when he had glimpsed the doorkeeper’s features in the moonlight.

The sight would undoubtedly have caused the founding father of Kloster Altbergen to sit up in his do-it-yourself grave and demand an entire keg of Grand Abrouillac, for his venerable dining hall was populated by half a dozen Chinese.

They were not dressed in grim woolly habits, but in shirt sleeves or white laboratory coats. They were not engaged in silent meditation, but in gambling games, idle conversation, and cigarette smoking.

On the whole they were not husky or even particularly robust-looking men, which led the Saint to the swift conclusion that they constituted a technical rather than a military task force. If there were other trained soldiers such as the guard probably had been, they were not in sight. And it also appeared that unless egalitarianism in China had gone further than he suspected, there appeared to be no leader among the group. The men had the air of comrades glad to be relaxing at the end of a day’s routine work.

The Saint dragged himself away from that fascinating spectacle and moved around the cloisters until he came to another lighted window.

There he hit the jackpot: a rather overweight Chinese gentleman in a green uniform without insignia was sitting at a table in the library; with him was another man, not Chinese but some variety of European. What language they were speaking could not be heard through the sealed glass. Between them on the table was a pile of gold coins and a sort of record book in which the Chinese — whom Simon immediately christened “the General” — would occasionally write something.

The European, who the Saint now assumed to be “Brother Anton,” was not in black robes either, but in a suede jacket, and he seemed to have just concluded a discussion with the General. He stood and left the room as the Chinese went back to his calculations.

Simon flattened himself behind a pillar; Anton emerged through a narrow passage into the courtyard a few feet away. The erstwhile monk stretched his arms, took a deep breath, and admired the moon.

Then, as his gaze returned earthwards, he seemed to be transfixed by some much less pacifying vision. For three or four seconds he stood frozen in unnatural rigidity, and then he whirled around and rushed back to the entrance from which he had emerged, yelling something shrill and incomprehensible, but the Saint had no need of a literal translation to recognize the strident urgency of the alarm.

Looking around to discover what could have triggered it, he saw that the big door which he had been so careful to almost close was now wide open. The mild force of the wind could not possibly have moved the heavy gate on its hinges, and the guard Simon had disposed of would be out for some time more, if not permanently.

Turning back again the other way, the Saint had a glimpse through the window of the General scraping gold coins into a leather purse which he jammed in his pocket as he jumped to his feet. Anton lunged into the room and pressed a button which set off muted alarm bells throughout the monastery.

Simon stooped low and dashed for the well. Sticking the guard’s automatic into his belt, he swung his legs over the waist-high circular wall, seized the doubled rope which hung from the pulley on the scaffolding above his head, and slid down so that he was just able to see what was happening around him.

He had already been asking himself if Tanya had followed alone, or if Ivan and Igor had arrived after he left and come up to the monastery with her. Then, as the Chinese were hurrying out of the refectory, he saw a shadowy figure dart from near the gate into the passage taken a few moments before by Anton.

He was sure it was Tanya. She had probably seen him in his borrowed cap and mistaken him for a guard. Seconds later he saw her through the lighted window holding a pistol on the General and Anton.

The alarm had roused the refectory, and an influx of shouting, confusedly milling people into the courtyard allowed the Saint no more time to watch Tanya’s progress. He slipped down about two feet, straddled the bucket which swung at one end of the rope, and held himself steady by grasping the other strand. Knocking the forage cap deliberately from his head, he heard it plop into water just a couple of yards underneath him, and then he listened closely in order to follow the events taking place above.

An authoritative voice was calling out in Chinese over the hubbub, and all activity seemed to come to an abrupt halt. The excited shouts died away, and the running feet were still. Simon raised himself so that he could see. The half-dozen civilians, joined by Anton and a pair of men in uniforms like that of the guard who had originally been at the gate, were standing frozen, watching Tanya holding her pistol near the General’s head in one of the archways.

She and her hostage had apparently already discovered that they had a common language in English.

“Tell them to be still and put their guns down, or I shoot you,” she said. “Also, my men are watching and will fire if they resist.”

“Yes,” said the General.

He called something in Chinese, and the guards dropped their weapons.

“Where is that pig, Templar?” Tanya asked.

The General shook his head.

“I do not understand.”

“A man came here before me. Where is he?”

“No man. We see no man.”

Simon might have spoken then, but the uncomplimentary epithet which Tanya had attached to his name made him reticent. Besides, just at that moment one of the Chinese civilians let out a yelp, pointing at the well. The Saint let the taut rope slip quickly through his hands, dropping him from the sight of those above ground. As he descended he could hear Tanya’s voice above the others.

“What is it?”

“Man in well,” the General translated.

Simon could not distinguish any more words in the confusion of sounds that echoed in the depths of the well. He did not particularly care; he was much more interested in avoiding being trapped and possibly shot like a fish in a barrel. He could only hope that a theory he had formed in the afternoon would turn out to be right: He believed that an underground stream ran under the monastery, passing through the well, under the kitchen, and directly beside the liqueur-making vault.

Letting go the rope entirely, he dropped down into the water and found footing on the slippery bottom, bracing himself against the curving wall. To his relief, he felt that the water, which reached above his waist, was flowing and not still. Though his pistol had been submerged and possibly put out of commission, his breast pocket flashlight was in working order.