J.T. Edson - Blonde Genius

“He couldn’t have used it from the back row,” Miss Benkinsop protested, wondering how the girl had found time to take both objects from the enforcer.

“No, ma’am,” Amanda agreed. “He didn’t. It was Mr. Garibaldi.”

“ Garibaldi! ” Miss Benkinsop gasped. “And he was sitting on the front row. We must do something about him.”

“I hope you don’t mind, ma’am,” Amanda said, apologetically. “I have already played a practical joke on him.”

“What kind?”

“He had rather a large sum in Italian currency in his wallet—”

“You didn’t deprive him of it?”

“Not entirely, ma’am, I merely exchanged it for some of those rather inferior copies the Lower Third had made in Miss McCoy’s Thrifty Hands class. When he discovers the deception, it may amuse him.”

“I hope that he regards it in the spirit that it was done,” Miss Benkinsop remarked. “As a harmless schoolgirl’s prank.”

When Garibaldi found himself in court, charged with possession of counterfeit money, and was sent to prison for seven years, he still could not work out from whence the nearly—but not quite—perfect copies of Italian banknotes had come. Certainly he never suspected that they had been transferred by Amanda, with the help of the nimble-fingered Mademoiselle de Vautour.

“That explains how Penelope was caused to lose,” Miss Benkinsop went on. “But there’s no way we can prove it.”

“No, ma’am,” Amanda answered, pouting and showing her distress. “It’s all my fault for making that concoction so effective.”

“Good heavens, dear,” Miss Benkinsop consoled the distraught girl. “I could hardly hold that against you. However, as we can’t prove what happened, our only chance is to discover who carried out the robbery.”

“It was a climb job,” Amanda announced, looking at the front of the house. “But I can’t understand how he could have opened the lock I fitted on the window.”

“I’m afraid that was my doing,” Miss Benkinsop confessed. “I left it open so that awful Fiorelli’s perfume would blow away. And, after all, burglar alarms do seem a little inappropriate here, don’t they?”

“With respect, ma’am,” Amanda replied. “Inappropriate or not, I do feel that you should let me install a few simple ones.”

“I do believe you’re right,” Miss Benkinsop admitted. “Who do you think made the climb?”

“I don’t wish to cast aspersions on anybody, ma’am,” Amanda replied. “Would you wait in your study, please while I search for clues down here?”

“If you wish,” conceded the headmistress.

Waiting until Miss Benkinsop—who she knew would most certainly not have approved—had followed the rest of the staff into the building, Amanda removed her gym-slip, blouse and shoes. Clad only in her tasteful black lace bra, briefs, suspender belt and stockings, she made a most attractive picture. She had known that the night was too dark for her to search for visual clues, but had used that as an excuse to carry out an experiment.

Opening the door of her study, after strolling leisurely up the stairs, Miss Benkinsop stared in amazement at the window. Amanda was climbing through, breathing a little heavier than usual and with the knees torn from her sadly laddered stockings. She looked a little sheepish On meeting the headmistress’s cold eyes.

“What on earth?” Miss Benkinsop ejaculated. “Good heavens, child, are you trying to catch pneumonia?”

“The night is quite warm, ma’am,” Amanda lied, closing the window. “And I had to work out a small problem this way.”

“What did you decide?” Miss Benkinsop asked then remembered her duties to her pupils. “First, though, go and fetch my robe from next door. Right away, my girl, and no arguments.”

“I understood that only five gentlemen in the Profession would be capable of making a climb of this importance,” Amanda said, after obeying the order. My fags father, who is regrettably unavailable, M’sieur de Pignon of Paris, Mr. Maundby of Los Angeles, California. M’sieur de Pignon, however, is currently touring in the Far East and Mr. Maundby is famous for never working east of the Rocky Mountains.”

“For a task of this importance, the Mediterranean Syndicate would have been willing to make it worth either of them’s while to change their habits,” Miss Benkinsop pointed out.

“Possibly, nia’am. But both gentlemen have daughters here and, I feel sure, would not wish to see the status of the establishment changed so drastically.”

“You’re right, of course.”

“There is even more convincing proof. ma’am.”

“What might it be?” Miss Benkinsop inquired.

“There’s one section of the wall that a person below my height could not possibly traverse. Both of them are smaller.”

“Then who could it he?”

“I would suggest Mr. Saunders, ma’am,” Amanda replied.

“Of course !” Miss Blenkinsop agreed. “Gus Saunders would do it. He’s had no love for us since we decided against allowing him to enrol his daughter. The next question is, where do we find Mr. Saunders?”

“Might I suggest at Mr. Fiorelli’s villa on Troodos Mountain?” Amanda asked.

“I do believe you’re right,” Miss Benkinsop praised. “They’d consider he’d be safe there. You made that place like a fortress for Fiorelli’s predecessor.”

“Could we stop Mr. Fiorelli’s aircraft from taking off?” Amanda asked, then gave a disappointed shrug. “Even if we could, I doubt if your property or Mr. Saunders will be aboard. They’d have left as soon as he had completed his work, in the Syndicate’s other aeroplane.”

“That’s true,” Miss Benkinsop sighed, then glanced at her wristwatch. “Now, young lady, it’s high time you were in bed. Off you go and we will discuss it further in the morning.”

CHAPTER NINE

High on the western slopes of Troodos Mountain, in the island of Cyprus, the executive’s villa owned by the Mediterranean Syndicate stood isolated and in solitary splendour. The occupants’ desire for privacy was ensured by a high stone wall, which surrounded the whole property. The sole means of egress was through an electrically controlled and permanently attended gate made in decorative style out of the stoutest carbon steel bars.

Beyond the wall, at the front and sides of the villa, stretched exotic tropical gardens as decorative and well-tended as those at Miss Benkinsop’s Academy. Behind the building were located the garages for several large, powerful, exceptionally fast cars.

Inside the luxuriously furnished villa were to be found all the modern conveniences a house-proud wife could desire. There were also a few less conventional, but very useful, additions calculated to increase the occupants’ sense of security and peace of mind.

On the morning after the Debating Evening at the school, the daily routine of the villa was operating at full Swing.

Too much so for Rosalie Fieldbank’s entire satisfaction.

While Rosalie was fully aware of the importance of keeping the domestic staff fully occupied and constantly on their toes, she felt that—for once—there was a little too much activity going on.

After a most delightfully carefree and gay evening with Miss Pedlar and other friends of her happy schooldays, the state of Rosalie’s health suggested that the servants should have been put to some quiet duty. Cleaning and polishing the cars, as long as they did not start the engines or blow the horns, or the various firearms kept in the gun-room—in case any visitor or employee wished to go hunting—would have been much more to her liking than what was actually happening.