The Saint Abroad: The Art Collectors/ the Persistent Patriots (2 page)

“Don’t go,” he said earnestly.
“I have something …
special. Special for you. Just wait a few
moments …” He
turned to the stranger and motioned him
toward an alcove
in the rear of the salon, separated from the main area by
a
pair of velvet
curtains. “If you would step this way, please,
monsieur. We must be brief.”

If the Saint had not been naturally
inquisitive, he would
have spent many more quiet evenings at home
than in fact
he did. It would not be accurate to say that he listened
to
the conversation between Marcel LeGrand and his stolid
visitor,
but he did not take, pains to avoid hearing a phrase
here and there from
the dialogue of hushed voices.

The first fragment was quite clear, since the
newcomer uttered it before he had entered the alcove: “I am Inspector
Mathieu…” LeGrand’s reactions were almost inaudible
but had overtones of puzzled
incomprehension. Inspector Ma
thieu mentioned
a young woman, paintings, Leonardo da Vinci. LeGrand said, raising his voice,
“But it is unbeliev
able…” Inspector Mathieu went on to insist, at length,
that it was quite believable, but the details of
his statements
were lost as the street
door of the salon opened and in
troduced
a period of traffic noise from outside. Then, after a few seconds, the expensive
cushioned hush of the salon
was
inviolate again, and the Saint moved around the end
of one of the partitions to see a chic and
beautiful woman
of about thirty
standing inside the doorway. Her outfit of
brown suit and gloves did justice to a very deserving figure.

“Monsieur Marcel LeGrand?” she
asked in French with
a foreign accent so slight that it was
impossible to identify.

Simon looked at her honey-colored hair and green eyes,
and regretfully admitted that he was not Monsieur
LeGrand.
At that point LeGrand
himself, hearing the voices, came
alone
very quickly out of the alcove and scurried toward the
green-eyed lady. Apparently they had never seen
one another
before, but were
otherwise acquainted. LeGrand was looking at the woman in a peculiar way as he nervously
went toward
her.

“You are …” he began in a low
voice.

“Yes,” she said.

LeGrand was glancing meaningfully back over
his shoulder
without completely turning his head.

“Come back in ten minutes,” he
whispered. “We can talk
alone then.”

She looked at him with the first traces of
indignation.
Then, over his shoulder she saw the dark-haired
Inspector
Mathieu step between the curtains of the alcove and look
toward her. Realizing that it was to him that LeGrand’s
nervous
glances referred she suddenly changed her expression
and spoke in a
completely natural voice.

“Well, if you are busy, monsieur, I shall come back later.
I am thinking of something for my husband’s
birthday.”

“I am certain we can furnish the perfect
gift for him.
Would you care to wait?”

LeGrand had regained his usual sangfroid and
was speak
ing at normal volume.

“No, thank you,” the woman said.
“Until later.”

“Au revoir,
then. Thank you,
madame.”

Inspector Mathieu waited by the curtains.

“I hope you have not lost a customer because
of me,”
he
said.

“The lady was in a hurry,” LeGrand
replied. “But of
course the sooner we can finish this
discussion, the sooner I
can get on with my business.”

Mathieu looked at the Saint, who no longer
had any
intention of leaving LeGrand’s gallery, where so many fas
cinating
bits of side-play took place in the course of an
afternoon, until he
had satisfied his curiosity as to what
was going on. He stood
his ground and looked mildly back
at Mathieu, who seemed to grow a
little uneasy under the gaze of those brilliant blue eyes.

“Well,” the Inspector said, “I
believe I have given you
all the facts …”

“Facts!” LeGrand said, rolling his eyes toward the
ceiling.
“Fantasies would be a better
word.”

“We shall see,” Mathieu said.

He bowed slightly to the art dealer, granted
the Saint a
slight nod of his head, and walked to the door. LeGrand
did not
accompany him all the way, and just before stepping
out on to the
sidewalk the Inspector paused and spoke over
his shoulder.

“We have kept this quite secret,” he
said. “If you wish
to speak with me on this subject, call me only
at the number -
I have given you.”

When he was gone, Marcel LeGrand exhaled like an under
water swimmer surfacing at the limit of his
endurance. His
body seemed to sag a
little and he put one hand over his
heart,
which apparently was going a good deal faster than
its normal rate.

“I think I’ve been missing
something,” the Saint remarked.
“I never realized there was quite
so much excitement in the art business.”

“Nor did I,” LeGrand said weakly.
“If I survive all this
I think I shall retire.”

“You asked me to stay,” Simon said.
“I hope that means
you’re intending to tell me what ‘all this’ is
about—or did
it just mean you still want to sell me something?”

LeGrand sank down on a bright purple leather
chair in
the center of the display room and motioned Simon to take
its yellow mate.

“Both,” he answered. “I both
wanted to tell you some
thing and at the same time interest you as a
buyer. This
sudden intrusion of the police was completely
unexpected.”

The Saint had taken the chair which LeGrand
had offered.
He settled back and crossed his long legs.

“And Mata Hari?” he asked.

“Pardon?” said LeGrand.

“That lovely creature you shooed out of
here a minute
ago.”

“Ah, she,” the dealer said.
“Yes; she is a part of what
we are calling ‘all this.’ She is almost the
most important
part.”

“Almost?”

“Yes. What she
has
is the most
important.”

The Saint smiled reflectively.

“Having seen her, I wouldn’t question
that … except to
ask if you have anything specific in
mind.”

LeGrand leaned forward, his hands clasped
between his
knees. His voice was low, secretive, and almost
melodramati
cally intense.

“To leave all humor aside, this is
truthfully the most
fantastic thing which has ever happened to me. It is an
art
dealer’s
dream—if it is true—and the greatest art discovery
of this century. The young woman you saw here may have
in her possession five paintings—three Leonardo da
Vincis,
one Titian, and one
Raphael—which until now were not
known
to exist, and any one of which would be worth more than all the paintings in
this room put together.”

2

Marcel LeGrand had no time to continue his
explanation.
The door of the room opened and the same woman who
had come
in a few minutes before stepped from the sunlight
into the strangely
artificial atmosphere of the salon.

“I am sorry,
Monsieur,”
she
said. “I am afraid I cannot
continue to wait. If you …”

Marcel LeGrand was instantly on his feet,
hurrying toward
her and showing every sign of being ready to prostrate
him
self on the carpet in front of her. With simultaneous shrugs,
wags of his head, and wavings
of his hands he shepherded
her toward the
cluster of four chairs in the center of the
room, apologizing every step of the way. Simon was standing,
waiting with more outward nonchalance than he
actually
felt. His interest had been
aroused, but more than that, he
was
experiencing that peculiar sense of involvement that
had so often marked the point of no return in his
adventures
—a feeling of fated
inclusion in a course of events in whose
beginnings he had had no part, but in whose outcome he
was destined to play a crucial role. He had no
idea how
he might become further
involved in LeGrand’s business,
but
he suddenly had no doubt that he had had only a taste
of what was to come.

“You will understand my behavior when
you hear what
happened,” LeGrand was saying to his new guest.
“It was an impossible situation, and there was nothing I could do
but ask you
to leave.”

The woman looked at Simon icily.

“I see that you still have
business,” she said to LeGrand.
“Perhaps I should go
elsewhere.”

That sent the dealer into renewed paroxysms of apology and
entreaty.

“This gentleman is Monsieur Simon
Templar, a most val
ued client and a man completely to be trusted,”
LeGrand con
cluded. “You must have heard of him? The Saint?”

The woman’s green eyes revealed nothing.

“I lead a rather sheltered life,”
she said.

“In any case, please be seated,”
LeGrand implored her.
“Monsieur Templar, this is Mademoiselle
Lambrini.”

She did not offer her gloved hand, but acknowledged the
introduction with not much more than a glance as she
sat
down in the chair which LeGrand
offered her.

“I thought I had made it clear,”
she said, “that our busi
ness was to be confidential.”

“And so it is!” LeGrand protested.

“With no exceptions,” Mademoiselle
Lambrini said, look
ing pointedly at Simon.

“Mademoiselle,” LeGrand said,
“believe me, he is to be
trusted, and will perhaps play a part in our
transaction. And let me add very quickly that there are already exceptions
—which I
knew nothing about. The man who was here when
you came the first
time was from the police.”

Mademoiselle Lambrini finally reacted with something
other than frosty calm. Her eyes narrowed and her
hands
unconsciously moved over one
another with nervous agitation
in her
lap.

“What did they want?” she asked. “The police, I
mean.
They could have no interest in
me.”

“But they have,” LeGrand said. “The
Inspector——Mathieu
was his name—instructed me
to telephone him if I should
be
approached by a woman with rare paintings to sell.”

“Why?” Mademoiselle Lambrini asked.

She seemed nervous, as Simon had noticed as
soon as she
heard about the investigator from the police—and yet she
seemed genuinely surprised and puzzled that the police should
be taking
any interest. Simon felt strongly that the probings
of the police were a
new and unexpected factor in her plans,
and a factor which
she really could not explain to herself.

“He did not tell me,” LeGrand
replied. “He said only
that if such a person should contact me with
paintings to
sell I should contact the police because they wished to
inter
view her.”

“And you told them … what?” she
asked.

“Nothing. But I would appreciate an
explanation from
you.”

“I have none,” she said. “I
can think of no reason why
the police, even if they should have heard
about my paint
ings, would have any interest in them. But of course it
does seem
that all the world is hearing about them very
rapidly.”

She was looking at the Saint again.

“If there is no reason for the police to
be interested in
them, why should you be ashamed of letting the world
hear
about them?” Simon asked.

Mademoiselle Lambrini drew herself up haughtily.

“Monsieur, I assure you that I am not ashamed in the
slightest. But I am discreet, and for good reason.
Monsieur LeGrand has apparently already told you about my paintings.
They are not the sort of possessions a woman,
living alone, advertises for everybody on earth to hear about. If Monsieur
LeGrand is unwilling to respect my wishes about
this, there
are plenty of other dealers in Paris who would be delighted
to hear about them.”