The Saint and the Happy Highwayman (4 page)

“I was just having a friendly chat with a guy,” he said. “How was I to know he was going to print what I said? I didn’t know anything about it until I saw it in the paper myself.”

Fernack turned to page eleven and read out from another of his blue-pencilled panels: “Lieutenant Corrio is the exact reverse of the popular conception of a detective. He is a slender, well-dressed man who looks rather like Clark Gable and might easily be mistaken for an idol of the silver screen.”

“You didn’t know that he’d say that either, did you ?” Fernack inquired in tones of acid that would have seared the skin of a rhinoceros.

Corrio glowered and said nothing; and Fernack passed on to what was to his mind the brightest and juiciest feature of the Daily Mail reporter’s story. He read it out:

“After I left Lieutenant Corrio, it occurred to me to find out what Simon Templar thought about the subject.

“I found him without any difficulty in his suite at the Waldorf. The Robin Hood of the modern underworld, who was once the favourite target of gangsters and police alike on account of his ruthless free-lance campaign against the criminals whom the law could not or would not touch, listened with his laziest smile while I read over Lieutenant Corrio’s statements to him.

“I asked him if he had any answer to make.

“The Saint uncoiled his six feet two of steel-and-leathery length from the armchair where he had been sitting, and his clear blue eyes twinkled maliciously as he showed me to the door.

” ‘I think Lieutenant Corrio will put Clark Gable out of business one of these days,’ he said.”

If there was anything that could have been guaranteed to increase Inspector Fernack’s long-established secret sympathy for the Saint, it was this climax of a quotation. It is true that he would have preferred to have originated it himself, but the other compensations far outweighed this minor disadvantage.

Lieutenant Corrio’s face reddened. He was particularly proud of his presidency of the Merrick Maskers, and he had never been able to see anything humorous in his confirmed conviction that his destined home was in Hollywood and that his true vocation was that of the dashing hero of a box-office-shattering series of romantic melodramas.

Having dealt comprehensively with these lighter points Fernack opened his shoulders and proceeded to the meatier business of the conference in a series of well-chosen sentences. He went on to summarize his opinion of Lieutenant Corrio’s ancestry, past life, present value, future prospects, looks, clothes, morals, intelligence and assorted shortcomings, taking a point of view which made up in positiveness and vigour for anything which it may have lacked in absolute impartiality.

“An’ get this,” he concluded. “The Saint hasn’t come here to get into any trouble. I know him an’ he knows me, an’ he knows me too damn well to try to pull anything while I’m still gettin’ around on my own feet. An’ what’s more, if anybody’s got to take care of him I can do it. He’s a man-sized proposition, an’ it takes a man-sized cop to look after him. An’ if any statements have to be made to the papers about it, I’ll make ‘em.”

Gorrio waited for the storm to pass its height, which took some time longer.

“I’m sure you know best, sir—especially after the way he helped you on that Valcross case,” he said humbly, while Fernack glared at him speechlessly. “But I have a theory about the Saint.”

“You have a what?” repeated Fernack as if Corrio had uttered an indecent word.

“A theory, sir. I think the mistake that’s been made all along is in trying to get something on the Saint after he’s done a job. What we ought to do is pick out a job that he looks likely to do, watch it, and catch him red-handed. After all, his character is so well known that any real detective ought to be able to pick out the things that would interest him with his eyes shut. There’s one in that paper on your desk—I noticed it this morning.”

“Are you still talking about this?” Fernack demanded unsympathetically. “Because if so–-“

Corrio shook his head.

“I mean that man Oppenheim who owns the sweatshops. It says in the paper that he’s just bought the Vanderwoude emerald collection for a million and a half dollars to give to his daughter for a wedding present. Knowing how Oppenheim got his money, and knowing the Saint’s line, it’s my idea that the Saint will make a play for those jewels.”

“An’ make such a sucker play that even a fairy like you could catch him at it,” snarled Fernack discourag-ingly. “Go back and do your detecting at the Merrick Playhouse—I hear there’s a bad ham out there they’ve been trying to find for some time.”

If he had been less incensed with his subordinate Fernack might have perceived a germ of sound logic in Corrio’s theory, but he was in no mood to appreciate it. Two days later he did not even remember that the suggestion had been made; which was an oversight on his part, for it was at that time that Simon Templar did indeed develop a serious interest in the unpleasant Mr Oppenheim.

This was because Janice Dixon stumbled against him late one night as he was walking home along Forty-eighth Street in the dark and practically deserted block between Sixth and Seventh avenues. He had to catch her to save her from falling.

“I’m sorry,” she muttered.

He murmured some absent-minded commonplace and straightened her up, but her weight was still heavy on his hand. When he let her go she swayed towards him and clung onto his arm.

“I’m sorry,” she repeated stupidly.

His first thought was that she was drunk, but her breath was innocent of the smell of liquor. Then he thought the accident might be only the excuse for a more mercenary kind of introduction, but he saw that her face was not made up as he would have expected it to be in that case. It was a pretty face, but so pale that it looked ghostly in the semidarkness between the far-spaced street lamps; and he saw that she had dark circles under her eyes and that her mouth was without lipstick.

“Is anything the matter?” he asked.

“No—it’s nothing. I’ll be all right in a minute. I just want to rest.”

“Let’s go inside somewhere and sit down.”

There was a drugstore on the corner and he look her into it. It seemed to be a great effort for her to walk and another explanation of her unsteadiness flashed into his mind. He sat her down at the counter and ordered two cups of coffee.

“Would you like something to eat with it?”

Her eyes lighted up and she bit her lip.

“Yes. I would. But—I haven’t any money.”

“I shouldn’t worry about that. We can always hold up a bank.” The Saint watched her while she devoured a sandwich, a double order of bacon and eggs and a slice of pie. She ate intently, quickly, without speaking. Without seeming to stare at her, his keen eyes took in the shadows under her che’ekbones, the neat patch on one elbow of the cheap dark coat, the cracks in the leather of shoes which had long since lost their shape.

“I wish I had your appetite,” he said gently, when at last she had finished.

She smiled for the first time, rather faintly.

“I haven’t had anything to eat for two days,” she said. “And I haven’t had as much to eat as this all at once for a long time.”

Simon ordered more coffee and offered her a cigarette. He put his heels up on the top rung of his stool and leaned his elbows on his knees. She told him her name, but for the moment he didn’t answer with his own.

“Out of a job?” he asked quietly.

She shook her head.

“Not yet.”

“You aren’t on a diet by any chance, are you?”

“Yes. A nice rich diet of doughnuts and coffee, mostly.” She smiled rather wearily at his puzzlement. “I work for Oppenheim.”

“Doesn’t he pay you?”

“Sure. But maybe you haven’t heard of him. I’m a dressmaker. I work with fifty other girls in a loft down near the East River, making handmade underwear. We work ten hours a day, six days a week, sewing. If you’re clever and fast you can make two pieces in a day. They pay you thirty cents apiece. You can buy them on Fifth Avenue for four or five dollars, but that doesn’t do us any good. I made three dollars last week, but I had to pay the rent for my room.”

It was Simon Templar’s first introduction to the economics of the sweatshop; and hardened as he was to the ways of chiselers and profiteers, the cold facts as she stated them made him feel slightly sick to his stomach. He realized that he had been too long in ignorance of the existence of such people as Mr Oppenheim.

“Do you mean to say he gets people to work for him on those terms?” he said incredulously. “And how is it possible to live on three dollars a week?”

“Oh, there are always girls who’ll do it if they can’t get anything else. I used to get forty dollars a week doing the same work on Madison Avenue, but I was sick for a couple of weeks and they used it as an excuse to let me go. I didn’t have any job at all for three months, and three dollars a week is better than nothing. You learn how to live on it. After a while you get used to being hungry; but when you have to buy shoes or pay a dentist’s bill, and the rent piles up for a couple of weeks, it doesn’t do you any good.”

“I seem to have heard of your Mr Oppenheim,” said the Saint thoughtfully. “Didn’t he just pay a million and a half dollars for a collection of emeralds?”

Her lips flickered cynically.

“That’s the guy. I’ve seen them, too—I’ve been working on his daughter’s trousseau because I’ve got more experience of better-class work than the other girls, and I’ve been going to the house to fit it. It’s just one of those things that make you feel like turning communist sometimes.”

“You’ve been in the house, have you?” he said even more thoughtfully. “And you’ve seen these emeralds?” He stopped himself and drew smoke from his cigarette to trickle it thoughtfully back across the counter. When he turned to her again, his dark reckless face held only the same expression of friendly interest that it had held before. “Where are you going to sleep tonight?”

She shrugged.

“I don’t know. You see, I owe three weeks’ rent now, and they won’t let me in until I pay it. I guess I’ll take a stroll up to the park.”

“It’s healthy enough, but a bit drafty.” He smiled at her suddenly with disarming frankness. “Look here, what would you say if I suggested that we wander around to a little place close by here where I can get you a room? It’s quiet and clean, and I don’t live there. But I’d like to do something about you. Stay there tonight and meet me for dinner tomorrow, and let’s talk it over.”

She met him the following evening, and he had to do very little more than keep his ears open to learn everything that he wanted to know.

“They’re in Oppenheim’s study—on the second floor. His daughter’s room is next door to it, and the walls aren’t very thick. He was showing them to her yesterday afternoon when I was there. He has a big safe in the study, but he doesn’t keep the emeralds in it. I heard him boasting about how clever he was. He said, ‘Anybody who came in looking for the emeralds would naturally think they’d be in the safe, and they’d get to work on it at once. It ‘d take them a long time to open it, which would give us plenty of chances to catch them; but anyhow they’d be disappointed. They’d never believe that I had a million and a half dollars’ worth of emeralds just tucked away behind a row of books on a shelf. Even the man from the detective agency doesn’t know it—he thinks the safe is what he’s got to look after.’ “

“So they have a private detective on the job, do they?” said the Saint.

“Yes. A man from Ingerbeck’s goes in at seven o’clock every evening and stays till the servants are up in the morning. The butler’s a pretty tough-looking guy himself, so I suppose Oppenheim thinks the house is safe enough in his hands in the daytime… . Why do you want to know all this?”

“I’m interested.”

She looked at him with an unexpected clearness of understanding.

“Is that what you meant when you said you’d like to do something about me ? Did you think you could do it if you got hold of those emeralds?”

The Saint lighted a cigarette with a steady and unhurried hand, and then his blue eyes came back to her face for a moment before he answered with a very quiet and calculating directness.

“That was more or less my idea,” he said calmly.

She was neither shocked nor frightened. She studied him with as sober and matter-of-fact attention as if they were discussing where she might find another job, but a restrained intenseness with which he thought he could sympathize came into her voice. She said: “I couldn’t call anybody a criminal who did that. He really deserves to lose them. I believe I’d be capable of robbing him myself if I knew how to go about it. Have you ever done anything like that before?”

“I have had a certain amount of experience,” Simon admitted mildly.

“Who are you?”

“If you were reading newspapers a few years back you may have read about me. I’m called the Saint.”

“You? You’re kidding.” She stared at him, and the amused disbelief in her face changed slowly into a weakening incredulity. “But you might be. I saw a photograph once … Oh, if you only were! I’d help you to do it—I wouldn’t care what it cost.”

“You can help me by telling me everything you can remember about Oppenheim’s household and how it works.”

She had been there several times; and there were many useful things she remembered, which his skillful questioning helped to bring out. They went down into the back of his mind and stayed there while he talked about other things. The supremely simple and obvious solution came to him a full two hours later, when they were dancing on a small packed floor above Broadway.

He took her back to their table as the main batteries of lights went on for the floor show, lighted a cigarette and announced serenely:

“It’s easy. I know just how Comrade Oppenheim is going to lose his emeralds.”

“How?”

“They have a man in from Ingerbeck’s at night, don’t they? And he has the run of the place while everybody else is asleep. They give him breakfast in the morning when the servants get up, and then he takes a cigar and goes home. Well, the same thing can happen just once more. The guy from Ingerbeck’s comes in, stays the night and goes home. Not the usual guy, because he’s sick or been run over by a truck or something. Some other guy. And when this other guy goes home, he can pull emeralds out of every pocket.”