The Saint and the Hapsburg Necklace (12 page)

“When the Monarchy is restored he will
be made a real
baron. I shall see to it.”

The Saint shrugged.

“I suppose that makes it all worth
while.”

“Of course. His grandchildren will even
be accepted into
the aristocracy.”

“If he ever gets around to having any.
But you mean he
himself wouldn’t be accepted?”

“Certainly not. He is a tradesman by
birth.”

“I see. When is a baron not a baron?
When he isn’t two
generations removed from vulgar trade. And how did
Leopold
get in on the act?”

“Because he is my second cousin, and I
have known him since childhood and can trust him completely. That is something
worthwhile.”

“Yes, definitely. He belongs all right.
But whether or not
that fact makes him a good Necklace-getter-backer is something
else.”

“He is young and foolish sometimes, but
he is not a fool.
He is also a noted shot.”

“That might certainly come in
handy,” said the Saint. “Ac
tually, he seems a nice enough lad,
even though I don’t think
he’s crazy about me. Of course, he’s in love
with you, as you
well know.”

Frankie sighed dramatically.

“Ach, it is such a nuisance. But men can
get so silly!”

“Sometimes it’s fun to be silly,”
said the Saint.

She looked at him provocatively from beneath
her long
lashes. “Are you ever silly, Simon?”

This was the edge of the thin ice that he
still hoped to
skate around.

He shook his head.

“Never. I often lose my heart, but
never my head.”

He blew her a kiss with the tips of his
fingers. She caught it,
pressed it to her lips and blew him one back.
The Saint pretended to catch it and put it in his pocket.

“I’ll keep it for bedtime,” he
said. “It’ll go well with my Ovaltine.”

It was a happy excursion, and they were as
far removed
from the realities of Nazi-occupied Austria as was
Johann
Strauss—and indeed most of the Austrians at that time.

When they got back to Schloss Duppelstein
late in the af
ternoon, they were met by Leopold who informed them
stiffly
that Max was waiting to show them the stables.

“Furchtbar!”
exclaimed
Frankie. “I quite forgot to tell you,
Simon. He wants to
show us his prize stallion. It is called Neville Chamberlain because it’s by
Aeroplane out of Mu
nich. You see it is a joke.”

“It might have been more suitable to call
him Lloyd
George,” Simon remarked.

“Lloyd George? What did he have to do
with Munich?”

“Nothing at all,” said the Saint,
“but he was much more
the stallion type.”

She shook her head in puzzlement.

“I do not understand. You too are
making a joke, yes?”

“You’re too young to explain it
to,” Simon told her. “But
come along.” He pointed to where
Leopold was already strid
ing in the direction of the stables.
“He’ll be your second
cousin once removed if he has a
stroke.”

Max Annellatt was watching the stallion
being led around
a tanbark ring by a stable-boy.

“I shall have the papers after lunch tomorrow,” he said.
“Also the clothes you wanted—it was
easy to buy them but now they are being made to look not so clean and new. My
horse is beautiful isn’t he?”

“He is indeed,” Simon said
unreservedly.

“Tomorrow morning you must take him for
a ride.”

“If Frankie will go with me.”

“I will kill you if you try to leave me
behind,” she said.

Leopold scowled, but for once made no
protest, and Simon
wondered if Max had been giving him some avuncular advice
about how not to cope with a young woman’s provocation
to the
rivalries of courtship.

In spite of the boy’s sulkiness and juvenile
jealousies, he liked Leopold and felt considerable sympathy for him. After
all, the
young man was up against the ruthlessness of woman
kind and in
particular the ruthlessness of Frankie, who,
Simon judged,
combined the self-centredness of aristocracy
with a singleness of purpose which in
itself did not allow
much room for the
consideration of others. Whatever Frankie
wanted to do, she did;
whatever she wanted to get, she got.
It was
not that she lacked feeling, but she used people for her
own purposes and indeed considered that most
people had
been created to be used by
her.

She was certainly, by her own admission,
using Max; but Simon suspected that the reverse was also true. Certainly Annellatt
was no fool, and in his way he was certainly as ruthless
as
Frankie. If it came to a clash of wills and ambitions, Simon
wondered
which one would win. It might be amusing to find
out.

The following afternoon, to Simon’s surprise,
Leopold
asked him if he would like to do a little
Auerhahn
shooting.
The
invitation was gruffly tendered, but Simon understood
that he was making
an effort to be pleasant. After all, except
for his unfounded
jealousy, there was no reason for him to
dislike Simon. The
Saint accepted because he wanted to find
out more about
Leopold’s character, not because he wanted
to shoot
Auerhahn,
a sport he particularly disapproved of be
cause of the peculiar
and particular way it was done. The
birds could only be shot when they
were singing their love
songs, at which time the males perched in the branches of trees
and sang with their eyes closed. Simon had always
thought it was really not quite cricket to sneak up on a
lover thus engaged and do him in. After all, he
would be
seriously annoyed himself
if someone tried such a dirty trick
on
him. Not that he ever sang with his eyes closed, or even
open for that matter, while he was making love.

They didn’t get any
Auerhahn.
Simon
had guessed that they wouldn’t, and that the invitation had merely been a
friendly overture, because the
birds mate in the spring and
not in the
autumn. Nevertheless, they had a pleasant walk in the woods and Leopold turned
out to be a surprisingly amusing companion when he was not being tormented by
his love
for Frankie. At one point he
even entertained Simon with a
hilarious
imitation of Max talking to Thai.

It was dusk when they returned to the
Schloss. They found Annellatt and Anton in the State Drawing-room. It was im
mediately
apparent that something was wrong from the
expressions on their
faces.

“Thank God you are back,” groaned
Max. “The worst has
happened!”

“Hitler and Stalin have been jointly awarded the Nobel
Peace Prize,” suggested the Saint; but his
flippancy was brittle and unsmiling.

Annellatt waved his hands wildly.

“This is serious, Simon. Frankie has
gone!”

3

Leopold stopped as if he had been struck. His
face was
deathly pale.

“What do you mean?” he demanded
hoarsely.

Max was more agitated than Simon would have
thought
possible. His hand shook as he put it up to his forehead, and
the whites
of his eyes showed like those of a nervous horse.

“She took the clothes I had brought, to
try on, and the
papers to go with them. And just now, Anton found this
note
in the hall.”

It was significant that he thrust the paper
towards Simon
and not Leopold.

The Saint took it. It was short and to the
point and said in
German:

Dear Friends,

Do not be annoyed with me. 1 have a plan of
my own
for getting the Necklace. It is better that I carry it
out
alone. But if I am not back in three days’ time, come and
get me out
of Schloss Este. I am sure Simon can do it
even
if it’s impossible!

Love to you all and
Thai.

Frankie.

The Saint felt that old surge of tingling
excitement, the
herald of adventure to come.

“Perhaps we can still head her off,” babbled Leopold.

“And risk fouling up this plan of hers
for getting the
Necklace—whatever it is?”

“Who cares about the Necklace?”
Leopold ranted. “It is
only Frankie who matters.”

Max was lighting a cigarette. It was a gold-tipped Russian
one, and its most oriental fragrance, though it
evidently
pleased him, irritated
Simon’s nostrils. In spite of his trem
bling
fingers, Max’s voice was firm and decisive.

“It so happens that Frankie cares a lot
about the Necklace.
So much that she is willing to risk her life for it. We
owe it to her to give her a chance with her plan, whatever it costs
her. It would only be tragic if
we could not complete the plan,
if she
fails.”

Simon gave him a quizzical look. This
combination of prac
ticality and romantic idealism was very Austrian. It was
just the sort of thing which had caused the downfall of their great
Empire. No
man can serve two masters, and the Austrians
always tried to please
everyone with the result that their
priorities often got hopelessly
muddled. But he didn’t think
Max’s were.

“Unfortunately,” Simon reminded him,
“none of us has
the faintest idea where to look for the Necklace. We can only
hope that she does get her hands on it.”

“And so you would just leave her to do everything
alone,”
accused Leopold, ready to work
himself up into one of his
quick
rages.

“Calm yourself, Leopold.” Max spoke
authoritatively. “I
am sure that Simon is thinking of something
more than
that.”

“I’m thinking that at least we know
where she’s headed
for,” said the Saint. “And if it’s too late to
stop her, at least
we
could be a lot closer than this if she needs help. How far is it to Schloss
Este?”

“About an hour’s drive. It’s on the
border, as a matter of
fact.”

Simon looked thoughtful.

“I’d rather avoid the official frontier
check-point. That
would get us involved with passports, visas, and all the
other
red tape of customs and immigration.”

Max nodded vigorous agreement.

“Especially since the Germans who have
occupied the Cas
tle, the Gestapo, have turned the whole village of Este
into a
verboten
area since they made the Schloss their
headquarters
for both Hungary and Austria.”

“How do you know that?”

“I know a lot of things. It is my
business to find out as
much of what is going on everywhere as
possible.”

“Why did they pick Schloss Este?”

“Because it is large, and because of
its situation. With the
river on one side and their gun emplacements
on the others, barbed wire, mine fields and all the rest, there is no way in
unless
one is officially welcomed.” Max grimaced. “And that
is not a
welcome many people would like.”

“I wonder how Frankie thinks she can get
in.”

Max spread his hands apart, palms upward.

“Who knows? She may have thought of some
story to go
with her peasant clothes, but what good that would do I
can
not think.”

The Saint concurred in that admission with a
slight tight
ening of his lips, but he forced himself to keep thinking
con
structively.

“She may have thought of using that
drain that you were telling us about in Vienna,” he said. “But
whether she did or
not, it still seems to be the likeliest way in for us.
The frontier
follows the river there, doesn’t it?”