How Simon Templar surrendered,
and Chief Inspector Teal was not helpful
1
EVERY light in the house seemed to be on when Cullis arrived at the gate of the little garden. It stood in a dark side road; and, so far as he could make out, it was one of those picturesque places often to be found in country byways which modern enterprise has taken and improved without damaging the picture — a small, two-storied house with outside beams and a gabled roof, and an atmosphere of comfortable serenity about it which seemed about to be belied that night.
He went up the short path and mounted a couple of steps to the front door. His hand was actually on the bell when he noticed that the door was not completely closed, and with a slight frown he pushed it open and stepped into the hall.
"Is that you, Cullis?"
The voice came down from the top of the stairs and startled him, though he recognized it at once as that of the chief commissioner.
"Yes, sir."
"Come along up, will you?"
Cullis mounted the stairs. At the top he found a small landing, and on the landing was the chief commissioner with an automatic pistol in his hand.
"You got my message? Good. I'm glad to see you."
"Where are they?" was Cullis's first question.
"In there." The chief commissioner jerked his thumb at a closed door. "I ran them to earth here, and here I was stuck. They've locked the door on the inside, but they can't get out through the window, because it's barred. They've been working away on the bars, but they haven't been able to get out yet. They can't get out through the door, because I'm waiting for them here. But they're armed themselves, and I didn't feel like committing suicide by trying to force my way in alone."
"But are you alone, sir?."
The commissioner nodded.
"Of course I am," he said testily. "That's how I got stuck. If you can tell me a way for one man to guard an inside door and an outside window at the same time I'll be glad to hear it."
Cullis made a movement towards the door, and the chief reached out and jerked him back.
"I should stay where you are," he said. "They've had one or two pot shots at me through the door as it is, and you mightn't be so lucky."
He pointed to three bullet holes neatly drilled through the woodwork.
"Couldn't you get to the telephone?" asked Cullis.
"There is no telephone."
"Then how did you send that telegram?"
"That was a bit of luck. I picked them up in Guildford and heard them give the address to a taxi driver at the station. So I waited to send off that wire before I followed along here… Listen!"
Cullis listened and heard, inside the locked room, the rasp and tinkle of metal.
"They're still trying to break through those bars," said the chief commissioner, "but I don't think they'll get out that way in a hurry."
Cullis pulled out his cigarette case.
"How did it all happen?" he asked.
"I got a squeal. It came from a man named Pinky Budd, who was one of the old Angels. He came up to my house last night and said he'd run into Trelawney at Guildford. He was hard up, and tried to get some money out of her, but she gave him the air. Budd felt nastier and nastier about that all the way home, and when he got to London he'd made up his mind to squeal. But when he found me all he could say was that he'd gathered that Trelawney and the Saint were living near Guildford, and also that they were coming up to town on a rush visit today. So I went down to Guildford and spent half the day in the station watching all the trains until they arrived."
"Without a word to anyone?"
"There's been too much inefficiency on this case already. I forget how many times that man Templar has slipped the men who are always supposed to be watching him. I was getting a bit tired of it, and when this squeal came through I made up my mind to settle the thing myself."
"And then you followed them down here—"
The chief accepted a cigarette.
"And even then it wasn't all plain sailing," he said. "I saw the lights go on upstairs, and thought it was going to be easy, went in through a French window on the ground floor — and found a man waiting for me. Duodecimo Gugliemi! You remember, the man who should have been deported the other day."
Cullis nodded.
"I got the order postponed. I was thinking the same thing as you about the men that Templar was always shaking off, and I wondered if someone who looked less like a detective might be able to do more."
"Instead of which," said the commissioner grimly, "he appears to have joined up with them. Anyway, there he was, loading a gun when I walked in. Fortunately I'd been very quiet about it, and he didn't hear me at first. His back was towards me, and I got quite close before something must have made him look round. The gun was in his hand, but he'd still got the magazine out and it wasn't much use to him. He let out a yell and heaved it at my head, but I ducked and caught him one behind the ear with the butt of mine. That settled him, but the alarm was raised. I sprinted out into the hall and saw a skirt whisking round the top of the stairs. Trelawney can't have had her gun on her at the moment, otherwise it might have been quite a different story. As it was, this door slammed just as I reached the landing, and I heard the lock turn as I went at it with my shoulder. Next minute a bullet came through a panel an inch from my ear, and I took cover. But I'd got them both in there together, which was a bit of luck, and the best thing I could do was to stand guard here and hope you'd get a train as soon as my telegram arrived."
"And what about Gugliemi?"
"He's still downstairs, unless he's woken up and sloped off. I've had to keep one eye on the stairs all the time in case he tried to shove in his oar again, but there hasn't been a sound. As a matter of fact, he's probably still dreaming. When I hit him, I hit him hard. Since you're here, I think you'd better go down and see if there's any sign of him before we do anything else. You brought a gun, of course?"
Cullis tapped his pocket.
"I shouldn't have come without one," he said and went down the stairs at once.
In the room below, which the chief commissioner had indicated, Cullis found the Italian sitting on the floor with his head in his hands. Certainly trie man was awake — Cullis heard him groan.
"Here, you!"
Cullis took him by the collar and yanked him to his feet, and Gugliemi turned a white scared face to his.
"Signor," he wailed, "it was an accident—"
"What was?" snarled Cullis. "Your double-crossing me?"
"I do not understand—"
Cullis thrust the trembling man roughly into a chair.
"You know quite well what I mean," he said, and the first brutal savagery of his voice had calmed down to something worse — quiet, frozen ferocity. "Do you remember the last time you saw me?"
"Yes, sair."
"You were to find this girl Trelawney and get rid of her. That's what I promised you a hundred pounds and a clear way out of England for. I didn't tell you to turn round and join her gang — you rat!"
"I can explain, sair."
"Can you?" said Cullis, and his pale eyes never left the Italian's face. "I don't think you can explain in any way that will satisfy me. You're a traitor, and I have a way with traitors."
"But, if you will listen, sair—"
"Be quiet!"
Cullis dropped the words like two flakes of red-hot metal. He had been jumpy enough earlier in the evening, but now he was master of himself, and there was no humanity in his face.
He pointed to the floor where Gugliemi's gun, with the magazine beside it, still lay.
"You see that?" said Cullis.
Gugliemi nodded dumbly.
"You were loading it when the commissioner came in. When I came in just now you had woken up and finished loading it, and you were waiting for me. I had to shoot you in self-defense. Do you understand? It will be quite simple for me to put the magazine in the gun and put the gun in your hand when you have finished with your treacherous life."
His finger was tightening on the trigger even as he spoke. Gugliemi could see the whitening of the knuckle, and his eyes bulged wide with horror. Cullis saw the man's mouth open for a scream and grinned savagely.
But the shot he heard did not come from his own gun. It came muffled through the ceiling above him, and a second report followed a moment later. Then the chief called, rather huskily:
"Cullis!"
Cullis cursed under his breath. His plan could not be put into execution then: it was too late for his explanation to hold water now. Another pretext must be thought of. But meanwhile—
He caught Gugliemi by the lapels of his coat and pulled him towards him. Reversing his gun with a swift movement, he struck callously…
As the man crumpled to the floor at his feet, Cullis heard the commissioner call his name again.
He raced up the stairs. At the top he found the chief leaning against the wall with one hand clutched to his shoulder.
"They got me," said the chief gruffly. "I heard them talking and I went closer to listen. Then a shot through the door. But I fired back, and I think I hit something."
Cullis listened, and inside the room he heard a stifled groan. Then, through the door, Simon Templar spoke:
"We're surrendering," he said.
The key grated in the lock, and the door opened. The Saint stepped out, holding his gun, butt foremost, at arm's length in front of him. His blue eyes swept the assistant commissioner with cool contempt as Cullis took the weapon and dropped it into his pocket.
"Jill's hit," said the Saint. "That was a lucky shot for you."
Cullis went in. He found himself in a small bedroom, and a glance at the barred window showed him that the prisoners had been well on the way to making the gap big enough to squeeze through. Then his eyes fell on the bed, and he saw Jill Trelawney lying there with a red stain spreading on her white blouse.
"It's only a flesh wound," said the Saint, "but it's good enough. You'd better send for a doctor."
He turned to see the chief commissioner stuffing a folded handkerchief inside his shirt.
"I'm sorry I didn't get a better bead on you," said the Saint pleasantly.
The chief commissioner grunted.
"You'd better get her downstairs, Cullis," he said. "I'll go out and find a telephone. You're in a better condition to look after this bunch than I am."
But Simon Templar pushed Cullis unceremoniously aside and picked Jill Trelawney up in his arms as lightly and tenderly as if she had been a baby. They went downstairs in procession to the room where Gugliemi was, Cullis covering Simon from behind, and the chief commissioner bringing up the rear. Downstairs, Simon laid the girl gently on the sofa, but when he would have moved away she caught his hand and held him.
The chief commissioner was looking at the prostrate Italian.
"He's moved," he said, "so I didn't kill him."
"He was waking up when I came down," said Cullis. "When I heard the. shot and you called me I hadn't time to do anything but knock him on the head again and leave him."
"Well, we've got them all together now. If you'll watch them I'll be getting along down the road. I think I noticed some telephone wires leading to a house about a hundred yards farther on."
"Are you sure you'll be all right, sir?"
"I'm all right, Cullis. It's messed up my shoulder a bit, but I can make that hundred yards without any trouble. You stay here and keep your eyes skinned. I'll be back as soon as I can."
He went out, and they heard the front door slam. Presently the gate clicked…
And then Cullis turned to the Saint.
"So this is the end of your cleverness?"
Simon Templar eyed him coldly.
"I'm not so sure," he said. "I never stop being clever. And I shouldn't bet on this being the last word, if I were you. It may be my last adventure, but there are so many possible endings."
Cullis showed his teeth.
"You'll get seven years for this night's work alone," he said.
"And how long do you think you'll get, old dear?" asked the Saint very gently.
Cullis returned his gaze stonily.
"I think," he said, "that it won't help you much to try that sort of bluff."
"But suppose," said the Saint — "just suppose, sweet Cullis, that it wasn't entirely a bluff. I admit that for the moment you have us under the lid. of the tureen, so to speak. But that's only a bit of luck: a chance shot through a door that ought to have missed both of us by miles. But it was good enough that Jill couldn't get away through that window — couldn't have run for it, even if we'd come out and put up a fight. And yet, Cullis, it mightn't turn out to be all jam."
"How, for instance?" asked Cullis, as if the idea amused him.
"When your desk was opened last night—"
"Yes?"
"Did you go through your papers after the police had come?"
"I did."
"Carefully?"
"Yes."
"You can't have done," said the Saint. "If you had, you'd have realized what we got away with."
Cullis laughed.
"You didn't have a chance to get away with anything. I came into the room just as she got the secret panel open, and she didn't go back again."
"I know she didn't go back," said the Saint, swaying gently on his toes. "But I did."
"You?"
"Me. Of course, you didn't realize I was there. But I was — impersonating a rhododendron in the middle distance. When you followed Jill outside and shot after her as she went across the lawn, I slipped in through the window, took what I wanted, and slipped out again."
Cullis's eyes gleamed.
"And what did you take?"
"Only this."
Simon slipped a hand in his pocket and brought out his wallet. From the wallet he took a piece of paper and unfolded it, holding it up before the assistant commissioner's eyes. It was a new five-pound note.
"Recognize it?" asked the Saint, in that very gentle tone. "Don't you hear its little voice chirruping to you and calling you Daddy?"
"It means nothing to me."
"But it was one of many which you had tied up in that deed box in your very ingenious desk, my pet. There must have been a couple of thousand pounds' worth all together… Oh, Cullis, did you forget what your old grandmother told you, and did you let your avarice get the better of your caution? You couldn't bring yourself to destroy them, and yet you didn't dare pay them into your bank or try to dispose of them in any other way."
Cullis stiffened.
"And why do you think that was?" he asked quietly.
"Because," said the Saint deliberately, "the number of this note — which was the top one of the bunch I found in your desk — is the very next number after the last number of the wad which was taken out of Sir Francis Trelawney's safe deposit, and which was traced back to Waldstein. And when the matter comes to be investigated, I wouldn't mind betting that this note will be found to have been drawn out of Waldstein's bank at the very same time!"
2
There was a long silence, tensed up almost to breaking point by the measured tick of a cabinet clock somewhere outside in the hall. And through that silence the Saint lounged at his ease against the revolving bookcase which he had selected for his support, and his bleak eyes rested unwaveringly on the assistant commissioner's face. Jill Trelawney lay still on the settee, and on the floor Duodecimo Gugliemi groaned and rolled over; with his fingers twitching; there was no other movement.
For a space of five or six taut and significant seconds. and then a glimmer of the old Saintly mockery twinkled back into Simon Templar's gaze, and he laughed.
"Which is all very unfortunate for you — isn't it, Algernon?" he drawled; and Cullis's mouth tightened up like a steel trap under his moustache.
"I see," he said softly.
"Cheers!" said the Saint. "Do you mind if I smoke?"
He helped himself to a cigarette from the box on the table and struck a match.
"So that's the yarn you propose to tell, is it?" said Cullis.
"It is," said the Saint tranquilly. "And I think it's a damned good yarn, if you ask me. At any rate, it'll keep your brain ticking over, working out what sort of an answer you're going to make."
Suddenly Cullis laughed.
"And you really think anyone will believe you?"
"I don't know," said the Saint. "I shall do my best to spread the glad news around, and when I get going I have no mean spread. With all the accumulated evidence—"
"What other evidence?"
"Duodecimo's, for instance. He has a little story to tell of his very own which ought to cause quite a sensation."
Cullis sneered.
"A crook lying to save his skin! Do you think that his word will have any weight? With a reputation like his—"
"Oh, but he hasn't got to rely on his reputation alone, comrade. There is a very important bit of corroborative what's it, or circumstantial how's-your-father."
"And what might that be?"
"I'll tell you that later," said the Saint, "if you remind me. But for the present I'm just fascinated to hear what fairy tale you think you're going to tell about that fiver."
"Do you really think you'll be able to use that against me?"
"I do."
"Let me tell you," said Cullis, "that you're going to be disappointed. There's one thing you seem to have forgotten, but I remember it quite well. Waldstein himself, under the name of Stephen Weald, was at one time a member of Trelawney's precious gang. Did you know that?"
"I did."
"Then," said Cullis deliberately, "what is more natural than that you should have in your possession a five-pound note which can be traced back to Waldstein's account?"
The Saint looked at him. And the Saint smiled, and shook his head.
"Not good enough," he said. "That might possibly be made to account for this note which I've got here; but will it account for the others which can probably still be found somewhere among your belongings?"
"Which you could have planted there."
"That excuse didn't save Sir Francis Trelawney," said the Saint, cold as a judge. "Why should you think it will save you?"
Their eyes met for a long while, and then Cullis took a slow step forward. His face had become a mask of granite.
"I see," he said again, very slowly.
"So glad you appreciate the point," said the Saint. "It is going to be a bit awkward for you, isn't it? But it ought to go a long way towards clearing Sir Francis Trelawney's name."
"And who," said Cullis, in the same soft voice, "is going to make a search of my possessions before I have time to get those notes out of the way?"
And the Saint smiled again, rocking gently on his heels.
"Thank you," he said, "for admitting that you have got the other notes."
"And suppose I admit it," said Cullis calmly. "You've still got to answer my question. Who's going to make that search — and prove anything?"
"I might arrange it," said the Saint. And he said it so quietly and naturally that it was hard to read any blind bluff into the words.
Cullis looked closely at him, and a little pulse began to beat in Cullis's forehead.
"There's something funny about you, Simon Templar—"
"We are amused," said the Saint politely.
"But perhaps," said Cullis, "even you couldn't have prophesied what was going to happen to you when you'd told me that story."
"Tell me."
"You're a dangerous criminal, and your accomplice is wanted for murder. Seeing that the game's up, you're going to make one last desperate effort to beat me and get away. And in self-defense I shall have to shoot you—"
"Just like you had to shoot Gugliemi," said the Saint, almost in a whisper; and Cullis went white to the lips.
Then the mask like features contorted suddenly.
"How did you know that?"
"I am a clairvoyant," said the Saint easily.
"And yet," said Cullis, "the trick is still good enough—"
"Not quite good enough," said the Saint. And there was a sudden swift urgency in his voice, for at that moment he saw death staring him in the face — death in Cullis's pale blue eyes, and death in the twist of Cullis's lips, and death quivering in Cullis's right hand. "Not quite good enough. Because there's one more instalment to my story — and you'd better hear it before you shoot!"
For a moment he thought that Cullis would shoot and chance the consequences, and he loosened his muscles for a desperate leap. And the assistant commissioner's pose slackened by a fraction.
"I'll hear what you have to say. But you needn't expect to get away with another bluff like the one Trelawney put over last night."
"And it was such a good bluff, too," said the Saint sadly, with one eyebrow cocked at the assistant commissioner's bandaged thumb.
And then he smiled into Cullis's eyes.
"But we don't need to use bluff any more," he said. "I'm strong for having everything in its right place, and the place for bluff has gone by, Cullis."
"Get on!"
"I am a brilliantly clever man," said the Saint, in his airy way, "and picnics like this are sitting rabbits to me. I worked this one out for your special benefit, and you've enjoyed it so much, too… You see, it would have been perfectly easy to bump you off, but that wasn't all we wanted. Waldstein and Essenden had been bounced too rapidly, and we weren't making the same error over you. We wanted to hear you sing to us here before you passed on to join the herald angels; but we quite appreciated that we weren't a sufficient audience. Jill and I are simple souls whom the world has used hardly, and Duodecimo is another piece of shop-soiled driftwood on the sea of life—"
"Cut the cackle," rasped Cullis, with a new venom in his voice. "If you're just trying to gain time—"
"I'm unbosoming in my own style, brother," said the Saint plaintively. "Give me a break. And now where was I?… Oh, yes. Duodecimo is another piece of shop-soiled driftwood on the—"
"I'll give you three minutes more. If you've got anything to say—"
"O. K., Algernon. Then let's put it that your word would probably outweigh anything that Jill or I or Duodecimo could say. So there had to be a witness who couldn't be challenged. And who could be a more ideal witness than the chief commissioner himself?"
The Saint saw Cullis's eyes narrow down to mere pin points, and laughed again.
"I went to the chief commissioner. I borrowed his own house. We came down here this evening and set the stage very carefully. Those bullet holes which you saw in the door upstairs were placed there three hours ago by special permission of the proprietor. The bars on the window were installed this afternoon and chopped about while you were travelling down. I personally staged the scene, wrote the dialogue, and produced the soul-stirring drama now drawing to its close — and all in one rehearsal. A microphone behind that picture of an indecently exposed lady throwing geraniums at a nightingale has been picking up all your winged words and relaying them, if not to all stations, at least to one — with a sergeant sitting on his Pitman diploma at the other end and taking them all down. Another connection upstairs gave up the personal lowdown on every word of your recent backchat with Duodecimo — which would have been enough to hang you by itself. But we are thorough. We didn't even stop there. Half a minute after you heard the front door slam behind the chief commissioner just now, he was creeping in through the back door and sprinting up the back stairs to hear some more of the story from his private broadcasting station. No, I shouldn't even shoot now, Cullis, because I think I heard Auntie Ethel coming back—"
Cullis heard the rattle of the door behind him, and spun round.
The chief commissioner stood on the threshold. And now he showed no signs of the injury which had at first impressed his assistant. His bearing was erect, he no longer clutched his shoulder, and there was a glitter in his eyes which had nothing to do with anything he had said to Cullis before he left.
Also, there was an automatic in his hand.
"I heard you," he said; and Cullis stepped back a pace.
Cullis still held a gun in his hand, but it hung loose at his side, and he knew that the least movement would be fatal. He stood quite still, and the chief commissioner went on speaking.
"You ought to know," he said, "that I've been watching you for some time. I think I first had my suspicions when those papers were taken from the Records Office; and then the Saint came to me with a story which I couldn't ignore, fantastic though it was."
"You believed a crook?" said Cullis scornfully.
"For my own reasons," said the commissioner. "He was, perhaps, something more than an ordinary crook when he came to me, and I was able to believe him when I shouldn't have believed anyone else in his place. Even you should admit that the Saint has a certain reputation. There was a warrant out for his arrest at the time." The commissioner's lips twitched. "It was one of many that have been wasted on him. But he placed himself unreservedly in my hands, and it seems as if the result has justified us."
Cullis looked around him, and saw that Simon Templar also held a gun; and Jill Trelawney was sitting up on the sofa, mopping at her blouse with a handkerchief.
"Only red ink," explained the Saint sweetly.
Cullis stood like a man carved in stone.
And then he nodded slowly, and the ghost of a smile twitched at his mouth.
"I needn't bother to deny anything," he said quietly. "It's all quite clear. But it was a clever piece of work on your part to get the story from my own mouth as you have done."
He looked the chief commissioner in the eyes.
"You may as well hear it in full," he said. "I framed Sir Francis Trelawney under your very nose. Waldstein and Essenden were the leaders of the combine that Trelawney was out to smash, and I was strapped at the time. They offered big money, and I came in with them. Trelawney was dangerous. In another month or so he'd probably have had them, if he'd been able to keep on. The only thing to do was to get him out of the way, and we fixed that up between us. It wasn't so difficult as it might have been, because he was always a man who worked on his own. We knew that if once he was discredited, no one else would be able to take up his work at the point where he left off. I paved the way by writing that warning about the raid on his typewriter. Then I telephoned the message which was supposed to have come from you, which sent him over to Paris and helped us to catch him out at Waldstein's hotel. After that, the rest was easy. I had Waldstein's money in my pocket when I opened his strong box in front of you, and I'd practised that little conjuring trick for weeks. It wasn't very difficult. The notes came out of his box in front of your very eyes, and there was nothing he could say about that. Later on, Waldstein, under one of his aliases, joined up with the girl to keep her out of mischief. He called himself lucky when he met her on the boat coming over from New York to start the work of the Angels… The trouble started when the Saint came after me — when my house was burgled and my desk broken open last night."
"I heard about that," said the chief commissioner.
Cullis nodded.
"From the Saint, I suppose? Well, it was a neat piece of work, although it was the girl who did it. Even before that I'd decided that Jill Trelawney was getting too dangerous, and sent Gugliemi out after her; but he turned against me, as you know. Even when my desk was opened, I didn't think anything had been taken, and when you told me to come down here I thought I'd got a chance."
"Until Templar showed you that five-pound note?" murmured the chief.
"Quite right… Is there anything else you want to know?"
"I don't think so."
Cullis's eyes shifted round the room.
"But there's one thing I should like to know," he said.
"What's that?"
"When the Saint came to you with that story, why should you have taken any more notice of it than if anyone else had brought it to you?"
A dry smile touched the commissioner's lips.
"Because I happen to know him well," he said. "When he got his pardon, I coaxed him into the Secret Service to keep him from getting into more trouble. His methods have always been rather eccentric, but they're effective. Some time ago he got an idea that there was something more in the Trelawney business than ever came out, and I let him take up the case in his own way. He's been working at it in his own way ever since: his police appointment was only part of the job, and his very irregular resignation was only another part."
There was one person who was more surprised than Cullis, and that was Jill Trelawney.
"You, Saint?"
"When we first met," said the Saint sadly, "I told you I'd reformed, but you wouldn't believe me. And in the last few days I seem to have done nothing but talk to you about my respectable friend. Let me introduce you — Sir Hamilton Dorn, Chief Commissioner of Police for the Metropolis, commonly known as Auntie Ethel. Pleased to have you meet each other."
Sir Hamilton bowed slightly.
"I never was the hell of a policeman," said the Saint apologetically. "Scotland Yard will probably survive without me — though I can't help thinking I might have pepped them up a heap if I'd stayed on."
For that one moment Simon Templar was the central figure, and there was not an eye on Cullis. And then the Saint, out of the tail of his eye, saw Cullis's right hand leap up, and shouted a warning even as he turned. But his voice was drowned by the roar of Cullis's automatic, and he saw the chief commissioner's gun drop to the floor, and saw a red stain suddenly splashed on the chief commissioner's wrist.
He raised his own gun, but the hammer clicked on a dud cartridge, and he threw himself down on the floor as Cullis's automatic barked again.
He heard the bullet sing over his head and smack into the wall behind him with a tinkle of glass from a smashed picture, and spun his legs round in a flailing semicircle that aimed at Cullis's ankles. Even so, he did not see how Cullis could possibly miss with his next shot…
He missed his kick… but he had forgotten Jill Trelawney. As he scrambled up, he saw both her hands locked upon Cullis's wrist, and Cullis's third shot went up into the ceiling. Then he himself also had hold of the wrist, and he twisted at it savagely. The gun went to the floor, and the Saint kicked it away.
He did not see Cullis snatch up the bronze statuette from the table behind him, but if he had not turned his head — more by intuition than by calculation — it would certainly have cracked his skull. As it was, the glancing blow half stunned him and sent him reeling, with his hold on Cullis's wrist broken. Jill had let the man go as soon as the Saint grappled with him.
As he climbed dizzily to his feet, with his head singing, and wiped the blood out of his eyes, he saw the chief commissioner groping blasphemously for one of the fallen guns with his sound left hand — saw the open French windows, and Jill Trelawney vanishing through them.
"Come back, you fool!" yelled the Saint huskily.
But she could not have heard him. She was gone, and he followed, staggering.
There was a patter of footsteps down the gravel path along the side of the house, and he saw her white blouse as a pale blur in the darkness.
He caught her up at the corner of the house, and, standing beside her, saw Cullis turning through the garden gate.
Then he started to run again, for he knew that if Cullis turned again at the next corner, as he would be likely to do, he would stumble straight upon the chief commissioner's car, which had been left standing there with the lights out.
And Cullis turned that way. Whether it was simply that he wanted to get clear of the principal road and attempt to shake off pursuit in the darkness and more open country, or whether it was that the luck which had been with him so long was disposed to help him yet a little while longer, could never be known. But he did come upon the car, and he was flinging himself into the driving seat as Simon turned the corner after him. An instant later the self-starter brought the engine to life, and the car was starting to move as the Saint flung himself at the luggage grid.
He hung there for a few seconds, getting his last resources of nerve and muscle together. He was still dazed, practically knocked out on his feet, after the murderous blow that he had taken on his head. And the blood that persisted in trickling into his eyes from a shallow scalp wound half blinded him. But he held on.
And then he pulled himself together and moved again. It had to be done, for his hold was precarious, and he could not have kept it for much longer in the state he was in. And by that time the car was travelling at forty miles an hour, and a slip, a fall in the road, would very easily have put an end to the adventure in quite a different way from which he had intended.
He got his hands over the furled top, hauled himself up, and tumbled over onto the cushions of the back seat.
With a sigh of relief, he eased his aching muscles; and for a while he lay there, dead beat, hardly able to move. His head felt as if it were splitting, and crimson specks danced in a grey haze before his eyes.
But the car drove on. The driver, intent only on the road that showed up ahead in the blaze of the headlights, never noticed his arrival.
Gradually the sick feeling in the pit of his stomach passed off. He was still weary from his reckless effort, but his brain was clearing. He mopped at his forehead with his handkerchief and opened his eyes.
Then he pulled himself up onto his knees. As his eyes came over the level of the front seat, the blaze of another pair of headlights that were racing over the road towards them flooded into his eyes.
"There's no more speed limit," said the Saint unhappily, in Cullis's ear, "but you're still breaking it, and I shall have to arrest you, Cullis, really I shall. Driving to the danger of the public, that's what you're doing—"
As Cullis heard his voice the car swerved perilously, and then straightened up again.
"At least," said Cullis over his shoulder, "I'll take you with me."
Simon took him by the throat, but Cullis's hands still clutched the steering wheel rigidly.
The oncoming car was less than twenty yards away. In any other circumstances, with the road to themselves, Simon might have been able to shoot Cullis, or even simply hit him over the back of the head with the butt of his gun, and trust to being able to keep the car straight while he clambered over and pushed the man out of the way and took the wheel. But there and then there was no chance to do that. In another second or two they would smash head on into the other car…
Cullis's intention was obvious.
With a desperate wrench the Saint rammed Cullis's face down between the spokes of the steering wheel; and for a moment the car was out of control. Then, pushing Cullis sideways, Simon grabbed the wheel and wrenched the car round.
The oncoming headlights blazed straight into his eyes, hurtling towards them. The driver of the other car swerved, but he could hardly manoeuvre on that narrow road, and there was no time for him to pull up.
Simon heard the futile scream of brakes violently applied, and thought he would die smiling.
"Here we go," he thought, and held the wheel round on a reckless lock.
He only just failed. For one horrible instant he saw the off-side wing light of the approaching car leaping directly into the off-side wing light of the car in which he rode. Even so, he might have succeeded if Cullis had not got a hand back on the wheel and fought to turn it the other way.
Simon lashed at him with one elbow, but it was too late for that to be any good. The running board of the other car slashed their front wing like a knife; and there was a grating, tearing, shattering noise of tortured metal.
Simon was shot over the steering wheel by the impact. The car seemed to heave itself into the air, and for one blinding, numbing second he seemed to hang suspended in space. Then the road hit him a terrible blow across the shoulder blades; there was a splintering clatter, another and more violent jar, and dead silence.
He did not know how long he lay there on his back with his feet propped up somewhere in the air, bruised and aching in every limb, and only wondering whether he was really dead at last — and if not, why not… A colossal weight seemed to be pressing into his chest…
He opened one eye, and discerned brake and clutch and accelerator pedals mysteriously suspended over his head.
There was something else on his chest. He made this out to be the front seat — and the body of a man.
He tried to raise one hand, and found that it moved in a pool of something warm and sticky; and he wondered whether the blood was Cullis's or his own.
Then there was a thunder of knocking on the shipwrecked coachwork beside his ear, and a voice said, rather foolishly:
"Are you all right in there?"
"Can't see how anyone can be alive in this mess," said another voice. "They must have been doing over fifty."
But the Saint had recognized the first voice, and a husky croak of a chuckle came from his lips.
"Dear old Claud Eustace," he said. "Always ten minutes too late!"