Saint Steps In (5 page)

“Well—Father doesn’t like Imberline, and he may be pre
judiced—probably as. But he maintains
Imberline is nothing
more than a straw man for a syndicate of unscrupulous men who wangled
his WPB appointment in order to further their
own ends. I told you that Father’s an individualist. I
suppose
that’s a nice way of
hinting that he’s a near-eccentric. Some in
ventors are. He’s frightfully bitter against the people in Wash
ington who gave him the runaround, and he insists
that cer
tain interests are trying to smother his process in order to
build up their own business during the war and, more selfishly, after
the war.”

“And your father, I take it, has only the good of the people
at heart.”

She looked down at her drink and he spoke swiftly.

“I’m
sorry,” he said. “A few days of Washington and I find
myself afflicted with cynicism.”

“It’s all right,” she said in a low voice. “It was a
logical
question, after all.”

She raised her
eyes to his and met them squarely.

“Yes,” she said stoutly. “He does have the good of the
people at heart. He offered his invention to the Government, free
and clear, but his offer never got to
the men he wanted to give
it
to. Instead, he was interviewed by strangers whom he
didn’t like or trust. When he refused to give them his formula,
when he insisted on being taken to the top man,
the mysteri
ous accidents began to happen.”

“Does
Imberline know of all this?”

She shrugged.

“Who knows? I’ve told you that he’s not exactly the heavy
intellectual. It might be that he’s of
the popular conviction
that all
inventors are pathological specimens who just want to
waste his time. Heaven knows he must meet plenty of that type,
too. Or it might be that somebody in his office
does work for
some other interests, as Father insists, and never lets
him see
anything or anybody they don’t want
him to see.”

She leaned forward eagerly.

“But
I’m sure that if I could get to him. I could make him
listen, get him interested.” She colored slightly. “Frank
Imberline
, you see, is one of those
I’m-old-enough-to-be-your-father
persons. I—I think he’ll at least give
me a hearing.”

Simon eyed the girl soberly. Her face blazed suddenly.

“I
know what you’re thinking,” she said. “But I can put up
with that if it would help Father
and—yes—help the war ef
fort. It sounds corny, I know, but I really mean it.”

Her eyes were beseeching.

“Couldn’t
you help me to see Imberline?” she pleaded.

He gazed at her soberly. She was not stupid in the way he
had thought, but it appeared that there
were certain of the
facts of
life that had not yet completely entered her aware
ness.

“Of
course I will,” he said kindly. “But it might take some
time to get an audience with the
pontiff. I’m not so well up In
the routines for getting into the inner sanctum of a Washing
ton panjandrum
…”

The Saint had a faculty of hearing things without listening
for them, and of correlating them with the instantaneous
effi
ciency of a sorting machine, so that
they were sharply classified in his mind almost before the mechanical part of
his sense of hearing had finished processing them.

This particular sound was no more than the shyest ghost of
a tap. But it told him, quite simply
and clearly, that some
thing had touched the door behind him.

He
moved towards It on soundless feet, while his voice
went on without the slightest change of pace or inflection.

“…
I believe if you take a folding cot and a camp stove
and park in his outer office for a few days you
can sometimes
get in a word with his
secretary’s secretary’s secretary …”

Simon’s
hand touched the doorknob and whipped the door
open in one movement of lightning suddenness. And with an
other movement that followed the first with the
precision of
a reciprocating engine,
he shot out another hand to grasp the
collar
of the man who crouched outside with an article like a
small old-fashioned ear-trumpet at his ear.

“Come
in, chum,” he said cordially. “Come in and intro
duce yourself. Are you the house
detective, or were you just
feeling lonely?”

The eavesdropper found himself whirled into
 
the room,
clutching wildly at the air in a vain effort to regain his balance.

Before
he could recover himself, one of his arms was hauled up painfully behind his
back, and he found himself helpless.

“Don’t scream, darling,” Simon said to the girl. “It’s
just a
surprise visit from
somebody who wanted to make certain he
wasn’t intruding before he knocked.”

His free hand moved swiftly over his captive’s clothes, but
discovered no gun. Simon twisted the
eavesdropper around
and
stared into his face. Then he relaxed his hold on the stranger’s arm. The man
cautiously stretched the twisted
member and began rubbing it, half whimpering as he did.

“Know
him?” asked the Saint of the girl.

Wordlessly, Madeline Gray shook her head.

“Not exactly the type,” Simon remarked, cocking his head
on one side. “He looks more like
the typical bookkeeper who’s
due to get pensioned off with a nice gold watch for fifty years
of uninterrupted service, and never a
vacation or a day off for
sickness.”

The little man continued rubbing his arm, squeaking. He
looked something like a careworn mouse
in ill-fitting clothes,
with shoe-button eyes and two rodent teeth that protruded
over his lower lip. As the pain in his
arm subsided, he worked
hard to present a picture of outraged innocence.

“Sir!” he began.

“Even
talks like a
mouse,” observed the Saint coolly.

“I’ll have satisfaction for this,” said the eavesdropper.
“This is—this is scandalous! When a man is attacked in the hallway
of a prominent hotel by a
hoodlum
who practically breaks
his arm, it’s time—”

“All
right, Junior,” the Saint said pleasantly. “We can do without all
that. Just who are you and who do you work for?”

The
little man drew himself up to his full height of about
five feet three.

“I might ask you the same question,” he retorted. “Who
are
you that you think you can
attack——
”

“Look,”
said the Saint. “I haven’t much time, and although
I’m usually an exceedingly patient sort
of bloke, I’m slightly allergic to people who listen at my door with patent
listening
gadgets. Who sent you here
and what did you expect to find
out?”

“My
name,” squeaked the little man, “is Sylvester Angert. And I was not
listening at your door. I was trying to find my own room. I thought this was
it. I was about to try my key in
the
lock when you assaulted me.”

“I see,” said the Saint thoughtfully. “Of course, you
didn’t
check the number of my room
with the number on your key
before you—er—prepared to try the lock. And you always
have a good reason to listen to what
might be going on inside your room before you enter. Is that it?”

The
little man’s eyes held Simon’s firmly for a second and
then slid away.

“If you must know,” he said, with a spark of defiance,
“that’s exactly what I do.
Listen, I mean. I’ve done that ever
since I had an unpleasant experience in Milwaukee. I walked
into my room, and I was
held up by two thugs who were waiting for me there. I procured this little
instrument to safeguard
myself against
just that sort of thing.”

“Oh, Lord,” said the Saint faintly. “Now I’ve heard
every
thing.”

“Believe
it or not,” said Sylvester Angert, “that’s the truth.”

“Suppose you show me your key,” Simon suggested.

Mr. Angert probed his pockets and came up with the tabbed
key and offered it to the Saint. Simon checked the number
and
frowned thoughtfully. Its last two
digits corresponded with
the number of
Simon’s room. Mr. Angert, it appeared, oc
cupied the suite immediately
above the Saint’s.

Simon returned
the key and smiled easily.

“Everything
checks beautifully, doesn’t it?” he asked. “Suppose you have a seat,
Sylvester, and toy with a drink while we
talk
this over.”

Reluctantly the little man took a chair across the room from
the door. Simon splashed liquor into a
glass and fizzed the
soda syphon. He nodded in the direction of the girl.

“I
suppose introductions are in order,” he said. “Mr. An
gert, this is Miss Millie Van Ess.
Miss Van Ess, Mr. Angert.”

His
eyes were bland but they would not have missed the
minutest change in Angert’s expression, if there had been any
reaction to the alias he had inflicted on Madeline
Gray. But
he saw no reaction at all.

The little man nodded stiffly to the girl and murmured
something that might have been
“How do you do.” He took
the glass
from Simon and sipped the highball daintily.

Simon’s long brown fingers reached for a cigarette.

“Now, Mr.
Angert,” he said. “I’m sure you’ll agree that ex
planations are in order—on both sides, possibly.
Just what is
your business,
Comrade?”

The liquor seemed to give the little man courage, or perhaps
it was the realisation that he was not
going to be stretched on
a rack—at least
not immediately. Over the rim of his glass, he
said: “I don’t know your name, sir.”

“So sorry.
It’s Templar, Simon Templar.”

Angert’s
voice was quite calm as he said: “I believe I’ve
heard of you. Aren’t you the one they call the Saint,
or some
such name?”

Simon bowed modestly.

“My wife, that’s Mrs. Angert, takes a great interest in the crime
news in the papers, and I’ve heard her mention your
name. I, personally, don’t pay much attention to that
sort of thing.” He looked up apologetically. “Not,” he added,
“that I
have anything against
crime news, but——
”

Simon held up a hand.

“No
apologies, please,” he said. “I much prefer the funnies
and the produce market reports, myself. But what do you do,
brother, besides not read crime news?”

The little man delved into a vest pocket and brought out a
card. Simon read that Sylvester was
sales manager of the Choc
taw Pipe and Tube Company of Cleveland.

“I’m in
Washington, trying to get to see somebody about a
subcontract, but, oh dear, I just haven’t been able to do
anything!
They
all keep sending me from one office to the other
and then back to the place I contacted first.”

Simon casually slipped the card into his pocket and dragged
at his cigarette.

“I take it you make pipes and tubes,” he said.

“We did, up until the war,” explained Sylvester. “Then
we
converted to more direct
war products. Naturally, I can’t ex
plain just what we’re turning out now, but it’s important
Yessiree, very important, if I may say so.”

“I’m sure
you may,” Simon murmured.

Then
he shot his next question in a rapier-like tone that cut away the smug
complacency Sylvester seemed to be building
up as thoroughly as a sharp knife would rip away
cheesecloth.

“Does your plant have anything to do with rubber?” he de
manded.

This
time Mr. Angert’s eyes bounced a bit. He had been
prepared for the other questions, but this one had
come out
of nowhere and there was a split second’s
interval before he
recovered.

“Rubber?
Oh no. We’re a metal production outfit No, we
have nothing to do with rubber at all.”

Simon half turned
away to freshen his drink.