Send for the Saint (4 page)

Joe was in cheerful form as always, and the Saint’ grinned as the short square figure appeared and slapped him on the back.

“Simon, you old son of a gun!” he exclaimed in his chirrupy brogue. “How’s business? Been keeping the nose clean then, I see,” he added, referring to the lack of recent news stories about the Saint’s exploits.

“I’ve been out of the country for a while, Joe. What can you give me on Diogenes Patroclos?”

” Patroclos ? Old golden guts ?”

“The same. Joe, I’d be obliged if you’d show me what you’ve got in the photo library.”

They went together into the long room that housed the paper’s main collection of personal data. Daly rummaged in a cabinet.

“Strictly against the rules, this, Simon, y’know. Ah, here we are, Diogenes Patroclos.” Daly pulled out a hefty file and gave it to Simon. “And there’s references to a whole string of his companies — you can have a look at the files on them if you like. Mostly pictures of aircraft and ships as I remember.”

“Thanks, Joe. Just now it’s the man himself that I’m interested in,” explained the Saint as he riffled through the photos.

Daly peered over his shoulder.

“Ugly bugger, isn’t he. What’s he been up to?”

“You tell me,” said the Saint.

Daly looked reflective.

“Wait — there was something. His ships’ve been carrying some dodgy cargoes lately. There was some rumbling here and there about it.”

The Saint nodded.

“I’d heard that much. But it never made the papers, did it?”

“We tried to work up a feature, but the old man said let it ripen a bit first.”

“What about women ?” the Saint asked, still thumbing through the photographs.

“The man’s a monk. Only thing he takes home is bits of glass.”

“Glass?”

“Tinkle, tinkle, you know. Stuff you drink out of. He’s got one of the best collections in the world. Antique goblets — all that sort of thing …”

The Saint had stopped and extracted two photos from the file.

“Joe — look at these.”

Daly took them, glanced at the pictures, and then read the description on the reverse.

“Diogenes Patroclos presenting the Out Islands Yachting Trophy — Nassau … Diogenes Patroclos party-going in Lisbon. So what?”

“Read the dates when they were taken,” suggested the Saint. Daly read the date stamped in the corner on the back of each print.

“Tenth July 49 … Tenth July 49.” Daly frowned, puzzled. “Well, he couldn’t have been in two places at once … Wait a minute, the photos must have been taken a few hours apart — Nassau in the afternoon or evening, Lisbon later on… No, that’s no good, no plane would get him there that fast. Must be a misprint.”

Simon nodded thoughtfully.

“Mind if I borrow these two?”

“Help yourself — just don’t flash’em around on your way out.”

The Saint was willing to admit to himself that this duplicate tycoon had him, at that moment, completely perplexed. He was as reluctant to believe in the possibility of perfect impersonation as in the existence of talking dogs; yet here was this Patroclos double, seemingly breaking all the rules. And the two photographs appeared to clinch the issue. Simon’s reasoning on that had followed much the same course as Joe Daly’s: two photos had been taken no more than a few hours apart, and each showed unmistakeably a man who appeared to be Patroclos; but it was an inescapable fact that no aircraft could possibly have flown him from Nassau to Lisbon in those few hours. In any case there was a time lag of several hours, which made it all the more inconceivable that he could have travelled from one engagement to the other.

After leaving the Express building Simon drove to Berkeley Square, where Patroclos had his London house. Simon cruised around the square until he came to the number Patroclos had given him. And then, to put it mildly, he blinked his eyes in disbelief.

True, the Patroclos house was one of the most expensive and elegant residences in that expensive and elegant quarter. That was exactly as the Saint had expected. But what he had not expected was to see Diogenes Patroclos and Ariadne getting out of a silver Bentley and going into the house.

For perhaps a minute, the Saint stared after them at the closed door. They had given no sign of noticing his presence, but he had been close enough to them to see that the likeness, if they were doubles of the real Patroclos and Ariadne, was incredible. Certainly, the Saint mused, from a distance of a few feet it was utterly convincing visually. Whether the effect could be sustained at closer quarters, and when voices and mannerisms could be studied, remained to be seen. The Saint had every intention of taking a close look at the two of them, but first there was one obvious check that had to be made.

He drove back to Manson Place and phoned Athens.

After the usual delay he was connected with the Patroclos HQ. He asked for Patroclos, and Ariadne came on the line.

“No, of course we are not in London. We are here in Athens.”

“But I’ve just seen someone here — he could be him.”

“That is impossible. Mr Patroclos is here in his office.”

“Let me speak to him,” said the Saint.

Ariadne hesitated.

“He is in conference. He gave strict instructions that he was not to be disturbed.”

“Get him to the phone — now,” Simon said flatly, “or I quit the job.”

There was a moment’s silence.

“All right,” Ariadne replied. “But he will be very angry. And you will have to wait while I interrupt the meeting.”

After some delay Simon heard Patroclos’ familiar accents on the line.

“Templar — I am told you have seen the impostor. Why are you wasting time telephoning, instead of watching him ?”

“I just wanted to be quite sure,” explained the Saint, “that it was the impostor I saw.”

“I am here in Athens. If you have seen the impostor, it should make your job easier. Now I am very busy. Please do not waste my time telling me that I am being impersonated. That I already know. Goodbye.”

There was a definitive clunk on the line, followed by a silence that effectively terminated all argument.

The Saint hung up and remained wrapped in thought for many minutes afterwards.

However, he had certain other private interests of some insistence with legitimate demands on his time, so that it was not until the evening that his meditations reverted entirely to the problems of Diogenes Patroclos, as his peregrinations took the Hirondel again through Berkeley Square. And it happened that he was cruising past Patroclos’ house just as an easily recognisable “society” couple in evening dress got out of a chauffeur-driven car. They rang the bell; the door opened, and they were admitted at once, but not so quickly that Simon missed catching a glimpse of someone shaped like Ariadne who was doing the reception. By the time he had a chance to stop without creating a block of honking traffic, another evening-dressed and equally publicised couple arrived and were admitted by Ariadne’s double in the same manner. And then the Saint’s eyes widened in amazement as he realised the extent of the fake Patroclos’ sheer barefaced audacity.

5
The impostor was giving a party.

For a few blissful minutes, the Saint sat in the car and savoured the full rich succulence of the situation. He watched as more guests — a dozen or so more — arrived. And then he spoke philosophically calming words to himself and went home to change into a more suitable costume than he was wearing.

Thirty minutes later, immaculately tuxedoed for the occasion, he knocked at the door of the Berkeley Square house. It was opened by the girl who looked like Ariadne; and the likeness was passable enough; but Simon was certain that this was not the girl he had met in Athens.

“Ariadne!” cried the Saint, with a complete show of spontaneous warmth. “And looking more beautiful than ever!”

The girl’s eyes flickered with puzzlement.

“Have we met somewhere?”

“Monte Carlo. Simon Templar. We shared a langouste at the Hotel de Paris, I seem to remember.”

“I�I think you must be mistaken,” said the girl slowly.

Simon’s brain was racing to make her reaction add up to some kind of sense. If she was impersonating the real Ariadne, he reasoned, surely she should be bluffing it out?

“Oh dear, forgotten incident, are we?” Simon did his best to look hurt. “Well, never mind — ‘just tell Dio Tin here, would you ?”

Ariadne Two flushed and hesitated; she must have known that the name Simon Templar appeared nowhere on the guest list, but she was reluctant to turn him away in case Patroclos himself had invited this tall and insolently handsome man and forgotten to let her know.

“I suppose it’s all right,” she said reluctantly. “You’d better come in.”

“Right ho,” said the Saint, who was already halfway into the hall.

His keen glance took in the crystal chandeliers and bracket-lights, the magnificent gilt mirror, the marble floor and columns, the elegant carved staircase. Georgian classic at its best. Coats and furs bulged from the cloaks recess behind the front door, and an upper-class babble of voices issued from the drawing room into which Simon followed the dubious-faced Ariadne Two.

About twenty people were standing about in typical party groups, drinking champagne and talking, and making more noise about both activities than was strictly necessary. Most of the guests were instantly recognisable, as Simon had already noted, as bigwigs of one sort or another — cultural, social, financial, or in some cases all three.

“Do you know anyone?” Ariadne Two asked.

“Probably,” replied the Saint. “I don’t see Dio, though.”

“He’s busy at the moment. But I’ll tell him you’re here.”

Ariadne Two beckoned over the footman with a tray of drinks; and then, with a last uncertain glance at the Saint’s innocent features, she disappeared through a door at the far end of the room.

Simon sampled the fine champagne appreciatively while his eyes absorbed the scene. Next to him a group were conversing loudly, trying to make themselves heard above the general hubbub.

“Well, you know Dio,” a famous merchant banker was explaining. “Once he gets his claws into a man …”

“Don’t we know!” chuckled another well-known financier. “Rends him limb from limb. What exactly did he do to this Kellner?”

“Sold the company. And him along with it — bound by contract for the next five years. Sold it to a firm of East End bookmakers, if you please!”

“Ha! Sold him into slavery, eh?”

“Exactly!”

“Marvellous!” put in the large operatic contralto who was part of the same group.

“Good old Dio,” said a younger, very decorative woman in the group. “Never changes, does he?”

The cue was too perfect for the Saint to resist.

“Oh, I don’t know,” he remarked. “Wouldn’t you say he’d changed a bit recently?”

Six pairs of eyes turned to look at the newcomer; and one of the financiers asked, “How d’you mean?”

Simon hesitated.

“I’m not exactly sure. I can’t put my finger on it somehow. There’s something …Maybe his appearance. Haven’t you noticed?”

“Well, none of us gets any younger,” suggested the more ornamental of the women, with an appreciatively appraising glance at the Saint’s youthfully lean and elegant form.

“I don’t mean he’s aged, exactly,” he explained. “Just … changed.”

“Well, /haven’t noticed it,” put in the large contralto decisively, as if that must be the end of the matter.

The Saint shrugged.

“Oh well, it was just an impression. Perhaps I’m wrong.” And then, as Ariadne Two appeared at his side and touched him on the arm, he added, “Will you excuse me?” and followed the girl through the far doorway.

“Mr Patroclos would like to talk to you privately,” she explained, as they passed through a small communicating room into the library beyond.

The room was fully pine-panelled, its walls lined with sunken bookshelves stuffed full of leather-bound volumes. Two big showcases full of choice glassware dominated one side of the room; and from a solid compact mahogany desk in one corner, the double of Diogenes Patroclos stared at Simon Templar with piercing interest.

Ariadne Two closed the door softly, leaving them alone.

The likeness was incredible. To any ordinary observation this was the same Diogenes Patroclos as the Saint had met in Athens: the same heavy figure, the same powerful set to the head and jaw, and the same sallow Greek complexion, the same bushy black brows and musketball eyes. And yet, to the Saint’s acutely perceptive scrutiny, there were minute, infinitesimal differences, which were well-nigh impossible to analyse — perhaps a fractional discrepancy here in the sweep of the hair, or there in a line or two of the face — but which nevertheless added up to just enough of an identifiable distinction to make the Saint feel fairly sure he would now be able to tell Patroclos One and Patroclos Two apart.

He went straight to Patroclos Two, hand extended.

“Dio. Good to see you!”

“Templar! What brings you here at this hour?”

The voice and handshake were noncommittal; Patroclos Two was not refusing to recognise the Saint, as the girl had done, but neither was he playing it up to the hilt. He was waiting and watching. But Simon marvelled at the double’s achievement with the voice, as much as with the appearance: again the difference from the man in Athens was so slight and elusive that no one would have detected it who was not listening for it — and listening with an ear as acute as the Saint’s.

“I was just passing,” Simon replied. “There seemed to be a party going on, so I thought you wouldn’t mind if I dropped in and said hullo. How was Athens ?”

“Not good. You know — the political situation.” Patroclos made a seesaw movement in the air with one hand. “Anyhow, you are welcome. You look well.”

“I hope so. But I was beginning to wonder. Ariadne gave me the cold shoulder just now. She didn’t seem to recognise me at all.”

Patroclos Two shrugged.

“Ariadne meets a lot of people … Now, will you have a drink? A cigar?”

The Saint accepted a Peter Dawson, declined a jumbosize cigar, and settled into a deep leather chair. The Patroclos double watched.