He gazed at the shares sadly. Then, with a shrug, he replaced them in the envelope and smiled. "May I keep them for a day or two?"
She nodded.
"I'd be frightfully grateful." She was watching him with a blend of amusement and curiosity; and then she laughed. "Excuse me staring at you like this, but I've never met a desperate criminal before. And you really are the Saint — you go about killing dope traffickers and swindlers and all that sort of thing?"
"And that sort of thing," admitted the Saint mildly.
"But how do you find them? I mean, if I had to go out and find a swindler, for instance —"
"You've met one already. Your late employer runs the J. L. Investment Bureau, doesn't he? I can't say I know much about his business, but I should be very surprised if any of his clients made their fortunes through acting on his advice."
She laughed.
"I can't think of any who have done so; but even when you've found your man —"
"Well, every case is taken on its merits; there's no formula. Now did you ever hear what happened to a bloke named Francis Lemuel —"
He amused her for an hour with the recital of some of his more entertaining misdeeds; and when she left she was still wondering why his sins seemed so different in his presence, and why it was so impossible to feel virtuously shocked by all that he admitted he had done.