“How do you feel?” Simon asked unnecessarily.
“Lousy,” said Freddie Pellman, no less unnecessarily. He sank into a chair and squinted blearily over the table. Ginny still had some orange juice in her glass. Freddie drank it, and made a face. He said, “Simon, you should have let the murderer go on with the job. If he’d killed me last night, I’d have felt a lot better this morning.”
“Would you have left me a thousand dollars a day in your will?” Simon inquired.
Freddie started to shake his head. The movement hurt him too much, so he clutched his skull in both hands to stop it.
“Look,” he said. “Before I die and you have to bury me, who is behind all this?”
“I don’t know,” said the Saint patiently. “I’m only a bodyguard of sorts. I didn’t sell myself to you as a detective.”
“But you must have some idea.”
“No more than I had last night.”
A general quietness came down again, casting a definite shadow as if a cloud had slid over the sun. Even Freddie Pellman became still, holding his head carefully in the hands braced on either side of his jawbones.
“Last night,” he said soggily, “you told us you were sure it was someone inside the house. Isn’t that what he said, Esther? He said it was someone who was here already.”