His clear blue eyes rested on her again, and this time their lazy mockery had a different twinkle. A slow grin etched itself around his mouth.
“Thank God,” he drawled, and held out his hand. She couldn’t help shaking it, and smiling back at him, and suddenly they were laughing together. “Now we can have fun,” he said.
So they were friends.
Simon Templar had to admit that inefficiency at least was not one of Mr Ufferlitz’s failings, or at any rate of his assistants. The head waiter at Giro’s, whom Simon had never seen before in his life, said “Good evening, Miss Quest,” and then, “Good evening, Mr Templar!” with an air of glad surprise, as though he were greeting an old and valued customer who had been away for a long time, and ushered them to a ringside table from which he removed the RESERVED card with a flourish. He said enticingly, “A cocktail to start with?”
“Dry Martinis,” said the Saint, and he bowed and beamed himself away.
“The works,” said April Quest.
“So I see,” murmured the Saint. “Let’s pretend we’re used to it.”
“You’re going to be an experience,” she said. “Did you ever do any acting?”
“Not for the camera.”
“Were you on the stage?”