The other seemed to consider whether he should accept the invitation, but while he was still making up his mind the Saint crossed the room to the door opposite the french windows and let himself out into the dark bare hall.
His fingers closed on the knob of the library door and turned it slowly without the faintest rattle. His only fear then was that the door itself might creak as it opened, but it swung back with ghostly smoothness as far as he needed to step into the room.
Peter Quentin saw him with an instant's delirious amazement and quickly averted his eyes. The girl saw him, and her face went white with the clutch of wild, half-unbelieving hope before she also looked away. She sat with her head bent and her eyes riveted on the toe of one shoe, her fingers locked together in intolerable suspense. The crudely assembled features of Mr Uniatz contracted in a sudden awful spasm that seemed to squeeze his eyes halfway out of their sockets: if he had been anyone else the observer would have said that he looked as if he had a stomach-ache, but on Mr Uniatz it only looked as if the normal frightfulness of his countenance had been lightly stirred by the ripple of a passing thought. And the Saint moved forward like a stalking leopard until he was so close behind Borieff that he could have bitten him in the neck.
The actual state of Borieff's neck removed the temptation to do this. Instead his right hand whipped around Borieff's gun wrist like a ring of steel, and he spoke into the man's ear.
"Boo," he said.
The man gasped and whirled round convulsively as if he had been touched with a live wire; but the Saint's grip on his wrist controlled the movement and kept the gun twisted harmlessly up towards the ceiling. At the same time Simon's left hand pushed the automatic he had taken from Lasser forward until it met Borieff's ribs.
"I should drop that little toy if I were you," he said. "Otherwise I might get nervous."
He increased the torque on Borieff's wrist to emphasize his point, and the man yelped and let go the gun. Simon kicked it towards the girl.
"Just keep him in order for a minute, will you?" he murmured. "If he does anything foolish mind you hit him in the stomach — it's more painful there."
As she picked up the gun he pushed Borieff away and took out his knife. With a few quick strokes he had Peter free, and then he turned to Hoppy.