"Miss Dexter was kind enough to tell me where you were staying," said the clipped persuasive voice. "I called her first, of course, to apologise to her... Mr. Templar, I shall enjoy resuming our acquaintance."
"I hope you will," said the Saint.
He put the handpiece back, and lay stretched out on his back for a while with his hands clasped behind his head and his cigarette cocked between his lips, staring uncritically at the opposite cornice.
He had several things to think about, and it was a queer way to be reminded of them — or some of them — item by item, while he was waking himself up and trying to focus his mind on something else.
He remembered everything about Cookie's Cellar, and Cookie, and Dr. Ernst Zellermann, and everything else that he had to remember; but beyond that there was Avalon Dexter, and with her the memory went into a strange separateness like a remembered dream, unreal and incredible and yet sharper than reality and belief. A tawny mane and straight eyes and soft lips. A voice singing. And a voice saying: "I was singing for you... the things I fell in love with you for..."
And saying: "Don't go..."
No, that was the dream, and that hadn't happened.
He dragged the telephone book out from under the bedside table, and thumbed through it for a number.
The hotel operator said: "Thank you, sir."
He listened to the burr of dialling.