The Saint held out his hand and smiled . . .
Crack!
The bullet actually grazed Simon’s arm, and he saw Algy’s eyes glaze over suddenly. The Saint was still holding the Tiger’s hand. A great silence followed the reverberation of the shot, and in that silence, without a word, the Tiger swayed and toppled to the floor. He lay there on his back, and above his heart, in the dark stuff of the bathing costume which he still wore, a darker stain was spreading. . . .
The Saint bent over him, but the man was dead.
Simon took in the situation out of the corner of his eye. Maggs and Bloem were crouching back against the bulkhead, but Bittle stood up, still holding the smoking revolver which he had snatched from the floor while the Tiger’s attention was distracted.
The Saint straightened up, and in the same movement Anna flashed from her sheath to his hand and whistled across the saloon like a humming flake of light. It drove into Bittle’s exposed wrist, severing flesh and sinew and grating on the bone, for the Saint could throw knives with unerring accuracy. Bittle’s hand relaxed limply. He dropped the revolver and flinched back, clawing at the knife which still hung from his arm.
The Saint was standing across the Tiger’s body with both the Tiger’s automatics trained on the little group.
“Treacherous to the last, Bittle,” said the Saint. “But I saw you, and for that shot you will hang at Exeter in about three months’ time.”
And at that instant the ship was flooded with a blinding light. Over the Saint’s shoulder, the three men could see, far astern, the blinding eyes of two powerful searchlights which converged on the ship.
“That will be Carn,” said Simon, without taking his gaze from his prisoners, and at that moment Orace and Patricia returned, sick with fear, for they had heard Bittle’s shot.