“Mind the glass on top. My coat’s up there. Found it? . . . Good. Over you go. Have some beer waiting for me—I’ll need it.”
“I hate leaving you.”
She could just see a tiny flashing blur of white as he moved a little away from the wall, for she was now nearly over, and she recognised it for his familiar smile.
“Tell me that some time when I can make an adequate reply,” he said. “Tinkety-tonk!”
Then she was gone—he drew himself up and almost thrust her down into the road outside.
The pursuers were very near, and the Saint broke off along the wall with a cheery “Tally-ho!” so that there should be no mistake as to his whereabouts. His job at the moment was to divert the attention of the hunt until the girl had reached safety. He also had a vague idea of taking a look at some of the other rooms of the house—it was only a vague idea, for the Saint was the most blithely irresponsible man in the world, and steadfastly refused to burden himself with a cut-and-dried programme.
Again he distanced the pursuit, working away from the wall to minimise the risk of being cornered, and trying to make enough noise to persuade the enemy that they were still chasing two people. Once, pausing in silence to re-locate the trackers, he heard a scuffle not far away, which shortly terminated in an outburst of profanity and mutual recrimination; and the Saint chuckled. In being saved the trouble of distinguishing friend from foe he had an incalculable advantage over the others, although it made him wonder how long it would be before the search became more systematic and electric torches were brought into service. Or would they decide to wait until daylight? The Saint began to appreciate the numerous advantages attached to a garden wall which so effectively shut out the peering of the stray passer-by.
Simon Templar, however, declined to let these portents oppress his gay recklessness. There seemed to be some reorganisation going on among the ungodly, following the unfortunate case of mistaken identity, and it occurred to the Saint that the fun was losing the boisterous whole-heartedness which had ennobled its early exuberance. No sooner had this chastening thought struck him than he set out to restore the former state of affairs. Creeping along towards the main gate, where he expected to find a guard posted, he almost fell over a man crouching by a tree. Templar had the sentinel by the throat before he could cry out; then, releasing the grip of one hand, he firmly but unmistakably tweaked the man’s nose. Before the sentinel had recovered from the surprise, the Saint had thrown him into a thorny bush and was sprinting for the cover on the other side of the drive. He had scarcely gained the gloom of another clump of bushes before the man’s bellow of rage drifted like music to his ears. The cry was taken up from four different points, and the Saint chuckled.
A moment later he was frozen into immobility by the sound of a voice from the house rising above the clamour.
“Stop shouting, you blasted fools! Kahn—come here!”