Alias the Saint Read Online Free PDF Page B

it,” said the Saint generously. “Bring me a bottle of whisky. A new one—and I’ll draw the cork myself.”
    Basher Tope was away five minutes, and at the end of that time he came back and banged an unopened bottle of whisky and a corkscrew down on the table.
    “Bring me two glasses,” said the Saint.
    Basher Tope was back in time to witness the extraction of the cork; and Simon poured a measure of whisky into each glass and splashed water into it.
    “Drink with me, Basher,” invited the Saint cordially, taking up one of the glasses.
    Tope shook his head.
    “I don’t drink.”
    “You’re a liar, Basher,” said the Saint calmly. “You drink like a particularly thirsty fish. Look at your nose!”
    “My nose is my business,” said Tope truculently.
    “I’m sorry about that,” said Simon. “It must be, rotten for you. But I want to see you have a drink with me. Take that glass!”
    “I don’t want it,” Tope retorted stubbornly.
    Simon put his glass down again.
    “I thought the lead cap looked as if it had been taken off very carefully, and put back again,” he said. “I just wanted to verify my suspicions. You can go. Oh, and take this stuff with you and pour it, down the sink.”
    He left Basher Tope standing there and went straight upstairs. The fire ready-laid in his bedroom tempted him almost irresistibly, for he was a man who particularly valued the creature comforts, but he felt that it would be wiser to deny himself that luxury. Anything might happen in that place at night, and Simon decided that the light of a dying fire might not be solely to his own advantage.
    He undressed, shivering, and jumped into bed. He had locked his door, but he considered that precaution of far less value than the tiny little super-sensitive silver bell which he had fixed into the woodwork of the door by means of a metal prong.
    He had blown out the lamp, and he was just dozing when the first alarm came, for he heard the door rattle as someone tried the handle. There followed three soft taps which he had to strain to hear.
    With a groan, Simon flung off the bedclothes, lighted the lamp, and pulled on his dressing gown. Then he opened the door.
    The girl he had met that morning stood outside, and she pushed past him at once and closed the door behind her. The Saint seemed shocked.
    “Don’t you know this is most irregular?” he demanded reprovingly.
    “I haven’t come here to be funny,” she flashed back, in a low voice. “Listen to me–were you talking nothing but nonsense this morning?”
    “Not altogether,” replied Simon cautiously. “Although I don’t mind admitting—”
    “You’re a detective?”
    “Er—occasionally,” said Simon modestly.
    The girl bit her lip.
    “Whom are you after?” she asked.
    Simon’s eyebrows went up.
    “I’m after one or two people,” he said. “Marring and Crantor, for instance, I hope to include in the bag. But the man I’m really sniping for is Bunnywugs.”
    “You mean Professor Raxel?”
    “That’s what he’s calling himself now, is it? I’ve heard him spoken of by a dozen different names, but he’s best known as the Professor. He has a certain reputation.”
    The girl nodded.
    “Well,” she said, “you gave the gang some pretty straight warnings at breakfast. Now I’m warning you. If the Professor’s got a reputation, you can take it from me he’s earned it. You’ve bitten off a lot more than you can chew, Smith, and if you go on playing the fool like this it’ll choke you!”
    “Rameses is rather a mouthful, I grant you, so my friends usually call me Simon,” said the Saint wistfully.
    The girl stamped her foot.
    “You can be funny at breakfast to-morrow, if you live to eat it,” she shot back. “For God’s sake— can’t you see what danger you’re in?”
    “Now I come to think of it,” murmured the Saint, “you must have a name, too.”
    “Tregarth’s my name,” she told him impatiently.
    “It must have been your