The Saint in Miami Read Online Free PDF Page A

bordering the ship channel, he slowed up the Meteor and began to edge her in to the treacherous bank.
    “Pat, old darling,” he said, “you and Peter are going ashore. Hoppy and I are going to pay a call on Comrade March.”
    She looked at him with troubled blue eyes.
    “Why can’t we all go?”
    “Because we’re too big a party for an expedition like this. And because somebody ought to be back at Gilbeck’s to hold the fort in case anything turns up there. And lastly because if anything goes wrong, Hoppy and I might need an alibi. Get going, kids.”
    The Meteor delicately nosed the bank. Peter Quentin jumped out on to the rocks and helped Patricia to follow him. He looked back unwillingly.
    “March’s place is called Landmark Island,” he said. “It’s right next to where his yacht’s anchored. The yacht is a big grey thing with one funnel, and it’s called the March Hare. If you’re not home in two hours we’ll come look for you.”
    Simon waved his hand as the Meteor drifted away in the current Scarcely waiting till they were clear, he stole a notch or two out of the throttle and turned the sleek speedster away in a wide arc. A big passenger ship was crawling up the channel behind him, looming doubly large beside the speeding cars on the Causeway. It’s whistle howled piercingly as they crossed under its bow; and the Saint smiled.
    “Bellow your head off, brother,” he said softly. “Maybe you’re lucky you didn’t sail two hours ago.”
    They headed down the bay at a moderate and inconspicuous pace that hardly raised the voice of the engine above a mutter; and Mr. Uniatz sat up on the narrow strip of deck behind the Saint and tried to bring the conversation back to fundamentals,
“Boss,” he said, “do we bump dis guy March?”
    “That remains to be seen,” Simon told him. “Meanwhile you can take the sack off that sailor.”
    Mr Uniatz clung with the pride of parenthood to his original idea.
    “He’s better in de sack, boss, when we t’row him in. I got it weighted down wit’ some old iron I find in de garage.”
    “Take him out of the sack,” Simon ordered. “You can throw the sack and the old iron in, but make sure he doesn’t go with them.”
    He switched off the engine as Hoppy began moodily to obey. Ahead of them loomed the grey hull of the March Hare. Besides the riding lights, other subdued lights burned on her, illuminating her deck and superstructure with a friendly glow, and at the same time vouching for the fact that there were still people on board who might not be quite so friendly. But to Simon Templar that was merely an interesting detail.
    The delight of his own audacity crept warmingly through his veins as the speedboat drifted silently towards the anchored yacht. The Meteor heeled slightly as Hoppy lowered the weighted sack into the bay.
    “Now whadda we do?” asked Mr Uniatz hoarsely. “He ain’t got nut’n on but his unnerwear.”
    Simon caught the anchor chain and made fast to it, steadying the Meteor with deft but heroic strength to ease her against the hull without a sound that might have attracted the attention of the crew. The moon was over the March Hare’s stem, and it was dark at the bow. His job began to look almost easy.
    ”I’m going on board,” he said. “You wait here. When I let down a rope to you, pass up the body.”
    3
He stretched his muscles experimentally, and felt under the cuff of his left sleeve to make sure that the ivory-hilted throwing knife which had pulled him out of so many tight corners nested there snugly in the sheath strapped to his forearm. Over his head, the anchor chain slanted steeply up to the March Hare’s flaring prow. He gripped the Meteor’s foredeck with soft-shod feet and jumped for the chain, and hung there above the rippling tide as the speedboat floated under him to the length or the painter. Then he went swarming up the chain with the soundless agility of a monkey.
    He reached the hawsehole, and swung both