The Saint in Miami Read Online Free PDF

legs up to it Manoeuvering himself gingerly, he was able to get the fingers of one hand over the edge of the deck planking near the bow. With a quick muscular twist he sent the other hand up to join it, and chinned himself cautiously.
    With his eyes on a level with his hands, he discerned a deck hand in white ducks leaning over the rail on the opposite side of the bow. Simon lowered himself again, and began to work his way aft with infinite patience, suspended from the edge of the deck by nothing but the grasp of his bent fingers.
    When he was almost amidships he chinned himself again. This time the forward end of the deckhouse secured him from the danger of being caught at a disadvantage if the man in white had happened to rum round, and there was no one else to be seen from that angle. He freed one hand and reached up for the lowest bar of the rail. In a few seconds more he was standing on the deck and melting into the nearest pool of shadow.
    From the stem of the yacht, soft voices and the tinkle of ice in glasses mingled with the faint music of a low-tuned radio. Motionless against the side of the deckhouse, Simon listened for an envious moment, and discovered that his throat was parched from the salt air and the neat whisky he had swallowed. The melodious sounds of tiny icebergs in cold fluid were almost more than his resolution could resist; but he knew that those amenities had to wait He started back towards the bow with the flowing stealth of a cat.
    The seaman at the rail had not moved, and did not move as Simon crept up to him on noiseless rubber soles. The Saint studdied his position scientifically, and tapped him on the shoulder.
    The man spun round with a hiccup of startlement With his mouth hanging open, he had time to glimpse the sheen of a shaded deck light on crisp black hair, the chiselled leanness of devil-may-care lines of cheekbone and jaw, a pair of mocking blue eyes and a reckless mouth that completed the picture of a younger and streamlined reincarnation of the privateers who once knew those coasts as the Spanish Main. It was a face which by no stretch of imagination could have belonged to any ally of his, and the seaman knew it intuitively; but his reactions were much too slow. As he reached defensively for a belaying pin socketed in the rail near by, a fist that seemed to be travelling with the weight and velocity of a power-diving aeroplane struck him accurately on the point of the chin, which he had carefully placed in the exact position where Simon had planned for him to put it.
    Simon caught him neatly as he fell.
    An open hatch just forward of the deckhouse gave him a view down a narrow companion into a lighted alleyway. Simon hitched the unconscious man on to his shoulder and carried him down.
    The alley contained four doors labelled with neatly stencilled letters. The inscription on one door said STORES. Open, it revealed a dark locker which exhaled an odour of paint and tar. It took exactly three minutes to truss the victim, gag him with his own socks and handkerchief, and tuck him away inside. After which Simon examined the other resources of that very conveniently located storeroom.
    He returned to the deck with a length of rope and a stout piece of wood slotted at each end, known to seafaring persons as a bosun’s chair. He moved along the rail until he was directly over the Meteor, rigged the chair, and lowered it over the side.
    A jacketed steward came out on deck amidships, carrying a tray, and turned aft. Simon crouched like a statue by the rail and watched him go. The steward had not even glanced in that direction when he emerged; but there was some slight difficulty in judging how long he would be gone, and on the return trip he could hardly help noticing Simon’s operations at the bow.
    Hoppy gave a couple of tugs at the rope to signal that the cargo was ready to load.
    There was still no sign of the steward returning.
    “Well,” said the Saint, to his guardian angel, “We’ve