The Saint in the Sun Read Free Page B

obviously subsidized by the local Society of Osteopaths?”
    But that had been the very night during which, somewhat later, Mr Daniel Tench made his catastrophic verification of the laws of gravity.
    The Saint had been detained all morning by the skeptical inspector of the Police Judiciaire, and when he got back he had found a brief note from Natalie saying that she had gone to Eden Roc with Mrs Noversham. By that time it was already late for lunch, and in any case he thought it might be more opportune to leave them on their own. He left an answering message for her to call him when she came in, and thus it was tea-time when she asked him to meet her at the Martinez, and it was there that he got off the wry reflection that could have been an epitaph on their brief friendship,
“This is another place where the guests often have jewels,” she pointed out.
    “There are so damn many of them,” he complained, “Staying away from them is easier said than done.”
    “And you do like some of the people, don’t you?”
    “I never thought of you as one of the jewelled ones. Which is a compliment to someone’s good taste in settings. Because now I come to think of it, the choice bits of ice I’ve seen you wearing could be worth twice as much as all Bertha Noversham’s rocks, if they’re real. You see how I must have reformed? Something like this has to happen before I even start thinking like a jewel thief.”
    “That isn’t the way Bertha sees it.”
    Her voice was so cool that he stared at her.
    “This is very interesting,” he said. “I know it was my idea for you to give me a build-up, but could you have over-sold yourself?”
    “I don’t know, but I couldn’t cover up for you. When Bertha called me about seven o’clock this morning, she’d just woken up and discovered that someone had taken that precious apron-bag of hers, which she was so sure couldn’t be done. I almost got the giggles when I remembered that the last thing she talked about on the way home last night was how she was going to break down and take something for her insomnia. But by the time I got to her room, she’d already called the manager, and of course they’d already found that man who fell off a balcony, so the police were there, and she’d told them that I knew about her apron and so you certainly knew too. She was much more hep than you thought-she knew who you were all the time. She didn’t blame me for letting you get so much out of me, but I couldn’t deny that you had.”
    “Naturally,” said the Saint, without rancor. “I gathered most of that while I was being grilled, though the inspector did his best not to let on. But it seems to be bothering you more than it does me.”
    She twisted her fingers together-he had not seen her so tensely defensive since their first meeting.
    “How do you explain that man being on your balcony?”
    “Just what the inspector asked me. I asked him if there was a French version of the English or American parable that we all know, only don’t ask me where it’s from, which says that ‘if a man only makes a better mousetrap than his neighbor, though he lives in the heart of a wilderness, the world will beat a path to his door’. I’d hate to calculate how many billions the advertising industry has spent to prove that this is the silliest old saw that ever lost its teeth, but it still works for me. At one time in the shocking days you’ve heard about, I managed to become the best-known alleged crook since Raffles. Since then, there has been the dreariest procession of otherwise bright lads who could think of no more dazzling climax to their careers than to leave their tracks on my doorstep. Brother Tench was only the latest, but he won’t be the last.”
    “He had Bertha’s apron, with all her jewels-she got them all back, I suppose you know. But what would he have done with them in your room?”
    “He could ‘ve afforded to drop one piece, or even just one stone. And then with only