But there was one place, one institution, that the Saint could have found in spite of far more sweeping changes in the geography of the city. Lexington Avenue could still be followed south to 45th Street; and on 45th Street Chris Cellini should still be entertaining his friends unless a tidal wave had removed him catastrophically from the trade he loved. And the Saint had heard no news of any tidal wave of sufficient dimensions for that.
In the circumstances, he had less than no right to be paying calls at all; in a city even at that moment filled with angry and vigilant men who were still searching for him, he should have stayed hidden and been grateful for having any place to hide; but it would have taken more than the combined dudgeon of a dozen underworlds and police forces to keep him away. He had to eat; and in all the world there are no steaks like the steaks that Chris Cellini broils over an open fire with his own hands. The Saint walked with an easy, swinging stride, his hands tucked in his trouser pockets, and the brim of his hat tilted at a reckless angle over his eyes. The lean brown face under the brim of the hat was open for all the world to see; the blue eyes in it were as gay and careless as if he had been a favoured member of the Four Hundred sauntering forth towards an exclusive cocktail party; only the slight tingling in his superb lithe muscles was his reward for that light-hearted defiance of the laws of chance. If he were interfered with on his way—that would be just too bad. The Saint was prepared to raise merry hell that night; and he was sublimely indifferent to the details of where and how the fun broke loose.
But nobody interfered with him on that passage. He turned in, almost disappointed by the tameness of the evening, before the basement entrance of a three-story brownstone house and pressed the bell at the side of the iron-barred door. After a moment the inner door opened, and the silhouette of a stocky shirt-sleeved man came out against the light.
"Hullo, Chris," drawled the Saint.
For a second or two he was not recognized; and then the man within let out an exclamation:
"Buon Dio! And where have you been for so many years?"
A bolt was drawn, and the portal was swung inwards. The Saint's hand was taken in an iron grip; another hand was slapping him on the back; his ears throbbed to a rich, jovial laughter.
"Where have you been, eh? Why do you stay away so long? Why didn't you tell me you were coming, so I could tell the boys to come along?"
"They aren't here tonight?" asked the Saint, spinning his hat dexterously onto a peg.
Chris shook his head.
"You ought to of telephoned, Simon."
"I'm just as glad they aren't here," said the Saint looking at him; and Chris was serious suddenly.
"I'm sorry—I forgot. . . . Well, you know you will be all right here." He smiled, and his rich voice brightened again. "You are always my friend, whatever happens."
He led the Saint down the passage towards the kitchen, with a brawny arm around his shoulders. The kitchen was the supplement to the one small dining-room that the place boasted—it was the sanctum sanctorum, a rendezvous that was more like a club than anything else, where those who were privileged to enter found a boisterous hospitality undreamed of in the starched expensive restaurants, where the diners are merely so many intruders, to be fed at a price and bowed stiffly out again. Although there were no familiar faces seated round the big communal table, the Saint felt the reawakening of an old happiness as he stepped into the brightly lighted room, with the smell of tobacco and wine and steaming vegetables and the clatter of plates and pans. It took him back at one leap to the ambrosial nights of drinking and endless argument, when all philosophies had been probed and all the world's problems settled, that he had known in that homely place.
"You'll have some sherry, eh?"
Simon nodded.
"And one of your steaks," he said.
He sat back and sipped the drink that Chris brought him, watching the room through half-closed eyes. The flash of jest and repartee, the crescendo of discussion and the ring of laughter, came to his ears like the echo of an unforgettable song. It was the same as it had always been—the same humorous camaraderie presided over and kept vigorously alive by Chris's own unchanging geniality. Why were there not more places like that in the world, he began to wonder— places where a host was more than a shopkeeper, and men threw off their cares and talked and laughed openly together, without fear or suspicion, expanding cleanly and fruitfully in the glow of wine and fellowship?
But he could only take that in a passing thought; for he had work to do that night. The steak came—thick, tender, succulent, melting in the mouth like butter; and he devoted himself to it with the wholehearted concentration which it deserved. Then, with his appetite assuaged, he leaned back with the remains of his wine and a fresh cigarette to ponder the happenings of the day.
At all events he had made a good beginning. Irboll was very definitely gone; and the Saint inhaled with deep contentment as he recalled the manner of his going. He had no regrets for the foolhardy impulse that had made him attach his own personal signature uncompromisingly to the deed. Some of the terror that had once gone with those grotesque little drawings still clung to them in the memories of men who had feared them in the old days; and with a little adroit manipulation much of that terror could be built up again. It was good criminal psychology, and Simon was a great believer in the science. Curiously enough, that theatrical touch would mean more to a brazen underworld than anyone but an expert would have realized; for it is a fact that the hard-boiled gangster constitutes a large proportion of the dime novelette's most devoted public.
At any rate, it was a beginning. The matter of Irboll had been disposed of; but Irboll was quite a minor fish in the aquarium. Valcross had been explicit on that point. The small fry were all right in their appointed place: they could be neatly dismembered, drenched in ketchup and tabasco, exquisitely iced, and served up for a cocktail—on the way. But one million dollars of anybody's money was the price of the leaders of the shoal; and apart from the simple sport of rod and line, Simon Templar had a nebulous idea that he might be able to use a million dollars. Thinking it over, he had some difficulty in remembering a time when he could not have used a million dollars.
"If you offered me a glass of brandy," he murmured, as Chris passed the table, "I could drink a glass of brandy."
There was a late edition of the World-Telegram abandoned on the chair beside him, and Simon picked it up and cast an eye over the black banner of type spread across the front page. To his mild surprise he found that he was already a celebrity. An enthusiastic feature writer had launched himself on the subject with justifiable zeal; and even the Saint was tempted to blush at the extravagant attributes with which his modest personality had been adorned. He read the story through with a quizzical eye and the faintest suspicion of a smile on his lips.
And then the smile disappeared. It slid away quite quietly, without any fuss. Only the lazy blue gaze that scanned the sheet steadied itself imperceptibly, focusing on a name that had cropped up once too often.
He had been waiting for that—searching, in a detached and comprehensive way, for an inspiration that would lead him to a renewal of the action—and the lavish detail splurged upon the circumstances of his latest sin by that enthusiastic feature writer had obliged. It was, at least, a suggestion.
The smile came back as he stood up, draining the glass that had been set in front of him. People who knew him said that the Saint was most dangerous when he smiled. He turned away and clapped Chris on the shoulder.