He had no time to make any plan, he would have to play it entirely by ear, but at least he could give himself the priceless advantage of the initiative, of throwing them off balance and forcing them to react, while giving them the impression that he knew exactly where he was going.
Before anyone else could do it, he flung open the door and stood squarely in the opening, the shotgun levelled from his hip.
“Were you looking for me?” he inquired mildly.
Pure shock froze them in odd attitudes like a frame from a movie film stopped in mid-action, a ludicrous tableau of gaping mouths and bulging eyes. The apparition on the very threshold of their secret conclave of the man they had been trying to dispose of in one way or another for a day and two nights, who must have been responsible for their recent rout before the armed forces of justice, and who they had every right to believe had at least temporarily been shaken off, would have been enough to immobilize them for a while even without the menace of his weapon.
There were four of them: nearest the Saint, a stocky man with a porcine face and a scar, and a taller cadaverous one with thick lips which made him look like a rather negroid death’s-head, both of whom Simon had seen at the bedside of Don Pasquale, and behind them Al Destamio and the man called Cirano with the nose to match it. They had been sitting around a circular dining table on which were glasses and a bottle of grappa, under a single light bulb with a wide conical brass shade over it. Cigarette and cigar ashes and butts soiled a gilt-edged plate that had been used as an ashtray.
Destamio was the first to recover his wits.
“It’s a bluff,” he croaked. “He only has two shots with that thing. He dare not use it because he knows that even if he gets two of us the other two will get him.”
He said this in plain Italian, for the Saint’s benefit.
Simon smiled.
“So which two of you would like to be the heroes, and sacrifice yourselves for the other two?”
There was no immediate rush of volunteers.
“Then move back a bit,” ordered the Saint, swinging the shotgun. “You’re not going anywhere.”
Scarface and Skullface gave ground, not unwillingly; but Destamio kept behind Skullface, whose bulk was not quite sufficient to mask the protrusion of Destamio’s elbow as his right hand crept up his side. Simon’s restless eyes caught the movement, and his voice sliced through the smoky air like a sword.
“Stop him, Cirano! Or you may never find out why he is a bad security risk.”
“I would like to know about that,” Cirano said, and widened his mouth in a tight grin that made double pothooks on each side of his majestic nose.
He did more than talk; he caught hold of Destamio’s right wrist, arresting its stealthy crawl towards the hip. Their muscles conflicted for a second before Destamio must have realized that even the slightest struggle would nullify any advantage he might have sneaked, and hatred replaced movement as an almost equally palpable link between them.
“You would listen to anyone if he was against me, non è vero?” Destamio snarled. “Even to this—”
“A good leader listens to everything before he makes up his mind, Alessandro,” Cirano said equably. “You can be the first to sacrifice yourself when he has spoken, if you like, but there can be no harm in hearing what he has to say. You have nothing to cover up, have you?”
Destamio growled deep in his throat, but made no articulate answer. He abandoned his effort reluctantly, with a disgusted shrug that tried to convey that anyone stupid enough to accept such reasoning deserved all the nonsense that it would get him. But his beady eyes were tense and vicious.
“That’s better,” drawled the Saint. “Now we can have a civilized chat.”
He advanced to within reach of the bottle on the table, picked it up, and took a sampling swig from it, without shifting his gaze from his captive audience. He lowered the bottle again promptly, with a grimace and a shudder, but did not put it down.
“Ugh,” he said politely. “I don’t wonder that people who drink this stuff start vendettas. I should start my first one with the distiller.”
“How did you get here?” Cirano asked abruptly.
“A stork brought me,” said the Saint. “However, if you were wondering whether I had some connivance from your guard at the gate outside, forget it. He never drew a disloyal breath, poor fellow. But he had an acute attack of laryngitis. If he is still breathing when you find him, which is somewhat doubtful, I hope you will not add insult to his injuries.”
“At the least, he will have to answer for negligence,” Cirano said. “But since you are here, what do you want?”
“Some information about Alessandro here — for which I may be able to give you some in return.”
“He is playing for time,” Destamio rasped shrewdly. “What could he possibly tell any of you about me?”
“That is what I should like to know,” Cirano said, with his great nose questing like a bird-dog.
He was nobody’s fool. He knew that the Saint would not be standing there to talk without a reason, but he was not ready to jump to Destamio’s conclusion as to what the reason was. Even the remote possibility that there might be more to it than a play for time forced him to satisfy his curiosity, because he could not afford to brush off anything that might weight the scales between them. And being already aware of this bitter rivalry, Simon gambled his life on playing them and their partisans against each other, keeping them too preoccupied to revert to the inexorable arithmetic which added and subtracted to the cold fact that they could overwhelm him whenever they screwed up their resolve to pay the price.
“Of course you know all about his riper or even rottener years,” said the Saint agreeably. “But I was talking about the early days, when the Al we know was just a punk, if you will excuse the expression. Don Pasquale may have known — but doubtless he knew secrets about all of you which he took with him. But Al is older than the rest of you, and there may not be anyone left in the mob who could say they grew up with him. Not many of you can look forward to reaching his venerable old age: there are too many occupational hazards. So there can’t be many people around unlucky enough to be able to recognize him under the name he had before he went to America.”
“He is crazy!” Destamio choked. “You all know my family—”
“You all know the Destamios,” Simon corrected. “And a good sturdy Mafia name it is, no doubt. And a safe background for your new chief. On the other hand, in these troubled times, could you afford to elect a chief with an air-tight charge of bank robbery and murder against him on which he could not fail to be convicted tomorrow — or with which he might be black-mailed into betraying you instead?”
4
Simon Templar knew that at least he had made some impression. He could tell it from the way Skullface and Scarface looked at Destamio, inscrutably waiting for his response. In such a hierarchy, no such accusation, however preposterous it might seem, could be dismissed without an answer.
“Lies! Nothing but lies!” blustered Destamio, as if he would blast them away by sheer vocal volume. “He will say anything that comes into his head—”
“Then why are you raising your voice?” Simon taunted him. “Is it a guilty conscience?”
“What is this other name?” Cirano asked.
“It might be Dino Cartelli,” said the Saint.
Destamio looked at the faces of his cronies, and seemed to draw strength from the fact that the name obviously had no impact on them.
“Who is this Cartelli?” he jeered. “I told you, this Saint is only trying to make trouble for me. I think he is working for the American government.”