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show of state for one insignificant guest, and who believed so clearly and
logically in the survival of the fittest, would not find it hard to
rationalize any expedient which helped him towards his unmistakable goal of
power.
Abstractedly the Saint took off his shoes, his collar and tie, his stiff
shirt. Whatever benefits he might have derived from it, that dinner had put
the finishing touch to his feeling of being a passive calf in process of
fattening for the slaughter; and it was not a feeling that fitted very easily
on his temperament. He pulled off his socks, because the night was sultry, and
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drifted about the room in his singlet and trousers, smoking a cigarette. As if
he had never thought of it before, it came to him, as he paced up and down,
that his bare feet were absolutely soundless on the carpet. Almost
absentmindedly he picked up the white waistcoat which he had discarded. In one
pocket of it was a burglarious instrument with which he had taken the
precaution of providing himself before he left his own home, with a nebulous
eye to possible voyages of exploration on the Nordsten premises, and which he
had thoughtfully transferred from his day suit when he changed. . . .
He watched, with the lights out, until the strip of light under the outer
door of his suite turned black as the corridor lights were switched off; and
then he waited half an hour longer before he set to work on the lock. He
realized that it was not outside the realms of probability that the same
thoroughness which had caused those minute electric contacts to be fitted to
the windows might have provided some similar system of alarms on the door; but
that was a risk which had to be taken, and possibly several glasses of Ivar
Nordsten's excellent port on top of twelve hours' enforced passivity had made
him a trifle light-headed. Every now and then he stopped, motionless, without
even breathing, and listened for any whisper of sound that might betray a
guard prowling around the passages; but he could hear nothing. And at last he
was able to turn the handle noiselessly and slip out into the silent darkness
of the house.
A tentative needle of light skimmed away from the Saint's hand, dabbed at the
floor and walls, and vanished again. It came from the masked bulb of a tiny
pocket torch which was another semi-burglarious instrument that he had brought
with him. And thereafter, with only that one brief glimpse of the route ahead
to refresh his memory, he disappeared into the blackness like a roving ghost.
His objective, in so far as he had an objective at all, was the library where
cocktails had been served before dinner. If there were any intriguing
developments to be unearthed in that house, the library seemed the obvious
place to begin a search for them; and he had always been a sublime optimist.
He reached the head of the staircase and stopped there to listen. A pale blue
glimmer of light came through the studio window on the stairway and achieved
little more than taking the harsh deadness off the dark for half a flight. A
faint musty smell touched the Saint's sensitive nostrils; and he stood for a
moment breathing it silently, like a wild animal, with an invisible frown
creasing his forehead. But the associations of it eluded him, and with a
slight shrug he set one foot stealthily on the first downward step.
As he did so he heard the scratching.
It was a queer soft noise, like some very light-footed thing with nailed
shoes pacing across a parquet floor. It seemed to take one or two steps, while
he listened with his heart beating a shade faster; then it stopped; then it
came again. And then the silence came down once more.
Simon remained motionless, a mere patch of shadow in the dark, so still that
he could feel the blood pounding steadily in his veins. It came to him, with
great clarity, that there were healthier places for him to be abroad at
midnight than the house of Ivar Nordsten. He had a momentary vision of the
very comfortable bed that was already turned down for him in the very
comfortable bedroom to which he had been assigned, and wondered what on earth
could have made him impervious to its very obvious enticement. But the
scratching sound was not repeated; and at length, with a wry grin, he went on.
He wouldn't stand much chance of completing his tour of investigation, he
reflected ruefully, if a mouse could scare him so easily. . . .
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At last he stepped down on the floor of the hall. An infinitesimal glimmer of
the light from the stairway window still reached there enough to take him to
the library door without the use of his torch. Very gently he turned the
handle; and as he did so he heard the scratching again.
In a flash he had whipped round and shot the pencil beam of his torch towards
it. Even as he did so, he realized that his nerves had got the better of him,
but the impulse was too strong for reason. And as he turned, his right hand
leapt to the automatic at his hip with a grim feeling that if by any chance
the scratching had a human origin it would relieve him considerably to
discover it.
The dimmed beam gave too feeble a light to show him any details. He saw
nothing but a black shadow which filled one far corner, and a pair of eyes
that caught the light and held it in two steady yellowish reflections as large
as walnuts; and one of the happiest moments of his life began when he had got
through the library door and shut it behind him.
Breathing a trifle deeply, he fished a cigarette out of his pocket and
lighted it, keeping his flashlight switched on. If complete disaster had been
the price, he couldn't have denied his nerves that time-honoured consolation.
Whatever the black shadow with the yellow eyes might be, he felt that his
system could stand a snifter of tobacco and an interval of thoughtful repose
before looking at it again. Meanwhile he was on the sanctuary side of the [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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