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started on their pilgrimage very recently, for their bare forearms were
practically untouched by the sun. Their hands, in contrast to that unexpected
whiteness of arm, were coarsened with the unmistakable rough griminess of
manual labour, which could hardly overtake the average holiday tramper before
exposure had left its mark on his skin. It was that minor contradiction of
make-up, perhaps, rather than their unfriendly silence, which made Simon
Templar pay particular attention to them; but there was no outward and visible
sign of his interest. He took them in at one casual glance, with all their
individual oddities-a big black-haired man who had not shaved, a thin
fair-haired man with a weak chin, a bald burly man with a vintage-port
complexion, and an incongruously small and nondescript man with a grey
moustache and pince-nez. And beyond that one sweeping survey there was nothing
to show that he had taken any more notice of their existence than he had of
the typical country-hotel wallpaper adorned with strips of pink ribbon and
bouquets of unidentifiable vegetation with which some earlier landlord had
endeavoured to improve his property. He dumped Mr. Uniatz in a seat at a
corner table, taking for himself the chair which commanded a full view of the
room, and cast a pessimistic eye over the menu.
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It offered one of those seductive bilingual repasts with which the traveller
in England, whatever he may have to put up with during the day, is so richly
compensated at eventide.
Potage Birmingham
Boiled Cod au Beurre
Leg de Mouton rôti
Pommes Chips
Spinach
Suet Pudding Fromage-Biscuits
Simon put down the masterpiece with a faint sigh, and opened his
cigarette-case.
 Did I ever tell you, he asked,  about the extraordinary experience of a
most respectable sheep I used to know, whose name was Percibald?
It was plain from the expression on Mr. Uniatz s homely pan that he had never
heard the story. It was equally plain that he was ready to try dutifully to
discover its precise connection with the shindig in hand. The convolutions of
painful concentration carved themselves deeper into his dial.
 Boss 
 Percibald, said the Saint firmly,  was a sheep of exceptionally
distinguished appearance, as you may judge from the fact that he was once the
innocent cause of a libel action in which a famous Cabinet Minister sued the
president and council of the Royal Academy for damages on the grounds that a
picture exhibited in their galleries portrayed him in the act of sharing the
embraces of a nearly nude wench with every evidence of enjoyment. On
investigation it was found that the painting had only been intended for a
harmless pastoral scene featuring a few classical nymphs and shepherds, and
that the artist, feeling that shepherds without any sheep might look somewhat
stupid, had induced Percibald to pose with one of the nymphs in the
foreground. This, however, was merely an incident in Percibald s varied
career. The extraordinary experience I was going to tell you about . . .
He blurbed on, hardening his heart against the pathetic perplexity of his
audience. It is one of the chronicler s major regrets that the extraordinary
experience of Percibald is not suitable for quotation in a volume which may
fall into the hands of ladies and young children; but it is doubtful whether
Mr. Uniatz ever saw the point. Nor was the Saint greatly concerned about
whether he did or not. His main object was to shut off the spate of questions
with which Mr. Uniatz s hairy bosom was obviously overflowing.
At the same time, without ever seeming to pay any attention to them, he was
quietly watching the four men in the opposite corner. After their first
silence they had put their heads together so briefly and casually that if he
had actually taken his eyes off them for a moment he might not have noticed
it. Then an exchange of whispered words opened out into an elaborately natural
argument which he had no trouble to hear even while he was talking himself.
 Well, I know it s on the road to Yeovil. I ve been there often enough.
 Damn it, I was born and brought up in Crewkerne, and I ought to know.
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 I ll bet you a pound you don t.
 I ll bet you five pounds you re talking through your hat.
 Well, you show it to me on a map.
 All right, who s got a map?
It turned out that none of them had a map. The big unshaven man finished [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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