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Lostman's River. Seems like you was still waitin' theah when the Coastguard
Cutter comes nosin' around. Had one helluvan explosion offa that coast night
before last, too. The Navy seems to think somebody blew up a submarine."
The Saint sipped his drink.
"It sounds fair enough," he remarked. "The first time we met was on account
of an explosion. There were a few small bangs in between. And now we can
finish on a last big blow-up. It rounds everything out so nicely ... Or have
you got some extra professional reason for all these questions?"
Haskins reloaded his glass and repeated his remarkable feat of finding a
third separate passage through his mouth. He wiped his lips with his large
spotted cotton handkerchief.
"No, son," he admitted. "Professionally speakin', I ain't got no business to
ask questions. Seems a whole lot o' big fellers come down from Washington to
take charge, an' they tell all us local officers not to meddle with any of it.
Seems it ain't supposed to be any concern of ours even if our respected
citizen Randolph March is one o' those dead bodies out at Lostman's River. We
ain't even supposed to discuss it with nobody till they get ready to issue an
official report from the State Department But you can't blame me for being
curious."
"Naturally I don't blame you," Simon agreed gravely.
Haskins rubbed the side of his long nose, hopefully at first, then with
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increasing depression.
"Well," he said at last, "that shuah is plumb understandin' of you,"
I'm sorry," said the Saint "But those guys from Washington told me the same
thing too. And since they were good enough not to keep me locked up, I think I
ought to play ball with them. They'll break the whole story as soon as they're
set for it."
Haskins drank again, gloomily.
"O' course," he said, "I don't rightly know if that covers a feller in
Ochopee who's swore out a warrant agin you for assaultin' him an stealin' his
blasted car."
"Are you going to serve it?"
"Nope," Haskins said. "I tore it up. I figured it warn't legal. Who the hell
ever heard o' callin' a boat with ten-foot wheels on it a car?"
Simon lighted a cigarette with some care.
"Daddy," he said softly, "I was wondering whether you ever switched from rye
whiskey if a friend of yours offered to buy a quart of champagne."
"That, son," said the Sheriff, "is something that nobody of my acquaintance
has ever offered to buy; but with the thirst I'm luggin" around today I might
give anythin' a try."
Simon caught the elusive bartender and placed the order.
"And after all," he said, "who ever heard of calling a mild scalp massage an
assault?"
"I dunno as I'd go all that way with you," Haskins demurred judicially. "But
seein' as this feller was workin' for Mr March, in a manner o' speakin', I
figured mebbe no one would care very much."
"You mean it was nothing but curiosity that brought you here?"
The Sheriff hunched his sinewy black shoulders and stared up at the clock
over the bar. He shuffled a little stiffly on the stool.
"Son," he said, "I told you once I had a sorter weakness for redheads myself.
This afternoon it seemed that I ought to check up on one that we both know.
She was packin' bags in an almighty hurry when I got theah. Seems she had to
catch a plane to somewheres in South America this evening. I reckon she just
made it by now. But she took time out to write a letter an' she asked me to
give it to you after the plane left."
He dragged an envelope out of an inner pocket and laid it on the bar.
Simon picked it up and opened it with hands of surgical precision.
Dear Saint:
When I made a date for tonight, I meant it. But it doesn't seem as if any of
us belong to ourselves any more. And there is so little time. I've had new
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orders already, to begin at once-and that means at once. I'll barely have time
to pack. I can't even say Goodbye to you. I had thought of calling you to meet
me at the airport, but now Haskins is here and I think I'll send this note by
him instead. The other would have been much harder for both of us.
1 could say Thank you, Thank you, a million times, and it wouldn't mean
anything. You know yourself fust how much you've done, as I know it too, and
as they know it by now in London as well as Washington. That should be enough
for both of us. But we both know that it's still only a beginning. Both of us
will have so much more to do before we can sit back in our armchairs again.
And fust for myself alone, it isn't enough either. That's why I'd rather
write this than have to see you again. I can't help it, darling. In spite of
all the impossibilities, I still want that evening that we never had.
So silly, isn't it? But if miracles happen and both of us are still alive
when all this is over-we might meet somewhere. It won't ever happen, of
course, but I want to think about it now.
Goodbye. 1 love you.
Karen
Dry champagne frothed on the bar. Simon looked at the label on the bottle as
he folded the letter slowly and put it away. Bollinger '28. That was what they
had drunk when they first met He could see her still as he had seen her then,
with her pale perfect face and flaming hair, and the deep violet of her eyes.
And he saw her as she had last been beside him, with his gun speaking from her
hand. And so-that was the story
Abruptly he raised his glass.
"Good luck," he said.
Sheriff Haskins held him with that shrewd timeless gaze.
"I'll say that to her too, son."
"You've been a good father to me, daddy." The Saint split a paper match with
his thumbnail and twirled it in his glass, absently swizzling bubbles out of
the wine. "Do you mind if I'm curious too? I'm not so used to all this
co-operation from the Law."
Haskins' jutting Adam's apple took a downward journey and vanished behind his
black string tie.
"Well, son, it's like this. A lot o' strange critters bed together [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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