13 The Saint Intervenes (Boodle)

Even by the elastic standards of the world in which they moved, it was an unusual combination. Mr. Sidney Immelbern had none of the Colonel's distinguished style—he was a stocky man with an unrefined and slightly oriental face, who affected check tweeds of more than dashing noisiness and had an appropriate air of smelling faintly of stables. But they had worked excellently together in the past, and only in such rare but human excesses of recrimination as that which has just been recorded did they fail to share a sublime confidence that their team technique would shine undimmed in brilliance through the future, as and when the opportunity arose.

The unfortunate part was that the opportunity did not arise. For close upon eight weeks it had eluded them with a relentlessness which savoured of actual malice. True, there had been an American at the Savoy who had seemed a hope­ful proposition, but he had turned out to be one of those curious people who sincerely disapprove of gambling on prin­ciple; an equally promising leather merchant from Leicester had been recalled home by an ailing wife a few hours before they would have made their kill. The profession of confidence man requires capital—he must maintain a good appearance, invest lavishly in food and wine, and be able to wait for his profits. It was not surprising that Messrs. Uppingdon and Immelbern should watch the dwindling of their resources with alarm, and at times give way to moments of spleen which in more prosperous days would never have smirched their mutual friendship.

But with almost sadistic glee their opportunity continued to elude them. The lounge of the Palace Royal Hotel, where they sat sipping their expensive drinks, was a scene of life and gaiety; but the spirit of the place was not reflected in their faces. Among the lunch-time cocktail crowd of big business men, young well-groomed men, and all their chosen women, there appeared not one lonely soul with the unmistakable air of a forlorn stranger in the city whom they might tactfully accost, woo from his glum solitude with lunch and friendship, and in due course mulct of a contribution to their exchequer proportionate to his means. Fortune, they felt, had deserted them for ever. Nobody loved them.

"It is," admitted Lieut.-Colonel Uppingdon, breaking the silence, "pretty bloody."

"It is," concurred Mr. Immelbern, and suddenly scowled at him. "What's that?" he added.

Somewhat vaguely, the Colonel was inclining his head. But the remarkable point was that he was not looking at Mr. Im­melbern.

"What is what?" he inquired, making sure of his ground.

"What's that you're staring at with that silly look on your face?" said Mr. Immelbern testily.

"That young fellow who just came in," explained the Colo­nel. "He seemed to know me."

Mr. Immelbern glanced over the room. The only man whom he was able to bring within the limits of his partner's rather unsatisfactory description was just then sitting down at a table by himself a few places away—a lean and somehow danger­ous-looking young man with a keen tanned face and very clear blue eyes. Instinctively Mr. Immelbern groped around for his hat.

"D'you mean he's a fellow you swindled once?" he de­manded hastily.

Uppingdon shook his head.

"Oh, no. I'm positive about that. Besides, he smiled at me quite pleasantly. But I can't remember him at all."

Mr. Immelbern relaxed slowly. He looked at the young man again with diminished apprehension. And gradually, decisively, a certain simple deduction registered itself in his practised mind.

The young man had money. There was no deception about that. Everything about him pointed unobtrusively but unequiv­ocally towards that one cardinal fact. His clothes, immacu­lately kept, had the unostentatious seal of Savile Row on every stitch of them. His silk shirt had the cachet of St. James's. His shoes, brightly polished and unspotted by the stains of traffic, could never have been anything but bespoke. He had just given his order to the waiter, and while he waited for it to arrive he was selecting a cigarette from a thin case which to the lay eye might have been silver, but which Mr. Immel­bern knew beyond all doubt was platinum.

There are forms of instinct which soar beyond all physical explanations into the clear realms of clairvoyance. The homing pigeon wings its way across sightless space to the old roost. The Arabian camel finds the water-hole, and the pig detects the subterranean truffle. Even thus was the clairvoyance of Mr. Immelbern.