Capture the Saint

1

The Saint opted for optimism. Walking eastbound up Olive Avenue, his eyes scanned the curbside for a restored Hirondel, Desurio, Furillac, or Bugatti 41 Royale. He saw no vehicle which would induce any sane individual to name it The Saintmobile, especially not the half-primer, half painted metallic copper Volvo GL station wagon, complete with luggage rack.

“We read in one of the books that you drove a Volvo,” offered the tall Daniel, “and we figured we could really spiff this up and make it Saintly, for example...”

The Saint, conscious of time and appointments, cut Dan off while scooping the keys from his hand.

“Putting me behind the wheel will add a touch of authenticity,” insisted Simon as they climbed aboard. A throaty roar, a cavalcade of rattles, and a lurching gear-catch later, Simon and his couplet entourage were on their way to the Sanitary Market Building. A glance at his watch assured him that he was running right on schedule. A quick phone call to Vi Berkman from his hotel room had rescheduled their meeting from morning to immediate. As he told her at their conversation’s conclusion, “I might have to kill more than one man tonight after all.”

“The difference between crime in fiction and crime in real life,” explained the Saint to his enraptured passengers as they threaded through Seattle’s downtown traffic. “is that writers give more thought to the structure, motive, and execution of crimes than do criminals, insisting every plot twist be logically motivated; every detail painstakingly dove-tailed. From my experience, which we can all agree is extensive,” Simon elaborated as he slowed down the windshield wipers to match pace with the diminishing rain, “the ungodly are too self-centered to seriously consider the contingencies, conditions, or coincidences destined to rip their little webs to pieces. Take, for example, a peculiar little liar I encountered only this evening...”

The Saint amused Dan and Ian with essential exposition of the story thus far, concluding with a demonstration of his astonishing ability to parallel park a Volvo wagon in a space intended for an Izetta.

Vi Berkman arrived only moments earlier, stilled the ignition of her BMW, and waited behind secured doors and smoked glass for signs of the Saint. Even in the acoustically engineered silence of her vehicle’s interior, she heard the distinctive cry of metal in despair as the Volvo braked without pads.

Viola Berkman emerged from the German import, hailed the Saint with a friendly wave, and shook her head in amusement. Simon waited while the exhaust system sputtered itself to a shaking expiration before pulling on the doorhandle.

“Hi, Vi,” said the Saint cheerfully. He threw open the door, swung his feet to the wet pavement, and stood gentlemanly erect. “These two are Dan and Ian, the lost boys. I commandeered their car and dragged them along in a swaggering tribute to their swashbuckling fantasies. Besides,” explained Simon, slamming the Volvo door behind him, “I felt less conspicuous driving Seattle’s most common vehicle of choice than if I hailed a cab or wandered about the Westin’s parking garage searching for my rented Chevrolet.”

“Less conspicuous?” Vi giggled, pressing finger tips to lips. “Look at the...” momentarily silenced by mirth, she delayed the sentence’s conclusion, “passenger side.”

Simon raised an accusing eyebrow at the two young men starring sheepishly at their shoes. The Saint circled the vehicle, and espying the impetus for Ms Berkman’s amusement, covered his eyes, moaned, and peeked warily through his fingers.

The boys, abashed, remained in apologetic silence. Summoning his resolve, the Saint dropped his hands and stepped back to more fully appreciate the artistry of the large decorative addition to station wagon’s passenger door: an iridescent red stick-figure topped by a rakishly tilted halo. Above it, equally iridescent and no less irritating, was painted the designation, “The Saintmobile.”

“Simply displaying my initials on the license plate would have sufficed.”

“We thought of that,” admitted Ian proudly, his intended elaboration curtailed by a sharp elbow to the ribs.

“Even without this four-wheeled billboard,” admitted the Saint, “it is only prudent to assume we’ve been followed.” True concern captured the features of Viola Berkman, and a more subtle expression summoned the Saint to her side.

“Some material may not be...” Berkman trusted Simon knew the phrase.

“Suitable for children,” completed the Saint, “but Daniel Long Noodle is a full grown marine biologist,” he reasoned aloud, “and the other one,” Simon realized he had no clue as to Ian’s career, “eats peanut butter cups for a living.”

“I heard that,” said Ian, “and it’s an avocation, not a vocation. But how did you know?”

“Candy wrappers in the car, chocolate smudges above your pockets,” the Saint recited the litany’s balance without emotion, his iron sight scanning intersections and alley entrances. Vi Berkman crossed to her car, removed a hefty black leather purse, and locked the BMW.

“C’mon,” said Vi, “it’s time for your lesson in contemporary street reality.”

The lesson began with a quick tour of Seattle’s First Avenue in the vicinity of the Pike Place Market. It was nothing that the Saint had not seen before in Times Square or Soho, except on a more confined scale. The unescorted women, underdressed and overly made-up, attempting conversation with passing males; irrational street people babbling beside overstuffed shopping carts; vacant eyed men waiting at bus-stops but never getting on board; children too young to be out alone stepping into cars with strangers.

“Where do these kids live,” asked Simon, although he could guess the answer.

“They don’t,” offered Vi ruefully. “If you mean where do they sleep, it could be anywhere, with anyone who’ll also fill their stomach or feed their habits. They grow up without maturing, age without wisdom, and die too young — inside and out. And the real tragedy is,” Vi said with a sigh that came from depths of caring, “they are tender little plants that have been denied shelter, exposed to the harshest elements our greatly vaunted civilization has to offer, and abandoned.”

They walked without speaking, hearing wolfwhistles, car honks, and rude epithets mingling with the rinky-dink disco soundtrack accompanying the bikini-clad women with surgically augmented figures dancing in the window of “Uncle Elmo’s Adult Emporium and Good Time Arcade.”

“Those must be Elmo’s nieces,” commented the Saint as they passed the gyrating display of enhanced allure, “I’m sure they’re a close family.”

“Elmo died with a plastic bag over his head six months ago,” stated Vi dispassionately. “They found his body in a White Center motel room.”

“Suicide, no doubt,” said Simon as if stating the obvious, “achieved after a failed attempt to fold himself to death in an ironing board.”

“Of course,” concurred Vi, “and now the Good Time Arcade is operated by a nifty little holding company called R.T. Enterprises, Inc.. Nothing illegal about it, but when I consider the ‘R’ and the ‘T’, it gives me the creeps.”

The Saint didn’t have to ask for an explanation.

“ ‘R’ stands for Rasnec,” she continued, “as in Arthur W. Rasnec, attorney at law, and the ‘T’ stands for Talon, as in Detective Dexter Talon of the Seattle Police Department.”

They crossed back to the other side of First Avenue, reversing direction and heading north, stopping to summon Ian and Dan from their temporary fascination with two of Elmo’s more demonstrably attractive relatives.

“And the reason ‘Elmo’s’ survives no matter how many Elmos go to the great arcade in the sky,” remarked the Saint, “is because humans are such easy prey.”

Vi Berkman stopped, shifted her black bag to the opposing shoulder, and looked Simon in the eye.

“Some prey are easier and younger than others.” She dug into her bag, retrieved keys, and unlocked the door to the Sanitary Market Building.

“And,” she said through her teeth, “I have the pictures to prove it.”

Simon allowed Vi, Dan, and Ian to enter while he lagged behind to give the bustling street scene further scrutiny. The Saint’s internal early warning system had already alerted him to the presence of the jungle cat, and the evening’s cavalcade of interconnected, although seemingly unrelated, incidents convinced him that mayhem was imminent.

There was no sudden rush of footsteps on the street, no uncharacteristic slowing of nondescript cars. In maritime parlance, the coast was clear. Unless, the Saint reasoned, the ungodly were ahead of them rather than behind, or simply awaiting a more opportune moment to interfere.

Simon took the steps ahead of him with swift, easy, strides, and caught up with his entourage before Vi could enter her office.

“Allow me,” insisted the Saint coolly, motioning the others aside. Simon opened the door as if anticipating an onrush of enemies.

“Something up, Mr Templar?” Ian spoke, his voice betraying a slight nervous tremor.

The Saint flicked on the overhead lights and crossed to the window, glanced out, and swiveling the latch, pushed it up and open.

Vi walked cautiously over to Simon, dropped her bag on the metal desk, and looked at him with questioning eyes.

“Is there something wrong, or is this ‘Paranoia for The Saint’?”

“I am simply being prudent,” said Simon with a relaxed smile of assurance, “We Saints don’t know the meaning of the word paranoid. Those who say we do are probably plotting against us.”

Simon’s easy manner instilled confidence, but internally the Saint was all steel — his senses intensely acute; balancing probabilities with an agility that would leave a Las Vegas odds maker shaking his head in amazement.

As Vi slid open a file cabinet drawer and removed a manilla folder, the Saint helped himself to a pen and note pad from her desk.

“You boys are about to provide a valuable service,” insisted the Saint, and the two young men snapped to almost military attention.

“First, I want that Volvo moved off the street, then I want you to follow these simple instructions. Here,” he handed Daniel the note, “If you see any problem, tell me now, because this is an important assignment.”

Dan shared the note with Ian while Vi, holding her folder, seemed a bit adrift.

“You want us to grocery shop and pick up your laundry while we’re out?” joked Daniel.

“Yeah,” interrupted Ian, “and you got us meeting a British Airways plane at Sea-Tac, besides.”

The Saint refrained from commenting on Ian’s sentence structure, and instead offered a partial explanation.

“I may be meeting up with you half-way through the scrawled itinerary, but Ms Berkman and I have things we must do before it gets much later. I don’t want her rabbinical spouse to bar her from the house.”

“My rabbinical spouse is used to me coming home at all hours with tales of sin and degradation — not my own, of course — besides, he is expecting Simon and me to join him in less than an hour.”

“So, hop to it, my Cherubs. Complete this assignment and fame will be yours. I’ll nominate Daniel as Maritime Man of the Year, and buy Ian a case of peanut butter cups. And,” said Simon as he handed them an admirable amount of negotiable currency, “here’s a little something extra for your efforts.”

“This is what we get for choosing a life of outlawry,” muttered Daniel in feigned exasperation as Ian and he headed back down toward the building’s main entrance.

“Uh, one question Señor Saint,” said Ian, “Did I hear you mention Thea Foss?”

Simon nodded.

“Cool,” Ian said with approval as he descended the stairs.

“Thea Foss is cool?”

“Yeah, way cool,” called out Ian. “You know, like Dolores Costello.”

The Saint heard the main door open and close, then moved back to the window to watch the boys cross to the Volvo.

“You ready to look at this?” Vi, perhaps from impatience or anxiety, seemed again on edge as she placed the folder on the desk and began pacing about the room.

“As soon as our boys are in the car,” said Simon, watching the lads cross First Avenue. Suddenly three men came up behind the boys, pushing them insistently towards the vehicle.

At the moment the Saint saw the triple threat advance, he instinctively turned determined to leap down the stairs, bolt through the door, and rescue his dutiful admirers. But before he could move, Berkman’s office was enveloped in darkness. To be more precise, it was near darkness, a distinction not lost on the Saint. Yellowed reflected illumination drifted foggily through the open window, providing scant hints of sizes and shapes.

The size and shape of the individual suddenly storming across Vi’s office was, to be polite, exceedingly generous. Were you to stuff an Alaskan brown bear into an ill-fitting ensemble of slacks and sweatshirt, and arm it with a length of pipe, you would have a fair approximation of the intruder’s dimensions and dementia. The unwanted night visitor violently thrust Viola aside before she could scream, and made a determined attack on the Saint.

If this was all Simon had to worry about, he wasn’t worried. The pipe wielding fashion plate with the lumbering gait was no jungle cat, and his offensive moves were as telegraphed as the standard repertoire of a television wrestler.

In the heightened reality of the moment, the Saint choreographed his own counter offensive, still hoping to intersect the Volvo before Dan and Ian were harmed, robbed, or kidnapped.

The bear swung the pipe with a wide round-house right, the type for which any boxer has a professional disdain, and it swished by without impact. It was still in its uninterrupted arc when the Saint launched his jack-hammer fist into the beast’s solar plexus.

In the Saint’s mind, the pipe wielding intruder was already collapsing, devoid of wind and consciousness. In reality, the rocket-launcher impact of Simon’s fist didn’t even slow him down. The Saint found this particularly disconcerting.

Unstoppable as a locomotive, the giant’s bulk sent the Saint sprawling back across the desk, his arm entangled in the straps of Vi’s leather bag, and propelled him over the desk’s edge. Simon’s head banged on the wooden seat of the swivel chair as he, the folder, and the contents of Vi’s purse, spilled over on to the floor.

The pipe again descended, splintering the chair where the Saint’s head had been an only instant before. With his shoulders on the floor and his legs flexed, Simon power-pumped his heels directly into an exceptionally sensitive area of his adversary’s anatomy. Far more effective than the solar plexus punch, the kick inflicted immeasurable discomfort, sent the brute stumbling back against the filing cabinet, and temporarily forestalled a renewed attack.

Three distinct sounds merged in the Saint’s mind — the giant’s animal moan, the clang of pipe dropping to the floor, and cries from Vi Berkman.

“My purse!” screamed Vi, “My purse!”

While a woman’s purse is often considered an inviolable and sacred item, the Saint rightfully decoded Berkman’s high-pitched exclamations as directives rather than admonitions, immediately perceiving two fascinating items among those loosed from Vi’s purse: a small canister and a long, thin, black flashlight. He didn’t have to read the label to know the canister’s contents. He reached for them both, but the canister rolled away under the desk. The Saint clutched the flashlight, spun his body, and kicked the canister across the floor to where Vi stood shrieking.

Before the Saint could stand, the giant’s massive paws grabbed Simon’s lapels, pulled him off his feet, and brutally banged him against the wall adjacent to the window frame.

In the amber illumination streaming through the window, the Saint saw the man’s eyes. What Simon Templar saw in those eyes would not haunt him for years to come, nor would the image visit him unwanted in the midnight hour.

Simon Templar’s instantaneous accurate appraisal of his assailant’s ocular condition was, while not medically precise, operationally adequate. The eyes were wide, wet, and unnaturally dilated. Stripped of prolixity, suffice it to say, the giant’s mental state was as artificially altered as Elmo’s nieces’ measurements.

The beast pinned Simon against the wall, one huge hand wrapped around the Saint’s throat while he pawed at Simon’s jacket with the other.

“Looking for something?” Simon spoke through a constricted larynx.

Slamming the flashlight’s head against the giant’s left eye, Simon fired the high-powered halogen bulb. The beast’s reaction was sudden, violent, and perfectly predictable. He bellowed, recoiled, clutched his head, and turned directly into the path Viola Berkman.

Vi thrust the canister’s nozzle into the beast’s gaping mouth, pumped a stream of lung-scorching Mace down his throat, and stood aside while Simon Templar smashed the giant’s contorted face with his right fist.

The ominous intruder’s head snapped back as if attempting to escape his ham-like neck. Stumbling clumsily backwards, his arms whirling in wild concentric circles, he came to a gagging, choking standstill against the side wall.

It was, all things considered, not a pretty sight.

The Saint immediately turned to the open window, searching for signs of Daniel and Ian.

The Volvo was gone.

Vi, holding the canister at arm’s length in her tremulous hand, kept the nozzle aimed at the intruder’s ugly face as she felt for the light switch. The flash of flourescence further aggravated the incapacitated attacker who stomped his booted foot in an ineffectual protest.

“OK, Snookums,” drawled the Saint.

“You calling me Snookums?” asked Vi incredulously.

“No, my child, Snookums is the term of endearment I have chosen to bestow upon this horrific specimen of modern male fashion and lapsed social graces,” said Simon as he twirled the retrieved pipe as if it were a baton. “Everything about his behavior, not to mention his wardrobe, is blatantly offensive to prevailing community standards, but it’s only fair that we allow him to offer whimpering excuses and pass the blame on to his tailor and whoever put him up to this.”

The man’s chest heaved labored breath as he emitted an unprintable example of his limited, although colorful, vocabulary. Simon came dangerously closer, slapping the pipe against his palm in a threatening gesture.

“Snookums, dearest, I’m afraid you’ve violated the verbal morality code. And in front of a lady, no less.”

The Saint’s tones were silken, but his eyes were chips of iced lapis. The brute hazily gazed into those famous mocking eyes, but he sought neither depth of emotion nor novel metaphor. The beast was picking a target. Had his vision been more acute, or had Simon Templar been six inches closer, the Saint’s hawk-like profile would have been permanently altered. Instead, the beasts fist slammed solidly into Simon’s forehead.

The Saint, to his perpetual embarrassment, never saw it coming. He did, however, see an astonishing array of lovely geometric patterns pulsating in colorful corroboration with the accompanying pain. Vi, equally surprised, failed to fire the canister, and the beast lurched out the doorway heading for the stairs.

Simon Templar’s powers of stamina and recovery, frequently documented and familiar to followers of the Saga, are the stuff of legend, and the Saint was as eager to preserve his image as he was to prevent his attacker securing an easy escape.

The beast had a good lead, but Simon moved with more agility, catching up at the head of the stairs. Vi, brandishing her canister, scrambled after him.

“Don’t go,” called Simon grabbing the back of the giant’s slacks, “we were just becoming disgusted with you.”

The Saint secured his grip on a handful of waistband, braced himself against the rail, and dug in his heels. Simon was rock-solid; the beast was in direct forward motion; the slacks worn by the fleeing adversary, despite the best intentions of their manufacturer, were never designed to withstand such intense amounts of opposing tension. Bare-bottomed and unexpectedly air-born, the beast flew down the flight of stairs, his face kissing the final few before colliding with, and crashing out, the front door. Pulling the back of his sweatshirt down over his embarrassment, he hurried into the First Avenue throng.

It is of minor sociological significance that nothing about his looks, dress, or behavior prompted a second look from any passers-by.

Simon Templar sat atop the stairs holding his head in one hand and a torn swatch of fabric in the other, his shoulders shaking in silent laughter. Momentarily, he raised his eyes to Vi and waved the pant seat as if it were a checkered flag.

“Snookums escaped by the seat of his pants,” said the Saint with a resigned laugh, “ ‘strong as a racehorse and swift as a rapier’.”

Berkman allowed the canister to hang by her side.

“He was?”

“No, I was, back in the days of my wayward youth.” Simon stood and playfully tossed the torn pant seat at Viola Berkman. She caught it in her left hand. “And our friend Snookums is a pickle packer.”

Vi’s eyebrows aimed for her hairline.

“I beg your pardon.”

“When he had his hand around my throat, I smelled the vanilla,” said Simon as they walked back into Vi’s office, “People who work with pickles rub vanilla on their hands to dispel the smell of brine.”

Vi put the canister and pant seat aside as Simon and she picked the folder and other scattered items off the floor.

“Simply telling me Mr Snookums reeks of vanilla and packs pickles leaves me clueless as to why he ran in here with a pipe and tried to smash your head in,” muttered Vi, as if expecting in-depth exposition of the intruder’s motivations, short term objectives, and long term goals.

Her expectations were not unrealistic, and Simon Templar answered.

“Snookums is not a professional thug. Despite his size and strength, he had to augment his attitude by artificial means — drugs of some kind — before he could take the assignment. His motivation was either promise of reward or fear of punishment, and his failed objective was to liberate a cashier’s check for ten thousand dollars from my pocket.”

“How did he know...”

“He knew because, I firmly believe, the man who gave me the check sent him to get it back.”

“And who...”

“My new business partner,” said the Saint. “but I don’t have much faith in the long term prospects of our relationship. Right now my focus is on more important things, such as your predatory pedophile,” Simon threw a glance at the window, “and the curious misadventures of Daniel and Ian.”

Vi sighed, checked her watch, and reached for the telephone.

“Your pal Snookums cut into our time. I suggest we take the file with us back to my house.”

She punched a rapid succession of buttons, paused, and brightened when her husband answered.

“Hi, hon. Listen, we’re on our way. Yeah. OK. Well, someone who packs pickles and smells like vanilla tried to assault Mr Templar, but,” continued Vi with an affected breathlessness, “the Saint pantsed him and threw him out the door.”

Simon growled.

Off the phone and by his side, Vi Berkman tapped the Saint on the shoulder.

“It is alright to tease you a little bit, isn’t it, Saint?”

Simon, redepositing the last errant item into her black bag, gave her the warmest of smiles.

“Viola, my dear, true adult professionalism manifests itself as childlike play.”

“Which means?”

“You can tease me all you want,” said the Saint comfortably, and he meant it.

2

The slender silver key slid into the precision ignition and the momentary whir of the starter died into the smooth sibilant whisper of a perfectly tuned engine as Vi Berkman’s BMW came to life. She depressed the clutch, eased the gear lever into first, and heard the subdued click beside her as Simon Templar fastened his seat belt.

“You’re a good boy, Saint,” said Vi with maternal intonations.

Simon leaned back against black leather and allowed himself a moment of nostalgia, speaking in accents peculiar to the late and unlamented Prohibition Era crime boss, Dutch Kuhlmann.

“Yes, you vas a goot boy, Saint.”

Vi shifted smoothly into second gear. Simon sighed, ran his hands through his dark hair, and opened the passenger side window for a breath of Seattle’s night air.

“I was just thinking of someone I shot once,” remarked the Saint, “or maybe I shot him twice, hard to recall. Memories and carbon monoxide make an intoxicating combination.”

Vi drove; Simon scanned Seattle’s streets with eagle vision for Dan and Ian’s Volvo wagon. At the intersection of 3rd and Denny he noticed an aqua and white Nash Metropolitan in which the driver, Mr Surush Josi, was belting out the theme from “Oklahoma” at the top of his lungs.

Of Nepalese birth and impressive girth, Josi was as ignorant of Simon Templar as the Saint was of Mr Josi. Seldom demonstrably sociable, Surush was usually quiet, introspective, and impressively efficient. The occasional rocks tossed into his life’s pond by the hand of happenstance created only minor ripples, leaving both his inner being and outer countenance essentially undisturbed. As befitted his employment at the King County Morgue, the sight of blood, decay, dismemberment and decomposition bothered him not in the least. And Surush Josi was a man of secret appetites. His duck pin build attested an earnest appreciation of Nepal’s cuisine, but the passion of his solitude was Broadway show tunes. Be it “South Pacific,” “Gypsy,” or “Brigadoon,” Surush knew and loved them all.

Simon Templar smiled at the sight of Josi belting out Broadway standards to the silent audience of his windshield. Josi, oblivious to all details beyond the generalities of traffic, continued Eastbound while Vi Berkman turned Westbound. The paths of Surush Josi and Viola Berkman were never destined to cross, nor would he recall catching a brief glimpse of either the attractive female driver or her piratical passenger.

To pry Josi’s attention from the twin demands of safe driving and singing show tunes required either an element of quiet curiosity or a thunderclap of cognitive dissonance. The only curious item on his nightly pre-work drive was the earlier sighting of a bright red luminescent stick figure topped by an absurd elliptical halo adorning the side of a Volvo wagon as it entered the northbound lane of Interstate 5. He had no idea of the insignia’s intended meaning, what product it advertised, political position it endorsed, or the sociological implications of its application to a Swedish vehicle. He only knew that he had never seen it before and would certainly recognize it if he saw it again.

“Not pleasant to contemplate, is it Mr Templar?”

Rabbi Berkman, looking more akin to a collegiate linebacker than a Rabbi, poured fresh brewed coffee into Simon’s cup. Husky, rugged, and athletic with sandy brown hair and deep dark eyes, Nat Berkman appeared as ready to wrestle Jacob and the angels as he was to unravel intricacies of Talmudic scholarship.

When Vi and the Saint first arrived, the muscular Rabbi ground fresh coffee beans, measured them on the heavy side, and prepared the perfect pot of coffee as his wife and her guest shared full details of the evening’s adventures. As an additional treat, the Rabbi pulled a cardboard carton of pre-fabricated cinnamon roles from the refrigerator’s freezer compartment, microwaved them, and squeezed out a decorative white topping from an accompanying pouch.

Savoring the aromatic Sumatran blend, Simon enthusiastically complimented Nat Berkman on the superlative quality of his coffee; eating the rolls, the Saint commented solely to himself, was rather like chewing on plastic.

“Not pleasant at all,” confirmed the Saint, placing the final picture back into Vi’s manila folder.

The three sat comfortably in the Berkman’s well appointed condominium on the south slope of Queen Ann hill. The living room view encompassed the Space Needle, making the bright Seattle landmark resemble a colorful backyard souvenir.

Having examined Vi’s disturbing collection of amateur photographs, the possession of which would to grounds for prosecution in more than one State, Simon understood why she requested that the Saint intervene. Had the photos featured consenting adults he would have merely cocked an eyebrow at their inventiveness. But the central figure featured in the photos was neither adult nor consenting. The snapshots, Vi explained, were lifted from the scene of humiliation by a fourteen-year old street child known only as “Buzzy”.

“There is no way to identify the perpetrators of this outrage,” remarked Simon, and they knew exactly what he meant. “Aside from Buzzy who, judging from her haircut, was also attacked by a blind barber, no one could be picked out of traditional line-up.”

“And she refuses to go to the police,” completed Vi. “She confided to me that one of the men is Detective Dexter Talon, but if you were to ask her right now, she would deny any ability to identify either the men, the location, or admit that she is the girl in the photos.”

This was not, according to the Berkmans, an isolated incident. A group of men, including Talon and an amateur photographer, centered their personal proclivities on underage and defenseless children. Shielded by an aura of professional respectability, they operated with immunity and impunity, violating the fragile dignity of the street’s most vulnerable victims.

“You’re sure about Talon?” Simon asked as he stood and walked towards the window.

“Absolutely,” confirmed Vi.

“Does he know that you know?”

“I don’t think so, but it is possible.”

Simon’s gaze took in the multi-colored highpoints of Seattle’s skyline, the gentle meandering of slow-moving vehicles, and romantic couples strolling along the Queen Ann side-streets. He noticed one young woman’s golden hair reflecting the metropolitan illumination of moonlight and neon. For a moment, the Saint was far away.

So was Viola Inselheim Berkman.

Throughout her adulthood, Viola held to the indelible impression of the Saint retained from her childhood. She saw him as almost more than human, shamelessly reckless and impudent, capable of accomplishing the near impossible with nary a hair out of place nor a wrinkle to his wardrobe. Viola Berkman was, of course, absolutely correct.

As for the Saint, he knew she perceived him as a knightly hero, slayer of dragons, and righter of wrongs. Simon Templar, by his own admission, had never gloried in that particular role. To himself he was always an outlaw, pirate, and adventurer. If he were a champion of justice, it was his own justice that he championed — one neither inscribed in books of law nor reached by general consensus — a justice derived from inherent integrity. Simon Templar also realized that on nights such as these, he was more than a soldier of fortune; he was an agent of fate.

“I would be most interested to know,” said the Saint in a voice of strangely ethereal detachment, “a good deal more about our illustrious Detective Talon.”

“Well,” offered the Rabbi as if announcing a sports score, “I can tell you plenty. He’s been around at least a good decade and a half. He has, or had, enough of a reputation to survive the big purge they had on the force about ten years ago.”

“Purge?” Simon turned to face the Rabbi.

“Yeah, a big one.” Berkman cracked his knuckles in emphasis before reaching for another cinnamon roll. “Corruption and cover-ups went all the way to the top, but some clean cops spilled the proverbial beans to reporters after all sorts of clandestine meetings at the Dog House restaurant. It came out in the paper, big shakeup, heads rolled, and most of the department was flushed. Only the strong or the upstanding survived.”

“Either Talon was clean,” said the Saint, considering options, “or simply slippery. Or then again, maybe his unsavory ‘hobby’ is of recent acquisition.”

Vi gave a cynical laugh and brushed crumbs from the front of Nat’s sweater. “You mean like his acquisition of Uncle Elmo’s Good Time Arcade?”

“As you said earlier,” Simon admonished in a manner neither harsh nor light-hearted, “there’s nothing illegal about Talon having business interests, and the assisted suicide of dearly departed Uncle Elmo is no indication that Talon had anything to do with it. We must be careful not to allow our distaste for his alleged abhorrent behavior with little Buzzy to color our perception. What we need are facts.”

A look of surprise and minor disappointment passed over the face of Viola Berkman. She couldn’t believe the Saint doubted Talon’s thorough corruption.

Simon sat down, leaned forward, and looked back and forth between Vi and Nat as if he were about to share a deep, dark, secret, but a playful spark glimmered in his ice-blue eyes.

“Confidentially, despite my considerable criminal savvy and almost unerring brilliance,” said the Saint, “I have, believe it or not, made mistakes. Back in New York, years ago, there was a man named Valcross. I thought he was a paragon of civic virtue; he was the biggest crook in town.”

Vi nodded. She knew the story.

“And there was another time,” continued Simon with a self effacing grin, “when I thought an honest and hardworking Portland businessman named Irv Jardane was a bunko artist. Only a simple twist of fate saved me from making a ghastly mistake. As it turned out, I helped Irv make a bundle in the food preservation business. And while we never became what you’d call close friends, at least he wasn’t swindled out of his honest earnings, thanks to the Saint.”

“So,” said Viola Berkman with a questioning lilt, “the omniscient Simon Templar is telling us that omniscience has its limits?”

Nat washed down his latest mouthful with a large gulp of dark coffee, his finger raised to make a point.

“No, dear,” observed the Rabbi, “Mr Templar is the Saint. Hence, ‘to err is human; errant Divine’.”

Vi scowled and kicked at Nat’s shin as if it were an irritating Pekinese; Simon considered tossing a couch cushion at him or beaning him with the remaining cinnamon role.

“Henny Youngman, you’re not, hon,” drawled Viola affectionately as Simon stood, stretched, and strolled towards the window.

“Seriously, Mr Templar,” said Nat, changing his tone, “considering the attack on you earlier this evening, the questionable disappearance of those two young men, and that other character who wants you to run off to Neah Bay to search for the Costello Treasure, why don’t you simply call this Talon character on some pretense...” Before the sentence could be finished, Simon turned in obvious interruption.

“Yes, I do need to use your phone if you don’t mind,” said the Saint, and he picked up the sleek, black, cordless resting on the end table.

“Just a quick call to the Westin to check for messages,” explained Simon.

Vi raised her coffee to her lips, but her eyes never left the Saint. She heard him identify himself, request messages, and she saw him smile at the two of them as he listened. She also saw his eyes momentarily narrow, then suddenly brighten.

“My, my, my,” said the Saint with bemused wonder. He depressed the new call key and punched in seven digits as he turned back towards the windowed view of the Emerald City.

Nat and Vi eyed Simon with mounting curiosity.

“Hello,” the Saint began with a solid, business-like delivery, “this is Simon Templar returning your call, and I must say that I am most eager to hear what you have to say.”

The Berkmans looked at each other and shrugged.

“Yes. Yes. Uh-huh. I see. The Checkerboard Room?” Simon looked over his shoulder at them for confirmation. They nodded, not knowing what they were confirming, nor to what they were agreeing. “OK. Half hour. I will? Alright. Thank you.”

Simon returned from the window, replaced the phone on the table, took his seat, and savored another sip of Nat Berkman’s superlative coffee.

The Berkmans were, as the saying goes, on the edge of their seats.

“Well? What was all that about?” asked Vi in a voice that was almost too loud.

The Saint laughed.

“Ah, the marvels of voice mail,” said Simon with absolute sincerity, “I had three messages waiting for me. The first was from Barney Malone informing me that if I had a brain in my head I would be watching ‘Trial Without Jury’ on Channel 13; the second was from Bill Farley of the Seattle Mystery Bookshop requesting additional autographed copies of ‘The Pirate’ to meet the rising and inexplicable demand; the third was from a Detective Dexter Talon. I returned his call immediately and I shall see the gentleman in person about a half-hour from now at Ernie Steele’s Checkerboard Room on Capitol Hill.”

Rabbi Berkman almost dropped his saucer.

The Saint cleared his cup from the table, carried it into the kitchen, and called out a request for Vi to summon a taxi.

“I’d borrow your BMW, but I having it riddled with bullet holes might harm the finish,” remarked Simon as he ran water in the sink and made clattering noises with the cutlery.

“Bullet holes?” Rabbi Berkman was still recovering from the syncronicity of Talon’s call for the Saint; Vi was already detailing their address to the cab dispatcher.

Simon excused himself to freshen-up before departing to meet Talon, but paused to make one admittedly unusual request.

“Would you happen to have either duct tape or an ace bandage?”

3

“Judas ain’t.”

“I beg your pardon,” said the Saint.

“Judas ain’t,” repeated the cabbie as the Grey Top taxi turned East on Mercer and headed towards Capitol Hill.

“Judas ain’t what?”

“Judas ain’t diguydigits dibageyes,” explained the driver with conspiratorial glee, “sawyon afer disoaps.”

“You’re absolutely right,” confirmed Simon after searching his memory bank for a neumonic Rosetta Stone to America’s diverse accents and intonations, “I am the Saint, the guy that gets the bad guys. And yes, you saw me on on after ‘the soaps’.”

Temporarily trapped in traffic directly in front of the Seattle Center Arena, Simon witnessed roving packs of denim clad teens and leather jacketed adolescents herding across the street to queue up under a marquee reading “Grand Theft — Conquest of America Tour.”

The driver spoke again, and Simon activated his mental decoder.

“This concert’s a big deal, I guess. Read about it in the paper. You into that stuff?”

The Saint shook his head and laughed.

“No, not at all. Whatever vices I have, being addicted to rock ’n’ roll is not one of them. I do admit, however, to following some of these characters’ more colorful escapades. If my memory serves me well, this particular thieves’ picnic had quite a spread in the newspaper.”

In truth, the only reason Simon Templar scanned the Seattle Times’ Grand Theft profile was because of its adjacency to more important articles about the Saint in Seattle, the premier of ‘The Pirate’, the love life of Emilio Hernandez, and the anticipated international attendees of the Maritime Issues Forum.

“This is Grand Theft’s big comeback tour,” the cabbie said sarcastically as the taxi began to make progress on Mercer, “they’re old enough to have fathered half the audience, and from what I’ve read about ’em, they probably did. They split up several years ago, but Lord knows why.”

Simon studied a gaggle of affluent youths preening, posing, and pretending to do neither as they acted out their pop culture rituals.

“It was probably a combination of interpersonal malaise, managerial condiments, and the group’s digression into out-of-body aerobics,” offered the Saint. “Personally, I wouldn’t buy a ticket if they were giving them away.”

“Naw, me neither,” admitted the driver, “they ain’t my style, but some of those kids would do anything to get in. Jeez,” added the cabbie, pointing to one rather colorful grouping, “these kids today. Just look at ’em.”

The Saint had been looking for some time. A young girl with a heretical haircut paced in front of the Arena wearing only a lightweight denim jacket, tank top, torn jeans, and tattered tennis shoes. Unlike the majority of youngsters crowding the concert’s doors, no caring parent dropped her off with a pre-paid ticket, an extra twenty bucks, and assurances of a safe ride home. Perhaps the frail young teen was not Viola’s Buzzy, but her street-weary aura pierced the crowd’s festive atmosphere like a lighthouse beacon, illuminating Simon Templar’s sense of purpose.

The two men traveled in silence as the cab dipped under the Aurora overpass, and at precisely the intersection of Mercer and Fairview the Saint vowed with iron resolve that Dexter Talon would not escape his justice.

Ernie Steel’s Checkerboard Room, the alcohol serving adjunct to what is best described as a diner rather than a restaurant or cafe, was comprised of two overlapping seating sections: smoking and chain-smoking. Had Simon Templar not long ago abandoned the harmful habit, he would have barely noticed the thick blue haze discoloring the wine-stained backdrop of false front comraderie demonstrated by Detective Dexter Talon.

The Saint had encountered all manner of detectives in his adventurous career, most of whom sought reasons for either his arrest or extradition, and he often derived delight from tweaking their collective noses. Simon did not want to tweak Talon’s nose. Punching his nose, for that matter, would be insufficient punishment for a representative of law and order whom Templar found totally insufferable and blatantly offensive. And while suppressed hostility is almost always perceived, the Saint had long ago perfected the uncanny ability of appearing benignly agreeable to those he thoroughly despised.

“So you’re the famous Simon Templar,” said Talon as if it were a joke.

“Yes, a pleasure to meet you, Detective,” Simon answered as if he meant it, extending his virile grip to Talon’s fleshy palm.

The detective recognized the Saint the moment Simon Templar walked through the door. It would have been difficult not to spot him. He was the only celebrity in Ernie Steel’s, and the singular gentleman in attendance who could, by any amplitude of perception or imagination, be termed elegant, refined, piratically handsome or dangerously picaresque. As the customers’ vocabularies were limited to the recitation of brand name bottled spirits and the mascot nomenclature of collegiate and professional ball teams, none of them would have applied analogous edifying phrases had they considered describing him at all, which they did not.

Talon, to be courteous in our appraisal, rather resembled a rolled boneless ham. His waxy flesh appeared sloppily glued to his rubbery sinews, giving the impression that creational improvisation, either by design or oversight, deprived him of a standard-issue skeletal frame. His adipose abdomen flopped over his waistband while his chin attempted obscuring the knot of his necktie.

“I know all about you, Saint,” said Talon, “and I know you’ve got a thing about detectives.”

“I’m not quite sure, under the circumstances, exactly how you mean that,” Simon said, his face giving a flawless impersonation of a friendly smile as the two sat at Talon’s dark corner table.

“I’ve read about you, even heard your ol’ pal John Fernack of the NYPD go on about ya once at one of our cop conventions back east some years ago. Beer?”

“Sure, the house brand will do,” answered the Saint, and Talon seemed to smirk while his dark little eyes swiveled in their sockets like greased ball-bearings.

“Yeah, right. Here’s the deal, Templar. Listen, we got a problem.”

“We? We’ve only just met, and we have a problem?”

Talon fished into a crumpled pack of short, non-filtered cigarette, pulled one out, lit it, hacked out the first puff, and poked the pack with a stubby forefinger.

“Help yourself if you want one.”

“That’s OK,” said Simon politely, “I’ll just breath yours.”

Talon glanced around the room as if what he was about to say required confidentiality. It did. When the beer arrived and the waiter departed, Talon spoke.

“I didn’t call up beggin’ you to come see me so we could swap true crime stories or chew the fat about dead criminals we’ve known and loved. When I say ‘we got a problem’ I mean it. The problem started out being mine, but now, whether you like it or not, it’s yours.”

The detective spit an errant piece of tobacco from his tongue’s tip, flipped a bit of ash into the black plastic ashtray, and waited encouragement from the Saint.

“Oh?” Simon’s response — flat, abrupt, and unemotional — was not exactly the encouragement Talon anticipated, but it served as an appropriate prompt. The grotesque detective raised the long necked bottle to his thin lipped mouth, the flabby flesh above his collar creasing and bending backwards as if an elastic hinge were secretly embedded behind his gullet. Talon gulped four ounces, banged the bottle back on the table, and began his clumsily rehearsed recitation.

“I ain’t no crooked cop, and I been around more than twenty years and in this town that’s sayin’ somethin’. But...” Talon stopped and stared at the table as if expecting his next line of dialog to be etched into the wood. It wasn’t. His heavy shoulders raised in a gargantuan sigh and, after taking another long, slow drag of acrid tobacco, continued. “I hate to admit what I’ve done because its embarrasing as hell.”

Remembering Viola’s photos of the violated Buzzy, the Saint’s eyes seared into Talon like twin shafts of iced lightning.

“I’m being blackmailed,” blurted out Talon with startling suddeness, “Blackmailed, Templar. You hear that? And I’ve paid and paid and there is no end to it.”

“Blackmail?”

“Damn right,” said Talon, his piggy eyes aimed pleadingly at the Saint. “I know how you feel about blackmailers. It’s no secret you think they’re scum. Hell, old John Fernack clued me in on your attitude about that years ago, but it ain’t easy acting like some vigilante rub-out artist when you’re a respected police detective.”

The Saint was not about to quibble with Talon over degrees of respectability, and as the unattractive detective had unexpectedly put a new spin on the evening’s festivities, Simon could no longer play it cold and aloof.

“You’re correct about my attitude towards blackmailers, Talon,” said the Saint seriously, “You’re a fool to pay them, they won’t stop on their own, and the option I endorse is outside the realm of approved police behavior. You did say you paid, right?”

Talon’s head wobbled an ashamed affirmation as he deliberately stubbed out the last life of his smoldering butt.

“Yeah, at first I figured what else could I do...”

Simon leaned closer, speaking in tones simultaneously silken and deadly.

“Tell me, dear Talon, why exactly are you being blackmailed, by whom, and why is it suddenly my problem?”

Dexter Tallon affected a sheepish expression for which he was ill suited, and a small smug grin inched across his lips. “It’s your problem because I used your name.”

Simon felt as if the linoleum floor of Ernie Steel’s Checkerboard room had evaporated mirage-like beneath him, leaving the detective, the table, two chairs, two bottles of beer, and one dirty ashtray suspended in mid-air.

“You used what?” The Saint did not disguise his incredulity.

Talon shifted in his chair, lit another cigarette as almost an affrontive gesture, and said it agin.

“I used your name. You know: Simon Templar, alias the Saint, the Robin Hood of Modern Crime and all that.”

“I believe my name and likeness are now officially registered trademarks,” said the Saint dryly, “I’m afraid they can’t be used without paying an outrageous licensing fee. According to my agent, I am worth more than all the Warner, Ritz, and Marx brothers combined.”

Talon took another hot-box drag and washed it down with cold beer.

“Yeah, well I figured your name was worth somethin’ alright. When they kept asking for money and I’d had enough, I told them you were an old pal of mine, that we shared similar interests,” said Talon with an offensive wink, “and that you and your gang would take care of them but good. When you came rollin’ into town with your famous face all over the news, that’s when I told ’em they were dead ducks for sure.”

Simon leaned back and gave Detective Dexter Talon the slow, visual once-over. The Saint’s steely gaze seemed to pierce his very soul, and Talon slowly squirmed in his seat.

“Who are ‘they’ and why exactly are you being blackmailed?” asked Simon, “And please be precise. If you’ve been throwing my name around, I have a right to know all the gruesome details. Before you answer, please give the formulation of your response significant considerations concerning honesty, accuracy, and my reputation.” The Saint weighted the final few words with intonations designed to elicit images of murder and mayhem.

Detective Talon deflated like a punctured bop-bag, small snorts of smoke puffed from his nostrils, and he told his tale of woe.

“I love bein’ a cop, Saint, but there’s more to life than that. Look at me. Its easy to see that I don’t have much of what you’d call a social life. I was married once, years ago, nice girl. Sort of. We had a kid. Got problems. Cop’s kid’s problems. Nothin’ but trouble.”

“And the reason your being blackmailed is...” prompted the Saint impatiently.

Talon glared while smashing his cigarette’s red tip into the crowded ashtray. His fingers came out smudged and smelly.

“Give a guy a break, Templar. I’m tryin’ to tell ya.” He reached for another smoke, but Simon put his hand on the pack.

“At the rate your smoking those you’ll be dead before the waiter asks if we want another beer, so to keep me from hearing this story wheezed through a respirator, let me make it easy for you. Most people are blackmailed over illicit romantic entaglements or past illegal activities. Being that you survived the famous purge of the Seattle Police, I’ll assume that you were indiscrete with someone’s wife, husband, daughter, livestock, or modern kitchen appliance, and the ungodly want you to pay up or be exposed. Am I correct?”

“Close enough,” admitted the detective, “I like women, OK? There’s nothin’ wrong with that. I’m a man. Unnerstan’?”

“Yes, I like women too,” responded the Saint compasssionately. “My only problem has been in the plurality, but please go on.”

“Well, I got in with a guy who snapped some photos and now I’m paying. But his demands are beyond extreme. I’ve already given him twenty grand.”

Simon Templar, an accomplished expert at the game of cat and mouse, long ago discovered the joys of tossing catnip and mousetraps onto the playing field.

“Oh, you must mean those cute snapshots of little Buzzy, the girl with the dreadful haircut,” announced the Saint happily, “why don’t you just arrange to give these leeches the ‘Uncle Elmo’ treatment?”

The emotional explosion from Dexter Talon was immediate and volatile. The thick fist thrown towards Simon’s face stopped mid-flight, snared by the immovable might of the Saint’s own grip. He tightened his fingers, Talon grimaced, and the Saint laughed as if the two were at play.

“Calm down, Detective,” said the Saint through a false smile, “or our fellow customers will think there has been a rift in our friendship. And we certainly don’t want to attract attention, now do we?”

Talon’ eyes smoldered, his ashen cheeks reddened with anger.

“What was it that pushed your hot-button, Talon? Was it little Buzzy that raised your ire, or was it the reference to the late, great Uncle Elmo? Speaking man to man, if you want my help, I need to know all the distasteful details.”

Talon relaxed, pulled back his squished fist, and sagged in his chair. Simon picked up the crumpled pack of smokes, removed one, and handed the single cigarette to the weary looking detective.

“You have from the moment you light it until the time you stub it out to tell me absolutely everything, so either speak quickly or don’t inhale.”

The detective sucked back more beer before igniting his fix; the Saint sampled the watery brew and found it lacking in both body and flavor.

“You know plenty considering you’re new in town,” began Talon with a trace of sarcasm, “the loser called Uncle Elmo got in deep with organized crime and they bumped him off. It was good riddance. A lawyer buddy of mine and I formed a corporation and bought out the place from his survivors. It was on the q.t., of course, but the criminals got the message — the place is clean, no prostitution, the girls are protected,”

“And you get dates motivated by appreciation and gratitude,” added the Saint.

A slight smile and small shrug from Talon indicated Simon was on the right track.

“Strange, isn’t it Saint, that the best way to put crooks out of work is for cops to take over the business?”

Simon simply raised his eyebrows.

“That’s it as far as Elmo is concerned,” said Talon, “He’s exceptionally dead, and probably the better for it. As for the girl with the horrid haircut,” he added bitterly, “she’s no innocent sweetheart, I’ll tell ya that right now. She may be underage, but what she lacks in years she makes up for in conniving greed and deception. Trust me, Saint,” insisted Talon with obvious anger, “if she was being used, it wasn’t by me. Put make up on her and a pair of heels, and believe me, she looks every inch a woman. I was set up with her by this guy who had become my party buddy. A picture taker who’s now takin’ me to the cleaners. Turns out this street-wise little trollop is in on the deal from the get-go.”

Talon, noticing that his cigarette was about to burn his fingers, set it in the black ashtray and used a previously extinguished fellow to crush it out.

“The Badger Game,” said the Saint, “it’s one of the oldest cons in the book. Except in your case no outraged husband came bursting in at an embarrassing moment accompanied by a camera toting accomplice pretending to be a private eye. Instead, you got the squeeze put on you maybe a day or even a week or two later.”

“Exactly. It was about five days after the girl and I... well, anyway, my ‘good buddy’ comes around and you know the rest, or most of the rest. And there has been some cat following me.”

“You mean cat as in hipster, cat as in feline, or do you mean something else entirely?”

“Maybe it’s an enforcer, maybe it’s someone from the old Uncle Elmo’s crowd, I even thought it might be someone with you. Anyway, I haven’t really seen ’im, but I can tell when someone is following me.”

So could the Saint.

Simon washed down his distaste for Talon and the other principle players in this unsavory game with another swallow of headless beer. As his mind was drifting into considerations of the mystery cat’s identity, he forced himself to re-focus on the most urgent and imperative issues.

“You said your ‘good buddy’, the one you told that I was coming to get him, is an amateur photographer,” said the Saint, “does he have another profession?”

“Ya mean a job?”

Simon nodded.

“Yeah, sure. Something normal, but...”

Simon raised his hand in obvious interruption. “And now, for the jackpot question: does his job have anything to do with seafood?”

Detective Dexter Talon starred at the Saint, a look of begrudging cynical admiration distorting his already unpleasant face.

“Jeeze, Templar, is there anything you don’t know?”

Simon waved a summons to the nearby waiter, addressing him with exultation.

“Bring my friend here another pack of these delicious, nourishing cigarettes,” insisted Simon as he showed the shabby pack to the gaunt, humorless waiter, “and bring us both another round of that yellow water with the suds on top.”

The Saint never tired of intrigue, nor was he distressed by mounting layers of deception. To Simon Templar, they were all part of life’s grand adventure.

“Talon, you slippery old rake, ’tis time for us to conspire together for the betterment of mankind.”

The adipose investigator regarded Simon with renewed suspicion.

“When the beer gets here, you can light up another one of your smelly smokes and tell me everything you know about Salvadore Alisdare. In return, I’ll tell you a little known but absolutely true story about Dolores Costello.”

4

In the following forty five minutes, Simon Templar inhaled massive amounts of second hand smoke, swallowed minimal amounts of American beer, and absorbed intoxicating information regarding Talon and Alisdare’s symbiotic relationship. Although exceptionally well concealed, the Saint’s disdainful attitude towards both men had not undergone even the most minimal of modifications. While Simon’s external presentation was warmth and accessibility personified, there was ice at the core of his being.

“He’s nuts and dangerous,” declared Talon to a seemingly enraptured Saint, “I never knew what a loose cannon this guy was until he started puttin’ the hammer on me. I ain’t no social worker or a psychiatrist, but the guy is a first class sociopath, if ya ask me.”

Simon Templar, having previously witnessed Salvadore’s dual nature in an unsubtle display outside the Westin Hotel, was not surprised by Talon’s roughly expressed evaluations.

“As for that stupid Costello Treasure nonsense,” continued Talon, “it musta been jus’ some scam to get ya to leave town with him. God knows what would have happened to you if you went with him. He probably planned to give ya da woiks.”

Simon spun his beer bottle slowly on the table.

“Give me the woiks?” the Saint found the phrase more flavorful than the local brew. “That’s the type of expression which proves you’re truly of the old school.”

“Yeah, and I graduated with honors,” said Talon, hacking out a gurgling, alcohol scented guffaw, “You and me, Saint, we both know the good ol’ days.”

Simon smiled with his lips, but allowed his eyes to drift. There was nothing in the two men’s life experiences upon which to base even the most superficial of friendships. To the Saint, they were sworn enemies. And, as did many of his enemies, Talon foolishly assumed the Saint could be played for a sucker.

“Kill him,” said Simon suddenly, catching the detective off-guard. “Kill the little weasel and get it over with.”

The Saint suddenly stood from the table, tossed a few bills down by the ashtray, and made obvious motions to leave.

“What?” Talon’s bulk banged the table as he attempted to rise. “Whatchamean?”

“You heard me,” said Simon as he put a restraining hand on Talon’s shoulder and bent down to speak sotto-voce.

“Listen to me. I gave up the swashbuckling business years ago because I figured it was time to live off my well earned reputation and dubiously acquired fortune. I haven’t been arrested for years, nor had as much as a traffic citation for decades. If a damsel in distress ran in here right now insisting that she was being pursued by a submarine fleet of armed and dangerous romance-starved terrorists, I would gently point her towards the pay phone and, at best, offer her correct change for a local call to the Seattle Police. Maybe you would be the detective assigned to the case. That, dear Talon, is the extent of my involvement with matters of law and justice. For all intents and purposes, I am a well-known has-been — a marketable one, but one none-the-less. As for my ‘gang’ taking care of anybody, my ‘gang’ dissolved so far back that any newspaper clippings they might have saved in their scrapbooks yellowed long ago. If you and I are of the ‘old school,’ I’m afraid that building has been condemned. But,” added the Saint emphatically, “I will give you this one bit of honest-to-God advice: kill Salvadore Alisdare. If he really did set you up, if he really is blackmailing you, I don’t know a cleaner cure. Make it appear an accident, make it appear self-defense, make it whatever you want. I’m not going to do it for you and I’m not going to participate. I am only giving you my opinion.”

Talon sat speechless, each softly spoken phrase pounding into his brain like a pile-driver.

“One more thing,” said Simon with intensified confidentiality, “I couldn’t help but notice that it never occurred to you to ask me how I knew about little Buzzy or where I had seen the incriminating photos. Decent detectives notice such errors of omission, even old amateurs such as myself. You are, in the vernacular, a scumbag, Talon. If these were the good old days, I would gladly give you ‘da woiks’ myself.”

Talon gulped audibly.

The Saint reached down, scooped up the pack of cigarettes from the table, pulled out the remaining coffin nails, and tossed them directly into the detective’s lap.

“Here,” said the Saint flashing his brightest smile, “why don’t you suck on all those at once and put everyone out of your misery.”

Simon Templar turned briskly on his heels and made a direct line for the door. The Saint always enjoyed a melodramatic exit, and he was particularly proud of this one. He had vented his honest anger at Detective Talon in a blatant display of believable dishonesty. There was no doubt that Talon swallowed Simon’s convincing post-retirement diatribe. After all, the Saint’s most recent foray in the realm of outrageous adventure — an unchronicled caper in British Columbia involving Marian Kent of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police — had been well-concealed from the press on both sides of the border.

Outside Ernie Steele’s, the Saint filled his lungs with Seattle’s crisp night air and noticed the brightly illumined marquee of the Broadway Theater.

Before he could turn left or right, Simon felt the distinctive pressure of a small gun barrel nudged against his ribs.

“Oh, no!” exclaimed the Saint, “Not that!”

“Calm down, Templar. Keep quiet and I won’t shoot.”

The gruff voice did not belong to Dexter Talon, and while the Saint was curious as to who was jabbing him with a diminutive firearm, he knew he would find out soon enough.

“It’s not the iddy-biddy gun in my ribs that concerns me,” said the Saint without so much as budging, “its the horrendous realization that ‘Love, The Redeemer’ has been made into a movie. Really,” continued the Saint as if having a drawing room conversation, “it was a quite dreadful play.”

“Start walking up the street, wiseguy,” insisted the voice, but the Saint refused to move.

“I don’t think so. No, I really don’t think so at all.”

Between the words “think” and “all”, Simon Templar turned sharply on his heels to face the man eye to eye.

“Why Snookums, dearest,” intoned the Saint, “you’re more ugly than ever. Of course, you’ll be even uglier after I take that away your clumsily concealed peashooter and use it to hammer your forehead. Besides, there is a famous Seattle detective sitting in the Checkerboard Room right beyond that door.”

Snookums, operating upon the erroneous assumption that any man will do what you want if you have a gun on him, stared at the Saint in total confusion.

“Do you honestly intend to gun me down amid the bright lights of Broadway?” asked Simon as if chatting with a familiar acquaintance. “You must be under the mistaken impression that I’ll go where you want and do as you insist because of the implied threat of physical violence. Now, it is possible that where you want to take me is exactly where I want to go, but your manners are so affrontive that my response is, with all due courtesy, decidedly negative.”

The Saint threw back his head and laughed as if he had heard the joke of the century. When his head snapped forward, however, it did so with sudden impact and accurate aim.

In one flashing instant of rhinoplastic agony, a broken-nosed Snookums released the weapon and sagged at the knees. Simon jabbed him quickly in the ribs, caught him in what appeared as a playful embrace, pressed the pistol into the beast’s back, and began walking his would be assailant northbound on Broadway Avenue.

“A drinking ditty would be appropriate right about now,” insisted Simon to his bleary eyed and wobbly companion, and the Saint raised his manly baritone in song.

The evening crowd strolling up Broadway chuckled at the presumably alcohol fueled comraderie of the unlikely male couple. As Capitol Hill is notoriously supportive of unorthodox interpersonal relationships, no one gave the men’s behavior a second thought.

When Snookums’ vision and personal attitude began to re-align, the Saint encountered problems maneuvering him around the luxuriously maintained black Jaguar XKE which suddenly emerged from the parking lot of Jimmy Woo’s Jade Pagoda. Having kept his stumbling, disoriented, and angry burden from becoming an unwelcome hood ornament above the personalized license plate, 1 °COM, Simon propped the groggy beast against the restaurant’s wall, discretely impacted the concrete with Snookums’ head, pocketed the pistol, and hastily joined the pedestrians crossing the intersection of Broadway and Roy. As the Saint stepped on the curb, he glanced back to see Snookums slowly slide to the sidewalk and the shiny Jaguar slip sleekly into Northbound traffic.

The Saint quickly merged with the patrons queued up at the ticket window of the Harvard Exit, Seattle’s most famous specialty cinema. Dissimilar to such historical palaces as the Paramount or the Orpheum, the Harvard Exit was formerly the Women’s Century Club. It retained the Club’s demure hospitality and living room atmosphere while accomodating a discriminating theatrical audience in the social auditorium. The Exit’s patrons — collegiates, bohemians, and tweed attired upwardly mobile professionals — obviously preferred the subtitled double bill of “La Vaca Espana” and “Les Anges des Tenebres” to the American made blood and thunder adventure playing at the Broadway.

Certain that Snookums did not attempt snatching him without backup nearby, Simon quickly bypassed the ticket booth and directly entered the front door. As the Saint mounted the stairs, he retrieved an impressive memento from his billfold — a lifetime pass assigned by the theater’s original owners.

“Is this still good here?” asked Simon, showing the ticket to the young man inside the door.

“For you, Mr Templar, we always have a seat. If you’re looking for Karl Krogstad,” said the fellow with understandable cinema savvy and a warm smile, “he’s pontificating over by the piano.”

The Saint had no idea that Karl Krogstad, director of The Pirate, would be one of this evening’s patrons. Considering Krogstad’s repeated viewings of his own film, a double dose of subtitled foreign pretension was undoubtedly a creative salvo.

As described, Krogstad was indeed holding pre-curtain court around the keyboard, loudly and gregariously proclaiming the plight of struggling independent filmakers — a noble gesture in as much as two prestigious domestic nominations and several international accolades elevated Krogstad long ago from the ranks of the struggling, if not the independent.

“Simon,” called out Karl, “you’ve missed ‘La Vaca Espana,’ but the French film rolls right after intermission.”

“I saw ‘La Vaca Espana’ in Juan-Les-Pins,” responded the Saint as he clasped Karl’s enthusiastic grip in his own, “it broke my heart and I never recovered.”

“But it’s a COMEDY, Saint, a COMEDY!” Krogstad laughed loudly, the only way he knew how to.

“I realize that, Karl,” replied Simon, playfully picking a napkin from the piano top and using it to daub his eyes, “that’s what broke my heart.”

Krogstad popped a complimentary cookie into his mouth, unaware of Simon’s attention being more directed towards the door than the refreshments and atmosphere.

“Is Beck with you?” asked Karl as he chewed a macaroon, “She made tentative plans to join me here before the first feature, but she hasn’t shown up.”

“No, the last time I saw her was at the hotel,” said Simon, dismissing the probability of Kathryne being a damsel in distress. “She might have called it a night. After all, she had three book signings today in addition to the media reception.”

Karl nodded as the lobby’s lights blinked a summons to the second feature.

“Winning the Pulitzer does wreck havoc on your social life,” remarked Krogstad with a straight face.

“Are you sitting with someone special, or will you join our little party? There is someone here that I am doing my best to impress.”

The Saint pulled him gently aside as the other patrons moved towards the auditorium.

“Actually, I came in here purely on impulse to avoid potential contact with a contingent of the ungodly. I left one of them unconscious in front of Jimmy Woo’s. Finding you here is a fortunate bonus.”

Krogstad loosed another thunderous laugh.

“Really! Simon, how exciting. But tell me,” Karl chuckled, “who’s directing this adventure?”

“You can direct me to your car and loan me the keys; I’ll cover the cost of your taxi. If my evening’s escapades ever become a movie, the rights will be yours.”

“Yeeee,” gasped Krogstad, “One of those direct to video releases, no doubt. While I would love my fame assured, I don’t have a car tonight. We decided the designated driver should have a meter on his dashboard. Sorry. Here, take a macaroon for the road.”

Before Simon could stop him, Karl swept a chocolate cookie from a nearby tray and thrust it into the Saint’s jacket pocket. Krogstad’s hand recoiled as if it had encountered a scorpion.

“My God, Templar,” rasped Krogstad dramatically, “that’s a GUN! A real GUN!”

“Shhhh,” admonished Simon, “take it easy.”

Little beads of perspiration glistened on Krogstad’s reddened forehead.

“Listen, Saint, this is Seattle. We don’t carry guns into theaters. Espresso, yes; guns, no. There’s always the danger that someone who doesn’t like the film will shoot the projectionist.”

“An honest concern,” concurred the Saint, putting an arm around the hyperkinetic filmmaker, “And who knows what they would do if they knew there was a director in the house?”

Krogstad glanced about as if expecting an outburst of machine-gun fire, sighed nervously, and attempted to conceal his agitation.

“Wonderful,” mused Karl, “Enter the Saint and our lives are imperiled. Listen, Templar, don’t go shooting up the theater and terrorizing the patrons. I have an important potential financial backer in the audience teetering on the brink of signing a large check.”

“Finacial backer? I thought Barney Malone paid you a king’s ransom to direct The Pirate,” chided Simon.

“Yeah, it was a King’s ransom — a small, Balkan king, but a king nonetheless — but the trick in this business is to never invest your own money in dicey ventures.”

Karl elaborated as they walked towards the crowded autitorium.

“I have envisioned an international independent filmmakers conference and competition which would allow others the opportunity to become as reputable and mainstream as I by offering them high-profile exposure. There is, of course, entrance fees and attendance fees, and workshop fees, and material fees...”

“And you have a heart of gold, Karl,” added Simon with minimal facetiousness.

“Yes, I have a heart of gold and my potential backer has deep pockets, a law degree, and several beautiful maidens absurdly eager to have a career in showbusiness.”

Simon Templar did not stop cold, but he did stop.

“Money, maidens, and a law degree?”

Karl smiled a broad affirmation. “It is almost too good to be true,” confided Krogstad, “We’re talking big bucks, Saint. Big bucks and buxum babes all tied together with the kind of loot only a lawyer can manipulate.”

The floor seemed to ripple beneath Simon’s feet, and for the second time that evening he felt detatched from reality’s reference points.

“Karl, does the phrase ‘Good Time Arcade’ mean anything to you?”

Krogstad almost burst with joy.

“Yes! Templar you amaze me. No wonder you’re famous, you know everything. Of course I know the Good Time Arcade. That’s the guy, them’s the dames, and that’s the source of my backer’s money. You walked right by him when you came in. He was standing at the snack bar yaking to some client on his cellular phone. Lawyers are always on the phone, which is the best time to put a pen in their hand ’cause sometimes they’ll sign anything simply out of habit.”

“Interesting habits, indeed,” said the Saint as he glanced back towards the snack bar, “I trust you will introduce us.”

“You’re not going to shoot him, are you?” asked Karl, unsure of his own seriousness.

“Heaven forbid,” stated Simon reassuringly, “I would never shoot a potential financial backer, at least not in this chapter.”

Krogstad stared at the Saint as if increased visual acuity could impart clarity of comprehension.

“Well, that’s a relief,” mumbled Karl pointing his thumb toward the snack bar, “as soon as he gets off the phone, he’ll be heading this way.”

Simon turned to get a look at Karl’s prospective sugar daddy, fully prepared to squeeze the slimy fingers of a pin-striped, Brilliantine dipped, shifty-eyed insult to the legal profession. Instead, the Saint saw a youthful Mount Rushmore of a man bedecked in a bright canary yellow sweater and beige slacks walking briskly toward them. Arthur Rasnec’s face looked less than thirty, and his bright blond hair was razor-shaped in the most contemporary style, but tiny lines accenting his hazel eyes implied an added decade.

Introductions exchanged and hands well-shook, the Saint searched Arthur Rasnec’s facial expressions and body language for tell-tale signs of predatory underpinnings. Rasnec’s emotional infra-structure remained an impregnable fortress of self-containment.

“There’s always something,” said Rasnec, shaking his head in mild dismay as he pocketed his blatantly expensive and stylishly unobtrusive cellular phone, “Someone pilfered my office tonight and made off with my little .22.”

Krogstad, remembering the cold steel in Simon’s pocket, laughed nervously.

“The Saint didn’t do it,” insisted Karl jokingly, “He has an alibi, don’t you Simon?”

“Absolutely,” responded the Saint, “I was drinking beer with Detective Dexter Talon of the Seattle PD until only minutes ago.”

Again, Simon searched the lawyer’s boyish visage for reaction, but saw only an inscrutable mask of practiced social graces. What the Saint next perceived caused him to momentarily catch his breath — a vision of feminine beauty gliding effortlessly towards the three men. Karl poked him in the ribs.

“Here she comes.”

If a woman can make an entrance when she is already in the room, that is exactly what she did. Had there been an orchestral overture accented by the sudden illumination of a single spotlight, her arrival could not have been more enrapturing of male attention.

Perched upon exquisite heels, she embodied every cliched attribute of the hackneyed phrase, “drop-dead gorgeous”. From the fine points of her precision nails to the lustrous tips of the reddish-golden-brown hair cascading down to her shoulders; from her well turned ankles to her lightly rouged high-boned satin cheeks, she was deft and dazzling testimony to natural beauty brought to perfection by cosmetic artistry.

Her figure and features were undeniably attractive, and even a man as potentially jaded as Simon Templar found himself unabashedly fascinated. The knowing curve of her smile communicated a degree of familiarity to which even the Saint was unaccustomed from a stranger, and her eyes’ unalloyed alertness was almost tangible.

The woman did not exactly stop moving upon joining the all-male trio, but rather softly undulated herself to the side of Rasnec where she continued the most subtle hints of suggestive motility. Despite the encircling of her waist by Rasnec’s arm, her luminous gaze did not shift from the face of Simon Templar.

“So you’re the Saint. Nice to see you in a social environment. Call me Diamond,” said the vision, with a hint of humor. She offered Simon her hand as if proffering a gift to a king. He accepted the benefaction, giving it a proper conventional squeeze before bestowing an unconventional second press of measured lingering intensity.

“Social environment?” Simon anticipated a humorous reference to the illustrious illegality of his notorious past. The expectation of his anticipation was misdirected by several decades.

“I recognized you ‘window shopping’ downtown earlier this evening,” stated Diamond pleasantly, her oblique reference to Uncle Elmo’s did not pass undecoded by the Saint. “Are you a fan of the performing arts, Mr Templar?”

“The art is in the performance,” said the Saint, and he noticed an encouraging increase in her smile. There was more to Diamond than glitter, and more than Simon’s interest was piqued by her telegraphed inferences of privileged knowledge and laser insight.

Rasnec, giving Diamond’s waist a possessive squeeze, interrupted the one-to-one atmosphere with exclamatory verbal intrusion.

“Yep! Diamond’s going to be star alright. Look’s like one doesn’t she? We’re going to put her on the big screen in one of Karl’s films. Isn’t that right, Krogstad?”

All eyes swiveled to the red-faced director who loosed another trademark guffaw and nervously hid his hands in his pockets.

Diamond, as if mocking herself rather than the self-conscious director, batted her luxurious lashes and dropped her voice to a throaty resonance. “Do you have an authentic casting couch?”

“No, but we have seats waiting for us,” recovered Karl, gesturing toward the auditorium, “Shall we?”

The timing was perfect. A short bald man with an impressive moustache was about to address the crowd, detail merits and shortcomings of the upcoming feature, explain why he selected it for viewing, and announce the annual anniversary showing of his personal favorite, Casablanca.

“You kids go ahead,” said Simon. “I have an imperative appointment with my caterer.”

Rasnec’s plasticine smile never wavered, Diamond pursed an impressive pout, and Karl seemed relieved.

“And good luck with your movie career,” added the Saint, making the word “your” inclusive of all three.

Diamond posed majestically as Simon moved towards the double exit doors.

“My parents named me Diamond because I am a gem of inestimable value,” she declared, “but I am destined to become...”

The Saint, in a flash of both recognition and precognition, discerned her surprising allusion to Dagfinn Varnes’ alledged memoirs, and knew exactly what she was about to say. She said it.

“...the new Dolores Costello.”