Salvage for the Saint by Leslie Charteris Page B

tension.
    “Could you help me, please?” Arabella said with forced sweetness, having just intercepted the frenetic canine nuisance with a roughness which had produced a definite winded yelp. “Mr Brightly has just told me I have a lot of debts and no money, and I seem to be in danger of murdering the dog.”
    Mrs Cloonan said “Oh, you poor thing!” and made clucking noises which likewise were not exclusively directed either to the dog or to its mistress but contrived to seem sympathetic to both. She swept the offending animal up to what, in less exalted literature than this, would be flatly—or perhaps not flatly—described as her ample bosom.
    When she had gone, Brightly said reassuringly:
    “Things aren’t entirely black, I’m glad to say. One thing you do own outright—the Phoenix. Though I’m afraid she’ll have to be sold to pay the debts.”
    “The—Phoenix?” Arabella was lost.
    “Still tied up down in Marseille, is she?”
    “Marseille? Well, I suppose … well, as far as I …” Then, giving up and shrugging helplessly: “What’s the Phoenix?”
    Brightly stared in astonishment.
    “Good God, you don’t mean you … she’s your yacht, Mrs Tatenor.”
    “My yacht?”
    “Pretty near half a million worth, thank heaven. But it’s amazing—he never even told you about your own yacht?”
    Arabella trailed the pink-nailed toes of one foot on the floor, propelling the wicker-work seat around in a series of meaningless little oscillating circles.
    “Charles always told me everything,” she said weakly and vacantly.
    -3-
    Simon Templar made an early start next morning. There was some exploring he wanted to do in the neighbourhood of the Candecour’s incineration now that the publicity had died down and he could hope to find the area reasonably clear of ghoulish or inquisitive sightseers.
    The weather was calmer than it had been on that memorable day when he had last set out in the Privateer on the course he now set. He had an almost dead-flat sea.
    Soon the sweeping bight of Christchurch Bay was lying to his starboard exactly as when Tatenor’s boat had veered off towards the shore.
    This morning the Saint had deliberately not shaved and had left his dark hair tousled after an early-morning dip in the sea. An old tweed flat cap he had unearthed in a local junk-shop made an odd but not impossible match with the muddy dungarees and moth-eaten sweater he had conjured from elsewhere: which was exactly the appearance of amiable eccentricity which he needed for the beachcombing project he had set himself.
    It was near high water when he reached the shore at Hengistbury Head. He beached the Privateer near the quiet western end and began his search, not confining himself to the beach itself but also poking and rooting among the dunes which backed on to it. Occasionally he stuffed something into his battered canvas hold-all to keep up appearances for the odd few holidaymakers who watched him curiously from time to time. In this way he gradually acquired a collection of soggy driftwood, bits of glass, cigarette packets and other useless detritus for later quiet dumping.
    He had been wise in his decision to begin at the western end of the beach, about half a mile along from the site of the explosion. Even then, it took him a good six and a half hours of searching—in a pattern of coverage that was a lot more systematic than it might have appeared—before he found what he was looking for.
    A corner of glass which lay exposed and glinting in the sun brought him to the spot near a grassy dune; and it only took him a minute or so to dig all the equipment out, after checking that he was unobserved.
    There was a swim-mask, flippers, weighted belt and compact backpack-and-breathing-pipe assembly.
    In short, a complete scuba outfit.
    Simon had uncovered it only to satisfy himself that it was indeed what he thought it was, and was still shiny enough to have been put there quite recently. It was. He buried it again