Send for the Saint by Leslie Charteris, Peter Bloxsom Page A

for a minute or more they both froze in silence, listening for the sound of approaching footsteps. Then gingerly, and with one ear still cocked, the Saint prised up the lid a few inches and peered into the crate.
    “What’s inside?” asked the girl.
    “Paint,” said Simon pressing the lid back on. “Let’s try this long one marked Agricultural Implements.”
    He repeated the breath-bating procedure with the shears and crowbar. The lid lifted more easily, and inside they saw dozens of gleaming hoes. But the Saint, carelessly for him, rammed the lid back on with unnecessary force and more than the unavoidable minimum of noise, and a hinged side of the crate dropped down. Inside, in a compartment beneath the hoes, were revealed at least a score of carbines.
    The Saint gave a low whistle.
    “A few hoes on top, and a rich harvest of guns underneath! And they’re the very latest thing. And American! But the interesting question is, Where are they going?”
    The girl reached into one end of the gun compartment and took out a folded piece of paper.
    “Look. Some kind of instruction leaflet. With diagrams. But it’s printed in Chinese.”
    Simon took the paper from her and studied it, frowning.
    “Not Chinese … My knowledge of oriental scripts isn’t all it might be,” he confessed. “But I’m pretty sure I’ve seen something like this before. It’s like ancient Sanskrit characters, only there’s a difference in the way they’re arranged on the page.” He spread out the paper on a crate in front of her. “Look — if you turn it so that the diagrams are the right way up, you can see which way the text goes. See — it’s in vertical lines — like Chinese. Sanskrit characters, Chinese arrangement. And the only script I know of like that is Korean! So that’s the game!”
    “The guns are going to Korea?” “North Korea,” said the Saint quietly. “American weapons, being exported for use against the Americans themselves in the war. And, of course, against the South Koreans.”
    “Couldn’t they be going to the South?” He shook his head.
    “There’d be no reason to hide them if they were. No, this little lot’s bound for North Korea all right, you could bet your life on that. And so are those other five ships, no doubt. Mystery solved.” He paused thoughtfully and then added: “But not the immediate problem.” “What is that?” “How to stop this shipment.”
    “We will tell Mr Patroclos, and he will tell the police.”
    “There’s no law against exporting arms. And the crew
would swear that they knew nothing about it, anyhow —
whether they did or not. Besides, there are the five ships
that’ve already sailed. They’ve got to be stopped.”
    “Mr Patroclos could radio them and order them to turn back.”
    “Could — but would he?” Simon’s expression was sardonic. “Dio may not be as unscrupulous as some people say he is, but I never heard of him having a reputation as a great philanthropist. Having those ships turned back and unloaded now, and maybe tied up for months in some official investigation, would cost him a small fortune in overheads and lost time and freights. No, I’m afraid that with his impostor disposed of he’d be liable to think it more practical to just let this operation take its course.”
    Ariadne looked troubled and uncertain. “Those other five ships have got to be intercepted, by force if necessary.” The Saint was frowning as he virtually went on thinking aloud. “But that’s a major naval operation, and nobody’s going to launch it just on our say-so. Someone pretty big has got to verify what we’ve seen here. Like, someone from the American Embassy.” He gripped the girl suddenly by the shoulders.
    “Ariadne, will you help me?”
    “How?”
    “Go and phone the Ambassador. Say it’s a red-alert United Nations emergency. Give my name. It may not shine like a bishop’s, but I think it’s got enough clout to make him listen. Have him send