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confidence could always command a supply of that virtue.
    The pub was dim, smoky, and redolent of stout
and the honest sweat of hiking from home to the tap. A dozen and a
half of what appeared to be neighbor hood regulars were enjoying the hospitality.
    “Find us a table, will you, dear?”
asked Mildred. “I’ve got to go and repair the damage.” She
indicated her face. “And make mine a Guinness.”
    Simon found a table in a corner, and the
volume of talk, which had briefly diminished because of the arrival of a pair
of strangers, soon returned to its original level. The barman took the Saint’s
order, brought it, in his own leisurely time, and several minutes later
Mildred had still not returned. Finally the Saint, aware of the in satiable addiction of some
women for ritualistic applica tions of face
paint, and secure in the knowledge that his car key was in his pocket, sat back with a sigh and began to drink alone.
    When his share of the foamy dark liquid was
half con sumed, Mildred came back, looking cheerful and un- contrite.
    “Now,” she said brightly,
“what would you like to know?”
    She slipped into the chair beside him,
propped her elbows on the table, and drank deeply from her glass, rolling her
eyes to look at him as he answered.
    “Let me see how much more you need to
tell me. You’re Eugene Drew’s daughter. You obviously don’t want to see Eugene Drew, but it seems
that your father would like to see you. It
seems, in fact, that he would like so much to see you that he has hired a couple of private investigators to find
and catch you. Right so far?”
    She nodded vigorously, her lips on the rim of her glass.
    “Now, unless insanity runs in your
family—which is a possibility I haven’t by any means completely dis counted—the
most likely explanation is that you have run away from home
and your poor distraught father is exerting every effort to bring you back into the fold. Just
why you left home is another question. Maybe you did something naughty, like smother your little brothers and sisters, or hock your mama’s diamond tiara, and you figure that any slaughtering that’s
done when you get back home
will involve you instead of a fatted calf.”
    She giggled.
    “You’ve got it right up to the end. But
my feelings are hurt.”
    “Why?”
    “Because you don’t know why I ran
away.”
    Simon finished his stout.
    “Should I?”
    “Don’t you read the newspapers?”
    “When I can’t find any really good fiction
Isome times sink to that.”
    “Then why didn’t you read about
me?”
    “I don’t believe this escapade has been covered. I saw a reporter trying to worm something out of your
father this evening. With no success,
I might add.”
    “That sounds like Dad. He’s rotten about
the papers. That’s one reason why he was so absolutely furious when I ran away
with Rick.”
    “So there’s another character in the
cast,” said the Saint. “Why haven’t I had the pleasure of
meeting this Rick, if you’re running away with him.”
    “That was last month. Rick is in America
right now. It’s Rick Fenton I’m talking about.”
    Simon shook his head.
    “Doesn’t ring a bell.”
    “Oh!” huffed Mildred, looking mortified. “Rick
Fenton, I mean. The actor.”
    “Sorry,” Simon said. “Has he
played Hamlet?”
    “He’s a teeniebopper idol.”
    “Sounds positively sacrilegious,” the Saint remarked. “What is it?”
    “You know … all the
teen-age girls scream and faint when they see him. He’s twenty-two but helooksseven teen, and he’s a really fantastic actor.”
    “I’ll bet he is,” said Simon.
    “He was in Beach Towel Tramp and Teen-Age Martian in a Girls’ Dormitory.”
    “Imissed both of those. You can tell what an
alienated life I lead.”
    “Anyway,” Mildred said with
resignation, “I ran away with him … to get
married. But they caught me, and it was in all the papers, with pictures and
everything. There was one of Dad with his hat in front of