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paying
attention, since the
oracle was clearly entranced enough with the gargled splendor of his own voice.
    Hence the Saint was able to disguise an occa sional unfocusing of the eyes, when his mind
wan dered
underneath the monotonous discourse, grop ing for another missing item of information
which he felt might
provide a key to some of the riddles of the past two days, but which kept eluding him
as exasperatingly as an itch
that could not be scratched.
    At last the coffee wound up the repast, and Destamio yawned and belched and announced his readiness for a siesta. Simon took this as his
cue for an exit, and was given no
argument.
    “Glad I could get to know you,
Saint,” Destamio said,
pumping his hand with the heart iness
of a professional politician. “You have any more problems, you come to me. Don’t try to
be a big shot by yourself.”
    The incredibly discreet Lily appeared once
more in the role of chauffeuse, now wearing a cashmere sweater and Capri pants so tight that if she
had been tattooed
the mark would have shown through.
Simon was delighted to observe that she was not tattooed.
    As she resumed her attempts to make the
Alfa-Romeo behave like a scared mountain goat, he felt that he had to make one parting effort to
discover whether she ever talked at all.
    “Do you live here or are you just
visiting?” he queried
chattily.
    “Yes.”
    He gazed at her for quite a long time,
figuring this out, but what could be seen of her face gave him no help. He decided to try again.
    “Do
you ever get away?”
    “Sometimes.”
    That was a little better. Perhaps it only
required perseverance.
    “I
hope I’ll see you again somewhere.”
    “Why?”
    “I’d like to know what your face looks
like. Would 1
recognize you without glasses?”
    “No.”
    Always the same pulse-stirring voice,
vibrantly disinterested
in everything.
    “Is
Al a jealous type?”
    “I
don’t know.”
    The Saint sighed. Perhaps after all his
charm was not absolutely
irresistible. It was a solemn thought. At any rate, she was evidently capable of holding out for the duration of the short ride to the heliport. But he had to keep on talking, because
the other haunting hint of knowledge
that he had been seeking had suddenly
given up its evasive tactics and
dropped out of the recess where it had been hiding.
    “Do you know why he was called
‘Gopher’?” he asked.
    “No.”
    “Well, I won’t burden your mind with
it. When you go back
just tell him that I know. I suddenly remembered.
Will you do that?”
    “Yes.”
    They were at the heliport, and a flight was
about to leave, the vanes of the ‘copter swishing lazily around. But the Saint wanted to be sure that
his message would
get through. As he levered himself out of the bucket seat, he stopped with the door still open and pulled out the sheaf of crisp
greenery that Destamio
had given him, fanning the leaves under her nose while he ostentatiously peeled off one of them.
    “Tell him, I liked these samples. The
only thing wrong is,
there weren’t enough of them. Show him this so he knows what you’re talking about. Tell him it’s going to
cost a lot more now, because of the
‘Gopher’ business. Do you think you’ll get that straight?”
    She
nodded placidly.
    “Congratulations,”
said the Saint.
    He shut the car door, and leaned over it.
There was one final
touch he could not forego, vain as it might seem. Although it should certainly help to make his point.
    “And if you want to find out whether
he’s jealous, tell
him I did this,” he said.
    He bent further and kissed her on the lips.
They tasted like warm paint.
    2
    The
helicopter leaped skywards, and Simon’s spir its soared with it. What had begun as the
most triv ial
happenstance, sharpened by a curt sequel in the newspaper, had grown into the adumbration of
a full-scale intrigue.
    He had some of the sensations of an angler
who was expecting
to play with a sardine and instead has hooked a tuna. What he would do with the