Thus the Saint brought both his psalm and his promenade to a triumphant conclusion; for the song stopped as the Saint stopped, which was at, the foot of a short flight of steps leading up to a door—the door of the house of Heinrich Dussel.
And then, as Simon Templar paused there, a window was smashed directly above his head, so that chips of splintered glass showered onto the pavement all around him. And there followed a man's sudden sharp yelp of agony, clear and shrill in the silence of the street.
" 'Ere," said a familiar voice, "is this the 'ouse you said you were going into?"
The Saint turned.
The Law stood beside him, its hands in its belt, having followed him all the way on noiseless rubber soles.
And Simon beamed beatifically upon the Law.
"That's so, Algernon," he murmured, and mounted the steps.
The door opened almost as soon as he had touched the bell. And the Law was still beside him.
"What's wrong 'ere?" demanded the Law.
"It is nothing."
Dussel himself had answered the bell, suave and self-possessed—exactly as the Saint would have expected him to be.
"We have a patient here who is—not right in the head. Sometimes he is violent. But he is being attended to."
"That's right," said the Saint calmly. "I got your telephone message, and came right around."