At that moment he would even have considered throwing up the sponge, tipping the wink to Carn, and sliding out of the picture. What stopped him from taking that desperate way out was a shrewd understanding of the girl’s character. Somehow, out of a normal education and a simple life in a forgotten country village, she had acquired the standards of a qualified adventuress—in the clean sense. And she had a ramrod will to back her up. She felt that it was only the game to stand by her man in any and every kind of trouble, and she meant to play the game according to her lights. She would only despise him if he refused to carry on on her account: she was determined to prove to him by deeds as well as words that she wasn’t a clinging vine who was going to cramp his style either before or after the wedding bells. And it was quite hopeless for the Saint to try and point out to her that she would only hamper him—as hopeless as it would have been ungracious, bearing in mind the uniqueness of a girl of her calibre. But for one thing Simon could and did thank his stars: he had successfully put her off the track of the first string of his bow—the disused inn behind the village. He would be able to tackle the proposition from that angle without her knowledge before nightfall, and if the Fates played into his hands he might manage to get a stranglehold on the Tiger before it was her turn to bat. “If the mountain won’t budge, Mahomet’ll have to leave it where it is,” said the Saint disarmingly. “But there are one or two knots that ought to be untied in the course of the afternoon, and that’s where you can help. One—it might be a sound plot to see if we can’t get this Aunt Aggie palaver cleared up a bit.” “She wouldn’t tell me anything last night.” “You were hardly on form then, with me loose in the menagerie. This afternoon you can go back full of beans, with a parting hug from me to pep you up, and lam into Auntie two-fisted. If you can only carry it, you’ve got her cold. After all, she admits having tapped your treasure chest to save herself. It isn’t too stiff a return to ask her to get a bit off her own chest for your satisfaction. I know she’s a hefty handful, but she isn’t half the size of some of the things you’ll have to wire into during the next twenty-four hours, and it’ll limber you up. If she tries to bully you, remember that there isn’t a bully swaggering the earth that can’t be bullied himself by someone with the guts to take on the job. And if she finds she can’t treat you high-handed, and bursts into tears—don’t let ’em dissolve you. I can’t take her on myself, so I’ve got to rely on you.” She nodded. “If you say so, Saint, I shan’t funk it.”