“Tell him it’s urgent,” he said, slipping a half-crown into the infant’s paw, “and hurry yourself. You can ride over in the trap, and I’ll stand you another of these if you’re back quickly.” The boy nodded and disappeared at the double. The innkeeper was working the beer engine, and Carn, outwardly impassive, gnawed mouthfuls out of the stem of his pipe in the effort of appearing calm. The absence of the Ford, however antique and rickety, was a disaster. It meant that unless he was remarkably lucky he would have to be content with the assistance of a mob of mutton-headed locals for the big job. They would be panting with excitement at the magnitude of it, twice as jumpy as so many cats on hot bricks, and good-naturedly clod-hopperily dense. The prospect of seeing the Tiger get away through their bungling almost broke Carn’s heart. He would have taken a chance and tackled the whole brigade of Tiger Cubs single-handed if he had seen the faintest hope of success, but he had been turned out of a different mould from Simon Templar’s, and his kind of brain did not run to schemes for capturing a boatload of bandits all by himself. As it was, he had more than half a mind to enlist the Saint. Templar was straight, he knew. And it would be better to pinch the Tiger with the Saint’s help than to see the Tiger get clean away. That, however, would have to be resolved on the spur of the moment, for there was still a chance—the rapidly fading ghost of a chance, but a chance all the same—that that final humiliation would not be thrust upon him. Carn gulped down his beer, thankful that the innkeeper was perfectly happy to conduct a monologue. “Have another?” “I don’t mind if I do, thank you, sir.” The detective cursed and fumed inwardly, but it had to be borne. If he had rushed out without standing his whack, every subsequent customer would hear the innkeeper’s comments on the doctor’s extraordinary behaviour. And that would get to the Tiger’s ears, and the Tiger, as Simon Templar had observed, owned a nasty, suspicious mind. But the ordeal ended at last, and Carn was able to excuse himself. He went through the village and set out up the hill to the Pill Box. It was a sultry day, and Carn had accumulated a lot of spare avoirdupois since his London-to-Southend days. He climbed doggedly, with the perspiration streaming down into his collar, and gasped his relief when the slope commenced to flatten out. He was still a dozen yards from the Pill Box when Orace appeared at the door. Orace made it elaborately obvious that he had simply come out for a breather. He surveyed the scenery with the concentrated interest of an artist, and honoured the detective with nothing but a nonchalant glance, but he kept his right hand behind his back. “Mr. Templar in?” demanded Carn from a distance. “Ain’t,” replied Orace laconically. “D’you know where he is?” Orace focused the detective with unfriendly eyes.