Free Vendetta for the Saint. by Leslie Charteris Page B

acquired
from the ubiquitous font of linguistic
elegance, the enlisted ranks of the Ameri can armed services.
    “You mean that’s your very last
machine?” Si mon asked, nodding at the
disembowelled Fiat.
    “Sissignore. Cute-a little turista, she built like a brick-a gabinetto. I‘ave ‘er all-a ready dis eve ning.”
    “I wouldn’t want her, even if you do get
her put together again. Not that I want to hurt her feelings, but she just wasn’t built to fit me. So could
you perhaps tell
me where I might find something my size?”
    “Mebbe
you like-a drive-a da rich car, Alfa- Romeo or mebbe Ferrari?”
    There was a trace of a sneer in the question which Simon chose to ignore in the hope of
saving time in his
search.
    “I have driven them. Also Bentleys,
Lagondas, Jaguars, and in
the good old days a Hirondel.”
    “You drive-a da Hirondel, eh? How she
go, gahdam?”
    “Like a sonovabitch,” said the
Saint gravely. “But
that has nothing to do with the present prob lem. I still need a car.”
    “You like-a see sumping gahdam especial, make-a you forget Hirondel?”
    “That
I would like to see.”
    “Come-a
wid me.”
    The man led the way to a door at the rear of
the garage, and out
into the dusty yard behind. Apart from the piles of rusty parts and old threadbare tires, there was a large amorphous object
shrouded in a
tarpaulin. With an air of reverence more usual ly reserved for the lifting of a bride’s veil pre paratory to the nuptial kiss, he untied the
binding cords and gently drew back the canvas. Sunlight struck upon blood-red
coachwork and chromed fittings; and
the Saint permitted himself the un common
luxury of a surprised whistle.
    “Is
that what I think it is?” he said.
    “It gahdam-a sure is,” the mechanic
replied, with his eyes
half closed in ecstatic contemplation. “You’re-a look at a Bugatti!”
    “And
if I’m not mistaken, a type 41 Royale.”
    “Say, professore, you know all
about-a dese bastards,”
said the man, giving Simon the title of respect due to his erudition.
    There was   once a body of aficionados who looked upon motoring as a sport, and not an
air- conditioned
power-assisted mechanical aid to bringing
home the groceries, and among their ever- dwindling survivors there are still some
purists who maintain that
only in the golden years between 1919
and 1930 were any real automobiles con structed, and who dismiss all cars before or
after that era as
contemptible rubbish. The Saint was not quite such a fanatic, but he had an artist’s re spect for the masterpieces of that great decade.
    He was now looking at one of the best of
them. The name of
Ettore Bugatti has the same magic to the motoring enthusiast as do those of Annie Besant or Karl Marx to other circles of
believers. Bugatti was an
eccentric genius who designed cars to suit himself and paid no attention to what other designers were doing. In 1911, when all
racing cars were lumbering
behemoths, a gigantic Fiat snorted to victory
in the Grand Prix. This was expected; but
what was totally unexpected was the second- placing of Bugatti’s first racer, looking like a mouse beside an elephant, with an engine only
one- eighth the size of the monstrous
winner. Bugatti continued to pull
mechanical miracles like that. Then,
in 1927, when everyone else was building small cars, he brought out the juggernaut on which Simon was now feasting his eyes.
    “Dey build only seven,” the owner
crooned, carefully
flicking a speck of dust from the glisten ing fender. “Bugatti ‘imself bust-a one
up in a wreck, and now
dey only six sonovabitch in ‘ole gahdam-a
world.”
    Immense is an ineffective word for such a
car. Over a
wheel-base of more than fourteen feet, the rounded box of the coupe-de-ville shrank in
per spective when seen along
the unobstructed length of
the brobdingnagian hood. The front fenders rose high, then swept far back to form a
running- board.
    “And-a
look-a dis—”
    The mechanic was manipulating the intricate