Leslie Charteris on Getting Your Goat

A tinge of old beetroot suffused Mr Teal’s rubicund complexion. To say that his goat was completely and omnipotently got conveys nothing at all. In the last ten minutes his goat had been utterly annihilated, and the remains spirited away to the exact point in space where (so Einstein says) eternity changes its socks and starts back on the return journey. He was as comprehensively de-goated as a man can be.

— Leslie Charteris, The Saint versus Scotland Yard.

“Mr. Teal” is one C.E. Teal, aka, Detective Inspector Claude Eustace Teal, the rotund gum-chewing fellow most usually tasked with bringing the Saint to book. The Saint was the goat-getter, naturally.

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photo credit: Winter day 18 – Center of attention via photopin (license)