Pursuit of a Parcel Read Free

didn’t see Cornelius again until I left school. Then I spent a long vacation in Holland picking up my Dutch and having a general look around. There was some idea that I might go into the firm. They thought a lot of my father.”
    Garrett blew out a cloud of smoke.
    â€œAnd what did they think of Cornelius?”
    â€œI didn’t ask them.” There was a faint sparkle in Antony’s eyes.
    â€œDon’t you know anything without asking? Don’t play the fool! How did he stand with them?”
    â€œQuite well, I think, but really I don’t know.”
    There was a pause which prolonged itself until Garrett said suddenly, “Seen much of him since?”
    â€œA certain amount. I didn’t go into the firm, as you know, because I got red-hot about flying. Mr. Merridew made me take my degree, and then he had to let me do as I liked.”
    â€œSome relation of your mother’s, isn’t he?”
    â€œUmpteenth cousin—family solicitor. She made him my guardian. He was by way of being trustee for Cornelius too—they left him a little money. Anything else you’d like out of the family archives?”
    Garrett looked at him sharply.
    â€œNot at the moment. Some old stuff, and some new. Run together, it amounts to this—you haven’t lived at close quarters with Cornelius Roos since you were eight, but you did live at very close quarters with him till then. A boy of eight knows the people he lives with inside out and downside up. He knows a damn sight more about them than if he were three or four times as old. They talk in front of him, and they don’t bother to put on frills. I should think you were sharp enough to cut yourself when you were eight.”
    Antony laughed. “Thank you, sir!”
    Garrett reached behind him and kicked the fire with his heel. “You needn’t. That’s when I saw you first—insubordinate little ruffian, but sharp. So now I’m asking you—how did Cornelius strike you then, and how does it check up with how he strikes you now?”
    Antony leaned back against the shabby red leather of the chair. He looked at the blaze of sparks which rushed up from the log Garrett had kicked. He said soberly, “I thought a lot of him. I wanted to do the sort of things he did. That’s the normal reaction of the small boy to a thirteen-year older brother. I always thought of him as my brother. He was awfully good to me.”
    â€œI want to know if he was straight.” Garrett’s tone was brutally direct. “You’re fencing, and I haven’t got time to fence. Out with it! How much of a liar was he?”
    The sparkle returned to Antony’s eyes.
    â€œOh, most accomplished.”
    â€œMoney?”
    â€œI don’t know about that.”
    â€œWhat did he lie about?”
    Antony lifted a hand and let it fall on his knee.
    â€œAnything—everything.”
    â€œWhy?”
    Antony sat up, leaned forward a little.
    â€œI think power. I didn’t size up that way at the time of course, but looking back and checking up on it, I think that’s what it was—and is. He likes power—he wants power. He hadn’t the capital to give him any real standing in the firm. He couldn’t get higher than he got, and it isn’t enough to work his brain or satisfy his abilities. And that’s why he looked beyond it. Intelligence work is meat and drink to him. It keeps him on the stretch—gives him adventure and the sense of power. He can gather a thread here and a thread there, and when he’s got all the threads in his hand he’s got a pull, and that’s what he likes. He looks as stolid as an ox, but he’s nobody’s fool. He’s an adventurer, a gambler, and a respectable Dutch citizen. That’s the best I can do for you.”
    Garrett smoked in silence. Then he said, “Meaning that he might be double-crossing us. Or the other side. Or both.