Pursuit of a Parcel

by Patricia Wentworth

  Garrett stooped to pitch another log on the fire.

  “When you’re told to,” he growled.

  Antony came out into the street and began to walk in the direction of John Norton’s flat. The distance to go was about three quarters of a mile. It was as dark as low-lying cloud and as an hour past midnight could make it. The nearer guns had been silent all this while. It had been quiet up there in Frank Garrett’s room, but here in the open the air sounded with a distant vibration and the fanning of wings a long way off. A faint flicker of light came and went on the unseen horizon, as sheet lightning comes and goes behind the hills on a summer night, making the darkness visible and fading into it again.

  He found his way pretty well. It was when he turned the second corner that he became aware of the footstep behind him, and that it had been behind him for more time than he could swear to. He thought he must have been hearing it for quite a while before he began to think that it might be following him. There were fifty yards to go to the next turning. The footstep went behind him all the way. He judged it to be a matter of ten yards behind.

  He took the corner, felt a railing on his left, and followed it to where it was broken by one shallow step and three deeper ones. At the top of the steps he stood pressed against the smooth paint of a door and waited for the footstep to overtake him. It stopped at the corner. Obviously the man stood there and listened—a leery fellow. He ought to be hearing Antony’s footsteps going away from him down the street. When he didn’t hear them, what was he going to think, and what was he going to do?

  He stood there quite unseen, not even a darker smear on the black dark that was the corner.

  There was one of those flickers of light. Antony had the momentary impression of a tall man standing there just as he had pictured him—listening. He thought there was a movement. He thought the man looked quickly right and left. And then the flicker was gone and it was all smooth dark. The footsteps had begun again. Coming this way? No—going straight on across the road. The sound flattened a little on the wood blocks of the roadway.

  Antony was just about to make after them. It was in his mind to see who had followed him from Garrett’s flat. If it had not been for the telltale listening pause at the corner of the street, he might have let the whole thing go as an accident. Now he thought he had better follow it up. He came down out of the porch, and was just going to cross the road, when someone forestalled him. A man came round the corner at a surprising speed and ran right over the crossing. That is to say, Antony judged that it was a man. He could see nothing to confirm his judgment, nor hear very much either. Whoever it was, he was softly shod—gym shoes perhaps. He made hardly any noise at all. Once over the crossing, he must have checked, for the sound was entirely lost.

  Antony felt a lively curiosity. He crossed over himself and heard away in the distance the footsteps of the man who had followed him and whom he now followed. Between them he thought someone else moved soft foot. A queer game. The first man had been following Antony Rossiter, but who was the second man after—Antony Rossiter, or the man who had been following Antony Rossiter? That the second man was after one of them he had no doubt. Gym shoes are not London wear, and a man doesn’t run in the dark unless he is either running after someone or running away. Since there was no sign of pursuit, Antony took the first possibility to be the more likely of the two.

  He was wondering how long a dance he was going to be led, and whether the game was worth the candle, when with a roar the guns opened again. A sudden blinding flash lit everything in a white dazzle of light—the sky all fire; roofs, houses, the whole unseen mass disclosed; window glass glittering; the street open, with its pavements on either side of the brown road stretching on, stretching endlessly. And, a dozen yards in front of him on the left-hand pavement, the man who had followed him from Garrett’s. It was all over in a moment which closed with a deafening crash. The ground shook. Antony was flung into the road. As he picked himself up he could hear the rumble and rattle of falling masonry.

  He stood up and got his breath. A second crash sounded from farther away. The flash was not so bright. There was no figure on the pavement. There was a smell of smoke and dust in his throat and nose. The noise of the guns was deafening. The flashes came and went. The man was gone.

  But he had seen him, and he was as sure as he had ever been of anything in all his life that it was Cornelius.

  The plane had passed over. The sound of the barrage died. He began to run, his fingers digging into his pocket for a torch, his mind full of that clear picture of the street flashlighted from end to end. He had seen Cornelius a dozen yards ahead of him, but he hadn’t seen anyone else. Where was the man who had passed him running, the man with the gym shoes?

  He came up to the place where he had seen Cornelius, switched on the torch, and sent its little pencil of light stabbing here and there. The street, like the one he had just left, was a monotony of houses, each with its railing, its steps, its porch.

  He moved the light to and fro. Four steps up. A green front door, a brass knocker, and the number 7. The door was shut. He moved on. Same thing, but blue paint—No. 9. But 11 broke the pattern. A black door stood ajar, a black figure sprawled at the threshold. The torch picked it up without detail—the shape of the head, no face showing, the hat crushed sideways, an arm flung out with the wrist dangling over the top step. The torch stiffened in Antony’s hand. The light caught on a mess of broken glass, white and staring red. He bent, held it closer, and saw the cuff shot back from the wrist, and blood running down on to the glass.

  And with that the man began to stir, to groan, and to struggle up. There was a mutter of Dutch, slipshod and indistinct. Antony stuffed the torch in his pocket and went to help him.

  “That you, Con?” he said. “I thought it was. Here, hold up—it’s Antony, alive and kicking. Did you think I was dead? Delia said you did.”

  He had him on his feet, when the door swung widely back, striking the wall. There was no light within. Something was swung at Antony, he didn’t know what—something heavy and hard—perhaps a golf-club. It missed his head and caught him a crack on the shoulder. His arm went numb and dropped to his side. He let go of Cornelius and jumped back. There was a scuffle. Somebody swore in Dutch—he thought not Cornelius.

  The beam of a torch caught him in the eyes, and as he ducked away, there was a forward rush. A fist took him on the jaw and he went backward over the steps to the pavement. The door banged, but he didn’t hear it.

  Garrett had on the legs of his pyjamas and was reaching for the jacket—maroon and yellow stripes on a ground of washed-out blue. The telephone bell rang. Since the war he had an extension by his bed, a course recommended for years by all his friends and stoutly resisted. He spoke rudely to the bell, dragged the striped abomination about his shoulders, and snatched the receiver. “Who is it?”

  “Antony. Sorry to bother you, but—”

  “I’m going to put some clothes on.”

  Antony could hear the receiver clatter down upon the table. After an interval the line crackled. Garrett barked,

  “Well—what is it? If you don’t want any sleep, I do!”

  “Yes—I’m sorry—but I had to let you know. When I left you I was followed.”

  “Sure?”

  “Yes. I think it was Cornelius.”

  Garrett jerked another “Sure?” at him, and Antony said,

  “No, I’m not sure—I just think it was. And I think there was someone following him. I’ll tell you what happened—”

  When he had finished Garrett grunted.

  “Stupid business! Any damage?”

  “Lump on the jaw, and another where my head hit the pavement. When I came round there wasn’t anyone about and the house was all shut, so I thought I’d better come back here and let you know. The address is 11 Silverthorn Road. If Cornelius is there, I thought—”

  Garrett said sharply, “Wait a minute!” Then, after a pause, “What do you make of it? You say som
eone was following Cornelius. Do you think he knocked him out?”

  “I’m afraid I took it for granted that he’d been knocked out by the blast. It threw me into the road. There was loose stuff and rubble in front of the house, and a lot of broken glass. He’d bled on it from a cut on the wrist—that was the first thing I saw when I got my torch on him. I hadn’t time to sort things out whilst they were happening, but going over it afterwards, it struck me that Cornelius might have had some idea of coming to see you. He told me he was going to, you know. Well, he may have seen me as I came out. If he was in the back of the hall as I came through, he would have seen me without my seeing him. Perhaps he just thought there was something familiar about the way I walked—I don’t know. You must remember he’s been thinking I was dead. Or he may not have been following me at all. He may just have given up the idea of seeing you tonight and been on his way home. No, that won’t do, because when I cut off out of the straight and lurked in a porch and he missed me, he stood waiting at the corner for quite a time. That’s where the other fellow got a chance to catch up. I never saw him, so I can’t describe him, but he was running—he must have eyes like a cat—and I’m sure he was after Cornelius. Someone might be interested in keeping tabs on him, you know.”

  “I don’t know anything!” said Garrett crossly. “Nor do you—you’re just guessing. You don’t know that it was Cornelius, you don’t know that he was following you, or that anyone was following him. I suppose I shall have to send someone to look at the house, after which we shall probably know less than we do now. If it was Cornelius, he won’t be there. He’s got an assignation with your young woman tomorrow morning, hasn’t he? Get off to bed, and mind you’re down there on time, or he’ll steal a march on you. You can ask him all what about it when you see him. And if you ring me up again tonight, I’ll have you framed for bigamy, or burglary, or something that’ll give you a good long stretch!”

  X

  There are days when everything goes right, and there are days when everything goes wrong. In the nursery Antony remembered stress being laid upon the importance of getting out of bed with the right foot first. The problem, unsolved down to what press photographers call present day, was whether the word “right” in this context should be taken to mean the right of right or left, or the right of right and wrong. He had always had a sneaking feeling that to make it mean that you should get out of bed with the right foot rather than the left was altogether too easy, but that if there was a right foot and a wrong foot, and you didn’t know which was which, it was too difficult to cope with at all.

  This particular October morning was, from the start, one of the wrong-foot days. To begin with, John Norton’s alarm-clock, set to go off at 6:30, produced a delayed-action alarum at half past seven.

  Antony woke with a start, took a horrified look at the time, and jumped to the telephone. He had got to stop Delia catching the 8:45 bus from Wayshot. He got through in ten minutes, which wasn’t too bad.

  “Antony—what is it?” She sounded frightened.

  “Nothing—I mean nothing to worry about. It’s only you needn’t come up to town, because I’m coming down.”

  “Oh, Antony!”

  “Yes, I’m looking forward to it myself. Now listen! I’m catching the half past eight bus—at least I hope I am—so I ought to be with you before ten. But if Cornelius turns up first, don’t you budge. Tell him I’m coming, and tell him you’re going to wait for me. After all, he did address the parcel to me, and I’m going to have a look at it. Now, have you got that? Tell him I’m coming, and don’t move an inch without me. I must fly.”

  He dressed in a hurry, found shaving a painful operation, boiled himself a couple of eggs, swallowed a hasty cup of tea, and found on arrival at Victoria that the bus on which he had counted had not a seat unbooked. This meant going to Waterloo, catching a train, and hoping for the best. By this time it was as near nine o’clock as makes no difference.

  The hoped-for best remained an unrealized dream. Owing to damage on the line, the train meandered by unfamiliar ways to a sticking-point where the passengers were decanted.

  Antony looked at his Watch and walked grimly to a garage where, according to a helpful porter, he might be able to hire a car. He found the proprietor talkative, melancholy, and overflowing with tales of the car he might have hired if he had come this way a couple of days ago. He was a large, pale man with a large, pale hand and a reddish watery eye. He laid the hand on Antony’s arm and showed him the crater which the bomb had made. “Biggest anywhere this side of London—that’s what everyone says that’s seen it. Two Morrises—well, they were all over the place—about as much of them left as you could put on a sixpence. Direct hit, that’s what they got. Then there was the Humber limousine—a very nice job, that Humber—special body, only done five hundred miles—on commission sale for the Honourable Mrs. Pumphrey—smashed up so you wouldn’t have known her from a Ford. The old Daimler—well, I reckon she got off cheap—glass all smashed to blazes and the near front wheel buckled—”

  Antony struck in firmly.

  “Wouldn’t she run if you put on the spare?”

  The man blinked, Antony was being sudden—he liked a leisurely client. He had yet other harrowing details to impart; the tale of dead and wounded cars was by no means told. Still business was business. He admitted reluctantly that the Daimler would probably run.

  “No reason why she shouldn’t, so far as I can see. She’s old, but she goes. Proper engineering jobs, Daimlers. And as luck would have it, we didn’t lose our petrol—missed the pumps nicely. Would you be wanting to go far, sir?”

  “Wayshot. I’m in a hurry.”

  “Matter of fifteen, sixteen miles.” He lifted his voice and called, “Bill!”

  The proceedings were leisurely. It was half past eleven before they got going. Bill was a red-headed lad just short of eighteen. He had the largest, boniest wrists, and the largest ginger-coloured freckles that Antony had ever beheld. He drove casually, brilliantly, dangerously, and never stopped talking about aeroplanes. When Antony admitted to being in the Air Force, he asked so many questions that he very nearly forgot to drive at all. A nice lad, with a cheerful spirit and nerves of iron.

  It was a cold, raw morning with a mist drawing up off the low ground. Delia looked out of the dining-room window and saw it blanketing the fields on the other side of the road. The willows at the foot of the slope had only their heads showing. Mr. Canning who owned the land had had them pollarded, and they looked for all the world like enormous cabbages.

  She glanced at her watch. It was nearly half past nine. If the bus was punctual, Antony might be here in less than half an hour, but if the fog was bad nearer London, the bus might very easily be late. She had decided that it was only a local mist and would soon go, when Parker came in to tell her that Mr. Brown was in the drawing-room.

  She was young enough to make a face. She didn’t want Cornelius to arrive first. She wanted. Antony. Things were going cross. Cornelius was early, and Antony might be late. She put the best face she could upon it and walked into the drawing-room.

  Cornelius was certainly a big man. She hadn’t really taken him in yesterday, but she looked at him now appraisingly, and decided that he was too large to be comfortable—big hands and feet, shoulders too high and square, and a face like the side of a house. He would have been a good deal astonished if he could have guessed her thoughts. Without taking an undue interest in his own looks, he had always considered that they did him credit.

  He took stock of Delia as she came in, and was immediately struck by the alteration in her appearance. The girl he had seen yesterday was a pale statue cast in a mould of grief. This girl bloomed with an agreeable morning freshness. She wore a tweed skirt and knitted jumper in a smoky shade of blue. Her hair shone like pale gold. The eyes he had seen fixed in despair were as bright as happiness could make them. He was considerably taken aback, and for the moment at a loss to account for the change.

&nb
sp; Delia herself supplied him with an answer to the puzzle. Without any preamble she came out with what was uppermost in her mind.

  “Oh, Mr. Rossiter—he isn’t dead!”

  Her meaning did not reach him. His mind was full of its own picture and could not at once relinquish it. He said, reacting only to her first words,

  “If you do not mind, it will be better if you call me Mr. Brown.”

  Delia could have shaken him. She came a step nearer and raised her voice.

  “You said he was dead. But he isn’t—Antony is alive!”

  A shock is a shock whether it is pleasant or unpleasant. Joy has been known to kill. Whatever this big man felt, he kept it to himself. If Delia had been watching his hand she would have seen it stiffen and clench, but she was looking at his face, which remained quite without expression. He spoke at once with some severity.

  “What are you talking about?”

  Delia had the feeling that she had tried to shake him and failed. She beat her hands together and said in her high, clear voice,

  “Antony—your brother Antony. He isn’t dead—he’s alive.” The colour had come into her face. Just to say it made her feel radiantly alive herself.

  He said, “Who told you that?” and she cut in joyfully,

  “He did—Antony did. He rang me up—so you see he couldn’t be dead, could he?”

  If he had any natural feeling he did not show it. His tone was hard and businesslike as he demanded,

  “Are you sure that it was Antony?”

  Delia laughed. She had been wanting to for some time. Laughter had been bubbling up inside her for just no reason at all but being alive—she and Antony.

  She wanted to laugh, as a bird wants to sing on a sunny morning.

  “Of course I’m sure! I talked to him—he rang me up. Aren’t you glad—aren’t you pleased? He’s your brother. Don’t you mind about his not being dead?”

  He put up a hand as one does to a child. His accent became a little more marked as he said,