"The sign of progress. The oriflamme of a budding financier, a comet flashing athwart the financial firmament," Phil intoned with ironic inflection. "That's Grove. Hawk's Nest and timber was too cramped a field for his vaulting ambition. He couldn't be satisfied with the one-horse show that was started here a century back. Our brother is by way of shedding a golden luster on the name, Rod."
Rod snorted.
"What's he after?"
"That's what I ask," Phil replied. "Echo answers what? Money, is one's natural answer. But that doesn't follow. He could live here and run things in the same offhand manner that we're used to, and have more money than he would ever need. There's always been a surplus. Do you know what the income of this estate runs for the last twenty-five years?"
Rod shook his head.
"Over a hundred thousand on the average. It could be doubled, trebled, if one cared to go at the timber rough-shod. So it isn't money," Phil continued. "The governor would have been perfectly satisfied to turn everything over to him as soon as he married. On the contrary, he persuaded the gov. to set him up in this blatant money-grabbing scheme. Personally, I think private banking and trust fund operations are just a glorified sort of pawnbroking. We've always made our money out of productive enterprises. I can understand Christ's indignation at the money changers. They're damned parasites. Grove, however, has no such peculiar ideas. He's become a man of affairs. The two years he spent in New York and London financial circles have turned his head, I think. Talks in millions. A wizard of finance. A wizard! Grove could always fool women. He never fooled a man of keen perception—outside of his own father. Grove's actually proud of this trust company thing, you know. Nailed our name to his financial flag-pole. And he has associated with him five or six of the shrewdest business buccaneers on the coast,—Deane, Arthur Richston, Mark Sherburne, and his father-in-law, John Wall. I don't like it, Rod."
"It's his funeral," Rod answered carelessly, "if they pluck him."
"I wasn't thinking about him," Phil drawled. "It's the rest of us. We wouldn't like a smash. Maybe I'm pessimistic."
"What does the pater think of it?"
"Oh, backs him stoutly. Keeps all his loose change in the Norquay Trust. Believes Grove is launched on a wonderful career. Maybe he is. But I don't think our beloved brother has the necessary grip for that sort of career. He loves power; he's the chesty sort. He revels in big affairs. And I don't think he really knows what power consists of, nor how skilfully and wisely to direct affairs."