Bonbright's first day in the plant had carried no suggestion from his
father as to what his work was actually to be. He had merely walked
about, listening to Rangar's expositions of processes and systems.
After he was in bed that night he began to wonder what work would fall
to him. What work had it been the custom for the heir apparent to
perform? What work had his father and grandfather and great-grandfather
performed when their positions were his position to-day?... Vaguely he
recognized his incompetence to administer anything of importance.
Probably, little by little, detail by detail, matters would be placed
under his jurisdiction until he was safely functioning in the family
groove.
His dreams that night were of a reluctant, nightmarish passage down a
huge groove, a monotonous groove, whose smooth, insurmountable sides
offered no hint of variety.... As he looked ahead he could see nothing
but this straight groove stretching into infinity. Always he was
disturbed and made wretched by a consciousness of movement, of varied
life and activity, of adventure, of thrill, outside the groove, but
invisible, unreachable.... He strove to clamber up the glassy sides,
only to slip back, realizing the futility of the EFFORT.
He breakfasted alone, before his father or mother was about, and left
the house on foot, driven by an aching restlessness. It was early. The
factory whistle had not yet blown when he reached the gates, but
already men carrying lunch boxes were arriving in a yawning, sleepy
stream.... Now Bonbright knew why he had arisen early and why he had
come here. It was to see this flood of workmen again; to scrutinize
them, to puzzle over them and their motives and their unrest. He leaned
against the wall and watched.
He was recognized. Here and there a man offered him good morning with a
friendliness of tone that surprised Bonbright. A good many men spoke to
him respectfully; more regarded him curiously; some hopefully. It was
the occasional friendly smile that affected him. One such smile from an
older workman, a man of intelligent face, of shrewd, gray eyes, caused
Bonbright to move from his place to the man's side.
"I don't know your name, of course," he said, diffidently.
"Hooper," said the man, pleasantly.
"The men seem to know me," Bonbright said. "I was a little surprised. I
only came yesterday, you know."
"Yes," said Hooper, "they know who you are."
"They seemed---almost friendly."
Hooper looked sharply at the young man. "It's because," said he,
"they're pinning hopes to you."
"Hopes?"
"Labor can't get anywhere until it makes friends in the ranks of the
employers," said Hooper. "I guess most of the men don't understand
that--even most of the leaders, but it's so. It's got to be so if we
get what we must have without a revolution."
Bonbright pondered this. "The men think I may be their friend?"
"Some saw you last night, and some heard you talk to Dulac. Most of
them have heard about it now."
"That was it?... Thank you, Mr. Hooper."
Bonbright went up to his office, where he stood at the window, looking
down upon the thickening stream of men as the minute for the starting
whistle approached.... So he was of some importance, in the eyes of the
workingmen, at least! They saw hope in his friendship. ... He shrugged
his shoulders. What could his friendship do for them? He was impotent
to help or harm. Bitterly he thought that if the men wanted friendship
that would be worth anything to them, they should cultivate his dead
forbears.
Presently he turned to his desk and wrote some personal letters--as a
distraction. He did not know what else to do. There was nothing
connected with the plant that he could set his hand to. It seemed to
him he was just present, like a blank wall, whose reason for existence
was merely to be in a certain place.
He was conscious of voices in his father's room, and after a time his
father entered and bade him a formal good morning. Bonbright was
acutely conscious of his father's distinguished, cultured, aristocratic
appearance. He was conscious of that manner which six generations of
repression and habit in a circumscribed orbit had bestowed on Bonbright
Foote VI. Bonbright was unconscious of the great likeness between him
and his father; of the fact that at his father's age it would be
difficult to tell them apart. Physically he was out of the Bonbright
Foote mold.
"Son," said Bonbright Foote VI, "you have made an unfortunate beginning
here. You have created an impression which we shall have to eradicate
promptly."
"I don't understand."
"It has been the habit of our family to hold aloof from our employees.
We do not come directly into contact with them. Intercourse between us
and them is invariably carried out through intermediaries."
Bonbright waited for his father to continue.
"You are being discussed by every man in the shops. This is peculiarly
unfortunate at this moment, when a determined effort is being made by
organized labor to force unionism on us. The men have the notion that
you are not unfriendly toward unionism."
"I don't understand it," said Bonbright. "I don't know what my feelings
toward it may be."
"Your feelings toward it," said his father with decision, "are
distinctly unfriendly."
Again Bonbright was silent.
"Last evening," said his father, "you mingled with the men leaving the
shops. You did a thing no member of our family has ever done--consented
to an interview with a professional labor agitator."
"That is hardly the fact, sir.... I asked for the interview."
"Which is worse.... You even, as it is reported to me, agreed to talk
with this agitator at some future time."
"I asked him to explain things to me."
"Any explanations of labor conditions and demands I shall always be
glad to make. The thing I am trying to bring home to you is that the
men have gotten an absurd impression that you are in sympathy with
them.... Young men sometimes come home from college with unsound
notions. Possibly you have picked up some socialistic nonsense. You
will have to rid yourself of it. Our family has always arrayed itself
squarely against such indefensible theories.... But the thing to do at
once is to wipe out any silly ideas your indiscretion may have aroused
among our workingmen."
"But I am not sure--"
"When you have been in this business ten years I shall be glad to
listen to your matured ideas. Now your ideas--your actions at
least-must conform to the policy we have maintained for generations. I
have called some of our department heads to my room. I believe I hear
them assembling. Let us go in."
Bonbright followed his father mechanically. The next room contained
some ten or twelve subordinate executives who eyed Bonbright curiously.
"Gentlemen," said the elder Foote, "this is my son, whom you may not
have met as yet. I wish to present him to you formally, and to tell you
that hereafter he and I share the final authority in this plant.
Decisions coming from this office are to be regarded as our joint
decisions--except in the case of an exception of immediate moment. ...
As you know, a fresh and determined effort is afoot to unionize this
plant. My son and I have conferred on the matter, but I have seen fit
to let the decision rest with him, as to our policy and course of
action."
The men looked with renewed curiosity at the young man who stood, white
of face, with compressed lips and troubled eyes.
"My son has rightly determined to adhere to the policy established many
years ago. He has determined that unionism shall not be permitted to
enter Bonbright Foote, Incorporated.... I state your sentiments, do I
not, my son?"
At the direct challenge Bonbright raised his eyes to his father's face
appealingly. "Father--" he said.
"I state your position?" his father said, sternly.
Against Bonbright's will he felt the accumulated power of the family
will, the family tradition. He had been reared in its shadow. Its grip
lay firm upon him. Struggle he might, but the strength to defy was not
yet in him.... He surrendered, feeling that, somehow, his private soul
had been violated, his individuality rent from him.
"Yes," he said, faintly.
"The first step he has decided upon," said his father, "and one which
should be immediately repressive. It is to post in every room and
department of the shops printed notices to the effect that any man who
affiliates himself with organized labor, or who becomes a member of a
so-called trade-union, will be summarily dismissed from his
employment.... That was the wording you suggested, was it not?"
"Yes," said Bonbright, this time without struggle.
"Rangar," said Mr. Foote, "my son directs that these cards be printed
AT ONCE, and put in place before noon. It can be done, can it not?"
"Yes, sir," said Rangar.
"I think that is all, gentlemen.... You understand my son's position, I
believe, so that if anyone questions you can answer him effectively?"
The department heads stirred uneasily. Some turned toward the door, but
one man cleared his throat.
"Well, Mr. Hawthorne?" said the head of the business.
"The men seem very determined this time. I'm afraid too severe action
on our part will make trouble."
"Trouble?"
"A strike," said Hawthorne. "We're loaded with contract orders, Mr.
Foote. A strike at this time--"
"Rangar," said Mr. Foote, sharply, "at the first sign of such a thing
take immediate steps to counteract it.... Better still, proceed now as
if a strike were certain. These mills MUST continue uninterruptedly....
If these malcontents force a strike, Mr. Hawthorne, we shall be able to
deal with it.... Good morning, gentlemen."
The men filed out silently. It seemed as if they were apprehensive,
almost as if they ventured to disagree with the action of their
employers. But none voiced his disapproval.
Bonbright stood without motion beside his father's desk, his eyes on
the floor, his lips pressed together.
"There," said his father, with satisfaction, "I think that will set you
right."
"Right?... The men will think I was among them last night as a spy!...
They'll despise me.... They'll think I wasn't honest with them."
Bonbright Foote VI shrugged his shoulders. "Loyalty to your family," he
said, "and to your order is rather more important than retaining the
good will of a mob of malcontents."
Bonbright turned, his shoulders dropping so that a more sympathetic eye
than his father's might have found itself moistening, and walked slowly
back to his room. He did not sit at his desk, but walked to the window,
where he rested his brow against his hand and looked out upon as much
of the world as he could see.... It seemed large to him, filled with
promise, filled with interests, filled with activities for HIM--if he
could only be about them. But they were held tantalizingly out of reach.
He was safe in his groove; had not slipped there gradually and
smoothly, but had been thrust roughly, by sudden attack, into it.
His young, healthy soul cried out in protest against the affront that
had been put upon it. Not that the issue itself had mattered so much,
but that it had been so handled, ruthlessly. Bonbright was no friend to
labor. He had merely been a surprised observer of certain phenomena
that had aroused him to thought. He did not feel that labor was right
and that his father was wrong. It might be his father was very
right.... But labor was such a huge mass, and when a huge mass seethes
it is impressive. Possibly this mass was wrong; possibly its seething
must be stilled for the better interests of mankind. Bonbright did not
know. He had wanted to know; had wanted the condition explained to him.
Instead, he had been crushed into his groove humiliatingly.
Bonbright was young, to be readily impressed. If his father had
received his uncertainty with kindliness and had answered his hunger's
demand for enlightenment with arguments and reasoning, the crisis
probably would have passed harmlessly. His father had seen fit not to
use diplomacy, but to assert autocratically the power of Bonbright
Foote, Incorporated. Bonbright's individuality had thought to lift its
head; it had been stamped back into its appointed, circumscribed place.
He was not satisfied with himself. His time for protest had been when
he answered his father's challenge. The force against him had been too
great, or his own strength too weak. He had not measured up to the
moment, and this chagrined him.
"All I wanted," he muttered, "was to KNOW!"
His father called him, and he responded apathetically.
"Here are some letters," said Mr. Foote. "I have made notes upon each
one how it is to be answered. Be so good as to dictate the replies."
There it was again. He was not even to answer letters independently,
but to dictate to his secretary words put into his mouth by Bonbright
Foote, Incorporated.
"It will help you familiarize yourself with our routine," said his
father, "and your signature will apprise the recipients that Bonbright
Foote VII has entered the concern."
He returned to his desk and pressed the buzzer that would summon Ruth
Frazer with book and pencil. She entered almost instantly, and as their
eyes met she smiled her famous smile. It was a thing of light and
brightness, compelling response. In his mood it acted as a stimulant to
Bonbright.
"Thank you," he said, involuntarily.
"For what?" she asked, raising her brows.
"For--why, I'm sure I don't know," he said. "I don't know why I said
that.... Will you take some letters, please?"
He began dictating slowly, laboriously. It was a new work to him, and
he went about it clumsily, stopping long between words to arrange his
thoughts. His attention strayed. He leaned back in his chair, dictation
forgotten for the moment, staring at Ruth Frazer without really being
conscious of her presence. She waited patiently. Presently he leaned
forward and addressed a question to her:
"Did you and Mr. Dulac mention me as you walked home?"
"Yes," she said.
"Would it be--impertinent," he asked, "to inquire what you said?"
She wrinkled her brows to aid recollection.
"Mr. Dulac," she replied, "wondered what you were up to. That was how
he expressed it. He thought it was peculiar--your asking to know him."
"What did YOU think?"
"I didn't think it was peculiar at all. You"--she hesitated--"had been
taken sort of by surprise. Yes, that was it. And you wanted to KNOW. I
think you acted very naturally."
"Naturally!" he repeated after her. "Yes, I guess that must be where I
went wrong. I was natural. It is not right to be natural. You should
first find how you are expected to act--how it is planned for you to
act. Yourself--why, yourself doesn't count."
"What do you mean, Mr. Foote?"
"This morning," he said, bitterly, "cards with my name signed to them
have been placed, or will be placed, in every room of the works,
notifying the men that if they join a labor union they will be
discharged."
"Why--why--"
"I have made a statement that I am against labor unions."
She looked at him uncomprehendingly, but somehow compelled to
sympathize with him. He had passed through a bitter crisis of some
sort, she perceived.
"I am not interested in all those men--that army of men," he went on.
"I don't want to understand them. I don't want to come into contact
with them. I just want to sit here in my office and not be bothered by
such things.... We have managers and superintendents and officials to
take care of labor matters. I don't want to talk to Dulac about what he
means, or why our men feel resentment toward us. Please tell him I have
no interest whatever in such things."
"Mr. Foote," she said, gently, "something has happened to you, hasn't
it? Something that has made you feel bitter and discouraged?"
"Nothing unusual--in my family--Miss Frazer. I've just been cut to the
Bonbright Foote pattern. I didn't fit my groove exactly--so I was
trimmed until I slipped into it. I'm in now."
A sudden tumult of shouts and cheers arose in the street under his
window; not the sound of a score of voices nor of a hundred, but a
sound of great volume. Ruth looked up, startled, frightened. Bonbright
stepped to the window. "It's only eleven o'clock," he said, "but the
men are all coming out.... The whistle didn't blow. They're cheering
and capering and shaking hands with one another. What does that mean,
do you suppose?"
"I'm afraid," said Miss Frazer, "it's your placard."
"My placard?"
"The men had their choice between their unions and their jobs--and
they've stood by their unions."
"You mean--?"
"They've struck," said Ruth.