Technically Graves was the personnel manager, but we called him “the
matador” because it was his job to deal the death blow, to give the
fatal thrust. He had, in other words, to do the “firing.”
He had developed a beautiful technique, and, like all good workmen, he
enjoyed his work. He was really a very kind-hearted fellow. His idea was
that it did people any amount of good to be discharged, if it were done
in the right way--if, for instance, you told the departing one exactly
why he or she was no longer wanted.
It was necessary, he said, to keep the nicest balance between candor and
brutality. What you wanted was to destroy conceit without injuring
self-respect. He added proudly that all the people whom he had fired
remained his firm friends.
I asked him how he knew this, and I refused to believe it a proof of
friendliness that these victims had never yet waylaid and assaulted him.
He said, however, that he could always tell--that no one could deceive
him. I denied that any man could know he had never been deceived. Such a
negative statement was impossible to prove.
He brushed all this aside, and continued to explain his technique.
“I never tell a man that we’re laying him off because business is bad,”
he said. “I try to show him what defects in himself make him the kind of
man who’s always laid off as soon as business drops. And as for those
printed slips in a pay envelope--‘Your services will not be required
after such and such a date’--inhuman, I call _that_. No, sir! I’ll call
the fellow, or the girl, as the case may be, into my office, and I’ll
say something like this:
“‘Now see here, So-and-So,’ I’ll say, ‘I’m going to give you the gate;
and if you’ll listen to me fair-mindedly, it’ll be the gate to something
a whole lot better.’”
“Always?” I asked.
“Why, yes,” said he.
“Of course,” I continued, “you’ve kept a record of the subsequent
careers of all the poor devils you’ve fired, so that you know exactly
how much they’ve benefited by your valediction?”
“Well,” said Graves; “well--”
“Of course,” I went on, “you keep a card index? You write down the fault
for which you discharge the fellow, and you keep track of the length of
time it takes him to overcome that fault?”
“Well--”
“What, Graves?” said I sternly. “You make me a positive statement, you
tell me it benefits people to be discharged by you, and you have not one
fact by which to substantiate your statement. I demand to be shown one
of these alleged persons!”
“Well--” he said again.
He was so much perturbed that I hadn’t the heart to perturb him further.
He was such an honest, artless, enthusiastic fellow, and altogether so
likable, that I can’t for the life of me explain why it was so natural
to worry and badger him; but everybody did. When some especially
woeful-looking derelict passed by, some one was sure to call Graves to
the window and say something like--
“See here, Graves! Isn’t that the shipping clerk you discharged for not
keeping his nails manicured?”
Rather gruesomely, we used to read aloud from the newspapers various
reports of suicides.
Unknown man found in the river--nothing to identify him but a scrap
of paper in his pocket, on which was written “Graves drove me to
this.”
These fictitious papers varied. Sometimes they said:
And after Graves had turned me down,
What could I do but go and drown?
Graves told me all I didn’t oughter,
Despair then drove me to the water.
We kept up a fiction that twelve desperate men were banded together to
take vengeance on him, and that their motto was “Give Graves the final
discharge.” I dare say we were pretty tiresome about it, and sometimes I
am afraid we hurt the poor devil more than we intended.
Of course “firing” was not all that Graves had to do. There was also the
hiring, but he wasn’t nearly so enthusiastic about that--or at least he
was warier, for his mistakes in character analysis could be too readily
checked up. He pretended that he took every one on trial, and withheld
even mental opinions until he had observed the applicant.
That, however, wasn’t true. Many and many a time he was tremendously
hopeful about some fellow who turned out to be quite worthless. I say
“fellow,” because he was notably reticent about the girls, and never
hopeful.
He objected to girls in an office. He said that the principle of the
thing was wrong, and so on; but the real reason was that he was afraid
of them. They knew this very well. Once he had had a booklet of
“Suggestions” printed and circulated among them. He wrote it in a chatty
and reasonable style, as for instance:
It isn’t a question of morals, but one of tone. We can’t have quite
the tone I’m sure we should all like to have in this office while
some of our young ladies wear peekaboo waists and openwork
stockings, and put paint and powder on their faces. In a ballroom
these things are all well enough, but--
The next morning he received a visit from the severe and efficient Miss
Kelly.
“Mr. Graves,” said she, “about your ‘Suggestions’--I have been in this
office six years, and have never seen a peekaboo waist. I have not
observed that openwork hosiery has been worn. My department has asked me
to mention this to you, as we feel it an unmerited slight. Incidentally,
Mr. Graves,” she added, “girls don’t as a rule wear waists in a
ballroom. _Even_ stenographers have _some_ knowledge of etiquette!”
The conscientious Graves bought a household periodical, and found no
mention of peekaboo blouses and openwork stockings. Unfortunately he was
discovered reading this magazine, and he had to explain. He became a
little annoyed at hearing so much laughter.
“Oh, shut up!” he exclaimed. “I know I’ve heard of those things. Read
articles about ’em in the newspapers.”
“But when?” somebody wished to know. “When did you last cast a glance at
a girl, oh, innocent and artless Graves?”
“Well,” he said, scowling, “the difference is so small that no one but
an idiot would laugh. I might have said ‘sheer hosiery’ and ‘chiffon
blouses.’”
Graves talking about chiffon blouses was too much. He regretted those
“Suggestions,” and made no more. We subscribed to a fashion magazine for
him, and by a most pleasing error it came addressed to “Miss F. Graves.”
This was even better than we had planned.