"COMPARISON!" The President screamed. "Let's have last first quarter,
you idiot!"
"_Ahem!_" Douglas rattled the paper in annoyance. "Last first quarter
fiscal year net revenue $34,955,376.81. Percent decrease--"
"Never mind." The little old man waved the Treasurer to his seat with a
weary gesture. His face, so much like somebody's grandmother, looked
tragic as he spoke his next words.
"You don't need the Accountovac to tell you the significance of those
figures, gentlemen." His voice was soft, with a slight quaver. "We are
not making much p-r-o-f-i-t. We are losing m-o-n-e-y. And the point
is--what's the reason? There must be _some_ reason." His eyes went over
them again, and Colihan, feeling like the culprit, slumped in his chair.
"I have a suggestion," said the President. "Just an idea. Maybe some of
us just aren't showing enough p-e-p."
There was a hushed silence.
The boss pushed back his chair and walked over to a cork-lined wall.
With a dramatic gesture, he lifted one arm and pointed to the white sign
that covered a fourth of it.
"See that?" he asked. "What does it say?"
The department heads looked dubious.
"_Well, what does it say?_" repeated Moss.
"ACT!" The department heads cried in chorus.
"Exactly!" said the little old man with a surprising bellow. "ACT! The
word that made us a leader. The word that guides our business destiny.
The word that _built_ General Products!"
* * * * *
He paced the floor. The chairs in the conference room creaked as the
department heads stirred to follow him with their eyes.
"ACT is our motto. ACT is our password. ACT is our key to success. And
why not? The Brains do the thinking. All of us put together couldn't
think so effectively, so perfectly, so honestly as the Brains. They take
the orders, designate raw materials, equipment, manpower. They schedule
our work. They analyze our products. They analyze our people."
Colihan trembled.
"There's only one important function left to us. And that's ACT!"
The President bowed his head and walked slowly back to his seat. He sat
down, and with great fatigue evident in his voice, he concluded his
polemic.
"That's why we must have pep, gentlemen. Pep. Now--how do you spell it?"
"P! E! P!" roared the department heads.
The meeting was over. The department heads filed out.
* * * * *
Colihan's secretary placed the morning mail on his desk. There was a
stack of memos at least an inch thick, and the Personnel Manager moaned
at the sight of it.
"Production report doesn't look too good," said Miss Blanche, crisply.
"Bet we get a flood of aptitude cards from Morgan today. Grimswitch has
sent over a couple. That makes eleven from him this month. He really has
his problems."
Colihan grunted. _He deserves them_, he thought.
"How did the meeting go?"
"Huh?" Colihan looked up. "Oh, fine, fine. Boss was in good voice, as
usual."
"I think there's an envelope from him in the stack."
"What?" Colihan hoped that his concern wasn't visible. He riffled
through the papers hurriedly, and came up with a neat white envelope
engraved with the words: OFFICE OF THE PRESIDENT.
Miss Blanche watched him, frankly curious. "That will be all," he told
her curtly.
When she had left, he ripped the envelope open and read the contents. It
was in Moss's own cramped handwriting, and it was a request for a three
o'clock "man-to-man" talk.
_Oh, Lord_, he thought. _Now it's going to happen._
* * * * *
President Moss was eating an apple.
He ate so greedily that the juice spilled over his chin.
Sitting behind his massive oak desk, chair tilted back, apple juice
dappling his whiskers, he looked so small and unformidable, that Colihan
took heart.
"Well, Ralph--how goes it?"
_He called me Ralph_, thought Colihan cheerfully. _He's not such a bad
old guy._
"Don't grow apples like they used to," the President said. "This
hydroponic stuff can't touch the fruit we used to pick. Say, did you
ever climb a real apple tree and knock 'em off the branches?"