It was not till early May that I was shown, and, as the thing chanced,
it was Forgan who then showed me.
I happened to come in when Ernie was not there. We spoke of him, and
Forgan said,
“You know what that old guy’s done?” I shook my head. “Company’s backing
him,” said Forgan. “He’s got a great thing. You come down-stairs.”
We went down to the machine shop under the receiving floor. Forgan
unlocked the door, led me into a small room. On a bench was set up a
tiny electric motor, harnessed to a wheel and connected with a simple
bit of apparatus which had no meaning, at first sight, at all. But
Forgan stopped the motor and made all clear to me. The power revolved a
wooden spindle, which entered a hole in a steel block, whirling there. I
could perceive no purpose in this, but Forgan said:
“It’s a test. It don’t do anything. Feel of it. Ain’t hot, is it?”
I touched the steel, touched the spindle that had been revolving so
swiftly.
“No.”
“See if you can pull it out.” I tried, and failed. “Tight fit, you see,”
Forgan told me. “But she’s been spinning in there for three days now,
except when we stop her to measure once in a while. No oil, and no heat,
and no wear.”
“But what’s it all about?” I asked.
“That’s an oilless bearing,” Forgan explained, a little disgusted with
my stupidity. “Piece of hard wood, filled with oil. Use the stuff to
make wrist-pins and all, and you’ll never have to oil your chassis at
all.”
The thing broke upon me.
“But does it work?” I asked.
“You see it,” he said. “It works here. Well, it’ll work anywhere.”
“And Ernie figured that out?”
“He sure did.”
“Why, the man’s a genius!”
“Yeah. Ever since he went and got his picture took.”
“How does he make this, anyway--this bearing? Soak the wood in oil?”
Forgan laughed.
“Not as easy as that. He puts her in as hot as the devil, and under a
lot of pressure. Don’t just know how. He won’t tell. He’s got a lay-off
now to work it out. Figuring on cost. Cost’s too much now; but he’s
going to figure to make it cheaper. He--”
Ernie himself came in just then. I hardly knew him. He had on a new suit
of clothes; he was close-shaven, and his hair was trimmed. His bearing
was that of a successful and confident man, and he nodded to the
respectful Forgan as one nods to a chauffeur.
“How is she?” he asked.
“Cool as a cucumber,” Forgan assured him.
“Any wear?”
“I’ll see,” the foreman said with alacrity, and proceeded to dismantle
the test-apparatus and apply a micrometer to the bearing. Ernie nodded
to me, and I said,
“Seems like a fine thing.”
“It is,” he replied, positively and confidently, yet without a trace of
arrogance or ugly pride. “Yes; it will do very well.”
“No wear at all,” Forgan reported, and Ernie nodded assent.
“Keep her going,” he directed.
While Forgan was setting the apparatus again in position, Ernie and I
went up the stair together. He said, as we came to the main floor,
“By the way, that film, you know--”
“The one you were in--”
“Yes. It’s at the Globe next week.”
“I’ll surely go and see it,” I promised him.
We separated with a word, and I drove home, marveling at this new man
that had been Ernie Budder--marveling at the power of suggestion. He had
been told that he looked like a great inventor, and he had emerged from
this experience stimulated, sure of himself, alert, and keen--a new man.
Such a slight fillip from the finger of Destiny to throw open before a
man’s feet new and lofty ways--
V
Toward the end of the next week I went to the Globe, and so understood
at last that what Destiny had brewed was tragedy. Ernie was in the film;
so far he had been right. But in how different a rôle! I could
understand how they had tricked him. An actor on the screen knows
nothing, or may know nothing of scenes in which he does not himself
appear. Ernie had no doubt been told that he was playing the part of a
great inventor upon whom the hopes of the nation rested; he had accepted
the explanation, had accepted the barred windows, the steel door, the
guard outside, and the solicitous visitors.
But he had been deceived, perhaps because they feared he would not
otherwise consent to play the part they assigned to him. For the Ernie
in the films was no great inventor but an insane old man; the bars at
his windows were the bars of a madman’s cell. Within, this madman
pottered at his mad designs, and the guard at the door was not to keep
others out but to keep him in; and the solicitous visitors paid him no
respect but only humored his poor illusion. There were tears in my eyes
before the thing was finished--tears of pity for Ernie, and tears of hot
anger at the callous brutality of those who had contrived this thing. I
thought of legal action on his behalf; but they had, no doubt, been wise
enough to have him sign a release from all responsibility. There was
nothing that could be done.
I avoided the service-station for the week thereafter; I could not bear
to see Ernie. But at last it was necessary to go in. I planned to tell
him, if he asked, that I had missed seeing the film. So much poor
kindness I could do the man.
When I drove in, he was on the washing-floor, working about a limousine.
The old, ragged hose was in his hand; the sprinkler he had designed was
still attached to the ceiling, but unused. I parked my car in an empty
space and walked across to him. He looked up with his old timidly
amiable smile, and I saw that the alert confidence and the sense of
power were utterly gone.
“There’s a grease-cup missing, Ernie, from the rear end,” I told him.
“If you see one kicking around--”
“Why, yes; sure,” he promised me.
I hesitated, then said smilingly, “Won’t need to bother with them in a
year or two--”
By his answer, I knew that the dreams were gone and the vision was fled.
“Oh, I guess we’ll have to keep puttering on in the same old ways,” said
Ernie Budder hopelessly.