by Ed McBain
“What does a girl like you want here, anyway?” McQuade asked gently.
The words came to her lips before she could stop them. “A girl like me wants to model at the Guild Week showing,” she said.
McQuade smiled. His eyes did not leave her face. His hand moved effortlessly, almost gracefully, dropping to her thigh. His fingers tightened on her flesh, tightened like a vise, gripping the nylon and the skin until she wanted to scream in pain.
“That might be arranged,” he said.
He released her suddenly and slid off the desk. He walked to the door and out into the corridor without looking back at her.
She could see the bruise marks his fingers had left on her thigh. She stared at them, and then she shuddered and pulled down her skirt. When she began trembling, she really did not know how frightened she was. She took her purse from the desk drawer and went to the ladies’ room.
She began sobbing quietly then.
Another Friday rolled around.
And another head rolled.…
Friday had become a dreaded day. Six men had been dropped from the Lasting Department on the Friday before, and two from Heeling on the Friday before that, and no one could forget the initial Friday firing in the IBM Room. Griff had been aware of the firings, of course, but he had been aware of them in a curiously detached way. After the IBM Room axing, the rest did not really concern him too much. Six men from Lasting. Six nameless, faceless men. What did they have to do with Raymond Griffin? Two men from Heeling, two names dropped from the payroll, two men he probably didn’t even know. It was all very far away and alien, and, whereas the firings made him vaguely uncomfortable, he more or less discounted them in favor of some of the things that had struck closer to home—like the hosing he’d witnessed in the Cutting Room, or the inquisition of Maria Theresa Diaz in Manelli’s office.
But the firing on that Friday of March 26 struck very close to home, very close to home indeed.
When Griff had been in the Army, he had always felt guilty when a-soldier standing beside him took a bullet between the eyes. He had always felt guilty, but he had also felt relieved. Since his discharge, he had read many fictional accounts of the war, and each account never failed to relate this strangely mixed feeling of guilt and relief, guilt because a buddy had been killed, relief because you yourself were still alive. He had accepted it as a statement of fact. He had experienced it, and apparently a good many other people had experienced it, too.
He did not feel any relief at all when Danny Quinn was fired.
He met Danny down at the lunch counter, and for some strange reason the twinkle in Danny’s eye seemed to have been extinguished.
“What’s the matter?” he asked immediately.
“Nothing,” Danny said. He attempted a smile, and then he limped closer to the counter and picked up his coffee cup.
“Come on, pal,” Griff said, “don’t snow me. You been getting some static?”
“I guess,” Danny said. He seemed very troubled. There was a pained look in his eyes, as if even talking were excruciatingly unbearable.
“What is it, Danny?” Griff asked blankly.
“I’ve been canned.”
For a moment, it didn’t register. “What do you mean, canned?”
“Fired.” Danny turned his head away. “It’s nothing to get excited about, Griff. People get fired every day, especially at Julien Kahn. I’ve just been canned, that’s all. Fired, axed, let go, dismissed, discharged, disemployed, laid off, cast off, thrown aside, kicked out, oh, Christ!”
“Are you kidding me, Danny?”
“No, I’m not kidding you.”
“When’d you find out?”
“About ten minutes ago. Manelli. Griff, what am I gonna do? What the hell am I ever gonna do? How can I tell Ellen I’ve lost my job? With her the way she is now, Griff? Oh, Jesus, I feel like bawling. I wish I was a kid, Griff. I’d lay down on the floor and bawl my ass out.”
“I’m going to see Manelli,” Griff said.
“What good will that do?” Danny sighed heavily. He seemed actually on the verge of tears. It was painful to look at him. “Listen, Griff, forget it,” he said. He bit his lip. “I’ll find something else. What the hell, I’ve got to find something else.”
“I’ll see you later,” Griff said. “I’m going to talk to Manelli. That son of a bitch has gone too far this time.”
He left Danny standing disconsolately at the counter, and he took the elevator up to the ninth floor and then walked straight to Manelli’s office. Cara must have been powdering her nose, for a girl he had never seen was sitting in for her at the reception desk.
“Is Joe in?” he asked.
“Yes. I’ll buzz him. Who shall I say is—”
“Never mind,” he snapped. He walked past the desk and then threw open the door to Manelli’s office. Manelli was signing something at his desk. He looked up, surprised, and started to say, “Well, Griff, to what do I owe—”
“Is it true you fired Danny Quinn?”
Manelli stared at him as if he were a maniac. “Yes. Yes, I did,” he said.
“Why?”
There was something about the way he said that single word that ruffled the comptroller feathers of J. Manelli. He put on his crown, picked up his scepter, and said, “Now, just a moment, Griff. Just a—”
“I’m asking you why you fired Danny Quinn,” Griff said coldly. “I’d like to know why. I damn well would like to know why.”
“I don’t see as it’s any of your business, Griff,” Manelli said curtly.
Griff recognized the crown and scepter, but they didn’t matter much to him now. “I’m making it my business,” he said recklessly. “Are you going to tell me why?”
“He was dead weight,” Manelli said, sighing.
“Dead weight, my foot! He does as much work as Magruder, if not more. Are you trying to tell me—”
“He does not. We’ve no need for a two-man Credit Department,” Manelli said hastily. “We’ve got less than a thousand accounts, big accounts, true, but Danny was handling only four hundred of them, and Magruder can throw those four hundred into his pile just as well. Griff, that job in Credit was manufactured for him, you know that as well as I do. It was invented, Griff, and we can’t afford paying a man for a useless—”
“Shut up!” Griff said angrily.
“What?” Manelli asked, his eyes popping wide.
“I said shut up! Where’d you get all this garbage from? You know goddam well the job wasn’t invented for Danny. He replaced Alberghetti who was shifted over to Sales. There was a legitimate opening in Credit, and Magruder filled it with Danny. Joe, I’ve been working at this factory for a goddam long time now, so don’t give me any crap about invented jobs. I know exactly which jobs were invented, and Danny’s wasn’t, and you know that as—”
“I don’t like the way you’re talking to me,” Manelli said. “I don’t like it a bit. I don’t think—”
“Do you know Danny’s wife is pregnant?”
Manelli’s words ended in a short gasp.
“Do you know how much trouble he had finding a job at all? God damn it, do you think he’s going to step into some other firm the second he walks out of here? What the hell’s wrong with you anyway, Joe? Can’t you let a week go by without throwing someone out into the gutter? What the hell—”
“Griff,” Manelli said, raising his hand. There was something of cowed surrender in the gesture, something almost pathetic. Griff stared at Manelli, his anger subsiding.
“Call his office,” he said softly. “Tell him it was a mistake, Joe. Go ahead.”
Manelli turned his head, avoiding Griff’s eyes. “I … I can’t,” he said.
“Why not? Why not, Joe?”
“I just can’t. I … I had no idea his wife … Griff, I had no idea. Griff, am I bad guy? You know I’m not a bad guy, don’t you? You’ve known me for a long time now, Griff, and have I ever hurt anyone? Would I ever hurt anyone, Griff? Griff,
am I a bad guy?” He would not bring his eyes to Griff’s face.
“Joe,” Griff said, “you’re a goddam jewel if that’s the way you want it, but give Danny back his job. Call him and tell him you made a mistake.”
“No,” Manelli said weakly. He shook his head. “No. I … I can’t. Can’t.”
“Joe—”
“I can’t!” Manelli screamed. “God damn it, Griff, I can’t! Do you think I want to wind up in the street, too? Griff, he’s fired, he’s fired, leave it at that. I can’t change things, Griff. Things are the way they are, and I can’t change them, not me, not me, Griff. Griff, try to understand that. I had to … he’s fired, that’s all. Forget it. Leave me alone, just leave me alone and forget Danny Quinn.”
“You’re comptroller!” Griff said incredulously. “If you haven’t the power to—”
“Comptroller!” Manelli snorted. “At two hundred dollars a week! Do you know what Kurz was earning? Have you any idea? Close to five bills, Griff, five bills, and I’m comptroller now and I’m making two hundred bucks, and they call me comptroller. No, I can’t do anything for your friend, I’m sorry. That’s the way it is.” He shook his head violently. “I’ve got my own job to think about. No. No, I can’t do anything.”
“Did you fire him, Joe?”
“Yes,” Manelli said.
“Did you?”
“I said yes, didn’t I? The comptroller fired him. J. Manelli, comptroller of Julien Kahn, Inc., fired him. Are you satisfied now? Are you satisfied you came in here and … and …” Manelli shook his head wildly. “Get out of here, will you? For Christ’s sake, leave a man alone, will you? I got enough headaches of my own. Can’t you just leave a man alone?” He shook his head again, and then buried his face in his hands.
“All right, Joe,” Griff said.
He left Manelli’s office with his head crystal-clear.
His head rang with its new clarity. It rang like a village bell atop a high steeple against a painfully blue sky, it rang loudly and sonorously and incessantly. It rang with knowledge that had hung in his hand from almost the very beginning, knowledge he had somehow hidden from his own consciousness until just now. It figured now, all of it, the IBM Room, and the memos from Manelli, and the hosing, and the Diaz girl, and now Danny. It all figured very clearly.
When he learned that Joe Manelli had fired the eagle-eyer, the man who gave quality to the bottom of a Kahn shoe, on the same day—there was no longer the slightest doubt in his mind.
He knew for certain then that any order coming from J. Manelli, comptroller, was conceived by J. McQuade, The Man From Titanic.
9
John Grant was a union delegate. He was a busy man who represented several other factories besides Julien Kahn. On the day that Bob Gardiner—the shop steward in Kahn’s Packing Room—called him, Grant’s desk was piled to the ceiling. He was not in a mood to listen to complaints.
“Grant here,” he said.
“Mr. Grant?” Gardiner said.
“Yes, yes.”
“This is Bob Gardiner. I’m a shop steward at—”
“I remember you, Bob,” Grant said. “How are you?”
“Fine. Mr. Grant, we’ve got troubles here at Julien Kahn. They sent this guy up from Titanic, and he turned a hose on two workers in the Cutting Room, and just because a pair of shoes was stolen in—”
“Just a minute, just a minute,” Grant said. “Give it to me slowly, will you?”
Gardiner gave it to him slowly. Grant listened. He knew the union didn’t have a leg to stand on in either the hosing incident or the theft. A fist fight always meant automatic expulsion, and theft was an unpardonable sin. But he listened to Gardiner patiently and when Gardiner came to the firings at Kahn, Grant realized that here was something else again and decided to use those firings as a wedge.
“Let me see what I can do,” he said. “I’ll call you back.”
“Thanks a lot, Mr. Grant,” Gardiner said. “I’ll be waiting.”
Gardiner was pretty happy about Grant’s reactions, because he knew he belonged to a fairly powerful union, and he was certain the union would work out this problem for the men. That’s what unions were for, to protect the workers. Certainty, under the old Kahn regime, they’d never had any trouble with the company. Oh, slowdowns and things like that, and once a general sitdown—he could still remember blowing the signal whistle in his department—but nothing serious. The Kahns had always come across.
So he was rather pleased, and he was even more so when Grant called him back to tell him he’d arranged a meeting for later that week, and would he come with two other shop stewards and they’d try to iron this thing out. Gardiner said he’d certainly be there. He chose his stewards, and he looked forward to the meeting with a good deal of excitement and pleasant anticipation.
The meeting had been called for Thursday, April 1. Gardiner’s two other shop stewards were a man from Stock-fitting named George Hensen and a man from Bottoming named Alec Karojilian. John Grant was there as union delegate. The foursome represented Labor.
Joseph Manelli and the company’s labor man, the man who set the pay rate for piecework, a man named Sal Valdero, were there representing Management. Jefferson McQuade went along “just for the ride.”
The men met in Manelli’s office, and Manelli was most cordial, behaving like the perfect genial host, passing out cigars and introducing everyone to McQuade, and asking everyone if they’d care for a little schnapps, eh? The men—with the exception of, McQuade—all accepted the smokes and declined the drink. McQuade neither drank nor smoked.
They sat around and lighted up, and Manelli beamed at them from behind his desk and said, “Well, fellers, to what do I owe the honor of this meeting?”
The men all laughed a little and enjoyed the aromatic pleasure of the fifty-cent cigars Manelli had handed out (cigars which Kurz had left behind in the desk humidor) and then they cleared their throats and got down to business. It was a little difficult to get down to business with McQuade sitting there. McQuade, as it happened, was a major part of their business that day.
“I understand there’s been a lot of unrest in the factory, Mr. Manelli,” Grant said, glancing at McQuade.
“Is that right, John? What sort of unrest?”
“The wholesale firings for one thing. The men tell me—”
“The men don’t like the way people are getting fired right and left,” Gardiner said.
“Well,” Manelli said, spreading his hands, “what can we do, fellers? You know as well as I do that this is a business and not a charity organization. When a man’s got to go, he’s simply got to go.”
“Seems like an awful lot have been going lately,” George Hensen said sourly.
“Well,” Manelli said, “we’re trying to modernize this business, George. We’re trying to make it a better place in which to work. That means clearing out the dead wood. More profits mean higher wages for those men who remain. I’m sure you know that.”
“We haven’t seen any higher wages yet,” Hensen said, glancing at McQuade. “We only see people getting fired, and we don’t like it.” McQuade remained silent, staring thoughtfully at his hands.
“There’s more to this than just the firings, Mr. Manelli,” Gardiner ventured. “A lot of us have been working for Kahn for a good many years now. We like Kahn, and we like making shoes, and so we’ve stayed on. But there was always a healthy respect for the working man here, and now there doesn’t seem to be that respect any more.”
“How do you mean, Bob?” Manelli asked.
“Well …” Gardiner looked at McQuade. “Everybody knows about what happened to those two cutters. Now, really, Mr. Manelli, that’s a hell of a way to treat a human being. We’re not slaves here, you know, and we’re not prisoners, either. I mean, turning a fire hose onto—”
“Those two men were ready to kill each other, Bob,” Manelli said.
“Kill, yeah, maybe,” Gardiner answered. “They didn’t kill each othe
r before the hose was turned on, though, did they? And chances are they wouldn’t have killed each other, neither. But that’s not the point. The point is, we got our dignity, too, and you don’t go turning fire hoses on people. What is this, Alcatraz?”
“On the contrary,” McQuade said suddenly.
“Do you have any ideas on this, Mac?” Manelli asked, grateful to have been let off the hook.
“Yes, a few,” McQuade said. “I don’t want to interrupt, though, without the permission of everyone present. After all, it’s your problem and not mine.” He smiled graciously. “Besides, I keep remembering what one Mr. Grant did to us back in the eighteen-hundreds, and I’m a little leery of getting into an engagement with another one now.”
John Grant chuckled, but at the same time he told himself to watch out for McQuade, who seemed to be a pretty smooth character. “I’d like to hear what you have to say, Mr. McQuade,” he said, puffing on his cigar. “I understand it was you who turned the hose on.”
“Yes,” McQuade said, “that’s right. I did turn the hose on, but only as a last resort. You’ll forgive my saying so, Mr. Grant, but neither you nor any of these men were up on the eighth floor that day. You did not see those cutters, and so you don’t know how close they were to doing actual physical harm to each other, and perhaps to throwing the entire floor into a state of panic.”
“Still—”
“I think, Mr. Grant,” McQuade went on forcefully, “that you would have done the same thing under the circumstances. I assure you, I do not have a cruel or insensitive soul. I was trying to stop a fight which might have led to a free-for-all in the Cutting Room, a dangerous place—you will admit—for any display of violence.”
“You could have stopped them by—”
“Mr. Grant,” McQuade said, “there is only one way to combat force, and that is by counterforce. Do you talk logic to a man with a knife in his hand, Mr. Grant? You do not. You kick him in the groin.” McQuade smiled disarmingly. “I wasn’t brave enough to walk out there and kick either of those two men. I used a fire hose instead. I think I did the right thing.” His voice lowered. “Believe me, Mr. Grant, I was not thinking of dignity or lack of dignity. I was thinking of the safety, yes, the safety and well-being of every citizen of this company.” He paused. “Are you surprised that I call them citizens? Please don’t be. I consider this factory a city, or even a small state, if you will. Everyone working here is a citizen, and he is entitled to his rights as a citizen, but those rights do not include endangering the lives of fellow citizens.”