The Spiked Heel

by Ed McBain

  “Do they include the right of trial by jury?” Gardiner asked.

  “Eh?” McQuade asked, off guard for a moment.

  “Mr. McQuade,” Gardiner said, “you’re a good talker and you’re probably a very nice fellow, and I got nothing against you personally, believe me. But I’ve worked for Julien Kahn for close to twenty-five years now, from when he had only the old factory, and I’m a little bit older than you are, and maybe I know just a little bit more about how the workers in this factory feel. And I can tell you they don’t like to be shoved around. All right, you call them citizens; well, if they are citizens they want to be treated like citizens, and I don’t know of any citizen friends of mine who were ever dragged into a police station and accused of a crime they didn’t commit.”

  “Are you referring to Martha Goldstein?” McQuade asked.

  “Martha Goldstein is a good woman, and she’s been with us a long time. I’m talking about her, and I’m also talking about Maria who used to work in my department.”

  “What about Maria? She did steal a pair of shoes, you know that, don’t you?”

  “Yes, she did. I suppose she did. But that’s no reason to treat her like an animal. She told me what happened, Mr. McQuade, and she told a lot of other people, too, and I can tell you that doesn’t help build any good will for Titanic.”

  “No,” McQuade said, “but perhaps it will stop stealing. You don’t seem to understand, Mr. Gardiner—”

  “I understand fine,” Gardiner said. “I understand that—”

  “Now, now, fellers,” Manelli said.

  “May I finish please, Joe?” McQuade asked. “You don’t seem to understand that the good of the factory is the good of the workers.” He turned to Grant. “Look, John—may I call you John?—Titanic is interested in your people. Titanic—”

  “Titanic sure shows it in a funny way,” Gardiner said.

  “Titanic is going to do a lot for you. Have you been on the eighth floor recently? New toilets are already being installed, and new lighting fixtures, and new—”

  “We can’t eat toilets or electric lights,” Karojilian said.

  “Nor do we expect you to,” McQuade said, smiling.

  “We want to know why all those people were fired,” Hensen said.

  “Economy,” McQuade said.

  Grant cleared his throat. “Mr. McQuade,” he said, “keep the toilets and keep the Coke machines. These men want assurance that they’re not going to be out in the street tomorrow, and if you can’t give them that assurance—”

  “I can,” McQuade said.

  “Then why were those men dropped from Lasting? And Heeling? And what about the eagle-eyer? Why was he—”

  “He was costing us money, and he was not essential to the operation. Nor were the other men we dropped. The departments are functioning perfectly without them.”

  “I find that a little hard to swallow, Mr. McQuade,” Grant said. “Are you trying to tell me that men who’ve been with the company for ten, fifteen years are suddenly no longer essential to the operation? Now how am I expected to swallow that?”

  “You’re not expected to swallow anything, John,” McQuade said. “But if I showed you books, would that help? If I showed you that the release of those men boosted our profit without any loss in production, would that validate my argument?”

  “Well …” Grant paused. “I’d have to see the books.”

  “And I’ll show you the books, whenever you want to see them.”

  “Well …” Grant paused again. “I can only tell you what the men are thinking, and they sure as hell ain’t happy, Mr. McQuade. Now, we’ve got ways to beat this, you know. We’re a strong union. You ain’t been here long, so you can’t appreciate the loss you’d suffer if we called a slowdown or a sitdown. Instead of twenty-six hundred pairs a day, you’d get a thousand pairs, and see if Titanic could stand up under that loss.”

  McQuade smiled happily. “In the first place, John, I don’t see what you have to beat. There’s really nothing to beat when you get down to facts. In the second place—and please listen carefully because I’ll say it only once, and I hope it penetrates—if we get union trouble, Titanic can close this whole damned factory tomorrow, and not miss it one damned bit. Now, what do you think of that?”

  “I doubt if Titanic would do that, Mr. McQuade,” Grant said confidently. “I don’t know how many millions of dollars were involved in this purchase but even Titanic doesn’t buy factories just to close them.”

  “Of course not,” McQuade said, “but it can be done. Titanic closed down a factory in New Hampshire because of union trouble, and, when the union still wouldn’t play ball, we moved that factory down to Georgia, and that’s right where it sits today. We threw that whole damned town out of work, John, so do you think we’d hesitate over a tiny little factory in New Jersey?”

  “I can see your point, Mr. McQuade,” Grant said calmly, “but I don’t think it would be feasible to transport Julien Kahn to Georgia. You can undoubtedly get labor down there, Mr. McQuade, but you’re not going to get the Donatos and the Cohens down there, and these are the men who know how to make shoes. You’re running a fashion house here, Mr. McQuade. Quality is your product. You can’t pull in a bunch of farmers and run your factory with them.” Grant paused. “It’s your Italians and your Jews and your Poles who are running those sewing machines for you, Mr. McQuade. You won’t find them down in Georgia.”

  “Then we’ll move the factory to wherever we can find them,” McQuade said.

  Grant chewed his cigar silently for a moment. “I thought Titanic was for the workers,” he said at last.

  “Ah, but only if the workers are for Titanic,” McQuade said.

  “I see. Then there’s no sense talking.”

  “There’s a lot of sense talking,” McQuade said, “a whole hell of a lot of sense. What, when you get right down to it, is your beef? Are you sore because two men didn’t kill themselves on the eighth floor? Are you sore because we caught a thief on the second floor? Are you sore because we’re trying to give your people better working conditions, safer conditions, cleaner conditions? Are you sore because we’re trying our damnedest to increase production so that your workers will be able to share in increased profits? Are you sore because we’re declaring bonuses? Are you sore because we’re trying to turn a rusting, filth-clogged machine into a well-oiled, smoothly functioning one? When you get right down to it, men, just what the hell are you sore about?”

  “These firings—” Hensen started.

  “What about them? Were you fired, Hensen?”

  “No, but others were. I’m a shop steward, and when I see—”

  “But how have these firings harmed you, Hensen, you as a citizen of the factory? Have you been touched? These people were getting paid for doing nothing. These people were stealing money out of your pocket, Hensen!”

  “Well …”

  “Think it over.”

  Hensen remained silent, thinking.

  “Look at it this way, Hensen. Suppose we divided up the money those men were earning. Suppose we did that and added it to each worker’s salary, would you be happy then? Of course you would. Don’t you see, if we stop cheating the company, the worker gains, the worker can’t help but gain.”

  “I don’t see any of that money being divided up,” Hensen said.

  “I was coming to that,” McQuade said.

  The men were suddenly silent.

  “John,” McQuade said, “you may have been wondering what Sal, our labor man, is doing here. Well, if you’ll stay after the meeting, you’ll find out. I want to sit down together, the three of us, and work out a pay raise for the men. Understand, of course, that we can’t go too high at the moment, not with all the expensive changes we’re making. But we can afford a little more than we’ve been giving, and once we increase our pairage per day, I can promise a hell of a lot of overtime—but necessary and important overtime. I’d like to work this all out with you and Sal.�
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  Grant smiled. “I’d be very happy to stay, Mr. McQuade.”

  “Good,” McQuade said, nodding. “And to clear up this other thing that seems to be bothering you, let me assure you that the firings are over and done with.”

  “How do you mean?” Grant asked.

  “Over and done with,” McQuade repeated. “You expected firings, didn’t you? Has there ever been a merger without resultant firings? I can’t think of any. But we’ve done all the firing we’re going to do, and I can assure you there will be no more firings to come. Unless theft or physical violence is involved, of course.”

  “I’ll believe that when I see it,” Gardiner said.

  “All right, Bob,” McQuade answered, “then you will see it. You’ll see a memo to that effect tomorrow morning, and you’ll see it posted on every floor of this factory. There will be no more firings from now on. Titanic can promise you that.”

  “Well, the men certainly appreciate that,” Grant said, relieved.

  “But what about this other thing?” Gardiner persisted. “The workers are being treated like—”

  “Like kings!” McQuade said. “By comparison, you are being treated like kings. Look at the changes, men, just look at them! Does all this seem to be a slap in the worker’s face? Of course not!” He rose suddenly. “I’ve just now promised you a raise and a secure employment policy. Titanic is now assured that every man in this factory is doing his job and doing it well. There’s no reason to fire anyone now, and you can damn well bet we are not going to. When Titanic makes a promise, it does not break that promise. So compare that with what you had. What was Julien Kahn before Titanic took over? One company among a lot of other fashion shoe houses, a name, a dot on the map. Sixteen hundred employees, more or less, twenty-six hundred pairs a day, so what’s that? What’s twenty-six hundred pairs a day? A drop in the bucket. Here we sit, Julien Kahn, Inc. A flyspeck in the industry. Are our shoes better than Delman’s or I. Miller’s? Maybe, maybe not. Who cares? We’ve got the name, and so we sit back and relax, but what does that name do for you, the worker, the man who put that flyspeck on the map to begin with?

  “It does nothing for you, nothing. Who steals your name steals trash, and that is wrong, my friends, that is goddam wrong. And now picture this. Picture a new Julien Kahn, a revitalized Julien Kahn. Picture a Julien Kahn that is leader of the fashion world, the pacesetter, the stylesetter, the industry’s mainspring. A strong Julien Kahn with factories in California, Texas, New York, Paris, you name it, everywhere, anywhere you want to work Julien Kahn can send you there. Florida? All right, you can get to Florida if you work for Julien Kahn. You can get there and live there and be paid for living there while you work. Do you yearn for shrimps creole, well damn it, man, Kahn has a factory in New Orleans, too, because Kahn is king of the industry.

  “The new Kahn is a young giant. The new Kahn is an outfit that makes other fashion houses seem obsolete. And then picture the profits, my friends, and picture what those profits will do for you, the worker. Can you see where the petty inefficiencies must go, can you see why the necessary tyrannies are all part of the plan? Bear with us, stick with us, understand that what we are doing we are doing for you, and then you will see, my friends, then, by Christ, you’ll be proud of your company, you’ll hold your head high whenever the name of Julien Kahn is mentioned. The name will be your banner, and the profits will go into your pockets, because labor is power, and power is strength!

  “This is what we are trying to do! We are trying to pull Kahn out of the mud! We are trying to pull it out with our bare hands, forge it into something you’ll be proud of, and something that will be a part of you. And so you’re getting new toilets, but are new toilets a part of the big profit? No, only a small part, only a very small part, but don’t they add to your comfort in the meantime? Or do you prefer pigsties, and do you prefer straining your eyes under inadequate lighting, or do you prefer riding in a freight elevator during the morning rush? Is it terrible that we’re installing new elevator banks? Is it terrible to think that the marble entrance of the building will be enlarged to cover practically the entire first floor? Is it bad that you’ll come to work and feel like a human being, and ride in an elevator that’s new and clean, with a man wearing a uniform, or that you’ll work in a factory that’s as spotless as a hospital ward, are any of these things bad? Are they bad, tell me? They’re good, men, they’re goddam good, I’m telling you, and it’s only the beginning, because things are going to get better and better, but only with your help, and only if you can overlook the tyranny of stopping bloodshed in the Cutting Room, or exposing a thief in Packing, only if you can overlook these things which were essential and necessary.”

  McQuade lowered his voice. “Titanic is giving you more money. Titanic has promised you that there will be no more firing, that its reduction program has been completed. Titanic will keep these promises, believe me. I can assure you that Titanic does not want to close down or move this factory. Titanic wants to grow, Titanic wants to be strong and healthy.”

  For a moment, they were not sure he had finished. Manelli looked at McQuade, and McQuade wiped the sweat from his upper lip.

  “Why don’t we all drink to that?” Manelli said.

  The men were silent. Manelli took out seven glasses and poured a shot of rye into each glass.

  “To a bigger and better, and I mean better, Julien Kahn,” he toasted.

  “And to the end of firings and a pay rise in the very near future,” Grant added.

  The men tossed off their shots. McQuade took one sip at his drink and then put it down. Gardiner, Hensen, and Karojilian left the office while McQuade, Manelli, Grant, and Sal Valdero sat down to work out the pay raise. The shop stewards were silent until they reached the elevators down the hall.

  “I never looked at it that way,” Gardiner said.

  “Maybe he’s got something there,” Hensen said. “What the hell, if a man isn’t doing anything, why keep him on? He’s stealing money from our pockets.”

  “Sure. Look, we’re getting a raise already, aren’t we?”

  “That stuff he said about Florida,” Karojilian said. “That wouldn’t be bad, you know?”

  “And he did stop them from killing themselves down there in the Cutting Room. Hell, nobody else lifted a finger to stop them.”

  “What the hell did the Kahns ever give us, anyway, except a lot of headaches? These guys have new ideas, and they’re willing to back up their ideas. That’s what counts.”

  “New blood, that’s what.”

  “Well, that’s what we’re getting. And the ideas sound good, you know? You can get excited about ideas like that.”

  “What I like best is the security. He promised no more firings, didn’t he? That’s the ticket, man.”

  “You know, he’s not a bad guy. You just have to understand him.”

  “I wouldn’t introduce him to my wife,” Karojilian said, laughing.

  “Man, he’d crack her in two!”

  The three shop stewards stepped into the elevator, laughing. They took the word back to the workers, and the workers thought about it, and some workers were still unhappy even though they’d been promised security and a pay rise, and they began to grumble, and a good many of them were sure the delegate had been paid off to play ball with the company officials, and they said they didn’t go for these long-range plans, and when would they get a raise, and how did they know Titanic was sincere about not firing anyone any more?

  But when the memo came around the next morning, the memo promising that there would be no further firings at Julien Kahn, the workers were sure that Titanic was an all-right outfit, and they began to talk about the new progressive system, and they began thinking of this idea of being able to work wherever they wanted to, even though most of them would never have left their native New Jersey or New York anyway.

  And they began discussing profits and losses as if they were stockholders in the company, and they began to be carefu
l with the leather and more careful with the shoes, and they began to go to their supervisors whenever they saw someone goofing off, because anyone goofing off was stealing money from their pockets, and they began to take a certain pride in keeping the building clean, and when the toilet on the eighth floor was completed, they all went up to use it, and they enjoyed the clean white urinals and sinks and drying machines, and then they went down to their own floors and compared the filth-encrusted toilets there with the gleaming white one upstairs, and the comparison was like night and day, and they were forced to admit that Titanic looked after its people all right, and wasn’t it a fine damned place to work for?

  But the grumblers still grumbled; there was just no appeasing some people. The grumblers said look at how many men were dropped from Lasting and look at how many men were dropped from Heeling, and look at what happened on the ninth floor, people dropped like flies, the whole IBM Room, here today and gone tomorrow, and how do I know I won’t be next? All this in spite of the promise Titanic had made, because some people just wouldn’t accept anything at face value, they were just that distrustful. And the grumblers said they didn’t care if they had to use a rusted tin can for a toilet, so long as they got a big raise, and where was the raise anyway, all this talk about more money and where was it, and who needed Coke machines on every floor, and wasn’t it dandy when we could do time work when our piecework ran out, and since when is it nice to get a hose in the face, and what’s wrong with stealing anyway, the company makes enough profit, doesn’t it, why shouldn’t we swipe a pair of shoes every now and then, the grumblers asked.

  And then, miraculously, and much sooner than anyone had expected, as if to show that the grumblers didn’t know what the hell they were talking about anyway, there was an increase in wages. A small increase, five or six mills per operation, but that added up, friend, and this was where the workers lived, this was right in their pocketbooks, and oh, this was grand, oh, this was money from home, screw everything else, this was positively, absolutely, without a doubt a very fine thing. Long live Julien Kahn, they cheered, long live Titanic!