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Updated: May 15, 2025
He made full contact with the man, rapidly summarizing his conversation with DeVore, and including DeVore's short flash of his own conversation with Ward Kirk. "And get a rundown from personnel. Dig up something on their angle, too. Several representative cases. Get a few people to help you many as you need. I'm going to take this whole mess in to the Chief tomorrow morning."
He'd merely consulted his Fiscal expert on a technical matter, and if DeVore had seen fit to use an illegal method of solving a problem, it was DeVore's responsibility alone. To be sure, Morely had been a little emphatic in his order, but that was simply because he was well aware of his Fiscal chief's disinclination to make exhaustive technical research.
Often I had wondered how the major had endured Devore's contempt. I had decided in my own mind that he must be blind to it, else he would have shown resentment. But now I knew the answer. The major wasn't blind, he was afraid; as the saying goes, he was afraid of his job. He needed it; he needed the little scrap of money it brought him every Saturday night. That was it, I knew now.
He nodded with a grave courtesy, and then paused a moment as though expecting that one of the others would introduce us. None of the others did introduce us though, so he went ahead talking about Albert Sidney Johnston's death, and I turned away. I stopped by Devore's desk. "Who is he?" I asked.
To the major he was always silently polite, with a little edging of ice on his politeness; he saved up his spleen to spew it out behind the old fellow's back. Farther than that he couldn't well afford to go anyhow. The Chief, owner of the paper and its editor, was the major's friend. As for the major himself, he seemed never to notice Devore's attitude.
It struck me as one of the funniest things and one of the most pathetic I had ever seen. I'll say this for Devore he tried out the major on nearly every kind of job; and surely it wasn't Devore's fault that the major failed on every single one of them. His first attempt was as typical a failure as any of them.
I think he had even forgiven Devore for spilling his toddy and not stopping to apologize. As for Devore, he didn't say a word to the major what would have been the use? To Devore's credit also I will say that he didn't run to the chief, bearing complaints of the major's hopeless incompetency.
So Devore's threat didn't jar me much. I'd heard it too often. "What's the trouble?" I asked. "Heat getting on your nerves?" "No, it's not the heat," he said peevishly; "it's worse than the heat. Do you know what's happened? The chief has saddled Old Signal Corps on me. Yes, sir, I've got to take his old pet, the major, on the city staff.
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