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Updated: May 13, 2025
"Ten o'clock." Bates looked up. "And don't try to skip. You be there, because I don't know what to tell them." Walter was there a half hour early. Torkleson's legal staff glowered from across the room. The judge glowered from the bench.
"And just what does the production manager do all day?" Walter reddened. "He organizes the work of the plant, establishes production lines, works with Promotion and Sales, integrates Research and Development, operates the planning machines." "And you think you do a pretty good job of it, eh? Even asked for a raise last year!" Torkleson's voice was dangerous. Walter spread his hands. "I do my best.
Anyway, the stock room is full, and the freight yard is full, and the last run of orders we sent out came back because nobody wants any more trash cans." Bailey shook his head. "The men won't swallow it any more. There's well, there's been talk about having a board meeting." Torkleson's ruddy cheeks paled. "Board meeting, huh?" He licked his heavy lips.
"I've been doing everything I could," Walter snapped. "Of course the reports are bad, they couldn't help but be. We haven't met a production schedule in over two years. No plant can keep up production the way the men are working." Torkleson's face darkened. He leaned forward slowly. "So it's the men now, is it? Go ahead. Tell me what's wrong with the men."
Workers began joking about the trash cans; then the humor grew more and more remote. Finally, late in the afternoon of the eighth day, Bailey was once again in Torkleson's office. "Well? Speak up! What's the beef this time?" "Sir the men I mean, there's been some nasty talk. They're tired of making trash cans. No challenge in it.
No more private gold-plated Buicks for you boys. No more twenty-room mansions in Westchester. No more big game hunting in the Rockies. No, you don't have to know anything but how to whip a board meeting into a frenzy so they'll vote you into office again each year." Torkleson's eyes glittered. His voice was very soft. "I've always liked you, Walter. So I'm going to pretend I didn't hear you."
The union boss's office was crowded with TV cameras, newsmen, and puzzled workmen. The floor was littered with piles of ominous-looking paper. Torkleson was shouting into a telephone, and three lawyers were shouting into Torkleson's ear. He spotted Bailey and waved him through the crowd into an inner office room. "Well? Did they get them fixed?" Bailey spread his hands nervously.
It was duly appealed, legal machinery began tying itself in knots, and the strikers still struck. By the fifth day there was a more serious note. "You're going to have to appear, Walter. We can't dodge this one." "When?" "Tomorrow morning. And before a labor-rigged judge, too." The little lawyer paced his office nervously. "I don't like it. Torkleson's getting desperate.
Shut the door and come over here." The man behind the desk hoisted his three hundred well-dressed pounds and glared at Walter from under flagrant eyebrows. Torkleson's whole body quivered as he slammed a sheaf of papers down on the desk. "Just what do you think you're doing with this company, Towne?" Walter swallowed. "I'm production manager of the corporation."
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