Sincerely, Willis Wayde (42 page)

Yet you always had to remember that a sales force, no matter how effective it might be, was hopeless without a product in which it could believe. It was odd how many people, even in large organizations, were prone to neglect this simple fact. Willis lived, ate, and slept with Planeroid belting. He was only too glad to share his ultimate successes in this regard with Jerry Bascomb, whom he was lucky enough to hire in June '37, just after Jerry graduated from Tech. From the very start Willis insisted on naming Jerry's inventions that improved the Planeroid process the Bascomb patents. This was a good means of insuring loyalty, and to prove it Jerry was with him still, and Willis was the godfather of one of Jerry's lovely children. By the beginning of 1940, the Planeroid line was better than it had ever been, and sales figures and earnings showed that it was going places in a modest way.

XIX

The year 1940, when you came to think of it, was a headache year for nearly everyone in America, and Willis's personal and private affairs offered no exception. They moved, like nearly everyone else's, against a background of shock and crisis. To begin with, young Paul arrived that February. Rahway Belt was picking up and they could afford with difficulty a nurse for the children. Willis's whole budget was thrown out of balance but this was only the domestic side of the picture. Besides an uncertain business situation and restlessness among plant workers, Mr. Jacoby's health suddenly became so bad that he was obliged to cancel his usual winter trip to Arizona. Willis felt a premonition when he went to call on Mr. Jacoby. Without knowing anything about illness, Willis could tell that Mr. Jacoby, in spite of his high spirits, was far from well, and Willis's gloomiest conclusions were confirmed when he met Mrs. Jacoby downstairs in the living room.

He must have made this call several days after Paul was born, because he remembered apologizing to Mrs. Jacoby for not having come sooner. Willis often thought that everyone's life consisted of a series of repetitions. He had once been the young confidant of Mr. and Mrs. Henry Harcourt, and now his relationship with the Jacobys was on a larger scale, but there was the same atmosphere of trust and friendship. If Rahway Belt meant little to Mrs. Jacoby, except as something that made her husband happy, Willis knew that she appreciated what he had done by way of putting the investment on a paying basis.

Only a few days before his call, Mr. Henry Peters, who was a stockholder in Rahway Belt, had offered Willis some shares of Rahway Belt common. If Willis were to buy this stock, his holdings would be nearer 40 than 30 per cent. This was something which in all honesty he should tell Mrs. Jacoby, but he did not do so immediately when he met her downstairs, because he was still shocked by Mr. Jacoby's appearance.

There was never any use mincing matters with Mrs. Jacoby. She looked worried and unhappy, but like the late Seth Wilfred she knew how to cut her losses.

“There's a heart complication,” she said. “Manley won't go to the hospital. He has superstitious ideas about hospitals.”

“I'm awfully sorry,” Willis told her. “I didn't know things were as serious as this.”

“Well, they are,” Mrs. Jacoby said, “but something serious happens to everyone some time. Sit down, and I'll ring for Henry to get you something.”

“Oh, no thank you, Mrs. Jacoby,” Willis said. “I mustn't keep you from anything you're doing.”

“Sit down,” Mrs. Jacoby said. “You're only keeping me from worrying. How are things at Rahway?”

“Everything's going pretty well,” Willis told her.

“I know it is,” Mrs. Jacoby said, “and it's a great comfort to Manley. He was reminding me only this morning how I had advised him to sell that plant.”

Willis smiled, but at the same time he had a qualm of apprehension. If Mr. Jacoby should die, there might be every reason for Mrs. Jacoby to sell out her interest in Rahway Belt.

It was time to mention the common stock he had been offered. He did not want for a moment to have Mrs. Jacoby gain the idea that he was trying to get control of Rahway Belt. He wanted to explain his motives very clearly, but Mrs. Jacoby spoke again before he could start.

“Henry Peters says you want to buy his stock,” she said.

Although Willis was beginning to pride himself on his ability to handle situations, he found himself pausing clumsily.

“Peters offered it to me first, of course,” Mrs. Jacoby said, before Willis had a chance to speak. “But I didn't want any more. Why should I, with Manley the way he is?”

Willis often thought it was a pity that Mrs. Jacoby had not been a man.

“I am very glad that Mr. Peters consulted you first about this matter,” Willis said, and he hoped he was not speaking too quickly or eagerly. “I was just going to take up the question with you myself, but seeing Mr. Jacoby so ill made it completely leave my mind.”

There was a pause, a very brief one, but it was long enough to make Willis highly uncomfortable.

“I'm sure you were,” Mrs. Jacoby said.

“I really was, Mrs. Jacoby,” Willis answered.

It was a very silly remark to make, and besides, he had answered much too quickly.

“Of course you would really,” Mrs. Jacoby said. “You're too shrewd to play around behind my back.”

“I'm awfully glad you realize that, Mrs. Jacoby,” Willis told her.

“Of course I realize it,” Mrs. Jacoby said. “There is no need to worry about me, Willis. I don't want to have control of Rahway Belt”—she lowered her voice slightly—“if Manley should pass on.”

The lowering of her voice gave Willis an uncomfortable sensation. It was the duty of anyone in business to discount any unpleasant possibility, but somehow Mrs. Jacoby made the passing on of Mr. Jacoby an accomplished fact.

“Now, Mrs. Jacoby,” Willis said, “it's probably the winter climate. I'm sure Mr. Jacoby has many happy years ahead of him.”

He was not surprised that Mrs. Jacoby should discount the remark, but he did think that she might have acknowledged it slightly.

“All I care about is the earnings,” Mrs. Jacoby said. “Rahway Belt won't mean a thing to me except as another holding in the portfolio”—she lowered her voice again—“if Manley passes on.”

Willis cleared his throat. He wished there were not always someone upon whom his future depended.

“Would you mind telling me, Mrs. Jacoby,” he said, “if Mr. Jacoby should—er—pass on, are you planning to sell your stock?”

“I won't sink any more money in it,” Mrs. Jacoby said. “I've bailed the company out once but I won't again. It's Manley's company, you know.”

Willis laughed, but he was afraid his laughter was not very convincing.

“You won't have to bail it out again, Mrs. Jacoby,” he said.

He was pleased that Mrs. Jacoby did not pause before she answered.

“No,” she said, “you're doing very well, but let's stop beating about the bush. I won't have any sentimental feeling about Rahway Belt—if Manley passes on.”

He was always grateful to Mrs. Jacoby for having stated her thoughts so frankly. He could understand that Mrs. Jacoby was actually saying that the end of an era was approaching, and that he must begin looking out for his own interests—if Manley Jacoby should pass on. He was certain that he never would have thought of writing Mr. Bryson Harcourt—that he would only have thought in the vaguest way about combining the Klaus patents with the Planeroid patents—if Mrs. Jacoby had not said that she would no longer have a sentimental interest in Rahway Belt in the event of Mr. Jacoby's demise.

It was a relief to meet someone like Mrs. Jacoby, who did not have the Harcourts' sentiments, because anyone with common sense knew that sentiment had no place in industrial transactions.

As soon as he left the Jacoby house on the ridge, Willis went at once to see Sylvia at the hospital. She was sitting up in her new bed jacket, and there were several new vases of flowers in the room, besides new offerings of booties and knitted blankets, all with a blue motif for a boy. He made a careful note of all the cards so that he might acknowledge them without bothering Sylvia.

“How is Mr. Jacoby, dear?” Sylvia asked.

“I'm afraid he's not very well, honey,” Willis said. “There's the usual arthritis, but it is also complicated by a heart condition, but don't worry about it, honey.”

“Oh, dear,” Sylvia said. “I'm just beginning to get to like Mr. Jacoby.”

He did not want Sylvia to be worried, especially now that she was giving little Paul several ounces more milk than she had managed for little Al.

“What is going to happen if he dies?” Sylvia asked.

It was obviously not the time to tell Sylvia about his conversation with Mrs. Jacoby.

“Honey,” he said, “you let me worry about that one.”

It was fortunate that Willis started that same evening to give serious thought to the possible merger of Rahway Belt and Harcourt Mill, because Mr. Jacoby died two weeks later, just when he was rallying and when preparations were going head for the Jacobys' annual trip to Arizona. Of course the whole picture changed immediately.

The truth was that the time was ripe for a change and everything fitted together in a more perfect manner than any other proposed merger that Willis had ever explored. Usually there were many unexpected obstacles, but not with Harcourt and Rahway Belt. There was no duplication in their products, because Planeroid filled a need completely different from the more ambitious Hartex line. In fact the two plants complemented each other, and the only possible objections to a merger was distance.

Two days after Mr. Jacoby's funeral, Willis decided to get in touch with Mr. Bryson Harcourt, without consulting Mrs. Jacoby, because obviously no one would be committed by an exploratory conversation. In order to avoid office gossip he wrote the letter himself, using his portable typewriter, on a card table in his living room in Orange. Little Paul and Sylvia had only recently arrived from the hospital with Miss Farquahr, a trained nurse who was giving Sylvia a sort of refresher course in baby-tending. Margaret, the new general maid, who had come after Minnie left, had already started quarreling with Miss Farquahr, for no good reason except to prove the axiom that trained nurses and other household employees never could get on together. Sylvia was still not allowed downstairs, and little Al was quite a problem, since he had reached the stage of pulling breakable objects off tables and then of pulling the tables and chairs on top of himself. Just when Willis was preparing to sit down quietly before supper, Sylvia had called to him from upstairs that he would simply have to look after little Al until his bedtime. Miss Farquahr was busy changing little Paul, and Margaret was busy with supper.

Dear Mr. Harcourt,

I am Willis Wayde, whom I hope you will remember from the old days at the Harcourt Mill. Although it has been a long time since we have met, I have a warm spot in my heart for Harcourt, and any news I hear from the mill is still to me like news from home in a very real sense.…

There was a crash and a scream from little Al. It was pure coincidence, of course, that Al had contrived to pull over the silver cigarette box which the Bryson Harcourts had sent as a wedding present. The corner of the box hit Al on the forehead, and now the floor was strewn with cigarettes.

“All right, Al,” Willis said. “Daddy doesn't want Al to touch. No, no.”

It was necessary in those days to speak to Al in simple monosyllables, and even so Al usually went right on with what he was doing. It took quite a while to gather up the cigarettes, and Al roared when the silver box was taken away from his clutches. He did not want the small horse which Willis gave him in place of it, and so thoughtlessly Willis let Al have his fountain pen. In the quiet that ensued Willis returned to his typewriter.

Knowing how busy you must be, I shall state my reason for this letter briefly. I find myself here in general charge of the Rahway Belting Company, and I believe I have an idea regarding its future …

Willis observed that Al had completely dismantled the fountain pen and that ink had cascaded over his knitted suit and down to the rug. He immediately took the pen away from little Al, who began to weep again, and then he called first for Miss Farquahr and then for Margaret, but no one answered. Then as long as the damage had been done he turned back to the typewriter.

… which I think may interest you as much as it does me. I would prefer to tell you the details verbally and so I ask whether I may call on you at your convenience and by appointment.…

There was another crash by the fireplace. Little Al had pulled over the fire tongs and shovel, and this time he appeared to be severely injured, but Willis decided to finish the letter because fortunately little Al's screams of pain were changing to a shriller and more familiar note of indignant fury. As Willis endeavored to concentrate, it occurred to him that life was one long journey past milestones of hurt feelings, and though you might learn to suppress the reaction, it was better, perhaps, to scream openly and shamelessly like little Al.

It so happens that I must make a few calls in Boston next week. You may not have heard, by the way, that the Walton people up there are ordering our new Planeroid conveyors, and this is keeping us pretty busy in Rahway.

Willis looked up again from his typewriter. Miss Farquahr had arrived. She stood impersonally in front of the card table in her starched white uniform.

“What have you done to little Alfred, Mr. Wayde?” she asked.

“I didn't do anything,” Willis said. “He does things to himself. Would you please mind taking him upstairs?”

“His crying upset Mrs. Wayde,” Miss Farquahr said.

“Miss Farquahr,” Willis said, and he smiled in an engaging way that usually worked with secretaries and office employees, “I don't seem to be very good at child rearing and I am trying to write a rather important confidential letter. Couldn't you keep an eye on Alfred for a minute, Miss Farquahr?”