Confidence Game Read online

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  +--------------------------------------------------------------+ | | | Transcriber's note: | | | | This story was published in _If: Worlds of Science Fiction_, | | September, 1954. Extensive research did not uncover any | | evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was | | renewed. | | | +--------------------------------------------------------------+

  _Illustrated by Ed Emsh_

  CONFIDENCE GAME

  _Cutter demanded more and more and more efficiency--and got it! But, as in anything, enough is enough, and too much is..._

  By JAMES McKIMMEY, JR.

  George H. Cutter wheeled his big convertible into his reserved space inthe Company parking lot with a flourish. A bright California sun droveits early brightness down on him as he strode toward the square,four-story brick building which said _Cutter Products, Inc._ over itsfront door. A two-ton truck was grinding backward, toward the loadingdoors, the thick-shouldered driver craning his neck. Cutter movedbriskly forward, a thick-shouldered man himself, though not very tall. Aglint of light appeared in his eyes, as he saw Kurt, the truck driver,fitting the truck's rear end into the tight opening.

  "Get that junk out of the way!" he yelled, and his voice roared over thenoise of the truck's engine.

  Kurt snapped his head around, his blue eyes thinning, then recognitionspread humor crinkles around his eyes and mouth. "All right, sir," hesaid. "Just a second while I jump out, and I'll lift it out of yourway."

  "With bare hands?" Cutter said.

  "With bare hands," Kurt said.

  Cutter's laugh boomed, and as he rounded the front of the truck, hestruck the right front fender with his fist. Kurt roared back from thecab with his own laughter.

  He liked joking harshly with Kurt and with the rest of the truckdrivers. They were simple, and they didn't have his mental strength. Butthey had another kind of strength. They had muscle and energy, and mostimportant, they had guts. Twenty years before Cutter had driven a truckhimself. The drivers knew that, and there was a bond between them, thedrivers and himself, that seldom existed between employer and employee.

  The guard at the door came to a reflex attention, and Cutter bobbed hishead curtly. Then, instead of taking the stairway that led up the frontto the second floor and his office, he strode down the hallway to theleft, angling through the shop on the first floor. He always walkedthrough the shop. He liked the heavy driving sound of the machines inhis ears, and the muscled look of the men, in their coarse work shirtsand heavy-soled shoes. Here again was strength, in the machines and inthe men.

  And here again too, the bond between Cutter and his employees was athing as real as the whir and grind and thump of the machines, as realas the spray of metal dust, spitting away from a spinning saw blade. Hewas able to drive himself through to them, through the hard wall ofunions and prejudices against business suits and white collars and softclean hands, because they knew that at one time he had also been amachinist and then tool and die operator and then a shop foreman. He gotthrough to them, and they respected him. They were even inspired by him,Cutter knew, by his energy and alertness and steel confidence. It wasone good reason why their production continually skimmed along near thetop level of efficiency.

  Cutter turned abruptly and started up the metal-lipped concrete steps tothe second floor. He went up quickly, his square, almost chunky figuremoving smoothly, and there was not the faintest shortening in his breathwhen he reached the level of his own office.

  Coming up the back steps required him to cross the entire administrationoffice which contained the combined personnel of Production Control,Procurement, and Purchasing. And here, the sharp edge of elation,whetted by the walk past the loading dock and the truck drivers and themachine shop and the machinists, was dulled slightly.

  On either side of him as he paced rapidly across the room, were the rowsof light-oak desks which contained the kind of men he did not like:fragile men, whether thin or fat, fragile just the same, in the eyes andmouth, and pale with their fragility. They affected steel posturesbehind those desks, but Cutter knew that the steel was synthetic, thatthere was nothing in that mimicked look of alertness and virility butposing. They were a breed he did not understand, because he had neverbeen a part of them, and so this time, the invisible but very realquality of employer-employee relationship turned coldly brittle, likefrozen cellophane.

  The sounds now, the clicking of typewriters, the sliding of filedrawers, the squeak of adjusted swivel chairs--all of it--irritated him,rather than giving him inspiration, and so he hurried his way,especially when he passed that one fellow with the sad, frightened eyes,who touched his slim hands at the papers on his desk, like a cautiousfawn testing the soundness of the earth in front of him. What was hisname? Linden? God, Cutter thought, the epitome of the breed, this man:sallow and slow and so hesitant that he appeared to be about to leapfrom his chair at the slightest alarm.

  Cutter broke his aloofness long enough to glare at the man, and Lindenturned his frightened eyes quickly to his desk and began shuffling hispapers nervously. Some day, Cutter promised himself, he was going tostop in front of the man and shout, "Booo!" and scare the poor devil tohell and back.

  He pushed the glass doors that led to his own offices, and moving intoLucile's ante-room restored his humor. Lucile, matronly yet quick andyouthfully spirited, smiled at him and met his eyes directly. Here wassome strength again, and he felt the full energy of his early-morningdrive returning fully. Lucile, behind her desk in this plain butexpensive reception room, reminded him of fast, hard efficiency, thequality of accomplishment that he had dedicated himself to.

  "Goddamned sweet morning, eh, Lucy?" he called.

  "Beautiful, George," she said. She had called him by his first name foryears. He didn't mind, from her. Not many could do it, but those whocould, successfully, he respected.

  "What's up first?" he asked, and she followed him into his own office.It was a high-ceilinged room, with walls bare except for a picture ofAlexander Hamilton on one wall, and an award plaque from the StateChamber of Commerce on the opposite side of the room. He spun hisleather-cushioned swivel chair toward him and sat down and placed histhick hands against the surface of the desk. Lucile took the only otherchair in the office, to the side of the desk, and flipped open herappointment pad.

  "Quay wants to see you right away. Says it's important."

  Cutter nodded slightly and closed his eyes. Lucile went on, calling hisappointments for the day with clicking precision. He stored theinformation, leaning back in his chair, adjusting his mind to each, sothat there would be no energy wasted during the hard, swift day.

  "That's it," Lucile said. "Do you want to see Quay?"

  "Send him in," Cutter said, and he was already leaning into his desk,signing his name to the first of a dozen letters which he had dictatedinto the machine during the last ten minutes of the preceding day.

  Lucile disappeared, and three minutes later Robert Quay took her placein the chair beside Cutter's desk. He was a taller man than Cutter, andthinner. Still, there was an athletic grace about him, a sureness ofstep and facial expression, that made it obvious that he was physicallyfit. He was single and only thirty-five, twelve years younger thanCutter, but he had been with Cutter Products, Inc. for thirteen years.In college he had been a Phi Beta Kappa and lettered three years on thevarsity as a quarterback. He was the kind of rare combination thatCutter liked, and Cut
ter had offered him more than the Chicago Cardinalsto get him at graduation.

  Cutter felt Quay's presence, without looking up at him. "Goddamned sweetmorning, eh, Bob?"

  "It really is, George," Quay said.

  "What's up?" Cutter stopped signing, having finished the entire job, andhe stared directly into Quay's eyes. Quay met the stare unflinchingly.

  "I've got a report from Sid Perry at Adacam Research."

  "Your under-cover agent again, eh?"

  Quay grinned. Adacam Research conducted industrial experimentation whichincluded government work. The only way to find out what really went onthere, Cutter had found out, was to find a key man who didn't mindtalking for a certain amount of compensation, regardless of sworn oathsand signatures to government statements. You could always get somebody,Cutter knew, and Quay had been able to get a