Executive Suite

by Cameron Hawley

  The nervous play of Erica Martin’s fingers was a completely involuntary gesture of annoyance. If she had been conscious of it she would have stopped it at once, for she had long since schooled herself against any outward display of emotion, particularly where Avery Bullard was concerned and there was very little emotion in her life with which Avery Bullard was not concerned. She had been his private secretary for almost sixteen years.

  At eighteen, Erica Martin had not been a pretty girl. At thirty-eight she was a handsome woman. As a girl she had been tall, heavy-boned and rather too strong-featured to match the current standards for sweet femininity. Now, at maturity, she had the compensation—inadequate and belated though it was—of inciting constant admiration. Men paid her the supreme business male’s compliment by saying that she had a mind like a man’s. Women, particularly those of her own age group, saw her as the strong, independent, and capable person that they might have been if they had not sacrificed themselves to the enervating demands of housekeeping, childbearing, and the constant catering to a husband’s petty quirks and foibles.

  The truth, which almost no one bothered to suspect, was that Erica Martin’s life was not so very different from that of her long married compatriots. Her relationship with Avery Bullard, although completely platonic and totally devoid of any compensating display of even minor affection, did not differ greatly from the relationship between any intelligent and helpful wife and any dominant, driving, and brilliant husband. She was treated with slightly more respect than is usually typical in such a marriage, but that advantage was offset by the fact that there were no moments when a pleasant disrespect might be the prelude to an act of love.

  As for a husband’s quirks and foibles, no wife could have been subjected to more—and Erica Martin also had her moments when tolerance was difficult to summon. There were times when Avery could be a very annoying person. The silly thing about it was that it was almost always over some minor matter. Day after day, Avery would make decisions on big problems almost as fast as she could place them on his desk. She couldn’t ask for better co-operation. Then, all of a sudden, some little thing would come along and, for no reason at all, he would decide to be stubborn about it, almost as if he were purposely trying to annoy her. Every week since Mr. Fitzgerald had died she had struggled to find adroit ways of nudging Avery into clearing the “executive vice-president” note from her personal reminder pad. Once she had even asked a direct question. Even then he had done nothing. That was as far as she could go. If Avery wanted to be stubborn he’d just have to be stubborn. “Elect executive vice-president” wasn’t something that she could write at the top of his engagement calendar every Monday morning the way she wrote “Haircut.” The disconcerting thing, of course, was that Avery never stopped to realize the unpleasant position in which she was placed as a result of his negligence. She was the one who had to call the vice-presidents. But, of course, he never thought of that.

  She glanced down and the telegram in her hand was an urgent reminder that the minutes were slipping away. It was Friday afternoon. None of the vice-presidents knew that Mr. Bullard was coming back from New York. Any one of them might be planning to slip away for an early start on the weekend. She must catch them at once … all of them. Avery would throw a tantrum if anyone missed executive committee meeting and those tantrums weren’t good for him … his blood pressure had been up two points last time.

  Hurriedly she slipped through the door of her office and started down the winding, medieval oak staircase that joined the two floors of the Executive Suite. The foot of the staircase solved the problem of precedence. Directly opposite was the door lettered: Frederick W. Alderson, Vice-President and Treasurer. No one could possibly place any special significance on the fact that she opened that door first.

  Frederick Alderson was sitting behind his desk, his body squarely in his chair, his head held plumb-bob straight, not a white hair out of place on the high dome above his wax-pink face. He sat as if his own presence were a part of the meticulously precise arrangement of everything in his office. His smile of welcome was in the same careful pattern.

  “Come in, Miss Martin.”

  “I’ve just had word from Mr. Bullard that he’s on his way home from New York. He’s called a meeting for six o’clock.”

  There was an almost imperceptible fading of his smile, so slight and so quickly recovered that she all but missed it.

  “I hope it isn’t too inconvenient, Mr. Alderson.”

  “No.” He made the one syllable say that there was nothing in his personal life that could ever overshadow the importance of a summons from Avery Bullard.

  “I’m sure it must be something important,” she said, “or he wouldn’t have asked everyone to stay.”

  “Everyone?” Mr. Alderson asked in cautious inquiry.

  “The executive committee.”

  “Oh, of course. Thank you, Miss Martin.”

  His voice stopped her at the door. “I don’t suppose you have any idea how long a meeting it might be?”

  “No. I’m sorry.”

  “Well, it really doesn’t matter. Mrs. Alderson and I are going out to dinner at seven, but I’m sure our hosts will understand if we’re a few minutes late.”

  As she was closing the door she saw him pick up a newly sharpened pencil and reach for his desk pad. Nothing ever happened in Mr. Alderson’s life that did not seem to require a note to himself, written in a tight bookkeeper’s script that looked like copperplate engraving.

  Down the hall, Erica Martin wondered if Avery Bullard ever really stopped to appreciate the sacrificial loyalty of Frederick Alderson … a nice gesture if Avery were to make Mr. Alderson his executive vice-president … no reason why he shouldn’t … every reason why he should. Mr. Alderson was the oldest of the vice-presidents. There would be no organizational complications and, since he was sixty-one, he would retire in four years anyway.

  She passed the blank door waiting to be lettered with the name of the new executive vice-president and went on to open the door labeled: Jesse Grimm, Vice-President for Manufacturing.

  Jesse Grimm was not in his office but the odor of his pipe hung heavily in the air. Erica Martin walked through to the door of his secretary’s little cubicle. “Hello, Ruth. Mr. Grimm around?”

  Ruth Elkins swallowed hard, sending another chocolate-topped cookie the way of all the thousands upon thousands of tidbits that had contributed to her puffball figure. “Gosh, Miss Martin, he left just a few minutes ago.”

  “You’ll have to reach him, Ruth. Mr. Bullard’s called an executive committee for six o’clock.”

  “Six o’clock? Gosh, Miss Martin, I don’t know if I can or not. He’s going down to his place in Maryland.”

  “How long ago did he leave here?”

  “Maybe about ten minutes.”

  “Was he going home first?”

  “I guess so.”

  “Then you still have a chance to reach him if you call immediately.”

  “Sure, only—gosh, it’s a shame, Miss Martin. Mr. Grimm’s been at the factory almost every night and this was the weekend—”

  “If you don’t reach him, let me know at once,” Erica Martin said sharply, clipping off the subject. Ruth would blabber on endlessly if you gave her half a chance. How Mr. Grimm had managed to put up with Ruth Elkins all of these years was something almost beyond understanding. The only possible explanation was pure pity. That was like Mr. Grimm … his one weakness … demanding perfection from his machines but too quick to excuse the lack of it in his people. It was a fault … Avery recognized it, too … but, as he had once said, if a man had to have a fault there were worse ones to have. Avery liked Jesse Grimm. That was plain. There was a special affection in his voice when he said, “Get old Jesse up here.” The other vice-presidents were almost always referred to by their surnames … “Ask Mr. Alderson to come up for a minute.”

  The juxtaposition of the two names in her mind sparked a question. Was that why Avery
was delaying? Perhaps he wanted to make Mr. Grimm executive vice-president but was waiting until he could find some way to do it without offending Mr. Alderson … no, she was wrong … Avery never shrank from facing anything that needed to be faced. Personal considerations had never stopped him before … he had the strength to override them … he couldn’t hide behind that excuse. There was no excuse … he was just being stubborn!

  J. Walter Dudley, Vice-President for Sales, and Don Walling, Vice-President for Design and Development, occupied offices that were joined by a connecting door. Dudley’s office was empty but she heard his voice through the closed door and opened it. The two men were seated in front of a long side table over which a collection of furniture-design sketches was scattered.

  Walt Dudley was on his feet instantly, a broad smile blooming. He was an impressive man—big, broad-shouldered, with prematurely white hair above a strong deep-tanned face—and he was a practiced master of the art of winning quick friendships. “Erica, my dear, you’re just what we need—a neutral referee—but with a good eye for a fast-selling number. Don and I can’t figure out which of these specials I should take along to the Chicago market tonight.”

  Erica Martin smiled in spite of herself. She knew that everything Walt Dudley said was a part of his own highly personal act—like the “Erica, my dear” that no other vice-president could possibly have said—yet he was able now, as he always was, to demand her smile.

  “What you’d really like me to tell you,” she said, letting the smile lighten her tone, “is which designs Mr. Bullard will like.”

  Dudley tossed his handsome head with an appreciative chuckle directed at Walling. “Don, haven’t I always said she was a mind reader?”

  Don Walling nodded in the demanded agreement but it was obviously tinged with an undertone of slight embarrassment. “I’m afraid that’s putting Miss Martin on a spot—asking her to outguess Mr. Bullard.”

  “If I could outguess Mr. Bullard,” she said lightly, “I’d be a vice-president myself.”

  Dudley’s laughter was instantaneous. “That’s not a qualification. If it were, there wouldn’t be any vice-presidents.”

  She saw the conversation was fast reaching the forbidden ground of personal comment about Mr. Bullard and she cut it off with a quick announcement of the meeting.

  For once Walt Dudley was caught off guard. His smile vanished. “But I’m taking the seven o’clock plane to Chicago. The furniture market opens Monday and we’re to have a preview showing for the chain and mail order boys tomorrow.” His last words weakened as if the hearing of what he had said destroyed its validity. “Well, I can probably get a later plane.” The smile was back. “Dust off my chair, Erica, I’ll be there.”

  Walling was facing her, frowning. “I don’t see how I can possibly make it, Miss Martin. Everything’s set to start our test run on the molding process as soon as the five o’clock shift comes off.”

  “Better hold it up,” Dudley advised, the older man to the younger.

  “We can’t hold it up,” Walling protested. “They’ve already started reacting the finish resin. It has to come off on schedule or not at all. We’ve spent a whole month getting things organized for this one weekend. If we miss now it will be a month before we can get things set again for another factory test.”

  “Couldn’t they go ahead without you?” Erica Martin asked, framing the question so that it was a way of telling him that nothing must stop him from attending the meeting. Don Walling was a new vice-president … it had been less than two years since he had moved up to the Executive Suite … there were still things that he had to be taught.

  “I don’t see how. There’ll be decisions to make as they go along,” Walling said, “but under the circumstances, I don’t suppose there’s anything else that can be done except to hold up.”

  He was learning, Erica decided, but there was more to learn … he hadn’t taught himself to hide his feelings.

  “Cheer up, boy,” Dudley broke in with a forced laugh, the good actor covering a fellow player’s bad cue. “The meeting might turn out to be a quickie and then you could still get over to the factory in time.”

  Erica Martin was tempted. She knew how important the test run was. She had seen the preliminary estimates that had been attached to the appropriation request. If the new molding process worked out it might well become the most important development in years. A month’s delay would be serious. If Avery were there he would almost certainly tell Walling to go ahead with the test run and not worry about the meeting. Yet she dared not yield to the temptation to speak for him. That was the frustrating prohibition that hemmed in her whole life. She knew, better than any living person, what Avery Bullard’s reaction would be to any given situation, yet she never dared anticipate it. She could only repeat his words, relay his orders, echo his commands. That was all. Anything else was beyond the border line.

  Outside the door, Erica Martin groped, as she had groped so many times before, to find some bench mark of reason that would make it easier to orient her thinking and find some justification for the unpleasant situation in which she constantly found herself. She was always in the bufferland between Avery Bullard and his vice-presidents. She had nothing to do with the orders that she relayed, yet she was forced to be the object of the resentment and anger that they aroused. The demand for a six o’clock executive committee meeting was an arbitrary act of dictatorship, issued without consideration of anyone else’s plans or desires. She agreed. But it wasn’t her fault. Why should they hate her … and they did hate her, all of them! Walling was the only one who had dared to show it, but that was only because he was new, because he hadn’t learned yet that a mask was essential equipment for the vice-president’s trade. They all had their masks, Dudley’s was laughter, Alderson’s was his impassivity, Grimm’s was the thin blue veil of smoke that drifted up from his black pipe. Shaw’s was …

  The name was a prod and she hurried around the corner to the door that was lettered: Loren P. Shaw, Vice-President and Comptroller. There was a meeting in progress and she withdrew quickly, intending to leave the message with Shaw’s secretary, but she was only a step away from his door when he popped out.

  “Something, Miss Martin?”

  “I’m sorry I disturbed you, Mr. Shaw.”

  “Not at all, Miss Martin. Nothing important, just a little gathering of our section heads. Getting our plans laid for the midyear closing, you know.”

  “Mr. Bullard is on his way home from New York. He’s called an executive committee meeting for six o’clock.”

  Of all the masks, Loren Shaw’s was the best. Her eyes were directly on his, yet she saw not the faintest flicker of reaction, nor was there the slightest hint of an unusual tone in his voice as he said, “Apparently there must have been some developments in New York today.”

  “Apparently,” she said quickly. Did he know what Avery had been working on in New York … or was he making a guileful attempt to get her to tell him what the meeting was about? In either event there was nothing more to be said. “Thank you, Mr. Shaw.”

  “Not at all, Miss Martin. I’ll be there.”

  She felt his eyes following her down the hall and it was not until she had turned the corner and was starting up the staircase that she heard his door close.

  At the top of the staircase she suddenly realized why Shaw had been watching her. He was confirming the fact that he had been the last one that she had told. An unaccountable tremor of fear ran through her. She brushed it aside. Why should she be afraid of anything that Loren Shaw might think? He was only a vice-president. In less than three hours Avery would be here.

  She walked through her own office and into Avery Bullard’s. She had drawn the shades against the sun and now she closed the door, shutting out all of the light except the soft cathedral glow that came through the stained-glass ports between the heavy oak beams. She walked behind his desk, stopping when she could reach out to touch the back of his chair. Then, slowly, her
hands dropped until her fingertips had passed over the hard roughness of the oak and found the soft yielding flesh-touch of the red leather. Her eyes did not follow her hands. She was looking straight ahead. There was no break in the mask of her face.

  3

  NEW YORK CITY

  4.52 P.M. EDT

  As is often the case with many another a public servant, Frank Gross was a harsh critic of the human shortcoming that accounted for the means of his livelihood. If, as he frequently suggested, every citizen were required by federal law to be indelibly tattooed with his name and Social Security number, the necessity for his employment would have been largely eliminated. That fact had no effect upon his caustic railing against all persons who were stupid enough to allow themselves to fall dead in a public place without suitable identification on their persons.

  The eventual solution of the identification riddles that were placed on Frank Gross’ desk gave him little satisfaction. From his viewpoint, he was wasting his effort and his ingenuity on something that should never have been necessary in the first place.

  He opened the file that lay in front of him with particular distaste, recalling that MacIntosh had said when he brought it in, “Make this a special, Frankie. Looks like it might be someone important.” Frank Gross had no love for important people. If it weren’t for his nineteen years of seniority … and that was something a guy with a wife and four kids couldn’t forget … he would have told MacIntosh what he could do. MacIntosh was a pain in the tail. An ordinary guy drops dead, it’s nothing but routine, but let a case turn up that looks maybe like it’s got a couple of votes behind it and right away MacIntosh has got to make it “special”… yah, and at twenty to five just so it would make him miss his train.