Neither of them spoke for a moment. Palmer watched the upturned palms of his hands, then turned them over on the cool table top. His palms
I definitely think that the prices are our lowest.
I'm absolutely convinced that you should take advantage of our introductory offer.
There's no doubt in my mind that it depends on the number you order.
Extract 3
Virginia Clary said: "The savings banks use the Ubco as a correspondent bank. We sell mortgages to them. We're all doing the same thing — banking. But there is our side and their side. Why?"
"Do you know the difference between a commercial and a savings bank?"
She nodded, blew out smoke and waved it away in a business-like manner, as if disposing of the question. "They can't make business loans."
"That's a by-product of the real difference."
"Which is?"
"Which is shrouded in the mists of time," Palmer explained. "Back, oh, about a century and a half. Right after the turn of the nineteenth century. Poor people could do only two things with their money: hide it under the mattress, or spend it. It wasn't safe under the mattress, so they spent it on the thing that would let them forget their poverty: whisky."
"Ah, well I know the feeling."
"The do-gooders of the day were appalled. Drunkenness was all about
them. So they imported an idea developed in Scotland by a dominie. Minis
ters, philanthropists, educators, reformers... they began organizing savings
banks to accept the savings of poor people."
"Sounds pretty dastardly."
"Terribly. The regular banks of the period wouldn't touch anything but business deposits or the estates of wealthy men. But the savings banks would accept anything, a penny a week, whatever a wage earner wanted to put aside. And the really dastardly thing was that they invested those pennies and paid back interest to the wage earners as an incentive to save more."
"Criminal!"
"No, the worst part hasn't been explained yet."
"What could be worse?" she asked.
"Just this: these savings banks were mutual. They had no stockholders. They were owned by their depositors. They made money only for their depositors. Nobody skimmed a profit off the top. All the earnings went right • back to the wage earners who deposited their pennies in the savings bank."
"Sounds downright socialistic."
"It is," Palmer told her. "But, you see, Karl Marx was only eight years old when that Scottish minister had his brainstorm."
"Oops."
"In any event, our brand of savings bankers were pretty true-blue. They usually invested their funds in government bonds. Highly patriotic. Highly stable, too. Almost none of their banks ever failed, which is more than you can say for... well, anyway, time passed."
"A century of it."
"A century and more," Palmer said. "Things happened to the wage earner. He became unionized. He got Social Security, old-age benefits, health insurance, life insurance, welfare funds, pensions, everything. The commercial banks stopped turning up their noses at him. They welcomed his savings. He was banking's darling now, secure whether he worked or not, whether he was healthy or sick and with his family provided for when he died." |
"Which has what to do with savings banks?"
"Exactly. It has nothing to do with them. They've outlived their usefulness. Nobody needs them any more."
"Oh," she said, "that's a shame. Really?"
"Seriously. What do they provide that isn't available to the wage earner from five other sources?"
"But it's sad," she objected. "All those ministers".
"I'd never have told you if I'd thought you'd crack up."
"I'll get over it in a moment," she said. "See? I'm over it already. Tell me, has anyone mentioned this to the savings banks? They're cruising right along as though they still served a purpose."
One corner of Palmer's mouth turned up in a wry expression. "That's the whole problem."
"No one's told them, huh?"
"Here is what's happened," Palmer said. "Those ministers planted a seed that grew into a tree. Nobody needs the tree, but it keeps right on growing. Savings banks give jobs to tens of thousands of employees, from the presidents on down to the clerks. True, there aren't any stockholders. But the employee corps has a stake in making sure the savings banking system keeps flourishing."
"Why not let them? I mean, people like to save at savings banks."
"I'll tell you why," Palmer said. "That tree, the one that kept growing? It has deep roots. They've spread out and they keep spreading. And they're stealing the nourishment from the ground on which we're planted. Does that make it clear to you?"
"All of sudden, yes." She sat back and stubbed out her cigarette. Then, looking up at him in a wary way, her eyes half hidden behind her long black lashes, she asked, "What are you going to do about the tree?"
Palmer looked at the table. "Prune it... drastically."
SUCCESS STORY
by James Gould Cozzens
I met Richards ten years or more ago when I first went down to Cuba. He was a short, sharp-faced, agreeable chap, then about twenty-two. He introduced himself to me on the boat and I was surprised to find that Panamerica Steel and Structure was sending us both to the same job.
Richards was from some not very good state university engineering school. Being the same age myself, and just out of tech, I was prepared to patronize him if I needed to; but I soon saw I didn't need to. There was really not the faintest possibility of anyone supposing that Richards was as smart as I was. In fact, I couldn't then imagine how he had managed to get his job. I have an idea now. It came to me when I happened to read a few weeks ago that Richards had been made a vice-president and director of Panamerica Steel when the Prossert interests bought the old firm.
Richards was naturally likeable and I liked him a lot, once I was sure that he wasn't going to outshine me. The firm had a contract for the construction of a private railroad, about seventeen miles of it, to give United Sugar a sea terminal at a small deep-water Caribbean port. For Richards and me it was mostly an easy job of inspections and routine paper work. At least it was easy for me. It was harder for Richards, because he didn't appear ever to have mastered the use of a slide rule. When he asked me to check his figures I found it was no mere formality. "Boy," I was at last obliged to say, "you are undoubtedly the dumbest white man in this province. If you don't buck up, Farrell will see you never get another job down here."
Richards grinned and said, "I never want another one. Not a job like this, anyway. I'm the executive type."'
"Oh, you are!"
"Sure, I am. And what do I care what Farrell thinks? What can he do for me?"
"Plenty. If he thinks you're any good, he can see you get something that pays money".
"He doesn't know anything that pays money, my son."
"He knows things that would pay enough for me," I answered, annoyed.
"Oh," said Richards, "if that's all you want, when Farrell’sworking for me I'll make him give you a job. A good one."
"Go to the devil!" I said. I was still checking his trial figures. "Look, stupid," I said, "didn't you ever take arithmetic? How much are seven times thirteen?"
"Work that out." " Richards said, "and let me have a report tomorrow."
When I had time, I continued to check his figures for him, and Farrell only caught him in a bad mistake about twice; but Farrell was the best man Panamerica Steel had. He'd been managing construction jobs both in Cuba and Mexico for twenty years. After the first month or so he simply let Richards alone and devoted himself lo giving me the whole benefit of his usually sharp and scornful criticism. He was at me every minute he could spare, telling me to forget this or that and use my head, showing me little tricks of figuring and method. He said it would be a good plan to take some Spanish lessons from a clerk he named in the sugar company's office.
"Spanish?" said Richards, when I told him he'd better join the class. "Not for me! Say, it took me twenty-two years to learn English. People who want to talk to me have to know it, or they'd better bring an interpreter with them."
"All right," I said, "I don't mind telling you the idea is Farrell's. He spoke to me about it."
"Well, he didn't speak to me," said Richards. "I guess he thinks I'm perfect the way I am. And now, if you'll excuse me, I have a date with a beer bottle."
I could easily see that he was coming to no good end.
In January several directors of the United Sugar Company came down on their annual jaunt—nominally business, but mostly pleasure; a good excuse to get south on a vacation. They came on a yacht.
The yacht belonged to Mr. Joseph Prossert, who was, I think, chairman of United Sugar's board then. It was the first time I'd ever seen at close quarters one of these really rich and powerful financial figures whose name everyone knows. He was an inconspicuous, rather stout man, with little hair on his head and a fussy, ponderous way of speaking. He was dressed in some dark thin cloth that looked like alpaca.14 His interest in sugar was purely financial—he didn't know anything about it from the practical standpoint. I really saw him at close quarters, too, for he was delayed on his boat when the directors went on a tour of inspection and Farrell left Richards and me and two or three armed guards to come up that afternoon.
Mr. Prossert was very affable. He asked me a number of questions. I knew the job well enough and could have answered almost any intelligent question—I mean, the sort that a trained engineer would be likely to ask. As it was, I suppose I'd said for perhaps the third time, "I'm afraid I wouldn't know, sir. We haven't any calculations on that," getting a glance of mildly surprised disbelief, when Richards suddenly spoke up. "I think, about nine million cubic feet, sir," he said. He looked boyishly embarrassed. "I just happened to be working it out last night. Just for my own interest, that is. Not officially." He blushed.
"Oh," said Mr. Prossert, turning in his seat and giving him a sharp look. "That's very interesting, Mr.—er—Richards, isn't it? Well, now, maybe you could tell me about—"
Richards could. He knew everything. He knew to the last car the capacity of every switch and yard; he knew the load limits of every bridge and culvert; he knew the average rainfall for the last twenty years; he knew the population of the various straggling villages we passed through; he knew the heights of the distant blue peaks to the west. He had made himself familiar with local labor costs and wage scales. He had the statistics on accidents and unavoidable delays. All the way up Mr. Prossert fired questions at him and he fired answers right back.
When we reached the railhead, a motor was waiting to take Mr. Prossert on. Getting out of the gas car, he nodded absent-mindedly to me, shook hands with Richards. "Very interesting indeed," he said. "Very interesting indeed, Mr. Richards. Good-by and thank you."
"Not at all, sir," Richards said. "Glad if I could be of service to you."
As soon as the motor moved off, I exploded. "Of all the asinine tricks! A little honest bluff doesn't hurt; but some of your figures—"
"I aim to please," Richards said, grinning. "If a man like Prossert wants to know something, who am I to hold out on him?"
"I suppose you think you're smart," I told him. "What's he going to think when he looks up the figures or asks somebody who does know?"
"Listen, my son," said Richards kindly. "He wasn't asking for any information he was going to use. He doesn't want to know those figures. If he ever does, he has plenty of people to get him the right ones. He won't remember these. I don't even remember them myself. What he is going to remember is you and me."
"Oh, yes?"
"Oh, yes," said Richards firmly. "He's going to remember that Panamerica Steel and Structure has a bright young man named Richards who could tell him everything he wanted to know when he wanted to know it—just the sort of chap he can use; not like that other fellow who took no interest in his job, couldn't answer the simplest question, and who's going to be doing small-time contracting all his life."
"Oh, yes?" I said. But it is true that I am still working for the Company still doing a little work in the construction line.
