One Man's Credit

Cromwell Argus, Volume LXX, Issue 3627, 3 July 1939, Page 2

One Man's Credit

[Short Story]

# George Payafef, assistant, advertising manager io| The ; firm of Blough, Gibbpns and Company, Ltd., soapmakers, snt moodily at his desk. His thoughts were as grey as the morning. Hadn’t he been with the firm since he was office boy? Slogged his way for fifteen years from the high stool to the desk at tho front of, the office where daily he had filled up invoices by the score, then two years .as assistant in the laboratory, and thence to thb seat behind Mr. James Boff?-' - , True, he was now deputy to Mr. Boff lint he felt he was made pt better stuff. Promotion was too slow. He ought to be higher up—in Boff’s place, Boff who had treated all his ideas as though they were the suggestions of a child, and then promptly, put them forward to the directors as his own proposals. It was heartrending, unfair. . . . His thoughts ceased y abruptly as his senior’s strident tones broke in. ■“Paynter, that advertising copy for our next campaign. We had it back from the agents on Wednesday. Let me have it to show the Board at this afternoon’s meeting.” ";. 1 Paynter got the plans and laid them before the advertising manager. Mr, Boff glanced at them and made a few notes in the margins, chewing the top of his pencil between times in. a way that'was peculiar to him. Paynter hesitated aU his senior’s desk. a “Yes, Paynter, What is it?” “I can’t help thinking that we should do better if we steered clear of this beauty theme,” he said. “Boardmau’s have been running a similar scheme for some time without much success. What is the point of imitating a competitor’s unsuccessful ideas, anyway?” “Well,” asked Mr, Boff, “what do you suggest in its place?” “I think,” replied Payntor, ‘that we should drop the charm stuff entirely, and go all out for the health and hygiene aspects. You know how keen the public now are on keeping healthy* and the municipal health|departmeuts are encouraging everyone to look to personal hygiene for kfealth and happiness. Surely that should be the basis of our next campaign.” The scheme was altered, and when the first advertisements appeared, they stressed the “hygiene” note. Except for some small modifications made by Boff, they were very much as Paynter ' had proposed,and subsequently prepared, at Mr; Boffis suggestion. This was very gratifying to Paynter, but it was anything but gratifying to know that once again his proposal had been purloined and put forward as his senior’s own idea. And one morning he learned something which added fuel to the fires of jealousy which were burning within him. Tate, of the invoice section, accosted him. “I say, Paynter, have you heard it’s rumored that Mr. Boff has had a rise?” “Oh, that’s interesting. Anything else?” But George Paynter’s thoughts were hitter as aloes for the rest of that day. Boff a rise, his rise, his ideas. They were all his ideas. The thought obsessed him like an evil spirit. The sight of James Boff seated in front of him, smug, self-satisfied, sucking his pencil, was as a red rag to a bull. He couldn’t keep his eyes off the dark, sleek head. Its every movement fanned the fire inside him. That head —how close it was! He could reach it by half standing and stretching out bis hand. A good clout with au inkpot and —an inkpot, ink — That reminded him, he was working late to-morrow Boff was speaking again. - “I shan’t be back to-morrow afternoon, Paynter. There’s a directors’ luncheon, and I’ve got to be there — honor and glory, I suppose, for the soap-doll scheme—you remember. Means staying late at the office, though.” Payuter remembered . well., enough, for it was he who thought of:,it, though in this case Boff had worked out the details. But there it was agaiu. Why did credit never go where it was due? “How about yourself? You working late, too?” : , T “I think not, Mr. Boff.” A plan was hastily forming in his mind. Fortune was playing into his hands. Boff was going to remain on in the office. He would probably be there till nine o’clock, even later. But he himself would go home, have his supper, then return, unknown to anyone. Well, I shan’t have your company after all,” James Boff was saying. “Then I’ll work iu the Board room; it’s cosier there.” The next day, on his way to work, Paynter called at a chemist, bought and pocketed a small package (how he., ' blessed those years of work in., the firm’s laboratory) and hurried on to the office. a, Strangely enough, the sight of ’ his arch-enemy to-day roused no - feelings of resentment. Perhaps it was the realisation that after to-night the tables Avould be-turned, that at last ;he, ! would be rid of this accursed, stumb-ling-block to his ambitions. > ■ Paynter even found;it possible to sympathise with his enemy. For s he experienced pleasure in Eoff’s company, and with it an anticipation ; which prompted *n attitude of arti.ficial camaraderie towards his senior. Boff noticed it. 1 “Paynter, you’re more than usually* ' exhilarated to-day. What is it, another; suggestion ? Or have you fallen in i love, or won first prize in a competl- | tion?” ■ ' “None of those, Mr. 8011. Just an unusually exalted sensation. A know- . ledge that the dream of years is at ; last to be fulfilled.” a t Boff raised his eyebrows in some ;1 surprise, but said nothing. 1 ; 1;

At tea-time, when he knew the Board-room would be .empty, Paynter repaired there. he^withdrew a pencil from his pocket. , ,-How this habit of-Boff[s r >pfi:chewing.his pencil simplified-'things' '-He had never seen , . sSiii; ■■ ■ . '-■agSS'.S I, .MR; his enemy: use any. but wooden ones supplied by the office —another of the advertising manager’s T queer ideas. This one, Boff?s special, with its halfinch of chewed strands, be dipped, frayed end, into the bottle' he had brought With him. Then he laid the pencil near the blotter. He smiled to himself at the very simplicity of bis plan, the impossibility of detection. Five minutes from the, time of entering the Board room, lie was back at his own desk. « Punctually at 5.30 Paynter left the offices .with the rest of the, staff. He went home and had Afterwards, telling his father he was going out for a stroll, he put on his overcoat and turned his steps in the direction of Blough, Gibbons and Go. Whatever happened, he must return and remove that pencil after it had done its work. Paynter’s many evenings spent at work had made him familiar with the systematic movements of the night watchman. Holding back till the time when the old man was due in another part of the building, he entered the automatic lift and pressed the button. As he did so he heard a sound above,; on the office, floor, a sound which he knew well —the watchman’s tread. He had miscalculated the.times. But there was no turning back. “Good evening, sir,” said old Johnson, as he stepped from the lift. ‘‘To be sure, there might be something on the way you’re all coming hack tonight. If it’s work you’ve come to do, well, Mr. Boff hint bothering much about it.” > What did the man mean? Had .he been to the-Board room? Had his plans gone awry? He would have questioned the watchman, but checked himself. With doubt tugging at his mind, Paynter made for the Board room and opened the door softly.' Then he halted abruptly. Boff was at the table, w- cigar in hismouth, before him a sheet of pencilled figures. ’Something had gone wrong. Boff greeted him cheerfully. “Didn’t expect to see you here,” he said. “Well, the luncheon was a great success. You should have been there. But perhaps it was as well you weren’t or you might have got swelled head. Still, I might as well tell you, as you will hear it officially to-morrow. Both you and I are scheduled for a rise. And you, you lucky devil, are to take over the Paris branch. That’s what you get for supplying me with ideas.” Paynter "swallowed hard. # “That’s great,” he managed to say. “And—er, by the way, have you a pencil I could borrow? That one there will do.” And he moved quickly towards it. “Why, yes,” Boff said. “Take it.” And he swept the bitten pencil across the table to Paynter. “I shan’t use those things any more now. See here.” And be held up a slim, rolled-gold pencil case. “A little present from the directors, Paynter, for pushing that , hygiene idea. Old Gibbous pulled my leg no end when he gave it me. Said I ought to know better than to chew wooden pencils. Unhygienic, and all that, and the Board were determined to.put.a, stop to it . . . never knew what might happen some day if I didn’t break myself of the habit. Very thoughtful of them, wasn’t it, Paynter?” Paynter smiled grimly and pushed the pencil he held deeper down in his pocket. “Yes,” he replied slowly, “very thoughtful,"