From that day Bonbright tried to work himself into forgetfulness. Work was the only object and refuge of his life, and he gave himself to it wholly. It was interesting work, and it kept him from too much thinking about himself…. If a man has ability and applies himself as Bonbright did, he will attract notice. In spite of his identity Bonbright did attract notice from his immediate superiors. It was more difficult for him, being who he was, to win commendation than it would have been for an unmarked young man in the organization. That was because even the fairest-minded man is afraid he will be tempted into showing favoritism—and so withholds justice…. But he forced it from his laborers—not caring in the least if he had it or not. And word of his progress mounted to Malcolm Lightener.
His craving for occupation was not satisfied with eight hours a day spent in the purchasing department. It was his evenings that he feared, so he filled them with study—study of the manufacture of the automobile. Also he studied men. Every noon saw him in the little hash house; every evening, when he could arrange it so, saw him with some interested employee, boss, department boss, or somebody connected with Malcolm Lightener's huge plant, pumping them for information and cataloguing and storing it away in his mind. He tried to crowd Ruth out of his mind by filling it so full of automobile there would be no room for her…. But she hid in unexpected crannies, and stepped forth to confront him disconcertingly.
Gradually the laboring men changed their attitude toward him and tolerated him. Some of them even liked him. He listened to their talk, and tried to digest it. Much he saw to call for his sympathy, much that they considered vital he could not agree with; he could not, even in a majority of things, adapt his point of view to theirs. For he was developing a point of view.
On that evening when he had gone down to see what a mob was like he had no point of view, only curiosity. He had leaned neither toward his father's striking employees nor against them…. His attitude was much the same now—with a better understanding of the problems involved. He was not an ultracapitalist, like his father, nor a radical like Dulac…. One thing he believed, and that was in the possibility of capital and labor being brought to see through the same eyes. He believed the strife between them, which had waged from time immemorial, was not necessary, and could be eliminated…. But as yet he had no cure for the trouble.
He did not lean to socialism. He was farther away from that theory than he was from his father's beliefs. He belonged by training and by inheritance to the group of employers of labor and utilizers of capital…. Against radicalism he had a bitter grievance. Radicalism had given him his wife—for reasons which he heard expressed by laboring men every day. He had no patience with fanaticism; on the other hand, he had little patience with bigotry and intolerance. His contact with the other side was bringing no danger of his conversion. … But he was doing what he never could have done as heir apparent to the Foote dynasty—he was asserting in thought his individuality and forming individual opinions…. His education was being effectively rounded out.
News of the wrecking of Bonbright's domestic craft came to his father quickly, carried, as might have been anticipated, by Hangar.
"Your son is not living with his wife, Mr. Foote," Rangar announced.
"Indeed!" said Mr. Foote, concealing both surprise and gratification under his habitual mask of suave dignity. "That, I fear, was to have been anticipated…. Have you the particulars?"
"Only that she is living in their apartment, and he is boarding with one of the men in his department at Lightener's."
"Keep your eye on him, Rangar—keep your eye on him. And report."