"That's all."
"The lunch-box, then, will be slightly special?"
"More or less, although it will look ordinary enough. Now as to the cover-up. How would 'Director of Research' sound?"
"I don't know. Depends on what the researchers are doing. Before I became an engineer I was a pure scientist of sorts; but that was quite a while ago and I was never a specialist."
"That is one reason why I think you will do. We have plenty of specialists—too many, I often think. They dash off in all directions, without rhyme or reason. What we want is a man with enough scientific training to know in general what is going on, but what he will need mostly is hard common sense, and enough ability—mental force, you might call it—to hold the specialists down to earth and make them pull together. If you can do it—and if I didn't think you could I wouldn't be talking to you—the whole force will know that you are earning your pay; just as we could not hide the fact that your two predecessors weren't."
"Put that way it sounds good. I wouldn't wonder if I could handle it."
The conversation went on, but the rest of it is of little importance here. The plane landed. Isaacson introduced the new Director of Research to Works Manager Rand, who in turn introduced him to a few of his scientists and to the svelte and spectacular red-head who was to be his private secretary.
It was clear from the first that the Research Department was not going to be an easy one to manage. The top men were defiant, the middle ranks were sullen, the smaller fry were apprehensive as well as sullen. The secretary flaunted chips on both shapely shoulders. Men and women alike expected the application of the old wheeze "a new broom sweeps clean" for the third time in scarcely twice that many months, and they were defying him to do his worst. Wherefore they were very much surprised when the new boss did nothing whatever for two solid weeks except read reports and get acquainted with his department.
"How d'ya like your new boss, May?" another secretary asked, during a break.
"Oh, not too bad ... I guess." May's tone was full of reservations. "He's quiet—sort of reserved—no passes or anything like that—it'd be funny if I finally got a boss that had something on the ball, wouldn't it? But you know what, Molly?" The red-head giggled suddenly. "I had a camera-fiend first, you know, with a million credits' worth of stereo-cams and such stuff, and then a golf-nut. I wonder what this Dr. Olmstead does with his spare cash?"