“I—I'm afraid I am, sir.”
“Keep on being it. Listen to me. You will spend next month in the shop.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Looking!”
“Yes, sir.”
“At the machinists and the engineers and the electricians and the mechanics and the foundry-men and the laborers and the painters—at everybody. You will look at them. But what I want you to see is men.”
“Human beings?”
Thompson nodded. Then he said: “Four weeks. Do you know Milton?”
Tommy tried to recall.
Thompson added: “John—poet.”