"Then you'll lend us the ten thousand?" asked a hopeful voice.
"I will not," said Armstrong. "Rather, I cannot."
"What do you mean, then?"
Armstrong stood silent a moment. This brief silence emphasized his dominance; every man there was listening intently for his proposal. When it came, it held an unspeakable bitterness.
"Gentlemen, we meet downstairs upon a social plane, but here I speak to you as a business man, without the least personal animas. I'll not lend this money for the same reason that no bank will lend it, for the same reason that you'll not lend it to yourselves. Your credit is totally exhausted. The loan would result in nothing.
"For the past year or more," he went on inexorably, "your company has gone from bad to worse. It has been made a dumping ground for wholly inefficient relatives and friends. Your sales department is a joke. Your purchasing department is topheavy with poor judgment and rotten with graft. Your advertising department is a byword in the trade for doing the wrong thing at the wrong time. Above all, your management is so absolutely hopeless that the entire organization is affected. I might better say, infected."
Some of the faces about the table flushed at these words; some turned pale. Deming did not move, until Armstrong uttered his final sentence. Then a slight quiver shook the man's shoulders. This was a confession, an admission, a realization. Ruin opens the eyes that prosperity has blinded.
Slosson, who was assistant general manager, leaped to his feet in a blaze of anger.
"You lie, when you say we've dumped worthless men—"
"Let me prove it," cut in the inflexible voice of Armstrong. "Two months ago, Mr. Slosson, you put two of your relatives at the head of the rolled oats department. One of those men was an accountant to whom no bonding house would furnish bond. The other had been a railroad clerk until you gave him a position of authority. Will you kindly sit down and let me finish, or do you wish further evidence?"