“No,” he said, raising his hand in solemn affirmation, “as the Lord God liveth, while I stay he stays.”
“Come in,” he said, in answer to a timid tap at the office door. Mr. Wickes laid a file before him. It needed only a rapid survey of the sheets to give him the whole story. Incompetence and worse, sheer carelessness looked up at him from every sheet. The planing mill was in a state of chaotic disorganization.
“What does this mean, Mr. Wickes?” he burst forth, putting his finger upon an item that cried out mismanagement and blundering. “Here is an order that takes a month to clear which should be done within ten days at the longest.”
Wickes stood silent, overwhelmed in dismayed self-condemnation.
“It seems difficult somehow to get orders through, sir, these days,” he said after a pause.
“Difficult? What is the difficulty? The men are there, the machines are there, the material is in the yard. Why the delay? And look at this. Here is a lot of material gone to the scrap heap, the finest spruce ever grown in Canada too. What does this mean, Wickes?” he seemed to welcome the opportunity of finding a scapegoat for economic crimes, for which he could find no pardon.
Sheet after sheet passed in swift review under his eye. Suddenly he flung himself back in his chair.
“Wickes, this is simply damnable!”
“Yes, sir,” said Wickes, his face pale and his fingers trembling. “I don't—I don't seem to be able to—to—get things through.”
“Get things through? I should say not,” shouted Maitland, glaring at him.