Teams of Many Men
Nelson James Dunford
Whither is thy beloved gone, O thou
fairest among women?
Whither is thy beloved
turned aside? that we may seek him with thee. -- The
Song of Solomon 6:1
From my office window, I can see seven
insulated cables. One group of four has a couplet parallel to
the ground and a few inches apart, the other pair above and below
these on the plane centered between the first two, all passing
black against the sky. A little to the right of center within
the frame of my window there is a square of translucent insulating
material. It hangs with one corner to the ground, one to the
sky; the third and fourth point away from and towards the building.
Each of the four strands passes through a corner of the square which
keeps them from rubbing when wind blows them or when ice coats them.
The uppermost of the quartet is very fine, less than an inch in
diameter, while the other three are as stout as steel piping.
Several feet below the four, one
massive cable as big around as a clenched fist passes against a
backdrop of the tops of the trees that stand across the road. This
cable is positioned just at the tops of the trunks level of the
tallest trees so that I can see only sprays of twigs above it before
the sky starts. The big cable has more sag than the group of four.
The last two cables have the most sag
of all. They hang about a yard below the big one. The upper of the
two is as fine a strand as the one at the very top, while its partner
is the thickness of the other three in the sky. These bottom
-most lines are only two or three inches apart; every foot or
foot-and-a-half along their lengths an almost invisible wire connects
them as though the thicker one were suspended from the thinner one.
From my window, I can see neither of the utility poles between which
the cables are strung.
When I was a child, I had a book that
explained the principles of electricity. It was illustrated
with cartoons. Particles of electricity were represented by
stick figures whose bodies, arms, and legs were jagged like
lightening bolts and whose heads were shaped like light bulbs. These
critters ran back and forth inside the wires that were laid out on
the pages. The racers were feverishly busy. By looking long and
hard at the wires outside my window, I have learned to pierce the
black swaddling clothes of the lines that I may watch the little men
at work. I am glad that I have a lazy job and need not toil as
they do.
I am the purchasing officer for a
small machine-tool company. My secretary does most of my
paperwork for me. Gladys has been with me for fifteen
years. She knows the procedures of our company as well or
better than I do. I trust her implicitly to handle anything
that comes up when I am not available.
Gladys was an attractive youngster
when she came to me. I was younger then and had thoughts
about her; but ours was a business relationship, and I kept it
nothing more than that. Now that I am an old man and Gladys is
middle aged, I seldom muse inappropriately about her.
I work hardest when a salesman calls and I
must listen to his pitch. It takes a damn good presenter to
keep my mind from wandering. I try hard to understand what each
salesman has to offer; my company pays me to buy wisely.
A rep who keeps my mind off the electric men for half an hour has a
better chance of selling me than one who doesn’t. At least
that’s what I would have said until last week.
Wednesday last, Hammond Harvey dropped
by. He is marketing a new concept in filing. On his
visit, Hammond used my wires to sell me.
Gladys brought Hammond Harvey’s
card in to me at seventeen minutes after ten. (I make notes on
my desk calendar of the exact times salesmen arrive. If one
keeps my mind off the wires for his whole stay, the length of the
presentation is an excellent measure of his product’s
value). I told Gladys to show Hammond in.
Hammond Harvey has a permanent grin chiseled
into his face. He settled himself across the desk from me and got
down to brass tacks. He launched a thoroughly masterminded pitch
complete with fliers, booklets, and samples. He had hardly
spoken three words before he had me busily tightroping back and forth
along my wires. About quarter to eleven, he caught my ear anew.
“What’s that?” I asked.
“I was saying that it’s sometimes
hard for a businessman to grasp the implications of a radically new concept.”
"What about the wires?”
“I was saying that you get a
first inkling that’s not much thicker than the little wire up at
the top.”
“Or the one next to the
bottom?” I pursued the topic.
“You’re entirely right, sir.
As you think about my proposition, your understanding grows until
it’s pretty nearly as big around as the middle wires.”
“ Yes?”
“What I’m here for is to show you
all of the possibilities. I want you to have at your
fingertips as many of the factors involved in our system as there
must be strands of copper crammed into the biggest cable out there.”
Hammond Harvey talked some more, and I
listened . When he left, he had an order in his attache case.
Undoubtedly Hammond patted himself on the back for having used a
technique discussed at training conferences.
“Gentlemen,” the sales manager of Hammond Harvey’s
company had probably said more than once, “Pay close attention
to the prospect’s mood. If his mind seems to wander, pin
down what it is he is thinking about. If you ferret that out,
and use it, you will close the sale.”
Hammond Harvey was welcome to his
self-pride. He will never know that I bought from him not because he
showed interest in my wires, but because he gave me a new insight
into their meaning. He brought the runners into my office and
made them part of me. The creatures with jagged bodies and
bulbous heads now course through my blood vessels and my nerve
fibers. Their energy is mine and I am ready to scale cliffs I
once thought were insurmountable.
I called Gladys into my office.
“Those wires,” I said, “are like a man’s feeling
for a woman. At first, he has stirrings not much larger
around than the two babies. For years, I did not pay attention
to these stirrings. Now that Hammond Harvey has pointed them
out to me, I have begun a program to make them grow.
Already, I have swollen almost to the middle size. Gladys, if
you’ll only help me, I may soon equal the girth and solitary
strength of the big cable.”
She cast a puzzled look my way.
Rather than ruin a good start, I let her go to her desk to think
about the wires herself. The little men kept charging through
me and I kept growing. I hoped Gladys would understand before I
burst without her. She did not mention my speech again that
afternoon, but I hoped she would sleep with the idea I had planted
and become full of understanding.
That was what I had hoped when I went to
bed. My feelings for Gladys were at the smallest-wire
level. I strung my hopes across the city to Gladys’
house. As my wire stretched from pole to pole, I realized that
it was not thick enough to carry all the charged particles I meant to
send. I let it swell slowly as I continued to string.
When my hopes were attached to the pole just outside
Gladys’ house, and were about to leap the gap to her building, a
gust dropped the strand to the street. It lay across a
track, and a bell-dinging car hurtled towards it.
The sharp front edges of the trolley’s
forewheels had just sliced the insulation when I awoke. I
fetched a bandage to mend the break. It was then that I
realized that I had best wait Hammond Harvey’s next call to
learn more.
Monday the next week, I sent an urgent
summons to Hammond. He arrived promptly and said he hoped I was
satisfied with my purchase. “Certainly,
certainly,” I answered. “It’s about the
wires I called you.”
“About the wires?”
“You put me on the wrong track, Mr .
Harvey. I almost lost mine altogether. One big one hasn’t
the strength of smaller ones bound together.”
"I’m afraid I don’t understand.”
“I want to use both our wires, tied together.”
“What wires?”
“These wires,” I said, rising so
as to show him my own that was swollen to middle size. “Now
give me yours and I’ll fasten them together with this twine.”
Hammond Harvey backed away from me.
“Mr . Harvey!” I shouted.
“It’s Gladys we’re after. Modern science
has brought light and power to the darkest jungle, but it has taken
teams of many men to effect this penetration. You and I as a
team can bring love to Gladys.”
Hammond Harvey swung the door open and
rushed out. Before Gladys had a chance to peek in at me, I sat
down so that she could not see my intentions.
Hammond’s departure left things with
Gladys at a standstill. I hope, though, to persuade another to
join me. Looking out the window, I am reminded that four
together have the least sag. I had best look for three friends.
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