He hung up. "All right; let's get on with it," he said. "Ben, you get
them into the lunch room; there are enough tables and benches in there
for everybody to take the written test in two relays."
"The union's gotta be represented while these tests is going on," the
union steward announced. "Mr. Crandall says I'm to stay here an' watch
what you do to these guys."
"This man working for us?" Melroy asked Puryear.
"Yes. Koffler, Julius. Electrical fitter; Joe Ricci's gang."
"All right. See to it that he gets placed in the first relay for the
written test, and gets first turn for the orals. That way he can spend
the rest of his time on duty here for the union, and will know in
advance what the test is like." He turned to Koffler. "But understand
this. You keep your mouth out of it. If you see anything that looks
objectionable, make a note of it, but don't try to interfere."
The written tests, done on printed forms, required about twenty minutes.
Melroy watched the process of oral testing and personal interviewing for
a while, then picked up a big flashlight and dropped it into his
overcoat pocket, preparatory to going out to inspect some equipment that
had been assembled outside the reactor area and brought in. As he went
out, Koffler was straddling a chair, glowering at Doris Rives and making
occasional ostentatious notes on a pad.
* * * * *
For about an hour, he poked around the newly assembled apparatus,
checking the wiring, and peering into it. When he returned to the
temporary office, the oral testing was still going on; Koffler was still
on duty as watcher for the union, but the sport had evidently palled on
him, for he was now studying a comic book.
Melroy left the reactor area and returned to the office in the converted
area. During the midafternoon, somebody named Leighton called him from
the Atomic Power Authority executive office, wanting to know what was
the trouble between him and the I.F.A.W. and saying that a protest
against his alleged high-handed and arbitrary conduct had been received
from the union.
Melroy explained, at length. He finished: "You people have twenty Stuart
tanks, and a couple of thousand soldiers and cops and undercover-men,
here, guarding against sabotage. Don't you realize that a workman who
makes stupid or careless or impulsive mistakes is just as dangerous to
the plant as any saboteur? If somebody shoots you through the head, it
doesn't matter whether he planned to murder you for a year or just
didn't know the gun was loaded; you're as dead one way as the other. I
should think you'd thank me for trying to eliminate a serious source of
danger."
"Now, don't misunderstand my position, Mr. Melroy," the other man
hastened to say. "I sympathize with your attitude, entirely. But these
people are going to make trouble."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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