Wheels Read Free Page B

weight off your feet, then simmer down .”
    They faced each other across the desk. "I'm willing to hear your version of what happened," the assistant plant chief said, "but don't waste time because the way this reads" he fingered the red-tabbed grievance report you've cooked us all a hot potato .”
    "The hell I cooked it !”
    Parkland glared at his superior; above the bruise his face flushed red. "I fired a guy because he slugged me. What's more, I'm gonna make it stick, and if you've got any guts or justice you'd better back me up .”
    Matt Zaleski raised his voice to the bull roar he had learned on a factory floor. "Knock off that goddam nonsense, right now .”
    He had no intention of letting this get out of hand. More reasonably, he growled, "I said simmer down, and meant it. When the time comes I'll decide who to back and why. And there'll be no more crap from you about guts and justice. Understand .”
    Their eyes locked together. Par kland's dropped first. " All right, Frank," Matt said. "Let's start over, and this time give it to me straight, from the beginning .”
    He had known Frank Parkland a long time. The foreman's record was good and he was usually fair with men who worked under him. It had taken something exceptional to get him as riled as this. "There was a job out of position," Parkland said. "It was steering column bolts, and there was this kid doing it; he's new, I guess. He was crowding the next guy. I wanted the job put back .”
    Zaleski nodded. It happened often enough. A worker with a specific assignment took a few seconds longer than he should on each operation. As successive cars moved by on the assembly line, his position gradually changed, so that soon he was intruding on the area of the next operation. When a foreman saw it happen he made it his business to help the worker back to his correct, original place. Zaleski said impatiently, "Get on with it .”
    Before they could continue, the office door opened again and the union committeeman came in. He was a small, pink-faced man, with thick lensed glasses and a fussy manner. His name was Illas and, until a union election a few months ago, had been an assembly line worker himself. "Good morn ing," the union man said to Za leski He nodded curtly to Parkland, without speaking. Matt Zaleski waved the newcomer to a chair. "We're just getting to the meat .”
    "You could save a lot of time," Illas said, "if you read the grievance report .”
    "I've read it. But sometimes I like to hear the other side " Zaleski motioned Parkland to go on. "All I did," the foreman said, "was call another guy over and say, 'Help me get this man's job back in position.'" "And I say you're a liar! " The union man hunched forward accusingly; now he swung toward Zaleski. 'What he really said was 'get this boy's job back.' And it so happened that the person he was speaking of, and calling 'boy,' was one of our black brothers to whom that word is a very offensive term .”
    "Oh! for God's sake ! " Parkland's voice combined anger with disgust. "D ’ you think I don't know that? D'you think I haven't been around here long enough to know better than to use that word that way? "But you did use it, didn't you .”
    "Maybe, just maybe, I did. I'm not saying yes, because I don't remember, and that's the truth. But if it happened, there was nothing meant. It was a slip, that's all .”
    The union man shrugged. 'That's your story now .”
    .It 's no story, you son-of-a-bitch! " Illas stood up. "Mr. Zaleski, I'm here officially, representing the United Auto Workers. If that's the kind of language . . .”
    'There'll be no more of it," the assistant plant manager said. "Sit down, please, and while we're on the subject, I suggest you be less free yourself with the word 'har.' Parkland slammed a beefy fist in frustration on the desk top. "I said it was no story, and it isn't. What's more, the guy I was talking about didn't even give a thought to what I said, at least before all the fuss