C4 antho - Chamber Four

American Subsidiary ~285~
“Nothing, no, you can return to your work. I was just
saying good morning. Good morning.” Herr Halsa nodded,
still rubbing his hair with his head aslant, and closed the office
door. He preferred to give orders in his own good time,
when he’d chanced across things that needed doing, and in
the meantime he expected his employees to stay busy on
their own.
Joseph returned to what he’d been doing. He was typing
up another proposal for robots that would replace human
workers in an engine factory.
No one else in the building, only Joseph Stone, could say
that his cubicle opened on to the boss’s door. The other cubicles,
their short walls paneled in grey carpeting, were strung
together to form two separate mazes, each of which closed in
on itself and had a single entrance at the printers and copy
machine, not far from the kitchen door. Herr Halsa’s office
took up the corner diagonally opposite.
To the gear-hobbing maze belonged seasoned American
salesmen who were unable to sell machines, though not for
want of escorting potential buyers to golf courses and strip
clubs. For whatever reason, probably some sort of native laxness,
the Americans were unsuccessful―and with them one
German who was so good at selling gantries that he’d been
transferred to raise the Amerikaner out of their slump, and
had instead fallen into one himself. To the gantry maze belonged
newcomers who had not sold anything before their
arrival from Germany. They were young and hungry and
German and knew how to browbeat their former colleagues
at the Automationsfabrik to give them extremely large discounts.
Why shouldn’t the parent division sell its robots at a
loss if it meant gaining a toehold in the prestigious American
car market? These good Kerle had rubbed elbows in company
showers with the very men they now called on for favors.
The Americans in gear hobbing had visited Germany