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"The Room-Ch12-Few Crystals" by johannalipfordiolit

A scene from The Room, care being taken to repeat descriptions given in other chapters and to ensure that the new words (unit, TO) are understood by the reader of just this chapter.

Category: Book Chapter

Tags: "Few Crystals" is a stand-alone chapter from the Room (i.e. a short story). If you do not feel that it stands alone, please tell me, and why. To understand it fully, you could read Ch1 or Ch2 Tags: Ch1-Room: New Beginning, Ch2-Room: Thoughts in the Mind After A Killing, Ch3-Room: Just Like Forbes, Ch4-Room: Last Day In Rome, Ch5-Room: Shagfly

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FEW CRYSTALS, MUCH MATRIX



The member of the Tribunal at the moment interrogating Count Wilhelm Von Gunden was its junior member Mr. James Shagfly, acting Room manager and American company rep, a tall broad-shouldered man with an abrasive voice. The second member of the Tribunal was Jack (“Smilin’ Jack” to his friends) Watson, vice president for European sales. But none had seen Mr. Watson smile. He frowned, and when he frowned everyone trembled. Mr. Watson was a big man, well over six feet, with a great head of silver-white hair and a florid face and a stentorian voice, and his presence was indisputable. Everyone feared him, including Mr. Shagfly, with one exception: the third member of the Tribunal, the six-foot-five Mr. Harold Ames, who terrified Mr. Watson. And Mr. Ames was terrified by nobody, except the wiry five-foot-six Mr. Nathan Greenstein himself. When Mr. Greenstein frowned, Mr. Ames had stomach pains. But the Company’s founder was across the Atlantic in Miami Florida and so Mr. Ames was unballasted, he had no limits, he filled the Room – and he almost filled it physically as well: he weighed easily three hundred fifty pounds. The earth jarred when he walked, he jarred the ground with each step, and when the ground jarred everyone around him sympathetically quaked. Right now he was simply mountainously sitting between Watson and Shagfly at a long table on top the platform in the front of the Room, gazing with two unblinking flat level dead colourless eyes at Von Gunden.

“…awright Von Gunden,” Mr. Shagfly was attacking, “why didn’t you close that unit? That was the best unit in the Room! It was a college professor and his wife – so they could afford the deal! They’re from Washington DC – not far from Florida, so they could get there! His survey sheet says he’s been thinking about buying land – so he had the desire! When Mr. Watson gave the pitch he says he noticed that unit looking right at him and nodding – so he was interested! So we have a unit that could afford to buy, that could see the land, that wanted to buy land, and that was interested! And you couldn’t close him!”— this with pitying scorn. Then like a whiplash “Why not?”

The Prussian elegantly lounged in his chair, one arm resting on the cloth covering the round dinner table where he had hosted his unit. “Well…he was a college professor…” Von Gunden had an unhappy inspiration to be facetious: “Perhaps he was too smart!” Smiling, he looked round to his fellow salesmen seated at their tables. No one smiled back.

Ames spoke. His voice was as flat and as level and as dead and as colourless as his eyes. “Do you mean to imply, Mr. Von Gunden, do I understand you correctly as saying, sir, that ‘smart’ people don’t buy land from the International Holding and Land Company? Are you implying that you do not believe in the deal you are offering?”

Von Gunden glanced at him and straightened in his chair. “Why no, no sir, I did not mean to imply that. I was only making a small—“

“Any man who does not believe in the deal can’t close. And if a man cannot close, he doesn’t belong in this Room,” Ames pursued, crushing Von Gunden under his flat stare. “Do you wish to be a member of this Room, Mr. Von Gunden?”

“Yes. Yes sir. I did not mean—“

“What is your closing average?”

Von Gunden looked unhappy. His turned-up moustaches drooped. “Well, I have not calculated it, I do not really—“

“This week its way up, Mr. Ames,” Shagfly happily volunteered. “It’s six percent.”

Ames accepted this information. It seemed to soak into him through his pores. “Six percent. Yes. You close one out of every seventeen units you meet. Yes. Mr. Von Gunden, do you know that at the site, in Port Sueños, any man who does not close twenty percent is terminated? Sir, do you know that at any Room in the United States a man is terminated if he closes less than twelve percent? Do you think you could last one day as a closer, in the United States?”

“No,” Von Gunden said hastily. “Oh no sir. No I am sure—“

“Mr. Von Gunden, you could not even qualify as a unit, in the United States,” Ames finished, with withering sarcasm.

“Now,” Shagfly pursued. “Why didn’t you close this unit, Von Gunden…?”

The other member of the Tribunal sat lending his weight to the Tribunal by glaring fiercely at Von Gunden. But he took little part in the actual harassment. Mr. Watson saved himself for perorations, for sermons. His mission in life was to inspirit men, to lift them above themselves to the unearthly plane of the pure Deal, which he in moments of mystic frenzy was one with. When Mr. Watson had a vision of the Deal, he briefly descended to earth to reveal it to ordinary closers. For revelations he was admirably equipped. Besides his physical presence he had a full rich voice, deep bass, which he used as expertly as a concert violinist his instrument. Passion he had, did Mr. Watson, and he believed, believed with every fibre of his soul that the Company had a mission. Mr. Watson often declared that he would not rest content until every one of the two hundred fifty millions of Americans owned land with the International Holding and Land Company. Mr. Watson’s other nickname was “the preacher”.

Yesterday Mr. Watson had had a vision, and after the dinner party, standing on the pitch platform in front of the film screen, he had revealed it to the assembled closers. As text for his sermon he had chosen the Company training manual section 2.1, which begins “Thou shalt not pre-judge…”

“Men,” Mr. Watson had begun, his vibrating bass throbbing with emotion, forefinger up, pointing to heaven, “Men, somewhere out in the streets of Rome, right now, right this instant!, walking around touring the city, is your unit, the unit you will have tomorrow morning for breakfast here in this Room at the Hilton. Men, that unit doesn’t know you, yet. Men, that unit may not know about our city, Port Sueños, nor of the Company’s existence…” Mr. Watson paused. “Men, when that unit enters this Room, he may not even want to buy a piece of land.” Gathering his forces he bellowed “But men, He SHOULD BUY! He CAN BUY! He WILL BUY! It all depends on YOU…!”

The Room shuffled and murmured. Most of the closers were convinced Calvinists: the units had been predestined through all eternity whether they would buy when they entered the Room. Most of the closers felt that, finally, they could only elicit a sale, not create one. Many were called, but few were chosen, and those chosen had always been so. The Room muttered, angry with Watson for snatching at their faith that, whatever they did, it was already written whether they would close. The Room sat, sullenly hating the preacher.

“…Men, have you ever thought of the terrible waste involved, in a Room? The terrible, terrible waste? Even the Company’s best Room, the Las Vegas Room, has a yearly closing average of only thirty percent. Do you understand? in Las Vegas, seventy out of every hundred units fed a meal and given a tour are wasted! They will probably pass through a Room only once, one single time, and that one time when they had the opportunity, they did not take it.” Mr. Watson paused, to let the Room pity the units who had lived all their lives in vain. “Why have those units been wasted, men? NOT!” -- the forefinger poked higher – “Not as some of you may believe, because they inherently could not be closed. No! But because their closers failed them! Yes men, the closer has failed, every time he has not closed a unit. In this Company we have no – I repeat: NO successful Rooms. We have only varying degrees of failure! Men, I have been talking about the Las Vegas Room. Now when we come to Italy, to the Rome Room, men…” He paused. Shagfly smiled. Even Ames’ lips twitched on his broad dead flat smooth moon face. “…when we come to this Room, why, what do we find? We find a Room, men, that has wasted, month in, month out, ninety-two out of every hundred units that have passed through it! That is criminal waste, men! It is inexcusable waste!”

Mr. Watson sat down. Mr. Shagfly jumped up. “Awright men, let’s give Mr. Watson a big hand!”

The Room had sullenly clapped, cursing Watson for forcing on it free will.

During Von Gunden’s quizzing a member of the Room, Charles Driscoll, a struggling architect who worked for the Room summers to eke out his uncertain income, sat loathing Watson, because Watson’s sermon on waste yesterday had set going a train of thought in his mind. It seemed to him that Watson, in his ascent to the plane of the Deal, had truly seized there an insight, even if wrongly interpreted.

While Watson prophesied Charles too had grasped the vision he had seen, the vision of Waste as essential to the machinery of the universe. A heat engine of any kind had to waste most of its fuel to operate – it was a physical “law”, the law of entropy. The sun poured forth its energy into all space, only a tiny fraction of it of use to the earth. The doctrine of evolution envisaged waste to colossal scale, waste of whole species that, tested, had been found wanting…for a moment Charles had seen too that every thing man had gained, the most trivial and the most worthwhile, had been won only at cost of enormous waste. Wars were fought with terrible waste of human life so that a few men might learn self-discipline and courage. Artists spent years of their lives so that a few could give to the world cathedrals, sculptures, paintings, novels, symphonies – but for every artist who succeeded in giving, a thousand, ten thousand had tried and failed. And this waste of their lives was required, so that the few might have squeezed from them their very best. Most men wasted their lives in humdrum tasks that a few might have leisure to think, to explore the universe, to create, to build… How many had starved to death, that Saint Peter’s might be built? People wasted money, time, to purchase a very few things that they truly wanted, to have a few moments of happiness in a lifetime of boredom and suffering.

And finally – and it was this that Charles loathed Watson for having made him think – perhaps most of the human race was condemned to be wasted, perhaps most of us lived otherwise wasted lives, only to provide the matrix of life necessary so that a few, the chosen, the Saved, would in their clashes with life eventually crystallize out as men and women who found the Absolute. Perhaps it had all been set going just to winnow out a half-dozen, or a half-hundred, or a half-thousand persons who could develop to the point that they finally became one with absolute reality. And all the others were wasted, matrix. Charles could not bear thinking this because he grimly feared he might be only part of the matrix, that he was living his life only because, in some way, he would enable someone else to eventually find the Absolute by reacting against him. He might be only a tool, to be used once then mercilessly discarded. Though Charles had often had intuitions of the Absolute, he had never once had an intuition of its goodness – not any goodness, at any rate, that a human being could understand. Charles dismissed the rest of Watson’s vision: “…it all depends on YOU!”

Another member of the Room, Ray Smith, angry too, watched Von Gunden squirm. He hated, each day more, what he saw happening in the Room. Not that the men didn’t deserve their harassment: Von Gunden, for example, had been flippant when he should have tried harder to close, he had taken for granted that the Room owed him a living, and now the Room, materialized as the Tribunal, was meting out its punishment. But that Von Gunden was getting what he deserved did not make Ray feel better about it. If we all got our just desserts who would escape hanging? There were no innocent bystanders. Ray knew it was true about himself, and he believed it true for every man. Every man who had ever done anything anyway, and those who had not done anything were guilty of the mortal sin of Accidia. If there were any. The old Dutchman Van Leyden, for example, who seemed as harmless and vain in his womanizing as a man could be, had once confided to Ray that he had been a guard at Auschwitz.

It was the fear the Tribunal evoked, that Ray hated. It sometimes infected him until he grew aware of its presence and threw it off, by looking to see it, and then to feel it until it dissipated. He had known real fear once, and had been vaccinated against it, the murder he had committed in Louisiana had set the antibodies swarming in his blood. But Ray still sensed the fear in the Room, and he detested it. Because fear corroded men’s souls, more so than any other single emotion. Ray loved the Room. And he saw that the fear saturating it might destroy the Room he knew.

There was no objective reason to fear the Tribunal: few of the closers truly feared losing their jobs – rascals and adventurers that most of them were, they were men who had proven to themselves a hundred times their ability to survive. So their fear sprang ultimately from the source at the top. Ray visualized the prime jet of fear, springing perhaps from childhood memories of a slum or a ghetto, shooting up and falling down into catch-basin after catch-basin, until it finally flooded the Room, filling it too. Fear was inexhaustible and self-generating in a chain reaction, it had no limits and no bottom, there was always more of it. There were only two emotions that drove men totally, that made them summon all their energies and bend them to a single purpose, that gave them authority over other men, that made them impressive, powerful, and one was fear. The other was its true opposite: love.

“…awright Von Gunden,” Shagfly finished, “you better get on the ball, got me? You know what you’re doing wrong – so correct it!”

“Yes, sir.” Von Gunden, unsmiling, grey-faced, flopped back into his chair, looking neither left nor right.

“Who had the doctor?” Ames casually asked Shagfly. The Room held its breath, knowing very well that Ames knew who had had the doctor. And the Room felt that a death sentence had been passed on that closer.

“Let’s see…” Shagfly made a great pretence of consulting the list. “Awright, it was Aldo Tagliaferro. Awright, Tagliaferro?”

The Room murmured. The former Room manager snapped erect. His hands were in his lap, wringing one another. “Yes sir?” he said humbly, voice a near whisper. His face was yellowish, he was already sweating.

“What happened, Tagliaferro? – that was the best unit in the Room!”

Ray watched Tagliaferro explain, abase himself, and was sickened. If the other closers had been humbled, Tagliaferro had been crushed. When the Tribunal left, the others would regain their insolence – their insolence was like rabbits who cower in their holes when the weasel is nigh, but when he is gone poke quivering noses out to sniff the air, then come hopping jubilantly up to munch again their stolen carrots. But Tagliaferro would not regain what he had lost. He had been subjected to a cruel and persistent attack and he had shivered, then crumbled. There was little left now of Tagliaferro but pieces of a man.

No one had grasped what the Tribunal was about, at first. After each party it had selected two or three men to harass, and only gradually did the Room realize that almost always among those few there was Tagliaferro. For the past two days he was always one of the chosen. Ray had watched the Tribunal – deliberately, he was now sure – destroy him. Clearly, they wanted him gone. But dismissing him was almost out of the question: he was Italian. Therefore, he had to resign. Ray had done nothing about it because he had not known what to do. Had Tagliaferro fought Ray would have found ways to help him, but Tagliaferro did not fight. It was as if he acquiesced in his own destruction, as if he wished to be destroyed because he believed he ought to be. He was the only man in the Room who had gone two weeks without closing a single unit, and this for a closer, Ray knew, was the equivalent of having gone to bed with forty-two different women and been impotent every time.

“…do I understand you to say, then, Mr. Tagliaferro…” – Ames had a trick of “understanding what you said” so that your own words sounded in your ears like the most damning evidence against you – “…that you couldn’t close this doctor because he lives in California and couldn’t make a trip to see the property in Florida?” Tagliaferro miserably half-nodded. “Are you aware, sir, that fully one-third of the property owners in Port Sueños are Californians?”

“Ecco— Well— I— He— It wasn’t— I couldn’t— It—“

“Cut the excuses, Tagliaferro! You just couldn’t close ‘im, isn’t that right?” Shagfly. “In fact, you can’t close anybody, isn’t that right Tagliaferro?”

“I have closed—I’ve closed… I— It just— This past two— I don’t know…”

“Why didn’t you call a Take-Over, Mr. Tagliaferro, when you saw you were incapable of closing him?”

“I did—I did call one. Yes sir. I called one. I called a TO.”

“Yeah, you called one! I clocked you: you called Khan as TO forty-five minutes after the pitch ended! When the unit was dead, Tagliaferro!”

“Aren’t you aware yet, Mr. Tagliaferro, that the Room rule is that the closer call a Take-Over within fifteen minutes of the end of the pitch, if he fails to close?”

“Well— I— In my judgement—“

“In your judgement? In your judgement, sir! You have not closed a single unit, Mr. Tagliaferro, since you’ve started working again as closer! What do you think that leads us to believe about your judgement? Will you set your judgement above that of the men who have written the Company manual? Do you imagine your judgement to be better than theirs, Mr. Tagliaferro?”

“No! No, sir, no, no, sir, I didn’t mean to imply that! I only meant to say that my unit wasn’t impressed by the pitch, and I felt I had—“

“Oh? Did I hear you correctly, Mr. Tagliaferro? Do I understand you as saying that you think you failed to close the unit because the pitch was bad? Are you going to tell Mr. Watson that his pitch was not good enough?”

“Oh no! No, I didn’t mean—“

“Men, while I was giving the pitch,” Watson now grandly interjected, “I was watching that unit! It was the most interested unit in the entire Room! The man was nodding his head, he was eating right out of my hand, men! When I stepped down from the platform I said to myself ‘Well, here’s a deal Tagliaferro just can’t fail to close!’”

“Yet you couldn’t close ‘im, Tagliaferro!”

Tagliaferro hung his head. He stared down into his lap, meeting nobody’s eyes. Charles turned and looked to Ray. Ray usually returned a wink or a smile when someone looked to him, but now he only frowned. He and Charles averted their eyes. Ray was ashamed of himself, and he knew that Charles was too. He felt his own shame sharpened, by its mirroring in Charles.

“Mr. Tagliaferro, when you were managing this Room what did you think of a closer who went two entire weeks without closing even once?”

Tagliaferro was silent.

“I say, what did you think of him, Mr. Tagliaferro?”

“I—I have closed. My first year—“

“What did you THINK! sir?” Ames thundered.

“I thought he was no good.” This almost whispered.

“And what did you do?”

“I—I let him go.”

“What do you think we ought to do, then Mr. Tagliaferro, with any man in this Room who has gone two entire weeks without closing?”

Tagliaferro looked up from his lap to Ames, he looked desperately round, then back down at his wrung hands. “Fire me.” His voice was so low that only closers seated next him heard it.

“What? What’s that, Mr. Tagliaferro? I didn’t hear you, sir. What did you say we ought to do, that we have a right to do, that we have a duty to this Room to do?”

Something moved inside Ray. He suddenly decided that he could take no further part in this. He stood up from his chair and walked toward the door. He had almost reached it before the Tribunal recovered its wits and reacted.

“Mr. Smith!”

Ray turned. “Yes, Mr. Ames?” he said pleasantly.

“Where do you think you are going, sir? No one has been dismissed here.”

“I’m leaving sir. I can’t stop what you’re doing, but....” Ray moved to the door and put a hand on the knob.

“Mr. Smith, if you walk out that door, you need not come back. Not ever.”

“I know sir,” Ray said quietly. Opening the door he walked out, and shut it behind him.

The Room sat sunken in its shame. A murmur ran over it and the Tribunal was suddenly aware that a mutiny was in the making. They were all thinking fast, and Shagfly was seized by inspiration.

“Awright, if there’s anybody here who thinks we’ve been too tough on Tagliaferro, let ‘im stand up and tell us about it!” It was a gamble, Shagfly knew, but coupling with protest the physical act of raising oneself from a chair and the consequent possibility of finding oneself the only one standing before the others, would make protest more difficult. And if the moment passed then the Room was his, totally, wholly. That it not yet was, was why the former manager had to go.

Charles, feeling his shame burn inside him, looked at the closed door Ray had just left by. Ray was the only one of them with any guts, Charles thought. He wanted to follow Ray, but could not quite bring himself to leave the Room. He sat in a daze, hating himself, and then heard Shagfly say “…let ‘im stand up and tell us about it!”

Charles did not bother to look around. He stood up, sure that all around him men inspired by Ray’s example were standing up too, standing up to show the Tribunal that it had gone too far. They could bully Tagliaferro, but they couldn’t fire Ray and get away with it! Charles was sure of that. The Room simply wouldn’t stand for it! He stood up, feeling on every side of him the solidarity of the Room standing with him, standing up against the Tribunal.

Charles now looked around. He was the only one on his feet. He glanced to Van Leyden, to Von Gunden. They averted their eyes. Lockett was looking into his lap. Al-Jabr was staring off into space to one side. Stavrilov sat slack in his chair hands in pockets, looking straight ahead…

The Tribunal let him stand alone a moment. Charles understood that if he sat down he would be forgiven and the matter would not be mentioned. But once having stood up, he would rather have died than sit down. He stood, cursing himself for a fool, wishing that his act could somehow be nullified, erased from everyone’s memory. But it could not be. So he stood propped up by honour, which is codified fear.

“Do I understand, then, by your action, Mr. Driscoll, that you are questioning our disciplinary authority over the Room?” Ames purred. “Do you believe like Mr. Tagliaferro that your judgement is better than ours, how best to run this Room?”

Charles shrugged. No answer was needed.

“All right, Mr. Driscoll, you may leave. We have no place in this Room for any closer who can not submit to the authority of his superiors, who is not ready and willing to be corrected when he makes mistakes. You can pick up your pay Friday, at the office downtown.”

Charles looked helplessly around, then turned and unseeing threaded his way between the tables. His friends withdrew their sprawled legs to make way for him, to speed from the Room the last reminder of its shame. He walked rapidly, blindly, to the door and opened it. He left without closing it, and behind him he heard Ames say “Mr. Palermo, will you please shut the door?”

The Tribunal set about consolidating its gains and cutting its losses. But a gesture of magnanimity was inevitable. Ames said calmly, as if nothing had happened, “Now Mr. Tagliaferro, you agree that we not only have the right, but the duty to terminate you, is that correct?”

Tagliaferro nodded miserably.

“Yes. Now, Mr. Shagfly…” Shagfly was instantly attentive. “…as you know, I never interfere in the way a manager runs a Room. I consider myself here strictly in advisory capacity, since only the manager understands all the variables involved, the delicate balance, I might say, that governs a Room. Therefore, Mr. Shagfly, I wish to ask you: notwithstanding the fact that Mr. Tagliaferro has not produced for two weeks, I wonder, since he has been associated with the Company for more than three years, and was once manager of this Room, if he may not deserve a second chance? I leave this decision strictly up to you, Mr. Shagfly. What do you think?”

Shagfly looked unhappy, but he immediately swallowed the toad. In his opinion he thought that Mr. Tagliaferro might have some of the qualifications and capacities of a closer, and that he should be given a little more time.

Speaking in his strictly advisory capacity Ames noted that Shagfly had made a very wise decision. Glancing meaningly to Watson and Shagfly he continued: “Now gentlemen, I have nothing further to say, and I propose that this meeting be adjourned for the evening.”

Watson nodded. “I have one thing to say, sir,” Shagfly said.

Ames looked at his watch. “Then say it, Mr. Shagfly – but please keep your remarks brief. I think the men are getting tired.”

The Room muttered to itself, it being unclear whether with tiredness or with surprise at Ames’ unwonted solicitousness.

Shagfly addressed the Room. “Awright. I just want to make one point, and then you can all go. There isn’t anybody who’s indispensable to this Room! No one! There’s not one of you I can’t fire instantly if I think the Room would be better off without you! Now, is there anyone here who thinks he’s indispensable to the Room?” Shagfly raised a hand, fingers clawed, looking at each man in turn. No one moved a muscle. Shagfly squeezed his fist closed. “Awright! Just remember: you need the Room! The Room does not need you! I’ve said it before and I'll say it again: let ***** walk in here off the street and I’ll make a closer of it! That’s what you all were when you walked in here, and that’s what you’ll all be when you walk out! Got it? *****! Awright, now I want you all to give a big hand to Mr. Watson and Mr. Ames. I want you to know that they were on vacation, but just to help you close they dropped down on Rome! Awright.” Shagfly began to clap, and the Room dutifully clapped back. Shagfly looked to Ames, then: “You’re all dismissed.”

The men got up, sore in body from the long hours of sitting, sorer yet in spirit from the drubbing they had taken. Silently they filed from the Room, not talking to one another till they had reached the spiral stair to the lobby, well out of earshot of the Room.

“***** ‘em! ***** the mother fuckers! I’m not gonna put up with any more of their ***** *****…!” Stavrilov.

“Are you going to put up with being called ‘*****’?” Von Gunden was asking Al-Jabr. “Are you going to stand for that…?”

“If I must hear that merde one time more! Just one time more …!” Van Leyden.

“Did you see how Ames pulls the strings on Shagfly? He danced just like a puppet! And he’s always talking about who’s got balls!” Palermo.

“Worse than the Marines, all right!” Lockett.

“They can’t get away with firing Smith and Driscoll. The Room won’t stand for it!”

Thus the matrix muttered among itself as it slowly poured up the stair and out the hotel entrance into the warm Roman night.



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Category Name: My Thoughts

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Category Name: Dialog

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1.

2. FEW CRYSTALS, MUCH MATRIX

3.

4.

5. The member of the Tribunal at the moment interrogating Count Wilhelm Von Gunden was its junior member Mr. James Shagfly, acting Room manager and American company rep, a tall broad-shouldered man with an abrasive voice. The second member of the Tribunal was Jack (“Smilin’ Jack” to his friends) Watson, vice president for European sales. But none had seen Mr. Watson smile. He frowned, and when he frowned everyone trembled. Mr. Watson was a big man, well over six feet, with a great head of silver-white hair and a florid face and a stentorian voice, and his presence was indisputable. Everyone feared him, including Mr. Shagfly, with one exception: the third member of the Tribunal, the six-foot-five Mr. Harold Ames, who terrified Mr. Watson. And Mr. Ames was terrified by nobody, except the wiry five-foot-six Mr. Nathan Greenstein himself. When Mr. Greenstein frowned, Mr. Ames had stomach pains. But the Company’s founder was across the Atlantic in Miami Florida and so Mr. Ames was unballasted, he had no limits, he filled the Room – and he almost filled it physically as well: he weighed easily three hundred fifty pounds. The earth jarred when he walked, he jarred the ground with each step, and when the ground jarred everyone around him sympathetically quaked. Right now he was simply mountainously sitting between Watson and Shagfly at a long table on top the platform in the front of the Room, gazing with two unblinking flat level dead colourless eyes at Von Gunden.

6. “…awright Von Gunden,” Mr. Shagfly was attacking, “why didn’t you close that unit? That was the best unit in the Room! It was a college professor and his wife – so they could afford the deal! They’re from Washington DC – not far from Florida, so they could get there! His survey sheet says he’s been thinking about buying land – so he had the desire! When Mr. Watson gave the pitch he says he noticed that unit looking right at him and nodding – so he was interested! So we have a unit that could afford to buy, that could see the land, that wanted to buy land, and that was interested! And you couldn’t close him!”— this with pitying scorn. Then like a whiplash “Why not?”

7. The Prussian elegantly lounged in his chair, one arm resting on the cloth covering the round dinner table where he had hosted his unit. “Well…he was a college professor…” Von Gunden had an unhappy inspiration to be facetious: “Perhaps he was too smart!” Smiling, he looked round to his fellow salesmen seated at their tables. No one smiled back.

8. Ames spoke. His voice was as flat and as level and as dead and as colourless as his eyes. “Do you mean to imply, Mr. Von Gunden, do I understand you correctly as saying, sir, that ‘smart’ people don’t buy land from the International Holding and Land Company? Are you implying that you do not believe in the deal you are offering?”

9. Von Gunden glanced at him and straightened in his chair. “Why no, no sir, I did not mean to imply that. I was only making a small—“

10. “Any man who does not believe in the deal can’t close. And if a man cannot close, he doesn’t belong in this Room,” Ames pursued, crushing Von Gunden under his flat stare. “Do you wish to be a member of this Room, Mr. Von Gunden?”

11. “Yes. Yes sir. I did not mean—“

12. “What is your closing average?”

13. Von Gunden looked unhappy. His turned-up moustaches drooped. “Well, I have not calculated it, I do not really—“

14. “This week its way up, Mr. Ames,” Shagfly happily volunteered. “It’s six percent.”

15. Ames accepted this information. It seemed to soak into him through his pores. “Six percent. Yes. You close one out of every seventeen units you meet. Yes. Mr. Von Gunden, do you know that at the site, in Port Sueños, any man who does not close twenty percent is terminated? Sir, do you know that at any Room in the United States a man is terminated if he closes less than twelve percent? Do you think you could last one day as a closer, in the United States?”

16. “No,” Von Gunden said hastily. “Oh no sir. No I am sure—“

17. “Mr. Von Gunden, you could not even qualify as a unit, in the United States,” Ames finished, with withering sarcasm.

18. “Now,” Shagfly pursued. “Why didn’t you close this unit, Von Gunden…?”

19. The other member of the Tribunal sat lending his weight to the Tribunal by glaring fiercely at Von Gunden. But he took little part in the actual harassment. Mr. Watson saved himself for perorations, for sermons. His mission in life was to inspirit men, to lift them above themselves to the unearthly plane of the pure Deal, which he in moments of mystic frenzy was one with. When Mr. Watson had a vision of the Deal, he briefly descended to earth to reveal it to ordinary closers. For revelations he was admirably equipped. Besides his physical presence he had a full rich voice, deep bass, which he used as expertly as a concert violinist his instrument. Passion he had, did Mr. Watson, and he believed, believed with every fibre of his soul that the Company had a mission. Mr. Watson often declared that he would not rest content until every one of the two hundred fifty millions of Americans owned land with the International Holding and Land Company. Mr. Watson’s other nickname was “the preacher”.

20. Yesterday Mr. Watson had had a vision, and after the dinner party, standing on the pitch platform in front of the film screen, he had revealed it to the assembled closers. As text for his sermon he had chosen the Company training manual section 2.1, which begins “Thou shalt not pre-judge…”

21. “Men,” Mr. Watson had begun, his vibrating bass throbbing with emotion, forefinger up, pointing to heaven, “Men, somewhere out in the streets of Rome, right now, right this instant!, walking around touring the city, is your unit, the unit you will have tomorrow morning for breakfast here in this Room at the Hilton. Men, that unit doesn’t know you, yet. Men, that unit may not know about our city, Port Sueños, nor of the Company’s existence…” Mr. Watson paused. “Men, when that unit enters this Room, he may not even want to buy a piece of land.” Gathering his forces he bellowed “But men, He SHOULD BUY! He CAN BUY! He WILL BUY! It all depends on YOU…!”

22. The Room shuffled and murmured. Most of the closers were convinced Calvinists: the units had been predestined through all eternity whether they would buy when they entered the Room. Most of the closers felt that, finally, they could only elicit a sale, not create one. Many were called, but few were chosen, and those chosen had always been so. The Room muttered, angry with Watson for snatching at their faith that, whatever they did, it was already written whether they would close. The Room sat, sullenly hating the preacher.

23. “…Men, have you ever thought of the terrible waste involved, in a Room? The terrible, terrible waste? Even the Company’s best Room, the Las Vegas Room, has a yearly closing average of only thirty percent. Do you understand? in Las Vegas, seventy out of every hundred units fed a meal and given a tour are wasted! They will probably pass through a Room only once, one single time, and that one time when they had the opportunity, they did not take it.” Mr. Watson paused, to let the Room pity the units who had lived all their lives in vain. “Why have those units been wasted, men? NOT!” -- the forefinger poked higher – “Not as some of you may believe, because they inherently could not be closed. No! But because their closers failed them! Yes men, the closer has failed, every time he has not closed a unit. In this Company we have no – I repeat: NO successful Rooms. We have only varying degrees of failure! Men, I have been talking about the Las Vegas Room. Now when we come to Italy, to the Rome Room, men…” He paused. Shagfly smiled. Even Ames’ lips twitched on his broad dead flat smooth moon face. “…when we come to this Room, why, what do we find? We find a Room, men, that has wasted, month in, month out, ninety-two out of every hundred units that have passed through it! That is criminal waste, men! It is inexcusable waste!”

24. Mr. Watson sat down. Mr. Shagfly jumped up. “Awright men, let’s give Mr. Watson a big hand!”

25. The Room had sullenly clapped, cursing Watson for forcing on it free will.

26. During Von Gunden’s quizzing a member of the Room, Charles Driscoll, a struggling architect who worked for the Room summers to eke out his uncertain income, sat loathing Watson, because Watson’s sermon on waste yesterday had set going a train of thought in his mind. It seemed to him that Watson, in his ascent to the plane of the Deal, had truly seized there an insight, even if wrongly interpreted.

27. While Watson prophesied Charles too had grasped the vision he had seen, the vision of Waste as essential to the machinery of the universe. A heat engine of any kind had to waste most of its fuel to operate – it was a physical “law”, the law of entropy. The sun poured forth its energy into all space, only a tiny fraction of it of use to the earth. The doctrine of evolution envisaged waste to colossal scale, waste of whole species that, tested, had been found wanting…for a moment Charles had seen too that every thing man had gained, the most trivial and the most worthwhile, had been won only at cost of enormous waste. Wars were fought with terrible waste of human life so that a few men might learn self-discipline and courage. Artists spent years of their lives so that a few could give to the world cathedrals, sculptures, paintings, novels, symphonies – but for every artist who succeeded in giving, a thousand, ten thousand had tried and failed. And this waste of their lives was required, so that the few might have squeezed from them their very best. Most men wasted their lives in humdrum tasks that a few might have leisure to think, to explore the universe, to create, to build… How many had starved to death, that Saint Peter’s might be built? People wasted money, time, to purchase a very few things that they truly wanted, to have a few moments of happiness in a lifetime of boredom and suffering.

28. And finally – and it was this that Charles loathed Watson for having made him think – perhaps most of the human race was condemned to be wasted, perhaps most of us lived otherwise wasted lives, only to provide the matrix of life necessary so that a few, the chosen, the Saved, would in their clashes with life eventually crystallize out as men and women who found the Absolute. Perhaps it had all been set going just to winnow out a half-dozen, or a half-hundred, or a half-thousand persons who could develop to the point that they finally became one with absolute reality. And all the others were wasted, matrix. Charles could not bear thinking this because he grimly feared he might be only part of the matrix, that he was living his life only because, in some way, he would enable someone else to eventually find the Absolute by reacting against him. He might be only a tool, to be used once then mercilessly discarded. Though Charles had often had intuitions of the Absolute, he had never once had an intuition of its goodness – not any goodness, at any rate, that a human being could understand. Charles dismissed the rest of Watson’s vision: “…it all depends on YOU!”

29. Another member of the Room, Ray Smith, angry too, watched Von Gunden squirm. He hated, each day more, what he saw happening in the Room. Not that the men didn’t deserve their harassment: Von Gunden, for example, had been flippant when he should have tried harder to close, he had taken for granted that the Room owed him a living, and now the Room, materialized as the Tribunal, was meting out its punishment. But that Von Gunden was getting what he deserved did not make Ray feel better about it. If we all got our just desserts who would escape hanging? There were no innocent bystanders. Ray knew it was true about himself, and he believed it true for every man. Every man who had ever done anything anyway, and those who had not done anything were guilty of the mortal sin of Accidia. If there were any. The old Dutchman Van Leyden, for example, who seemed as harmless and vain in his womanizing as a man could be, had once confided to Ray that he had been a guard at Auschwitz.

30. It was the fear the Tribunal evoked, that Ray hated. It sometimes infected him until he grew aware of its presence and threw it off, by looking to see it, and then to feel it until it dissipated. He had known real fear once, and had been vaccinated against it, the murder he had committed in Louisiana had set the antibodies swarming in his blood. But Ray still sensed the fear in the Room, and he detested it. Because fear corroded men’s souls, more so than any other single emotion. Ray loved the Room. And he saw that the fear saturating it might destroy the Room he knew.

31. There was no objective reason to fear the Tribunal: few of the closers truly feared losing their jobs – rascals and adventurers that most of them were, they were men who had proven to themselves a hundred times their ability to survive. So their fear sprang ultimately from the source at the top. Ray visualized the prime jet of fear, springing perhaps from childhood memories of a slum or a ghetto, shooting up and falling down into catch-basin after catch-basin, until it finally flooded the Room, filling it too. Fear was inexhaustible and self-generating in a chain reaction, it had no limits and no bottom, there was always more of it. There were only two emotions that drove men totally, that made them summon all their energies and bend them to a single purpose, that gave them authority over other men, that made them impressive, powerful, and one was fear. The other was its true opposite: love.

32. “…awright Von Gunden,” Shagfly finished, “you better get on the ball, got me? You know what you’re doing wrong – so correct it!”

33. “Yes, sir.” Von Gunden, unsmiling, grey-faced, flopped back into his chair, looking neither left nor right.

34. “Who had the doctor?” Ames casually asked Shagfly. The Room held its breath, knowing very well that Ames knew who had had the doctor. And the Room felt that a death sentence had been passed on that closer.

35. “Let’s see…” Shagfly made a great pretence of consulting the list. “Awright, it was Aldo Tagliaferro. Awright, Tagliaferro?”

36. The Room murmured. The former Room manager snapped erect. His hands were in his lap, wringing one another. “Yes sir?” he said humbly, voice a near whisper. His face was yellowish, he was already sweating.

37. “What happened, Tagliaferro? – that was the best unit in the Room!”

38. Ray watched Tagliaferro explain, abase himself, and was sickened. If the other closers had been humbled, Tagliaferro had been crushed. When the Tribunal left, the others would regain their insolence – their insolence was like rabbits who cower in their holes when the weasel is nigh, but when he is gone poke quivering noses out to sniff the air, then come hopping jubilantly up to munch again their stolen carrots. But Tagliaferro would not regain what he had lost. He had been subjected to a cruel and persistent attack and he had shivered, then crumbled. There was little left now of Tagliaferro but pieces of a man.

39. No one had grasped what the Tribunal was about, at first. After each party it had selected two or three men to harass, and only gradually did the Room realize that almost always among those few there was Tagliaferro. For the past two days he was always one of the chosen. Ray had watched the Tribunal – deliberately, he was now sure – destroy him. Clearly, they wanted him gone. But dismissing him was almost out of the question: he was Italian. Therefore, he had to resign. Ray had done nothing about it because he had not known what to do. Had Tagliaferro fought Ray would have found ways to help him, but Tagliaferro did not fight. It was as if he acquiesced in his own destruction, as if he wished to be destroyed because he believed he ought to be. He was the only man in the Room who had gone two weeks without closing a single unit, and this for a closer, Ray knew, was the equivalent of having gone to bed with forty-two different women and been impotent every time.

40. “…do I understand you to say, then, Mr. Tagliaferro…” – Ames had a trick of “understanding what you said” so that your own words sounded in your ears like the most damning evidence against you – “…that you couldn’t close this doctor because he lives in California and couldn’t make a trip to see the property in Florida?” Tagliaferro miserably half-nodded. “Are you aware, sir, that fully one-third of the property owners in Port Sueños are Californians?”

41. “Ecco— Well— I— He— It wasn’t— I couldn’t— It—“

42. “Cut the excuses, Tagliaferro! You just couldn’t close ‘im, isn’t that right?” Shagfly. “In fact, you can’t close anybody, isn’t that right Tagliaferro?”

43. “I have closed—I’ve closed… I— It just— This past two— I don’t know…”

44. “Why didn’t you call a Take-Over, Mr. Tagliaferro, when you saw you were incapable of closing him?”

45. “I did—I did call one. Yes sir. I called one. I called a TO.”

46. “Yeah, you called one! I clocked you: you called Khan as TO forty-five minutes after the pitch ended! When the unit was dead, Tagliaferro!”

47. “Aren’t you aware yet, Mr. Tagliaferro, that the Room rule is that the closer call a Take-Over within fifteen minutes of the end of the pitch, if he fails to close?”

48. “Well— I— In my judgement—“

49. “In your judgement? In your judgement, sir! You have not closed a single unit, Mr. Tagliaferro, since you’ve started working again as closer! What do you think that leads us to believe about your judgement? Will you set your judgement above that of the men who have written the Company manual? Do you imagine your judgement to be better than theirs, Mr. Tagliaferro?”

50. “No! No, sir, no, no, sir, I didn’t mean to imply that! I only meant to say that my unit wasn’t impressed by the pitch, and I felt I had—“

51. “Oh? Did I hear you correctly, Mr. Tagliaferro? Do I understand you as saying that you think you failed to close the unit because the pitch was bad? Are you going to tell Mr. Watson that his pitch was not good enough?”

52. “Oh no! No, I didn’t mean—“

53. “Men, while I was giving the pitch,” Watson now grandly interjected, “I was watching that unit! It was the most interested unit in the entire Room! The man was nodding his head, he was eating right out of my hand, men! When I stepped down from the platform I said to myself ‘Well, here’s a deal Tagliaferro just can’t fail to close!’”

54. “Yet you couldn’t close ‘im, Tagliaferro!”

55. Tagliaferro hung his head. He stared down into his lap, meeting nobody’s eyes. Charles turned and looked to Ray. Ray usually returned a wink or a smile when someone looked to him, but now he only frowned. He and Charles averted their eyes. Ray was ashamed of himself, and he knew that Charles was too. He felt his own shame sharpened, by its mirroring in Charles.

56. “Mr. Tagliaferro, when you were managing this Room what did you think of a closer who went two entire weeks without closing even once?”

57. Tagliaferro was silent.

58. “I say, what did you think of him, Mr. Tagliaferro?”

59. “I—I have closed. My first year—“

60. “What did you THINK! sir?” Ames thundered.

61. “I thought he was no good.” This almost whispered.

62. “And what did you do?”

63. “I—I let him go.”

64. “What do you think we ought to do, then Mr. Tagliaferro, with any man in this Room who has gone two entire weeks without closing?”

65. Tagliaferro looked up from his lap to Ames, he looked desperately round, then back down at his wrung hands. “Fire me.” His voice was so low that only closers seated next him heard it.

66. “What? What’s that, Mr. Tagliaferro? I didn’t hear you, sir. What did you say we ought to do, that we have a right to do, that we have a duty to this Room to do?”

67. Something moved inside Ray. He suddenly decided that he could take no further part in this. He stood up from his chair and walked toward the door. He had almost reached it before the Tribunal recovered its wits and reacted.

68. “Mr. Smith!”

69. Ray turned. “Yes, Mr. Ames?” he said pleasantly.

70. “Where do you think you are going, sir? No one has been dismissed here.”

71. “I’m leaving sir. I can’t stop what you’re doing, but....” Ray moved to the door and put a hand on the knob.

72. “Mr. Smith, if you walk out that door, you need not come back. Not ever.”

73. “I know sir,” Ray said quietly. Opening the door he walked out, and shut it behind him.

74. The Room sat sunken in its shame. A murmur ran over it and the Tribunal was suddenly aware that a mutiny was in the making. They were all thinking fast, and Shagfly was seized by inspiration.

75. “Awright, if there’s anybody here who thinks we’ve been too tough on Tagliaferro, let ‘im stand up and tell us about it!” It was a gamble, Shagfly knew, but coupling with protest the physical act of raising oneself from a chair and the consequent possibility of finding oneself the only one standing before the others, would make protest more difficult. And if the moment passed then the Room was his, totally, wholly. That it not yet was, was why the former manager had to go.

76. Charles, feeling his shame burn inside him, looked at the closed door Ray had just left by. Ray was the only one of them with any guts, Charles thought. He wanted to follow Ray, but could not quite bring himself to leave the Room. He sat in a daze, hating himself, and then heard Shagfly say “…let ‘im stand up and tell us about it!”

77. Charles did not bother to look around. He stood up, sure that all around him men inspired by Ray’s example were standing up too, standing up to show the Tribunal that it had gone too far. They could bully Tagliaferro, but they couldn’t fire Ray and get away with it! Charles was sure of that. The Room simply wouldn’t stand for it! He stood up, feeling on every side of him the solidarity of the Room standing with him, standing up against the Tribunal.

78. Charles now looked around. He was the only one on his feet. He glanced to Van Leyden, to Von Gunden. They averted their eyes. Lockett was looking into his lap. Al-Jabr was staring off into space to one side. Stavrilov sat slack in his chair hands in pockets, looking straight ahead…

79. The Tribunal let him stand alone a moment. Charles understood that if he sat down he would be forgiven and the matter would not be mentioned. But once having stood up, he would rather have died than sit down. He stood, cursing himself for a fool, wishing that his act could somehow be nullified, erased from everyone’s memory. But it could not be. So he stood propped up by honour, which is codified fear.

80. “Do I understand, then, by your action, Mr. Driscoll, that you are questioning our disciplinary authority over the Room?” Ames purred. “Do you believe like Mr. Tagliaferro that your judgement is better than ours, how best to run this Room?”

81. Charles shrugged. No answer was needed.

82. “All right, Mr. Driscoll, you may leave. We have no place in this Room for any closer who can not submit to the authority of his superiors, who is not ready and willing to be corrected when he makes mistakes. You can pick up your pay Friday, at the office downtown.”

83. Charles looked helplessly around, then turned and unseeing threaded his way between the tables. His friends withdrew their sprawled legs to make way for him, to speed from the Room the last reminder of its shame. He walked rapidly, blindly, to the door and opened it. He left without closing it, and behind him he heard Ames say “Mr. Palermo, will you please shut the door?”

84. The Tribunal set about consolidating its gains and cutting its losses. But a gesture of magnanimity was inevitable. Ames said calmly, as if nothing had happened, “Now Mr. Tagliaferro, you agree that we not only have the right, but the duty to terminate you, is that correct?”

85. Tagliaferro nodded miserably.

86. “Yes. Now, Mr. Shagfly…” Shagfly was instantly attentive. “…as you know, I never interfere in the way a manager runs a Room. I consider myself here strictly in advisory capacity, since only the manager understands all the variables involved, the delicate balance, I might say, that governs a Room. Therefore, Mr. Shagfly, I wish to ask you: notwithstanding the fact that Mr. Tagliaferro has not produced for two weeks, I wonder, since he has been associated with the Company for more than three years, and was once manager of this Room, if he may not deserve a second chance? I leave this decision strictly up to you, Mr. Shagfly. What do you think?”

87. Shagfly looked unhappy, but he immediately swallowed the toad. In his opinion he thought that Mr. Tagliaferro might have some of the qualifications and capacities of a closer, and that he should be given a little more time.

88. Speaking in his strictly advisory capacity Ames noted that Shagfly had made a very wise decision. Glancing meaningly to Watson and Shagfly he continued: “Now gentlemen, I have nothing further to say, and I propose that this meeting be adjourned for the evening.”

89. Watson nodded. “I have one thing to say, sir,” Shagfly said.

90. Ames looked at his watch. “Then say it, Mr. Shagfly – but please keep your remarks brief. I think the men are getting tired.”

91. The Room muttered to itself, it being unclear whether with tiredness or with surprise at Ames’ unwonted solicitousness.

92. Shagfly addressed the Room. “Awright. I just want to make one point, and then you can all go. There isn’t anybody who’s indispensable to this Room! No one! There’s not one of you I can’t fire instantly if I think the Room would be better off without you! Now, is there anyone here who thinks he’s indispensable to the Room?” Shagfly raised a hand, fingers clawed, looking at each man in turn. No one moved a muscle. Shagfly squeezed his fist closed. “Awright! Just remember: you need the Room! The Room does not need you! I’ve said it before and I'll say it again: let ***** walk in here off the street and I’ll make a closer of it! That’s what you all were when you walked in here, and that’s what you’ll all be when you walk out! Got it? *****! Awright, now I want you all to give a big hand to Mr. Watson and Mr. Ames. I want you to know that they were on vacation, but just to help you close they dropped down on Rome! Awright.” Shagfly began to clap, and the Room dutifully clapped back. Shagfly looked to Ames, then: “You’re all dismissed.”

93. The men got up, sore in body from the long hours of sitting, sorer yet in spirit from the drubbing they had taken. Silently they filed from the Room, not talking to one another till they had reached the spiral stair to the lobby, well out of earshot of the Room.

94. “***** ‘em! ***** the mother fuckers! I’m not gonna put up with any more of their ***** *****…!” Stavrilov.

95. “Are you going to put up with being called ‘*****’?” Von Gunden was asking Al-Jabr. “Are you going to stand for that…?”

96. “If I must hear that merde one time more! Just one time more …!” Van Leyden.

97. “Did you see how Ames pulls the strings on Shagfly? He danced just like a puppet! And he’s always talking about who’s got balls!” Palermo.

98. “Worse than the Marines, all right!” Lockett.

99. “They can’t get away with firing Smith and Driscoll. The Room won’t stand for it!”

100. Thus the matrix muttered among itself as it slowly poured up the stair and out the hotel entrance into the warm Roman night.

101.

102.

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