Harvey calmed visibly. "Not to tease me?"

"No."

"And your husband didn't send you? He doesn't know you're here?"

"No, sir." Kim's hands were on her cheeks in dismay. "It's just not fair to fire him because of what I've done. I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to cause any trouble. Things have been so bad lately."

"Still, it's an insult to me," Harvey said. "And a serious breach of etiquette. How can a man who can't control his wife handle any responsibilities in this company? A man like that would have to be dismissed."

Kim lost all her composure at that point and fell to the floor sobbing. Ike Harvey rounded his desk and took her firmly by the shoulders and helped her to the couch. Her face fell against his chest and she sobbed out the frustration and loneliness of the last five weeks.

Harvey said, in a much softer voice, "Suppose you tell me all about what's going on. Maybe you have a reason for all this, maybe you're not here to tease."

The young bride lifted her tearful face up and opened her eyes to the man who was hatching one of the most diabolical schemes he had ever tried to put into effect. He remembered the guy now, Stevens, Kirk, or something like that. He remembered that the young man had insulted him in the elevator some weeks ago, not knowing who Harvey was, had called him a fat old man. Ike was heavy, he admitted, but not fat, and he could never brook such an insult without seeking of some kind of revenge. That was why Stevens had been kept at the bottom and not moved to a junior management level soon after his arrival, why he would stay there until Ike was satisfied that he had been punished. That was why he hadn't been summarily fired. Ike had wanted to keep him around to see what could be done.