As he stomped upstairs, Paul kept his voice raised. “I can’t meet our production quotas with a forty-eight-hour week. How on earth could I do so with forty? It’s absurd!”
“That’s not my concern. The men are my concern. Forty hours!”
“If you didn’t get it in ’37, what makes you think you can get it in ’41?”
“Hire more men!”
At the top of the stairs, Paul threw up his hands. “Who? You tell me—who?”
He flung open his office door and barged in.
Miss Thibodeaux looked up, her eyes huge.
“Pardon me, Miss Thibodeaux,” Paul said. “Why don’t you take your lunch? Then you won’t have to listen to this yelling boor of a man.”
“Boor?” Moreau bellowed. “Better than a pompous bourgeois pig!”
Miss Thibodeaux scurried out.
Paul entered his private office with Moreau on his tail, and he slammed the door for good effect.
Then he grinned at Moreau. “Pompous bourgeois pig? Nice touch.”
Moreau thumped his fist over his chest. “It comes from the heart.”
Paul laughed and pulled a chair to his side of the desk so they could review plans, then he opened his lunch tin. “My cook packed two lunches. This pig is providing ham.”
But Moreau studied the drawings on Paul’s desk. “I don’t recognize this design.”
Paul traced one finger along the lines. “I call it the Aurabesque, inspired by a ballerina’s arabesque.” Someday he’d build the elegant sedan that would carry a family but make drivers feel as if they were in the Monaco Grand Prix.
“It’s good.” Moreau tapped the drawing. “Your best yet.”
“Thanks. I think so too.” He could already see the ad campaign—Lucie in a golden tutu, lit to bring out the gold in her hair, photographed in arabesques paralleling the car’s lines—a full color spread in the major magazines.
Alone at night, Paul could only think of Lucie—dancing, saying she was falling in love with him, glowing with trust. If only they could meet more often in her little ballet studio.
But they hadn’t done so once in the past month. Lucie insisted they could only meet when they absolutely needed to speak in private. Paul had joked that Josie needed a lesson every day, but he’d received only a watery smile in response.
Lucie was right. They had to follow the original plan to see each other only at church, Children’s Hour, and his midweek visit to check for messages. All at a polite distance. Anything more would risk unraveling the webs they’d spun.
Seated at the desk, Moreau unwrapped his sandwich. “That went well on the factory floor. You reminded me why I used to hate you.”
Paul laughed and placed his drawings in his attaché case. “Same here. Everyone believes it, including Lafarge.”
“Lafarge.” Moreau spat out the name with a few bread crumbs. “Always snitching, making up sabotage that doesn’t exist, opposing our strike.”
“He’ll make no friends that way.” Paul sat and unwrapped his sandwich. “What’s next?”
“The men are worked up enough. On Monday, we’ll start our sit-down strike.”
“Good.” Paul chewed his ham sandwich. They’d chosen a sit-down strike so the workers would come in and out of the factory as usual—but without working. That would allow them to continue to move British airmen.
“How long do you think we can strike?” Moreau wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.
“I don’t know. As long as the men are peaceable, I can hold off the police. I’ll have to notify Schiller—and sound irritated. We’ll have at least one day, plus the slowdown this week due to the agitation. Every day we can stretch it out will help.”
Moreau swallowed a bite. “We’re running out of time. America is sure to enter the war, and the Germans will take over the factory.”
