Plot unfolds - divide and conquer

The following week Paul Johnson stopped in my office and invited me to dinner with
him, his wife, and several of his clients from the Chicago area. Since Paul was about my age, a former chemist and a confidant at work, I thought that the dinner was an excellent way to cultivate a friendship with a co-worker. I readily accepted. Of course, I was not to tell Ravi I was having dinner with an area sales manager.

On December 19, Anit and I joined Paul, his wife and two Allis Chalmers managers and their wives for dinner at Paul's house. At dinner I was seated next to Paul with my wife on my immediate right. During the course of the evening, I was talking to an Allis Chalmers representative and was telling him about my background and how I planned to help Gamma Supplies provide the best foundry binders possible. Suddenly, Paul gave me a sharp rap on my leg under the table as if I was saying something wrong. Since they were Paul's clients, I terminated the conversation. After dinner, I asked Paul what was wrong. He ignored my question and said, “well, tomorrow is the big day.”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“Ravi is going to be fired tomorrow.”

“How do you know that?” I asked.

“Darth told me today that the attorney had given his approval so tomorrow they are going to make the changes.”

I was still skeptical. Darth had not said anything to me. “Are you sure?” I quired.

“Definitely,” Paul replied.

The next day I went to work with great anticipation. With all the events that had happened since my October meeting with Darth, I had almost begun to believe that the promise to fire Ravi was just another one of Darth's hollow promises. The day went by slowly and no announcement was made, and Ravi was his usual happy self. Late in the afternoon I saw Paul and pulled him into my office.

“I thought you said today is suppose to be the day. What happened?”

“I don't know,” he replied. “That is what I was told.”

I went home that evening feeling let down. The next day came and went with no
changes. Finally on the third day, Ravi had a meeting with Darth. When Ravi came out I was the only one in the laboratory, and as he walked by me he was visibly angry. He looked at me and said, “Have you ever been had?”

Ravi's words contained no animosity towards me, and they almost seemed to be a
warning more that anything else. I wanted to go in and talk with Ravi and to try to find out what was going on, but the rift between us was too great. There was still no official announcement, but rumors were everywhere that Ravi had been fired. I feigned ignorance about the situation.

On December 23rd, the long awaited announcement was made in the form of a memo to all Gamma Supplies personnel from Arnold Clin. The memo contained several startling revelations. First, there was no mention of Ravi. Second, my name was noticeably missing from the memo. Several sales people were promoted or given increased responsibility, and Jay Wells was officially made Manager of Technical Services. Third, Carl Host was given the evasive title of Executive Assistant with the responsibility to “work on various projects, such as our joint venture with Tenneland.” There in black and white was what I had long suspected; Tenneland and Gamma Supplies were carrying out a joint effort. That effort I believed was to develop a phenolic resin and to have it manufactured. I was surprised to see it in writing because all our efforts had been to present Gamma Supplies in the Federal Court as some small fly-by-night outfit who had accidentally infringed on big, bad Better Supplies patents. Here was written evidence that Gamma Supplies was not acting alone, and that a larger corporation was involved in the attack on Better Supplies patents. While the memo stated many things, it did nothing to establish my position in the company.