Peter Keating

Written on 8/27/2008 10:25:00 am by Swift!

Peter Keating is a new draftsman in the office of Francon & Heyers, the leading Architects in America. Guy Francon, one among the two partners is very much impressed with Keating’s academic records and so has a liking for him. Tim Davis is the most skilled draftsman at Francon’s office. Now read the following:


In the drafting room he found Tim Davis, his best friend, slouched despondently over a drawing. Tim Davis was the tall, blond boy at the next table, whom Keating had noticed long ago, because he had known, with no tangible evidence, but with certainty, as Keating always knew such things, that this was the favored draftsman of the office. Keating managed to be assigned, as frequently as possible, to do parts of the projects on which Davis worked. Soon they were out to lunch together, and to a quiet little speak-easy after the day’s work, and Keating was listening with breathless attention to Davis’ talk about his love for one Elaine Duffy, not a word of which Keating ever remembered afterward.

He found Davis now in black gloom, his mouth chewing furiously a cigarette and a pencil at once. Keating did not have to question him. He merely bent his friendly face over Davis’ shoulder. Davis spit out the cigarette and exploded. He had just been told that he would have to work overtime tonight, for the third time this week.

“Got to stay late, God knows how late! Gotta finish this damn tripe tonight!” He slammed the sheets spread before him. “Look at it.! Hours and hours to finish it! What am I going to do?”
“Well, it’s because you’re the best man here, Tim, and they need you.”
“To hell with that! I’ve got a date with Elaine tonight! How’m I going to break it? Third time! She won’t believe me! She told me so last time! That’s the end! I’m going up to Guy the Mighty and tell him where he can put his plans and his job! I’m through!”
“Wait,” said Keating, and leaned closer to him. “Wait! There’s another way. I’ll finish them for you.”
“Huh?”
“I’ll stay. I’ll do them. Don’t be afraid. No one’ll tell the difference.”
“Pete! Would you?”
“Sure. I’ve nothing to do tonight. You just stay till they all go home and then skip.”
“Oh, gee, Pete!” Davis sighed, tempted. “But look, if they find out they’ll can me. You’re too new for this kind of job.”
“They won’t find out.”
“I can’t lose my job, Pete. You know I can’t. Elaine and I are going to be married soon. If anything happens…”
“Nothing will happen.”

Shortly after six, Davis departed furtively from the empty drafting room, leaving Keating at his table.

Bending under a solitary green lamp, Keating glanced at the desolate expanse of three long rooms, oddly silent after the day’s rush, and he felt that he owned them, that he would own them, as surely as the pencil moved in his hand.

It was half past nine when he finished the plans, stacked them neatly on Davis’ table, and left the office. He walked down the street, glowing with a comfortable, undignified feeling, as though after a good meal.

In the drafting room, Keating concentrated on Tim Davis. Work and drawings were only unavoidable details on the surface of his days; Tim Davis was the substance and the shape of the first step in his career.

Davis let him do most of his own work; only night work at first, then parts of his daily assignments as well; secretly, at first, then openly. Davis had not wanted it to be known. Keating made it known, with an air of naïve confidence which implied that he was only a tool, no more than Tim’s pencil or T-square, that his help enhanced Tim’s importance rather than diminished it and, therefore, he did not wish to conceal it.

At first, Davis relayed instructions to Keating; then the chief draftsman took the arrangement for granted and began coming to Keating with orders intended for Davis. Keating was always there, smiling, saying” “I’ll do it; don’t bother Tim with those little things. I’ll take care of it.” Davis relaxed and let himself be carried along; he smoked a great deal, he lolled about, his legs twisted loosely over the rungs of a stool, his eyes closed, dreaming of Elaine; he turned once in a while: “Is the stuff ready, Pete?”

Davis had married Elaine that spring. He was frequently late for work. He had whispered to Keating: “You’re in with the old man Pete, slip a good word for me, once in a while, will you?-so they’ll overlook a few things. God do I hate to have to be working right now!” Keating would say to Francon: “I’m sorry, Mr. Francon, that Murray job sub-basement plans were so late, but Tim Davis had a quarrel with his wife last night, and you know how newlyweds are, you don’t want to be too hard on them,” or “It’s Tim Davis again, Mr. Francon, do forgive him, he can’t help it, he hasn’t got his mind on his work at all!”

When Francon glanced at the list of his employees’ salaries, he notices that his most expensive draftsman was the man least needed in the office.

When Tim Davis lost his job, no one in the drafting room was surprised but Tim Davis. He could not understand it. He set his lips defiantly in bitterness against a world he would hate forever. He felt he had no friend on earth save Peter Keating.

Keating consoled him, cursed Francon, cursed the injustice of humanity, spent six dollars in a speak-easy, entertaining the secretary of an obscure architect of his acquaintance and arranged a new job for Tim Davis.


By a unanimous decision of Francon, Heyer and the chief draftsman, Tim’s table position and salary were given to Peter Keating. But this was only part of his satisfaction; there was another sense of it, warmer and less real-and more dangerous. He said brightly and often: “Tim Davis? Oh yes, I got him his present job.”

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