The Fountainhead Part 48

The dinner took place a few days later. Keating's mother had pleaded some previous engagement and escaped for the evening; she explained it to herself by believing that she merely needed time to get used to things. So there were only three places set on the dining-room table, candles in crystal holders, a centerpiece of blue flowers and gla.s.s bubbles.

When Toohey entered he bowed to his hosts in a manner proper to a court reception. Dominique looked like a society hostess who had always been a society hostess and could not possibly be imagined as anything else.

"Well, Ellsworth? Well?" Keating asked, with a gesture that included the hall, the air and Dominique.

"My dear Peter," said Toohey, "let's skip the obvious."

Dominique led the way into the living room. She wore a dinner dress-a white satin blouse tailored like a man's, and a long black skirt, straight and simple as the polished planes of her hair. The narrow band of the skirt about her waistline seemed to state that two hands could encircle her waist completely or snap her figure in half without much effort. The short sleeves left her arms bare, and she wore a plain gold bracelet, too large and heavy for her thin wrist. She had an appearance of elegance become perversion, an appearance of wise, dangerous maturity achieved by looking like a very young girl.

"Ellsworth, isn't it wonderful?" said Keating, watching Dominique as one watches a fat bank account.

"No less than I expected," said Toohey. "And no more."

At the dinner table Keating did most of the talking. He seemed possessed by a talking jag. He turned over in words with the sensuous abandon of a cat rolling in catnip.

"Actually, Ellsworth, it was Dominique who invited you. I didn't ask her to. You're our first formal guest. I think that's wonderful. My wife and my best friend. I've always had the silly idea that you two didn't like each other. G.o.d knows where I get those notions. But this is what makes me so d.a.m.n happy-the three of us, together."

"Then you don't believe in mathematics, do you, Peter?" said Toohey. "Why the surprise? Certain figures in combination have to give certain results. Granting three ent.i.ties such as Dominique, you and I-this had to be the inevitable sum."

"They say three's a crowd," laughed Keating. "But that's bosh. Two are better than one, and sometimes three are better than two, it all depends."

"The only thing wrong with that old cliche," said Toohey, "is the erroneous implication that 'a crowd' is a term of opprobrium. It is quite the opposite. As you are so merrily discovering. Three, I might add, is a mystic key number. As for instance, the Holy Trinity. Or the triangle, without which we would have no movie industry. There are so many variations upon the triangle, not necessarily unhappy. Like the three of us-with me serving as understudy for the hypotenuse, quite an appropriate subst.i.tution, since I'm replacing my antipode, don't you think so, Dominique?"

They were finishing dessert when Keating was called to the telephone. They could hear his impatient voice in the next room, snapping instructions to a draftsman who was working late on a rush job and needed help. Toohey turned, looked at Dominique and smiled. The smile said everything her manner had not allowed to be said earlier. There was no visible movement on her face, as she held his glance, but there was a change of expression, as if she were acknowledging his meaning instead of refusing to understand it. He would have preferred the closed look of refusal. The acceptance was infinitely more scornful.

"So you've come back to the fold, Dominique?"

"Yes, Ellsworth."

"No more pleas for mercy?"

"Does it appear as if they will be necessary?"

"No. I admire you, Dominique.... How do you like it? I should imagine Peter is not bad, though not as good as the man we're both thinking of, who's probably superlative, but you'll never have a chance to learn."

She did not look disgusted; she looked genuinely puzzled.

"What are you talking about, Ellsworth?"

"Oh, come, my dear, we're past pretending now, aren't we? You've been in love with Roark from that first moment you saw him in Kiki Holcombe's drawing room-or shall I be honest?-you wanted to sleep with him-but he wouldn't spit at you-hence all your subsequent behavior."

"Is that what you thought?" she asked quietly.

"Wasn't it obvious? The woman scorned. As obvious as the fact that Roark had to be the man you'd want. That you'd want him in the most primitive way. And that he'd never know you existed."

"I overestimated you, Ellsworth," she said. She had lost all interest in his presence, even the need of caution. She looked bored. He frowned, puzzled.

Keating came back. Toohey slapped his shoulder as he pa.s.sed by on the way to his seat.

"Before I go, Peter, we must have a chat about the rebuilding of the Stoddard Temple. I want you to b.i.t.c.h that up, too."

"Ellsworth ... !" he gasped.

Toohey laughed. "Don't be stuffy, Peter. Just a little professional vulgarity. Dominique won't mind. She's an ex-newspaper woman."

"What's the matter, Ellsworth?" Dominique asked. "Feeling pretty desperate? The weapons aren't up to your usual standard." She rose. "Shall we have coffee in the drawing room?"

Hopton Stoddard added a generous sum to the award he had won from Roark, and the Stoddard Temple was rebuilt for its new purpose by a group of architects chosen by Ellsworth Toohey: Peter Keating, Gordon L. Prescott, John Erik Snyte and somebody named Gus Webb, a boy of twenty-four who liked to utter obscenities when pa.s.sing well-bred women on the street, and who had never handled an architectural commission of his own. Three of these men had social and professional standing; Gus Webb had none; Toohey included him for that reason. Of the four Gus Webb had the loudest voice and the greatest self-a.s.surance. Gus Webb said he was afraid of nothing; he meant it. They were all members of the Council of American Builders.

The Council of American Builders had grown. After the Stoddard trial many earnest discussions were held informally in the club rooms of the A.G.A. The att.i.tude of the A.G.A. toward Ellsworth Toohey had not been cordial, particularly since the establishment of his Council. But the trial brought a subtle change; many members pointed out that the article in "One Small Voice" had actually brought about the Stoddard lawsuit; and that a man who could force clients to sue was a man to be treated with caution. So it was suggested that Ellsworth Toohey should be invited to address the A.G.A. at one of its luncheons. Some members objected, Guy Francon among them. The most pa.s.sionate objector was a young architect who made an eloquent speech, his voice trembling with the embarra.s.sment of speaking in public for the first time; he said that he admired Ellsworth Toohey and had always agreed with Toohey's social ideals, but if a group of people felt that some person was acquiring power over them, that was the time to fight such person. The majority overruled him. Ellsworth Toohey was asked to speak at the luncheon, the attendance was enormous and Toohey made a witty, gracious speech. Many members of the A.G.A. joined the Council of American Builders, John Erik Snyte among the first.

The four architects in charge of the Stoddard reconstruction met in Keating's office, around a table on which they spread blueprints of the temple, photographs of Roark's original drawings, obtained from the contractor, and a clay model which Keating had ordered made. They talked about the depression and its disastrous effect on the building industry; they talked about women, and Gordon L. Prescott told a few jokes of a bathroom nature. Then Gus Webb raised his fist and smacked it plump upon the roof of the model which was not quite dry and spread into a flat mess. "Well, boys," he said, "let's go to work." "Gus, you son of a b.i.t.c.h," said Keating, "the thing cost money." "b.a.l.l.s!" said Gus, "we're not paying for it."

Each of them had a set of photographs of the original sketches with the signature "Howard Roark" visible in the comer. They spent many evenings and many weeks, drawing their own versions right on the originals, remaking and improving. They took longer than necessary. They made more changes than required. They seemed to find pleasure in doing it. Afterward, they put the four versions together and made a co-operative combination. None of them had ever enjoyed a job quite so much. They had long, friendly conferences. There were minor dissensions, such as Gus Webb saying: "h.e.l.l, Gordon, if the kitchen's going to be yours, then the johns've got to be mine," but these were only surface ripples. They felt a sense of unity and an anxious affection for one another, the kind of brotherhood that makes a man withstand the third degree rather than squeal on the gang.

The Stoddard Temple was not torn down, but its framework was carved into five floors, containing dormitories, schoolrooms, infirmary, kitchen, laundry. The entrance hall was paved with colored marble, the stairways had railings of hand-wrought aluminum, the shower stalls were gla.s.s-enclosed, the recreation rooms had gold-leafed Corinthian pilasters. The huge windows were left untouched, merely crossed by floorlines.

The four architects had decided to achieve an effect of harmony and therefore not to use any historical style in its pure form. Peter Keating designed the white marble semi-Doric portico that rose over the main entrance, and the Venetian balconies for which new doors were cut. John Erik Snyte designed the small semi-Gothic spire surmounted by a cross, and the bandcourses of stylized acanthus leaves which were cut into the limestone of the walls. Gordon L. Prescott designed the semi-Renaissance cornice, and the gla.s.s-enclosed terrace projecting from the third floor. Gus Webb designed a cubistic ornament to frame the original windows, and the modern neon sign on the roof, which read: "The Hopton Stoddard Home for Subnormal Children."

"Comes the revolution," said Gus Webb, looking at the completed structure, "and every kid in the country will have a home like that!"

The original shape of the building remained discernible. It was not like a corpse whose fragments had been mercifully scattered; it was like a corpse hacked to pieces and rea.s.sembled.

In September the tenants of the Home moved in. A small, expert staff was chosen by Toohey. It had been harder to find the children who qualified as inmates. Most of them had to be taken from other inst.i.tutions. Sixty-five children, their ages ranging from three to fifteen, were picked out by zealous ladies who were full of kindness and so made a point of rejecting those who could be cured and selecting only the hopeless cases. There was a fifteen-year-old boy who had never learned to speak; a grinning child who could not be taught to read or write; a girl born without a nose, whose father was also her grandfather; a person called "Jackie" of whose age or s.e.x n.o.body could be certain. They marched into their new home, their eyes staring vacantly, the stare of death before which no world existed.

On warm evenings children from the slums nearby would sneak into the park of the Stoddard Home and gaze wistfully at the playrooms, the gymnasium, the kitchen beyond the big windows. These children had filthy clothes and smudged faces, agile little bodies, impertinent grins, and eyes bright with a roaring, imperious, demanding intelligence. The ladies in charge of the Home chased them away with angry exclamations about "little gangsters."

Once a month a delegation from the sponsors came to visit the Home. It was a distinguished group whose names were in many exclusive registers, though no personal achievement had ever put them there. It was a group of mink coats and diamond clips; occasionally, there was a dollar cigar and a glossy derby from a British shop among them. Ellsworth Toohey was always present to show them through the Home. The inspection made the mink coats seem warmer and their wearers' rights to them incontestable, since it established superiority and altruistic virtue together, in a demonstration more potent than a visit to a morgue. On the way back from such an inspection Ellsworth Toohey received humbled compliments on the wonderful work he was doing, and had no trouble in obtaining checks for his other humanitarian activities, such as publications, lecture courses, radio forums and the Workshop of Social Study.

Catherine Halsey was put in charge of the children's occupational therapy, and she moved into the Home as a permanent resident. She took up her work with a fierce zeal. She spoke about it insistently to anyone who would listen. Her voice was dry and arbitrary. When she spoke, the movements of her mouth hid the two lines that had appeared recently, cut from her nostrils to her chin; people preferred her not to remove her gla.s.ses; her eyes were not good to see. She spoke belligerently about her work not being charity, but "human reclamation."

The most important time of her day was the hour a.s.signed to the children's art activities, known as the "Creative Period." There was a special room for the purpose-a room with a view of the distant city skyline-where the children were given materials and encouraged to create freely, under the guidance of Catherine who stood watch over them like an angel presiding at a birth.

She was elated on the day when Jackie, the least promising one of the lot, achieved a completed work of imagination. Jackie picked up fistfuls of colored felt sc.r.a.ps and a pot of glue, and carried them to a corner of the room. There was, in the corner, a slanting ledge projecting from the wall-plastered over and painted green-left from Roark's modeling of the Temple interior that had once controlled the recession of the light at sunset. Catherine walked over to Jackie and saw, spread out on the ledge, the recognizable shape of a dog, brown, with blue spots and five legs. Jackie wore an expression of pride. "Now you see, you see?" Catherine said to her colleagues. "Isn't it wonderful and moving! There's no telling how far the child will go with proper encouragement. Think of what happens to their little souls if they are frustrated in their creative instincts! It's so important not to deny them a chance for self-expression. Did you see Jackie's face?"

Dominique's statue had been sold. No one knew who bought it. It had been bought by Ellsworth Toohey.

Roark's office had shrunk back to one room. After the completion of the Cord Building he found no work. The depression had wrecked the building trade; there was little work for anyone; it was said that the skysc.r.a.per was finished; architects were closing their offices.

A few commissions still dribbled out occasionally, and a group of architects hovered about them with the dignity of a bread line. There were men like Ralston Holcombe among them, men who had never begged, but had demanded references before they accepted a client. When Roark tried to get a commission, he was rejected in a manner implying that if he had no more sense than that, politeness would be a wasted effort. "Roark?" cautious businessmen said. "The tabloid hero? Money's too scarce nowadays to waste it on lawsuits afterwards."

He got a few jobs, remodeling rooming houses, an a.s.signment that involved no more than erecting part.i.tions and rearranging the plumbing. "Don't take it, Howard," Austen h.e.l.ler said angrily. "The infernal gall of offering you that kind of work! After a skysc.r.a.per like the Cord Building. After the Enright House." "I'll take anything," said Roark.

The Stoddard award had taken more than the amount of his fee for the Cord Building. But he had saved enough to exist on for a while. He paid Mallory's rent and he paid for most of their frequent meals together.

Mallory had tried to object. "Shut up, Steve," Roark had said. "I'm not doing it for you. At a time like this I owe myself a few luxuries. So I'm simply buying the most valuable thing that can be bought-your time. I'm competing with a whole country-and that's quite a luxury, isn't it? They want you to do baby plaques and I don't, and I like having my way against theirs."

"What do you want me to work on, Howard?"

"I want you to work without asking anyone what he wants you to work on."

Austen h.e.l.ler heard about it from Mallory, and spoke of it to Roark in private.

"If you're helping him, why don't you let me help you?"

"I'd let you if you could," said Roark. "But you can't. All he needs is his time. He can work without clients. I can't."

"It's amusing, Howard, to see you in the role of an altruist."

"You don't have to insult me. It's not altruism. But I'll tell you this: most people say they're concerned with the suffering of others. I'm not. And yet there's one thing I can't understand. Most of them would not pa.s.s by if they saw a man bleeding in the road, mangled by a hit-and-run driver. And most of them would not turn their heads to look at Steven Mallory. But don't they know that if suffering could be measured, there's more suffering in Steven Mallory when he can't do the work he wants to do, than in a whole field of victims mowed down by a tank? If one must relieve the pain of this world, isn't Mallory the place to begin? ... However, that's not why I'm doing it."

Roark had never seen the reconstructed Stoddard Temple. On an evening in November he went to see it. He did not know whether it was surrender to pain or victory over the fear of seeing it.

It was late and the garden of the Stoddard Home was deserted. The building was dark, a single light showed in a back window upstairs. Roark stood looking at the building for a long time.

The door under the Greek portico opened and a slight masculine figure came out. It hurried casually down the steps-and then stopped.

"h.e.l.lo, Mr. Roark," said Ellsworth Toohey quietly.

Roark looked at him without curiosity. "h.e.l.lo," said Roark.

"Please don't run away." The voice was not mocking, but earnest.

"I wasn't going to."

"I think I knew that you'd come here some day and I think I wanted to be here when you came. I've kept inventing excuses for myself to hang about this place." There was no gloating in the voice; it sounded drained and simple.

"Well?"

"You shouldn't mind speaking to me. You see, I understand your work. What I do about it is another matter."

"You are free to do what you wish about it."

"I understand your work better than any living person-with the possible exception of Dominique Francon. And, perhaps, better than she does. That's a great deal, isn't it, Mr. Roark? You haven't many people around you who can say that. It's a greater bond than if I were your devoted, but blind supporter."

"I knew you understood."

"Then you won't mind talking to me."

"About what?"

In the darkness it sounded almost as if Toohey had sighed. After a while he pointed to the building and asked: "Do you understand this?"

Roark did not answer.

Toohey went on softly: "What does it look like to you? Like a senseless mess? Like a chance collection of driftwood? Like an imbecile chaos? But is it, Mr. Roark? Do you see no method? You who know the language of structure and the meaning of form. Do you see no purpose here?"

"I see none in discussing it."

"Mr. Roark, we're alone here. Why don't you tell me what you think of me? In any words you wish. No one will hear us."

"But I don't think of you."

Toohey's face had an expression of attentiveness, of listening quietly to something as simple as fate. He remained silent, and Roark asked: "What did you want to say to me?"

Toohey looked at him, and then at the bare trees around them, at the river far below, at the great rise of the sky beyond the river.

"Nothing," said Toohey.

He walked away, his steps creaking on the gravel in the silence, sharp and even, like the cracks of an engine's pistons.

Roark stood alone in the empty driveway, looking at the building.

Part 3

GAIL WYNAND

I

GAIL WYNAND RAISED A GUN TO HIS TEMPLE. He felt the pressure of a metal ring against his skin-and nothing else. He might have been holding a lead pipe or a piece of jewelry; it was just a small circle without significance. "I am going to die," he said aloud-and yawned.