The Fountainhead by Rand, Ayn

“Because that capitol of his is so awful that to pan it would have been an anticlimax. So I thought it would be amusing to praise it to the sky. It was.”

“Is that the way you go about it?”

“That’s the way I go about it. But no one reads my column, except housewives who can never afford to decorate their homes, so it doesn’t matter at all.”

“But what do you really like in architecture?”

“I don’t like anything in architecture.”

“Well, you know of course that I won’t believe that. Why do you write if you have nothing you want to say?”

“To have something to do. Something more disgusting than many other things I could do. And more amusing.”

“Come on, that’s not a good reason.”

“I never have any good reasons.”

“But you must be enjoying your work.”

“I am. Don’t you see that I am?”

“You know, I’ve actually envied you. Working for a magnificent enterprise like the Wynand papers. The largest organization in the country, commanding the best writing talent and…”

“Look,” she said, leaning toward him confidentially, “let me help you. If you had just met Father, and he were working for the Wynand papers, that would be exactly the right thing to say. But not with me. That’s what I’d expect you to say and I don’t like to hear what I expect. It would be much more interesting if you said that the Wynand papers are a contemptible dump heap of yellow journalism and all their writers put together aren’t worth two bits.”

“Is that what you really think of them?”

“Not at all. But I don’t like people who try to say only what they think I think.”

“Thanks. I’ll need your help. I’ve never met anyone…oh, no, of course, that’s what you didn’t want me to say. But I really meant it about your papers. I’ve always admired Gail Wynand. I’ve always wished I could meet him. What is he like?”

“Just what Austen Heller called him–an exquisite bastard.” He winced. He remembered where he had heard Austen Heller say that. The memory of Catherine seemed heavy and vulgar in the presence of the thin white hand he saw hanging over the arm of the chair before him.

“But, I mean,” he asked, “what’s he like in person?”

“I don’t know. I’ve never met him.”

“You haven’t?”

“No.”

“Oh, I’ve heard he’s so interesting!”

“Undoubtedly. When I’m in a mood for something decadent I’ll probably meet him.”

“Do you know Toohey?”

“Oh,” she said. He saw what he had seen in her eyes before, and he did not like the sweet gaiety of her voice. “Oh, Ellsworth Toohey. Of course I know him. He’s wonderful. He’s a man I always enjoy talking to. He’s such a perfect black-guard.”

“Why, Miss Francon! You’re the first person who’s ever…”

“I’m not trying to shock you. I meant all of it. I admire him. He’s so complete. You don’t meet perfection often in this world one way or the other, do you? And he’s just that. Sheer perfection in his own way. Everyone else is so unfinished, broken up into so many different pieces that don’t fit together. But not Toohey. He’s a monolith. Sometimes, when I feel bitter against the world, I find consolation in thinking that it’s all right, that I’ll be avenged, that the world will get what’s coming to it–because there’s Ellsworth Toohey.”

“What do you want to be avenged for?” She looked at him, her eyelids lifted for a moment, so that her eyes did not seem rectangular, but soft and clear.

“That was very clever of you,” she said. “That was the first clever thing you’ve said.”

“Why?”

“Because you knew what to pick out of all the rubbish I uttered. So I’ll have to answer you. I’d like to be avenged for the fact that I have nothing to be avenged for. Now let’s go on about Ellsworth Toohey.”

“Well, I’ve always heard, from everybody, that he’s a sort of saint, the one pure idealist, utterly incorruptible and…”

“That’s quite true. A plain grafter would be much safer. But Toohey is like a testing stone for people. You can learn about them by the way they take him.”

“Why? What do you actually mean?” She leaned back in her chair, and stretched her arms down to her knees, twisting her wrists, palms out, the fingers of her two hands entwined. She laughed easily.

“Nothing that one should make a subject of discussion at a tea party. Kiki’s right. She hates the sight of me, but she’s got to invite me once in a while. And I can’t resist coming, because she’s so obvious about not wanting me. You know, I told Ralston tonight what I really thought of his capitol, but he wouldn’t believe me. He only beamed and said that I was a very nice little girl.”

“Well, aren’t you?”

“What?”

“A very nice little girl.”

“No. Not today. I’ve made you thoroughly uncomfortable. So I’ll make up for it. I’ll tell you what I think of you, because you’ll be worrying about that. I think you’re smart and safe and obvious and quite ambitious and you’ll get away with it. And I like you. I’ll tell Father that I approve of his right hand very much, so you see you have nothing to fear from the boss’s daughter. Though it would be better if I didn’t say anything to Father, because my recommendation would work the other way with him.”

“May I tell you only one thing that I think about you?”

“Certainly. Any number of them.”

“I think it would have been better if you hadn’t told me that you liked me. Then I would have had a better chance of its being true.”

She laughed.

“If you understand that,” she said, “then we’ll get along beautifully. Then it might even be true.”

Gordon L. Prescott appeared in the arch of the ballroom, glass in hand. He wore a gray suit and a turtle-neck sweater of silver wool. His boyish face looked freshly scrubbed, and he had his usual air of soap, tooth paste and the outdoors.

“Dominique, darling!” he cried, waving his glass. “Hello, Keating,” he added curtly. “Dominique, where have you been hiding yourself? I heard you were here and I’ve had a hell of a time looking for you!”

“Hello, Gordon,” she said. She said it quite correctly; there was nothing offensive in the quiet politeness of her voice; but following his high note of enthusiasm, her voice struck a tone that seemed flat and deadly in its indifference–as if the two sounds mingled into an audible counterpoint around the melodic thread of her contempt.

Prescott had not heard. “Darling,” he said, “you look lovelier every time I see you. One wouldn’t think it were possible.”

“Seventh time,” said Dominique.

“What?”

“Seventh time that you’ve said it when meeting me, Gordon. I’m counting them.”

“You simply won’t be serious, Dominique. You’ll never be serious.”

“Oh, yes, Gordon. I was just having a very serious conversation here with my friend Peter Keating.”

A lady waved to Prescott and he accepted the opportunity, escaping, looking very foolish. And Keating delighted in the thought that she had dismissed another man for a conversation she wished to continue with her friend Peter Keating.

But when he turned to her, she asked sweetly: “What was it we were talking about, Mr. Keating?” And then she was staring with too great an interest across the room, at the wizened figure of a little man coughing over a whisky glass. “Why,” said Keating, “we were…”

“Oh, there’s Eugene Pettingill. My great favorite. I must say hello to Eugene.”

And she was up, moving across the room, her body leaning back as she walked, moving toward the most unattractive septuagenarian present.

Keating did not know whether he had been made to join the brotherhood of Gordon L. Prescott, or whether it had been only an accident.

He returned to the ballroom reluctantly. He forced himself to join groups of guests and to talk. He watched Dominique Francon as she moved through the crowd, as she stopped in conversation with others. She never glanced at him again. He could not decide whether he had succeeded with her or failed miserably.

He managed to be at the door when she was leaving.

She stopped and smiled at him enchantingly.

“No,” she said, before he could utter a word, “you can’t take me home. I have a car waiting. Thank you just the same.”

She was gone and he stood at the door, helpless and thinking furiously that he believed he was blushing.

He felt a soft hand on his shoulder and turned to find Francon beside him.

“Going home, Peter? Let me give you a lift.”

“But I thought you had to be at the club by seven.”

“Oh, that’s all right, I’ll be a little late, doesn’t matter, I’ll drive you home, no trouble at all.” There was a peculiar expression of purpose on Francon’s face, quite unusual for him and unbecoming.